SEEING R.E.D.: The big news in the whole race-gender thing is not that the first woman has been nominated by one of the two major parties to run for president, or even that she’s likely to win. The real news is that the City of Santa Barbara has just hired its first female chief of police, snagging Lori Luhnow — by all reckoning a certified rock star — from the City of San Diego. To the extent Luhnow cracked any glass ceiling, she’s quick to downplay the glass shards in her hair. “I’ve been a female my whole life,” she pointed out to Santa Barbara Independent News Editor Tyler Hayden last week, subliminally clarifying — I’m guessing — that she’s not transgender.
Given the all but irresistible vortex of Santa Barbara’s matriarchal tradition, Luhnow’s appointment almost seems a “what took you so long” moment. Except for one very brief and bungled male asterisk, all Santa Barbara mayors since the 1970s have been of the XX chromosomal persuasion. We’ve had a woman in Congress, a woman UCSB chancellor, a woman public school superintendent, a woman state assemblymember and senator — same person — a woman county CEO, a woman city administrator, two women district attorneys, and two more at the helm at City College. It’s worth noting that the three most influential media moguls in Santa Barbara are all women — Marianne Partridge of The Independent, Wendy McCaw of the News-Press, and Sara Miller McCune of pretty much everything else.
In today’s context, Luhnow’s “historic” appointment might seem beside the point had a Santa Barbara jury not ordered the City of Santa Barbara to pay $3.2 million to two female officers in 2002 who charged that the department’s promotion process was rigged in favor of the good old boys. Even by today’s standards, that’s a lot. Back then, it was, well, historic. Right before that trial started, the department promoted its very first female officer ever to the rank of sergeant. The timing was hardly coincidental. That she also happened to be one of the two plaintiffs was both embarrassing and desperate. One might think in the intervening 14 years of pseudo-enlightened promotion policies, the picture might have changed. If so, only by a few microns. Until Luhnow’s appointment, only three women officers have been promoted to positions of leadership within the PD. And one of those — a sergeant — cofiled the sex-discrimination lawsuit.