Candidate Statements

David Bonaccorsi

I am privileged to have been elected to the FFE Leadership team.  I am a lifelong Fremont resident, a former Fremont Councilmember and Planning Commission with 12 years of combined experience, promoting affordable housing and alleviating the challenges faced by persons experiencing homelessness. I’m also a past board member and board Vice-President Abode Services (which is also dedicated to ending homelessness).  I helped organize grass roots support for the Fremont Housing Navigation Center (HNC) - as the Friends of the HNC - over stiff and increasing increasingly vocal opposition, including representing our organization on KPFA radio over one of the opponent leaders.

In the last two years on the FFE Leadership Team, I have worked with my talented colleagues increasing FFE’s community engagement, including: moderating candidate debates, promoting Fremont’s Safe Parking initiative, organizing housing workshops with Abode and CatalyzeSV, and participating in bi-monthly FFE Leadership meetings. More recently, in also serving on FFE’s Policy Committee, I helped draft and edit FFE’s written public comment to the City of Fremont on Fremont’s updated 2023-2031 housing element, pressing for more affordable housing.    

I respectfully ask for your vote so I may continue in my service on the FFE Leadership team advocating for affordable and inclusionary housing as a matter of right.

Bob Brunton

Lisa Danz

I grew up in the Bay Area, and I've lived in Fremont since 2018. I joined Fremont for Everyone (FFE) when we were advocating for the Housing Navigation Center in 2019, and I have served on the FFE leadership team since early 2021.

My contributions on the leadership team have included monitoring City Council and Planning Commission agendas for items related to housing and homelessness, facilitating or taking notes at many FFE leadership team meetings, sending updates and announcements to FFE members, helping facilitate the Housing Element analysis and ensuring that we sent our comments to city staff before the deadline, submitting support letters for state-level bills that FFE has voted to endorse, representing Fremont for Everyone at CAYIMBY's monthly legislative update meetings, and creating a website (fremont-transcripts.com) that makes City Council and Planning Commission meeting transcripts available to the community. Overall, I take responsibility to make sure that the ball doesn't get dropped and we keep moving our priorities forward.

I think that what Fremont for Everyone is doing is important, and I want to make sure that it continues. I've demonstrated my willingness to step up and do the work to make it happen, and I'm willing to continue that work if elected for another term.

Jenna Daugherty

Hello everyone!!!! My name is Jenna. I’m a lifelong resident of Fremont who was brought into Fremont For Everyone back in 2019 during the HNC townhalls and now 4 years later I am running to be re-elected to my second term for Fremont For Everyone leadership. I sat back and observed for the first couple months of my first year to learn the ropes and quickly jumped in as Communications Director, I figured with my background in theater, choir, and broadcasting I could bring my people skills as well as my communication skills to the role as my way to contribute in a positive manner to the organization. Now with one year under my belt I feel a lot more experienced and can take my role as Communications Director to the next level, hopefully with your vote I can have the opportunity to do bigger and better things for Fremont For Everyone and in turn the City of Fremont!

Annie Koruga

Hi, my name is Annie! I’ve lived here in Fremont for more than a decade, and I’ve been with Fremont For Everyone since the beginning. Back in 2019, I was the tabling lead for our campaign to win the Housing Navigation Center. I turned people out, made plans, saw the need for this organizing work, and saw the power of us turning out to win. Since then, I’ve had many other organizing experiences: organizing electorally and around issues, for many different things from anti-homophobia to safe parking.

My organizing experience is very, varied which means that I’ve practiced a diversity of tactics and have a unique skill set. I know how to mobilize people, how to strategize, how to build coalitions, how to coordinate, and how to build consensus.

My three priorities are:

ONE: re-engaging people who have previously been involved, to build our base and our power. We learned that when we fight, we win, but we need a lot of people to fight. We need to re-engage our contacts on our contact list and in our Facebook Group.

TWO: we need to get new people involved, through building out our social media presence and exciting people by running campaigns. Usually new people engage when there’s a reason to, like when a campaign is going on.

THREE: I want to apply the lessons we’ve learned from previous campaigns to wage and win future ones. We’ve learned how to win, now we need to do it again. I want to, in time, run campaigns for things like more navigation centers, more safe parking, more affordable housing, and increased funding for unhoused support services. I also want to fight for things that prevent people from becoming unhoused in the first place like higher wages and reasonable rents whenever possible. Finally, I want to directly engage with community members through mutual aid, community education, and organizing tenants. Re-engage, engage, and campaign with me!

Katherine Rubie

My Name is Katherine Rubie. I have lived in and around Fremont for almost 17 years. Even when not living in Fremont, it has always been my hub for virtually everything, such as: shopping, doctors, restaurants, entertainment, parks, and church. Fremont is my home and it is important for me to keep Fremont "the happiest place to live" for everyone. Fremont is a beautiful, fun, and all around great place to find everything you need in life.

I've been a Leader of Fremont For Everyone (FFE) over the last two years, but have been highly engaged for even longer in supporting tenant rights and those who are homeless in various capacities. Actions I've taken include advocating for the support of AB1482, the Housing Navigation Center (HNC), Safe Parking Program, Project Homekey, written to and spoken at the offices and chambers of local, State, and National leaders and politicians. I also belong to other organizations fighting for these same kinds of things: FIAEB, The RISE Coalition, PICO-CA, etc., but my heart is with Fremont For Everyone since this directly works in my home area. In addition, I was a member and leader of my congregation's Sandwich Squad, which made and delivered sandwiches to various places, which distributed those sandwiches to low-income and unhoused folks. I've also personally collected and distributed water, protein drinks, snack bars, socks, blankets, etc.

I come to the table having experience as a home & property owner, having a salaried position, to eventually being a renter, working hourly, commission-based, and independent contractor jobs, to eventually becoming homeless. My experiences from all these positions in life give me a unique perspective from many angles.

I can vouch for the fact that homelessness is frightening, stressful, traumatic, and affects one's mental, emotional, and physical health, as well as many more things. I never imagined that I would have ever experienced something like this when I came from an upper middle-class family and did everything society expects of us ( got married, had a child, graduated from college, worked hard, paid my taxes, attended church, even proudly served in the military), but it can happen even to people who are healthier, smarter, and better off financially than I ever was. Through my experience, I realized homelessness can happen to anyone, at anytime, for a multitude of reasons. For me, it was age and disabilities that caught up to me and forced me into lower and lower income as I struggled to keep up with the demands of work that are not always accommodating for the disabled. This was a huge eye-opener for me.

Not having a physical address creates other problems too because a physical address is required for updating one's ID or driver's license, registration, and car insurance and a plethora of other things. These things affect one's ability to get a job, or even hold onto a job. This is why it is vital we focus on housing first and foremost. Maintaining housing for low-income and at-risk persons is just as important as getting the unhoused re-housed into the living situation best suited for their individual needs.

Fremont For Everyone has advocated the Homeless Navigation Center (HNC), and the Safe Parking Program, as well as the Project Homekey plans. Though the first two goals were realized and are still operating, the third goal fell through when the State did not choose Fremont to receive the funding for it. However, we've not even up on this dream. Though we've made great strides against great opposition, we still have a LONG way to go.

This work is my passion and I feel strongly that it is my purpose in life. I have seen the many failures in how our system works, understand where and what those failures are, and have many ideas on how to fix them. I've also got many ideas on how to get the homeless housed in a variety of ways - appropriate for their individual needs, as well as how to fund them without having to raise taxes. I've learned many things as a leader over the past year and feel like I am even more ready and qualified to keep pushing for a better Fremont in a Multi-Pronged approach.