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Rev. Tom Watson: Toward Sensitivity
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During a recent three-person mayoral face-off on Channel 6, Tom Watson said he wants to have a woman police chief if he’s elected. The idea came out in response to one of Norman Robinson’s quick-fire questions, and Watson never really had a chance to explain himself. He said something about never having had a woman police chief, but he wasn’t able to give the idea any context that made sense and it ended up sounding absurd and disproportionate. Was this his platform? Was this why he was running for mayor?
But after talking to him, I found that, in fact, Watson is a serious man who, in various capacities, has devoted most of his working life to New Orleans. A 50-year-old black Baptist minister, Watson has degrees in sociology and social work; served sixteen years in the Army Medical Service Corps, rising to the rank of Major; worked in the city with children as a social worker for fifteen years; founded the Family Center of Hope Social and Educational Services Agency; and the list goes on.
Whereas some of the candidates seem to be running as a kind of adventure, a stab at something new, Watson’s campaign seems more assured, an extension of his previous work. Through the process of talking to his campaign organizers to set up an interview, I got a sense of the campaign’s momentum. When I first spoke to her, “Melissa” told me Watson was busy the rest of the day but should be able to talk to me tomorrow.
The next day she had evidently handed me up the line to “Lee” who called twice (“courtesy calls”) to postpone the 15 minute interview slot, juggling it around the next “session” Watson was about to go into and his afternoon radio engagement. Finally Watson himself called: “Hey Simon? Tom Watson.” The voice was gravelly, direct. He is relaxed; practiced at laying out his positions, yet not glib.
He was keeping other balls in the air during the interview. “What other suspenders do you have?” he asked someone. This sartorial negotiation continued intermittently—I was sidelined a number of times, but the interruptions didn’t seem rude.
Since the race is turning into a contest between Nagin and two or three strong white candidates (Forman, Landrieu), I first asked Watson why voters should choose him. What’s wrong with Nagin’s performance?
“Nagin was not about people; he was about business,” Watson says. “He never had a clue as to what it means to serve all his constituents. His constituency was the white business community that put him in place. Katrina revealed he didn’t know his city. You can’t take a business model and impose it on city government. A business plan is not all bad, but government is about serving people.”
By way of example, he explains that the Nagin budget contains 25 million dollars for housing, which has not yet been used. “I keep bringing this up in debates,” he says, “and nobody challenges me on it. Nagin never responds when I bring it up. Why hasn’t he spent any of that?”
Nagin has also put a moratorium on bringing trailers to the city, Watson says. I ask why he thinks Nagin would do that. “He’s confused. Can’t figure it out. He’s trying not to offend people. Trying not to offend the constituency that got him elected. I don’t know. I’m speculating. You’d have to ask him.”
If he were elected, Watson’s first act in office would be to “immediately get housing up and running. I’d make sure monies for housing get into the hands of community organizations and faith-based organizations” who would build housing. “Within 90 days you’ll see Katrina cottages and other housing going up.”
His website emphasizes bringing former residents back to the city; he often calls evacuees the “diaspora” scattered across the country. The “right to return” has become a familiar position, but Watson’s history in social work and various churches in the city suggests that he might actually know who those people are and have a real sense of how many are missing and might want to return. “We have not connected to our people,” he says, and argues that much more should be done to reach former residents.
What about the argument that the city needs to be smaller, that allowing rebuilding everywhere will result in failed, blighted neighborhoods? “The jury’s still out,” he says, somewhat confusingly, but we must have “rebuilding with equity. You can’t shut down an area based on an assumption that that area won’t come back, because that’s all it is, an assumption.”
Watson is clearly driven in large part by his past experience working for the city. He paints a bleak picture of city government. “Employees were insensitive to the people they are supposed to serve,” and “it operated in an archaic fashion,” he says, referring to his time in what was then the city’s Department of Welfare. (He was also the manager of the Youth Services Bureau at the St. Bernard Housing Development, a school social worker in Orleans Parish, and an administrator at the Milne Boys Home, among other similar positions.) City government in general, he says, is insensitive to the people it’s supposed to be serving, adding, “One reason I left was that I couldn’t feed my family.”
Other issues Watson has talked about in debates are police brutality and the “brain drain.”
What causes police brutality? I ask. “Racism,” he says. “Insensitivity. Poor leadership from the top.” His solutions are more citizen input, getting the Inspector General involved, as well as a “truly independent overseer for the police.”
Regarding a woman police chief, he says “Women are as effective in leadership as men,” and cites other cities with women police chiefs. “I just want to do something creative in a chauvinistic city,” he adds. “It’s not about gender; it’s about leadership.”
To keep students in the city, he proposes forgiving student loans for those who are working in “critical areas” such as social work, or for those who are otherwise “working with impoverished families.”
Finally, I’m curious how a former social worker and low-level city employee finds the money to finance a mayoral campaign. How has he raised money? “Basic fundraising,” he says, and mentions fundraising in Houston, among other cities where he has campaigned. “Our money goes farther than other campaigns,” he adds.
As I offer to let him go he turns the tables with a question. “Who did you say you are with?” And, “How many readers do you have?” When I tell him, he sounds approving, then asks, “Will you get this out to people?” The question isn’t anxious or needy. He seems to genuinely want to get the word out.
Simon Hand is the soon-to-be-married editor of the Bywater Neighborhood Association newsletter.
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