Downtown Louisville has become our crown jewel. It is walkable, welcoming and vibrant. We must work to continue to energize this unique asset.

We must make sure that Louisville maintains its financial health so we can maintain our infrastructure and continue to deliver the services that all Louisville residents enjoy. 

From a revenue perspective, we must nurture the sales tax strategy that has served Louisville so well for the past years. However, we also must recognize that the game is changing with the advent of the internet economy. These days we see more delivery truck on our streets and less cars in the big box parking lots.

We must work hard to nurture our existing business community and attract new businesses that bring shoppers to Louisville. At the same time, we need to be mindful of the changing revenue patterns and adjust our strategy as circumstances change.

As an entrepreneur who has built a successful software company with a legal education, I have the management skills to guide our financial strategy forward so Louisville remains a shining example of municipal administration.

We must pro-actively rethink sections of our community that were planned and developed during a different era. Specifically, the big box retail area on McCaslin and the former Storage Tech property.

Online commerce is changing the retail landscape and the massive company campus is a rare opportunity in this increasingly work-from-home world. These days, we see less people at the mall and more delivery trucks crisscrossing our neighborhoods. We also have more people telecommuting. These changes affect both how we use our land and how we collect our sales taxes.

We need to create an environment that turns our underutilized retail areas into vital community assets that continue to attract shoppers and workers. We must rethink our strategy considering the continued advent of online sales and make sure that Louisville remains an attractive place to live and visit.

We need to tie our land uses and pedestrian/bicycle network to the excellent transit access that our residents cherish. This will keep Louisville sustainably and affordably connected to the rest of the Boulder/Denver Metropolitan Area.

We must strive to have a complete life-cycle of housing in Louisville. Empty nesters should be able to have options to remain in Louisville while freeing equity from the houses where they raised their children. I also want our children to find a place in our community as they start their adult lives and careers. And we need new, young families to come to Louisville to keep our schools and our community spirit continually evolving.

These are not simple issues especially given the tremendous growth in property values that Louisville has experienced. There are no simple answers.  We must be creative and find a way to lead our community into the next era. I will foster that community conversation that will allow Louisville to remain a leading community in the Denver metropolitan area.

Every decision we make needs to be reviewed through the lens of sustainability.  Whether it’s our municipal vehicles and facilities, our office practices, or where we choose to locate new residential development.

We have the benefit of a modern, multi-modal transit hub along the US36 corridor.  Let’s plan around this to reduce the need for our citizens to commute.  Let’s promote live, work, and play neighborhoods in appropriate places so we can park our cars and enjoy life without driving.  We must be creative and innovative in crafting solutions that will help us break from the current suburban planning model with rigid zones for distinct uses that require us to drive everywhere.

The City also can help rally our citizens. Let’s set some city-wide goals for reduction of solid waste or wise use of water that we can all rally around as we work together to achieve the target. Not only will this help us ease our carbon footprints, it will give us a shared camaraderie as residents of Louisville.

We have a smart and motivated citizenry in Louisville. Let’s use our collective brainpower to work towards common goals that will position us a national leader in sustainability.

If Downtown is our crown jewel, then Louisville’s open space is our emerald necklace. In cooperation with our neighbors and Boulder County, we have created significant buffers that will prevent the wall-to-wall development we see in other communities. As importantly, our open spaces are active recreation areas that our citizens use to exercise or simply get away from it all and revel in the natural beauty of Louisville’s ideal Front Range setting. As the co-author of Louisville’s original open space ordinance, I will continue to ensure that we maintain the integrity of our investments in open space for the benefit of the current and future Louisville citizenry

We have a wonderful legacy in Louisville’s mining past and have taken steps to ensure that our community has the resources available to take action to preserve and protect important aspects of that rich history.  We must make sure that we use those resources actively and wisely while we still have the opportunity.

Initially, we must finish the effort to turn the historic grain elevator property into an attractive area where people want to gather in the shadow of Louisville’s history. I have heard from many of our citizens on both sides of the grain elevator discussion. There is a diversity of opinion. It is a clear, however, that we should bring that project to a completion. I will work to find the catalyst to make that happen.

Additionally, we must actively find ways to use the resources that we have available to make sure that the future citizens of our great town have the ability to know and experience the rich history of Louisville.

We also must continue the investment we have made in the Louisville History museum which enables us to understand the rich culture that our predecessors have set for us. By respecting and nurturing our historical past we will maintain the small-town character that makes our old town charming. Additionally, this gem increasingly will become an attraction that will bring attention to our cherished downtown.

Finally, we all cherish the special small-town character that makes Louisville an attractive place to spend our lives: The ability to encounter friends and neighbors in our walkable downtown. The camaraderie shared daily amongst our citizens at our recreation and senior center, our golf course, our library and our myriad of open spaces, trails and parks. The respectful relationship between our citizens and the officers who police our community. These are but a few aspects of what we call small-town character and they all are derived from the people and the common respect and pride we invest in our community. We must always nurture this small-town character.