The Heidi Harmon campaign called in a ringer to help remind her base of support what a local mayoral election means in the bigger scheme of politics.
Jonathan Tasini, a New York Bernie Sanders surrogate who appears on CNN and other national outlets gave an impassioned speech Dec. 9 at the newly sworn in mayor’s victory party in the SLO Masonic Lodge, in part he said, to thank the local electorate for what’s been a rare victory in the days since Hillary Clinton secured the Democratic Party nomination for President.
Tasini was heckled once – towards the end of his remarks – by an elderly gentleman who objected to a pledge to tirelessly fight the perceived, racism, xenophobia, and misogyny of the President Elect.
Harmon picked up the thread to address the climate of despair experienced by her supporters and likeminded citizens across the nation. Riffing on the idea favored by old school profligates of doom and gloom that “The End is Near,” she said, “you know what maybe this is the apocalypse, but it’s not the end that’s near its the beginning.”
It was all a quite different experience from earlier in the day at the SLO City Hall when the majority of seats on the City Council changed hands.
Jan Marx, the now former mayor of three terms and councilwoman who returned to the body from a stint of service in the 1990’s had some pearls of wisdom, along with a City-logo emblazoned jacket to share with Harmon.
Among the things to remember about the job, “you lose your name. For weeks whenever someone on the street called me Mayor I looked around for Dave [Romero],” she said, referring to her predecessor, who nodded from his seat in the audience.
“We have a unique vision that is still relevant,” Marx said after reading excerpts from the City’s General Plan for the audience. “We wrote this in 1992 and we’re progressively realizing it…. there will be many challenges coming to the new council that can’t be foreseen, but please remember ‘the greatest good for the greatest number of people’…protect our General Plan and don’t fix what isn’t broken.”
It was the most direct advice given publically to Harmon or the soon to be sworn in Councilwoman Andy Pease and Councilman Aaron Gomez all sitting in the front row.
The latter pair replaced councilmen John Ashbaugh and Dan Carpenter, who despite public feuding had kind words for each other in retrospect and had both worked on the City’s Planning Commission before elected office.
For each outgoing member of the body, their colleagues were given a few moments to reflect and to recognize achievements in office. Each had a proclamation read into the record and received a commemorative gift from the Council and Senior City Staff prompting recipients to quietly fight back emotion.
