Marti Brown

As a recent graduate of Emerge California, Marti comes to the role with a wealth of environmental experience, including accomplishments in economic development, city planning, and open space preservation. She is currently the Senior Redevelopment Planner with the Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency.  She manages a $14 million budget and regularly coordinates improvement projects with the City's Planning, Building, Transportation, Public Works, and Economic Development Departments, as well as works with the City's Code Enforcement and Neighborhood Services Departments.

After Marti moved to Vallejo, she started to more seriously consider a candidacy for City Council.  She described her political interest as "coming from a place of being fed up. The majority of leadership in this city is misguided, and I have a very different vision for the city."   While Marti is already incredibly active in the city's environmental policies, as a member of the City Council Marti would like to expand her influence to other policy areas as well.  To learn how to successfully start executing her vision for Vallejo, Marti joined Emerge California.  Through her Emerge training, Marti learned how to prioritize her time on the campaign trail.  She recognizes that she could "overanalyze and obsess over doing everything perfectly," or she could just spend that critical energy meeting her constituents and thinking of creative ways to raise money.

In addition to her running her campaign, Marti is also serving as the Chair of the Vallejo Design Review Board, overseeing the implementation of the Downtown and Waterfront Design Guidelines for projects and buildings constructed in the merged Waterfront/Downtown Redevelopment Area. Most recently, the Board approved the Vallejo Station Parking Garage and Bus Transfer Facility projects.   

Marti is also Co-Chair of the Vallejo Waterfront Coalition (VWC), where Marti was instrumental in negotiating a 10-month long settlement agreement among Callahan-DeSilva, the Waterfront Master Plan Developer, and the Vallejo Redevelopment Agency guaranteeing an additional four-acres of public open space for Vallejo residents on the Waterfront, increasing view corridors and animal habitat, and improving the Project's overall design and architecture. The VWC won the Clearwater Award for Excellence on the Waterfront in 2005 for its proposed Vallejo Waterfront Community Plan and its tremendous effort to improve community involvement and participation in the development of Vallejo's Waterfront.

She completed her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Environmental Studies from the now obsolete World College West (Petaluma, California) in 1988.  She also received a Master of Arts Degree in Geography from San Francisco State with a concentration in Resource Management and Environmental Planning in 1998.  She also received Masters of Business Administration at Hope International University in 2000.