Here’s my plan for Lafayette’s trail ahead

I want to make sure that everyone who wants to live in our community can afford to live here. That means supporting responsible growth and housing initiatives that keep Lafayette livable for working families, while preserving our city’s remarkable character. I know that stable, affordable communities directly contribute to public safety and resilience.

Preventing displacement and ensuring diverse housing options strengthens the fabric of our city; that means creating substantially more affordable housing options to address out of control housing costs, through zoning reform and enabling more varieties of housing.

The median sale price for a home in Lafayette is now over $700,000, which is great for home equity but challenging for new arrivals, young people, seniors on fixed incomes, and folks working low-wage jobs.

If you’d like to read more about my approach to addressing issues of food insecurity in Lafayette, please take a look at my responses to the Food Security Network of Boulder & Broomfield Counties.

Improving public transportation and existing road infrastructure is critical, because Lafayette is primarily a commuter town and well over a hundred thousand cars pass through our city each day.

We must continue to invest in safe, well-maintained roads and intersections, expand reliable public transit, and drastically increase the number of protected bike lanes and electric charging stations. We also need to craft a solution to protect children riding extremely fast e-bikes around town.

And as a long-term strategic goal, I would love to connect Lafayette to Bus Rapid Transit and eventually even a regional commuter rail network, so you could ride the train to Denver, Fort Collins, Colorado Springs, ski resorts, the airport, and beyond— with ease.

Lafayette’s natural beauty and intimate town character are part of why we all love living here. From my work with USAID, I know that the strongest communities are formed when people feel connected to their home, their surroundings, and their neighbors.

Perhaps most importantly, I want us to be sure that we protect and preserve Lafayette’s gorgeous parks and open spaces and preserves for generations to come.

That doesn’t mean we don’t continue to grow Lafayette and offer new residents and businesses the opportunity to build and thrive, but it does mean we don’t deprive future generations of the natural wonders we are so fortunate to enjoy.

Indeed, preserving Lafayette’s identity and fostering thoughtful growth go hand-in-hand: just look at our extraordinary new Farmer’s Market, which brings fresh produce from local farmers, supports SNAP recipients, and provides a weekly local gathering spot.

I support targeted zoning reform, more pocket parks (like the one coming downtown!), vacant lot development, small business grants to continue to enliven S Public Rd, and policies to encourage a variety of housing options to meet folks where they are.

Our city’s small businesses are critical to our community’s thriving. I want to see us expand our small business grant and incubator programs, and continue to promote the heart of Lafayette down Public Rd as a hub for our entire community.

When I’ve talked with local business owners, I’ve heard many great things about Lafayette, but also headaches of red tape, permitting delays, and keeping up with skyrocketing costs, that challenge their ability to get up and running, hire, and do business. Streamlining processes while ensuring labor protections and good wages is a major focus for me.

As I see it, Lafayette’s biggest challenge going into 2026 is the tremendous uncertainty currently unfolding in our country.

Tariffs, looming cuts in Medicare/Medicaid, escalating political violence, and other disruptions from the federal government affect our wallets, our rights, and our city.

Navigating this requires local governments to work more creatively, collaboratively, and effectively than ever before.

I believe it is fundamental to demonstrate respect for our neighbors, visitors to our community, and one another, and one of the most wonderful things about Lafayette is our welcoming, inclusive spirit.

From public art to public festivals, our community’s emphasis on the beauty of our diversity, on our rich coal-mining and immigrant and civil rights heritage, to integrating nearly 10,000 new residents in the past couple decades; our city thrives because of its diversity and inclusivity.

A stroll around Waneka Lake is joyful because we are all in community together. I will always fiercely defend Lafayette as a welcoming, tolerant, kind, and open place to live.

Lafayette’s vibrant civic engagement is one of my favorite parts of living here!

However, there are three reforms I believe we should make as a city:

1. Align our municipal elections to even-numbered years to ensure robust voter turnout and cost savings

2. Adopt Ranked Choice Voting to ensure every vote counts and broader candidate participation

3. Expand the number of ballot drop boxes to improve convenience for voters

And if you haven’t, please take a look at one of the finest local journalists working in the region, Karen Norback, whose blog is a MUST-READ for folks interested in local politics and goings-on!

If elected, I’ll bring my experience building coalitions and executing strategies with national security partners to future-proof Lafayette, rather than reacting after a crisis. I view the following 3 items as critical to scenario plan for:

1. Continuing to invest in planning for if another Marshall Fire-type event hits our region, and ensure we have plans in place with neighboring cities and the County for what to do if FEMA decides to withhold funding.

2. Supporting our residents who may lose their healthcare when the Medicare/Medicaid cuts arrive; we know the cuts will affect senior citizens disproportionately and we need to plan ahead for this.

3. As the Sundance Film Festival comes to Boulder, our city’s businesses (and our tax base) stand to benefit significantly from an influx of tourist dollars, but we need to plan robustly so that our infrastructure is poised to take advantage of being next door to the festival’s new home.

I wanted to provide some insight into the role of a City Councilor in Lafayette so that you, as a voter, may understand some of the responsibilities and constraints placed on City Councilors, to ensure fairness. Most of the below comes directly from Lafayette’s excellent City Administrator, Kady Doelling:

When a development application comes before the City Council, the City Council acts in a quasi-judicial capacity, and the applicant has a constitutional right to Due Process. Due Process requires quasi-judicial decisions to be made by unbiased officials based solely on the evidence presented. This means that Council members must act like judges:

• They must base their decision only on the evidence, testimony, and record presented at the public hearing on the application.

• They must maintain impartiality and an open, unbiased mind about the application until all evidence is presented.

• They must avoid ex parte communications (discussions outside the public hearing) about the application.

During a campaign for City Council, members of the public may ask a candidate for their views on pending or expected development applications. If the candidate were to take a firm position on those applications or promise to vote a certain way, that may create legal and ethical issues if they are elected and must vote on the matter.

• Due Process and Bias: Applicants and affected parties have a constitutional right to a fair hearing before an impartial decision-maker. If a candidate takes a position on a land-use application before the public hearing, their impartiality could be questioned. Even the appearance of bias can violate Due Process and potentially lead to their recusal.

• Recusal: If campaign statements indicate a candidate has already made up their mind on a development application, they may be required to recuse themselves, which means they wouldn’t be able to participate in the hearing or vote on the application once in office.

• Legal Challenges: An applicant or other affected party could challenge the City Council’s decision in court, claiming the hearing was unfair because one or more Council members were biased and had prejudged the application. Courts in Colorado and elsewhere have overturned decisions when officials showed bias before the hearing.

These rules rightly constrain me and the other City Council candidates from providing firm declarations on specific issues and projects to ensure that every Lafayette resident and business and stakeholder gets a fair shake.

That said, I would love to talk about any and every issue you are grappling with!