{"id":491485,"date":"2026-10-10T11:08:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-10T11:08:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/491485\/"},"modified":"2026-10-10T11:08:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-10T11:08:16","slug":"mayoral-candidates-forum-replays-long-standing-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/491485\/","title":{"rendered":"Mayoral Candidates Forum Replays Long-Standing Problems"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Sept. 27, six Santa Clara mayoral candidates revisited problems that have outlived several city councils: council dynamics, Levi\u2019s Stadium and the 49ers, the still-unbuilt Related Companies project, downtown redevelopment and data centers. The forum was sponsored by the League of Women Voters Santa Clara\/San Jos\u00e9, the Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce and San Jos\u00e9 Spotlight. Candidates had 60 to 90 seconds for answers.<\/p>\n

Candidates Karen Hardy, Kevin Park and Kathy Watanabe have served on the council, stressing institutional knowledge and voting records.<\/p>\n

The candidates who haven\u2019t served on council, Gary Ferraris, David Kertes and Mike Wiltberger, pointed to other experience: Ferraris as a longtime city employee, and Kertes and Wiltberger as business managers.<\/p>\n

Council Dysfunction<\/p>\n

The forum opened with a question on council dynamics, and it wasn\u2019t long before those dysfunctional dynamics were on display. Park answered the question by pointing to a chair that doesn\u2019t respect \u201ceither the public or the other council members.\u201d<\/p>\n

SPONSORED<\/p>\n

\"Devid\"Devid<\/a><\/p>\n

Watanabe followed by saying dysfunction started in 2020.* That election, she said, \u201cis where you can see where the divisiveness starts to take place and has gone downhill since then.\u201d An ethics commission was needed, she said.<\/p>\n

Hardy recounted that friends had called her \u201cthe grownup in the room,\u201d and credited a new city manager and city attorney for calmer meetings. The other candidates said that the council needed to ensure that everyone was respectful<\/p>\n

Levi\u2019s Stadium and the 49ers<\/p>\n

Levi\u2019s Stadium and 49ers influence are a longstanding council dispute. To untangle routine stadium management from politics, Park and Wiltberger separately proposed replacing the council as the stadium board with a professional management boar<\/a>d.<\/p>\n

SPONSORED<\/p>\n

\"Kevin\"Kevin<\/a><\/p>\n

Hardy, Kertes, Park and Watanabe said the 49ers should stay out of city elections; Park said that 49ers management asked him to drop out. He also said that 49ers should \u201cstop choosing our candidates,\u201d while noting that PAC spending in city elections began with the police union PAC.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Watanabe said she told 49ers CEO Al Guido that she was the best candidate and asked him to \u201ccall off his dogs.\u201d When he refused, she held a rally outside the stadium demanding transparency.<\/p>\n

Since 2016, Related Companies has had a development agreement<\/a> for 240 acres of vacant land across the street from Levi\u2019s Stadium. Significant parts of the development should have been built by now, but so far no construction has started.<\/p>\n

Watanabe blamed lawsuits, COVID, and \u201cfinancing\u201d for delays, nonetheless expressed optimism about the project. She said she had \u201cevery confidence\u201d the development would be everything \u201cand more\u201d than agreed to. She noted that Related paid the city about $850,000 in lease payments, and is looking at \u201cAI manufacturing, which is going to bring in good jobs and business into the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related was approved two years before she joined the council, Hardy said. There wasn\u2019t a lot the city can do now about the project because of the agreement that was signed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are bound to that and it is frustrating,\u201d she said, adding \u201cthey are having trouble with their financing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because Related changed its plan to light industrial, Kertes said, Silicon Valley Power \u00a0had \u201cto redo its plan for getting power to the site.\u201d Electricity won\u2019t be on the site until the end of 2028, putting construction out until 2029. He would get the city manager, SVP and Related \u201cto sit down in a room\u201d until \u201cwe understand what are the roadblocks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Park objected to Related\u2019s light industrial plan, saying data centers didn\u2019t belong in entertainment districts, and noting that the promised Fire Station 10 has yet to be built. Wiltberger and Ferraris said they wanted it started, but didn\u2019t know what the holdup was.<\/p>\n

Data Centers<\/p>\n

Hardy has made a data center moratorium the centerpiece of her campaign. She was tired, she said, of people saying, \u201cwe need to look at it \u2026 I was the one that put it on the agenda. If I were the mayor, I could [have] done it directly,\u201d but as a council member she has to get the council concurrence to put it on the agenda.<\/p>\n

Park is an outspoken opponent of more data centers, saying that he\u2019s the only council member voting against them.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur rates keep going up \u2026 because we keep having to build out infrastructure for the data centers,\u201d said Park.<\/p>\n

Wiltberger said a moratorium wasn\u2019t needed. Ferraris said they should be treated like any other development. Data centers brought the city $34 million last year, said Watanabe, agreeing with Kertes that data center companies should pay for infrastructure they need.<\/p>\n

Downtown<\/p>\n

Watanabe and Hardy talked about work underway, while the newcomers pointed to delays.<\/p>\n

Watanabe said an RFP was coming to the council \u201cshortly\u201d and the council should consider waiving fees to encourage development. Hardy noted that the city is in negotiation with Santa Clara University \u201cto swap some land with them to make a bigger piece of property that the city will own from Lafayette to Benton and Homestead.\u201d<\/p>\n

The city should get started, Wiltberger said, and \u201cmaybe knock down that huge building on the corner of Homestead in Lafayette.\u201d Ferraris said he would \u201croll up my sleeves and find out what the holdups are.\u201d \u00a0Kertes would \u201chold a city manager accountable\u201d because \u201cthis RFP needs to happen now.\u201d He also endorsed incentives for developers.<\/p>\n

The city \u201cdidn\u2019t capture\u201d a lot of the spending during the 2026 games, Park said, because it had no downtown for people to gather.<\/p>\n

*Mayor Lisa Gillmor lost the council majority in 2020.<\/p>\n

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Districts 2 and 3 Candidate Forum: Few Differences, Few Specifics<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Sept. 27, six Santa Clara mayoral candidates revisited problems that have outlived several city councils: council dynamics,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":491486,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[1818,6036,25438,191652,88,90,89,197,2919,191653,2921,2922],"class_list":["post-491485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-49ers","tag-bay-area-news","tag-levis-stadium","tag-related-santa-clara","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-santa-clara","tag-santa-clara-city-council","tag-santa-clara-downtown","tag-santa-clara-weekly","tag-silicon-valley-voice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=491485"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491485\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/491486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=491485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=491485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=491485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}