Dick Spotswood: Advocacy of Marin residents continues to make a difference

Making Marin work requires an energized citizenry. Our county is fortunate to have many well-informed residents who’ve exerted much influence on improving Marinites’ quality of life, despite not being in elected office.

I’m reflecting on two women who are soon to retire from their decades-long role as community advocates.

Wendi Kallins is co-founder of “Safe Routes to Schools Marin.” The organization is the prime force facilitating the movement of kids to schools in a safe and healthy manner without being transported in traffic-clogging autos.

Susan Kirsch is founder of Catalysts, California’s leading statewide citizens advocate for returning control over the design, location and composition of new housing back to cities and counties. The Catalysts group boldly rejects our state Legislature’s “one size fits all” housing mandates.

Both Kallins and Kirsch have sufficient kinetic energy that if plugged into the grid, each could power a Larkspur-sized town. While proponents of vastly different causes, each exhibited the staying power and commitment associated with Olympic-class long distance runners.

I met Forest Knoll’s Kallins years ago when I was a Golden Gate Bridge, Highway & Transportation District director representing Marin’s 11 cities. Kallins was and remains an avid environmentalist and public transit proponent.

It’s passionate citizens like Kallins who educate and persuade elected officials on the nuisances of public policy. If they have credibility, they’re persuasive even when the elected official doesn’t agree with them on every point.

In recent years, Kallins focused on getting children out of their parents’ cars and into walking, cycling or riding yellow school buses to their schools. The “Safe Routes to Schools” movement originated in Demark and spread to Britain. Those European visionaries inspired Kallins and “Safe Routes” cofounder and cycling advocate Deb Hubsmith to establish it in Marin.

It’s not just kids, parents and schools that benefit. A recent Transportation Authority of Marin report disclosed that home-to-school trips comprise 25% of morning peak traffic. Cut that in half and traffic congestion will evaporate on local arteries.

Getting students out of autos requires persuading their parents that walking or biking to school is safe. A necessary component is improving cycling infrastructure to make school-bound routes physically safe. With TAM now serving as “Safe Routes” lead agency, the effort has been productive. They still have far to go persuading a majority of Marin students into walking or cycling.

Before Marin residents were paying attention, Mill Valley’s Kirsch raised a red flag alerting locals that state and regional agencies were eradicating local control over new housing sites and design.

While most Californians agree there’s a need for more workforce housing, they also believe those homes need to be sited and designed to be compatible with existing communities. That’s a view not shared by most state legislators regardless of party.

In 2016, Kirsch ran for Marin’s Board of Supervisors in Southern Marin’s District 3. In a close race, she lost to appointed supervisor Kate Sears of Sausalito.

With Kirsch’s defeat, Marin lost an effective advocate to rally coastal counties to collectively fight the “build, baby, build” onslaught out of Sacramento. The result is projects like the 17-story condo building without adequate parking that is inappropriately sited in downtown San Rafael. Similar projects are planned for other California coastal communities.

The truth that local control advocates, including Kirsch, face is that money talks in Sacramento. Voluntary citizen groups including Catalysts can never amass campaign contributions on a scale achieved by real estate developers, building trade unions and the technology industry.

Now Kirsch is retiring. Catalysts will wind down. A viable successor may be “Wake up California” led by Tamalpais Valley’s Amy Kalish. She’s another “force to be reckoned with” to carry out the good fight.

Citizens like Kallins, Kirsch and Kalish are encouraging signs that even in these dark times, at the local level there’s genuine, talented leadership fighting to advance our quality of life.

Columnist Dick Spotswood of Mill Valley writes on local issues Sundays and Wednesdays. Email him at spotswood@comcast.net.