June 3 Election
When opposition to the recently proposed Royal Gorge development began to surface, heated emotions began to take the stage. Yet Jennifer Montgomery – opposed to the proposed plan – was a calm, articulate voice amidst the clamor. As a 20-year Donner Summit resident, she talked about the significant impacts on the existing community, clearly and with details. Montgomery then took the discussion further, along with many others, suggesting that perhaps a community plan for the Summit region was in order. Summit residents talked to Nevada and Placer County Supervisors about developing such a plan. When they talked to Nevada County, they ‘got great response and support to do a community plan.’ But when they talked to the Placer Supervisor, they felt ‘essentially stonewalled.’
‘We were told we didn’t need a community plan, because the developer – the largest landowner on the Summit – would create a project that would really be a community plan,’ Montgomery said. The Donner Summit community ‘didn’t feel that this was right, that this was not how a community plan should work.’
Montgomery was spurred to start looking at the rest of the county, realizing that similar issues were happening across Placer County. Looking into the Forest Ranch proposal in Foresthill and the Homewood proposal on the West shore of Tahoe, Montgomery saw the same issues as Royal Gorge surfacing as well as a recurring sentiment from residents that the county was non-responsive. Although these places weren’t officially in her ‘backyard,’ she realized that really, they were tied together.
‘These are places that are part of my home, part of my ecosystem, if you will. Once I started looking into it, I realized this is not a Donner Summit issue. We are just part of a much larger picture where the same issues keep coming up,’ she said.
With that, Montgomery felt the pull toward the political arena and is one of three candidates for the 5th District Placer Country Supervisor in next Tuesday’s election.
‘The decisions that Supervisors make really directly impact communities and individuals on a much greater level than decisions made on the state and federal level,’ she said in a phone interview. And although separated by some 70 miles in places, the communities of District 5 are faced with similar issues, Montgomery said.
‘Hot button issues in District 5 are strangely, even though we think of ourselves as different, the same as the rest of the District. People are concerned about overdevelopment, loss of rural heritage, wildfires – I heard it in Meadow Vista, Foresthill, Donner Summit…we share the same issues,’ Montgomery said. ‘It’s time we look at making some changes in direction, in taking a new approach in how we make decisions and deal with things.’
When asked of her priorities if elected, she focused on development, transit, and wildfire.
On development: ‘I would definitely want to take a much harder look at what is and what isn’t approved for development in this county. The real basis would be community input to find out what they want and need.’
On transit: ‘With fuel costs going through the roof, we really need to implement a world-class public transit system – more trains along the I-80 corridor and in the west end of the county, a lot more buses…We could be taking people off the roads, but we don’t have the infrastructure in place.’ For Tahoe, which direly needs more public transit but has significant limitations, Montgomery said some ideas to explore include waterborne transit or reinstating some of the old rail lines.
On wildfire: ‘It’s a huge issue.’ She promoted forest thinning and using resulting biomass for creating green energy that could be sent into the grid.
Montgomery believes, in the end, these issues are actually intertwined and should be looked at from a holistic perspective.
‘All of these issues are tied into each other, transit is tied into wildfire and it’s all tied into development. It’s an integrated whole – we haven’t really looked at it in the past and we need to,’ she said.
And of course, another big issue is the projected $23 million budget shortfall for the upcoming fiscal year. While out campaigning, many residents asked Montgomery, ‘With all the development we had and all the mitigation fees, and tax dollars, and real estate fees, and property taxes, why do we have budget shortfall? That’s just crazy, where did that money go?’
Montgomery said the board will need to take a ‘very long hard look’ at what happened and what to do. While acknowledging that it is a scary proposition to walk into the potentially contentious situation, she feels her experience as a business owner taught her, ‘I cannot spend more than I earn.’ In her mind the current model, even nationwide, has moved from fiscal responsibility to ‘spending everything that is coming in and that is just not wise.’
To revitalize the local Tahoe community, ‘we need to figure out a way to move from the second homeowner model. Nothing against second homeowners, but it is not a model that supports businesses,’ she said. ‘It’s the full-time residents that really drive the businesses. Without them, I don’t see a great future for the lake. We’ve got to bring back full-time, year-round residents back to our community.’
Montgomery has lived in Placer County for 17 years, and has been the owner of her own business since 2001. The business provides concierge services to second homeowners – many of her clients support and have donated to her campaign.
One of Montgomery’s key catchphrase goals in her campaign is to ‘restore transparency to government.’ Montgomery wants to focus on ‘reinvigorating’ the Municipal Advisory Committees, a hot topic of the race. She said the true purpose of MACs has been waylaid. What was once a two-way street between constituents and the county has been reduced to one-way communication, coming from the county. She believes the solution is bringing fresh blood to the Committees, to represent the entire community.
‘I would make sure that people that really represented a broad spectrum of the communities, not just large business leaders and political cronies, but people whose opinions I may not necessarily agree with but who are well thought-of and well-respected members of the community,’ Montgomery said. She would also continue the coffee-talks, as currently hosted by Bruce Kranz, but she would vary the times, to be available for all people.
The biggest challenge in her campaign, Montgomery says, has been getting her name out to people. Utilizing ‘traditional grassroots’ techniques – a website, standing in front of post offices and schools, a slew of community events and word of mouth – the process was easier than she expected. While she admits other challengers are probably ‘substantially better funded,’ Montgomery said her campaign is doing an incredible job with the money they do have. One issue she wants to clear up, however is a rumor circulating that if elected, she ‘would take everyone’s guns away from them.’ A supporter of the Second Amendment, she finds the rumor comical, since as a Supervisor, she would have no power to do so even if she wanted. And for those who also ‘detest’ robo-calls, rest assured that Montgomery shares your sentiment.
Montgomery’s campaign revolves around the slogan, ‘Preserve, Protect, Restore and Respect,’ a shortened version of ‘preserving the county’s natural assets, protecting property rights, restoring responsive government to the people and respecting existing communities.’
‘If we replace Supervisor Kranz, there is a real potential for changing that board dramatically, because the balance of power will shift. I truly believe that; it’s not a pipe dream. It really can happen,’ Montgomery said.
