Pasco council makes history by electing city’s first Latino mayor and mayor pro tem
Pasco elected its first new mayor in 10 years. And its first Latino mayor in city history.
Saul Martinez, a 10-year veteran of the Pasco City Council, stepped into the role of outgoing Mayor Matt Watkins with a unanimous vote of the council.
“I know that I have big shoes to fill,” Martinez told the Herald. “I would like Pasco pride to continue and to help move Pasco into a city that can be admired nationally.”
Watkins held the position since 2010, but left in December after deciding not to seek re-election.
Along with Martinez, the council also picked Blanche Barajas to be its mayor pro tem. This means she will step in to serve as mayor whenever Martinez is unavailable.
This is the first change in the mayor position since the city elected five new council members following the historic 2017 redistricting election.
The court-ordered redistricting ensured residents were able to pick a candidate who was more reflective of their neighborhoods, as well as the city at large.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington claimed four years ago that Pasco’s previous election system violated the federal Voting Rights Act, diluting the Latino vote and keeping Latinos from being elected to the city council.
Prior to the election, Martinez only knew of one other Latino council member in Pasco.
Pasco’s population is 55 percent Latino, according to the latest numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Martinez is Mid-Columbia native
Martinez is the only council member remaining from before the 2017 election.
He joined the city council in 2010, and he represents District 3, northeastern Pasco. He works for Mission Support Alliance at Hanford as an environmental compliance officer and owns a small business in Pasco.
Before moving to the city in 2002, he was one of nine children who grew up as part of a large close-knit family in Mesa. He graduated from Connell High School and attended Columbia Basin College.
When he was a child, his father used to tell him that he would become Mesa’s mayor.
“I never had an idea that this would happen,” he told the Herald.
After moving to Pasco, he joined the school board, where he served as the president of the board. He and his wife, Neddy, have four children.
His work on the council is a way of giving back to the community that has supported him, Martinez said. He wants to provide hope to people who didn’t have it before.
He applauded the vision of previous councils to install the industrial wastewater treatment plant, which allows manufacturing and food processing jobs to continue to grow in the city.
The council is also looking to provide more recreational opportunities, as well as opening up new areas for development by adding new water and sewer lines.
“Our hope is to lay out the platform to grow,” he said.
Barajas on the council 2 years
Barajas joined the council in 2018 and represents District 1, which is mostly bordered by Court Street and Interstate 182 on the north and south and Road 36 and Owen Ave on the east and west.
She was one of the class of new council members elected in 2017.
Barajas holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration and an associate’s in criminal justice. She works for a managed care organization, and regularly helps under-represented and under-served members of the community with health services.
She is a board member with Elijah Family Homes and a mentor with Ignite Youth Mentoring. She also is a member of the Latina Professional Leadership group and serves on several youth health awareness coalitions.
Most recently, she was co-chairwoman for the Downtown Pasco Cinco de Mayo planning committee.
This story was originally published January 7, 2020 at 11:23 AM.