AFFORDABILITY

High rents, stagnant wages, and steadily rising prices at the grocery store and gas station have created a cost-of-living crisis in Tempe. The price of rent in Tempe increased over 70% from 2010-2022, and 2025 is on track to have the second-most evictions filed in any year since 2000, just behind 2024. 

Tempe's housing expenses are 37% higher than the national average and the utility prices are 7% higher than the national average. Across the board, Tempe’s total cost of childcare, food, healthcare, housing, transportation, utilities, and other necessities is 13% higher than the national average.

Minimum wage workers are forced to work multiple jobs and unreasonable hours, just to stay in their hometown. City shelters and cooling stations have shut down at dangerous rates, causing serious harm to newly unhoused families and workers. Tempe is arresting unhoused residents for the crime of existing on our streets, the city is cracking down on mutual aid organizers, and nobody is taking action to hold corporate developers accountable for gentrifying our city.

Thankfully, Tempe has the tools to address this cost-of-living crisis.

To solve Tempe's workforce housing shortage, we can build public housing on public land, subsidize the development of multi-family townhomes, duplexes, triplexes, and establish a residential missing-middle zoning overlay that covers the entire city. 

To keep Tempe Tenants in their homes, we can establish rent controls on city owned, financed, subsidized or insured freeze our unreasonably high rents, and increase funding while expanding access to housing vouchers and rental subsidy programs.

To address Tempe's crisis of homelessness, we can buy and build shelters and non-congregate care facilities, and obtain additional public land to create public housing programs that incorporate the historically successful “housing-first” model of homelessness prevention. 

To address immediate pains felt by Tempe residents experiencing homelessness, we can redirect a tiny fraction (less than 1%) of our $1.7 billion city budget to reopen city shelters and cooling stations. Tempe can also allow generous residents to provide mutual aid without fear of criminal charges by redirecting funds that are currently spent on criminalization.

To eliminate food deserts and provide high-quality meals for Tempe families at below market-rate prices, we can invest in city-owned grocery stores modeled after the historically successful projects in Kansas and Wisconsin. 

To cut down on carbon emissions in our city and provide social mobility for Tempe workers, we can expand our low-cost and no-cost public transportation options like the Orbit bus and the Tempe Streetcar.

To secure public investment in public benefits for generations to come, Tempe can investigate the creation of a public bank or, at least, a non-depository municipal finance corporation that partners with local credit unions to invest public resources in the public good and diversify the city’s revenue streams while protecting our finances from billionaire owned banking conglomerates.

These public projects will do more than reduce expenses for Tempe residents. They will create stable, good-paying, public municipal jobs in construction, finance, retail, and public service. These jobs will stabilize life within Tempe and incentivize our young families to lay down life-long roots.

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

We deserve to live in a safe and healthy world.

If elected, I will introduce legislation to expand public transit options and place solar panels on all publicly owned buildings to decrease carbon emissions and provide Tempe residents with safe sources of renewable energy. I will also introduce legislation that places strict limits on the use of water for the maintenance of non-native plants and corporate luxury developments.

I will also use my platform in the league of cities and towns to fight for an Arizona green new deal and support the repeal of unreasonable preemptions on municipalities that want to enforce green building codes and establish their own solar power programs to move away from gas reliance. 

EDUCATION

I believe that every child is entitled to a free, quality, public education. Rich or poor, black or white, gifted or disabled-all our children deserve the chance to grow, to learn, and to reach their potential. Students and school employees should be honored for their differences in culture, history, language, religion, physical condition, ethnicity, and learning styles. These differences enrich our society.

Tempe is losing public school funding at record rates because of our cost-of-living crisis. Young families are unable to build lives in Tempe because of our cost-of-living crisis. That means class sizes are dwindling, which results in smaller budgets from the state. That means that families are living in school districts outside of Tempe, which results in smaller tax bases to generate revenue for public schools.

At the same time, ESA vouchers are demolishing public education funding in Arizona. The money that goes into charter schools through ESA vouchers could be used to provide better educational opportunities to everyone if they supported public schools.

If elected, I would introduce legislation to enhance our public schools by increasing educator compensation, covering classroom expenses that teachers are practically forced to pay, providing social services to students, and updating our public school campuses.

To empower educational experiences and give our students and families the opportunity to learn on their own time, I would introduce legislation that automatically enrolls Tempe residents in our public library system by issuing virtual library cards, giving Tempe residents immediate access to our library's digital and physical resources. I will also seek to increase funding for our library through grants, bonds, and the redirection of inefficient city expenditures.

CHILDCARE

Childcare is one of the most expensive costs that young families face in America. Covering that cost will improve our economy by putting money back in the pockets of parents.

If elected, I will introduce legislation that creates a free municipal childcare program for Tempe’s new parents and young families to make this city more affordable for everyone. 

RACIAL JUSTICE

Tempe is a diverse city, and our communities of color make this city more vibrant and resilient. 

As a city council member, I will use my office to support Tempe’s Hispanic communities, Latine communities, Black communities, Asian communities, and other communities of color by fighting for policies that address the inequalities created by historically racist laws. To counter the impact of redlining, I will support missing middle residential overlays and subsidies for accessory dwelling units to make our neighborhoods more accessible and more diverse. To address the racist impact of surveillance culture and over-policing, I will fight to prioritize community over criminalization and introduce legislation that will create an office of oversight, accountability, and transparency that will be empowered to investigate and affirmatively address instances of misconduct by Tempe employees.

I will also use my platform to elevate Tempe’s communities of color and hold space in city hall by building coalitions around public celebrations of community leaders, inspiring historical people of color, and public servants of color who currently work for the city of Tempe as city hall staff, and first responders. 

EMERGENCY PROTECTIVE SERVICES

Women, children and LGBTQIA+ individuals in America have struggled against gender-based violence for hundreds of years. As our national dialogue moves further into the alt-right, woman-hating rabbit hole, Tempe needs to chart a different path for our at-risk communities.

If elected, I will introduce legislation creating a city sanctuary shelter for survivors of domestic abuse and their minor children who need to flee abusive partners or captors. I will introduce legislation to deploy social emergency response teams consisting of healthcare professionals and skilled social workers across the city to provide needed empathy and support to women who call out for help.

COVERING THE COSTS

These are not small ideas, and they will require real investments from the city of Tempe.  We can fund these necessary programs through a combination of good governance, efficiency, real property vacancy fees,  and common-sense city tax increases on short term rentals, transient lodgings, commercial leases, and other large-scale business activities.

Our cities don't need fleets of armored cars that can each cost over $500,000. We don't need to waste taxpayer money on policies that criminalize the symptoms of poverty and despair.

If elected, I will always fight for responsible budgets, progressive tax structures, and reasonable spending priorities in Tempe. 

By increasing Tempe's transaction-privilege taxes (aka "city taxes") on corporate development and construction contracting by 2%, we could add $10,000,000 to the city's budget overnight. By increasing city taxes on hotels, motels, and short term residential rentals like Airbnb's by 2%, we could add another $20,000,000. By increasing city transaction-privilege taxes on the leasing of commercial properties by 2%, we could add another $5,000,000. By increasing city taxes on businesses that rent vehicles and transport goods or passengers by 2%, we could add another $1,500,000.

These common sense 2% city tax rate-increases on commercial activities and developments will cover lost city revenues from residential rental taxes and provide financial for public services, social housing, and so much more.

While fighting for city funding to ensure that our shelters and supportive services are always properly funded, I will continue to use my voice and platform to push for the repeal of overreaching state preemptions that restrict city taxes on billionaires and big business. 

Arizona must empower cities to tax the transfer of real property worth more than $1,000,000. This would increase our city budgets by tens of millions of dollars, and that money could (and should) be legally earmarked for shelters, services, and permanent supportive housing.