Giselle Hale is a mom, advocate and businesswoman who is currently the Mayor of Redwood City. She has built a reputation for hard wor Giselle Hale is a mom, advocate and businesswoman who is currently the Mayor of Redwood City.She has built a reputation for hard work, collaboration and effectiveness, with the courage to take on tough problems – and gets results.k, collaboration and effectiveness, with the courage to take on tough problems – and gets results.
Giselle has made addressing our housing crisis a top priority and made a difference for thousands in our community. She has created more affordable housing and developed programs that are helping those experiencing homelessness get a real path to permanent housing.
On the Redwood City Council and Planning Commission, she helped approve housing affordability programs, as well as encouraged smart growth measures. She has approved multiple housing policies that continue to produce new housing units at all income levels and encourage the development of housing that seniors, young families, veterans, and disabled residents can call home despite the high cost of housing in the area.
As a working mother, expanding accessible, quality childcare programs has long been a top priority for Giselle. In Redwood City she held developers accountable for not just paying impact fees but also producing new child care seats in their developments. She was previously a national leader with the National Partnership for Women and Families, helping to secure sick days and parental leave for workers across the country.
Giselle became involved in our local public schools before her first child was born, working to pass local ballot measures, supporting our education foundation and helping found a Mandarin Immersion program. Giselle knows that without a quality education and the support of their teachers and community, she and her husband both would have been left behind. But a quality education was their path to success. It's why she led efforts to make Redwood City the only San Mateo city with "Children and Youth" as a top three priority. In the Assembly, she will work to ensure every child has the same opportunity to succeed that she and her husband had.
With reproductive justice under attack around the country, it is essential that we stand together to protect these rights - not just in California, but around the country. Giselle won’t just be a reliable vote for access to reproductive care, but will be an active and effective champion and partner for the reproductive justice movement.
That includes protecting health care clinics and providers that provide reproductive services and their patients, strengthening confidentiality laws, protecting Prop 56 funding, stopping the use of fake clinics meant to “counsel” patients and more. And she will be committed to protecting reproductive freedoms for those around the country and ensuring essential medical services remain open to them in California.
Our state is facing a major mental health crisis, that has been worsened by the struggles of a long pandemic. Giselle Hale brought together 11 other San Mateo County mayors to secure $200,000 in funding for a proven mental health first aid training program, increase awareness for mental health needs and improve access to care. As Assemblymember, she’ll also fund much-needed mental health programs in our schools.
Giselle has been a vocal advocate for gun violence prevention and stronger, common sense gun laws to make our communities safer. On the Redwood City Council, she partnered with local advocates to pass a “safe storage” ordinance in January 2020.
In the Assembly, Giselle will work to pass common-sense gun safety and gun violence prevention legislation like stronger background checks, protecting victims of domestic violence, prohibiting “ghost guns” and stronger safe storage policies. She will also work to keep guns out of our schools and hold gun manufacturers accountable. Giselle is proud to be a 2022 Moms Demand Action Gun Sense Candidate
Giselle is already a regional leader on addressing our climate emergency and protecting the environment for future generations. She worked to update Redwood City’s climate action plan, created a green purchasing policy, championed new construction policies to reduce gas usage, and serves on the Executive Board of Peninsula Clean Energy where they are ambitiously tackling a 24/7 clean energy goal.
Giselle has been focused on issues that impact our local quality of life, including reducing traffic congestion and increasing safety for bicyclists and pedestrians; programs to keep seniors, youth and residents active and healthy; important services like libraries, parks & recreation, public safety; and a strong local economy. In Sacramento, she’ll make these core issues that affect San Mateo County families a priority.
Giselle worked with Assemblymember Kevin Mullin to pass a bill in the legislature to modernize how local elected officials can communicate with the public online (AB 992) so that officials can be more accessible to residents. The bill was signed into law by Governor Newsom in 2020. As our Assemblymember, she will hold the government accountable, reduce waste and increase transparency.
Reduce traffic congestion on our highways and roads.
We have an aging transit system and a booming economy, the perfect recipe for traffic. On top of that, higher housing costs means people are forced into long commutes. As a Planning Commissioner, I had the opportunity to weigh in on our RWCMoves plan and encouraged our staff to be goal-oriented and focus on a small set of metrics that will matter to residents daily lives. Whether that be commute times, walkability scores and or safety measures like accidents and fatalities, we need to invest in transit options that make a real difference for residents.
Increasing childcare options for working families
Attracting and retaining ground floor retail and supporting Small Business & Entrepreneurs
Bringing a Smart Growth approach to development.
“Smart growth is an approach to development that encourages a mix of building types and uses, diverse housing and transportation options, development within existing neighborhoods, and community engagement.”
Retaining Neighborhood Character.
Protect neighborhood character while ensuring property owners rights
Evaluate ways to Improve parking in your neighborhood
Improve safety including safe routes to school
Reduce speeding and excess traffic in our neighborhoods
Build a plan to address infrastructure priorities including sidewalks, flooding and potholes
Invest in our neighborhood associations and neighborhood events
Increasing our Parks Spaces & Protecting Open Space
Identify, scope and build a downtown park
Pursue a plan for daylighting the creek
Protecting Public Safety & Neighborhood services
Ensure prompt 911 response times
Work with our Police and Fire departments to ensure they have the staff, training and equipment they need to serve our growing community
Engaging more residents in important decisions
Invest in technology platforms that allow for easy community input
Vary the time and location of City meetings to encourage greater participation
Invest in more community listening forums
Giselle is already a regional leader on addressing our climate emergency and protecting the environment for future generations. She worked to update Redwood City’s climate action plan, created a green purchasing policy, championed new construction policies to reduce gas usage, and serves on the Executive Board of Peninsula Clean Energy where they are ambitiously tackling a 24/7 clean energy goal.
She will continue to fight for smarter environmental policies, working for clean air and water, addressing drought conditions with water conservation programs, helping lead the equitable transition to a green economy and clean energy and addressing climate change.
Giselle was one of the first leaders in the County to call for a strong local response to the pandemic together with health care experts. Giselle helped lead Redwood City and the County’s response to COVID-19, focusing on health and safety measures, maintaining essential government services and programs, Safe Streets for pedestrians and bicyclists, funding to keep childcare programs open, securing funding for small business pandemic grants and restaurant parklets, as well as getting the local economy back on track.
Giselle knows countless families face similar or even more difficult challenges as her own family did and need help – especially related to equity, housing and food insecurity, and access to programs and services.
When the pandemic hit, Giselle took action to help local small businesses survive. She helped secure $600,000 in private funds to support small businesses as part of the San Mateo County Strong Fund’s Small Business Grant Program. On the Council, she has supported policies to allow local businesses to succeed and work to create well-paying local jobs.
As a successful businesswoman and former small business owner herself, Giselle knows the important role small businesses play in our local economy and believes that we can both help workers and help businesses succeed. That’s why, in the Assembly, she’ll support policies that encourage economic growth and help small businesses thrive and stay in California.
In the Assembly, Giselle will stand up for consumers, defend our right to online privacy and ensure the safety of children online. An accomplished businesswoman with a deep understanding of social media and evolving technology, Giselle is uniquely positioned to regulate the tech industry in an effective manner.
While California has the strongest online privacy regulations of any state in the country, the ever-changing nature of technology means we must continue to adapt and update our laws to continue to protect Californians. Giselle will ensure these laws change to keep up to date with new technology and expand regulations to better protect consumer information including medical and mental health data, protecting consumers from fraudulent practices and scams, and create more transparency around data breaches.
As a mother of young children, Giselle knows that children are especially vulnerable to exploitation, predatory behavior and other online dangers. She will protect children by supporting the creation of an Office for the Protection of Children Online, which will focus their privacy and well-being, and requiring tech companies to change their systems to avoid overuse and exploitation from strangers. She’ll also work to stop cyberbullying by requiring better reporting mechanisms from social media companies.