It is an honor to represent the people of Mountain View on our City Council. Mountain View has been my home for my adult life and what happens here means a tremendous amount to me.

Currently, getting through and recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic is job one. Over the long haul, my efforts center on increasing our housing supply and protecting our environment.

As the center of innovation for Silicon Valley, Mountain View suffers from the Perils of Prosperity which are too little housing and too much traffic. Too little housing leads to ridiculous housing costs, homelessness and people driving too far from their jobs to find housing they can afford. What can City Council do about it? Quite a bit!

• We can zone for housing and make sure the plans include the range of uses needed for real neighborhoods such as parks, schools and shops.
• We can make sure they are near jobs, so some people have the choice of biking or walking to work.
• We can also work through all the issues that invariably arise with development OR we can stop or delay the development with an endless list of conditions of approval.

I have a record of voting to increase housing AND working through development issues as they arise.

Too much traffic increases our GHG emissions, wastes a tremendous amount of time and worsens air quality. Making our city more pedestrian and bike friendly is important for getting people out of their cars. We are also building a network of EV chargers, so people have readily available places to charge their electric cars.

As your Councilmember, I need to hear from you–questions, suggestions and criticisms. If I don’t have an answer to your questions, I’ll do my best to find them.

I send out an email message about once a month on important community topics that are coming before Council. If you would like to receive them, please email me at patshowalter2020@gmail.com.

Learn About My Priorities