Carson City – Stacey Giomi is a candidate for Carson City Board of Supervisors Ward 1, and though Giomi would represent Ward 1 if elected, his and all Supervisor candidates are on every Carson City ballot, not just their respective wards. Stacey Giomi recently stopped by the Nevada Capital News studios and recorded an interview with Brian Bahouth.
We asked Stacey Giomi why he’s running for the Carson City Board of Supervisors.
“I’ve always been involved in the community in one way or another,” Giomi said. “As Fire Chief you are intimately involved in what’s going on, and you’re directly involved as a fire fighter helping people, and so, you really develop a connection to people that is deeper than your average Joe on the street, and I guess for me is sound cliche, but I care about the community and I care about the people in the community, and you can’t see those kinds of horrible things and have a hand in trying to make them better and just turn that off … I’ve lived here for 41 years and I have a deep connection to this community and I have a strong desire to serve.”
Stacey Giomi was appointed the fourth paid Carson City Fire Chief in history on January 1, 2005 but began his 31 year career with the Carson City Fire Department as a volunteer in 1980. We asked if he better understands the workings of city government by virtue of his time with the fire department.
“You know I’ve been away from city government for almost four, three and a half years, and I think that has given me good perspective because I have my nearly 32 years of government work, but now I also have three and a half, four years worth of looking at it from the outside,” Giomi said. “As department director you are not only involved in building your budget but helping to build the budget for the city, and we went through some pretty tough financial times in the late 2000s, and part of the city’s budget team, you’re involved intimately with that process, so I think I have really good insight into how government works and how it doesn’t work. If I were to be elected, I think that’s an advantage because I could hit the ground running and really start to make decisions without having to spend a lot of time learning.”
What about growth?
“As I talk to people in the community, the thing I consistently hear through conversations is that they like our Carson City way of life, our quality of life in Carson is very important to us, and one of the things I know concerns people occasionally is growth, and Carson City has a growth management ordinance that precludes us from exploding,” Giomi said.
Carson City first began limiting its growth in 1978.
“There have been a lot of stories lately about developments in the news, homes, how many homes can be built in these developments, and I think the key thing for people to remember is that we have a growth management ordinance that was alertly put into place many many years ago, and it prevents growth from just running rampant, so we can have growth, but it’s quality controlled growth, and really that’s what I support.”
Giomi said he comes from a family of small business people, and that history infects his thinking regarding development and commerce.
“You can’t have a community that’s getting stagnant because if it isn’t growing or changing or evolving than it’s kind of taking a step backward. The way a business would, so I’ve always had that in the back of my mind,” said Giomi.
Homelessness and poverty are pressing issues in Carson City.
“Richards Crossing is certainly a great community resource. The Mallory Center at the hospital is another great community resource that helps with mental health issues,” Giomi said when asked about the homelessness problem in Carson. “If government is going to be part of the solution, and I don’t think it is our responsibility to be the solution, but I certainly think it is part of our responsibility to be part of the discussion and maybe spearhead in order to reach a resolution.
“I think it has to happen regionally because Carson City is a hub,” Giomi continued. “And we’re a hub for the counties that adjoin us, so a lot of the homelessness that we have, is because we have services for those folks. Whereas maybe Douglas County doesn’t have those services, Lyon County doesn’t have those services.”
For more from Stacey Giomi, listen to the audio interview above …
