Big Ideas

With mutual agreement and cooperation of police, fire, and general employee unions, I support mandatory vaccinations or weekly testing for City employees in public buildings where infection is easy to spread, with exceptions. Listening to our employees and community before making decisions is paramount and, if elected, this is a deeply held principle that will guide me as a future Councilmember. Community education to get vaccinated, lower our vulnerability to COVID-19, and protect one another must be a priority. I encourage the use of testing methods that are quick and accurate to help us prevent the spread of infection and reduce the impact on businesses and the community.

• Inventory Public Sites for Affordable Housing: Evaluate parking lots and underutilized public properties and request proposals for affordable housing or a condo ownership program for moderate incomes.
• Live/Work Space: Create customized solutions for different industries – live/work space for artists and tech workers.
• ADU Design Templates and Permit Streamlining: Create pre-approved templates and radically streamline process for Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) to help homeowners convert garages or add a unit, creating a below-market, affordable housing unit, providing an income stream to help homeowner afford mortgage, and offer a diverse selection of designs from local architects (Exceptions for historic districts or high fire hazard areas that cannot accommodate additional units.)
• Adaptive Reuse Standards and Incentives for Vacant Buildings: Incentivize the development of a wide range of housing for vacant and underutilized sites. 
• Build Housing Downtown With a Surgical Approach: Build housing within current height limits with sensitivity to historic buildings and character, with exceptions upon review. The impacts of using an FAR (Floor Area Ratio) model should be evaluated carefully by all stakeholder groups to ensure it will result in desired outcomes.  
• Expand Student Housing Options: Form stronger partnerships with SBCC, UCSB, and Westmont to expand housing options for their students, freeing up inventory of housing for local workers.
• Moderate Income Home Ownership Program: Initiate a home ownership program to help renters with good credit become homeowners through public-private partnership. 
• Micro-Unit Housing: Encourage the development of small micro-units for local workforce with minimal space needs.
• Rehab Older Housing: Develop options and loan program to rehab older housing stock.
• Form Business Coalition to Make Recommendations: Create a coalition of business leaders, housing advocates, and community members to recommend specific strategies for the city and local employers to address housing affordability and wages.
• Build Community Awareness: Help the community understand the need for housing production, the risks and high cost to build housing, and how lower risks and project costs, and encourage more housing proposals to meet a range of income levels.

• Coordination with Service Providers: Improve oversight and coordination with all City contracted social service providers to ensure data sharing among agencies and clear deliverables.
• Inviting Business Areas: Keep business areas welcoming for dining and shopping by enforcing sit-lie laws, develop a system to determine daily where beds are available, and transition people into shelter and services they need.
• Lower Shelter Costs: Assess capacity at existing shelter sites and request proposals to develop sites for permanent supportive housing on an ongoing basis.
• Mental Health Outreach: Increase mental health street outreach and trained support. 
• Homelessness Prevention: Prevent people from becoming homeless and be attentive to needs of individuals living in vehicles.
• Create Entry Level Jobs: Create and help unhoused individuals find work. 
• Public Education: Change public education to encourage giving funds directly to social services to support unhoused individuals. 

• Design Competitions: Host design competitions to gather ideas from a diverse community of architects, creatives, and residents for improvements to parks, plazas, gateways, and the promenade, obtaining community input to select top designs and features.
• Update the City’s Design Process: Convene design review boards, builders, designers, and representatives of history, environment, and arts community to review design framework from beginning to end and improve focus on aesthetics, inspired public spaces, cultural significance, and problem-solving, integrate art and creative elements, and environmental best practices.

• Clean Public Areas: Maintain high standards of cleanliness for sidewalks, streets, and public areas.
• Beautification in Neighborhoods: Implement art and beautification elements in neighborhoods to foster neighborhood pride and community building.

• Increase Carbon-Free Energy Portfolio: Support transition to Community Choice Energy plan for City to purchase carbon-free energy, transmit through Southern California Edison infrastructure, and reduce community emissions.
• Electric Vehicle Infrastructure: Improve technology and use of electric vehicle charging with super-charging stations in convenient areas.
• Adopt Food Action Plan: Increase coordination among food growers and organizations to prevent food waste and improve access to healthy, locally grown food and food security. 
• Small Steps to Make Green Living Easy and Convenient: Install mini bike repair and air stations throughout community and expand locations for more convenient drop off of batteries and bulbs.