Joshua Arce '97 of the City & County of San Francisco’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development

Bruin Success

Joshua Arce serves as the City of San Francisco's Director of Workforce Development following his appointment by Mayor London Breed in August 2018. In this role, Arce and his department support tens of thousands of unemployed residents and workers that have been displaced by the COVID-19 pandemic, working with community-based organizations, labor unions, and employers to prepare for San Francisco's economic recovery and advance employment equity for all community members. Arce previously served in the administration of the late Mayor Ed Lee as the Director of CityBuild, San Francisco's landmark construction training program that has trained nearly 1,600 disadvantaged job seekers to become union construction apprentices since 2006. Prior to joining the City government, he spent 15 years as a civil rights attorney and labor representative for Laborers' Union Local 261, working with community members to improve employment, housing, and environmental conditions in low-income communities of color. In 2005, Arce founded civil rights non-profit Brightline Defense Project which advances sustainable communities strategies that promote job opportunities, clean energy, and affordable housing. Arce's career in public service began in 2012 with his work as the President of the San Francisco Commission on the Environment, and he currently chairs the Board of Directors of Mission Housing Development Corporation, one of the city's largest affordable housing non-profits. Arce and his wife Lisa Weissman-Ward, an Immigration Defense Attorney at the Stanford Law School Immigrants Rights Legal Clinic, live in San Francisco's Mission District with their two sons.

Bruin Success is hosted by Katie Russo, produced by Christian Chavez '13, and made possible by UCLA Alumni.