Paul McFarland

Committed to community… public service is about “we” not “me.”

That said, here’s a bit about me.

My family and I live in the heart of downtown Lee Vining. My wife, Yvette Garcia, teaches reading and math across the Eastern Sierra Unified School District, while our three kids, Solomon, Henry, and Lydia, get to grow up exploring the best place in the world around some of the kindest people known.

Like so many of us, I came to the Eastern Sierra for the land - the wide open wonderfulness of desert, sky, forest, canyon and ridge after ridge inviting multiple lifetimes of exploration. Over these last two decades, I’ve realized that while I came for the land, the people make this place worth staying in. The folks who get out of bed at 3am when the fire alarm goes off, the folks who magically produce hidden hand warmers for the kids when playing little league in the snow, the people who shovel neighbors out before they even know it was done, the businesses that keep their folks employed and stay open to support their communities during the months when locals outnumber tourists.

Over these decades, I’ve learned that almost nothing worth doing gets done alone; good things take time and a team. I’ve learned to listen, respect, adjust, and build a team together. I want to take the collaborative skills I’ve forged here, and work for you and our home.

Besides raising kids, chasing butterflies, and shoveling snow, here are a few highlights:

  • Founding staff member responsible for building three non-profit, public benefit organizations from the ground up, managing staff, working with boards of directors, raising funds to sustain growing budgets and implementing creative programs with dozens of partners from the Forest Service to churches to local businesses: Friends of the Inyo, Ventana Wilderness Alliance and the DeChambeau Creek Foundation;

  • Helping to shift our local public lands conversation from conflict to collaboration and stewardship through the establishment of programs like the Eastern Sierra Stewardship Corp, Lakes Basin Stewardship program, Mono County Sustainable Recreation program, and Camp Like a Pro;

  • Answering the call as a Firefighter with the Lee Vining Fire Department for over a dozen years;

  • Coaching Little League and trying to throw practice strikes for over a dozen years;

  • Serving as the Vice-Chair of the Mono County Local Agency Formation Commission (aka LAFCO) to oversee local special districts that provide direct services to our communities;

  • Serving locally on the Boards of the Lee Vining Public Utility District (10 years), Mono Basin Historical Society, Mono Basin Regional Planning Advisory Council (RPAC), and Lee Vining High School Parent Teacher Student Organization (Treasurer);

  • Serving regionally on the Federal Recreation Resource Advisory Council, Stakeholders Advisory Group for the California State Park’s Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation Division, and the Bureau of Land Management’s Central California Resource Advisory Council for which I received the Cooperative Conservation Award from the George W. Bush Administration.

  • Founding member of the Mono Basin Fire Safe Council, Lee Vining Cares, and the Mono Basin Housing Working Group.