Not Slowing Down – Sonoma City Council member Sandra Lowe

Mother of four, bilingual high school math teacher, campaign professional, school board member, dancer, local teachers union President, nonprofit executive, current Sonoma City Council member; at a point in life when many people sit back and retire, Sandra Lowe shows no signs of slowing down. A resident of Sonoma since 1986, Sandra is still living life to its fullest, and enjoying every bit of it.

Born in Santa Monica, Sandra was brought up in Los Angeles, raised by a father in real estate and a mother who owned a designer resale shop selling, in Sandra’s words, “high end, beautiful things. Sidney Poitier and his wife sold their clothes to my mom for her store.” She attended public school in L.A., including University High School, and considers herself to have received an exceptionally good education.

Sandra comes from a liberal family, noting “My grandfather worked for Al Smith! I have a history of very strong Democrats in my family.”

After first attending college in Longmont, she later transferred to the University of California at Berkeley in the early ‘70s. It was a pretty wild time, she remembers, “I was on Telegraph Avenue when Patty Hearst got kidnapped, literally two blocks from where I was.” A physically active person, while attending school Sandra earned money by teaching dance, both classical and modern. “My vocation was as a dancer. I taught dance and worked at a shop where I sold dance supplies.” She graduated with a degree in Psychology, after specializing on the mathematical side, “testing, measurement, that sort of thing.”

Not content to hang around after graduating, “I bought a one-way ticket to Frankfurt, and just left,” Sandra notes. She hauled herself off to Europe to get a close-up glimpse of the world, traveling to Germany, Greece, France, Belgium, and Holland. After a couple of years of exposure to other cultures, she read an advertisement in the International Herald Tribune for a teaching position in England, and on a lark decided to apply. To her surprise, her application was accepted. “I thought, what the heck. I didn’t even think my letter would make it to England from this little village in Greece. Nothing seemed very orderly. But they wrote me back and said ‘yes’.” She landed at London’s Heathrow Airport not long thereafter, and spent two years teaching math in Northrup. This was to be the beginning of a long period of teaching.

“At some point it seemed to me like time to go back to L.A. They were looking for teachers and next thing you know I’m teaching math and Spanish,” she explains. “That’s where I met my now ex-husband. We had two girls pretty quickly, and realized we didn’t want to be in L.A. We had friends in Santa Rosa, went up, got jobs and rented a house in Sonoma Valley. This was in 1986.” Sandra and her husband went on to have two more children, both boys.

Working at Sonoma Valley High School, she was “speaking with vice-principal Bob Kruljac and he said ‘I didn’t know you speak Spanish!’ I said ‘Sure, give me all those classes.’ I taught a bilingual math class and an ESL class. I enjoyed it.” Her skills in Spanish also helped her encourage the bilingual immersion program at Flowery School. She notes, “My two girls went to Flowery. I’m a big fan of bilingual education. It opens up your brain much more.” After separating from her husband, Sandra became a hard-working single parent. She also became the local teachers union president.

In time, Sandra’s savvy and exceptionally good communication skills enabled her to become a representative of the California Teachers Association, the statewide teachers union. “In 1999 I started working full time for CTA. I had the territory from Hopland to Leggett, places like Round Valley, which is an Indian Reservation. The road out there often washes out each year; it was very difficult to get there, but I was there to bargain teachers’ contracts.” She adds, “While at CTA, I testified in the Prop 87 California Supreme Court case while Pete Wilson was Governor. That was cool.”

Meanwhile, no longer on the School District payroll, Sandra attended a meeting of Sonoma’s School District Board of Trustees, at that time in turmoil, and suddenly found herself being urged to run for a position on the board. “The second I got to that meeting word spread throughout the Valley that the former teachers union president was going to run for the school board. I was regarded as a bit of a firebrand. People said ‘You’ve got to run,’ I said ‘OK!’” She won a seat and served two consecutive four year terms. 

“I stopped working for CTA fairly recently. In 2017 I was asked to work for the Democratic Party in Sacramento, where I worked on some big campaigns – statewide races. I had a very successful career there.” After two years, however, a shakeup left her jobless, and that opened up an opportunity, she explains. “I was approached by Joe Sanburg, ‘father’ of the earnings and tax credit program in California. He was looking for a new Executive Director at Working Hero, a nonprofit created to advocate for programs to end poverty. We met and hit it off, and the next thing you know I’m working for Joe. Right now we’re working on a statewide ballot measure that will progressively raise the minimum wage. I’m responsible for that entire campaign.”

An avid sports fan, dancer, yoga practitioner, as well as political campaign expert, Sandra recently took a trip back to Europe and a first visit to Iceland for her birthday. It was her gift to herself at an age when many of us would be content to sit back on the couch and relax. “I wanted to do something fantastic for my birthday, December 31. I went to Iceland and climbed down a mountain of ice with crampons on my feet. I hiked five or six miles a day. I’m in good shape, I work out every single day.”

Not content with just one job, in 2021 Sandra threw her hat into the ring as a candidate running for Sonoma City Council. Unsurprisingly, given her experience in politics and public service, she won. For some, the glacial pace of local government might be frustrating, but Sandra exudes enthusiasm and excitement. She’s already making an impact, just a few months in. She’s someone who makes things happen, so it’s just the beginning for Sandra.

Now an empty-nester, Sandra keeps very busy. “I’m doing yoga, which keeps me limber and strong. I love cooking and every once-in-a-while I ‘chef it up.’ I’m not slowing down at all.”