When Alexandria Ayala was elected to the Palm Beach County School Board in 2020 as its youngest member ever and first Hispanic woman, she was excited to give back to the community that had shaped her. Three years into the job, Ayala was shocked to learn that there were nearly 6,000 children in the district who were sleeping on couches, living in cars, or huddling under bridges at night.
“I felt almost ignorant,” Ayala recalls of that moment in 2023. “The face of homelessness had changed. And I just couldn’t stand that it was the most vulnerable in our community.”
Disturbed by the data, Ayala volunteered on the board of the Homeless Coalition of Palm Beach County, a 40-year-old nonprofit that aims to prevent and end homelessness in the county. In February 2025, she became the Homeless Coalition’s chief executive officer, working in an interim capacity before officially taking on the role in October…