Recently, San Diego LGBT Weekly welcomed San Diego State University educator, Pat Washington, who is running for a California State Assembly seat in the 79th District. Washington, a married, openly lesbian candidate with a strong focus on education as the foundation for her campaign platform, gets downright fiery when talking about the needs of the people of the 79th District (Chula Vista). With her, solutions to problems – whether they’re economic, health, or law and order – always come back to education.
San Diego LGBT Weekly
Is there a lot of energy in your campaign organization as the primary election draws closer?
Pat Washington, Ph.D.
I think so. We have a very dedicated volunteer staff and my campaign headquarters is at the home of a friend of mine who is a faculty member – a professor – at San Diego State Universtiy.
Who is that?
Asidro Ortiz. I’ve known him for a number of years and we’ve done a lot of work together around educational equity and immigration reform as well as issues of social justice. We have a lot of links between us among various individuals and organizations with whom and with we each work.
Since you personally, professionally and politically as a local candidate for statewide office have remained heavily focused on education, how do you respond to talk at the national level of the GOP about actually eliminating the U.S. Dept. of Education?
(Visibly restrained) Not very well.
If you had to describe in one word where an idea like getting rid of Education comes from, what word would that be?
Stupidity. Just focusing on the 79th Assembly District alone; what we need has been well researched and documented – even by businesses – comes from the fact that we need to import hundreds and hundreds and thousands of workers into the San Diego region workers for the high-skill jobs that are already here and going unfilled. So what that means then is that our own local community doesn’t meet the needs of the job market because of the need for more and better education.
Jobs that are available here and now?
Here and now. If you look at all of the things that make a community, a city, a state or a nation great and vibrant are simply the facts that the people who live there can shop; can buy homes; they can support their families; they can open businesses; they can see themselves and their children growing into better lives. But if we’re not creating the opportunities for individuals to learn the skills they need to a part of that vibrancy; to be a part of that greatness; then we’re not doing our jobs as leaders. How do we know when leaders aren’t doing the job? We know when people need jobs and employers need workers to fill jobs that can’t be filled for lack of an educated workforce.
You’re talking about the basics of what we call the American Dream?
Yes.
Is the American Dream alive in the 79th District?
Yes. The American Dream is alive and well, because it’s a strong dream; but there’s a problem. There’s a decrease in the appreciation of people. When you look at the state budget, you see a budget crisis. It’s a permanent state. Yet, every time we go back to the drafting table to draft a new budget, the first things to go are the very services we need to keep the dream alive: Education gets cut. It’s almost automatic! Get out the chopping block; place education on it; then place the services that go to the most vulnerable among us. We don’t have a budget process anymore. We have a perpetual budget-crisis process. What’s missed is the fact that this very process is creating the crisis.
Can you be specific about what causes this cycle we seem to be locked in to.
We have a structural problem with the budget. We spend more than we take in. We see the solution as cutting the things that are needed to get us out of the perpetual crisis. For the 79th District, we have a high population of people who are not getting that necessary secondary education and post-secondary education. You remember those jobs that are going unfilled and that educated workers? Well, here’s a chance to solve that problem – here in the 79th. Invest in education. But instead, in the Cal State system, we see the local population where San Diego State University is located, being cut off by the university. We see San Diego State University eliminating the local-student- guaranteed admissions policy. That affects local students who are qualified to attend not getting into the university. Then you have the UC system eliminating the transfer agreement with our local community college districts.
Is that a done deal?
I hope not. I’ve been working on that in my campaign and I have dear friends and colleagues who are working to stop that from happening. There’s nothing more important for me as assembly member if the people choose to send me to represent them in Sacramento than to make sure every resident has the education they need to succeed. Not just those who are in the education system already, but also those who need to go back and get the education that they need for the jobs that are currently available.
What would you’re greatest wish be for education in your district?
I’d like to see a California State University campus in Chula Vista.
Why Chula Vista?
Because what we see with San Diego State is there are 50-60,000 applications for 5,000-6,000 spots.
Do you mean an extension campus; or a whole new CSU campus?
My personal feeling is that we need a completely new, separate campus.
But it hasn’t been that long since the last campus was built – the Channel Islands Cal State.
We’ve built three prisons since then. Need I say more?
Politicians have been able to borrow money from Prop. 98. That was a measure in which voters said no matter what, we want to be able to educate our people in California. But money from Prop. 98, which the voters were absolutely clear about as being for education and only for education, has been used by politicians to fund other things. So one of the issues about how they want their tax dollars to be spent that we have to honor that. My guiding philosophy is that government only exists to do things for people that they cannot do for themselves. It’s a thought I’ve borrowed from Dr. Martin Luther King. He was a true good-government leader. We need to be doing things for people which they can’t do themselves. We don’t need to do things for people who can easily do them for themselves.
What new ideas or initiatives do you bring to the fore that might help your constituents in the near term should you be elected?
It’s not completely an original idea, but it’s a good one. What I’d like to do is to try a five-year program in the community colleges, just as Assemblyman Marty Block tried to get passed, where we would give a limited number of Bachelor’s degrees only in fields professions where there’s a proven need for workers.
In addition to voting for you, what else would you like to see voters approve?
There are going to be two ballot initiatives that the voters are going to be asked to support. I think they both deserve support. One is the governor’s ballot initiative which asks millionaires to pay their fair share while also taxing those of us who are not millionaires by raising the sales tax by a quarter of a percent. All that bill does is stop the bleeding. It stops us from hemorrhaging the services that keep people living healthy lives; keeps them educated and out of prison and keeps them employed – I’m talking about education and basic social services.
We’ve talked mostly about education and the state budget and we’ve only got time for one more issue. What else do you want to do as assemblywoman?
(Laughs) I have so many. Another problem I’d like to address is to get help for women who have been sexually abused in the military. I’d like to help get the word out about the need for them to get services at the VA for PTSD and other problems that they may be having, but get them in a way where they feel safe accessing them from the VA.
Any last thoughts?
As a good Democrat, I set out to support the best candidate for this seat. I looked at the field and I honestly believe that I can do a better job for our constituents than anyone else on the ballot.
