Today Los Angeles officially became a City of ONE. Joined by local ONE members, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) announced that LA will join more than 130 cities across the country in the fight against extreme poverty.

We’ll have more on this exciting news later, but please take a minute to check out this great piece by LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

Today, on World Health Day, the City of Los Angeles—the “City of Angels”—is also a ONE City. We take this occasion to stand together with ONE, the campaign to fight extreme global poverty, and recognize the important role that each individual citizen can play in promoting issues of global health, development, and saving lives in the world’s poorest regions.

The struggle to overcome extreme poverty and global disease is a struggle that unites us all in our common humanity. From the ground in highly impoverished countries, to the streets of our own neighborhoods, we all must do our part to create a better and safer world for all. While no one can solve these problems alone, it is also important to remember that no one is alone in the lifesaving fight against global HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other preventable and treatable diseases. Millions of voices and hundreds of organizations, including many here in Los Angeles, are working together to save lives, increase economic opportunity and make the world a better, safer place. That’s what being a ONE City is all about.

Today is also an occasion to celebrate the recent U.S. efforts to combat global poverty which are providing results. Because of the generosity of Americans, millions of lives are being saved and newly found good will toward America is being recognized around the world. Some notable successes in just the past several years include more than 2 million people with HIV/AIDS in Africa now receiving basic medicines and beating the disease thanks to America’s commitment. That number is up from just 50,000 in 2003. Millions more are surviving malaria because of investments in simple—and remarkably inexpensive—bed nets and medicines. And in just the past decade, some 34 million more children living in the world’s poorest regions have been given the chance to go to school for the first time, opening the door to productive and hopeful futures instead of potentially desperate and vulnerable ones.

Today is also an occasion to use our voices to call for accelerating these efforts and expanding these programs that are working on the ground. In these difficult times, we must continue and strengthen the cost-effective and proven initiatives that bring stability and hope to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people. We must match the needless suffering with the simple needs of clean water, bed nets, basic education and cheap medicines.

I commend the efforts of ONE, and all ONE members in Los Angeles that use their voice for the world’s poorest people. This is a historic day for ONE, for Los Angeles, and for the fight against global poverty and disease.

-Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Los Angeles