As a 35-year City employee with the police department, I would like to share my view of today’s policing challenges in our communities. I understand the struggles of poverty and ethnicity, as well as the historical resistance to change in the policing profess... More »
It’s November 1996. Republican Pete Wilson is Governor of California. California’s Congressional delegation is split exactly down the middle between Democrats and Republicans. Sonny Bono is a Congressman. A dance craze called the Macarena is sweeping the n... More »
As I was driving to work today I was thinking about how it must feel to be a police officer in this current climate. These men and women are sworn to protect us and 99.9% do just that. Without them, chaos reigns and all you have to do is turn on the news and y... More »
It’s hard to pick the right word for what it is. Sympathy? Empathy? Compassion? I looked up the definitions of each one of these and none of them are quite right. Such is the kingdom of names, ultimately unsatisfying. Wanting to help others? The Golden Rule... More »
Today we celebrate Juneteenth, Freedom Day, commemorating the ending of slavery in the United States. It’s fitting that last night, the Board of Education unanimously approved Commitment to Black Students, a resolution declaring our District’s unequivocal comm... More »
A couple of years ago, I was sitting in a packed auditorium on Easter Sunday listening to my pastor talk about waiting. How the world waited for a Savior to come. How the disciples mourned and forgot to wait for that Savior to rise again on the third day after... More »
In the weeks following George Floyd’s killing, I have attended peaceful protests, read your emails and talked directly to many of you, and have felt the outpouring of concern and the calling for reform and accountability from every part of our city. I hear you... More »
For the past few weeks, I have been worried about Luz, the woman I have employed to care for and clean my home for the past five years. I haven’t seen Luz since shelter in place started, and I want to work out an agreement with her so that she can safely come ... More »
A few years back before mobile devices were everywhere, I spent a Saturday night with the Pasadena Police Department. It was an eye-opening experience as I joined a beat officer responding to calls across town. We spent most of the evening patrolling the easte... More »
A beautiful vision is being discussed in communities across the United States, ignited this time by the senseless and cold-blooded murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery. The vision is a world without policing as we’ve known it. If anything... More »
His name was Bryant and he is the reason that I became a lawyer. I never knew his first name. In the Corps we only knew each other by our last names unless you picked up a nickname along the way. Mine was Pappy. Bryant was an African American from Georgia. He ... More »
Reimagine the Budget The City of Pasadena is about to decide the budget for the next fiscal year and I’d like to say that, as an educated, voting, tax paying, white-identifying-as-human, woman, I think defunding the police is a good idea. The police department... More »
