Second in a series
Re “Parks Yes, Recreation No in Council District”
As Marqueece Harris-Dawson’s second day dawned representing District 8 on the Los Angeles City Council, Damien Goodmon, community observer, sought to define how he will be different from his three-term predecessor.
“Now you have a Council member who comes from an orientation of being a community organizer and a consensus builder,” Mr. Goodmon said.
“Bernard Parks came from the orientation of a bureaucratic police officer.
“I don’t think you can get more different than that.”
Not to mention the yawning generational gap.
At 45 years old, the almost youthful Mr. Harris-Dawson will reintroduce an energy level to this section of South Los Angeles that has been missing for more than a decade when Mr. Parks, a tired 71, administered his duties in the fashion of a reserved, desk-comfortable executive.
Not that their 26-year age difference is a guaranteed panacea for what ails District 8 neighborhoods.
Says Mr. Goodmon, himself a millennial: “I am a young person, 32. I am not wild, though, about all of these people who say I am of a new generation because I am young.”
Much more is required.
“A lot of young people just try to be replacements for old people,” said the astute Mr. Goodmon.
Then came a zinger.
“Like (Sebastian) Ridley-Thomas,” the second-year state Assemblyman who chose the political career modeled for almost four decades by his father Mark, the County Supervisor,
(to be continued)
