Boulder 2021 Election Results: Wallach, Winer, Christy In Lead

This story was updated at 5:30 a.m. Wednesday.

BOULDER, CO — Early vote totals show Boulder candidates Mark Wallach, Tara Winer, Michael Christy, Matt Benjamin and Nicole Speer pulling ahead in the City Council race.

Boulder voters have returned their ballots for the election, which will decide the fate of ten candidates who are running for five seats on City Council.

Jacques Decalo, Lauren Folkerts, Steve Rosenblum, David Takahashi and Dan Williams have also been campaigning for a council seat.

Boulder City Council Election Results

Unofficial results as of 5:30 a.m. Wednesday.

Don't miss the latest news updates in Lakewood: Free Lakewood Patch Newsletters and Email Alerts | Facebook | Twitter

Michael Christy: 9,416

Mark Wallach: 11,291

Lauren Folkerts: 8,636

Matt Benjamin: 9,363

David Takahashi: 4,729

Tara Winer: 9,722

Nicole Speer: 9,030

Dan Williams: 7,520

Steve Rosenblum: 8,481

Jacques Decalo: 2,367

Mark Wallach has served on Boulder City Council since 2019. A retired attorney and real estate developer, Wallach said he's seeking another term "to continue the work I have been doing for the past two years, and to address the many issues facing our community."

Wallach said one of his top goals is improving affordable housing in the city.

"Unlike other candidates, I do not believe the best solution for Boulder is to maximize the construction of market rate housing in order to obtain a small amount of affordable housing from the developers," Wallach's profile read.

"I believe we have an opportunity to convert our municipal airport to the construction of large amounts of affordable and middle-income housing. As the site is 179 acres, we could easily build in excess of 2,500 units there. It is a difficult, multi-year process to do this, but I think the result would justify the effort."

Wallach said his other top goals are the "protection of open space and providing a vigorous response to the challenge of climate change."

Michael Christy has been a licensed attorney since 1997. He advises City Council on cannabis policy after he was appointed as a community-at-large member to sit on the Cannabis Licensing and Advisory Board, and he volunteers at the Boulder Shelter for the Homeless and Boulder's Community Mediation and Resolution Center.

Christy, a former Judge Advocate Generals Corps Air Force officer, said he believes the most pressing issue facing Boulder is public health and safety.

"In Boulder, our violent and property crime rates have been increasing," his profile read. "We've seen anywhere from a 30% to 243% increase in crime (depending on the crime) since the beginning of the pandemic."

Christy said he's an advocate of expanding the Crisis Intervention and Response team, solving the understaffing issue in the Boulder Police Department, creating a new approach to 911 dispatch, and creating a non-emergency response team. He also supports adding homeless outreach officers and improving police community relations through sensitivity training.

Christy's campaign platform also included boosting affordable housing through strategic policies and rezoning, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by expanding the city's multi-modal transportation system.

"We should be looking at what other cities are doing, i.e., mini-transit systems like a regional/city-wide van/transit system under a private-public partnership," Christy said. "I support the exploration of a regional electric bus transit system. We can get funding assistance for these programs through the Federal government's $1.2 trillion dollar infrastructure bill, of which $39 billion is specifically dedicated for public transit improvements."

Like Christy, Tara Winer said she believes the most pressing issue in Boulder is public safety.

"I want the camping ban enforced but I also want to help those with mental health and substance abuse challenges," Winter's Patch profile read.

Winer has spent 35 years in the branded merchandise industry, and she's served on many boards, including the Boulder Parks and Rec advisory board.

Winer said she campaigned for elective office "to help Boulder recover environmentally [and] economically from the pandemic."
Her campaign platform also included affordable housing, environmental stewardship and a "thriving downtown."

Matt Benjamin, a professional photographer and science education consultant, has served on the city's Campaign Finance and Election Reform Working Group and The Stormwater and Flood Mitigation Master Planning Working group. Benjamin led the 'Our Mayor-Our Choice' 2020 ballot measure, which now gives Boulder residents the right to elect our mayor using Ranked Choice Voting.

Some of the issues that defined Benjamin's campaign platform included improving housing, transportation, the economy and public safety.

"We need to do more to provide housing opportunities to middle class working families," Benjamin's Patch profile read. "They are simply priced out. I will advocate for changing our zoning to allow more duplexes, triplexes, etc. to create opportunities for working families to live, work and play in Boulder."

Benjamin called for adding more bike lanes, installing more electric vehicle charging stations, creating a day shelter to help those experiencing homelessness, making West Pearl street closures permanent for local businesses, and restricting access to military grade weapons and accessories.

Lauren Folkerts, an architect who serves as the chair of Boulder's Design Advisory Board, said she's running for City Council for the same reasons she became an architect. She is also the president elect of the Colorado Green Building Guild.

"I am an architect not because I love buildings, but because I believe in their ability to improve the lives of the people who interact with them," her profile read. "The way we build has a large impact on both our climate and our connection to each other ... I care deeply about strengthening the community and making the Boulder of the future one we can be proud of."

Folkerts said she believes the most pressing issue facing Boulder is the affordable and attainable housing crisis.

"Making progress on this issue will also help us meet our climate goals, improve air quality, help address access and equity issues, and make our community stronger," she said. "Right now the housing we have serves only a very narrow group. We are leaving out seniors, young families, students, and anyone who is working in our community and not making six figures."

Folkerts' platform also included "improving health and safety by filling gaps in social services, expanding transportation options, increasing government efficiency, and ensuring our open spaces are protected and maintained for generations of enjoyment," her profile read.

Steve Rosenblum has worked in the finance, housing and investments sectors for two decades, and he too agrees that Boulder's top issues are housing, homelessness and climate change. But he also expressed concern with what he called "inflexible ideology" and an "unwillingness to consider other perspectives" among some of his fellow candidates.

"For all issues: I will listen to the community, conduct my own research, seek out the strongest arguments of those who most strenuously disagree with me and try to prove myself wrong." Rosenblum said in his Patch profile. "This is how we will arrive at the best policies and solutions for the community on the critical issues we face."

Like Christy and Winer, Rosenblum believes that crime and public safety must be addressed immediately.

"We are facing epidemic of crime and dangerous drugs in our community," Rosenblum said. "We need to restore our depleted police department and have them focus on solving and preventing crimes ... our public spaces are no longer safe and welcoming for residents and our local environment is suffering from abuse and degradation."

Rosenblum said Boulder needs to invest in mental health and substance abuse treatment programs, and "work harder to connect people with the services they so desperately need."

Some of his top priorities also include protecting residents from wildfires, achieving net zero electricity generation and reducing the carbon impact of transportation "as rapidly as possible."

Dan Williams has spent the past two decades working as a litigation attorney. He has served on organizations such as Better Boulder, the ACLU of Colorado and Growing Gardens.

Some of his top campaign platform issues included expanding housing opportunities, making it easier to run a small business in the city, enhancing parks access and bike paths, racial equity and diversifying neighborhoods, protecting South Boulder from flooding, addressing climate change and promoting social justice.

"Focus police resources where they belong—on stopping property crime and crimes against people including violent crime," his profile read.

"Social problems should be handled by social workers and civilian personnel, not police."

Nicole Speer is a scientist and businesswoman. She's spent the past nine years as director of operations at CU's Institute for Cognitive Science brain imaging research facility.

Speer is a member of the United Campus Workers Colorado union, NAACP Boulder County, and she volunteers for Feet Forward, a local homelessness service connector.

Speer was the only candidate to not respond to Patch's profile request, but according to her campaign website, some of her top policy priorities are housing, racial justice and inclusion, homelessness and climate change.

David Takahashi, who has a biochemistry degree from San Jose State University, has spent the past decade fighting against climate change.

"Our home was destroyed by a wildfire predicted by climate science in 2010," his profile read. "My neighborhood was decimated by a predicted flood in 2013. "We took a 60-year-old replacement home and retrofit it to net positive in order to prove it could be done and to be able to say we have done what we are asking the world to do. I live climate change.

"We are in a declared code-red climate emergency. Boulder can break its fossil fuel addiction. Boulder needs an advocate for a livable climate in local decisions. I also will network with other climate champion council members around the country."

Some of Takahashi's top issues also include fixing the housing crisis in a climate-friendly way, lowering energy costs and boosting participatory democracy.

"I will advocate making boards and commissions empowered and relevant. I will use the idea of citizen assemblies to ensure council is working on the issues that matter to our public," he said. "Boulder has an incredibly intelligent, innovative, risk-taking, and caring population, we need to make better use of them in our local decision-making."

Jacques Decalo, a Tesla advisor and lifelong Boulder resident, said he wants to see Boulder become the leading sustainable city in the nation.

"I will fight to push Xcel to create solar gardens, improve battery storage for energy, and put a fee on single use plastic," Decalo's profile read.

Decalo said he also wants to increase "greywater recycling, create sustainable affordable housing, and advocate for affordable housing which respects existing communities while allowing high-density areas through zoning."

Some other issues that defined Decalo's campaign platform were creating public outreach to reduce the demand for policing, increasing emergency reserve funds for residential housing and local businesses (for unpredictable events such as the pandemic), and designing a program that encourages those experiencing homelessness to use existing resources to gain social and economic stability.