Supervisor Hopefuls Answer 10 Questions

By Jondi Gumz

On Feb. 7, the five candidates for Santa Cruz County supervisor in the Second District answered 10 questions posted by the Aptos Chamber of Commerce leaders at a forum at Seacliff Inn, Aptos.

Mail ballots arrived Friday, and polling places are open Tuesday, March 5, from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

If no one gets 50% plus one vote, the campaign will go on until Nov. 5. Details: See www.votescount.us

The chamber picked the questions at random, but here you’ll find the answers by question. Some questions were answered by only one candidate. Answers are edited for brevity and clarity.

Among the issues: Highway 1 traffic jams, delays to get planning permits, short-term rentals, and lagging FEMA reimbursement for disaster response.

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What are the top 3 issues & how to solve them?

Bruce Jaffe: Affordable housing requires roads and water, which I know something about. Transportation: Traffic jams on Highway 1, it can take 45 minutes to get from La Selva Beach to downtown Santa Cruz. There’s no one solution. Free rides on the bus. Passenger rail? I will look at that. If it’s not feasible, I will say: Don’t go that way.

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How to deal with traffic jams on Highway 1, north & south, and Soquel Drive?

Kristen Brown: I’m all about data driven policy decisions. I’m chair of the RTC Transportation Commission. Metro bought 57 hydrogen buses, bus on the shoulder of Highway 1 is coming, with signals on Soquel Drive to let buses through. Free fares for youth boosted bus ridership by 400%. We’re moving forward with electric passenger rail, but a lot of questions remain. Our culture is single-occupancy vehicles.

Bruce Jaffe: I was on Highway 85 when it opened and there was a traffic jam. I like David Schwartz’ idea for flexible hours for county workers. I worked with FEMA in a tsunami and there’s a lot of silo-ing.

David Schwartz: We have options other than buses. What about van pools and carpools? How many in this room carpooled today? (1-2 hands) Would you car pool if there was a background check? If everybody on Highway 1 carpooled with one person, that could take hundreds of thousands of cars off the road. The train would go 20 mph, it would take an hour and a half, who’s going to ride that? Stop highway work during the day, do it at night, not during rush hours.

Kim De Serpa: I see young mothers with brown skin spending 2 hours of their day dropping off kids and picking them up. The county owns land on Emeline, Freedom Blvd and Ocean St where they could build workforce housing. The widening of Highway 1 will bring us relief.

Tony Crane: I’m not a big fan of widening. People will drive more. People don’t want to wait for a bus They want to be in control. How about incentives for a bus ride? A stipend. I ride an electric bike but I can’t do it today in the rain. Passenger rail is futuristic.

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What to do about the permit process at county planning that delays businesses from opening?

David Schwartz: I’d like to start with completely reorganizing the planning department. We need to inspire the staff to be customer-oriented, not process-oriented. We need to reduce the cost, which means redoing the budget. The county gets a 12% tax on short-term rentals. Can that money be earmarked for new homebuyers? I see Metro buses hardly full. Why not have a smaller fleet of vans that picks you up at your door? You’d have more riders.

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Short term vacation rentals take away housing from residents. What to do?

Tony Crane: It’s hard to tell people what to do with their property. I owned an AirBnb. Monitoring is really important. Some advertise a vacation rental on the internet but it’s not legal. We need to hold people accountable.

Kristen Brown: We have 240 short-term vacation rentals and 46 hosted rentals with the owner on-site, and 81 on the waitlist. We’re maxed out. The city of Santa Cruz empty home tax failed. We could incentivize property owners with a tax break for long-term rentals. We’d have to work with the Board of Equalization and the county assessor.

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What to do about federal disaster reimbursement owed by FEMA which is years behind?

Kristen Brown: More than $100 million is owed by FEMA for disaster aid dating to 2017. Capitola just got FEMA reimbursement from the January 2023 storm disaster – that was fast. We need strong advocacy. I have worked with U.S. Rep. Jimmy Panetta, State Sen. John Laird, Assembly Members Gail Pellerin and Dawn Addis. I advocate a change: Applying for grants, if the money is not spent, it’s returned to FEMA.

David Schwartz: Go to the state and say “we can’t afford this. Why don’t you the state finance it? Hold the IOU? Take the risk?” If the state says no, find an investment group that would buy this 80 cents on the dollar. We could do a lot if we had the money right now.

Kim De Serpa: The county is going for a bond to pay for this. I had a Public Works guy ride Trout Gulch Road (her neighborhood) to identify sections in disrepair for FEMA. FEMA only covers 80%, so we need money in reserve for these disasters.

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How to deal with the county budget’s structural deficit?

Kim De Serpa: I won’t know til I get in deep, after the May revise. At the Pajaro Valley school district, we had to make a lot of cuts. The new superintendent did a line by line review; I expect the county would do the same.

Bruce Jaffe: The supervisors basically got it right. People talk about raising that 13 cents we get from property taxes, but who is going to give up their money? Public Works say what gets funded is sexy stuff not potholes. Get to know your inefficiencies. Other than that, live within your means.

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With Santa Cruz County one of the most expensive places to live in the U.S., how to retain and recruit essential workers?

Kim De Serpa: We have this problem in the Pajaro Valley school district. We give a $5,000 signing bonus to bus drivers; the county could do the same. To pay livable wages, you need revenue. Under the state formula, Santa Cruz County gets only 13 cents from every property tax dollar.

Kristen Brown: $119,000 is considered low income. Police officers and firefighters are not making that much. No. 1, prioritize affordable housing for essential workers. Hiring bonuses. Longevity bonuses.

Bruce Jaffe: Where you choose to live depends on quality of life. It’s up to employers to provide a fair wage. It’s up to the county to prioritize its limited amount of funds to improve quality of life.

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How will you work with other supervisors?

Tony Crane: People are not being held accountable for their decisions. The county squandered a million dollars on the Encompass behavioral health respite care home in my neighborhood. When a mistake is made, they don’t ‘fess up. I’d be a squeaky wheel.

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How will you represent our voices at state and federal level?

David Schwartz: I’m new at this. I’ll meet with every department head to find out what issues hold them back from doing their job. With persistence and common goals, we can get things done. For Watsonville Community Hospital, private foundations have trillions of dollars and grants can be sought.

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Top 3 issues Zach Friend did well, and top 3 you would handle differently.

Tony Crane: My experience is we requested his help for this behavioral health home in my residential neighborhood. We provided irrefutable evidence that it was improper and nothing happened. I spent seven years fighting the county. It affected my property rights – they established a precedent for crisis mental health in our neighborhood. It sounds great but it doesn’t work.