Maya BROWN Sometimes politicians really do improve the lives of their constituents, regardless of wealth or color. That’s one one insight Maya Brown says she got out of a spring semester in Tallahassee. As a junior at the University of South Florida in 2014, Brown attended the Tallahassee Internship Program, which gives students a chance to take a politics course, watch legislators in Session or talk to news or lobbying organizations. “That internship changed my life forever,” said Brown, an independent Tampa strategist. “I saw firsthand as a student how laws were being made in Florida’s capital, and to some extent I saw the laws they made that were harming Florida’s working families. And I wanted to be a part of the work that helped select people with shared values who wanted to put working families first.” That’s the second part of the epiphany that started that semester several years ago. Brown, of Deland, comes from a long line of educators. For a long time she assumed she would probably do the same, making a difference one student at a time. A talented singer, she figured she would teach chorus. Seeing the mechanics of government close up opened her eyes to the helpful or harmful effects of the smallest decisions. “I think I realized how deeply personal this work is,” Brown said. “Some folks view politics as this big esoteric issue that folks don’t feel impacts our daily lives and your vote doesn’t count. And I see how the election of a Governor impacts the day-to-day life of a working mom or a child in school. And if we have a Governor that line-item vetoes a budget allocation to help low-income students have better access to reading materials, that has a direct impact on someone that I probably know.” In the immediate aftermath of the semester in Tallahassee, Brown still thought that one way poli-
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cies change is from lobbyists and committed volunteers working hard to marshal the best arguments for those changes to elected officials. It’s why she had originally set her sights on becoming a lobbyist. “I wanted to be part of a public advocacy with elected officials,” she said, “and really learned through some of the leaders in Tallahassee that because of the partisanship in our state right now, the way to get things done was to elect more Democrats to the Legislature who had similar values.” She took a semester off from school to back a City Council candidate and became a field organizer for NextGen Climate Action. In that capacity, she promoted Charlie Crist’s climate proposals over those of Gov. Rick Scott, who was running for reelection. Brown served as president of the Hillsborough Young Democrats. She formed her own company in 2016, MB Strategies, and her visibility has only grown since, consulting for Sean Shaw’s bid for Attorney General in 2018. Her House candidate in 2020, Michelle Rayner of District 70, cleared out three opponents in the primary to run unopposed in November. Nancy Millan won her election as Hillsorough’s tax collector, and Amendment 3, which Brown had lobbied against, went down to defeat. Brown remains committed to encouraging “frank and honest conversations about how institutional racism has plagued our communities, our state and our communities, and that we have to then make space for folks with these lived experiences to lead, because that’s how we change the narrative.” In her free time she seeks out music, still her first passion. She has been known to hit a karaoke bar every now and then, and enjoys reading and “spending quality time with the ones I love.”