Educator reflects upon community involvement
Mike Rotkin ‘not close to slowing down,’ friend says
SANTA CRUZ >> When Mike Rotkin was elected for what would be the first of six full terms on the Santa Cruz City Council 41 years ago, he had no intention of winning.
A self- described socialist- feminist, Rotkin said he avoided the Vietnam War draft in the 1960s because his numerous antiwar demonstration arrests had earned him the badge of “security risk” to the U. S. In fact, his political run started as a “protest campaign,” one designed to get his neighborhood group’s ideas taken seriously and debated in front of the public. The promise that he did not stand a chance in a field of 19 candidates that year was part of his incentive to run. Little did he know he would find it difficult to stay away, once he was voted into office.
“I always sort of like the concept of being the organizer of things, rather than the leader or the person who sits front and visible to folks,” Rotkin said by phone in a recent interview. “It took a lot to talk me into running for City Council back in 1979.”
Rotkin, who turned 75 last week, last served on the City Council a decade ago — after completing five stints as appointed mayor over more than 30 years — and semi-retired from decades of lecturing at UC Santa Cruz nine years ago. Now, the Westside resident is considered a treasure trove of past and current political and activist knowledge, often tapped for advice, insight and help moderating tense debates. As of his latest birthday, there was little sign that he had begun to slow down. In fact, Rotkin has taken up kayaking on local rivers in his spare time. Mark Stephens, who joins Rotkin on many of his kayaking trips, said of his friend, “I assure you he’s not close to slowing down.”
In addition to continuing to teach an honors course on history and politics and an internship class in Santa Cruz in UCSC’s Community Studies Program, Rotkin serves on the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission board and is chairman of the Santa Cruz Metropolitan Transit District board. He organizes programs for the Democratic Women’s Club of Santa Cruz County, sits on the Coastal Watershed Council board and remains active as a labor organizer for the University Council of the American Federation of Teachers.
“It’s interesting, because, when your life is structured around the more- orless full-time job of being council member or mayor and for-sure full-time-job at the university, there’s a lot more structure to it,” Rotkin said. “Now, I’m doing a million little things all over the place and it actually is
more difficult to keep on top of it, in some ways, than it was when I was full time in two jobs.”
Early Influences
As a child, Rotkin’s idea of political involvement was cultivated in the Maryland suburbs outside Washington, D.C. while joining his mother going door-to- door stumping for Democratic Party candidates, witnessing Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech with his father and seeing the family dining room table given over to a mimeograph machine used to help to organize 250 families to build an Olympicsized neighborhood swimming pool.
“I think early on, I got the sense that life’s about contributing to the community and being part of those kinds of things,” Rotkin said in a recent interview. “I think it stuck with me on some level.”
Rotkin fell in love with Santa Cruz during a summer break from Cornell University, while assisting with research on migrant workers. Parlaying a fellowship he already had, Rotkin found out in September that year that he would be starting classes at UCSC the next month.
“I came to Santa Cruz and I was here about literally two days and I thought, there must be a way to stay in this town, it’s so beautiful,” Rotkin said.
Community fabric
Democratic Women’s Club Chairwoman Carol Fuller, a behind-the-scenes political mover and shaker in her own right, recently recalled that she first got to know Rotkin more than three decades ago, during one of his council stints. She described him as “a really nice person” who tries to get along with all — “and that’s not easy in this town.”
“He’s really knowledgeable about a lot of things, but he’s really knowledgeable about the Regional Transportation Commission. He’s been on that forever,” Fuller said. “He’s been on the Metro board, the bus service board, forever. He knows the water issues really well. He’s been there long enough and he’s diligent enough in his work to actually have a great deal of knowledge.”
Rotkin said there are “a lot of things I’m still working on” and that he wants to make happen. Keeping in touch with the latest in local issues is not easy, he said, once you are not living and breathing the politics from atop the Council Chambers dais. It is a challenge, however, the Rotkin said he continues to relish.
“A lot of my stuff is kind of running around, trying to figure out, like, what’s happening with various issues, calling people, trying to be involved,” Rotkin said. “I’m kind of a political junky on that level. I really enjoy — especially at the local level — enjoy what’s going on and trying to follow it.”