Community advocate makes run for state house

Peachtree Corners Business Owner Seeks House Seat

The route to seeking political office may have been long, but the desire to serve the community has always been a part of Long Tran’s DNA. He’s seeking Georgia House of Representatives District 80, which used to be District 79 until a new map was drawn. It doesn’t include Peachtree Corners but borders it. He is a local businessman — the owner of Peachy Corners Café and a fixture in the community for more than two years. A child of Vietnamese immigrants, Tran says he’s just as American as those who founded this country, with the same goals of uniting the nation and the community. He recently spoke to Peachtree Corners Magazine about his run for office.

Despite his youthful appearance, Tran will be turning 46 in May. He’s married with two sons, 14 and 10, and credits his wife’s career with his move from Columbus, Ohio to metro Atlanta. A certified public accountant, her Ohio-based firm merged with one here, necessitating a location change.

“My background is actually in IT network security. I was doing that for a little less than 20 years,” said Tran. The family moved to Georgia in 2010 right around the time of the recession when work in his field began drying up. Staying ahead of the trends, Tran switched to mobile app development.

“This was when the iPhone 3G came out. On the iPhone App Store at that time, there were maybe 40 or 50 apps versus the hundreds of 1000s of apps available now,” he said.

Doing that part time, Tran focused on being a Mr. Mom, of sorts, with most of his time spent taking care of the couple’s first-born son.

Creating family-friendly space

As any modern parent can attest, it’s not easy to find a spot to hang out in between their child’s extracurricular activities.

“One day, I was sitting at my son’s karate class and sometimes the chronic schedule means your older son goes at, say, four o’clock. And then he’s done at five, and maybe your youngest son doesn’t have his class until seven, or six. And so, you’ve got a one-hour gap, but you don’t want to go home because as soon as you get home, you have to come back. And there wasn’t really a good place to go hang out that had the fast Wi Fi we all need,” said Tran. “So, I drove around and saw the location we’re in now and thought it would be really cool for a local, independently-owned coffee shop and started the process.”

About a month in, the pandemic hit. Since the place wasn’t really conducive to pick-up or delivery service or even social distancing, Tran shut down the café four days before the governor’s mandate. With a surplus of supplies and a pipeline to obtain more, he began distributing sanitizer, toilet paper and other non-perishable items to hospitals and front-line workers as well as coffee and bubble tea that had a long shelf life but would have diminished freshness after a few months.

From that altruistic act, a loyal customer base began to grow.

“People started calling us and messaging us asking, ‘Hey, I have a friend or brother or sister that’s a doctor at this hospital, they could use what you sent to the other hospital. Can we make a donation to you to send drinks there?” Tran said. “We used that money to source extra masks and gloves and supplies that we took to the hospitals, in addition to the drinks that we were bringing. And that got us through the worst part of the pandemic. And as soon as the governor loosened restrictions, we started opening our doors.”

Growing community advocacy

Another consequence of the pandemic was the attacks on people of Asian descent.

“People were attacking Asian Americans, blaming us for COVID,” said Tran. “It was happening in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, but not here, and the Asian community felt insulated until the attacks on the spa workers in Cherokee County and Atlanta in March 2021.”

Prior to that Tran discovered the Asian community wasn’t very engaged and hadn’t been as diligent about voter registration and other events to exercise citizen rights.

“I started reaching out to my friends that were Asian American and the Asian-American nonprofits — the Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese, Japanese communities working together to get voter registrations and people out to vote. There were some groups, but there wasn’t a big movement,” Tran said.

He began working with Asian Americans Advancing Justice to push voter registration, but also ensuring that the community was heard and that they were given facts instead of lies that people were spreading about Stacey Abrams and her campaign.

“We kicked things into overdrive in 2020. Asian American voters in Georgia increased by more than half, I believe,” he said.

According to Asian American Advocacy Fund data, there are more than 300,000 registered voters in Georgia who identify as Asian American or Pacific Islander. More than 185,000 voted in 2020. That’s about a 63% increase compared to 2016. Although Asians make up about 4% of the population in the state, it’s the fastest growing demographic, nearly doubling from a decade ago, according to U.S. Census data.

Government for all people

But Tran isn’t looking to just strengthen Asian-American presence in state government. He recognizes the importance of diversity and wants to make sure everyone’s point of view is represented.

“February 1, the start of Chinese New Year, I made the announcement that I’m going to run for state representative of House District 80,” he said. “I’m seeing a lot of support across the board. The first endorsement I can talk about is Beth Moore, a state representative of House District 95, which includes where my store is located, and she was among the first people to reach out to me and encouraged me to run for the new district.”

Tran has reached out to the Jewish community and the Hispanic community. He’s contacted labor organizations and religious leaders. An unofficial announcement party on Super Bowl Sunday brought a lot of people to his café that he didn’t realize were behind him.

“I was expecting about 20 people tops and we had more like 70,” he said. “I’m hoping my campaign is a representation of the broad diversity we have, not only in our district, but actually, in Georgia. In Atlanta. We’re very diverse. And I want people to see my campaign as one where everyone can truly work together, truly get along, even the more conservative Republicans.”

His platform is looking at ways to make public education more efficient, moving toward a livable minimum wage statewide, finding a way to work with undocumented immigrants for a legal status that includes citizenship or something else, and more ways to sustain small business, especially when a crisis like the COVID pandemic hits.

“The relief for small businesses was slow coming. A lot of business owners were forced to close and find other jobs. They weren’t able to get unemployment right away. They suffered greatly,” said Tran.

Although, if he’s successful, his district will be in DeKalb County, Tran wants his Gwinnett County neighbors to know that he’ll represent the entire state.

“I’ve formed friendships with the elected officials in DeKalb, but I’ve also formed friendships with elected officials in Gwinnett, as well. If I’m lucky enough to make it to the statehouse, I’ve got people I can collaborate with and work with to fix issues that affect both counties and the state as a whole. And I think that is an important skill and ability that’s required because you’re not going into the gold dome alone and just yelling, trying to make people do what you want. It’s a collaboration, a teamwork, and I’m looking forward to working with the elected officials everywhere.”

About GA House District 80 (formerly House District 79)

• On Dec. 30, Gov. Brian Kemp signed Georgia’s congressional map into law. This map takes effect for Georgia’s 2022 state legislative elections. So, there will be some shifting of representation after November.
• It is currently represented by Michael Wilensky (D).
• The population is 60,655 which consists of 51.1% white, 17.1% Hispanic, 16.5% Asian, 13.3% Black and 0.9% Native American.
• As of the 2020 Census, Georgia state representatives represented an average of 59,510 residents each.
• The general election will occur on November 8, 2022.