New York: In a tight race, an Indian-American engineer won an open seat in a city council election in Sunnyvale, California, by just a single vote.
Murali Srinivasan became the first Indian-origin council member elected in Sunnyvale and the first candidate chosen to represent District 3, The Mercury News reported.
District 3 was formed in 2020 after the city voted to switch to a district-based electoral system, and drew six districts based on US Census data.
While Srinivasan secured 2,813 votes, his opponent, Justin Wang, concluded the race with 2,812 votes.
“If you look at District 5 and District 3, we pulled nearly 1,100 more votes,” Srinivasan told The Mercury News.
“It’s definitely a great victory for democracy and District 3 voters a” credit should go to them,” he added, saying that waiting for election results was “interesting and stressful” he told the paper that he feels honored to represent the Indian-American community within Sunnyvale’s local government.
As a council member, he hopes to address issues like climate change lack of access to affordable housing.
He will also be working on ways to boost civic engagement in the city.
Srinivasan, who will be sworn in at a council meeting on January 3, 2023, grew up in Bengaluru.
According to his website, Srinivasan “immigrated to the US from India to pursue his American Dream”.
A resident of District 3 of Sunnyvale since 1997, he was an engineer and a tech executive at Sun Microsystems and General Electric.
Srinivasan did his Master’s in Computer Science from Virginia Tech and Engineering Management from Stanford University.
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