Clayton Watch

Clayton Watch · Candidate Record Review · No. 2

Maria Shulman for Clayton
City Council

An update on the Clayton City Council election. Seven residents have pulled papers to run. As of today, four have submitted the completed paperwork required to qualify for the November ballot.

Those who have pulled papers: Peter Cloven, Councilmember Kim Trupiano, Mayor Jeff Wan, Planning Commissioner Maria Shulman, Amy Callaghan, Jim Killoran, and Charlie Schmidt.

Over the coming months, Clayton Watch will examine the public record of each of these candidates and publish what we find, from City records, our own files, and other background material. We will do this for every name on the list.

Next up, Maria Shulman. She has not held elected office in Clayton. She currently serves on the Planning Commission. Because there is no Council voting record to review, what follows draws on her filed application to the City and on her own candidate statement.

Throughout her career, Maria Shulman has dedicated herself to caring for individuals, and she has spent her years in Clayton serving this community.

EDUCATION

Four credentials at three universities, every one of them earned while working.

She started at Temple University with a Bachelor’s in Criminal Justice and a minor in Mental Health. She trained at the Germantown Hospital and Medical Center School of Nursing for her nursing diploma, the working nurse’s route into the profession rather than the academic one. From the University of Texas at Arlington she added a Bachelor of Science in Nursing and Public Health, then a Master’s in Healthcare Administration.

Criminal justice, mental health, public health, nursing, administration. Every one of those disciplines turns up in a Clayton council packet sooner or later.

WILDFIRE

She has already put Clayton’s missing evacuation plan in writing.

In her filed application to the City, Maria Shulman noted the Commission had been made aware that Clayton has no evacuation plan. She also drew the line correctly: evacuation planning is not the Planning Commission’s job, but road width, secondary access points, and proposed density in high fire zones and at the wildland-urban interface are. Those are the conditions that bottleneck an evacuation route during a fire.

She has taken coursework from the Institute for Local Government on CEQA and its impact on wildfire risk reduction. Clayton sits against open hillside. This is the rare candidate statement that names a specific hazard and the specific lever a commission actually controls.

PLANNING

Chair of the Clayton Planning Commission in 2025, Vice Chair in 2024.

In these roles, she helped guide thoughtful growth that preserves Clayton’s small-town character.

Her filed statement of philosophy sets out three principles: decisions grounded in data, staff expertise, and applicable codes rather than personal preference; a transparent process where residents and applicants are both heard before a vote; and long-term thinking that weighs a project’s cumulative effect on infrastructure, housing affordability, and community identity. She calls the seat a public trust.

HEALTHCARE

A nurse and healthcare leader recognized for patient advocacy.

As a nurse and healthcare leader, Maria Shulman has held management, supervisory, pediatric special-needs, and care-management positions, earning recognition from Today’s Nurse for her advocacy and leadership in patient care. That work taught her to listen attentively, ask tough questions, and make considered decisions when the stakes are high.

MANAGING BUDGETS

Experience managing budgets, ensuring compliance, and owning decisions.

She brings extensive experience in managing budgets, ensuring regulatory compliance, and being accountable for her decisions.

Those are the three things a Council member is actually asked to do, and she has done all three in a field where getting them wrong has immediate consequences.

COMMUNITY

Serving Clayton beyond City Hall, for seventeen years.

She also serves on the Clayton Community Library Foundation Board and volunteers at events such as Clayton Cleans Up, the Art & Wine Festival, the Fourth of July parade, and Oktoberfest.

Add Holidays in the Grove and decorating the Police Department 4x4. None of it carries a vote or a title.

In her own words

“I’m a wife, mother, and a nurse who reads the fine print and asks the hard questions, and I’ll do that for every Clayton resident.”

Keep Clayton moving forward.

Clayton Watch is reviewing the record of each 2026 Council candidate.

By Clayton Watch, FPPC ID #1471612. Biographical and Commission details are drawn from Ms. Shulman’s application for appointment on file with the City of Clayton; quoted passages are her own statement. Conclusions are the opinions of the committee.