Advocacy Updates, Eden Updates

Mayor Fred Keeley Brings Consensus-Driven Leadership (and Affordable Housing) to Santa Cruz

June 16, 2025

Fred Keeley, Mayor of the City of Santa Cruz, has dedicated his life to public service, starting right out of college campaigning for a friend. His prolific career has included countless noteworthy successes, all of which he obtained by looking at issues through a community-oriented and consensus-building prism. Today, he has brought that collaborative spirit to the City of Santa Cruz, where he recently mobilized ample support for the Workforce Housing Affordability Act, which will raise approximately $5 million annually to increase the supply of workforce housing in Santa Cruz.

Formative experiences lead to a life of public service

As a student at San Jose State University from 1970 to 1974, Keeley believes it was almost impossible to be on a college campus during that time and not be impacted by the social and political activism related to a host of issues, from the Vietnam War to the environmental movement, feminism and more.

After graduating, he became involved in issue-oriented politics and worked on the campaign of a friend, Joe Cucchiara, who was running for the Board of Supervisors in Santa Cruz in 1980. After Cucchiara was elected, he offered Keeley the one and only staff position available, where they worked on a range of environmental issues. Keeley then filled a Chief of Staff position that had opened for California Assembly Member Sam Farr, who eventually went on to serve almost a quarter century in the United States House of Representatives.

When Cucchiara decided not to seek a third term on the Board of Supervisors, Keeley did, and was elected to the position, which he held from 1988 to 1996.

While Keeley is quick to give credit to the many people who worked with him, he says that one of the most meaningful achievements he had in those years was converting the Medi-Cal fee-for-service program to a Medi-Cal health maintenance organization, which is designed to keep people healthy, rather than seeing them when they already have an acute medical condition. “It completely changed access to healthcare and the participation by healthcare providers by shifting the fiscal incentives,” he explained.

After eight years on the Board of Supervisors, an assembly seat opened, which he won, eventually serving all his allowable terms. He became Speaker pro Tempore, the highest-ranking member of the Speaker’s leadership team, where he served under four Speakers.

There, Keeley’s assignments and accomplishments ranged widely, from overseeing a scandal in the Insurance Commissioner’s office where he subsequently negotiated the resignation to authoring bills related to helping address the energy crisis, the budget crisis and the Marine Life Management Act.

In 2005, he was appointed by the Board of Supervisors to be County Treasurer, which he held for a decade, a period that included the massive global recession in ’08-’09. “I am proud that we were able to realize a positive return on investment every month during the crisis,” he said.

Coming full circle

After 2015, Keeley didn’t seek reelection and essentially retired, although it wasn’t long before he found other areas where he could make a difference, including teaching in the graduate program of public administration at San Jose State and at the Panetta Institute for Public Policy. He also developed a course for third-year Santa Clara law students called “Achieving Consensus in a Partisan Environment.”

However, public service called again, when the voters of the City of Santa Cruz changed their charter to directly elect a four-year Mayor. “I had many people point out that it would be good to have somebody with leadership and government experience take the role, and eventually I agreed to run for a single four-year term.”

During his campaign, he pledged in part to get an affordable housing funding measure on the ballot and oversee a downtown expansion plan that will essentially double its size and include a significant amount of affordable housing.

These goals came to fruition when the downtown expansion plan was adopted, and Eden Housing President and CEO Linda Mandolin joined him to file the signatures for the Workforce Housing Affordability Act, which will be on the November ballot.

Recognizing affordable housing as a local priority

While Keeley has always championed a wide range of issues, affordable housing hadn’t been top of mind, until he found himself knocking on doors when he was running for Mayor. “I’d ask their top concerns and more than 90% instantly said housing and homelessness. Now, that’s also where the agreement ended because some people think there’s too much of it being built or it’s being built for the wrong people, while others said there’s not enough of it being built,” Keeley pointed out. “But when they said they were all in on housing and homelessness, as a public servant, I realized I needed to be all in on housing and homeless. “

Keeley says he had never before encountered a time when one issue was overwhelmingly top of mind with voters. Fortunately, given his experience, he understands how to navigate complex, vexing issues and work for extended periods of time with people as they aim to reach the broadest consensus possible. “That includes figuring out what problem you’re trying to solve and who you’ll be working with,” he said. The goal is to manage towards a “principled compromise,” which means never asking the counterparty to compromise their principles.

Keeley, his team and the community worked tirelessly to accomplish this, and the result is the Workforce Housing Affordability Act, which will be on the ballot after two years of consensus-building in a community-driven process. “You want to leave people feeling empowered and invested rather than misused and abused in the process, which you’ll never guess in a million years happens in politics,” Keeley said.