Imagine this: you wake up late on a Saturday morning and are just getting your morning coffee. You settle in for breakfast, and just before you take the first bite, the doorbell rings. Groggily, you get up from the table to answer the door and there stands a middle-aged, graying man who introduces himself and says his name followed by “I am running for city council” and confidently hands you a slick flier with his picture, some words about public safety and a list of people that support him. Still half-asleep you mutter something that sounds like, “Thank you, I will consider it,” and return to your breakfast with the flier in hand.
This is how government works at the local level. Your neighbors show up at your door talking about the things you see first-hand in your daily routine, from potholes to untrimmed trees to the local mom-and-pop restaurant leaving town. It is nothing like the news you see on TV about wars and debt. That is abstract and far removed from directly impacting you. Even if you did have an opinion, your congressman would not listen to you. They get their cues on major issues from their political party. City councilmen and school board-members are much more likely to take note and act on your concerns because they are your neighbors — they live under the same conditions you do. These are not “full-time” politicians — they do it in their free time after they come home from their full-time jobs. As realtors, pastors, lawyers, teachers, cops or stay-at-home parents, they continue to live a normal life among us, rather than on an ivory tower 3,000 miles away.
Often these men and women go unnoticed unless there is a scandal. Their work in deciding what curriculum will be taught to our children, what programs will be offered to assist seniors and whether to tax you to pay for paving roads affects you in the most immediate and personal ways. For example, if you live near a railroad crossing and are constantly awoken by a train’s horn louder than a jet, you can show up at the council meeting and voice your troubles. Soon the city will announce a project to build an underpass below the tracks. A couple years later they finish the project so you can rest well.
Just last week, the City of La Mirada held an election for city council. According to the City Clerk’s election results, a hair over 4,000 voters showed up out of the approximately 28,000 registered voters. That is a turnout of less than 15 percent. Ultimately the two incumbents, including the sitting mayor, were returned to a second term along with a challenger who filled the open seat of a retiring councilman. For the next four years, Larry Mowles, Steve De Ruse and Ed Eng, along with Pauline Deal and Biola alumnus Andrew Sarega, will be tasked with maintaining La Mirada’s fiscal responsibilities and governing over the city limits, with Biola at its heart.
Local governments employ more people than both the states and the federal government. It takes dedication to have a laser focus on one particular community’s quirks and nuances. In many communities it may be considered small-pond politics, but it is our pond.
