About Claire
I grew up in Indiana and, after college in Minnesota and law school in Ohio, moved with my future husband to Colorado in 1982 to begin practicing  | | Claire Levy |
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law. We lived in Denver for four years, first in the Capitol Hill neighborhood and then in our first house in the Congress Park neighborhood east of downtown. We immediately became involved in Denver politics and made friends with whom we are still close to this day. We moved to Boulder in 1986, and we have lived in south Boulder ever since, first in Martin Acres, then in Table Mesa, and now on Shanahan Ridge. I have two daughters, ages 15 and 20.
 
They are both astute observers of national and international affairs. We also have an English Setter, Coco, who has loyally served as my office receptionist for the past five years.
The newest addition to our family is a wonderful Greyhound who we rescued. His racing name is My Sir George, but I call him Georgie Boy. He's a delight.
My husband of 26 years, David Driscoll, and I enjoy backpacking, cross country skiing, bike rides and reading.
 
In addition, I like to garden, cook and sew. My first job after law school was clerking for Judge Alan Sternberg on the Colorado Court of Appeals. From that one-year position I went to the Appellate Division of the Public Defender's Office in Denver. I represented indigent people on appeal who had been convicted of serious felonies. My job was to assure that anyone charged with a crime for which they could be imprisoned received a fair trial, regardless of their income. This work required me to hone my argument skills, both written and oral. I moved on to a brief stint as a civil trial lawyer in Boulder. I worked with talented attorneys who were leaders in representing people with serious injuries from accidents, whether at work, in their cars, by dangerous products, or by professional malpractice. Through this work I learned about our system of tort claims and automobile insurance. The public sector and public policy beckoned, and so when a position working on land use and planning opened in the Jefferson County Attorneys office, I jumped at it. I spent ten years driving Highway 93 between Boulder and Golden to work on land use, solid waste, water quality, liquor licensing, and subdivision regulation, among other things. Jefferson County faced tremendous growth pressure. It faced problems with wildfire hazard in the mountains and insufficient access. I helped draft and enforce regulations regarding mountain subdivisions, rural cluster subdivisions, location of cell towers and television towers, aggregate mining, and erosion control, among others. I also worked with legislators on bills related to local government land use authority. Our goal was to retain flexibility for local governments to address their unique problems during a time when the state legislature wanted to take tools away from local government in favor of developers. I then spent eight years in private practice in Boulder representing individual land owners, developers, neighborhood organizations, public interest groups and local governments. I also had the privilege during this period of volunteering in my daughters' classrooms, with the Boulder Arts Academy, and the Boulder Ballet. I have served on the Boulder County Parks and Open Space Advisory Committee, including three years as Chair; the board of PLAN Boulder County, as co-chair for two years and vice-chair for one year; the Boulder County Housing Authority; and the city of Boulder Planning Board.Through these experiences I have gained the knowledge required to be an effective legislator; the experience necessary to know when to fight and when to collaborate; the depth to be able to reach out to many interests; and the wisdom to know that I will always have more to learn.
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