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Ami Chen Mills has been busy. Many Santa Cruz County residents might know her because of her community activism, which has recently been focused on keeping automated license plate readers (ALPRs) out of the community through her work with Get The Flock Out, which opposes the cameras and their vendor, Flock Safety. But she’s also a lecturer at UC Santa Cruz, where she teaches a class on resiliency; a writer; and host of the podcast “Moment of Truth with Ami Chen Mills,” although that program is currently on hiatus.

Chen Mills, having run for District 3 county supervisor in 2022, ultimately losing to current Santa Cruz City Councilmember Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson and current District 3 County Supervisor Justin Cummings, said she returned to electoral politics to run for Santa Cruz mayor because she felt that opponent Ryan Coonerty had been essentially appointed by the local political establishment. She said she isn’t pleased with his approval of ALPRs, nor with his adviser role for San Jose mayor and gubernatorial candidate Matt Mahan, who has received hefty donations from tech moguls.

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Max Chun is the general-assignment correspondent at Lookout Santa Cruz. Max’s position has pulled him in many different directions, seeing him cover development, COVID, the opioid crisis, labor, courts...