Why I'm Endorsing Dr. Flo Cofer for Sacramento: A Visionary Consensus Builder

Why I’m Endorsing Dr. Flo Cofer for Sacramento Mayor: A Visionary Consensus Builder

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of meeting with Sacramento mayoral candidate Dr. Flo Cofer, and I was deeply impressed. I’ve endorsed her, and she has my vote. Dr. Cofer reminds me of my former boss and mentor, the late former Sacramento Mayor Joe Serna, Jr. Like Joe, Flo understands the constraints of Sacramento’s City Manager form of government, where the mayor’s vote carries the same weight as any other City Council member. Yet, she already has a plan to create consensus on the City Council and craft a strategic vision for Sacramento—one that the City Manager can then implement.

It sounds straightforward, but anyone familiar with the political system knows that special interests often thrive in environments where there is a lack of clear vision and consensus. Flo is determined to change that.

A Familiar Challenge

When I was in college in Springfield, Ohio (yes, that Springfield, Ohio) back in 1985, I wrote an independent study paper on how to build consensus in a city with a City Manager form of government. Little did I know that just two years later, I would find myself living in Sacramento and working for Joe Serna, Jr., a member of the City Council who would go on to become one of the most visionary, consensus-building leaders I have ever known.

Joe was a tireless advocate for the communities in his district. He understood that the real power of being on the City Council wasn’t in his single vote—it was in the ability to organize people around common goals. As a lieutenant of labor leader and civil rights activist Cesar Chavez and a protégé of State Senator, Congressman and Lieutenant Governor Mervyn Dymally, Joe was well-trained in the art of community organizing.

Dr. Flo Cofer: A Modern-Day Consensus Builder

As I listened to Dr. Flo Cofer, it became clear that she embodies these same principles. As a public health advocate, she has had to navigate the art of consensus-building to address underfunded and critical, but often unpopular, issues—such as homelessness. And unlike many candidates, she has a practical, make-sense plan for addressing it.

A colleague once shared with me that the bureaucratic creed is: “The absence of blame is sufficient praise.” In other words, many officials aim not to solve the problem, but simply to avoid being blamed for it. I believe the corollary to this is: “The absence of blame is insufficient leadership.” Or, as President Harry Truman famously said, “The buck stops here.”

Leadership Through Ownership

Sacramento has much to celebrate—our leadership in the farm-to-fork movement, for example—but we must also recognize that with leadership comes responsibility. The big problems we face as a city fall on us, the leaders in our communities.

Joe Serna knew this. I watched him take ownership of the city’s problems, particularly when it came to housing. He was concerned about the blocks of boarded and vacant housing units in the Oak Park community back in the late '80s. As Mayor, he worked on encouraging the development of housing in the central city while simultaneously striving to find funds to revitalize the deteriorating housing units in Franklin Villa, South Sacramento.

As one of the first advisory board members of the Nehemiah Progressive Housing Development Corporation (also known as Nehemiah Corporation) when I founded it in June 1994, Joe encouraged us to tackle the boarded and vacant homes in Oak Park. This led to our first project, “The Park Project,” which was headed up by David DeLuz . Even then, Joe understood that government alone couldn’t solve these problems. It would take a collective consensus from the labor, business, education, and nonprofit sectors to create lasting solutions.

Flo Cofer: A Leader for Our Time

This is exactly what I heard in my conversation with Dr. Flo Cofer. She has a keen understanding of how the role of Mayor can be used to build consensus across Sacramento’s diverse sectors to tackle the tough and often unpopular issues we face. This approach may not be business as usual, but business as usual isn’t working, and avoiding blame is not true leadership.

No leader is perfect. Compromise, unintended consequences, and self-interest are inevitable. However, one thing I have noticed about people over the years: If you want to know what someone is likely to do tomorrow, look at what they did yesterday.

Joe Serna was a consensus builder before he became a politician and continued to be one throughout his career. I see this same quality in Dr. Flo Cofer, just as I see it in my dear friend and fellow Serna mentee, Elk Grove, CA Mayor Bobbie Singh-Allen . Dr. Cofer is the kind of leader Sacramento needs.