Clay-Flores shakes up commission with win

Bexar County commissioners are kind of like Supreme Court justices. Once they attain their position, they generally get to hold it for as long as they like.

Commissioners have no term limits or fundraising restrictions and face the voters only every four years (as opposed to City Council members, who run every two years).

Until last Tuesday, it had been 16 years since a county commissioner was voted out of office. The last time it happened, Sergio “Chico” Rodriguez knocked off Robert Tejeda in a South Side grudge match.

On Tuesday, Rodriguez experienced what it feels like to be on the other end of an upset, as political newcomer Rebeca ClayFlores routed the veteran commissioner by nearly 24 percentage points in the Precinct 1 Democratic runoff. In doing so, she almost guaranteed that she will become the first woman of color ever to serve on the Commissions Court.

This was easily the most stunning upset in Bexar County politics since 2011, when Rey Saldaña came out of nowhere and defeated Leticia Cantu, a well-funded former interim council member, for the District 4 City Council seat.

Four months ago, I came away from an interview with ClayFlores convinced that she had the ability to win this runoff. It’s hard to meet her and not be thoroughly impressed by her passion, intelligence, commitment to public service and compelling biography.

Clay-Flores, 44, who is Black and Latina, was raised by her mother, a native of Mexico. ClayFlores spent the first four years of her life homeless but overcame her childhood challenges to get an undergraduate degree from Princeton and a master’s in education from Harvard.

She spent 15 years working in education and currently serves as a special projects manager in the city’s health department.

Clay-Flores reminded me of

Saldaña, the child of an undocumented immigrant father, who made it to Stanford and returned home with an idealistic drive to improve the community where he grew up.

Shortly after I spoke with Clay-Flores, however, the COVID-19 pandemic shut everything down. I came to believe that the quarantine would adversely affect Clay-Flores more than any other candidate on the runoff ballot.

After all, she came into the runoff with a major name recognition deficit. Her big advantage — her determination to knock on every door and connect with every voter — seemingly had been taken away from her by circumstances beyond her control.

I should have known better than to underestimate ClayFlores — or voters’ desire for change.

During the runoff campaign, Clay-Flores and her campaign volunteers walked the neighborhoods of Precinct 1 and left nearly 15,000 door hangers for residents to find.

In the case of the first 5,000 door hangers, the runoff date had to be altered after Gov. Greg

Abbott rescheduled the election from May 26 to July 14.

Because of her limited finances, Clay-Flores couldn’t afford to throw out the door hangers she had already ordered. So she and her volunteers put stickers on them to correct the date.

Over the past year, Rodriguez spent more than $450,000 on his campaign. Clay-Flores barely spent $30,000.

But Rodriguez did little to reverse the impression that he was disengaged from his constituents, an absent commissioner who failed to turn up at neighborhood association meetings and had little to show for his long tenure on the Commissioners Court.

Last month, for example, he ignored an invitation to join Clay-Flores for a candidate forum on Texas Public Radio’s “The Source.”

While Rodriguez rested on his laurels, Clay-Flores took every opportunity to make her case with voters.

“I took off all my vacation time for the last 3½ weeks,” she said. “I was never home. I was outside working the polls and hanging door hangers and returning calls and returning texts and praying a lot.”

Last Sunday, she and her volunteers spent 12 hours putting hangers on doors.

On Tuesday, she was at a polling site at 7 a.m.

“I wanted to win so that I could serve in this capacity and really wanted to be a voice for the voiceless.”

During her eight months on the campaign trail, she crossed paths with Rodriguez only once.

Clay-Flores had taken time off from work to volunteer at a Valentine’s Day dance at Palo Alto College. Rodriguez entered with his brother, former Congressman (and current Justice of the Peace) Ciro Rodriguez.

“I had my gloves on; I was serving the plates,” she said. “I immediately went up to them. It was the first time meeting my opponent. I extended my hand with my big smile that I have.

“I said, ‘Hi, I’m Rebeca ClayFlores.’ I said that to both of them and shook their hands. And neither one said a word to me.”

They say pride comes before a fall. If you need proof, just look at the Precinct 1 runoff.