Tony Anderson, the SeaTac mayor for just over a year, wears many hats, but they have not inflated the head of this humble community servant. At nearly 7-feet, (when he stands up straight) he walks tall, but walks gently, too.
He earned his doctorate in education. "Yes, I'm 'Dr. Tony', but if you want a prescription, I can't help you," he quipped.
As SeaTac mayor, Anderson, with the help of State Rep. Tina Orwall, D-Des Moines, the SeaTac-based Genesis Project and its volunteer detectives, and others, he has pushed for stricter laws in Washington State against human traffickers, while opting to rehab the exploited girls who work as prostitutes, which are really the victims, as he sees them. He spreads the word about fighting human trafficking when he attends the National League of Cities in Washington, D.C., an influential organization that represents 200 million people.
He just returned last week from one such meeting. Mayors or council members of cities big and small attend, and many pay attention to him. He said that SeaTac, and this region in general, is progressive and ahead of the curve in arrests and legislation.
As Port Police Officer, Investigative Division, and, up until recently, with their Training, Accreditation, Budget, and Internal Affairs Division, he has been stationed both at the desk, and boots on-the ground, and, you might say, up-in-the-air, too. He has had to do some climbing to talk down would-be suicide jumpers at the highest levels.
Anderson began teaching a course in terrorism at Central Washington University, where he said things can get tense in a classroom of Muslims, Jews, and other students with strong, conflicting opinions on the subject. He also teaches Leadership in Police Organization at the college, and at the International Association for Chiefs of Police. He may travel to Qatar to instruct law enforcement, and has taught both Iraqi and Kurdish police chiefs here.
And then there is his former basketball career. He explained, "I moved to Seattle after high school from eastern Washington. I got a basketball scholarship at Highline Community College. I wasn't a good player but I was really tall. It's so funny because back in those days, in the '70's, tuition was $8.30 a credit, and you paid for 10 credits per quarter, so my scholarship was $83 a quarter, and at the time I thought 'I was all that.' I was a center. I was so skinny. Actually, I could jump pretty well. I was really springy. Then I went to Seattle Pacific on a scholarship and sat the bench there. I had a good seat for the games.
"I did get better," he added. "After college I played for a year in Melbourne, Australia. Lauren Jackson wasn't even born yet." Jackson is the Australian WNBA star on the Seattle Storm.
"Melbourne was kind of a rugged, industrial city back then," he said. "Now it's a nice town. I played for the Bulleen-Templestowe Basketball Club, named for two Melbourne suburbs. The same green cable cars I took in downtown Melbourne ended up here in downtown Seattle along the waterfront. When I rode them here the trolleys still had the Melbourne schedules posted with the same route I had taken to downtown Melbourne."
He also played for Proville, France, for two years. While playing, and studying, in Europe he learned about terrorism through two close calls. There was an explosion at a nearby market caused by the French revolutionary group, Action directe (AD) which committed assassinations and violent attacks in France between 1979 and 1987. They blew out the power in his town.
Around that time, in 1984-'85, he attended college classes through Boston U. held in a NATO facility outside Brussels.
"I had arrived early to attend class, and was sitting outside reading a book when a cop came up to me with a gun asking who I was," Anderson recalled. "I showed him my passport and said I was a student there. The cop said I was 'stupid' and that there was 'no class tonight. He said, 'Look at the school.' I looked up and noticed the whole front had been blown up. Someone had set off a car bomb. That got my interest started in terrorism. Part of my doctoral dissertation was airport and seaport security."
On a lighter note, Anderson said that perhaps his highlight as mayor was reading to young school children during an official day of reading.
"I am such a lightweight," he said. "The warmest and fuzziest moment as mayor was when they invited me out to Bow Lake Elementary and I went around to several classrooms and I read the Dr. Seuss book, 'Horton Hears a Who!' This is where the elephant's got big ears and can hear real well and heard voices on this little spec which was this whole planet and he want to keep it safe, and put it on a little flower to keep it safe. And the kangaroos and monkeys were being mean and saying he was crazy."
The mayor of the spec which is Whoville asks the elephant for help.
"His constant refrain in the book was that people were people no matter how small," said Anderson. "And I'm reading this and looking out at these little faces. Golly, I got all misty. I got choked up. It was really sweet. The kids were a rapt audience."
Correction: Mayor Anderson teaches at Central Washington University, not Seattle Central Community College. Also, he may fly to Qatar to teach law enforcement, not to Iraq, as we originally reported.
