Along with his three brothers and two sisters, he was raised by his mother Erlinda, an office worker, and his father Hector, a longshoreman and member of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.

[12] In December 2010, working with a coalition of labor and Black, Brown, and Asian community organizations, Avalos passed the strongest Local Hiring Ordinance in the country.

[13] The ordinance was crafted during the great recession years at a time when San Francisco had one of its highest unemployment rates in decades.

[18] In his second term in office and his role as a director of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD), Avalos championed environmental initiatives such as Clean Power SF, the City's renewable power program, and worked to adopt the BAAQMD's 10 Point Climate Action Program.

[19][20][21] In 2013, Avalos initiated an effort to convince the San Francisco Employees Retirement System Board to divest from fossil fuel corporations.

[22] Avalos also worked on opposition to the Keystone XL Pipeline and rulemaking to limit emissions from petroleum refineries, particularly around working-class communities of color.

[25] The measure sought to prohibit unconstitutional detention of any person in San Francisco law enforcement custody beyond his or her release date at the request of immigration officials.

The measure also sought to limit involvement by local law enforcement with S-Comm, which has resulted in thousands of deportations nationwide, dividing families and fracturing communities.

[27] His office funded neighborhood planning efforts that led to the City setting aside land for transit-oriented affordable housing.

[35] During the Great Recession years and afterward, mortgage defaults and foreclosure rates were particularly high in San Francisco's south and southeastern neighborhoods.

Avalos worked with the Association of California Communities for Empowerment (ACCE) to occupy homes where households face evictions after struggling to modify their mortgages.

[40][41] In 2016, San Francisco supervisors unanimously passed legislation by Avalos cutting ties with Wells Fargo, following the bank's "phony accounts" scandal.

[45] On January 18, 2019, the San Francisco Ethics Commission fined Avalos $12,146 for failing to properly disclose campaign finances from his unsuccessful run for mayor in 2011.