|
Cleveland
City Councilman
Joe
Santiago
Not
An Ordinary Sailor
by
Denny Meyer |
|
Ten-year
Navy veteran Joe Santiago was elected to
the Cleveland (Ohio) City Council as an
openly gay Latin-American on November
8th, 2005, representing the city's 14th
Ward. Coming from a hardscrabble
background, he decided early on not
simply to better his own circumstances,
but to return home to improve the life
on the mean streets in his own
community.
He
had known he was gay since he was a
teenager; yet that simply was not an
issue for him when he decided to join
the Navy in 1988. What was on his
mind was "finding a way out of
poverty, getting and education,"
and bettering his life. Having no
money for college or even for college
entrance exams, he saw military service
as a challenging opportunity through
which he could both serve his country
and succeed in life. He was no
different from any young American
seeking to start on his way in life by
having the courage and patriotism to
volunteer to serve in our armed forces.
In
that era, he was among the first
generation to grow up believing that he
had nothing to hide as a gay person and,
as a Latin-American, had all the rights,
privileges, and responsibilities as
other Americans. As he put it, he
believes in "taking the bull by the
horns," and taking responsibility
for his own progress.
He
excelled from the start in Navy boot
camp and was in the top five of his
class at A School where he was trained
as a mess specialist (cook). When
volunteers were sought to serve in the
Persian Gulf war, he stepped forward and
was assigned to the guided missile
cruiser USS Leyte (CT55) where he became
the Captain's chef. On the day he
arrived aboard ship by helicopter, he
met what was to become a lifelong
friend, a yeoman who had been assigned
to help him with his rather large amount
of luggage. That, in retrospect,
was the first clue, shall we say, that
led to the friendship; most young
sailors don't tend to arrive with quite
so many shoes, clothing, accessories,
and a Damron gay guidebook (ooops).
As it turned out, he became one of a
small cadre of gay Leyte enlisted
sailors who held highly responsible
positions aboard the ship and buoyed one
other through the tasks at
hand. While they were not overt,
they were open; yet they were all 4.0
sailors, doing their jobs to the best of
their ability and excelling.
Petty
Officer Second Class Santiago later
served in the Pentagon as an aide and
private cook to Chief of Naval
Operations Admiral Boarda (the first
enlisted person to advance all the way
to Admiral in the modern US Navy).
His final duty was as an enlisted
assistant to Admiral Chiles at Offit Air
Force Base in Omaha. In all he earned 13 medals and ribbons, including one for the Liberation of Kuwait.
To
this day, Councilman Santiago remains
deeply proud of his having served his
nation and insists that the experience
has given him the discipline and
fortitude to succeed at community
organizing, running for office, as well
as actively and effectively serving his
constituents. Nevertheless, he and
his mates had a terrifying episode, as
many of us have had, when the rumors led to
their being questioned by a zealous
security chief. "It was a
horrible experience." At that
time, serving in silence was still the
rule; there were regular witch hunts for
homosexuals. Yet, the group
survived that ordeal. When DADT
was enacted in the early 1990s they were
already long accustomed to supporting
one other and carrying on with the goal
of excellence in their duties.
Yet, at first they were unclear on what
it meant; it certainly resulted in their
suffering more fear of loosing their
careers, and in being more careful of
allowing others into their friendship
and trust. Through it all,
however, Joe Santiago regards his time
in the Navy as the most wonderful time
in his life. He has no regrets; he
left because of knee injuries and moved
on, without pause, to his career as an
activist.
Asked
if gay and lesbian young people should
consider joining currently, he said,
"Absolutely." He believes that
service in the military "can be a
tool to make your dreams come true if
you have good intentions and a career
focus of what you want to be. When
you join you become part of a group of
young men and women who are the elite,
who can excel, and this will enable you
throughout life. If you
behave professionally at all times while
on duty there should be no
problems."
Asked
about the repeal of DADT so that we may
serve openly without fear of loosing our
careers, he said that the time will
come; the majority of those in the
military today are more understanding
than even ten years ago. He said that he
thinks it's time that the military
realize that we are a positive element
in our armed forces, that every American
who is able to serve should be allowed
to do so. It's what the military is
about, and we are way behind other
countries in this regard. During
his time in the service, there were
sensitivity classes regarding harassment
of women, he noted. A few
individuals create the problem due to a
lack of education on sensitivity issues,
insecurity, and ignorance. "I
see in future in which it will be ok to
do the job as openly gay," he said.
In
his time in the military, his generation
were able to form bonding relationships
to help one other through traumatic
times and the strenuous demands of
military life. It is important to
realize, he suggests, what those of us
who served in the past have done in
order to be able to serve. For
those serving today, he said, it is not
easy considering the active opposition
of those on the right. He suggests
that you have to go in with the attitude
of being focused on improving your life
and not let obstacles distract you;
keeping your non-professional self
separate from your work (just as all
service members should). He has
used his experience of serving in the
military to guide him in serving his
community as an elected official,
conducting himself in a professional
manner in serving the needs of
constituents. His personal life,
while open, is not primary among the
issues that concern those on the streets
he represents.
Joe
Santiago's record as a community
organizer, which led to his election as
a councilman, is listed in his biography
on the Cleveland City Council website (http://www.clevelandcitycouncil.org/
Home/CouncilMembers/Ward14JoeSantiago/JoeSantiagoBiography/tabid/150/Default.aspx).
He studied business management in order
to be more qualified to serve as a
councilman. He attributes his
successful election, in his second run
for office, to that, his team, and many
others; among those were the support he
received from the Victory Fund,
Stonewall Democrats, and his local Gay
and Lesbian Center. He is working
on the provision of Domestic Partner
benefits, and has gotten the City
Council to support a resolution asking
the FDA to reconsider rules that
prohibit gay people from donating
blood. He works actively with
elected colleagues across America on
these issues.
Councilman
Joe Santiago has a philosophy born of
his self-reliant background and
experience of "getting the job
done" in
the Navy. He feels that those who
want to improve the community need to
"step up to the plate instead of
simply complaining." What he is
modest about is his leadership ability
to motivate people to do that, to
organize and involve his constituents to
work as a team on the streets to do an
overwhelming job to improve their
neighborhood. His emphasis is on
participation and moving forward, as
opposed to allowing negativity to block
progress. When he first came home
from the military, he said, he saw
wonderful festivals but felt that
something was missing in his
community. He wanted to be an aggressive
advocate for betterment. When I
asked him exactly how that is done, he
quipped, "serve lots of food."
|