Dee Hardison became only the second woman to become mayor of Torrance when she won the office in 1994. She directly followed the city’s first female mayor, Katy Geissert, who served two terms from 1986 to 1994.
But Hardison achieved a whole lot more before and after her two productive terms as mayor.
She was born Delores June Grinton in Bellingham, Washington, on Jan. 22, 1938. She graduated from Western Washington University in Bellingham in 1960, and married Boeing employee Lowell Hardison following graduation.
She taught at Lincoln High School in Seattle for a time, then moved to Reno, Nevada with Lowell before settling in Torrance in 1967. At the time, the couple had two young children, Mark and Brad. The Hardisons were attracted to the city by the good reputation of its schools.
Hardison was pleased to hear that the city was planning to build a park near their home on 236th St. in southeast Torrance. The Kettler Knolls area had tons of postwar tract homes at the time, but not much in the way of green space for children to play in.
But as time went on and no park appeared, the park seemed like more of a rumor than a done deal. The City of Torrance had begun planning the facility, which it eventually gave the name Sur La Brea Park, in the 1950s, but finding a place to put it took some time.
Lack of funds kept the city from acquiring any of the parcels it had been considering, and by the mid-1960s, those had been snapped up by developers. In 1965, all that was left were sites being worked by oil drilling firms that were unlikely to be used for housing.
The city put together two such parcels on Cabrillo Ave. between 236th and 237th streets. As an active member of the Southeast Torrance Homeowners’ Association, Hardison began actively prodding the city to get the 7.5-acre park built.
Construction began in 1973, and the park’s first dedication came in 1974. But the park was only partially completed. Sur La Brea Park finally opened completely in 1984.
Hardison’s successful activism on the park project led to her being asked to serve on Torrance’s Parks and Recreation and Planning commissions during the next ten years, all while she continued to teach physical education and special education for the Torrance Unified School District.
In 1986, she decided to parlay her experience by running for a seat on the Torrance City Council. She surprised longtime election observers by receiving the most votes of any of the candidates. This happened in the same year that Geissert became the city’s first female mayor.
After serving on the City Council for eight years, Hardison decided to run for mayor in 1994. Geissert termed out of office that year, having served her two terms.
The mayor’s race was a close one, with Hardison edging fellow council member Bill Applegate in the election on March 8, 1994. Applegate outspent Hardison, $37,000 to $27,682, with most of their money being spent on political mailers.
Mayor Hardison’s next eight years were busy and productive. Among her achievements were the creation of the Madrona Marsh Nature Preserve and the opening of the Nature Center there, a major expansion of the Torrance Civic Center Library (renamed for Katy Geissert in 1996), the building of the Torrance Veterans Memorial and the redevelopment of Old Torrance.
She also advocated for the establishment of the sports center in Wilson Park. It opened in 2000, and was renamed the Dee Hardison Sports Center in 2009 in her honor.
She also found time to meet with her constituents. Here’s what she told the Daily Breeze she did following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City:
“I went over to the (Del Amo Fashion Center) for some reason . . . that day at the mall, I found that people wanted to talk.They wanted to know are we OK, are we safe? I spent the next couple of days just going to the mall.”
She continued her volunteer work on multiple fronts after leaving office in 2002. She served on the boards of the Torrance Cultural Arts Center Foundation, the Torrance Education Foundation, the Pediatric Therapy Network, Torrance League of Women Voters, the Torrance Blue Ribbon Committee on Ethics and the Torrance Performing Arts Consortium.
She also led the successful community outreach effort to keep Harbor-UCLA Medical Center open, and became an advocate for its prestigious research institute, LA BioMed. She even spent more than three decades working as a volunteer on the annual Torrance floats in the Tournament of Roses parade.
Her community awards and honors are too numerous to list, but include the city’s Jared Sydney Torrance Award and the Torrance YMCA Woman of the Year award.
On Aug. 24, 2017, Hardison suffered a stroke from which she never recovered. She died at 79 on Sept. 30, 2017.
Her funeral service two weeks later had to be moved from her home church, St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church in Lomita, to St. James Catholic Church in Redondo Beach in order to accommodate all who wanted to pay tribute to her.
Sources:
City of Torrance website.
Daily Breeze archives.
Find A Grave website.
“Honoring the Life of Former Torrance Mayor Delores “Dee” Hardison,” by Rep. Ted Lieu, Congressional Record, Oct. 4, 2017.
