Santa Clara Mayor Lisa Gillmor submitted a proclamation declaring Swift the honorary mayor and renaming the city “Swiftie Clara” for July 28 and 29, while Swift is scheduled to be in town for her Eras Tour. The proclamation was approved at a city council meeting on Tuesday night.
Not wanting to be outdone, San Francisco moved to declare July 28 and 29 “Taylor Swift Weekend.” San Francisco Supervisor Matt Dorsey announced the resolution at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting while incorporating as many mentions of the singer’s song titles and lyrics as he could muster.
“I must ‘Speak Now’ on this resolution declaring July 28 and 29 Taylor Swift Weekend in the city and County of San Francisco,” Dorsey said. “As you may know ‘All Too Well,’ Taylor Swift is a music industry icon and an advocate for change. A once-in-a-generation talent who has captivated people like a fireworks show, she is setting records to the moon and to Saturn.”
“‘Don’t Blame Me,’” he added. “This is a work of four passionate Swifties in my office to whom I committed to be ‘Fearless.’”
Dorsey even worked references to Swift’s music into a description of San Francisco’s struggling pandemic recovery, while pointing out that Swift’s Eras Tour has had economic impacts on the cities it has already visited.
“‘The Story of Us’ and our tourism industry has been called dwindling and mercurial,” he said in introducing the resolution.
Santa Clara and San Francisco are far from the first cities to, in Dorsey’s words, cow to “Big Taylor” and the “Swift lobby.”
Throughout the Eras Tour, we’ve gotten Swiftieapolis, Swiftsburgh and Swiftsborough.
The Federal Bureau of Investigations even got in on the fun with a wildly misguided tweet urging followers to “Speak Now” and report federal crimes. In fairness to the FBI, the asking price for Swift tickets on the secondary market feels like it could amount to extortion.
Why should San Francisco and Santa Clara stop at only giving Swift honorary powers? Maybe as mayor of Santa Clara, Taylor could try to solve Levi’s Stadium’s traffic hellscape? Does she have a plan to combat the slew of layoffs hitting Silicon Valley? Perhaps during Taylor Swift Weekend, the singer could give her thoughts on how to bring retail back to downtown San Francisco.
These are important questions to ask as Taylor slowly marches toward our favorite cities.