Why I’m running

My name is Alison Sweeney, and I am running for Bozeman City Commission because our city needs a culture change at the top. Instead of advocating for Bozeman residents’ interests, our city government has morphed into an institution that prioritizes the interests of developers and their investors, non- residents, and tourists, at the expense of those who actually live and work in Bozeman. For years our commission has ignored their stewardship responsibilities to our city, our valley, our natural resources, and the Greater Yellowstone region, in order to pursue a vision of Bozeman as a high-density big city with a valley population of 450,000 residents.

As a founder of the Better Bozeman Coalition, an activist when necessary, and a lifelong Bozeman resident, I have the knowledge and experience to help us make needed changes. We must prioritize the needs and wishes of the residents who’ve given their lives to cultivating Bozeman as a beautiful place, full of community character, and a place others want to move to. We must begin calibrating development activities with things like long term water availability and the affordability needs of the city. Consultants can be valuable, but the direction we ultimately take needs to come from the residents, full stop.

At the Better Bozeman Coalition, we too, have brought in consultants like professor Patrick Condon of the University of British Columbia, and raised money to support a Strong Towns webinar tailored to Bozeman. We’ve researched and written reports. I supported these efforts because I thought we needed credentialed experts to tell our City Commission that the changes we wanted to see, have merit in the policy world. I now realize that strong factual information falls on deaf ears when it contradicts the vision for the future our current leadership pursues with an almost religious fervor. We need a new vision that puts stewardship and local citizens first.

I believe we can build more housing while respecting the folks who already live here by defining “infill” in a neighborhood friendly way. I believe the best way to honor the land is by acknowledging that we humans are not the only land users. That goes for water too. We can no longer afford to scrape our history and natural environment to replace it with sidewalk-to-sidewalk high rise development. Maintaining our community identity and our climate resilience going forward demands a different approach.

Too often I’ve watched highly engaged volunteers advocating for their home and quality of life treated with contempt by both staff and some commissioners. That’s why I’m running for election in November. We have a chance to seat a new majority. I want to be part of a City Commission that takes its direction from the people – where citizen input is acted upon instead of ignored. I would be honored to serve, and I’m asking for your support on election day.