Santa Rosa has its first ever African American mayor, Natalie Rogers. She was selected by her fellow City Council members in a vote on Dec. 13, marking a historic occasion for the biggest city in the North Bay.
"I'm grateful to my colleagues for appointing me to this position, for my constituents for electing me, and for all Santa Rosans for building a great community in the North Bay," Rogers said in an announcement following Tuesday night's council session. "I'm ready to roll up my sleeves, work with my partners in Council, and continue to find real solutions to the issues facing the city and region, such as prevalent homelessness, economic vibrancy and equity, sustainability and housing for all."
In an interview with KQED's Shreeya Aranake, Rogers discussed the issues she wants to tackle over her upcoming two-year term, including affordable housing, COVID recovery, fiscal stability and her commitment to advancing diversity and inclusion in the city of Santa Rosa, where she grew up.
The following interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Shreeya Aranake: Were you aware of the history at stake before the City Council vote, that you would be the first African American mayor of Santa Rosa?
Natalie Rogers: No, I was definitely not. I wasn't even sure if I would be the first African American or the first African American female. But when I found out, I was still humbled, even more so after I was receiving text messages and phone calls and emails about children telling their parents and their aunts, "I can do that now. We have a new mayor. And I can do that. I can be that mayor." So it's definitely inspiring. And I thought that that was it. But today I also received a text message from a woman who was just like, "Wow, how do you do that? Like you have superpowers, everything that you juggle." So I set out to be a inspiration to younger people, and I'm learning that I am an inspiration to younger people, but also to my peers.
Is being the first African American mayor of the city a factor when you're thinking about the goals for the next two years?
Diversity, equity and inclusion are our goals for the council and for the city staff. So, it doesn't really come into play when I'm looking at what I need to look at. But I do believe that Santa Rosa is on the right track to equitably distribute our resources among the different locations in Santa Rosa. So I would like to keep going with that.
What do you hope to achieve as mayor in the next two years?
Well, I would really like to focus on our infrastructure improvements. We have received staff input and they have told us where we are, but there's been really no movement with that. So we're looking at creative ways that we can address our infrastructure, our pavement conditions, our city facilities, and we also have a lot of deferred maintenance around the city. So I would like to look at that. Housing for everyone. We focus a lot on affordable housing, which is great. We do need affordable housing, but we need affordable housing for everyone, not just low-income housing, because housing is very difficult to maintain even when you have a two-person-income household. Nowadays, people need more than a two-income household, and that's too much. And what about people that are single that can't afford to live? COVID recovery ... We're still recovering from COVID, supporting our businesses, supporting our residents to be employed where they live. And then fiscal stability. We were able to pass a budget that everyone could agree on. And it was a balanced budget. And I look forward to continuing that trend when we do look at our budget and our fiscal situation.
You talked about the just equitable distribution of resources across Santa Rosa, and you talked about diversity and inclusion. Could you go into detail about any specific initiatives that you're planning on putting into place?
I don't have specific initiatives that I'm planning on putting in place. I really am a big believer in going out into the city and seeing what it is that our residents want, to see what it is that our staff can implement and actually carry out. And so we do have some projects that are already in the works and have been for a while. Our Heron Crossing project. And then we have a new community center coming over to southwest Santa Rosa, which historically has been underserved. So just looking at actually pushing those to the finish line and pushing some of the projects that we already have in the pipeline to the finish line and making sure we have our ears open to see what it is that our residents need.
And what projects or initiatives will you be either changing or continuing from the previous mayor?
The way we mayor will probably be a little different. But I think the former mayor and I are on the same track about how we see Santa Rosa moving forward and what that looks like. So, no, I don't want to get in and totally change where it is that we're going. I think that we are going in the right direction and I only want to complement that, not get in there and change everything.
Is there anything else you'd like to add?
Well, this is the first time I believe that we have a council that's 50 years old and younger. I think that is great. It is. Our council is very diverse as far as our backgrounds, our current situations. So with that richness of diversity and our backgrounds, I think that we really will be able to represent the residents of Santa Rosa. And I'm also the first mayor to come from this side of town, which is very important. I think we need to have mayors come from all parts of Santa Rosa, not just what historically has been the east side of Santa Rosa.