Born and Raised

Dear Healdsburg City Council and Director Themig, I write to inform you that I am very much interested in serving another term on the Healdsburg Parks and Recreation Commission. Please be sure to consider my reinstatement during your upcoming appointment process. I have taken great personal satisfaction in serving the community in this way and have accepted the responsibilities of the position eagerly. Thanks to fantastic support from my fellow commissioners, and by Director Themig and his staff, I was able to apply my skills and concerns to commission work from the very beginning by helping set the Capital Improvement priorities we completed in early 2016. This gave me a great overview of the department and the city’s parks and community services programs and a platform for further engagement with the commission’s work. At the onset of my second year, I was elected chair of the commission. It was during this time that the department, and the open space ad-hoc committee that is belo

On 2/12, our Planning Commission will review the design of Dustin Valette's new restaurant at 106 Matheson St. Many feel it's too large. There may be a market to support a new, large restaurant, but does Healdsburg really need one? If we get a new restaurant, what would the community get out of it? Valette has a well-deserved good reputation for generosity in town and certainly has a right to build this restaurant. Who doesn’t want success for a business owner who gives back? This project has been touted as "a gift to the community". He aims to offer family friendly and affordable dining (some specifics would be nice on this count). One benifit that’s routinely mentioned as a gift to the community when new businesses are discussed are good paying jobs. This may or may not be part of the vision here. But if the only way to deliver this, or to succeed at all, is to build something which is potentially out of scale with the surrounding (which will create cong