Grandma's Retirement

Grandma's last city council meeting is tonight. Below is the article about her this morning from the Chronicle. It was great to open up the Bay Area section as I was leafing through the paper over tea this morning and see a picture of Grandma smiling back at me.

She has been a towering pillar of strength, determination, and humor throughout my life. I'm incredibly proud of her accomplishment and continually inspired by the great strides she made - trekking through the world, managing things at home, and breaking into politics.

~Chronicle Article~

Berkeley's City Council will lose its crankiest, wittiest and often most rational member tonight when Betty Olds bids farewell to her 30-year career in local politics.

Olds, 88, will serve at her final City Council meeting tonight before handing over the reins to her longtime aide, Susan Wengraf, who on Nov. 4 was elected to replace her as the Berkeley Hills representative on the nine-member council.

"I just decided that at age 88, it was time to get out," Olds said Monday. "My hearing's starting to go. But I will say this: I've never fallen asleep at a City Council meeting."

Olds generally takes a moderate approach to Berkeley politics, often siding with landlords during her days on the rent board and frequently chiding her more liberal colleagues for their forays into foreign policy. She was among the council's most outspoken critics when it voted in January to call the Marines "unwelcome intruders" in Berkeley, and she usually makes potholes, not world affairs, her priority.

But she's never fit into a partisan mold. In 2007, she climbed into an oak tree next to Memorial Stadium to show support for the tree-sitters, and worked closely with the council's most progressive member, Dona Spring, on animal welfare issues.

But it's her candor, humor and lack of pretension that left the biggest mark, her colleagues say.

"It's pretty hard to go up against her," said Councilman Laurie Capitelli. "She's so candid and strong-willed, she can be pretty intimidating and convincing. One wouldn't expect that from this curmudgeon in the hills."

Olds brings a reality check to the council, said Mayor Tom Bates.

"Her wit and personality have been a major factor on the council," he said. "She brings a certain spark. I'm definitely going to miss her."

Even those who often butted heads with Olds said they appreciate her hard work and personal style.

"Even in the darkest moments, when things were at their most hostile, she was polite and reasonable," said Councilman Kriss Worthington, whom Olds once called a "little prince" at a council meeting. "I never had the sense she had a vendetta against me. It was never personal."

Olds traces her down-to-earth demeanor to her childhood spent on a farm in Missouri. Determined to send her daughter to college, Olds' mother sold cream and eggs for years to pay Olds' tuition at Iowa State.

It was in college that Olds met her future husband, Walter, who was studying architecture. He eventually was accepted at Taliesin to study with Frank Lloyd Wright, who Olds said had a profound influence on her sense of environmentalism and civic beauty. Throughout her career, she's fought for open space and architectural preservation.

Her husband's job with Wright brought them to the Bay Area, where he worked on several Wright buildings in San Francisco and the East Bay. The couple settled in Berkeley in 1950.

After her three children grew up, Olds became involved in neighborhood preservation issues, eventually winning an appointment to the zoning board in 1977.

"I really liked it," she said. "I liked the power, and that's the truth. That's why people get into politics. The power, and the ability to help people."

She later was elected to the rent board, serving eight years before running for City Council in 1992.

On the council, she helped renovate the Rose Garden, open a new firehouse in the Berkeley Hills, lobby for a new animal shelter and maintain the city infrastructure. But she's most proud of the attention she gave to her constituents.

"We always return calls and try and go out and see what the problem is," she said. "I learned that from the beginning. If your elected officials aren't responding, something's wrong."

In retirement, Olds plans to continue fighting for environmental causes, particularly the plight of birds killed by wind turbines.

"My relatives in Missouri think I'm a flaming radical," she said. "They say, 'Oh, there goes Aunt Betty again.' But I've had a wonderful time. I wouldn't have missed it for anything."

This article appeared on page B - 3 of the San Francisco Chronicle on November 18, 2008.