Mel Milstein

Mel Millstein currently serves as the Policy Director for the County of San Diego’s Chief Administrative Office.

His career spans more than 15 years in various leadership roles in local government. From 2008 to 2015, Mel served as a Senior Policy Advisor and Deputy Chief of Staff at the City of San Diego City Council. In that role, Mel was involved in numerous, high-profile land use projects and community- focused issues. In 2015, Mel was appointed as the Chief of Staff for the County's Third District Supervisorial Office, where led all policy strategy and crisis communication for that office.

In 2017, Mel joined the County’s operations team, first as a Group Program Manager at the County’s Office of Emergency Services, and then as Group Program Manager at the County’s Land Use and Environment Group Executive Office (LUEG). During his time at LUEG, Mel served as the Chief of Staff to LUEG’s Deputy Chief Administrative Officer. In that role, he led numerous complex and controversial projects, such as cannabis policy and several General Plan Amendments coming before the Board of Supervisors. These efforts in part earned Mel the Chief Administrative Officer’s Excellence in Leadership award in 2019.

Mel left the County in 2021 to pursue a private sector opportunity serving as Vice President of a local public affairs firm in San Diego. He returned back to the County in May of 2023 as Policy Director for LUEG and subsequently joined the CAO’s office January 2024.

Mel is a native-Russian speaker and earned his Bachelor's degree in Political Science from the University of California, San Diego. He resides in the Sabre Springs community of San Diego with his two kids, is a devoted Kansas City Chiefs fan and a well-known Beatlemaniac.