JACKSON, Wyo. — Voters now have an opportunity to learn more about where each Mayoral candidate stands prior to the 2024 primary election. This year’s candidates get candid on how they plan to address the Town’s budget deficit, affordable housing, growth versus sustainability and the relationship between the Town and County. Both candidates will automatically move forward to the general election, which will be held on Nov. 5.
Jessica Sell Chambers
Councilwoman Sell Chambers announced her run for Mayor in March. She has served on Jackson’s Town Council for the past three years. Sell Chambers told Buckrail that a healthy relationship between the Town and County requires accountability.
“Historically, the two entities have shied away from mature and constructive conflict, which hasn’t served the community or taxpayers,” Sell Chambers said. “As Mayor, I’ll make sure the town residents aren’t paying more than their fair share for joint services and I’ll hold our county partners accountable for actions that negatively or unequally affect our residents.”
She said that in the past Town and County have focused on different priorities for joint departments — such as the Jackson/Teton County Housing Department, Parks and Recreation, START, Pathways, Jackson Hole Fire/EMS and more — and this has led to serious issues.
“The joint Fire/EMS department was subjected to a really bad hire by the County administrator,” Sell Chambers said. “I was the sole Council member who came to the defense of the firefighters, volunteers and EMT’s demanding they fix the situation. My colleagues chose to remain silent. That is not a healthy relationship.”
Sell Chambers said that she made the decision to run for Mayor because action is now needed to reduce the Town’s $4 million deficit. She plans to enlist the services of highly skilled municipal finance experts to complete a comprehensive evaluation of Town finances, budgets, departments, services, fees, investments and projects.
“We need a more sophisticated and comprehensive manner in which we address our funding and spending,” Sell Chambers said. “It would take a few months for a finance expert to initially gather the data from the organization but it would pay for itself many times over and put us on a balanced budgetary path forward.”
She said her number one priority will be making changes to affordable housing policies.
“We’ve made it easier to build super high-end homes and luxury short-term rentals than for average working people to build affordable housing,” Sell Chambers said. “The more rules, guidelines and red tape we have, the more we cater to really wealthy developers who can afford to jump over the endless hurdles to develop, resulting in higher-end products and ever increasing building and land costs. Three years ago, I was the only town councilor to call for a moratorium to fix these issues.”
Sell Chambers said that she will call on a housing summit to bring all of the “various and sometimes adversarial housing advocates and developers to the table” to address outdated housing rules.
In 2021, Sell Chambers said that she pushed for the 2024 Town of Jackson Sustainability Plan. According to Sell Chambers, the plan’s sustainability road map will help “balance” community growth and environmental preservation. According to Sell Chambers, Jackson has not yet reached its limit of growth.
“The lack of growth has worsened our environment from a sustainability standpoint,” Sell Chambers stressed. “More and more people are forced out of the community into their cars. A sustainable community requires intelligent growth … affordable housing construction, denser walkable neighborhoods with services and groceries nearby, strong public transit, (for lowering car emissions and limiting wildlife collisions) and locally housed workforce. Thankfully, the town and county adopted plans for all of this years ago.”
Arne Jorgensen
Jorgensen, a Jackson native, has served on Town Council for six years. He announced his run for Mayor on May 1. For the past four years, he has also held the position of mayor pro tempore, stepping in for Mayor Hailey Morton Levinson when she is unavailable.
Jorgensen told Buckrail that the work of both the Town and County are critical for the wellbeing of the community and that both entities are equally important.
“The Town is in the County, nearly one half of the County residents live in Town,” Jorgensen said. “We are clearly one community and I will always work to ensure that the interests of the Town are respectfully considered. While both the Town and County budgets have access to overlapping revenue options, County wide revenues (paid by both Town and County residents and businesses) are generally more equitable and generate two to four times the dollars than Town only options.”
Jorgensen reflects on his past work approving six Town budgets while on Town Council. According to Jorgensen, the Town budget has supported core services including wastewater, water, Jackson Hole Fire/EMS, the Jackson City Police Department, administrative support and Public Works, along with the community priorities of transportation, conservation, housing and health and human service partners. In reference to the deficit, he stresses that these expenses are covered by general fund balances, not by debt.
Looking ahead towards shaping the budget, Jorgensen said he will prioritize the efficient delivery of services, review conservative projections of revenues, assess additional revenue options from the State Legislature and negotiate the funding of critical joint departments with Teton County to better reflect roles and responsibilities of each entity.
As a founding board member of the Community Housing Trust, Jorgensen said that he is a strong, consistent supporter of affordable community housing.
“I am intensely proud of the efforts of our community that have led to the creation of over 1,600 restricted affordable community ownership and rental homes,” Jorgensen said. “As a current member of the Town Council and emeritus board member of the Housing Trust, I work tirelessly to leverage public investment to add critically needed additional restricted affordable homes and to add to the range of types of homes.”
He also said that providing affordable housing means adding appropriate density in appropriate locations, investing public dollars for new homes, expanding the Housing Preservation Program to purchase resale restrictions on existing homes, updating mitigation programs and working with Wyoming partners to protect local control within the community.
“One redline that I will not cross,” Jorgensen said, is that any home being presented as affordable or workforce has to be protected with appropriate restrictions. “I have voted ‘no’ if I feel that public benefit is not sufficient or protected,” Jorgensen said.
In an effort to balance sustainability and growth, he said that working with current tools, like the Comprehensive Plan, will help shift density to currently developed areas. Jorgensen said the community faces three development timelines.
“In the short-term, the Town is working through our Land Development Regulations to address the scale of large development within the context of the recently unanimously approved moratorium,” Jorgensen said. “I am pleased that the Council is now agreeing with my efforts over the last couple of years to address these regulations.”
He added that over the next couple of years, he envisions updating design guidelines to mitigate a wider range of impacts with larger projects. For the longer term (in three years), Jorgensen said that the Comprehensive Plan needs to be updated to better reflect the community and ecosystem of today in order to “maintain a thriving community.”
