An Accomplished Community Leader

Biography

Anna May is the oldest of three children. She grew up in Hayward and attended Hayward public schools from K-12. While she was growing up, her family struggled financially and Anna benefited from free/reduced lunch programs in school. Because her parents were working hard to make ends meet, Anna and her siblings were "latch-key" kids with little parental supervision or involvement. As a student, she was subject to the effects of school closures. Anna was a GATE student and is grateful for the educational opportunities she was afforded in her earlier school years.

Anna grew up awkward & shy and at the age of 16, she started working as an international model. Her world travel enabled her to receive a "real life" education with persons of other cultures. In spite of her frequent absence from school, she took extra classes both here and abroad and finished high school a semester early. Although she enjoyed a fast-paced lifestyle, she stayed away from drugs and alcohol. Anna continued working as a model for several years but became terribly homesick from all the travel. After missing and needing her family, she finally came home.

Anna's successes came at a very early age. In 1991 she got involved in the real estate industry and started out as a loan agent. For that job, she shied away from telling her real age for fear that nobody in their right mind would want to hire 19-year old for a job like that. Despite her age, she was a top-performing loan agent in her first year.

In 1992, Anna joined the management team of a small chain of bay area restaurants called "Rickshaw". She's no stranger to hard work. Her duties ranged from scrubbing the floors to negotiating leases with big landlords for new restaurant sites and finding franchisees. She had the courage to make difficult decisions to fire underperforming/non-compliant managers, many of whom were more than twice her age. Anna instituted new policies and procedures for streamlining restaurants' operations.

In 1995 after removing herself from the chain's management, she, along with a partner, opened Hayward's Rickshaw Express restaurant on Jackson Street. During that time, she was faced with the task of building sales and making payroll. She was known as a provocative marketer of boldly named menu items that made customers laugh and have fun when they walked into her restaurant. She ran a clean, disciplined operation and after 10 years of success in that location, she sold the business in 2005.

One of the things she misses about owning the business is her opportunity to make an impression on many of the youth she employed who were going through a similar scenario that Anna experienced growing up: Not enough parental supervision, involvement or guidance. Not much older than many of the youth she employed, Anna fulfilled a need in mentoring and often times disciplining those kids as measures to prepare them for what will be expected of them in other careers later in life.

Since selling the restaurant, Anna has enjoyed success as a real estate consultant. She has received many awards and recognitions for her business and civic accomplishments and contributions.

Anna May is no stranger to community service involvement and has built a reputation for being a bold leader. She became a Rotarian in Hayward in 1998 and has held many leadership positions within the club, including club president from 2003-2004 and for a second term from 2004-2005. Her presidency enabled her to support on a group level many organizations dear to her heart and that she strongly believed in.

These organizations include the Hayward Police Explorers, Rotary's Third Grade Dictionary Project, The Kids' Breakfast Club and the Sulphur Creek Nature Center, and many others. During Anna's term as president, she was affectionately referred to as the "Dragon Lady".

Over the last several years, Anna May has been very active in her neighborhood improvement organization, the historic Prospect Hill Neighborhood Association. She has been described as the driving force behind improved neighborhood communication, crime awareness and unity among neighbors. She started the “National Night Out” block parties in the area that lead to a stronger relationship between the neighborhood and the police department.

Her experiences in living, working and doing business in Hayward led her to believe that better decisions could be made at City Hall. For example, Anna believes that the decision to burden our neighborhoods with the expensive mini-loop traffic plan is both wrong and wasteful.

On the Hayward City Council, Anna intends to bring people together to come up with common sense solutions that respond to the real needs in our neighborhoods.