About Maven

Maven is Denise Castellucci, a San Francisco Native and fourth generation Californian. She moved to Northern Marin with her husband and young son.

Maven has more than 20 years of high tech experience from working from 976-Jeanne Dixon Horoscopes and large telecommunications projects, to computer training, to large corporate IT projects, to becoming a web designer.

In the 199os, worked with an innovative interactive television project called 21st Century Vaudeville. In 1996, Denise founded T.I.E.S. Terminal Illness Emergency Search, which offered free post-adoption search services to those with terminal illness. She worked with Bastard Nation working on Adoptee Rights issues.  Denise designed Filmmaker, Sheila Ganz’s website for her film, “Unlocking the Heart of Adoption”. She has also volunteered with Mid-Peninsula Support Network and worked in clinic defense for Planned Parenthood. Denise has testified before state and local government and lobbied multiple state legislatures.

She has a BA in Political Science degree and a British & American Literature Minor from San Francisco State.

She is a former web designer and writer of an award-winning adoption website, Voices of Adoption. In 1998, Denise was named one of “The Top 25 Most Influential Women of the Web.” After a hiatus away from the Internet in 2003, Denise is returning to the Internet to mix her interest in politics and living in Marin.

When it comes to blogging, her biggest influence is wonkette.com and huffington post, yet it is impossible to compete on a national level like those blogs do. She wants to take the best aspects of both of those sites and create a blog that is devoted to this region. The politics and life is here is interesting.

Marin Maven is a site devoted to taking a look at Marin politics and North Bay living. We are interested in looking at the full spectrum of North Bay politics — town by town, neighborhood by neighborhood. We will include links to Marin republicans, independents, socialists, greens, as well as democrats. With that said, this area is still very much democrat, so a lot of activity will be democrat. We want to be where interesting things are happening and we are welcome to listen in and share it with our readers. Marinmaven.com will not only deal with Marin politics, but Sonoma politics as well, since what happens up North can impact Marin. We will also keep an eye on Sacramento legislation that would effect where we live.

Marinmaven.com is not only about news, events, opinions, and politics, but it is also about encouraging those who live here to get more engaged with making this place a better place. We are going to be featuring non-profits and individuals who are doing in good in this area. We would also like to give props to businesses who are giving back and getting green. Our goal is to make sure that you don’t just know what is going on, but why you should get involved and how you can get involved.

Maven has a long history of being involved in politics. At age 10, she convinced her parents to vote for Carter and at age 12 she verbally cornered a candidate for state office about Proposition 13. The Maven has long loved attending and watching local and state legislative bodies. She lost her legislative virginity watching a Menlo Park City council meeting for a high school civics class. Every one of her classmates gave her the task of writing up what happened at the meeting. The thing was she loved taking notes at such deliberative events. What some people consider mundane and dry, Maven finds facinating. Look for her reports of Board of Supervisors meetings!

If you live in Marin or Sonoma and have an interest in writing about goings on in Marin-Sonoma, please drop us a note. We are looking for writers, photographers, and artists to contribute in return for fame and the possibility of being paid with shells and shiny objects. If you are a Marin-Sonoma based business and would like to advertise here, let us know. If you want to be a tipster and just want to give us a tip or a heads up about an event to be at, let us know.

Many people find themselves up here in the North Bay because they have become parents, so we also include parenting resources.

While we are here, we might as well have fun! We will also explore how we entertain ourselves and enjoy the outdoors here in Marin.

If you are a business in Marin who would like to become one of our sponsors, please let us know.  We promise to make it worth it.