Santa Monica has a vigorous local democracy and we expect our public officials to seek out and learn from all community members. I take that commitment as a sacred responsibility:

• I listen to everybody: residents, neighborhood groups, business people in Santa Monica, community members with issues that aren't being resolved, and anybody who reaches out to me - and I pledge to continue to do so.

• Working with you, your neighbors, our City employees, and those who work and operate businesses in our city to achieve common goals makes our government work.

In office I successfully initiated several changes to promote more transparent government, including the amendment to the City's municipal code that requires financial disclosure for all initiative and referendum campaigns during the signature gathering period, instead of the regular calendar-based dates as required by state law, which don't necessarily correspond to a local timeline.

To promote a more informed electorate and to decrease the role of money in politics, I've successfully promoted an substantial increase in coverage on CityTV of ballot qualified candidates, valued at $12,000 to $15,000 worth of coverage per candidate today, as candidate statements, interviews and forums are broadcast for a month before the election on CityTV.

To increase voter turnout in special elections, I initiated the successful two-day weekend City Council special election in April 1999 and the all-postal mail initiative election in May 2003.

To promote the public's right to know, in the late 1990s I successfully worked to get the School Board's meeting's broadcast on CityTV, something we take for granted today, but was not the case until them.

To promote more representative local elections, I have promoted ranked-choice voting for our local elections.

To promote more understanding and transparency in our city budgeting process, before the budget was on the internet, I initiated the 'Bring the Budget to the People' program, where City Staff tabled with the budget at our neighborhood farmer's markets.

To promote more representative local elections, I've promoted ranked-choice voting elections for Santa Monica.