Nelly Nieblas is a policy and advocacy leader guided by a simple but powerful motto: making the outsider the insider. Throughout her career, she has worked to bring marginalized communities closer to power, ensuring that children, families, people with disabilities, and historically excluded voices are not only heard, but included in the decisions that shape their lives.

 

Nelly currently serves as a Policy Analyst for Child Welfare at the California Alliance for Children and Family Services, where she advances policies that support children and families and helps elevate the voices of those too often left out of policy conversations. She also serves as a Governor Newsom appointee to the Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians.

Previously, Nelly served as Policy Manager at Disability Belongs and, earlier, as Manager for Advocacy, Policy, and Civic Engagement at RespectAbility, now Disability Belongs, where her work focused on workforce development and education. She also served as a City Commissioner on the Personnel Advisory Board for the City of Montebello.

 

Appointed by Governor Jerry Brown, Nelly served as Legislation and Public Information Manager at the California State Council on Developmental Disabilities, where she advanced disability policy and public engagement efforts across California. As Director of Public Policy & External Affairs at Public Allies, she worked with Congress and the Obama Administration to protect SSDI benefits for people with disabilities and was invited to participate in the first-ever White House Forum on Nonprofits in 2013.

 

Her public service experience also includes roles with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services, the Office of Los Angeles County Supervisor Gloria Molina, service as a United Nations Observer for the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, and work as a Program Analyst for Mexico’s Office of the Secretary of Health and Education.

 

Nelly earned a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations from the University of Southern California and a Master of Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School, where she was a David Rockefeller Fellow affiliated with the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies.

 

She is also a graduate of Emerge California, New Leaders Council, the HOPE Leadership Institute, the Coro Fellowship Lead LA Program, and the Women’s Campaign School at Yale University.