Letter to the Editor: Byers Brings Exceptional Leadership and Service

I am writing to urge support for Lisa Byers’s election to the County Council.

We badly need intelligent, responsible, and well informed representatives to administer San Juan County, and under our newly adopted system of three county-wide officials, each representative will have an especially powerful voice in decisions that affect us all.

Lisa Byers is unusually well qualified for this task. As the Executive Director of OPAL, the Orcas community land trust, she has led an exceptionally successful effort to provide affordable housing on Orcas Island. Over the years of her leadership, OPAL has put 138 families in permanently affordable ownership homes and taken over operation of Lavender Hollow apartments, which provides affordable housing for an additional 22 families. Leading this effort has required Lisa to be intimately familiar with the public world of citizens’ needs, real estate practices, the economics of affordable housing, and community planning. At the same time, she has guided OPAL’s operations, which include such diverse activities as raising funds from grants and gifts, dealing with federal and state housing officials, and identifying appropriate recipients for OPAL’s services.

Lisa will bring to the Council years of experience in our county, intelligence, and a habit of working hard. She will make an exceptional public servant.

Karin Agosta