Ashurst ready to take seat on council

In less than a week, Denise Ashurst will be sworn in as Boulder City’s newest council member. And she’s ready and eager to do so.

She will be sworn it at 5 p.m. on Dec. 10 in council chambers. She will then quickly take her spot on the dais as the only new member of council, having defeated incumbent Matt Fox in the general election. Sherri Jorgensen received enough votes in the primary election and avoided moving to the general election.

“I have family coming in, so I thought after being sworn in, we’d come back here for cake and coffee,” she said. “But to my surprise, I take the dais and start working right then and there. You’re sworn in and then take a seat.”

During COVID is when she first considered running for council and felt her skills in the military, plus 40 total years working for the government, would translate nicely in helping to run the city.

“I talked to a few friends about running for council,” she said. “I was told that instead of running for council, I should run for state Assembly based on the things I was talking about. The next day I got a call from Joe Hardy, who said, ‘We sure could use you at the state level’ so I ran for state Assembly and just missed it by a little over 500 votes.”

While disappointed by the loss, Ashurst said she realized starting with running for council may be the best approach.

“I’ve always felt you need to crawl before you walk,” the 68-year-old said. “I met with a couple of people who had been on council prior and they said I’d be a good fit for Boulder City and so I threw my hat in the ring.”

She then started meeting with as many people and groups, both Democrats and Republicans, even though council is a non-partisan position. That’s because she wanted to hear about the issues from all residents and not just those on one side of an issue. She also became a member of the city’s Historic Preservation Commission and served on it for more than a year. It prepared her for the feeling of sitting on a board and things that come along with it like the Open Meeting Law.

“I really didn’t have a platform on any specific issues; instead I wanted to listen to the residents and decide how I could be a voice for the city,” she said.

In her candidate profile that appeared in the Review earlier this year, Ashurst was asked what single issue most influenced her decision to run. She said it was inflation.

“I live comfortably with two retirements under my belt, and I still struggle with high and increasing prices, for food, gas, and taxes,” she said. “I’m also aware of my less-fortunate neighbors and their financial struggles. It is for this reason, controlled spending is paramount, and transparency in our local government must be a priority. Lawlessness abounds in so many areas—if spending is curbed, other issues will subside, such as petty crime, etc.”

After 20 years in the Air Force, Ashurst finished out her military career at Nellis Air Force Base. Having come to Boulder City around 2000, she said Boulder City reminded her of her hometown of Yonkers, N.Y, but much smaller. She moved here full time in 2005.

“It just has that small-town feel,” she said. “You can walk everywhere. I love my neighborhood and I love hearing sounds from the high school from my backyard like the band playing. You can’t get that same hometown feel in Vegas or Henderson. I love Boulder City.”

Ashurst said she realizes there is a lot more to being on council than simply showing up two times a month. She’s prepared to hit the books and do as much research as she can on issues facing Boulder City.

“Similar to the military, there’s a lot of negotiating that occurs in politics,” she said. “That’s helped prepare me for this new position. They used to call me the “The Fireman” because I was always putting out fires on things that came up. Bringing people together for the common cause is important and we have to realize that we can agree to disagree.”