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San Anselmo, California – It’s hard to miss Brian Colbert. It’s not just his sturdy 6-foot-4 frame, his clean shaved head, or the boldly patterned, brightly colored Hawaiian shirt he employs as an informal uniform.
Colbert is one of only a few black people living in the wealthy Woodsea and very white Marine County, and is the first black supervisor to be elected since the county was founded more than 175 years ago.
He campaigned in the fall, so he wasn’t leaning on race or history. He didn’t have to do that. “As a big black man,” he said, his physicality and the barrier-breaking nature of his candidacy was self-evident.
Rather, Colbert won after knocking at 20,000 doors, polishing several pairs of size 15 shoes, knocking at the heart of his campaign with bigoted concerns such as wildfire prevention, disaster preparedness, and flood control. During these early inauguration months, he continues to focus on a variety of local government issues in the garden that make housing, transportation and local governments more accessible and sensitive.
But that doesn’t mean that Colbert doesn’t feel deeply about the importance of his election set, or the living experience that will bring him to office — unlike most of this privileged slice of the San Francisco Gulf region — President Trump has turned his back on civil rights and treats his administration as if diversity, fairness and inclusion are four words.
“I’m thinking about the challenge, the insults my grandparents suffered every day,” Colbert, who lives under Jim Crow, said he recently had lunch in his hometown of San Anselmo. He carefully chose his words. At one point, he placed his index finger on his temple to show a pause while gathering his thoughts.
Colbert recalls his visit to Savannah, Georgia, where he attended a Baptist church service with his mother’s parents.
“I remember seeing my face,” Colbert said. “And for me, they were the faces of African Americans waiting to die, because they knew and knew the opportunity they had been denied because of their skin tone.
Colbert, 57, grew up in Bethel, Connecticut, about 60 miles northeast of New York City. Residents attempted to prevent his parents (accountants and stay-at-home moms) from moving into an overwhelmingly white community. The neighbors distributed a petition urging the owner to not sell the house to black couples. They did anyway.
Colbert continued to hold degrees in political science and acting, public policy and law. His wife, Syrian-American, traveled the world by practicing law on Wall Street, running a chocolate company and a small high-tech company. He lived in Türkiye for three and a half years, where he taught international law and political science at a private university.
In 2007, when the couple returned to the US, they established their sights in the Bay Area, painted by the spirit of entrepreneurs who wanted countless opportunities for weather, natural beauty and entrepreneurship. (Colbert started wearing a Hawaiian shirt on the Silicon Valley Conference Circuit after being mistaken for a security guard multiple times.)
In 2013, Colbert, his wife and daughter settled in San Anselmo, a community lined with Charmy trees about 15 miles north of Golden Gate Bridge. A relatively short commute to San Francisco was a major attraction with a quality school and vast open space where he manages medical concierge services.
San Anselmo has a sturdy hillside and downtown red bricks, with around 13,000 residents. The black population is less than 2%. However, Colbert’s extensive travel and living abroad convinced him that people were “on a certain level.” [are] Same everywhere – “Warm, welcoming, kind, generous and helpful.”
He was interested in policy and public services, so in 2013 Colbert joined the city’s Economic Development Council. Four years later, he was elected to town council. He served as one of the mayor’s spinning grounds for seven years, then ran for the Nonpartisan Supervisory Committee.
Inevitably, he encountered racism along the way. There were threatening calls and emails. He occasionally got side eyes when he canvas door-to-door in his all-white neighborhood. However, for the most part, “people were incredibly comfortable” and the campaign “were not more challenging… [for] Candidate. ”
On a recent sunny afternoon, Colbert was heartwarmingly greeted – “Hey, Brian!” “Hey, Supervisor!” – as he walked past the imaginative imagination park, bequeathed along with statues of film directors George Lucas, Yoda and Indiana Jones, the city’s most famous resident.
These are bothering me. The calculations that followed the murder of George Floyd have given way to repulsion, have equal and undermine efforts, and refuse to rige powerful black men and women in the name of a mythical colour-fire society.
What would Colbert (the Democrat) say when he was given the opportunity to speak directly with Trump?
“President, I would like to thank you for your service,” he began. “Being a civil servant is difficult and difficult.”
He paused. A few beats passed. The waiter put the food away.
“I encourage you to change your tone, certainly publicly and broaden your perspective and embrace people who may have a different perspective than you,” continued Colbert. “A lot of people came to this country and they added value, they made this country even better.
“Remember those who don’t necessarily have easy access to power. Remember those who are struggling. Focus on the most vulnerable and highly dependent on government and support a short amount of time. In other words, the American experiment is incredible. Please sympathize with it a little.
“Thank you, President.”
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