This city has helped me flourish, from my first apartment in the Trelawny Building to a long stay in Parkside, where I raised my daughter and where I lived while I worked as a paralegal for the City Attorney’s Office for the last 11 years, working on council agendas, drafts of orders and amendments, and much more. I have worked as a journalist, and written updates to Maine, An Explorer’s Guide, as well as a book about Maine restaurants called Chow Maine and Maine Sunday Telegram restaurant reviews. I was a picker during the third shift at the L.L. Bean warehouse, a Maine right-of-passage, and went door-to-door during the 2010 Census, grateful for the chance to meet people from all walks of life. I love to cook — knekkebrød (crispbread) is my latest favorite recipe — and keep trying to learn Italian.

But life is too expensive now. I will seek new ways to increase Portland’s affordable housing. People in school or starting out or just making modest incomes need more places to live.

The problems facing the unhoused are heartbreaking and complex. Our homes are the foundation of our lives -- we all need shelter. For now Portland has more shelter space and has made progress after working with nonprofits and government agencies in 2023. By working together and respecting each other, we must make more. We all need safe places to live and work and walk and raise our children.