Sally J. Lieber

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Sally Lieber (born April 24, 1961 in Detroit, Michigan) is a Democratic California State Assembly member and former Mountain View, California City Council member and Mayor. She represents the 22nd Assembly District that includes the cities of Mountain View, Sunnyvale, Cupertino and portions of Santa Clara and San Jose which are all located in Santa Clara County. She is married to her husband David and they together have a black and white pet cat.

Lieber holds the office of Speaker pro Tempore in the current 2007-2008 legislative session. In the November 7, 2006 general election she was re-elected to her third and final term in the assembly, beating her Republican opponent Roger Riffenburgh by 68.8% to 31.2%. Next election cycle she will be term-limited out of the office. Lieber announced in December 2006 that she'll be running for the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors district 5 in 2008 against Liz Kniss [1].

Contents

[edit] Background

[edit] Early life

Lieber was born in Detroit, Michigan on April 24, 1961. As a youth growing up in the '60s and '70s, and she was interested in the antiwar and civil rights movements. In junior high school, she wore glasses over her hair so she would look like Gloria Steinem, the feminist icon and revolutionary journalist.

After graduating high school, Lieber worked restoring Victorian houses and specialized in hanging historical wallpapers [2] [3]. She spent 10 years at this job. As she hung wallpaper, Lieber's interest in politics grew as she listened to NPR and this encouraged Lieber to return to school.

[edit] Return to school

In her late 20s, she took night classes at San Francisco City College. During this time, she met her husband David Phillips, a product management director in Mountain View. The two ran into each other at Burning Man, an art festival held every year in the Nevada desert.

After they married in 1992, Lieber moved to the peninsula and transferred to Foothill College, where she started going to school full-time and became involved in student government. She worked on issues of child care for single moms, access for the disabled and health care.

[edit] Local politics

In the mid-1990s, Lieber transferred to Stanford University with a political science major, working with Professor Luis Fraga. When she took his urban politics class, she began to think seriously about running for the Mountain View City Council. The 37-year-old Lieber, still a senior at Stanford, launched her campaign for city government in 1998. She later told the Stanford Magazine that they could expect to see her in Sacramento soon although she had not seen the state capitol as late as 1998. Lieber would later serve as Vice Mayor and Mayor of the City of Mountain View. She also served as the City's representative on the Valley Transportation Authority's Board of Directors and as Chair of the Santa Clara Valley Water District's Water Commission. In 2001 a group of citizens launched an effort to recall her from office but that effort ultimately failed to gain enough signatures to get the recall measure to the ballot.

[edit] Run for the Assembly

Lieber ran for the 22nd Assembly district seat in 2002. She ran against Santa Clara council member Rod Diridon Jr. who was endorsed by most of the party heavyweights, and fellow Mountain View council member Rosemary Stasek in the democratic primary. She surprised some a political spectators when she won with 44 percent of the vote. Her volunteers walked to 58,000 households during the campaign [4].

Lieber won the general election against Sunnyvale Republican Mayor Stan Kawczynski. Kawcynski accused Lieber of voter fraud because Lieber referred to herself on the ballot as a "councilwoman" instead of a councilmember and because she referred to her position on the Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) Board of Directors as a transit director [5]. A lawsuit over the issue was dismissed.

[edit] Assembly member

[edit] Leadership positions and committees

During her first term she served as Assistant Speaker pro Tempore. During this term she was the only woman to serve as an officer of the Assembly. She took the oath of office for Speaker pro Tempore on October 24, 2006, becoming the third woman to serve in this role since 1849. She also serves on the Assembly's Committee on Insurance, Committee on Judiciary, Committee on Local Government, Committee on Health and as the Chair of the Committee on Mobilehomes. She previously served as the Assembly Chair of the legislature's Joint Committee on Ending Poverty in California.

[edit] Legislative priorities and accomplishments

Sally Lieber's main legislative priorities include: increased educational and economic opportunities for all citizens of California, protection for the environment, improvements to public health, and increased social justice. Since she's been in office, Lieber's dedication to her citizen constituents far outweighs her allegiance to big corporate players[citation needed], which is unusual considering her district includes the business hub of the Silicon Valley.

Lieber authored legislation to increase the state's minimum wage, co-authored a green house gas reduction bill, and joint-author of a bill to legalize gay marriage (though that bill was later vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger). Lieber was one of only a few heterosexual legislators to joint-author Mark Leno's marriage equality bill. She has authored legislation that includes efforts increasing pupil immunizations, creating an independent sentencing commission, and improving the living conditions of inmates in California's overcrowded prisons.

Most of her bills sprout from the ground up, rooted in social inequalities that her community members face. She has pressed for a death penalty moratorium, advocating for the rights of pregnant inmates in state prison, fighting for victims of human trafficking and battling toxic-dumping corporations. Most recently, she helped thousands of people by pushing for a mandatory vaccine against the virus that causes cervical cancer.

[edit] Homelessness experience

In April 2006, Lieber spent several days living homeless in Silicon Valley in an attempt to understand the problems the homeless face and how the legislature can help them. She begged for money and collected cans and bottles to buy food on the streets of Mountain View and San Jose [6]. Lieber used the experience to encourage the Governor to keep cold weather shelters open for the homeless.

[edit] Spanking bill

Lieber was in the press in January 2007 by announcing she was planning on introducing a bill that will make it illegal in California to spank a child three years-old or younger. The proposed bill has since been opposed by some on the basis of the practical aspects of enforcing it, though there are those who support it as well (early polling suggests that it is supported by 23% of Californians).[1] Lieber was not spanked as a child [7].

[edit] Political leanings

Lieber is a staunch liberal. Lieber has been rated at 100% by the Sierra Club California, the California National Organization for Women, California League of Conservation Voters, California School Employees Association, the California Alliance for Retired Americans, and the California Labor Federation AFL-CIO. She has received low ratings from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association and the California Chamber of Commerce.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Yi, Matthew. Spank a little kid, go to jail, if bill becomes law - Critics blast effort as intrusive and difficult to enforce, SFGate.com, January 19, 2007, retrieved January 23, 2007

[edit] External links