photo credit: Paul Saulsbury for U.S. Congress

As part of our ongoing coverage for the June 2nd primary election, we’re bringing you interviews with the candidates on your local ballot.

That includes the race for California’s 2nd Congressional District.

The Proposition 50 redraw means the district still covers all of Marin County, up through the western coastal areas of Sonoma and Mendocino counties, and the entirety of Humboldt, Del Norte, and Trinity counties; but now includes Shasta, Siskiyou, and Modoc counties as well.

Paul Saulsbury is one of seven candidates challenging seven term incumbent Jared Huffman for the 2nd Congressional District seat.

A mobile crisis clinician and Redding resident, Saulsbury said the quick decision making and care for community that are core to his work, are also at the heart of his decision to run for Congress.

"In my opinion, mental health impacts every single area of the community, whether it's cost of living, whether it's healthcare access, whether it's community safety," Saulsbury said. "My entire life, I have noticed that when people people are looking for answers, I am the one that's responding with the possible solution. So, I am about helping people and making sure that people get the care that they need as much as possible."

Saulsbury, a lifelong registered Republican, said common sense and accountability are just as much political guides as the letter next to his name.

"My goal upon getting elected into Congress is I'm going to vote what makes most sense to the majority of the people within my district," Saulsbury said. "So, being a representative in Congress as a Republican does not necessarily mean that I am only going to vote Republican issues because a majority of my constituents or the voters are not Republican. They're Democrats, they're Green Party, they're independents."

Saulsbury said a major focus if elected would be on getting more federal dollars sent to states for health care, and in particular mental health care.

"One area that that can happen is what's known as crisis stabilization units," Saulsbury said. "Cause right now when somebody has a mental health emergency, they are required to go through their local emergency room. At that point, they are having to connect with a doctor or nurse. They're occupying a hospital bed, and they're going through a very lengthy process just to get into a mental health facility so they can get mental health treatment; and oftentimes, what I see is people who...they've run out of medication or they don't have a place to stay for the night. Oftentimes, that can be addressed more locally and more state statewide."

He said he'd like to see more dedicated mental health crisis response across the district instead of defaulting to law enforcement, and at the same time improve coordination in both inland and coastal communities between police, healthcare workers, and social services.

Saulsbury said his background in mental health care and crisis response has led him to believe providing more federal resources to deal with clinical responses and the root causes of mental health crises will have positive upstream effects for other quality of life issues in communities across the US.

"When we get mental health patients out of the hospital and into the proper treatment facility, you're going to see traditional things like wait times might go down, insurance premiums would go down," Saulsbury said. "Law enforcement officers are not...held up in a hospital room having to be with the mental health patient. They can be out addressing the criminal aspect of things. So we what we have right now is we're applying the wrong type of systems to the problem. So I want to fix that and I want to change that and I want to coordinate with the proper agencies to make that happen."

Saulsbury said district-wide issues like addressing forest health and management, and the cost of living are also major campaign priorities.

"My goals are to represent all nine counties from the Redwood to the Ranchlands, that's my campaign slogan," Saulsbury said.

Saulsbury, who has an A rating from the California Rifle & Pistol Association said he supports responsible gun ownership and community safety; and said he hopes to see more support and options for women seeking abortions.

He said to address pocketbook concerns, he would also focus on lowering energy and fuel costs, cutting regulatory burdens, and increasing the housing supply to drive down costs.