Marina Councilmember Adam Urrutia took office in 2018, running unopposed for one of two open seats. During his brief time in office, the former city planning commissioner has helped craft the city’s cannabis ordinance, worked on ways to make development in the city less onerous and sided with Mayor Bruce Delgado on a split council when the city, faced with a voting rights lawsuit over its at-large elections, went to “goofy districts and gerrymandered them like crazy, specifically to protect those sitting [in office] now.” He’s tried to figure out the source of the occasional stench that wafts over North Marina, which one resident described as a combination of “rotting garbage and raw sewage.”
One thing he hasn’t been able to fight: Covid-19, and its impact on his family, including and most importantly, his two daughters ages 6 and 9.
Urrutia, after the council’s July 21 meeting, announced his resignation from office. He and his wife both work full-time, schools are not reopening and someone needs to attend to the girls’ educational needs as classes remain online. The family is temporarily moving to Rocklin, where Urrutia’s in-laws live; they will handle their grandchildren’s distance-learning needs while Urrutia, a political director for a 17-county region of the Service Employees International Union, and his wife, a spa manager, both work.
His final day in office will be Aug. 5, opening up the second half of the four-year term.
“Covid-19 has affected my family like so many others across the city. My wife and I support teachers and parents who feel, as we do, that it isn’t safe to return to in-person instruction,” he says. “We also support the families for whom distance learning poses too great of a hardship. We are also one of those families.
“I sincerely regret that I am unable to fulfill my obligation” to the people of Marina, he adds.
Note: This story has been updated to correct the nature of Heidi Urrutia's job title.
(1) comment
Needs updating because Mr. Urrutia has, in fact, not yet resigned and the future date of any such resignation is now ambiguous.
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