Part 2 - Mayor Maureen Copelof In Person
Meet Brevard's Mayor, who puts her life experience to work for her community
Brevard Mayor Maureen Copelof has said,
I love working with people and making things happen.
To me, this is a job qualification for success. And she means it. My recent post, “Part 1: The Mayor Is In”, was about the many goals she and other leaders and volunteers have fulfilled during her first 13 months in office.
Now in Part 2, I invite you to meet the woman behind her official title.
To put my own viewpoint in perspective - my generation is just ahead of Maureen’s. Many of my friends graduated with an MRS degree, and the first co-ed dorm hadn’t opened yet. I was 31 before women could finally open a bank account and get a credit card without permission of their husband or a male relative.
I’m fascinated by the great surge of energy for public life that some women have shown since then. I know the obstacles they’ve worked to clear away. I’m interested in the values that have guided them.
Maureen’s parents taught her to not be afraid of a challenge. When you don’t fear failure, she says, you have the freedom to learn from it when it happens, and then go forward.
Also, she sees empathy and cooperation as ways to give everyone “a fair chance and a fair share”. She asks herself, “Have I honestly studied both sides of the issue, and am I reasonably sure my decision will benefit the community?”
Copelof holds degrees in religion, business administration, and political science. She is a retired U.S. Navy captain who served on active duty for 30 years. She says,
My tour as the commander of an overseas military base gave me experience running an organization similar to a small city.
In the Navy, she says, you learn to not just ignore a problem and leave it for someone else. You stand up and fix it.
I asked Maureen about career challenges, being a woman. She said,
As a woman I have encountered a lot of challenges as I have progressed to higher positions of leadership. When I joined the Navy there was blatant, outright hostility to women in the military.
Over the years this lessened but a lot of the hostility just went ‘underground’ and was actually harder to identify and confront. I found I had to ignore the hostility and just worked around it. I worked as hard as possible, often volunteering to take on extra work and found that eventually I would win the respect of my male colleagues.
I asked her about having had mentors in her career.
When I joined the military I really missed having a mentor. Because I joined with the first wave of women, there were no senior women to help guide us. Over the years, I have tried to make sure that I am always there to help mentor others.
What would she tell girls and young women about becoming leaders?
Set goals and go after them. Never let others discourage you, because you have the strength inside yourself that will make it happen. You won’t always be successful. But learn from mistakes, learn from others, even from those who aren’t supportive of you.
I’ve worked for great leaders and some horrible leaders. I’ve learned from all of them. Remember you are often are not the smartest person in a room. … Listen to others, give credit to others, and work as a team.
It’s one thing to have a philosophy about the many ways to solve a problem. It’s another to use it creatively, effectively, and on the spot. Maureen tells this amazing story:
One experience I had was going to Japan to be the Commanding Officer of a Naval Facility. Japanese society at that time was very male dominated and there were no women in senior military or civic government roles.
The Japanese found it impossible to work with me because I was a woman and didn’t fall into the traditional role hierarchy. This was a serious problem because we needed to work together on joint issues such as police and fire support between my military base and the Japanese towns.
They came up with an ingenious solution that I accepted.
They made me a ‘honorary Japanese man’. We had a little ceremony where I received this designation and then the problem was solved. I was treated exactly the same as all the other men and the partnership and collaboration between my base and the local towns worked well.
I could have objected to this solution. But instead, I realized this was a good way to solve an international relations problem. Sometimes flexibility and keeping an open mind can take you a long way.
It’s hard to imagine Maureen Copelof taking a day off, but she does, just as creatively as she approaches her days at City Hall and around town. Sometimes her relaxation mixes with community work. She says,
I love to garden. I have gardens at my home and I do volunteer work at gardens around the city.
I also design and create stained glass windows. I now have 12 large stained-glass windows in my home … not sure what I will do when I run out of windows to replace.
After Maureen and her husband were stationed in Germany, she wrote a book about their experiences. Sam and I plan to order a copy for our county library. We look forward to reading it.
Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by the recent stress we’ve been put through by a few national and state leaders who value personal ideology over governing. I wish that just for one minute I could direct their attention to our local mayor’s ideas.
I asked Mayor Copelof, “For all those who work and donate for the good of our community, how would you define success?” She replied,
To me success is ensuring that our city is a safe, healthy, connected environment where everyone can thrive.
And to give success its best chance, Mayor Copelof holds regular informal public meetings in Brevard. The next one is this coming Thursday, January 12th.
Thank you, Mayor Maureen Copelof.
Great to hear all the good things Mayor Copelof is doing. I so admire her!
Maureen is a splendiferous gift to our community. As is Deda. Both wonderfully talented and committed and hopeful individuals who think/act the way many would wish [and some do].
I am thankful for both of them for their work.