City appoints 24 to boards and commissions

The Eugene City Council appointed 24 residents to committees, boards and commissions. Councilor Matt Keating announces the names just before each June 10 vote, and we’ve collected their statements from April 8.

[00:00:12] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint Wendy Simmons to the Budget Committee.

[00:00:15] Wendy Simmons (Budget Committee): I am Wendy Simmons, and I would like to become a member of the Budget Committee. After getting a bachelor’s degree in political science at UC Irvine, I moved to Eugene to get a master’s degree in fitness management at the University of Oregon.

[00:00:27] While my mother kept asking me when I was going to return home, I fell in love with this city, and 35 years later, here I still happily reside. I’m currently a faculty member at Lane Community College and have been for 26 years. I’ve served on several committees at Lane as an active member, such as on the Wellness Advisory Committee, Safety Committee, and Sustainability Committee.

[00:00:48] I currently serve as the Lane Community College Association membership chair, Action Team co-chair and I’m on the Executive Council as the vice president at large. I also currently serve on the OEA (the Oregon Education Association) Community College Council as the OEA board representative. Last June, I graduated from the Oregon Labor Candidate School and in the past I’ve served on the OEA Choice Trust Board, which awards grants and professional development for employee wellness programs for Oregon public K-12 districts, education service districts, and community colleges.

[00:01:22] In various roles I’ve held at the college as the employee wellness coordinator and fitness and lifestyle specialist coordinator, I oversaw an annual budget for these programs and received budget recommendations from advisory committees so we could allocate funding to where the needs were. Serving on the LCC Executive Council, I’m one of eight who oversees and approves the annual budget.

[00:01:44] I was also recently appointed to the LCC Bond Oversight Committee responsible for overseeing $120 million for capital construction. When I was a board member for the OEA Choice Trust, we managed a budget of about $3 million as well as the trust’s entire assets, which were approximately $70 million.

[00:02:02] I’m interested in serving on this committee for several reasons. I care deeply about our city and want to see it continue to thrive and improve for all its citizens. Appreciating the support and hard work of my union, I decided to give back by taking on leadership roles. I’m now in a place where I can also give back to our wonderful city. I became an instructor at a public institution because I get to continually teach and learn.

[00:02:25] I know that financials are extremely important to getting things done, and I see serving on the Budget Committee as an opportunity to contribute my expertise, serve the community, and grow and learn more about city processes and infrastructure. Serving on this committee, I would also work to help ensure that the city’s money is allocated in accordance with community needs and priorities.

[00:02:48] A budget is a statement of values. And then, also used responsibly, effectively, and for what it’s intended to be used for. Finally, I really enjoy building relationships. I pride myself on having high integrity, being dependable and fair, able to hear others’ perspectives, and work well with others.

[00:03:06] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint Morgan Mann to the Budget Committee

[00:03:08] Morgan Mann (Budget Committee): My name is Morgan Mann, and I’m here to express my interest in being a member of the Budget Committee. I volunteered for this role because I feel my background, experience, and community interests add value to the committee and to our community as a whole. I’ve lived in Eugene since 2020 with my wife and 16-year-old daughter.

[00:03:25] We greatly appreciate all the city has to offer and the surrounding environment along with the community members, here in the city. I have a 25-year relationship with the city because my wife was born and raised here, and we visit her parents regularly. It’s exciting to see how the city has evolved over those years.

[00:03:43] I’m currently an executive at Cisco Systems, a large Fortune 100 information technology company. My professional focus over the last 15 years has been in the cybersecurity domain. In that domain, I’ve worked extensively in business operations, finance, and strategy. Until recently, I was the chief operating officer of Cisco Security Business Group, where I was responsible for a $1 billion operating budget in a $4 billion revenue business. This included strategic planning, budgeting, resource prioritization, portfolio management, and acquisitions.

[00:04:16] In addition to my work at Cisco, I’m a venture partner with the Oregon Venture Fund. This fund invests in Oregon-based startup companies to unleash the region’s talent and capital. It’s a great way to bring more high-paying jobs to Oregon and improve our community.

[00:04:32] Finally, I’ve served for close to 30 years in the active and reserve components of the United States Marine Corps. I retired in 2019 as a colonel, having an amazing opportunity to serve our country and work alongside some of the best young men and women this country has to offer.

[00:04:48] I volunteered for this committee because I feel my background can add value. I believe in service and the need to contribute as a citizen to one’s community, and I feel this is a great way for me to accomplish this. I envision three areas where I can contribute. Number one: Help recommend an effective balance of public funding for public safety, social services, and public works, while not overburdening the community with taxes.

[00:05:11] Number two: Recommend a budget that supports economic growth, that expands the tax base to ensure we have future revenues to provide the service, the services worthy of this city being an amazing place to live and raise a family.

[00:05:23] Number three: Contribute to the long-range infrastructure plan to ensure the city has a roadmap for being a competitive place for early career individuals and families to get a job, live affordably and raise a family. In conclusion, I hope to serve our community and contribute to keeping Eugene a great place to live, work, and play.

[00:05:44] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint Britni D’Eliso, to the Civilian Review Board.

[00:05:47] Britni D’Eliso (Civilian Review Board): My name is Britni D’Eliso, and I’ve lived in Eugene for 17 years. My husband and I met at what is now Bushnell University, and we both fell in love with Eugene and decided to stay. Even though all of our fellow graduates moved on, we knew that Eugene was here and the place for us. We’re raising our two children here in the 4J School District, and we’re deeply committed to this community.

[00:06:07] I currently work with Lane County Health and Human Services in the Behavioral Health Division as a behavioral health project manager supporting the development of our crisis service expansion, specifically the Crisis Stabilization Center that’s in development is the project that I’m primarily supporting.

[00:06:24] Additionally, I volunteer as a member of the Trauma Healing Project, serve as a trauma-informed trainer for our community, and involved multiple times throughout the week with my local faith community and occasionally as a Kidsports coach for one of my kiddos when no one else would volunteer.

[00:06:41] In my current role with Lane County as a project manager, I’m trained as a mental health professional and therapist, and I’ve worked in community mental health, primarily supporting individuals who are members of the Oregon Health Plan, for the past 10 years. Through my work, I have had a front row seat to the intersection between the criminal justice system and the mental health system, as you heard me talk about a bit before, which is ripe with opportunities for improvement.

[00:07:01] As my career has transitioned from providing direct care as a therapist, to working as a behavioral health care system strategist and project manager, I’ve had the chance to lean in and support increased coordination and collaboration of these systems to better serve the individuals that are often caught in between them.

[00:07:17] I’ve convened numerous committees and work groups with health care professionals, law enforcement officers, local court representatives, individuals with lived experience, all at the table to reach a common goal of improved care for our community members.

[00:07:31] It’s this experience that has prompted my interest in the Civilian Review Board, as I have developed a passion for systemic work and a unique interest in helping our local criminal justice system become a better partner with health care providers as well as other systems in proximity. I would like to serve on this board to provide a mental health perspective and to help ensure that those involved on both sides of the criminal justice systems are providing informed humane and consistent engagement that aligns with the broader systems throughout our community.

[00:07:59] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint Martha Baldwin to the Human Rights Commission.

[00:08:02] Martha Baldwin (Human Rights Commission): I’m interested in serving on the Human Rights Commission. My husband, three sons, and I moved here almost two years ago from the Midwest. Hence the accent you’ll hear while I’m speaking tonight. Since moving here, I’ve had the opportunity to work for the city of Eugene and their Community Development Division from March 2022 through June 2023, and most recently, I was given the opportunity to work for Sponsors, Inc.

[00:08:25] For those of you unfamiliar with Sponsors, we are a nationally-renowned not-for-profit that works with the formerly incarcerated in order to help them successfully re-enter the community. In addition, I have volunteered over the last two winters with Egan Warming Center. I’ve also volunteered with Safe Families for Children Lane County, Santa Clara Church, and Junior League of Eugene.

[00:08:45] My work experience immediately prior to moving to Eugene was at Pillars Inc., a not-for-profit that serves the unhoused through street outreach, shelter, case management, supportive services, and affordable housing. In addition, I have served on the very first Appleton Police Chiefs Community Advisory Board.

[00:09:02] This group was founded by the police department in response to George Floyd’s murder and was a way to engage a diverse group of community members to become more knowledgeable about the policies and procedures of our local police department, as well as offer suggestions about how the police department could create more positive interactions within the community, especially with the Black, Indigenous, and people of color communities.

[00:09:25] I share all of this with you to show that I am deeply passionate about serving the community I live in. Since becoming a Eugenian 21 months ago, I have quickly and strategically become involved in serving my new neighbors, which I consider to be the greater Eugene community. I hope this also shows you my commitment to social equity, civil rights, and human rights.

[00:09:45] I continue to learn about all of these issues through my own personal development, by reading books, watching documentaries, attending seminars, experiencing cultural events, and serving the community. I have also served in a leadership capacity while at the city and at Sponsors in helping bring professional development around equity, accessibility, and human rights to the teams I have worked with and currently work with.

[00:10:09] Having a seat on the Human Rights Commission would allow me to continue to learn while also allowing me an opportunity to share the knowledge I have gained from my work and volunteer experience.

[00:10:20] I would like to end with a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt, one of the first members of the New York Junior League, which eventually became the foundation for the Association of Junior League International:

[00:10:31] “Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places close to home, so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person, the neighborhood he lives in, the school or college he attends, the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity, without discrimination.”

[00:10:58] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint John Bradley to the Human Rights Commission.

[00:11:01] John Bradley (Human Rights Commission): My name is John Bradley, and I’m asking to serve on the Human Rights Commission. Thank you for inviting me to speak this evening. The goals of our Human Rights Commission are noble, to promote the universal human rights and values and principles in city programs and in our community.

[00:11:19] These are the same values and principles that I hold myself as a professional social worker. But more than that, it’s important that we hold these values and implement them in our policies and in our law, because it’s the right thing to do. It’s the right thing to do to advocate for the inherent dignity and worth of the person.

[00:11:41] I’m an advocate for our protected classes and the most vulnerable among us. Since 2008, I’ve been a professional social worker with emphasis on our unhoused veterans and those who experience trauma. Since 2018, I’ve led and currently supervise social workers and other professionals in service to those in need.

[00:12:02] I’m also myself a veteran and a spouse and the father of two children in public schools here in Eugene. Eugene is a city that we have come to know as home and we want our home to be safe for all people, welcoming and caring. Specifically, and like our City Council, I’m encouraged when our Human Rights Commission advocates for evidence-based practices and policies that are not only well-intended, but offer effective means of achieving our goals.

[00:12:33] This requires attention not just to the planning and implementation, but to the essential follow-up study, program evaluation, and necessary course corrections. This also requires effort in working within systems and aligning with people, not against people. I offer the city of Eugene my time and concern for these shared values and principles and effective means of aligning our community to them.

[00:12:59] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint Alaire Fajardo to the Human Rights Commission.

[00:13:02] Alaire Fajardo (Human Rights Commission): Hi, my name is Alaire Fajardo. Thank you so much, council and Mayor Vinis. I truly believe—I’m actually applying for the Human Rights Commission—and I believe my lived experience, along with some of my professional and education, will qualify me for this position.

[00:13:21] I was actually in foster care up until the age of 10, when I was adopted into Junction City, so the Lane County area. I struggled a lot as a teenager, and I, due to trauma and things that had happened, I went on the streets, I was unhoused, I was a teen mother, and it took a lot of people who believed in me, and who saw me for, saw past the trauma that I had sustained, that helped me to become the person I am today.

[00:13:53] So I was able to, after having our daughter at the age of 18, I was able to go on to get my bachelor’s degree in psychology. And since then, I have worked on the school board for Junction City School District. I was able to use my lived experience to be able to help build an equity program out there. So I was one of the first people to help build that program for Junction City.

[00:14:18] We created an equity lens for the students and for the staff to be able to utilize while they’re making important decisions for those students, since I also currently serve on the board for Every Child Lane County, and that’s when I’m able to give back to the foster care community. So we help serve children who are currently in foster care.

[00:14:42] We support DHS and the families, the resource families, who are taking care of these children. So I’d really just be able to love to be able to use my lived experience and the experience that I have had to be able to move forward and be on the Human Rights Commission.

[00:14:58] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint John Fischer to the Sustainability Commission.

[00:15:00] John Fischer (Sustainability Commission): John Fischer, and I’m applying for the Sustainability Commission. Lived here since 1985. I’ve been doing this work for a long time. I have a long list of things that have educated me. I’m a master recycler, master composter, master food preserver. I’ve taken a sustainable landscape course, master gardener/pruner, and I took the climate master class that was initially offered here a few years ago.

[00:15:21] I do a little radio thing on KLCC about sustainable living or ‘Living Less Unsustainably,’ as I call it. I write for the magazine, Eugene Magazine. I’m taking the Sustainable Citizen course. I work with BRING, and I have a good relationship with folks at Lane County Waste Management.

[00:15:38] The reasons I would like to do this are to collaborate and learn from some other people. I’ve done a lot of this on my own to some degree, and help learn what we can do to make the city less unsustainable, and then provide that information for council to make climate-informed decisions and rules and ordinances.

[00:15:56] The goals I have that are more specific are to kind of re-institute, if it’s possible, the Climate Masters program where we used to go to people’s homes, and we would review either their landscape decisions or their transportation decisions or their home energy decisions, and we could make recommendations.

[00:16:12] I don’t know why that program has fallen to the wayside, but it’s not taking place anymore. But it seemed like a good sustainability thing. I’d like to see us reduce food waste somehow in Eugene and more specifically in homes than in restaurants and composting. And I’d like to see us do something educational just to get people to stop throwing away best-if-used-by food and that sort of thing.

[00:16:34] And then the last thing I would like to really see get pressured more or come to fruition more would be have multifamily units have better recycling and composting opportunities because it tends to get all thrown away. The last thing I would mention is, if there’s a large cadre of people who want to be on the Sustainability Commission, I think you should choose young people first, because it’s a lot of old people doing this kind of work, and we need more young people in there.

[00:17:01] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to appoint Anthony Baronti to the Toxics Board.

[00:17:04] Anthony Baronti: My name is Anthony Baronti and I would like to be considered for the Toxics Board. I’m a member of the regulated community, yet I do not speak for my employer. Outside of a few years in the naval service and traveling, I’m a native Oregonian. I’ve lived in Eugene for most of my life.

[00:17:24] One of my favorite pastimes as a child was to go fishing with my dad, and we used to go up to the McKenzie and I asked him, ‘Why do we go up to the McKenzie? Why don’t we just go to the Willamette River? It’s closer.’ You see, my dad grew up before there was a Clean Water Act. The Willamette River wasn’t that great back then. His answer was simply, ‘It’s polluted.’

[00:17:46] This led me to a path of getting a bachelor’s in chemistry, a master’s in business and sustainable business practices, and I’m now on eight years of government regulations in the private sector.

[00:18:00] My first position in environmental regulations was not the same way most people get them, which is, I was hired as a process engineer and then I volunteered for it. And my life got complicated. The next day, I was in charge of OSHA, RCRA (Resource Conservation and Recovery Act), Community Right to Know, Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, and a whole host of things that I had to learn by myself.

[00:18:25] Which leads me to one of my guiding principles: Compliance through simplicity. One of my—something that’s really important to me is to have clear instructions and simplistic instructions for the regulated community, so they can be compliant.

[00:18:41] Which leads me to the job that I have now, that I was fortunate to get in January of 2020, which is a very interesting time to be learning new and different regulations. I think it’s fair to say that the regulated community and the regulators were not prepared for COVID. We were not. We did our best.

[00:19:02] However, a goal of mine is to build resiliency in our systems. For, set the optimal circumstances. How do we maintain communication during our next crisis? How do we maintain our programs?

[00:19:18] Today as a member of a regulated community and a citizen of Eugene, I know how important a compliant, resilient, and simplistic Community Right to Know program is.

[00:19:27] John Q: With the rest of the appointments, Councilor Matt Keating:

[00:19:30] Councilor Matt Keating: Move to re-appoint Jesse Maldonado to the Budget Committee… move to re-appoint Clay Neal to the Civilian Review Board…move to re-appoint Daniel Sharp to the Toxics Board… move to reappoint Daniel Isaacson to the Planning Commission… move to reappoint David Edrington to the Historic Review Board… move to appoint Hailey Pratt to the Historic Review Board… move to re-appoint Jensina Hawkins to the Police Commission… move to re-appoint William Parham to the Police Commission… move to appoint Alan Lehman to the Police Commission… move to appoint Tina Thorsen to the Police Commission…move to appoint Jack Radey to the Police Commission…move to appoint Emeilia Foulkes to the Police Commission…move to appoint Jacy Price to the Police Commission… move to re-appoint Sharon Roberts to the Whilamut Citizen Planning Committee … move to re-appoint David Sonnichsen to the Whilamut Citizen Planning Committee… move to appoint Nick Sloss to the Whilamut Citizen Planning Committee.

[00:20:20] John Q: Mayor Lucy Vinis congratulated the new appointees.

[00:20:23] Mayor Lucy Vinis: I just want to say that’s a lot of new appointments and it is a credit to our community to have that many people step up willing to serve. Many of those are demanding roles. They’re incredibly important roles, and as council and as mayor, we conducted a lot of interviews. We talked to many more people than we just appointed.

[00:20:42] So, I often say, we have an embarrassment of riches here. There are many, many talented and willing people who are prepared to step up and do good work on behalf of the community. And so we thank you all, thank you all for applying and congratulate those of you who got an appointment this year.