That was the voice of Tina Marquis an incumbent candidate for Boulder city council introducing herself at a recent forum.

Welcome to the Better Boulder Hearts and Minds Podcast. Folks, voting is underway and it's time to make important choices about city council candidates. There are many great candidates to choose from and I hope you will consider the candidates endorsed by Better Boulder. We endorsed seven city council candidates and we hope this series of episodes is helpful for you to get to know them. Our slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our seventh candidate interview in this series is with Tina Marquis. We met on a Tuesday evening at the main branch of the Boulder Public Library and talked about the need for family friendly housing, vacancy tax, and fiscal responsibility among other subjects. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Tina Marquis.

Welcome to the Better Boulder Hearts and Minds Podcast. Folks, my ballot has arrived! I'm so thankful for mail-in ballots where I can sit in the comfort of my own home, open it up, read through it carefully, research the candidates and ballot measures and vote carefully. I remember 20 some years ago walking into a church building lobby with a vague idea of some of the candidates I would vote for, seeing my ballot for the first time and making weighty decisions about issues I had some uniformed, prejudiced intuitions about and either voting when I thought I knew enough to weigh in or leaving it blank when I did it. That's no way to vote and I'm so thankful for the movers and shakers who had the political will to make universal mail-in voting a reality in Colorado. I hope it goes nationwide.

So, we have our ballots - it's time to vote! There are many great candidates to choose from and I hope you will consider the candidates endorsed by Better Boulder. We endorsed seven city council candidates and we hope this series of episodes is helpful as you get to know them and make your choices. Our slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our sixth candidate interview in this series is with Jill Grano. We met on a Saturday afternoon at her place in North Boulder and sat on her back porch and talked about fiscal responsibility and housing, among other subjects. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Jill Grano.

Welcome to the Better Boulder Hearts and Minds Podcast. Folks, I received a text message from Boulder County notifying me that my ballot is in the mail which means it's time to make big decisions about who and what to vote for. There are many great candidates to choose from and I hope you will consider the candidates endorsed by Better Boulder. We endorsed seven city council candidates and we hope this series of episodes is helpful as you get to know them and make your choices. Our slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our fifth candidate interview in this series is with Ryan Schuchard who is running for reelection after serving his first term. We met on a Saturday morning at the main branch of the Boulder Public Library and decided to bike up Boulder Creek a ways where found a couple of logs to sit on in the shade. We talked about housing, transportation, wildfire resilience, and fiscal responsibility among other subjects. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Ryan Schuchard.

Folks, I received a text message from Boulder County notifying me that my ballot is in the mail. I don't know about you, but I plan to cheat like hell by filling out my ballot and dropping it off at one of the Boulder County ballot drop boxes so that it can be counted along with all of the others. It won't be easy because there are a lot of important choices to make and great candidates to choose from. This year Better Boulder endorsed seven city council candidates that we hope you will consider and we hope this series of episodes is helpful as make your choices. Our slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our fourth candidate interview in this series is with Sam Fuqua who is a first-time city council candidate. We met on a Tuesday evening at the NoBo branch of the Boulder Public Library. We talked about his service on the board for BVSD, his extensive work with the library district, and affordable housing, among others. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Sam Fuqua.

It's election season, ballots will be mailed soon, and it's time to get to know your candidates. We hope you are enjoying this series of Better Boulder endorsed candidates. The selection of our endorsed slate required two thirds of our board to vote in favor and this year we endorsed one mayoral candidate, Aaron Brockett, and seven city council candidates. This slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our third candidate interview in this series is with Aaron Brockett who is running for Mayor. We met on a Monday evening at the Wild Sage community center in the Holiday neighborhood. There were children running about and doors opening and closing - but hopefully most of that is minimized here. We talked about his accomplishments as Mayor, housing, transportation, the city budget, the Alpine / Balsam project, the bond measure, and the role of mayor, among other subjects. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Aaron Brockett.

It's election season and ballots go out early next month and so it's time to get to know your candidates. I think one of the most exciting things I get to do as a member of Better Boulder is to participate in the candidate endorsement process. It's always interesting to get to know the candidates and to see who will garner the support needed for an endorsement. The selection of our endorsed slate requires two thirds of our board to vote in favor and this year we endorsed one mayoral candidate and seven city council candidates. This slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. And this was a heavy lift because there is a large field of candidates this time around. But we didn't do all of the work for you because you will only get to vote for five city council candidates. So, to help you get to know our endorsed candidates better, we are going to interview as many of them as we can in the next few weeks for the podcast. We will try to keep these episodes short and sweet so they are easier to get through and we hope you find them useful as you try to decide who to vote for. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our second candidate in this series is Jamillah Richmond. We met on a Sunday morning and sat in a beautiful garden that she helped create called the Giving Grove Food Forest at Tantra Lake. We talked about why she's running for city council, the voices that go unheard in our communities, how she learned Spanish and other languages, and the municipal bond measure on the ballot, among others. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Jamillah Richmond.

It's election season and ballots go out early next month and so it's time to get to know your candidates. I think one of the most exciting things I get to do as a member of Better Boulder is to participate in the candidate endorsement process. It's always interesting to get to know the candidates and to see who will garner the support needed for an endorsement. The selection of our endorsed slate requires two thirds of our board to vote in favor and this year we endorsed one mayoral candidate and seven city council candidates. This slate is the result of numerous one-on-one conversations, in-person interviews in front of the entire board, lively discussions, and multiple rounds of voting. And this was a heavy lift because there is a large field of candidates this time around. But we didn't do all of the work for you because you will only get to vote for five city council candidates. So, to help you get to know our endorsed candidates better, we are going to interview as many of them as we can in the next few weeks for the podcast. We will try to keep these episodes short and sweet so they are easier to get through and we hope you find them useful as you try to decide who to vote for. To see our full list of candidates, please visit betterboulder.com and click "Elections".

Our first candidate in this series is Tara Winer. We met on a Saturday morning and sat outside her house and talked for well over an hour but only recorded about 20 minutes of it. We talked about why she's running for re-election, the Core Arterial Network, the municipal bond measure on the ballot, and responsible governance. We hope you enjoy this conversation with Tara Winer.

Did you know that RTD is governed by a 15-member board of directors that are publicly elected? If you live in Boulder, Niwot, Superior, or Louisville, or anywhere in Boulder County west of Boulder then you probably live in RTD Director District O. Elections for these positions are often uncontested and sleepy affairs with little attention given to them. However, this year we have the good fortune of having two excellent candidates campaigning for your vote. The two candidates are Audrey DeBarros, who is the executive director of Communing Solutions a regional transportation management organization that serves the Northwest Metro Area including Boulder and Jack Rosenthal who is a daily RTD rider and a data driven technologist. On Monday, July 27th, Better Boulder in partnership with Community Cycles hosted a live candidate forum for RTD Director District O featuring both candidates. The forum began with opening statements from both candidates which was followed by Q&A on a variety of RTD related topics. Please note that Community Cycles as a 501c3 does not endorse candidates. Better Boulder, on the other hand, is a 501c6 and frequently endorses candidates and ballot measures. However, at the time of this forum and subsequent release of this episode, Better Boulder has not endorsed either candidate. Please visit betterboulder.com later this fall for a complete list of endorsed candidates and ballot measures. Sue Prant who was featured on this podcast in episode 2 was the MC for the evening and read the questions. The first part of the forum featured prepared questions that the candidates were provided ahead of time and the second part of the forum feature questions submitted by audience members. We hope you enjoy this live recording of the RTD Director District O candidate forum.

• (00:02:26) - Opening statement - Audrey
• (00:07:01) - Opening statement - Jack
• (00:10:59) - Top 5 problems question - Audrey
• (00:14:00) - Top 5 problems question - Jack
• (00:16:42) - Board culture change question - Jack
• (00:18:30) - Board culture change question - Audrey
• (00:21:32) - General manager qualities question - Jack
• (00:23:33) - General manager qualities question - Audrey
• (00:25:42) - Bus stop accessibility and placemaking question - Audrey
• (00:28:35) - Bus stop accessibility and placemaking question - Jack
• (00:31:06) - Ridership recovery question - Audrey
• (00:34:28) - Ridership recovery question - Jack
• (00:36:30) - Bus electrification - Jack
• (00:38:47) - Bus electrification - Audrey
• (00:41:36) - Part 2
• (00:42:18) - Best book on transit question - Audrey
• (00:42:37) - Best book on transit question - Jack
• (00:43:12) - Budget cuts question - Audrey
• (00:44:20) - Budget cuts question - Jack
• (00:45:43) - Paratransit challenges question - Jack
• (00:48:04) - Paratransit challenges question - Audrey
• (00:49:55) - Bus and bike shelters question - Audrey
• (00:51:50) - Bus and bike shelters question - Jack
• (00:54:18) - District O focus question - Audrey
• (00:55:46) - District O focus question - Jack
• (00:57:55) - Closing remarks - Audrey
• (00:59:24) - Closing remarks - Jack