A New Generation of Local Leadership
Julia Mayer considers it the luck of a lifetime to have landed in Carpinteria among all places in the universe. The neighbors she wishes to represent on the City Council love Carpinteria too. Carpinteria residents are full of pride and are passionate about protecting our community. That’s exactly why Julia is running to represent you. She believes that as a mom, she owes it to her children to make sure the Carpinteria they know today retains its character tomorrow.
Julia spent most of her childhood in Carpinteria. She learned the importance of compassion, trust and community by spending lots of time at the Hallmark Store in Casitas Plaza, a business owned by one of her grandmothers and managed by her other grandmother. These hours around down-to-earth and caring Carpinterians are deeply imprinted on her earliest memories.
After high school, Julia went to college at University of California Santa Cruz, got a degree in Literature and met her husband, Todd Stewart, while working in coffee shops as a barista.
The couple wanted to do their own thing, so they poured their passion into creating Dune Coffee Roasters, a small local coffee brand and collection of coffee shops. Dune is dedicated to creating welcoming spaces for the local community to hang out in and drink fair trade coffee. Dune sources coffee beans directly from family farmers and roasts them in small batches, because little things done right are better.
Julia sees possibility and potential everywhere. Similar to creating a small business from scratch, she has focused on creating positive change through community volunteerism and advocacy. She has been particularly vocal about protecting open space and providing inclusive opportunities for recreation in the community.
As a board member of Carpinteria Skate Foundation, she led the final fundraising push and facilitated the creation of a world-class skate park in Carpinteria. She hopes to do the same with the Warrior Pool Foundation, whose mission is to create better opportunities for our high school students by making sure they have access to a pool. Julia’s volunteer work with Citizens for the Carpinteria Bluffs is driven by the knowledge that careful stewardship of local open space does not happen by accident. She is inspired every day by fellow volunteers who are motivated to make the world a better place for those around them.
We all have a say in what happens in the local community, and Julia’s top goal is to make sure local voices lead decision-making instead of state representatives who don’t get us or outside developers who only wish to sell Carpinteria for their own personal profits.
Got Questions?
Julia has answers.