Though November is still a month away, Oscar Gutierrez and Meagan Harmon have already won reelection to the Santa Barbara City Council for lack of any challengers.
Both have been on the dais only a short time. Gutierrez, representing District 3, the city’s Westside, won a special election in 2018. Harmon, representing District 6, the Oak Park area and downtown, was appointed last February. But they’ve packed a lot in, casting critical votes on where to site a new police station, how to address homelessness, and what protections to give renters.
And while both are progressives proudly representing the Millennial generation, they come from very different personal and political backgrounds. While Gutierrez — a lifelong city resident, TV Santa Barbara producer, and close ally of Mayor Cathy Murillo — has supported and been supported by the Democratic party machine for some time, Harmon — a Harvard-educated real estate finance attorney who grew up in Lompoc and a self-proclaimed “feminist with a to-do list” — came seemingly out of left field to secure her position.