realtor with William Pitt Sotheby's International Realty in Essex, and writes a weekly real estate column for the Shoreline Times. Peckinpaugh served as the marketing director for her friend Lisa Wilson-Foley’s LW Holdings. Political career In the early months of 2010 Peckinpaugh took an interest in politics when her good friend, Wilson-Foley, decided to run for Lieutenant Governor. Peckinpaugh was her campaign manager through the Republican Convention. She entered the political arena herself as a candidate for Congress from the 2nd district just a few weeks before the Convention but picked up enough votes to wage a primary. Peckinpaugh is a fiscal moderate and social liberal. Until the August primary, Peckinpaugh focused on meeting voters, raising money, and visiting all of the towns in the district. She quickly became a popular Republican candidate. On August 10, she defeated Daria Novak and Doug Dubitsky to become the Republican nominee. She was the only political candidate in Connecticut to beat the party-endorsed candidate. Following the primary, she went on to challenge the two-term incumbent, Democrat Joe Courtney. She continued to travel the district and meet voters and raised a quarter of a million dollars in six months but it was not enough to wage battle with the incumbent who had $1.4M to spend against her. The two frequently debated and sparred, and both had support from different groups. However, given the strong Democratic tendencies of the state's 2nd district, Peckinpaugh picked up 40% of the vote on November 2. In January 2011, she declared her candidacy for the Connecticut House of Representatives to fill a vacancy in a February special election. The seat she ran for had been vacated by Democrat Jamie Spallone. She ran a very strong campaign against Essex four term, first selectman Phil Miller, and lost by 80 votes. Charitable work Peckinpaugh has always been very active in charities in Connecticut. She currently serves on the board of directors for the Girl Scouts of Connecticut Girl Scouts, the CT Women's Hall of Fame and the Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford. She has been a corporator for Children's Hospital and was a fellow for Calhoun College at Yale University. Currently she is the Chair of the Economic Development Commission for Essex and is on the Board of Governors at the Essex Yacht Club. References http://www.yourpublicmedia.org/content/wnpr/where-we-vote-janet-peckinpaugh-vs-joe-courtney https://web.archive.org/web/20110718041806/http://www.cpbn.org/profile/janet-peckinpaugh http://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/12/nyregion/anchor-wars-around-the-state-s-tv-stations.html http://www.wtnh.com/dpp/news/hartford_cty/peckinpaugh-congress http://janetpeckinpaugh.com/ http://www.nhregister.com/video-archive/news/recent/11/32/ American television personalities American women television personalities