Santa Barbara’s Sheila Lodge Recognized for Her 36 Years of Service
Former Mayor, Councilmember, and Planning Commissioner Thanks Community for ‘Privilege, Opportunity, and Honor of Serving This Great City’
The daughter of Petaluma chicken farmers, Sheila Lodge moved to Santa Barbara in 1952, and the love affair between Lodge and the city has been as intense, dogged, and durable a civic engagement as any in the record books. Of her 73 years in town, Lodge has served as planning commissioner, councilmember, or mayor for 36 of them. Having served as mayor from 1981 to 1993, Lodge is the first woman ever to be elected Santa Barbara mayor and remains the longest-serving mayor in city history.
Lodge stepped down from the city’s Planning Commission — on which she served 16 years — last December at the age of 95, and this Tuesday, she officially retired from public office, bathing in the applause and standing ovation from the members of the City Council after Mayor Randy Rowse issued her a special proclamation for her years of service. The honor came a week after she was feted by the county Board of Supervisors.
Councilmember Oscar Gutierrez noted that he and his girlfriend remember thinking, “You had to be a woman if you wanted to be mayor.” In fact, Rowse is the first male to be elected mayor since Lodge first won election.
Councilmember Kristen Sneddon described Lodge as both an icon and a mentor and read a clip from a 1979 article in the News-Press describing how Lodge led a victorious slow-growth slate that took over from the pro-business and development majority that had long held sway in City Hall. Although Lodge has been unfairly pigeonholed as a knee-jerk slow-growther over the years, she has been steadfast and passionate in her commitment to preserving Santa Barbara’s Spanish Colonial architectural heritage, human scale, and distinctive sense of place.
Although Lodge stepped down in December, the ceremonial send-off was delayed by hip surgery. What made Lodge formidable over the years was her up-close-and-personal knowledge of every development project that’s come before her and how it fit — or didn’t — into the existing cityscape. Her questions were sometimes pointed and always informed. From the dais, she was not one to suffer fools.
Councilmember Eric Friedman remembered how excited he was to meet Lodge at the county courthouse when he was taking a 3rd-grade field trip there. “It was the coolest thing,” he exclaimed. “We got to meet the mayor.”
Lodge was brief in her remarks. “This is such a special place; it’s been a pleasure,” she said, and then remembered how she’d been falsely blamed for such things as causing one of the city’s great droughts. “Like it was my fault,” she said. “I want to thank the people of Santa Barbara for giving me the privilege, the opportunity, and the honor of serving this great city.”
