Running on her ‘Mom platform’

Andrew Edwards

Sports, music and camping just aren’t enough for Carlina Thomas, an

active parent who hopes to have even less free time by serving as a

school board member with the Huntington Beach City School District.

If elected, Thomas, who has two children at Hawes Elementary

School, would be the only parent with children in the district. Her

children were her biggest motivation when she decided to campaign,

she said.

“I want to be the voice of district parents and students,” she

said.

Her 6-year-old daughter Carolyn is in the first-grade, and Thomas

aspires to be a board member as long as Carolyn attends schools in

the district.

“It’s not a lifelong goal, I just really want to contribute while

I have children there,” she said.

Thomas’ interest in helping children goes beyond her own family,

said Lisa Rothbart, coaching administrator with American Youth Soccer

Organization Region 56, which serves south Huntington Beach. Rothbart

said she was impressed when Thomas declined to exercise her right to

pick two youngsters for her team, opting to coach a random squad.

“She likes a fresh bunch of kids, she doesn’t play favorites,”

Rothbart said. “She puts kids, period, as a priority.”

Thomas, who coaches her daughter’s soccer team, the Purple

Dolphins, turned her SUV into a campaign-mobile by tricking it out

with orange field cones and brightly-colored campaign signs. She said

her ride is attracting attention on Surf City’s streets.

“All these people are rubber-necking,” she said. “Everyone’s

commenting on them.”

Thomas worked as a jet-setting sales representative to market

environmental and engineering services until about 2 1/2 years ago,

when she resigned to spend more time with her children. In addition

to coaching her daughter’s soccer squad, she also coaches her son

Matthew during basketball season and leads both of her children’s

scout troops. She volunteers at Hawes, where she is a PTA board

member and helped to set up a new music program.

The PTA raised money to help pay the salary for a new music

teacher and bought $400 worth of new instruments, Thomas said. The

program is geared to help students learn about composers and how to

read and perform music, and about 40 children have already signed up

for a new choir.

“They’re so jazzed,” Thomas said. “They think they’re so hot, they

think they’re part of a band.”

With camping, soccer and baseball under her belt, Thomas said she

takes care of the land sports with her family while her husband,

Stephen, an avid surfer, is in charge of the water sports. Outside of

athletics, she said she hopes to teach her children about civics by

discussing her campaign at the dinner table.

“I pick and choose what I want to do, and I want to do things with

my kids, she said. “That’s my mom platform.”