Donning a purple tie and a large grin, former Speaker of the California State Assembly and San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown greeted an intimate audience of around 30 students and faculty at CMC’s Rose Institute of State and Local Government on Nov. 5. This smaller gathering preceded Brown’s talk at the CMC Athenaeum that evening which over 100 members of the 5C community registered to attend.
Brown has been at the forefront of California and national politics for decades. Elected to the California State Assembly in 1964, Brown later served as speaker from 1980 to 1995. Near the end of his final term in the Assembly, he ran for mayor of San Francisco and served from 1996 to 2004.
In response to a student question about his stance on local government, Brown said that he had become a “great advocate” for it. He stated that while state legislators are crucial in shaping the laws themselves, it is the local governments that play a key role in implementing them…