Santa Ana welcomes its new community services mascots: the CommuniTEAM
The City of Santa Ana voted to name the new mascots and the results are in!
New year, new mascots! Introduced in late November of 2023, the Santa Ana’s Parks, Recreation, and Community Services Agency presented three mascots to the community: a red-crowned amazon parrot, a golden-headed lion tamarin monkey, and a giant-river otter. All three animals were chosen as they perfectly embody the spirit of the City. Parrots are famously known for soaring across the city, tamarins have a long-admired history inside the zoo, and otters will become Santa Ana’s newest residents. As representatives of all city community services, the CommuniTEAM mascots will also regularly visit the Santa Ana Public Library. Both agencies will work together in integrating the CommuniTEAM at various events and programs.
The Santa Ana community welcomed the new mascots with open arms and embraced the idea of a crowd-sourcing naming campaign. A month-long online poll was opened for the public to cast their votes on favorite names and even make suggestions. The community poll was available at city events, on the city’s website, and on social media. Several fun social media posts (via Instagram and Facebook) were produced to remind the community of this special opportunity.
The poll closed on December 20, 2023 with over 2,500 votes casted. The selected new names were announced at the start of the new year on January 1, 2024. Name statistics were as follows:
Red-crowned amazon parrot
- Paco: 41%
- Tomatillo (Tomi): 37%
- Pepe (top community write-in): 10%
- Pedro: 9%
- Verde: 4%
- Honorable write-in name mentions: Bonito, Cuatro, Gavilan, Midori, ParrotMcParrotface, Perry, Pluma, Polly, Squawker, Tana, Rainbow, Viva, and Volador
Golden-headed lion tamarin monkey
- Tamarindo (Tami): 45%
- Milo: 22%
- Lenny: 17%
- Manny: 9%
- Ziggy (top community write-in): 8%
- Honorable write-in name mentions: King, Manny, Monkeylion, Oro, Oscar, Peaches, Peluchito, Rafiti, Spurgeon, Sunny, Tango, and Tino
Giant-river otter
- Ollie: 35%
- Ozzy: 30%
- Rio: 18%
- Benito (top community write-in): 9%
- Chip: 9%
- Honorable write-in name mentions: Aria, Bower, Bruno, Cappuccino, Chispa, Leo, Lola, Mugsy, Octavia, Otto, Patota, Rotter, Santiago, Scruffy, Webby, and Whiskers
To ring in the new year, Santa Ana officially welcomed the CommuniTEAM: Paco, Tamarindo, and Ollie. While the mascot group serves all of community services, each character holds special interests in parks and recreation, the zoo, and the library.
For more information, and to read more about the unique characteristics of each member of the CommuniTEAM, visit the Santa Ana Parks and Recreation mascot page at santa-ana.org/parks-recreation-mascots.