About Me

Biography

Advocate, strategist, organizer

Aria Sa’id is a celebrated social change advocate and award winning political strategist based in San Francisco. A noted body positivity and transgender advocate, She is perhaps most known for her work as a Co-Founder of the world’s first transgender cultural district, The Transgender District, in which she created the organization known today both nationally and around the world, from scratch- creating its key programs and theory of change in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood. Prior to her role in founding and leading The Transgender District, she led sex worker rights projects and contributed to numerous public policy initiatives in San Francisco and the State of California Legislature. A graduate of the Solis Policy Institute, Ms. Sa’id now serves on the Board of Directors for the Women’s Foundation of California, and is a 2022-2024 Leading Edge Fellow at the Rosenberg Foundation. 

Aria’s work has centered advocacy for our most disenfranchised communities, and sharing her lived experience has informed most of the trailblazing efforts she’s led to date. She has worked with Presidents, world leaders, Kings and Queens, and elected officials both domestically and globally to advance and advocate for the human rights of transgender people and sex worker communities. A noted speaker- Ms. Sa’id has shared space with the nation’s most preeminent thought leaders on racial and social justice, as well as worked with leading Tech and Fortune 500 companies to advance equity for Black and Brown people and transgender people. 

Ms. Sa’id and her efforts have been featured in CNN, ABC, Forbes, Harper’s Bazaar, OUT Magazine, The Advocate Magazine, Good Morning America, and more. In 2019, she received resolutions from the California State Legislature for her work in public policy and social change, becoming the youngest transgender person in the State of California to receive such honors from Senator Wiener, the California Legislature and Governor Gavin Newsom. In addition, she has received numerous honors and awards around the world for her work, and from Mayors, Governors and local elected officials for her contributions to transgender human rights. 

In addition to her efforts in community development, Ms. Sa’id has written and/or led numerous public policy efforts both in the City and County of San Francisco and at the California state legislature; most notably co-creating the United States’ first sex worker protection law, Prioritizing Safety for Sex Workers (San Francisco), and The Name and Dignity Act for Incarcerated Transgender People (Atkins- California) and the Gender Recognition Act (Atkins-California), in which she partnered with Transgender Law Center on the advocacy for the “X” gender marker and “self attestation” for Name and Gender Changes in the Superior Court of California. She has also supported legislation in advocacy, such as SCR 110 (California) the first legislation in U.S. history to name the harms of non-consensual medical interventions on intersex people. She has also led and/or provided strategy to San Francisco legislation supporting cultural districts, access to gender neutral restrooms, and transgender latina violence prevention- and political strategy support to California state legislature policies that reduce barriers for transgender and non-binary individuals seeking affirming gender markers on state issued documents.

A passionate advocate for Universal Basic Income as a radical solution to address abject poverty, Ms. Sa’id advocated for Guaranteed Income for Transgender People and Transgender Artists, working with Mayor London Breed in launching the nation’s first Guaranteed Income pilot program for Transgender People, and partnered with Yerba Buena Center for the Arts to expand UBI resources for transgender creatives. 

Ms. Sa’id is also the former appointed LGBT Policy Advisor to the San Francisco Human Rights Commission, a municipal agency of the City and County of San Francisco. She is a  2016-2017 Policy Fellow alum of the Women’s Foundation of California, and 2016-2017 Sojourner Truth Leadership Fellow of the Auburn Theological Seminary in New York.