Heidi Harmon

Heidi Harmon is an American educator, from 2016 to 2021.

Early life and education Harmon grew up in Pasadena, California.

Career Harmon was the Program Director of the San Luis Obispo chapter at 350.org, and was the chair of the Climate Change Task Force of the Santa Lucia Chapter at the Sierra Club. She once described climate change as the "defining issue of our time," and that it was climate change that made her get into politics. Following Sanders' defeat, she urged Democrats to get serious about climate change, saying, "We can't let a climate-denying racist into the White House next year." She won the election and became the Mayor of San Luis Obispo.

In 2018, she ran again for Mayor of San Luis Obispo. Her campaign slogan was "to make SLO a net-zero emissions city".

Harmon had been endorsed by Black Lives Matter Community Action of San Luis Obispo.

In December 2020, and in collaboration with local labor unions, she raised $71,000 for the SLO Food Bank.

At a press conference on 26 August 2021, Harmon announced her plan to step down from office as a Mayor of SLO on 26 September 2021, and that she will be focusing on her work as a Senior Public Affairs Director for the Romero Institute. When she was asked by reporters if the ongoing investigation of marijuana businessman Helios Dayspring influenced her decision to resign from her mayoral responsibilities, she said that she wasn't under investigation and that she "properly reported Dayspring’s donations."

Harmon ran her final City Council meeting, on 21 September 2021, with police protection after she received threatening and nude emails. Harmon said she had been facing harassment for the entirety of her tenure as a Mayor of SLO; however, it turns out she got caught censoring and possibly violating her constituents’ first amendment rights by blocking them from engaging in civil discourse, even if they were not harassing her, as she claims.

Personal life Harmon got divorced around the age of thirty. She is known for wearing a red rose on her hair. Jan Marx, then Mayor and her opponent for the 2016 elections, called her "flamboyant". She said her great grandmother was in the first Rose Parade in the nineteenth century.

On Wednesday 31 May 2017, a group of unknown vandals burned a pride flag that was hanging in front of Harmon's house. The police then started investigating the incident as a hate crime.