Anna Arnold is a Social Worker by profession, receiving her MSW from UCLA in 1967.  Anna spent most of her career in child welfare, working as a caseworker, supervisor, District Program Manager for Maricopa County and finally, as the Assistant Director at DES responsible for child protective services, licensing, foster care, and child abuse prevention programs. statewide.  During her tenure, she became convinced of the need for services to families, especially mothers, as many of the children were in single parent homes.  She wrote the legislation and started the Family Builders program to reach out to these families with whatever services were needed to keep the family intact safely, through the use of private agencies.  She also was instrumental in starting the Families First program for drug addicted parents and their children. She was awarded the NASW Lifetime Achievement Award, The Ounce of Prevention Award from Healthy Families, and the Commissioner’s Award from Health and Human Services in 2005.

In retirement, she has continued her commitment to families through participation in the statewide Healthy Families Committee, serving as a Board member of Prevent Child Abuse Arizona and since 2017, she has been an active Democratic Precinct Committee (PC) member of her Legislative District, which is currently LD3.  Along with other PCs in her Cave Creek area, she founded Black Mountain Democrats and Friends, which meets monthly, provides education to the public, and seeks to increase voter turn-out in elections.