Natalie Gavello and her mom, Tustin Councilmember Deborah Gavello Photo courtesy of The Liberal OC

If you suddenly felt a 3.0 earthquake, it was probably Boss Tweed Amante falling off his chair after reading the title to this article. A hat tip to our good friends at The Liberal OC for a heads up on this great story. No, it isn’t our good councilmember who was elected. It was none other than her lovely daughter, Natalie who is a sophomore at Cal and was elected Vice-President of Academic Affairs. They must have felt some déjà vu  as she received about the same number of votes as her mom when she ran for Tustin City Council.

From the Lib:

A little more about Natalie, who I had the pleasure of meeting her at a Gavello fundraiser last summer.  She is a sophmore at Cal majoring in Statistics/Consumer Behavior.  Natalie is a member of the Delta Gamma sorority.  In her new elected position, she’s a member of Cal’s executive board which consists of four people, a president and three VPs.  Her entire political party ran together as a slate and won all four seats so I’m not entirely sure what the fifth seat in the headline of the photo refers to here. The slate self funded their own campaign and Gavello earned 4,896 votes against three other candidates.  Her margin of victory over the next closest candidate was more than 1,000 votes.

Natalie attended the following Tustin Schools: Ladera and Tustin Ranch Elementary Schools and Pioneer Middle School.  She then auditioned and got into Orange County High School of the Arts in the Musical Theater Program in Santa Ana, she ultimately focused on acting.  She ran for and was elected for President for OCHA’s entire Student Body in her senior year.

Additionally, Natalie Gavello served as the President of the Make a Wish Club, and was the developer of the school’s club carnival, which she created, designed, and worked with administration and pulled off a fantastic event at OCHA in 2010.

More importantly, Natalie Gavello helped her mother campaign.  She knocked on doors asking for the votes for her Mom. One woman in old town called Deborah Gavello on her cell phone, and said she was voting for Gavello just because of Natalie’s work.

This is a great achievement for a young lady just getting started in life. Her mother, Deborah, is justifiably proud of her (although not proud enough to give us a heads up, hmmm) accomplishment as you can see by her beaming face in the photo. We hope that Natalie will continue the family tradition and possibly run for office in  the future. She appears to have the same grit her mom does and, she can draw from her experience when she has to fire back at the good old boys.

Now, here is a challenge to the far right of the dais: This is the daughter of one of your own, like it or not. I think a special recognition at an upcoming City Council meeting, even a presentation by our Mayor (if Boss Tweed would allow it) is in order. Assuming that won’t happen, I hope our town Tustin will join me in congratulating this young lady for her win. May she go on to  be an influence at Cal. Go Bears.