Nearly 100 people gathered at San Mateo City Hall on Friday, July 17, to watch the city unveil a permanent honorary street sign renaming a stretch of O'Farrell Street as "Jerry Hill Street" and declaring the day "Jerry Hill Day."

The sign, installed near City Hall, recognizes the former state senator, county supervisor, mayor and council member who held elected office continuously from 1991 to 2020. Local elected officials delivered remarks at the ceremony, the city said on its official X account.

Hill's 29-year career

Jerry Hill's public career began on the San Mateo City Council in 1991. He served as mayor in 1994 and remained on the council through 1998, sponsoring one of California's first local ordinances to regulate tobacco sales and restrict smoking in public places, according to the California State Senate archives.

He won a seat on the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors in 1998, representing District 2 until 2008. During that decade he led efforts that expanded health care coverage for more than 17,000 children and helped create a new homeless shelter in the county.

Hill moved to Sacramento in 2008, first in the Assembly and then in the Senate representing District 13 until term limits ended his tenure in December 2020. The Sacramento Bee reported in 2017 that Hill had more bills signed into law at that point, 108, than any other sitting state legislator.

Among his signature legislation: the Patient's Right to Know Act, which took effect in 2019 and made California the first state to require doctors to notify patients if placed on probation for serious misconduct, and Senate Bill 793, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in September 2020, which imposed what were then the strongest state restrictions on retail sales of flavored tobacco products.

Hill grew up in the Bay Area, graduated from UC Berkeley, and made his home in San Mateo with his spouse, Sky, according to the Senate archives.