Author: Jessica Stevens
As a flurry of red-foil balloons and drug store chocolates signaled the return of Valentine’s Day to Occidental, I was excited to share the love with fellow revelers on campus. Posing for pictures with student-cupids in the quad put a smile on my face as I made my usual afternoon trek to the mail room. However, as I sorted through the pile of Dora the Explorer cards that spilled out of my box, I found one announcement that chilled my otherwise jaunty mood. Tucked on the bottom page of this year’s Commencement Week guide, a one-sentence message confirmed the rumor I had dreaded for days. Antonio R. Villaraigosa, Mayor of Los Angeles since July 1, 2005, will be the featured speaker at this year’s Commencement ceremony.
I immediately phoned my 84 year old grandmother with the news. “¿El Alcalde? ¿Por que? [The Mayor? Why?],” she questioned. A 40-year resident of Northeast Los Angeles, my grandmother cheered Villaraigosa’s election as our City Councilman in 2003 and voted to make him the city’s first Latino Mayor since 1872. But since he first asked the City of Angels to dream with him on the steps of City Hall in 2005, Villaraigosa’s failed initiatives, tax hikes and extramarital scandals have influenced many Angelinos’ relationship with him. “Lo peor es que hizo mal por su familia [the worst thing is that he did badly by his family],” my grandmother said with finality.
Romantic forays aside, I have my own reservations about receiving my commencement address from the Mayor. As a senior at Eagle Rock High School, I recall now-broken promises from then-Councilman Villaraigosa that our City Council seat was not just his stepping stone to the Los Angeles’s highest office. But a few months later, I found a newly minted Mayor Villaraigosa pegged as the new poster boy for “Latino Power” on the cover of Newsweek. As a sophomore at Oxy, I recall the words of Mayor Villaraigosa’s Founder’s Day address in April 2006. In a generally uninspiring speech, the Mayor offered flashes of oratorical brilliance, building on Oxy’s commitment to the idea that diversity does not mean a diminution of talent, but enrichment. Although I appreciated the chance to interview the Mayor, I was left with a distinct impression that Oxy was little more than a photo-op on the way to bigger and better events. Expecting more genuine engagement and real-life reflection from his extraordinary experiences, Mayor Villaraigosa left my Founder’s Day unfulfilled, and left me heartbroken.
Two years later, it seems like the Mayor has all but abandoned his post downtown to stump for Hillary Clinton in the race for the White House. A critical surrogate for a campaign counting on Latino votes, our commencement speech might be delivered by the future Secretary of Education or HHS in a possible Clinton II administration. But before any potential presidential history is made and you abandon the beach for the Beltway, Mr. Mayor, there is work to be done in Eagle Rock.
As part of Occidental’s graduating class of 2008, Mayor Villaraigosa, I hereby extend to you a late valentine, a chalky conversation heart stamped with a message of high expectations. I hope you seize the opportunity to lose the talking points and get real about the challenges and opportunities that you have and we will face. I already know you are a champion of Occidental’s progressive mission, but a Commencement address requires more than passing congratulations on the number of Pell Grants awarded to the college. Thus, Mayor Villaraigosa, I hope that you heed this sincere request and use your second trip to Occidental to show us why we should continue to dream with you.
Jacob Stevens is a senior Politics major. He can be reached at jstevens@oxy.edu.
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