In the most recent election, USF St. Petersburg alumnus Victor Sims ran for a seat in the Florida House of Representatives District 39 against incumbent Neil Combee.
Sims received 28,117 votes but it wasn’t enough to trump Combee, who received 46,353 votes.
“I live in a very conservative and rural county, so for me it was hard to approach people in a conservative way while still representing the values I support,” Sims said.
Combee outspent Sims by $87,366.28 and received more than 11 times the donations. This was also Sims’ first time running for political office, compared to Combee who has held the position since 2012.
“I learned about what the people in my district are going through,” Sims said. “There’s a lot of people that are retired and part of the elderly community, so I got to listen to a lot of different concerns they had. In the beginning, I was coming in with the approach of how young people are represented, but there’s also the elderly [ages] 80 and above that aren’t being represented and I was trying to approach them also.”
Throughout his campaign, one of Sims’ strongest positions regarded foster care and representing the needs of young people in the program given his own experience being raised in a foster family. Sims said he wanted to supply changes to underrepresented groups.
“I serve on a few councils for foster care on a national and statewide level,” Sims said. “One of them is the National Foster Care Youth and Alumni Policy Council. We talk to federal stakeholders which is why it’s a very unique group. There’s a lot of statewide speakers and I was able to be nominated for the national one.”
The campaign trail has provided Sims with a wealth of experiences and learning opportunities. When Sims met with the mother of a Pulse nightclub shooting victim he felt the urge to reflect on his values.
“One of the girls that lived in my district was in that building and she ended up dying. I met with her mother after some time had passed and offered my condolences and also [talked] about how we can work together [to] help end gun violence in Florida. ”
The meeting led Sims to think more about gun control, something he had avoided throughout the campaign.
“It made me want to run for more than I was potentially going for. I stayed away from gun issues throughout most of my campaign because I live in a conservative area, but after listening to [the mother] and seeing how the Pulse shooting affected the community that I lived in, it made me look for where we can change something,” Sims said.
There was a number of moments that changed the direction Sims wanted to take. When he met some young men in an impoverished neighborhood, he realized that he could help people just by speaking to them about his own experience.
“I was talking to them and they were telling me about school. I told them if they made an A by Friday I would come and play basketball with [them]. They ended up making an A so I came back and played basketball. I told them my story and how I came up in a foster family and they were in awe.
That conversation affected him and now Sims is r pursue aeconsidering another bid for office, instead he is thinking about sharing his story with more people.
“I know that if I don’t end up running for office again,” Sims said, “I want to be more of a motivational speaker. In the beginning of the campaign I was like, ‘I’m going [to run] again 2018,’ but seeing those boys in awe is something I’m looking towards and just seeing where I can go [with it].”
Sims has no plans for now, but said he will announce what he wants to do going forward by January or February.
“I do plan on running for something in the future, but at least until after Christmas time [I won’t announce anything]. I want to take some time with my family. This is actually the first time in my life that I don’t have any concrete plans going forward and so for right now it’s just kind of, ‘What next?’”
