My Background and Priorities
I’ve spent much of this campaign talking about the issues facing Laguna Beach. But I’ve realized people also understandably want to know more about me, where I came from, what I’ve actually done, and what shaped the way I lead.
I was born in California into a family of creatives, fishermen, and entrepreneurs.
My dad spent more than 50 years running his equestrian business and horse ranch in the desert and coached at the Olympic level. My mom was part of the early Hot Dog on a Stick business before starting her own businesses and raising three kids on her own: my twin sister, my brother, who is only eleven months older than us, and me.
We grew up working. If my mom had a store or restaurant, we cleaned floors, counted inventory, worked the register, and did whatever needed to be done.
We also went through some very difficult financial years. I watched my mom lose almost everything and rebuild. Our houses changed. Our schools changed. Our lives changed.
That shaped me. I learned early that money is real, decisions have consequences, and sometimes, when something goes wrong, nobody comes to fix it for you. You figure it out.
I was also incredibly lucky to grow up in a close, multigenerational family. My grandparents moved across the country to help my mom raise us, and I was extremely close to them. On my dad’s side, my grandfather helped pioneer San Diego’s fishing industry. On my mom’s side, my grandfather was an engineer, inventor, and executive whose career included RCA and Lockheed.
I grew up around people who solved problems, took risk,s and created things from scratch.
We moved a lot: Williamsburg, Virginia, for elementary school; the Outer Banks of North Carolina for middle school; Michigan for most of high school; and back to California for my senior year.
California was always home in the background. My dad and much of my extended family were here, and we were constantly coming back to Southern California.
By high school, I had one school in mind: UCLA—my apologies in advance to the Trojan alums.
My grandfather had attended Anderson, and UCLA had been my dream for years. I graduated a year early in 2009 with a degree in Women’s Studies, right as the Great Recession hit.
I loved learning across disciplines and took classes in film, art, and philosophy. My last semester, I took 32 units, which probably says something about my personality: once I decide I’m doing something, I tend to go all in.
I originally thought I would go to law school. Instead, I went into hospitality to pay back college and fund an entrepreneurial idea.
That decision changed my life.
I worked with companies including MGM and TAO Group and was part of major openings during the CityCenter era. Hospitality taught me quickly that a good idea means very little if you cannot execute it. Budgets, staffing, construction, training, guest experience, deadlines and systems all have to work together.
From there I joined Ace Hotel and eventually became Director of Operations.
I later moved into hotel development and then became Vice President of Operations for Sustainable Restaurant Group. Over five years, I helped grow the company from operating in one state to five.
Then COVID hit.
As a senior executive, I had to furlough more than 500 people and help take the company through a bankruptcy. It remains one of the hardest things I have ever done professionally.
Those weren’t numbers on a spreadsheet. They were people I knew, with families, children, rent and mortgages.
It reinforced something I believe deeply: leadership matters most when the choices are hard, and other people have to live with the consequences.
During the pandemic, I also started a technology company focused on helping people shop local and small businesses market together. We eventually worked with more than 350 small businesses.
When that chapter ran its course, I returned fully to hospitality. I moved to New York and became Head of New York for an established hospitality company that needed help turning its operations around.
My final corporate role before Oto was with a London-based technology and entertainment company, where I served as Senior Vice President of North America and oversaw 21 locations across the United States.
By then, I had spent years opening businesses, growing them, turning around struggling operations, managing large teams and budgets, and being accountable for the results.
But I had always wanted to create something of my own.
By then my dad had cancer, and I wanted to come home, closer to my parents, sister, nieces, and extended family. I knew I wanted to be in Laguna Beach.
I began looking seriously in 2023 and actually lost the Oto space the first time around. Then the original deal fell apart, I got another call, and I jumped.
I put my own savings into Oto.
I love what we have created: our commitment to sustainable sourcing, the food, our team, the design, the operations, and the feeling of becoming part of a community.
Owning a business yourself also changes your perspective. When your money and your name are on the line, there is nowhere to hide. Construction, permits, payroll, financing, hiring, equipment failures, rising costs- the responsibility ultimately comes back to you.
My dad passed away before he ever got to see Oto. That remains one of the hardest parts of this story because so much of the confidence I had to do something on my own came from watching him, my mom, and my grandparents.
Outside of work, I still write screenplays because I never lost my love of film and storytelling. I run marathons because apparently I enjoy doing difficult things voluntarily. I volunteer with beach cleanups, and I love biographies, business books, art, film, and learning about how people and places work.
I’ve lived in ten states, visited 45 of the 50 states, and traveled to more than two dozen countries. I find myself paying attention to what makes communities work, where people gather, which local businesses thrive, and what makes a place feel like itself.
Because I moved so much, “home” was never really one address for me.
Home was my family.
Maybe that is why choosing Laguna has meant so much to me.
For most of my life, I went where school, work, or opportunity took me. Laguna was different. I chose it.
I chose to put my savings here, open a business here, volunteer here, and make Laguna the place where I want to put down roots and invest in my future.
My path has not been perfectly straight. I’ve lived through financial uncertainty, the Great Recession, businesses that succeeded and others that ran their course, a pandemic, layoffs, moves, loss, and starting over.
Those experiences gave me confidence, but also humility.
I know what I’m good at, and I’m comfortable admitting when I don’t know something and finding the person who does.
The people closest to me would probably tell you I’m intensely curious, deeply loyal, competitive with myself, relentless once something matters to me, and guilty of asking too many questions and taking on too much.
I’m happiest when I’m solving a problem, improving something, or helping an idea actually work.
That is also a big part of why I decided to run for City Council.
Most of my career has involved walking into complicated situations, understanding how the pieces connect, getting the right people around the table, creating a plan, and being accountable for the result.
That is the approach I would bring to Laguna: clear priorities, clear ownership, real timelines, realistic budgets, and much more focus on whether something actually worked.
On the budget, I want clearer budget-to-actual reporting and a serious review of contracts, consultants, staffing, and discretionary spending before asking residents or businesses for more money.
On wildfire preparedness and public safety, I want the entire system tested from beginning to end so we know where the gaps are before an emergency happens.
On emergency care, I want clear objectives, timelines, and coordination with the County, state, and healthcare providers. On permitting, clearer standards and more predictable timelines. And on tourism, decisions based on current data so we understand the actual impact on residents, businesses, and infrastructure.
Across all of it, I want us asking one simple question more often:
Did it work?
Not just: Did we discuss it? Did we create a committee? Did we approve funding?
Did what we said we were going to do actually happen?
Government is not a business. I understand that. But leadership is leadership.
Know the facts. Know the numbers. Listen to people who know more than you do. Put strong people around the table. Make a plan. Set deadlines. Measure the result. And if something isn’t working, be willing to change it.
I don’t have every answer.
But I know how to ask hard questions, lead teams, operate under pressure, manage real responsibility, and be accountable for results.
Laguna is where I chose to put down roots, open my own business, and invest in my future.
And it is where I want to bring that same sense of responsibility, problem-solving, and follow-through to public service.