Meet Your New Neighbors

Dieter and Connie Brehm began visiting Tehachapi in 2016 when their son, Ernie, who is a Kern County firefighter, moved here. During weekend visits Dieter and Connie became acquainted with the Tehachapi area and grew to appreciate its beauty, sense of community and quiet lifestyle. With retirement on the horizon, they considered Tehachapi an option, and began a home search that culminated with the purchase of a property in the Old Town area. They made their move to Tehachapi permanent this spring, after residing many years in the City of La Verne, located in the East San Gabriel Valley area of LA County.

Dieter retired in summer of 2017 from a 40+ year career as an industrial designer of energy plants including oil refineries, chemical plants and electric power plants. Connie retired in 2018 from her lifelong career as a professional nurse (RN), nurse educator and most recently from her position of 22 years as professor of Community Health Nursing at Azusa Pacific University (APU). In addition to teaching, Connie was founder and director of APU's Homeless Healthcare Outreach and is past president of East San Gabriel Valley Coalition for the Homeless, a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to housing the homeless.

The Brehms have four grown children. Kirstin, who is married to Brian, lives in Long Beach and is a PhD student at U.C. Irvine studying German literature. Son, Brent, is an attorney and resides in the San Fernando Valley with his wife, Rachel, and their three young daughters (the Brehms' granddaughters). Son, Ernest, is a Kern County fire fighter and is married to Alexandrea, who aside from raising goats, writes animal-related articles for The Loop Newspaper. Connie and Dieter's youngest daughter, Heather, plans to enter fire academy this fall (proudly taking after her brother) and resides in North San Diego County with her husband, Kurtis. Since all four of their grown kids are in Southern California, the Brehms enjoy frequent family gatherings.

Aside from family activities, Connie and Dieter like to garden and forge DIY projects around their Tehachapi property. Other interests include travel, amateur astronomy, geneology research, collecting antique music boxes, and camping/hiking. They report life is good in Tehachapi and appreciate their new friends.

Alex Munoz and her son Marques have been in Tehachapi for a while but when we met in Central Park over the 4th of July she said that, as she works in Bakersfield, she hadn't had a chance to learn much about her new Community. She has worked in Bakersfield for the school district for almost eleven years and now that her son is starting high school, she would like to be driving less.

She loved mountain living and the idea of four seasons. She is still waiting for the promised snow but is really glad to be in such a beautiful place.

Alex was born in Mexico and moved to the United States when she was five or six. The family settled in Bakersfield. She had three sisters and one brother and her family is still in Bakersfield.

When she married, she moved to San Jose where she lived for nearly six years. During that time she had the opportunity to work for the Santa Clara County courts. When she moved back to Bakersfield, she worked for the Kern County Sheriffs Office as visiting clerk at the prison for about two years before joining the school district.

A typical teenager, Marques loves gaming, is a budding artist and helps with the family dogs. Miska, Tutzie and Cookie are all rescues from the Los Angeles area.

Alex likes to hike and go camping and is now working on convincing her mother to join her here in Tehachapi. We gave her lots of tantalizing ammunition in the form reading material.

Welcome to Tehachapi Dieter, Connie, Alex and Marques.

If you have moved to the Greater Tehachapi Area within the last six months and would like to know more about your new community, call (661) 822-8188. We will be happy to make an appointment for a hostess to come by and give you lots of helpful information, some valuable coupons, gifts and much more. Many families and individuals who come to the area are pleasantly surprised with the amount of knowledge they gather about their new home. Publishing your welcome article is completely voluntary and is not a requirement of being welcomed.