Marcia Martin is running for re-election to the Ward 2 seat on the Longmont City Council, saying there is plenty of unfinished business she wants to complete during a second-four year term.
“I understood that as a first time council member there was a lot I didn’t know,” said Martin,who was elected to the council in 2017. “That’s true of any public office, the first term is a learning experience. Now, I have a very clear picture of what needs to be done.
“I am not driven by ideology but I will work for the entire city,” Martin said, whose career includes being a systems engineer, product architect, inventor, development manager and author.
Martin said she helped get rid of fracking within city limits and backs ongoing air quality efforts including air monitoring. Martin successfully lobbied the city council to push Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser to investigate allegations that the state’s air quality watchdog falsified data and approved permits for industrial operations “at all costs.”
If re-elected in the fall, Martin’s top priority is to create more affordable housing and workforce housing for residents. “We absolutely have a housing emergency in the city,” Martin said.
Teachers should be able to live in the same city as their students while emergency responders should also live in the city where they work. “They would be better rested and be better in their jobs if they live in the neighborhood they work,” Martin said.
Martin said she will continue to push hard to achieve sustainability energy goals set by the city, including electrifying homes and businesses in Longmont, signaling a decades-long effort to cut consumer use of fossil fuels by 2030.
Martin and fellow councilmember, Joan Peck, in March, were named as city council liaisons to the yet-to-be formed electrification feasibility committee. The eight-person body will oversee research and develop a phased plan for electrification, producing options the city can pursue while ensuring no one in Longmont will be left out of the effort, according to a city staff report to the city council.
She also wants to create a more “more agile, cleaner public transit” system in Longmont to replace RTD’s larger diesel buses. The city could renegotiate with RTD to create Longmont’s own, high-frequency intra city bus system, Martin said.
Martin said the city did a good job of offering short-term help to businesses hit hard by COVID-19 shutdowns. She now supports the city’s long-term efforts to develop a STEAM —Science, Technology, Education, and Arts — facility in the lower downtown area, south of First Avenue between Pratt Parkway and Martin Street.
“The STEAM redevelopment program would inject a lot of money into the Longmont economy without injecting a new population into the economy,” Martin said.
COVID-19 forced the city council to go to all virtual meetings. As the virus wanes, the city is now considering allowing in-person meetings in June or July, Martin said.
Martin said she is looking forward to interacting once again with the public during the meetings. “I really want to get back to that interactive democracy,” she said.
