Getting Personal
LAANE Honorary Board Member Beth Sieroty Meltzer’s Commitment to Social Justice Has Deep Roots

Beth Sieroty Meltzer is one of LAANE's earliest supporters. She became interested in LAANE in the 1990s, following the passage of the Los Angeles Living Wage Ordinance. A social worker and child psychologist, Meltzer is also the founder and president of the Verbena Fund, a family foundation that awards grants to community organizations that meet basic human needs in health, education and welfare, human rights and civil rights. She credits her passion for social justice to her mother and brother.

How did you first get involved with issues of economic justice?

My concern about issues of economic justice began in childhood. I grew up privileged in Beverly Hills. My mother was an eloquent, outspoken progressive, a political activist who emigrated from Poland as a young girl with her widowed mother and six siblings. My father, a moderate Republican, was a successful businessman. But it was Mother’s vision that was influential. She was passionate about fighting for world peace and human and civil rights.

Our home was atypical. Our tennis court served as a meeting place for political fundraisers, left-wing organizational rallies as well as Jewish community service groups. I grew up with a strong sense of social justice and egalitarian values, but also with a good dose of guilt. I was uncomfortable in our large colonial home, imagined it akin to a Mount Vernon mansion.

One incident from my childhood stands out. I was home sick from elementary school and Mother was sitting on the edge of my bed and questioned me: Did I ever think about the differences between our lives and those of the “help” who worked for us? That question still resonates.

How did you first get involved with LAANE?

In the mid-’90s, I met Madeline [LAANE’s Executive Director]. I was taken with her natural, friendly way and impressed with the dynamism and creativity of her work. I continue to be inspired by her idealism, her vision of our fractured city as a place for change, where everyone could have a better life. I am awed by her leadership, her innovative strategic thinking, her political organizing and the depth of her commitment to ordinary working people and their families. There is no big ego here. In my experience, she inevitably seeks to share the limelight with her talented staff.

What other organizations are you involved with?

I contribute to many liberal/progressive organizations such as Liberty Hill, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Southern Poverty Law Center, Ocean Park Community Center and the Progressive Jewish Alliance. In 1991, I founded a family foundation, the Verbena Fund, to help my three children learn about charitable giving. I wanted them to feel empowered and enriched by their good fortune and to use money as a change agent for good. The mission of the foundation is to serve local charitable organizations that meet basic human needs. This year we awarded grants to the higher education program at San Quentin prison and to the Soldiers Project that provides mental health counseling to soldiers of the Iraq war and their families.

What do you do as a career?

I am a social worker and a child psychologist. Over the last 40 years, I have worked with many groups in several settings and had a private practice with children, adolescents and parents. Currently I am a mental health consultant to child care centers. But the “career” that has given me the deepest satisfaction has been in the making of a home with David, my husband, nurturing our family and seeing our children grow and develop into the young adults they are.

Was there an activist who inspired you while growing up?

My mother was an enormous influence but so was my older brother Alan Sieroty, who as a Democrat served in the California Legislature from 1966 to 1982. Unlike Mother, who was impatient with opposing views, Alan, for me, was a true liberal able to respectfully listen and dialogue with others who differed. I continue to admire him for his intelligence, integrity, humility, his endearing sense of humor and also because of his continual loving support of me.

Do you have a favorite politician?

Al Gore. But I also think Barack Obama is special, and I love Russ Feingold. Still, I await the Messiah, the return of someone like Oregon Senator Wayne Morse [1945 - 1969]. A Republican turned Independent turned Democrat, he was a fierce maverick and an unrelenting critic of Lyndon Johnson and the Vietnam War. He inspired student activism that helped end the Vietnam War.

Tell us something about yourself that people might not know?

I love Belgian dark chocolate with almonds. Try dipping a square in a cappuccino for dessert! Believe me, it’s dangerous!