Editorial: Sausalito’s Rose was strong, independent presence in Marin politics

As our county approached the 21st century, Annette Rose stood as a political force, for many years the lone woman on the Marin County Board of Supervisors and a strong voice for changing longstanding political attitudes.

Her passing on Jan. 30 at the age of 82 leaves behind a legacy that enhanced the county — from the way the county was run to preserving and protecting Marin’s environment, culture and quality of life.

Her longtime home was a Sausalito houseboat and she worked for preservation of the waterfront community, often protecting it from political and economic forces that had a different vision for the bayfront.

She also brought a branch of the county’s Free Library system to Marin City, supported efforts to preserve and build affordable housing and was a force in opposing the proposed building of an Indian casino at Sears Point.

Ms. Rose was also a strong advocate for the preservation of the county’s Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Civic Center. Even after retiring from the Board of Supervisors, she served on the county’s Frank Lloyd Wright Civic Center Conservancy Commission, an advisory panel that oversees the preservation of the nationally acclaimed landmark, the architectural titan’s largest governmental building and his final commission.

In 2003, her work and leadership were recognized by the Frank Lloyd Wright Conservancy, an advocacy group with global membership, when she received its “Wright Spirit Award” for helping preserve the Civic Center.

Ms. Rose was living on a retired tugboat docked in Sausalito when she got her start in local politics, fighting to preserve and protect the Bohemian houseboat community from evictions.

In 1971, the waterfront was the scene of a now-celebrated battle between Waldo Point houseboat residents and a force of county sheriff’s deputies and the Coast Guard that descended on its docks to evict residents and remove 30 houseboats, citing numerous safety and health-code violations. Residents clashed with authorities. In the end, only one residence was removed before the county halted its clean-up campaign. That violent skirmish, however, led to a decades-long fragile future for the waterfront’s houseboat communities and the affordable housing it provided.

In fact, in the early 1980s, old docks in the Marinship area were being demolished and boats were being cut from their moorings and cast adrift.

She got involved in Sausalito politics, for many years attending Planning Commission and City Council meetings, advocating for protection of the houseboat community as well as needed safety and code improvements.

“I was drawn to public service because of my concern about affordable housing and environmental protection,” Ms. Rose said in an oral history.

In 1988, she ran for City Council and was the top vote-getter. She later served as the city’s mayor.

She worked to include preservation of the waterfront communities – especially the affordable housing it provides –  as city and county priorities.

That focus led her to run for Southern Marin’s seat on the county Board of Supervisors in 1992. It was a seat she held until her retirement from the board in 2004.

For much of her tenure she was the lone woman on a board whose male members, including some long-term incumbents, were often criticized for engaging in wheeling-and-dealing “good old boy” politics.

She maintained a strong and independent presence on the board, forging closer alliances with her district’s constituents than with county big-wigs.

Ms. Rose marched to her own drummer. She was studiously well-formed and methodically careful, practical and caring.

She established many open-government reforms of county governance, among them yearly reviews of county department heads that included public sessions. She pushed to make sure supervisors’ actions were detailed on publicly posted agendas rather than being deliberated behind closed doors.

Ms. Rose was also a leading force of turning an undeveloped hillside behind Marin City into protected open space instead of a site for more buildings.

Ms. Rose was a community leader who leaves a lasting legacy that shaped our county for the betterment of its people, their governance and our environment.