Last week, I interviewed Laura Parmer-Lohan, San Carlos mayor and candidate for Don Horsley’s District 3 supervisorial seat. The other announced candidate is Ray Mueller, Menlo Park councilman and former mayor. The primary election will be in June 2022.
Mueller grew up in Vista outside Camp Pendleton in Southern California. He was born in 1974. His dad was a dentist until degenerative disc disease forced his early retirement. He then became a deacon in the local Catholic church and Mueller went to parochial school there. These were difficult economic times for a family with seven children. His mother, a high school grad, went back to school and studied computer science so she could help support the family. Mueller graduated from Vista High School where he met his wife to be. “We were childhood sweethearts,” he said.
He was accepted at the University of California, Berkeley where he studied natural resources, then off to UC Hastings College of Law. He worked for several law firms as a litigator in the Bay Area. He and his wife, Kristen Shima moved to Menlo Park in 2005. Mueller became chair of the city’s Transportation Commission. He then was elected to the council in 2012 and was hired as chief of staff for Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian. He did this for two years and then assumed his present position as in-house attorney and director of technology applications for IEM, an energy response and service company in Silicon Valley. He was re-elected in 2016 and again in 2020 in the city’s first district election.
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He is a member of the San Mateo County chapter of Surfrider Foundation, on the Board of Bay Area Water Supply Conservation Agency and on the advisory council of the Committee for Green Foothills. His wife is principal at Corte Madera middle school in Portola Valley; his son attends Woodside High School; his daughter La Entrada Middle School.
He has many endorsements inside and outside the district ( too many to list in this column) including U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto; state Sen. Josh Becker, D-San Mateo; Assemblyman Marc Berman, D-Palo Alto; San Mateo County supervisors Dave Pine and Warren Slocum; and many city councilmembers including Drew Combs, current mayor of Menlo Park. He and Parmer-Lohan share several dual endorsements. For the full list see raymuellerforsupervisor.com.
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Most people have not heard of MTC, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, but most public works directors, city councilmembers, and advocates for transit and roads have. It is the regional transit and planning agency for nine Bay Area counties and the primary distributor of federal funds. If you are not in MTC’s regional funding plan, your project may not get built. It has an A+ staff. It is governed by representatives from each county: two each for San Mateo, San Francisco, Contra Costa, and Marin; three for Alameda and Santa Clara; and one for Sonoma, Napa and Solano. These are selected by their respective jurisdictions. In San Mateo, the Board of Supervisors picks its representatives; the cities’ mayors pick the city’s representative. Today, it is Dave Canepa, president of the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors, of Daly City, and Gina Papan, Millbrae City Council. Before them, Supervisor Slocum and Redwood City Councilwoman Alicia Aguirre represented San Mateo County. Once you are on MTC, you are supposed to represent your entire county and not just your home base and hopefully have a regional perspective. San Mateo County is outnumbered by the larger counties.
There are no term limits for MTC. So representatives who come from counties and cities where there are no term limits seem to serve forever. Jim Spering of Solano County was an old commission hand when I joined MTC in 1997 and he is still there. So is Scott Haggerty, the current chair, from Alameda County. When I served from 1997-2009 (then South San Francisco councilman Kevin Mullin replaced me) I worked with supervisors Mary Griffin, Mike Nevin and Adrienne Tissier. It’s very important that our county’s reps work as a team in consultation with Caltrain, SamTrans staff and C/CAG, the Cities/County Association of Governments.
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MTC is more powerful than ever since it took over the Association of Bay Area Governments in 2017 and staffs of both were consolidated. But only one chief, and that’s the MTC executive director. MTC moved its offices from Oakland to San Francisco in 2016 and was joined by the Air District and ABAG. During the debacle over the cost of the new Bay Bridge, MTC took over toll operations from Caltrans, the state transportation agency. It uses the tolls to maintain the bridges (except Golden Gate) and to help fund transit projects. Toll money was also used to fund the new office in San Francisco.
Sue Lempert is the former mayor of San Mateo. Her column runs every Monday. She can be reached at sue@smdailyjournal.com.
I would think that because San Mateo County probably has close to 50% non-white residents that Cindy's question is not out of line, unless you don't care for minorities of any color.
Taffy - it may be because the minorities in this County believe that they are well represented. Would you consider that as an answer? One does not need to be a person of a certain color or ethnicity to understand and represent the values of all residents. To insist on having a forced representation based on ethnicity and race is pure racism and flies against all what the authors of the Constitution had intended for this country. Ironically, it is mostly white folks that bring this up which can be dismissed as patronizing or misplaced white guilt anyway.
Yes. That is a good answer. It would also be a good question for the DJ to put on the opinion vote column. “As a minority do you feel that your city and county officials fairly represent you?”
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(7) comments
Thank you Sue
Are there no people of color running for the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors?
Cindy - unlike Biden, San Mateo residents are looking for qualification instead of what candidates look like. I forgot, is white a color??
I would think that because San Mateo County probably has close to 50% non-white residents that Cindy's question is not out of line, unless you don't care for minorities of any color.
Taffy - it may be because the minorities in this County believe that they are well represented. Would you consider that as an answer? One does not need to be a person of a certain color or ethnicity to understand and represent the values of all residents. To insist on having a forced representation based on ethnicity and race is pure racism and flies against all what the authors of the Constitution had intended for this country. Ironically, it is mostly white folks that bring this up which can be dismissed as patronizing or misplaced white guilt anyway.
Dirk,
Yes. That is a good answer. It would also be a good question for the DJ to put on the opinion vote column. “As a minority do you feel that your city and county officials fairly represent you?”
Sue, thanks for sharing the information on the MTC. The body is mostly made up of elected officials with no direct accountability to voters.
Welcome to the discussion.
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Keep the discussion civilized. Absolutely NO personal attacks or insults directed toward writers, nor others who make comments.
Keep it clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
Don't threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Anyone violating these rules will be issued a warning. After the warning, comment privileges can be revoked.