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Her Own Wings — Government
Her Own Wings

Her Own Wings is a podcast featuring women in leadership across Oregon, hosted by CM Hall, a proud member of the Newport Oregon City Council.

The inspiration for this podcast came about recognizing that statistically, we just do not have nearly enough equitable numbers of women in leadership… and highlighting women could be an opportunity to feature and uplift a lot of everyday changemakers and perhaps, encourage more folks to seek elective office or careers as city managers and the like.

The name of our podcast comes from Oregon’s motto: She Flies With Her Own Wings.

We know that historically women do so much of the volunteer labor professionally and domestically on their own – and their to-do lists can be miles long – and to add unpaid elected civic roles while juggling personal lives … it can be A LOT. Hopefully these conversations will inform others about awesome women who are creating positive change in our state and create connections with others who have or are hoping to engage in service.

This podcast effort is a collaboration with the League of Oregon Cities. The LOC is the trusted, go-to resource that helps city staff and elected leaders across Oregon’s 241 cities by providing training, resources, information, and legislative advocacy. This podcast is also a partnership with the LOC’s Women’s Caucus which works to actively help women in municipal government positions succeed.

Mostly, this podcast will feature women in municipal government, but we also will sprinkle in interviews with women in other positions in government – elected or as staff. Among many objectives, we hope this informs and inspires those listening to think about the way they could join and become involved in public service and leadership.

Thank you to our podcast sponsor: Allied Video Productions (alliedvideo.com)!

Copyright: © 2024

Latest Episodes:

Mayor Tamie Kaufman, Gold Beach Nov 13, 2024

Show notes

Mayor Tamie Kaufman is a property manager by trade and has served on several committees including the City Council for the City of Gold Beach and was elected Mayor in 2020 and was just recently re-elected.

She has a Bachelor's degree from Eastern Oregon University (Philosophy, Politics and Economics) and an Associate's Degree from Southwestern Oregon Community College.

www.goldbeachoregon.gov

Councilor Jeanette Shaw, Tigard Nov 06, 2024

Show notes

Jeanette Shaw is the Senior Director of Policy at Forth and a member of their leadership team. Forth is a non-profit that advances electric, smart and equitable access to clean transportation. At Forth, Jeanette is responsible for public policy and regulatory affairs at the state and federal levels. She has over three decades of extensive international, national, state and local public policy expertise in technology and association management focusing on issues such as manufacturing investment credits, economic development zones, workforce training, organizational development, and transportation options such as shared mobility, first and last mile transportation options, and light and heavy-duty rail. Jeanette was also tapped to help start TechNet, a national technology trade association.

Jeanette Shaw was elected to the Tigard City Council in 2020 and began her service in 2021. She served on the Oregon Solutions Transportation and Electric Vehicle Collaborative; the State of Oregon Career Technical Education Advisory Commission and was a founding Board member of the STEM STEAM East Multnomah Partnership.

Councilor Shaw holds an Executive MBA from Stanford University and a Bachelor of Science from the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is married to Jason Shaw, a fifth-generation Oregonian.

Councilor Andrea Zielinski, Roseburg Oct 30, 2024

Show notes

Councilor Andrea Zielinski has been serving as a Roseburg City Councilor representing Ward 2 since 2015. Initially appointed to the position, she was then elected in 2016 and again in 2020. In 2023 she served as Council President, which was only the second time a female had held that position in Roseburg's history. She has chaired Roseburg's Historic Resource Review Commission and currently leads the City's Library Commission.

In addition to serving on Council and working full-time as an HR Manager for FCC Commercial Furniture, Andrea is actively involved in various community organizations. She serves on the board of directors for the Greater Douglas United Way, Family Development Center, Umpqua Heart, and Children's Public Private Partnerships (CP3). Additionally, she is a committee member for Music on the Half Shell, Douglas County Community Organizations Active in Disasters, and Friends of the Umpqua Valley Police K9 Programs.

Mayor Julie Fitzgerald, Wilsonville Oct 23, 2024

Show notes

Mayor Julie Fitzgerald of Wilsonville is an Oregonian, having also lived in other Western states. She is a graduate of Oregon State University in the School of Agriculture. After graduating, she managed her family's 1,000 head sheep ranch in Curry County. Julie discovered her lifetime career by volunteering to lead a fundraising drive to bring NPR and OPB to the southern Oregon coast between Brookings and Gold Beach. Julie is mostly retired now after a 43-year career in non-profit leadership and philanthropy, to advance education, health care and conservation for leading Oregon charitable groups including community hospitals, the OHSU Foundation, the Nature Conservancy, and the Oregon Zoo Foundation. She's raised three sons, and knows how busy single mothers can be. And with her husband Bob, she has two grown stepdaughters, and two young grandchildren.

Mayor Julie has run for office twice, and was elected in 2012 to the Wilsonville City Council, then decided not to run again, but in 2020, she ran for Mayor. She is completing that term this December, and looks forward to being able to spend more time with friends and family, and to pursue interests in the outdoors, as well as reading, and enjoying community theater, art and travel.

Frog Pond East and South Master Plan with integrated housing, parks and trails

City of Wilsonville SMART Transit

The Transit Oriented Development building now under construction, with 121 deed-restricted affordable housing units

Mayor Melanie Kebler, Bend Oct 16, 2024

Show notes

Melanie Kebler grew up in Bend, graduating from Bend High, and returned to her hometown in 2018 after attending the University of Michigan and Lewis and Clark Law School. Kebler was elected as the City of Bend's Mayor in 2022, having first been elected to the City Council in 2020. During her time on Council, Bend has approved nearly 1,000 new affordable homes, invested millions of one-time state and federal funds into solving homelessness in collaboration with Deschutes County, and won significant federal grants for transportation infrastructure that will reconnect the community in climate-friendly ways.

Melanie has spent her legal career working for the public, first as a Deputy District Attorney and then as a crime victims' rights lawyer at the nonprofit Oregon Crime Victims Law Center. She is honored to serve as the Mayor of her hometown.

Mayor Remy Drabkin, McMinnville Oct 09, 2024

Show notes

Mayor Remy Drabkin of McMinnville, Oregon has dedicated over 12 years to public service. She is the first woman, first Jew and first queer-identified person to hold the Mayorship. Remy served two terms on the McMinnville City Council and two terms on the Planning Commision before being appointed and then elected Mayor. Remy was pivotal in establishing the Affordable Housing Commission, and the city's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) Advisory Committee. As a housing advocate, Remy has brought forward policy resulting in thousands of nights of overnight shelter and projects that have helped people transition out of homelessness. Remy is active in her work and advocacy at the Oregon State Legislature. Additionally, Remy was appointed by Governor Brown as a Director on the Oregon Wine Board.

Remy co-founded Wine Country Pride, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit bringing LGBTQ+ Pride celebrations to rural Oregon in addition to broad regional representation through a commitment to education, economic activity and continuous visible celebrations of the queer community.

Through her eponymous winery which she founded at the age of 25, Remy Wines, Remy hosted the world's first Queer Wine Fest. Now an annual event, Queer Wine Fest showcases wineries with LGBTQ+ leadership, and through this event a queer professional network in the world of wine was established that hadn't previously existed. Remy's commitment to sustainability was highlighted through an adaptive reuse barn remodel which resulted in the creation of a new carbon-sequestering structural concrete called the Drabkin-Mead Formulation. The invention served as an incubator for others to launch a new McMinnville-based company that focuses on carbon sequestration. Remy actively promotes sequestering carbon into our built environment as key to reversing the effects of climate change.

Remy aspires to help cities implement carbon neutrality into their codes.

www.winecountrypride.com

www.queerwinefest.com

www.remywines.com

www.remyformayor.org

Thank you to our podcast sponsor, Allied Video Productions!

Councilor Briae Lewis, Corvallis Oct 01, 2024

Show notes

Originally from Maryland/DC, Briae moved to Oregon in 2019 and ironically did not get into politics until the 2020 election cycle and Black Lives Matter. After that, Briae decided to run for office and was elected in 2022 as the first openly gay black woman on the Corvallis City Council where she serves as liaison to the Historic Resources Commission, the Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Policy Advisory Board, the Home Opportunity Planning Equity (HOPE), and the Corvallis Sustainability Coalition.

briae.lewis@corvallisoregon.gov

Mayor Susan Wahlke, Lincoln City Sep 25, 2024

Show notes

Susan Wahlke was first elected in 2014 to the Lincoln City City Council. She later was elected fulfill the previous mayor's term. In 2022, she was elected to a full 4-year term as Mayor.

Susan is a 30-year resident of north Lincoln County. Born in Tacoma, Washington and having moved to Oregon in the 5th grade, she considers herself a native Pacific Northwesterner. After graduating from the University of Oregon with a degree in Elementary Education, she moved to Stuttgart, Germany where she substitute-taught in Department of Defense Schools. After three years in Europe, she was able to drive cross-country from New Jersey to Oregon, settling again in Eugene. After working in day care centers for a few years, she moved to Portland and began her 30-year career as a legal secretary. She moved to the Lincoln City area in 1992 with her two daughters. She now has four young grandchildren who she spends as much time with as possible.

Soon after moving to Lincoln County, Susan was hired by the City of Lincoln City and worked in the City Attorney's office and also for the Chief of Police. After leaving City employment, she worked for attorneys in Lincoln City until her retirement a few years ago.

Married to a musician, they attend as many live music events as possible.

Councilor Cynthia Jacobi, Newport Sep 18, 2024

Show notes

First appointed to the Newport City Council for a two-year term in 2018, Cynthia then won her seat in 2020. She is currently running unopposed for another four-year term. Cynthia reflects on the fact that the City has spent six years investing in her education about the city. She wants to give back as it takes a while to learn to ask the right questions. She never thought she would be in an elected position, but friends urged her on. She says, "So, I went for it, surprising myself most of all."

Cynthia has observed that the conversation changes when more women are in policy-making roles. She has been a strong, primary advocate of childcare, playgrounds, public safety, and housing the unsheltered.

She serves on several city committees: Airport, Budget, Public Arts, Commercial Core Revitalization Plan. Additional city/county committees are Solid Waste Advisory, County Consortium, Public Safety, and Lincoln County Housing Advisory.

In Cynthia's career as a Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist and Advanced Practice Nurse (retired), she has built a life of serving others. She tends to look through the lens of public health in every policy of her city.

Among her leisure activities are gardening, painting and writing poetry. She lives with her husband and black Chihuahua, Ser Jorah of Mormont, overlooking the ocean on the Oregon Coast where she marvels at her extraordinary luck to be in such a place.

Thank you to our sponsor: Allied Video Productions

Mayor Cec Koontz, Monmouth Sep 11, 2024

Show notes

Cec grew up in Salem, but has been a member of the Monmouth-Independence community for over 40 years. She has volunteered with organizations from the cooperative preschool to the Chamber of Commerce, to the Monmouth-Independence Community Foundation, where she has served on the Board since 2001 (with almost 20 years as its treasurer).

Currently, Cec works as the Director of Finance & Operations for the Central School District and just completed 10 years of service on the Board of Trustees of Western Oregon University. She has served in both appointed and elected positions in the City of Monmouth, beginning with the Economic Development Commission and four years on Council. In 2018, Cec became the first elected woman Mayor.

Besides raising a fantastic daughter (who lives in Independence!), her proudest accomplishments are those which help to create a more vibrant, connected community; she enjoys working with partners to deepen collaboration, respect differences, honor history and move everyone forward together.

Thank you to our sponsor: Allied Video Productions

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