This summer the candidates for Park City Council were sent a questionnaire which was used for the Park Record Primary Election Voter Guide. One of the questions asked was “How many years does someone need to live in Park City to be considered a local?” The two incumbents answered if you live here you are local. Interestingly, the one challenger, Diego Zegarra, answered “5–10 years: you need to have moved here before COVID to really understand our community.”
It is interesting that the candidate who currently serves as the vice president of equity and impact at the Community Foundation is basically saying there is no equity for you if you moved here after 2014, at least not yet. I do need to make a correction, Diego’s title is now director of impact, dropping the “equity” in a very calculated fashion.
Recently at the candidate forum, Diego asked another candidate if a word dropped (inadvertently) from his campaign sign meant that it didn’t matter anymore? I think the better question should be to Diego, “Does equity not matter any more? Or was that a calculated move you made because you wanted to run for office?”
Ironically Diego’s own boss, Joel Zarrow, and one of his biggest benefactors, Virginia Solomon, have both not lived in Park City long enough. How could Diego possibly think that his boss “really understands our community?” And yes, it is ironic that Diego says “our” community when he excludes so many. He really means his community. If you did not move here in 2014, tough luck, you are not a local and you do not count, but Diego will gladly take your donations at the Community Foundation even if you have only lived here a week.
This intertwining of interests and paychecks between the Community Foundation and the city feels uncomfortable at best, without even considering how Diego is able to own a deed-restricted affordable housing unit slope side at Kings Crown when he’s making about $140,000 a year with the Community Foundation. How does this work? Does it work for Diego on that salary but no one else? Going forward, my family is planning to make charitable contributions directly to the non-profits of our choice and not through the Community Foundation. The money should go to those in need, not salaries for a director living in deed-restricted housing on a $140,000 salary.
Diego, I will give it to you, you smile a lot, but that just isn’t going to cut it. You need to have substance and experience. You have offered zero substance during this campaign. Cowering from taking a bold position on anything and not offering one single new policy idea. Ironically the Voter Guide is the only place where you gave us a hint at how you might govern, and you othered over a thousand voters by saying they weren’t “locals.” At the candidate forum when asked if you were in favor of a gondola connection from Main Street to Big Cottonwood Canyon, you hemmed and hawed and then said you would have to study it more. That is 100% not what the community wanted to hear. It was an easy question with a yes or no answer and you failed miserably. I wish you had some gravitas, some experience.
All is not lost, and I commend you for running though you are clearly not ready to represent all the people as you indicated in the voter guide. We all make mistakes. The real measure is how we learn from those mistakes. Perhaps you might think about true equity and inclusion before you decide to run again, and maybe a private sector job to gain some real experience at business and management. How the real world works. Running Park City is a big business. Serious business that takes experience and true leadership. Many of us here have that experience and we recognize those who have yet to acquire it. I will be voting for the other two candidates who understand that everyone that lives here is a constituent and a local.
Mark Reese
Park City