Councilmember from Burlingame seeks Congress role

“My experience is exactly what’s needed right now in Congress,” Beach said during an interview last week. “The perspective of a military veteran, a local government leader who knows what issues matter the most … and a mom and a woman.”

Beach is running against South San Francisco Assemblymember Kevin Mullin, San Mateo County Supervisor David Canepa and Republican Gus Mattammal. The Daily Journal will be profiling the major candidates and running a story on the various issues of the race.

Born and raised in Long Meadow, Massachusetts, Beach attended the University of Notre Dame on an Army ROTC scholarship, earning a double major degree in government and Spanish. In the Army, she rose to the rank of captain, and was deployed in Saudi Arabia for a tour and spent 13 months in Korea. She trained in Texas, Kentucky, North Carolina and Georgia and graduated from the Army Airborne parachute school.

“One of the most important things people in the military know how to do is work with people from all walks of life, every different corner of this country, in many cases every different corner of the world,” she said. Just 17% of members of Congress have served in the military, a number Beach pointed to as insufficient amid “decisions on foreign policy, matters of war and peace, whether or not we send our daughters and sons into harm’s way.”

Additionally, Beach emphasized only 28% of representatives in the House are women.

“Look what’s happening across the country right now in terms of women’s reproductive rights,” she said. “We need women in Washington, D.C., working on codifying Roe v. Wade, championing things like affordable child care, championing the [Equal Rights Amendment] … I don’t want to see us lose more representation when Congresswoman Speier retires.”

Beach said, as a Catholic, she would be “a particularly strong asset” in the pro-choice debate, as someone who “understands the other side.”

Beach moved to the Bay Area in 2000, first to San Francisco. After working in the semiconductor industry, she moved with her husband and children to Burlingame in 2008, and became active in volunteer work including with Burlingame’s United Methodist Church nursery school and later with the school district’s education foundation. She was recruited onto the education foundation’s board of directors in 2011 and served as its president from 2013 to 2015.

In 2015, Beach was inspired to run for City Council as Burlingame was working to update its general plan, a task that provided opportunities to improve the city’s public transit and bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure.

“I’ve always been a sustainable transportation champion, I’m an avid cyclist,” Beach said. She said her two teenage children use a mixture of bikes, shuttles, SamTrans buses and Caltrain to get to school, and the family owned a single car for 15 years as her husband bike commuted to San Francisco.

“The transportation sector is one of our biggest polluters and the more we can make sustainable choices, that’s an area of passion,” she said. Beach has served on the San Mateo County Transportation Authority Board of Directors since 2017, and served as its chair in 2020 and 2021.

Beach served as Burlingame’s mayor in 2020 (councilmembers rotate the title annually), during which time she championed increasing the city’s minimum wage from $13 to $15 an hour. Beach said she is also proud of her work on the council to usher in housing, particularly affordable options and those near transit, in addition to preserving several acres of open space on the Bayfront.

“When I was mayor, I built coalitions of unlikely allies to get big things done,” she said. “I bring people together to roll up our sleeves and to build relationships to solve problems together and that’s a really important part of my kind of leadership.”

Beach also serves as the vice chair for active transportation advocacy agency Commute.org, is a founding board member of the Leadership Council San Mateo County and is a League of California Cities board member.

She said mental health, particularly for youth, and gun control would also be among her priorities in Congress.

Beach is endorsed by Delaine Eastin, former California state superintendent of public instruction, in addition to numerous local councilmembers and education leaders. She is endorsed by the San Mateo County American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees labor union, and has ally status with the county’s REACH Coalition.

“I am not part of the political establishment Democratic Party machine right now, this race is about grassroots, powerful inspiration and momentum,” she said. Beach reports she has raised $441,000 for her campaign.

California’s primary will be held June 7, narrowing the field to two candidates. The general election will be held Nov. 8.

corey@smdailyjournal.com

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