Back from Washington to Meet the President

On Friday, we caught up with Wes Farrow of the Echo Park Elysian Neighborhood as he was headed to meet President Obama later in the day.

We also checked in with Wes by email when he got back on Monday. Here’s the complete text of the email he sent, as well as some photos, in the accompanying gallery.

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Young elected officials from all over the country gathered in the Eisenhower building, just next door to the White House, for a series of policy briefings from top Obama administratoin staffers. Speakers included:

David Agnew - Deputy Director, Office of Intergovernmental Affairs

Austan Goolsbee - Chairman, Council of Economic Advisors

Stephanie Cutter - Deputy Senior Advisor to the President

Heather Zical - Deputy Assistant to the President, Office of Energy and Climate Change

Secretary Shaun Donovan, Department of Housing and Urban Development

Aneesh Chopra, Chief Technology Officer

Nick Rathod, Deputy Director, Office of Intergovernmental Affairs

The conversations covered various issues, with a focus on how these national level issues are effecting our local communities.

Meeting Austan Goolsbee, Economic Advisor

I found it particularly impressive to hear both Mr. Goolsbee, one of the main economic advisors in the administration, and Mr. Chopra, Obama's Chief Technology Office, focus largely on the importance of education's role in strengthening our nation's future.

The format allowed for a great amount of interaction between the staffers and the locally elected officials, which led to a great level of relevance and meaning to what was being said. 

Meeting President Obama

Afterward we walked to the East Wing for a reception hosted by President Obama. Last year I had been lucky enough to have a tour of the East Wing through a friend who works at the White House.

It's an amazingly historical and beautiful group of rooms decorated by various Presidents and First Ladies. This visit, however was far different than the tour I had months ago.

I was able to sit on the antique chairs that were previously within roped off areas as I enjoyed some great conversations with fellow young elected officials from around Los Angeles and beyond.

Although I did not have a chance to speak one-to-one with President Obama, he addressed us as a group with an inspiring speech. He thanked us for our work as locally elected officials, and emphasized the nobility in engaging in public service "not to be somebody, but to do something".

It was a speech that I will treasure and certainly look back on as a source of inspiration for serving my community.

I look forward to continuing some of the great conversations that I started in DC, including looking into LAUSD's participation in becoming part of what Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra called a "League of Innovative Schools".