Santa Cruz's Ed Porter: Teacher, mentor, policy-maker
Santa Cruz lost one of its most selfless, reliable and outspoken public servants in the early morning hours of April
28. Former City Council member, Santa Cruz High teacher, and Lockheed engineer Ed Porter died from a series of medical complications after suffering a fall in his home. He was 78 years old.
Porter lived for more than 40 years in a stucco house at the end of Lighthouse Avenue adjacent to one of the open-space trophies of Santa Cruz's epic progressive era, Lighthouse Field. He surrounded his home with lots of trees – pines and live oaks — because he believed in maintaining a vibrant urban forest. After taking early retirement from Lockheed Missile and Space Division as a senior engineer, he taught about computers at Santa Cruz High from 19792011. Ed was an environmentalist, humanitarian, mentor, and public policy wonk who was involved in some of the most ambitious and legendary Santa Cruz local political issues, the ones that would shape this community's progressive agenda, and legacy, for years to come.
Ed Porter was elected to the Santa Cruz City Council at the beginning of the millennium and became embroiled in some of this community's most contentious issues like mobile home rent control, the fight for a living wage, and the struggle to save the Homeless Garden Project. While a councilmember, Porter delivered key votes in saving the Del Mar Theatre on Pacific Avenue, and transforming Salz Tannery into an arts and affordable housing complex. It was his council votes that brought home a skatepark, senior housing on Gault Street, increased homeless services funding, and the Beach Street two-way bike lane. Of course, his earlier neighborhood activist efforts were key in the development of Lighthouse Field Park.
During his second run for council in 2004 he edged out both former councilmembers Mark Primack and Scott Kennedy
and won the fourth council seat in that election. Porter often credited his winning margin to his former S.C. High students who were able to survive the tight housing market.
Ed was never one to shy away from a just political fight. In 2005, for example, Ed went head-to-head with then-Mayor Mike Rotkin, in dueling opinion pieces in the fight over what the Dream Inn would become. Among Ed's numerous reasons for opposing this massive hotel project proposal was the impact on the next-door residents of Clearview Court mobile home park, the “inadequate traffic plan,” and most significantly, “the project did not conform to our General Plan.” And guess what? Porter prevailed in helping protect our community's beachfront from a six-level parking garage and convention hotel!
Edward Benson Porter, Jr., was born in Detroit, Michigan on Sept. 4, 1944. He attended the University of Detroit High School and graduated from the Detroit Electronics Institute of Technology with a degree in electronics. Porter left Michigan when he was 21 and headed for Sunnyvale. He moved to Santa Cruz in 1974. His father, Edward Benson Porter, Sr. (19101985) was born in Idaho and his mother, Winifred Mary Heinrich Porter (1917-2011) was a Detroiter. Ed was a Santa Cruz resident for almost 50 years, and he once wrote, “Living along the Pacific Ocean was my dream since I was six years old!” He often said that Country Joe McDonald's song, “Paradise With an Ocean View,” was about him living in Surf City.
Porter is survived by two loving sisters, Dona M. Porter of Chicago, Ill., and Patricia Porter of Portland, Ore., 10 cousins, and more than 30 local Santa Cruz friends who sat next to his bedside during his final days.
Right up until the time of death, Ed was a fierce critic of the market-rate high-rise housing that has often left behind middle-class locals and our community's homeless. He was a consistent voice for affordable housing, alternative transportation, and environmental protection. Porter was a member of the People's Democratic Club, an ardent advocate for Personal Rapid Transit, an avid photographer, and often could be seen on weekends at the Watsonville airport, either teaching flying or piloting his own Cessna 150 high above the community he loved.
Involved until the end in local political campaigns, Ed supported and campaigned for winning candidates, Councilmember Sandy Brown and Supervisor Justin Cummings.
“Remember Why You Live in Santa Cruz” was Ed's campaign slogan the second time he ran for City Council and it should give us all pause to consider what it means amid the current atmosphere of hyper-development. Porter will be remembered as someone who cared deeply about this community and who developed from neighborhood activist to elected official, and made a difference.