By Andrew Cohen
It doesn’t take long for recent UC Berkeley Law grads to climb the ranks and make a meaningful impact early in their wide-ranging careers. We periodically highlight standout alums who are shining across various practice areas in profiles that amplify what drew them to their current work, what they enjoy most about it, and their path to success.
The common threads were too strong to ignore. In Long Beach Mayor Rex Richardson, Paul Monge ’18 saw another driven policy advocate, past student government leader, former labor organizer, and someone who was also raised by a hardworking single mother.
After volunteering during Richardson’s 2022 campaign and advising him on several issue platforms, Monge joined his administration as policy director. In that role, he manages implementing the mayor’s policy and legislative priorities, coordinates statewide and national advocacy efforts to promote the city’s interests, and helps develop a $3.3 billion annual operating budget.
As the seventh largest city in California and 44th largest in America, Long Beach offers unique policy opportunities.
“It’s large enough where we can develop substantive policy initiatives that are scalable and are often replicated in other parts of the country, yet nimble enough where we can stand up new and impactful citywide programs in a relatively short amount of time,” Monge says.
His work has focused on progressing the mayor’s vision for accelerating economic growth and affordable housing opportunities, advancing climate resilience and green infrastructure, and improving community health and public safety. Monge also develops ordinances, regulations, and position papers, manages relationships with city council members, and works with city departments.
Coordinating legislative advocacy efforts to advance budget and policy priorities in Sacramento and Washington D.C., he tracks the impacts of state and federal legislation. In doing so, he works with members of Congress and the state legislature, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and county departments, state regulatory agencies, local funders and foundations, labor groups, business associations, and nonprofits.
Monge has managed the design and implementation of new public health, sustainability, and economic mobility programs and helped fuel the development and approval of citywide ballot measures. One created one of the nation’s highest minimum wage standards for hospitality industry workers, and another enabled Long Beach to implement one of the most comprehensive city job preference systems for local residents and college graduates in the country.
“What’s most rewarding is being able to brainstorm innovative policy solutions to improve the living and working conditions of Long Beach residents, and to help those ideas evolve into full-fledged citywide programs and initiatives that I get to see my own community directly benefit from,” Monge says.
Top-rate training
Monge calls his UC Berkeley Law experiences “invaluable” in preparing him for his career. He credits courses such as Statutory Interpretation, Local Government Law, Land Use, and Legislative Advocacy for providing a strong theoretical understanding of the opportunities and limitations that exist within the American lawmaking process — and direct technical training on how to write clear, precise legislation to achieve intended public policy outcomes.
“I wanted to learn how best to leverage the tools of law and public policy to expand opportunities for working families and immigrant communities like those that I’m a direct product of,” Monge says. “Berkeley Law has a long legacy of training individuals committed to social justice lawyering, and I was drawn by the vibrant community of scholars, staff, and students who share an unwavering dedication to building a world that’s more just, equitable, and inclusive.”
Outside the classroom, as a 1L he worked alongside classmate and longtime friend Cindy Dinh ’16 on drafting and introducing a state bill to expand student voter registration opportunities — which Gov. Jerry Brown ultimately signed into law.
Monge and Dinh experienced every step of the legislative process: exploring policy solutions to address systemic obstacles in registering to vote that they saw many peers encounter, writing legislative proposals and statutory language, securing a bill sponsor, building a statewide coalition of supporting organizations, and testifying at state legislative hearings.
As a 2L gaining direct clinical experience at the East Bay Community Law Center, Monge defended low-income tenants facing eviction, using daily interactions with clients to identify commonalities that could highlight policy-level solutions to support other tenants at risk of eviction.
That led him to draft a second legislative proposal that inspired a state law amending California’s Civil Procedure code to give tenants more time to respond to eviction proceedings and correct an imbalance in the tenant notice process. The bill was signed into law in 2018.
“These experiences at Berkeley Law taught me that the best policy solutions come from paying close attention to the lived experiences of people who are directly impacted by policy decisions, but often have the least amount of say in them,” Monge says.
Chosen as the UC Board of Regents’ lone student voting member during the 2017-18 school year, he represented and advocated on behalf of the University of California’s 270,000
undergraduate and graduate students. Monge regularly visited each of the UC system’s 10 campuses, collaborating with student leaders to address system-wide issues such as tuition and fees, faculty diversity, and university admissions.
He helped lead a statewide budget advocacy campaign in partnership with student advocates and UC system administrators, lobbying California lawmakers to invest over $100 million of state funds into the university. That helped avert a tuition increase proposal and led to the UC system’s first tuition reduction in nearly 20 years.
“Fighting for the needs and priorities of students across the state as the only voting student on the board was an incredible honor and responsibility,” he says of his year as regent.
Policy priorities
In his current role, Monge has supported complex climate policy initiatives, including regional partnerships to accelerate the greening of port operations.
He also helped draft and advocate for the passage of a state bill to support Long Beach’s phase-out of local oil extraction operations, and advocated to prioritize watershed resilience and stormwater management funding within a proposed state water and climate bond.
Before joining the mayor’s office, Monge worked for the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute and led statewide campaigns to enhance Latine representation within Gov. Newsom’s gubernatorial appointments to consequential state boards and commissions — as well as the judiciary — and published original policy research and op-eds supporting that campaign.
While working for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, he led the design and implementation of several COVID-19 response strategies, including a citywide wage replacement program for high-risk undocumented workers, isolation and quarantine facilities in vacant hotels for unhoused people, and pop-up testing, vaccination, and food distribution sites at local parks and schools.
“Public policy work is a meaningful and incredibly rewarding way to leverage your legal training and professional career to help build healthy and vibrant communities,” Monge says.
Between local, state, and federal government, regulatory agencies, think tanks, and policy advocacy organizations, he sees “no shortage of opportunities where law graduates can apply their legal analysis, writing, and problem-solving skills to improve the responsiveness of government institutions to meet the needs of our nation’s diverse constituencies — and strengthen the resilience of our democracy.”