Jefferson County Surveyor Candidate Questionnaire

Jefferson County Surveyor Candidate Questionnaire

Answered by Bryan Douglass, Democratic candidate for Jeffco Surveyor

1.) Why do you want to be Jefferson County Surveyor?

My motivations are many, but asked to provide the primary inspiration in the decision to run for office, I say this.

I love my profession, my home, and my community. I've been Land Surveying for a paycheck since 1995 and have dedicated substantial hours to the craft off the clock. I've lived in Jeffco for two decades and firmly believe Colorado has saved my life. My wife and I have raised our daughters as locals, nearly every member of my family has joined us, I have seen the best friends I've known do the same, and I would proudly submit we are all contributing to the most progressive society in America. I need to honor that.

This motivation to run is matched only by the evolving sense of disgust and contempt I have for Republican (and, by association, centrist Democratic) ideaology, behavios, and action. The initiatives and goals of Republican Party leadership are the product of historical ignorance, unmitigated entitlement, self preservation and profit, the pursuit of exclusive wealth and control at the expense of the whole, the propagation of corruption and manipulation, and fraudulent assertions of capability empowered by hypocritical morality. The people supporting and advancing these efforts are, at best, ignorant enablers (or, more common, single-issue voters). At their worst they are profiteers and practitioners of theft, rape, and genocide incapable of anything resembling accountability or remorse, much less empathy or humane consideration for others.

As I started, I love my profession, my home, and my community. I have grown weary of those who suggest my wife, my daughters, my family, my friends, my neighbors, and my colleagues aren't worthy of the same liberties, opportunities, and rewards from each. Republicans persist in attacking them. Centrist Liberals persist in leveraging them in the name of bipartisan compromise and profit. Anything I can do to change this, to combat this, and to end this, is imperative.

2.) What experience qualifies you to be Jefferson County Surveyor?

I come from a rural background where my education and experience not only tied me to a respect and appreciation for history, but also for labor. I was raised in farmland

Illinois by a military family cashing government checks. I cashed my own first paycheck when I was 15 and have had at least two jobs on my plate every day since to keep up and pay my own way. I graduated with honors from Southern Illinois University with a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering Technology with emphasis in Land Surveying in 1995, and after two years working near Chicago, I packed up the truck and moved to Colorado seeking happiness.

My time in the Rockies has been nothing short of a blessing. After 10 years in the Colorado private sector, I was hired by a local municipality where I have been for well over a decade. I earned a Professional Land Surveyors license in the State of Colorado (a requirement to hold this office) several years ago, but I would be quick to point to the nature of my experience as the true gift I bring to the office.

Throughout my career I've been an advocate for technological advance and the progressive pursuit of a better way via science, mathematics, and objective analysis. I have persistently targeted positions offering opportunities to work at or near the forefront of positional tech, from GPS through GIS to more recent developmens such as 3D laser scanning and LiDAR. I reside within a generational gap where the tools have exceeded the humans, from field to office, and I believe our communities are suffering through that same transition while many in my position are failing to stand up and lead our communities through these challenges while bringing those challnges to the forefront of public debate at the local level.

Your tax dollars are being wasted. Your opportunities as a community are being wasted. Money spent today favors the fight against progress, accountability, and transparency, and it's the local taxpayer who suffers through it all… and far too many do so without a clue they have the power to demand all of that and more. Worst of all, the potential for future costs associated with these decisions could create major issues for those who take leadership next. It's criminal, negligent, and reckless bhaviit that needs to be addressed, and I believe I can help make that happen.

My credentials are sound. My experience is documented, in full view for public evaluation, confirmation, and criticism. What truly qualifies me for this job is the personal accountability and priorities founded in efficient, effective public service I will bring to the Jeffco palace.

More importantly, I offer my promise to demand nothing less from those working in the building with me. When they fail, I'll be the first to ask why and will be persistent in asking you to do the same.

(And if we both fail, we can enjoy each other's company while we watch the palace burn to ashes.)

3.) How will you be an effective Jefferson County Surveyor?

One of the most productive initiatives waged by the American financial elite over the last 20 years has been the extensive attack on societal empathy. We care more about the effort to divide and judge rather than the effort to engage and solve.

We will find many running for office this year leveraging this desire, claiming the discourse, dysfunction, and disillusioned in government are the source of our society’s downward spiral. While there are undeniable truths in these assertions, I firmly believe this view is way too short sided, it is lazy, it is disconnected, and worst of all, it lacks accountability.

In truth, we are often our own worst enemy. The powers are working the same con they've been pushing since James Madison insisted this country should be controlled by the wealthy, yet we continue to suggest we lack the power to demand democracy and we fall in line, typically through the success in creating social division and thus degrading social empathy. The agenda is the same today, and our population appears to be discovering a moment (as it has via other generations past) in which we might recognize the error of our ways and strike back at these attacks to destroy our faith in each other and our potential as a democratic society. In the past, those moments have produced historic evolutions, yet they are rarely if ever sustained. Whether they fall prey to fear, they are entrapped by convenience, or they are overwhelmed by greed, they are lost and progress for the whole is lost with it.

While I am only one person hoping to serve one of the least influential offices in local government, I will pursue an effective term and execution of the opportunity through a promise to resist temptation, to exercise professional rigor and standards of excellence despite challenges, and to remain forthright and true to every member of our community throughout as we work together to make this moment count.

Most importantly, I will stand as a model to the power of societal empathy. I will stay true to a belief that ALL members of our community deserve this opportunity to evolve, and I will do all I can to sustain that evolution for each and every one of us.

4.) How will you attract and retain good employees to the surveyor’s office?

Employees… that's a good one.

The position of Jefferson County Surveyor offers approximately $400 per month in compensation. This represents a 50% reduction in pay compared to the second, part-time job I currently enjoy… and thus I stuggle to see how an employee would be a valid consideration.

That said, there will be improved production, efficiency, and community service under my guidance. I have designs for an educational community outreach program, hoping to engage local high school and college students in an effort to promote the profession as a potential career while teaching the future of our community about the societal

benefits our discipline provides and regulates. I hope to pursue the inclusion of internship opportunities via the office, as well. Most importantly, I hope to serve as an active and passionate model for the office and provide avenues for growth in various sectors of local government via advanced technologies and capabilities.

Short story long: I expect the Jefferson County Surveyor office, under my leadership, to be a team of one employee making significantly less than minimum wage, desperately seeking assistance from a diverse set of community contributors as often as possible, with every reason to believe we will dramatically improve productivity and service simply through responsible integration of technology, a promise to actively engage the community and those I serve, and an honest effort to match every dollar put in my pocket with at least two dollars in effort put back into the entire Jeffco community.

I'd invite any and all to ask the current office inhabitant if he can offer the same. Let me know how that goes for ya’.

5.) What important steps will you take to improve gender equality and safety in the workplace for women?

Far too many would suggest a) my profession is not one prone to inclusion and diversity, b) the office of County Surveyor would be limited in opportunities to support gender equality, and c) it's too difficult to connect the focus of our discipline to endevours of gender diversity due to the physical nature of the work.

I couldn't disagree more, and I've already begun working on an effort to obliterate those traumatic lies.

Having raised two daughters close in age currently attending high school together, and in spending more time in classrooms than most (I volunteer to speak to kids about Land Surveying several times a year), I've long noted the lack of feminine representation in the majority of those audiences. With the trending focus towards STEM curriculum in local middle schools, we've seen young women excel in the skills related to our field (primarily mathematics and engineering), yet there seems to be significant drop in feminine representation when we visit them again in high school.

My fear is that traditional gender bias that has long plagued our mathematics classrooms is still prevalent today. To help me understand this better, I decided I needed help. After all, as a middle-aged white man I can only encourage the young women (not to mention young Hispanic and Black students, regardless of gender identity) to trust me when I urge them to try. It's one thing to place faith in my assertions. It's another to hear the same from someone just like you who has already been through it.

During my campaign as a write-in candidate for this same office in 2016, I began to reach out to women in I encountered in various fields of Engineering to request

consideration for an advocate group, hoping to market the group as public speakers and mentors throughout the greater Denver community. We have a strong list of candidates passsionate about such an effort, and I believe we can do some wonderful things for our community with such a group.

It's just one idea, but it's one way I can connect with an effort I appreciate and support despite the lack of apparent opportunity. I could give you the line about fatherhood and the “I get it, I've raised daughters” line… but this is a disturbing trend in my industry that I have recognized for much longer. If the title of Jefferson County Surveyor can provide opportunities to do something about it, I'll be overjoyed to seize them.

Thanks for providing me with this wonderful opportunity to answer some insightful questions, and for providing your audience this opportunity to learn more about the office of the Colorado County Surveyors. If I can provide more or assist in any way, now or in the future, don't hesitate to ask. I'd be honored.