The City Council recently approved the San Pablo Avenue Specific Plan, a vision for the future of this important commercial corridor. This plan provides a new framework within which new development projects can be built to meet Albany's housing growth needs and continue to provide space to meet the services and retail needs of the community. Read more about the San Pablo Specific Plan here.

Our Commitment: As City Council members, Albany Forward candidates look forward to continuing implementing and refining this framework for a more sustainable, resilient and inclusive commercial corridor.

Albany is a community with a gridded network of streets that stitch together our neighborhoods, commercial corridors, schools and parks. Over the past decade and a half the community has been working to increase safety and expand the mobility options available for everyone in the community. These efforts have included improvements such as:

Redesigning intersections to make them safer for motorists.

Traffic calming measures along street to slow traffic in residential neighborhoods

Improvements to the Ohlone greenway for pedestrians, joggers, people pushing strollers, skaters and bicyclists.

Buchanan Street separated bike lanes and sidewalk connects the waterfront with San Pablo Avenue

Additional Measures Albany Forward will focus on

Strengthen commitment to traffic calming measures in our residential neighborhoods

Increase our street tree canopy and tree pruning

Increase lighting on our streets, in particular at the intersections to our major connector streets.

Increasing the safety and comfort of people walking, pushing a stroller, and riding a scooter or bicycle.

Our Commitment: As City Council members, Albany Forward Candidates are committed to providing Albany more choices in mobility, in particular focusing on the need for electric vehicle charging stations along our corridors and increasing resiliency and safety of our transportation networks.

We are in a global climate crisis, and Albany is no exception to the consequences. As a dedicated scientist and ecologist, much of my life work centers around ensuring the ecological integrity of our planet, while finding balance with human needs and survival. Albany has the power and opportunity to position itself as both a regional and state leader in climate policy and climate equity. The city of Albany has already established its strategic vision for Climate Action & Adaptation Plan, which can be found here.

Our commitment:

If elected to city council, we vow to ensure the ecological integrity of Albany, and push towards reducing the city’s carbon footprint. Additionally, we plan to be responsible land stewards of the waterfront and precious green spaces like Albany Hill. We commit to be mindful in acknowledging the legacy of the original land Indigenous stewards, whose descendants still interface and advocate for the protection of such spaces today.

We plan to work intentionally and fruitfully with the School Board, and ensure the youth in Albany are afforded every chance possible to be empowered. We strive to actualize their potential and listen to the needs of such community members who represent a significant portion of the city’s population, and represent the future of Albany’s direction.

Our commitment:

We commit to invest in youth, and interface with all appropriate stake holders to catalyze change that is socially and culturally responsive to the needs of our youth.

Public safety is undeniably paramount for a community to move forward and build trust among each other. Public safety though, also entails a respectful dose of public transparency and accountability. The City of Albany is set to initiate our Policing Commission, with the intention of also increasing better community engagement. No city or municipality is immune to moments of enduring lessons learned - including Albany. We have an opportunity to lead the way in our county and greater region, to showcase what true community engagement and dialogue can look like with respect to public safety.

My Commitment:

I commit to fostering accountability, transparency, and effective dialogue among community leaders, our neighbors, and public safety officials. Furthermore, I commit to nominating a community member to serve on the Policing Commission who represents diverse spaces and experiences, to ensure such critically needed perspective is not excluded from the decision-making table when it concerns the commission making recommendations to the council.