Candidate Levy brings a wealth of experience to commissioner race

One Friday morning, Claire Levy sat in her basement, sewing masks for health care workers in Boulder County. She lives in district one of Boulder County and is currently running unopposed for its county commissioner seat. "I think right now, I just feel like my campaign and my needs are unimportant relative to others'," she said.

Levy has been a longtime participant in local and state government. She has worked as an assistant county attorney, a citizen activist, a member of the state legislature and an executive director of a Denver nonprofit group.

"The time seemed right [and] I decided to run for the position I've always wanted to hold...I really think of elected office as public service and I'm just really eager to be back, spending my time making boco the best place for people to live, work, and raise a family."

When the district one commissioner seat became open, it seemed like the opportunity Levy was looking for. She explained that county commissioners have the unique ability to both make policy and implement policy, and that by doing so, commissioners are able to work with various levels of government. "What you do extends beyond policy, into the practical nuts and bolts of what affects people's lives."

After leaving the state legislature in 2013, Levy wanted to get back to local issues. In an attempt to better understand the community and constantly changing social dynamics, she started with research. For the last six years, Levy said that she has been educating herself on a wide variety of social issues, especially as they relate to race and implicit bias. These are topics she believes are important for everybody to understand. With that knowledge, she hopes to bring a sense of consciousness not only to her leadership role, but also to her life.

To further her social, community-based education, Levy began by reaching out to the community to see what issues seemed to be common sources of concern. While she had previously met with many western Boulder County residents during her legislative terms, she wanted to branch out for more perspectives.

"I met with as many people as I could think of to find out if they knew who I was, asking what issues they were interested in," she said. "[Being a county commissioner] is a partisan seat...my process has been reaching out to constituents and supporting them."

A few of her meetings were particularly memorable for her, including a meeting with a group of elderly Nederland residents who were concerned about housing. In Superior, she was made aware of how concerned residents were with the Jefferson Parkway. She also met with farmers who explained they were struggling to maintain their land, and with members of Longmont's Latino community who expressed their concern about representation with local government.

She has since had to suspend her group meetings as well as her one-on-one meetings with constituents in light of COVID, but she has continued to reach out to them. In addition to holding Zoom meetings, she has set up a mailing list that not only gives information about her campaign, but tries to provide people with resources for those affected by the pandemic.

"I'm a person who just likes to roll up my sleeves and solve problems, particularly with COVID, the opportunity to play a constructive role in helping people come out of this....So I'm sort of impatient to get to work already."

Not only is she excited to get to work on her goals of affordable housing, promoting financial stability, and dealing with climate change, she is also excited to be part of the "team," helping her fellow commissioners achieve their goals. "People are so used to seeing it [politics] in partisan terms," Levy said. "A lot of what the county does, like road maintenance and enrolling people in SNAP and Medicaid, are not partisan and are really important things. County commissioners really have to act as a team... It's important for people to come into the job from a perspective of being collaborative and being teammates."

Collaboration and support are very important to Levy, but she recognizes that not everyone sees government and politics the same way. But, while she is excited to work with the community, she admitted that she sometimes worries about the polarization that occurs along the way.

She hopes everyone remembers that government officials are people too. Levy is an avid hiker and gardener; she also adopts greyhounds. "People know me by my dogs," she said with a laugh. So even though she knows it's hard to be on the receiving end of criticism, she is used to it from her years in public service.

It is this experience that she hopes to bring to the board and to the community, especially as it comes out of the current crisis. In fact, she said, "I think this crisis shows how important local government is in keeping people safe. It's the local people that are the ones that are actually there. I hope people really remember and appreciate that."

More information about Levy's campaign can be found at http://www.claireforbouldercounty.org/.