Candidate for
Council Member; City of San Leandro; Council District 1

Mike Katz-Lacabe was born to a Mexican father and career military officer.

Mike came to California to attend UC Berkeley, where he majored in Environmental Science. While at UC Berkeley, he worked as a teacher at the Lawrence Hall of Science and joined Amnesty International.

After college, Mike worked as an environmental consultant for several years before moving back into information technology. He continued his human rights activism working with Amnesty International and School of the Americas Watch and co-founding Derechos Human Rights. He was part of the team of human rights activists responsible for the arrest of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in England.

Mike and his wife moved to San Leandro in 2000 and had two daughters a few years later. Mike soon became involved in the community by becoming a computer tutor at the library, attending city festivals and events, participating in Project Literacy's Trivia Bee and advocating in favor of the library at the City Council. He also founded the "San Leandro Bytes" blog to keep the community on the loop of what was going on in the City.

In 2006, Mike became a founding member of the San Leandro Community Action Network (SLCAN), a grassroots group that worked to support education, smart growth and community building. As a result of his involvement in SLCAN, he ran for and was elected to the San Leandro School Board in 2006.

For the last eight years, Mike has been an active member of the School Board. He was twice elected president by his colleagues. He steered the School Board through the terrible years of budget cuts, and worked diligently with the community to maintain Arts and Music education, while building a state-of-the-art 9th grade campus and a professional Performing Arts Center, while updating and retrofitting Burrell Field, the High School swimming pool and all school fields.

Most recently, Mike helped in hiring a new and dynamic Superintendent with the commitment and skill to turn around the San Leandro School district.

Meanwhile, Mike has continued to work to bring transparency and accountability to City Hall. Through his own research, Mike discovered and publicized the use of license plate scanners by the San Leandro Police, the plan to install surveillance cameras with microphones and to purchase a Bearcat armored personnel carrier. Mike's work on license plate scanners has received national attention.