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Welcome to the 2026 San Ramon Candidate Forum.
Thank you for joining us for an evening focused on the choices, ideas, and
leadership that will shape our community's future.
I'm Danielle Cook, the president and CEO of the San Ramon Chamber of Commerce, and
I'm honored to be a part of the team that helped organize this event tonight.
For more than 40 years, the Chamber has helped local businesses and non-profit
organizations connect, grow, and succeed.
Through networking events and community promotion, we help businesses and residents
discover the people, services, and organizations that make San Ramon a vibrant
place to live and work.
We would love to take this opportunity to invite all community members to come to
our next community event on October 22nd at the San Ramon Community Center.
It's our annual Wine and Dine. This is our 33rd
Annual Wine and Dine. And as always, we're going to be celebrating in style with
mocktails, wine, beer, tea, coffee, delicious bites of every kind from
36 local vendors.
Your ticket will include all food and beverage, and attendees will get to vote for
their best bite, their best sip, and their best dessert, and we'll do an awards
ceremony at the end of the night. We will also have our signature silent auction,
featuring a whole bunch of really cool prizes from local businesses.
And we are also going to have live jazz for a portion of the evening.
So, it's a lot of fun. We have some information about it on the table out front.
I would love to see you there. So first off, tonight, I would like to thank the
AAUW for their help. The AAUW is a nonpartisan national
organization with more than 40,000 members and donors working to expand
opportunity for women and girls. Its San Ramon branch, established in
1982, brings that mission home through advocacy, education,
scholarships, leadership development, and activities that build lasting community
connections. You can learn more about the branch from the information available in
the lobby, or you can meet several of its members serving as volunteer ambassadors
tonight. I would actually like to ask those volunteers to stand up really quick,
because they also have a job tonight.
Thank you. Yes.
They are going to be our timers during the forum.
They will also be collecting questions.
So, if you notice, we have some note cards on the table out front and in the lobby.
Looks like we have a question to be collected over here.
And they will be coming by and collecting those questions and bringing them to our
moderators to make sure that we address all of the issues that you're the most
concerned about tonight.
I would also like to thank Bishop Ranch for hosting us in the beautiful Tahoe
Auditorium. Bishop Ranch offers welcoming, innovative spaces that unite
businesses and residents. We genuinely appreciate their generous support in
providing us this venue for tonight's candidate forum at the Roundhouse.
It is a place that truly encourages community gathering, connection, and civic
engagement.
I would also like to thank our friends at VIP Audio Visual back there in the booth.
VIP has generously volunteered to record tonight's candidate forum and
share it with community members who are not able to attend.
VIP provides
professional audiovisual and media services for corporate events, including event
planning, sound, lighting, and video production.
We deeply appreciate their willingness, expertise, and commitment to helping more
people access this important community discussion.
We are especially fortunate to have two accomplished journalists guiding
tonight's conversation. I have Emily Lavin, division editor
of Embarcadero Media's East Bay Division, and Jeremy Walsh, associate publisher
and editorial director. They together bring decades of award-winning reporting,
editing, and publishing experience, and Jeremy leads the division's editorial work
and is part of its award-winning candidate forum moderator team.
Through trusted, independent journalism across the Tri-Valley, Embarcadero Media
helps residents understand the issues shaping their communities.
Together, they bring that same deep local knowledge, thoughtful preparation, and
commitment to fairness to tonight's forum.
So please join me in warmly thanking them for helping create an engaging
and informative conversation for San Ramon. Thank you.
Good evening.
Welcome to the San Ramon Mayor and City Council Candidates Forum.
Our program will be split tonight, with the three candidates for mayor speaking
over the next hour or so, and the four candidates for city council following at
approximately 7:15. At the dais now we have 2026 mayoral
candidates, incumbent Mark Armstrong, challengers
Emma Chibue and Paschalis
Datsos.
Well,
hello, I'm Jeremy Walsh, associate publisher and editorial director for Embarcadero
Media Foundation's East Bay Division, which includes your hometown,
DanvilleSanRamon.com, Livermore Vine, and the Pleasanton Weekly, which is the
reigning General Excellence winner in the California Journalism Awards.
My co-moderator this evening is our new editor, Emily Lavin.
Our reporter, Janita Lyman, will be covering tonight's forum, and our photographer,
Chuck Eckert, is in the room,
taking photos. We will start the mayoral program with two-minute opening statements
from each candidate, then each candidate will have up to 90 seconds to respond to
questions. Our timekeeper will signal when you have 30 seconds remaining
with a yellow card, and when time is up in red.
In the interest of time and asking as many questions as possible, we've asked the
candidates to save any rebuttals for their closing statements.
We have some prepared questions and some questions that were submitted by the
online survey. As Danielle said, we're also accepting questions tonight.
If you jot them down on an index card, raise it up in the air, one of our runners
will grab them and walk it up to us here, and we'll work that into the program as
best we can. We do consolidate questions on similar subjects, and we will ask as
many questions as time allows, but please understand that we cannot ask every
question.
At the end, each candidate will have up to three minutes for closing remarks.
Out of respect for the candidates and others, let's agree that all audience members
will be polite, attentive, and as quiet as possible.
No cheering or booing, distractions, or outbursts, please.
We will start in alphabetical order, with Mark Armstrong giving his opening
statement first. We will alternate who speaks first during the questioning portion
of the program. Mark Armstrong.
All right. Thank you, Jeremy, and thank you to DanvilleSanRamon.com, to the Chamber
of Commerce, to AAUW, and VIP for hosting this evening's event, and thank you
everyone for being here. My name's Mark Armstrong.
I've had the privilege of being the San Ramon mayor since 2024, since joining the
city council after the 2020 election.
And I'm running for re-election for San Ramon because it's an exceptional
community. But we're entering a period of significant change.
State housing laws are reshaping what cities can control.
Bishop Ranch and our city core is evolving, and we must strengthen our long-term
finances, keep our community safe, and make sure that infrastructure keeps pace
with the growth. And I believe those challenges require experience and steady
leadership. I graduated from West Point, served 30 years in the US Army, earning
the rank of colonel. I later joined FEMA, serving as a senior leader.
And those experiences taught me to prepare, to listen, to understand facts, to work
across differences, make difficult decisions, and be accountable for results.
That's the approach I bring to the mayor's office every day.
My priorities are clear. Keep San Ramon safe, manage growth thoughtfully while
protecting our existing neighborhoods and our open space, maintain long-term
financial discipline, and build a diverse business-friendly economy.
Experience is not about resisting new ideas.
It's about knowing how to turn good ideas into practical results.
I'm proud to serve San Ramon, and I'm asking for the opportunity to continue that
work, and I look forward to tonight's discussion. Thank you.
Thank you. Emma Chibue.
Good evening, everyone, and thank you to everyone who put in the work to make this
event happen. My name is Emma Chibue, and San Ramon is not just a city I live in.
It is not just a city I love. It is the city that has raised me.
San Ramon has always prioritized excellence in so many areas.
It is no question why so many of you have spent so many decades in this beautiful
city. It is because we have prioritized public safety, our beautiful parks and
recreation, and the education that San Ramon is known for.
That is why it has always broken my heart when I hear about the families that are
priced out, that can no longer afford to live in our beautiful city, all the
students that cannot get to their school places because we have not invested enough
in public transportation, and so many other things that we are encountering right
now. As we enter into this season of reflection on what we've already been doing in
San Ramon, I believe that it is time for a new perspective and new leadership.
It is time that we ensure that multiple demographics in San Ramon are being
represented and heard. So many of you have incredible ideas and perspectives from
your experiences living in San Ramon that are not currently being heard.
It is time we engage our community as we enter into this new era of San Ramon so
that we know what the future of San Ramon will hold, so that we know how we can
best serve our residents, so that San Ramon is a prosperous city for decades to
come. Thank you.
Thank you. Paschalis Datsos.
Jeremy,
Emily, Chamber of Commerce, thank you so much for organizing this event.
It's a great opportunity to share some of our thoughts and get to know each other.
It's nice also to see a lot of familiar faces here, people who care as much as I do
about the future of our city, and I found it very important, which shows that you
know
what's happening with our city and care about the city.
So
for me, three years ago, I received an email which says our city
has a deficit.
It was a surprise for me as I wasn't involved at all in the Civic Center matters,
and it was challenging for me to accept that something like this happened
in a day.
Three years later, I'm just standing in front of you.
Now, what happened in between was I got familiar with how the system
works. I followed all the courses for the City of San Ramon, which is Planning
Academy,
Government 101, and the Community Academy, which is a magnificent program that our
police is organizing.
I created great friendships. I learned the system, and I saw its vulnerabilities
and places where it can change, correct it, and get updated to the point that we
can all be proud that we are residents of this beautiful city.
And my name is Paschalis Datsos. Thank you.
Thank you. Our first question, we'll start with Emma Chibue.
Emily, we'll begin with the elephant in the room.
The redevelopment of Bishop Ranch from a vast office park to a mixed-use
neighborhood is arguably the most important project in modern San Ramon history.
What do you think of the plans built and approved to date, as well as those coming
down the pike? Has the city done a good job balancing the demands of the
developers, the residents, and the state mandates when it comes to the new Bishop
Ranch?
I will first say that this new project and development that we are working on has
brought many benefits and potential benefits to our city.
For example, with new housing, we will have so many young families that can start
their families in our city and can be here for decades to come.
With new businesses in these spaces in the city core, we will see an increased
revenue in our city, which allows us to manage this deficit.
Alongside the benefits that this development will have, of course, there will be
many challenges. For example, a lot of residents that I've spoken to are concerned
about what that might mean for their commute and the increased congestion that it
might bring to the area. A lot of us commute past City Hall to get to our freeways,
and we already know how much the development that occurs there can impact our
commute. Another thing that people are worried about is with all this new
development, will we still see the continued character of San Ramon being
preserved? I believe that City Council has an incredible challenge ahead of it, but
I believe that we are more than equipped to do what is necessary.
That includes speaking to our residents about what they believe must be prioritized
in this time, and also reaching out and looking at what is occurring right
now and analyzing what is happening right now and seeing how this might play out in
future years.
Thank you. Paschalis Datsos.
Thank you.
I'm not against building. Building pre-built profit.
But I prefer to do smart development rather than just build partially as what's
happening right now here in San Ramon.
The project that it has an environmental study and a master plan, and be a part of
a master plan is Orchard.
And everything else has been built up partially in the last two, three years
without understanding the strain they can put to the current traffic, sewers,
and water system.
When you build partially, then you don't understand, and you don't have the
expectation that everything's going to work out, and one day we're going to wake up
and someone's going to say, "Oh, really did work out."
There's a big challenge right now downtown in Bishop Ranch and in the developments
in Camino and Norris Canyon as to where
personally I feel it lacks of good architectural
aesthetic. State mandates does say build, but
it's our job to build right, build in a way that
encourages families to feel safe, to feel that they can walk in our streets and
feel that they can go on a long walk without using their car,
and feel that we have a purpose and we have a meaning in our own city.
Thank you.
Thank you. Mark Armstrong.
Yeah. Thank you. So we've had in our general plan for quite some time the idea of
building out the city core area. So this is not a new concept.
We've been doing that for where you can see it recently, but we just even
back in 2020, we approved the City Walk master plan.
That was for a 4,500 unit development. That master plan was open to the public.
It had all the requisite public hearings and environmental review.
So there's not a surprise there. We are also just recently
approved the Orchards master plan as well.
But this development, what it does for us is it, as I said at the outset, it helps
to protect our existing neighborhoods, and it protects the existing neighborhoods
by focusing that development in our city core as opposed to out in your
neighborhoods or on our hills that everybody loves.
We don't have a lot of extra space. We're basically built out to our urban growth
boundary. The state's mandated an additional 5,111 units.
We have to figure out where that goes.
It fits nicely in the city core, but we also have to thoughtfully figure out how to
adjust for all the infrastructure changes, the traffic changes, the public service,
and safety requirements that are going to go along with additional growth in our
area.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question, we will start with Paschalis Nassos.
Residents remain concerned about crime.
Just weeks ago, San Ramon was hit by a rash of business burglaries that made
headlines, plus residential and vehicle break-ins and purse snatchings, leaving
folks on edge. Where does public safety sit in your list of campaign priorities?
What ideas do you have to improve public safety and crime prevention in San Ramon?
In my priorities, it's number two,
meaning first priority for me, it's emergency preparedness,
that we need to be ready for earthquakes and wildfires, and the second one is the
protection of our
residents and our businesses and our homes.
As far as it has to do with how we can monitor, how we can secure
our establishments, it has to go with sometimes
some non-conventional and not accepted tools, such as the flow cameras.
If we manage to control and understand how to use that and sharing the information
only internally, then it's a great tool for our police.
As far as how to protect our businesses, we can secure
some micro grants. Depends, again, deficit.
When we're talking about deficit, it's always a challenge.
So we can secure some micro grants for the businesses for creating some
safety interoperable systems into their shops, but
also if in case there's burglaries, for public works to create
a crew, a program where we can immediately intervene, help them gather up,
and set up again shop immediately.
So there's a lot of
ideas in a 90-second
reply.
Thank you. Mark Armstrong.
So public safety continues to remain a top priority for me.
We do a great job with our police department.
They're well respected by our community, and they do a great job policing.
I'm fully supportive, as our council has been, of making sure that they're fully
resourced, they have the training, the technology, all the things that they need to
do their job. And they do a great job with their investigations and their detective
work.
We do use targeted crime prevention efforts.
In fact,
about three years ago, we got a $5.6 million organized retail theft prevention
grant from the state, and we used that to get some additional technology, some
vehicles, some license plate readers, some situational awareness cameras, some
staff, a drone to use as a drone as a first responder program.
And we've used that effectively to deter crime.
The other thing our police department does is they work with our local businesses,
and they help them with understanding how to improve their situation.
So it's a two-way street. It's not just the police, but businesses can also improve
things like lighting, cameras,
employee knowledge, as well as alarms and do other prevention measures.
So the simple goal for us is to prevent crime in the first place, at least deter
it, and then respond quickly and solve crimes and maintain that public trust.
Thank you. Emma Chibou.
When we speak about public safety in this new era of San Ramon, I first want to
speak on businesses. Businesses will not be incentivized to come stay in San Ramon
and be here long term if they do not feel that there is a rapport between them and
our police department, which is why I fully agree with Mayor Armstrong that public
safety must be one of our biggest priorities.
Businesses need to feel like their city is doing what is necessary in order to be
able to track down anyone who threatens the safety of their property and their
businesses. Next, I want to speak about families.
As we continue to have new housing, that means new families, and I don't want
residents to feel like with the increase of more families, the response times to
their emergencies will decrease.
Which is why we do need to continue to staff our police department, to invest in
technologies to help our police department be even more effective.
Because even with more people coming to our city, that does not mean that we can
let up on what has always been one of the greatest tenets of San Ramon, which is
our safety and our commitment to making sure that families feel like they are in
one of the safest cities in California.
Thank you. We'll start with Mark Armstrong for the next question.
What ideas do you have to promote economic development throughout San Ramon, from
the northwest side to Dougherty Valley to the southwest end and everywhere in
between? Please approach the question as it applies to small and medium-sized local
businesses, as well as the large companies and retailers with a strong presence
here.
Sure. I think one of the things we need to do is diversify
beyond the dependence that we've had on our large businesses.
Bring in some technology, bring in healthcare, bring in professional services and
businesses like that.
There's a lot of emerging industries that also can set up in San Ramon and succeed.
We need to retain existing businesses and help the new ones to set up.
We've had in the past a concierge service, a business concierge service, to help
new businesses get established. We need to make sure our city is not creating
hindrances with permitting, and make sure that if a business wants to make a tenant
improvement, they can do that without a lot of difficulty.
And just making it easy for businesses to operate.
One of the biggest things I think we can do is make sure we have a great quality of
life in San Ramon. That's what attracts businesses. That's what retains businesses.
We have a good quality of life. We have a safe city. There's great schools.
We have great parks. The businesses feel safe. The employees feel safe.
The shoppers feel safe. The employees who work in San Ramon love this city, and we
want to keep it that way, and that's what's going to not only attract new
businesses but maintain the ones that we have right now.
Thank you. Emma Chibou.
Mm-hmm. Businesses are critical to what we are talking about when it comes to our
deficit. With more businesses coming and setting up shop in San Ramon, we will see
an increase of, one, our own residents having jobs within their city, which means
they are not commuting outside of our city in order to be at their workplace, which
means they are spending more money within our city.
Another thing that brings is employees from outside of San Ramon, who will then be
around our new restaurant and buildings that we are putting in the city core.
Businesses are a crucial part of this process, and making sure that they feel safe
enough to be here long term is incredibly important.
I think another thing we have to look at is the business itself and whether or not
it has a history of being successful and, two, whether or not it is something that
appeals to families. San Ramon is a family city.
These businesses need to be able to connect with our residents, and they need to
have a history of being able to do that in other places.
When it comes to these larger businesses, like Mayor Armstrong said, I think we
should be prioritizing tech and healthcare businesses, because a lot of San Ramon,
especially newer San Ramon, the Dougherty Valley side, is a lot of tech workers.
If they could find their business here in San Ramon to be working at, it would be
incredible for residents, better for their quality of life and their commute, and
it would alleviate some of that traffic having to get out of our city.
Thank you. Paschalis Nassos.
You will notice from time to time when I mention things and I give an explanation
about a question in general, and this is who I am,
and it's hard to pass that,
is that I need to be pragmatic.
By
expressing a little bit the philosophy of what the business exactly is,
the rollercoaster that every single business owner experience
When we talk about bringing tech and new businesses, new retail in our city, first,
we have to figure out how, because everybody wants the same thing.
Everybody's going to bring tech, everybody's going to bring small businesses.
In the Doherty area, there is no plan.
There's no way that you can bring small businesses.
So everybody on the Doherty area is going where Pleasanton and Dublin to shop.
Now,
what we need to do is we need to audit our own system.
What exactly are the things that we're doing right or wrong, that the current
businesses can actually continue doing business in the city of San Ramon.
One thing that we really need to pay attention, and this is something that I also
spoke to the council meeting, is that when you impose an almost
14% to city's residents increased fees per year
to reserve space in the city of San Ramon, you do not suppose to have the
expectations these businesses will remain as a business, not in the city, as
a business. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question will start with Emma Shibu.
We're just two years removed from very tough budget discussions and the voters
passing Measure N, temporary sales tax to help stabilize things.
Where are we now with regard to the city's fiscal reality?
How is the short and long-term health of San Ramon's budget in your view, and what
should be done to address any issues?
Measure N and other increased taxes will not hold us forever.
Measure N only goes over, I believe, a 10-year period.
When we look at the fiscal health of San Ramon, we must think about things that
will be consistently bringing in revenue to San Ramon, which includes, like we've
mentioned, businesses that will be here for the long term.
It includes more housing so that residents are living here, and they can contribute
to the overall revenue of our city.
When we think about San Ramon's future, we do have to make sure that we are a
healthy city for decades to come financially.
If that means looking at very closely where we are spending and what we can cut
back on, I would like that to be done with the residents in mind, with
conversations with the residents.
We would like to know what they think could be cut back on and what is it about San
Ramon that they would absolutely need to stay the same.
For a lot of residents, that is public safety, and that is the money that we are
putting toward our excellent police department.
For some of them, it is our parks and recreation, and for some of them, it is our
roads and our safe roads and how we transport.
And so I would like everything we do when it comes to our fiscal health to be in
conversation with the residents.
Thank you. Paschalis Datsos.
Talking about Measure N,
it's just a temporary patch
in an effort where
we can
manage our expenses, but we can't manage our revenue.
Right now, what we have is, we have-- I don't want to say overdevelopment, I
will say development,
which it gives a good push economically to our budget
because it includes the impact fees that every developer has to give, and it's
spread out in seven years,
and you will see eventually by the 2035, we're going to have a huge drop
into our city finances, and we'll figure out then that we are desperate, and the
only option we have is another measure.
As I said, options right now is we're here, we are San Ramon.
We have an opportunity to see what's great in our city.
We need to act and think as a business,
and we cannot think and act as a government, where if we lose money, we
ask for taxes.
Thank you.
Thank you. Mark Armstrong.
So, as was said, Measure N was a 1% sales tax. Voters approved that in 2024.
And it is good for 10 years, but we have to treat that as a bridge.
That is not permission to avoid structural reform.
We still need to figure out ways to increase our revenues, to do government more
efficiently, to
decrease our expenditures. So this is just like your own personal finances.
City has to do the same thing. Our challenge is we still do have that structural
deficit. You look at every city in the Bay Area suffering the same kind of
financial challenge. Our revenues are only going up at about 4%.
Our expenditures are rising almost 9%.
That is naturally going to create a structural deficit.
We have to figure out how to bridge that gap.
And so Measure N is that bridging mechanism until we can figure out some of these
things into the future. And I'll just say that we did, before doing Measure N, we
did do quite an extensive survey with residents. What's important to you?
What are the services? What are the programs?
What are the things that are important to you?
And we did a lot of presentations on our financial outlook and then presented it to
the voters. If you want to keep those things that you think are so important, then
that Measure N is one way that we can do that right now and create that bridging
mechanism so we can work on other ways to have a secure financial future.
Thank you. Starting this time with Paschalis Datsos.
Traffic congestion and safety continue to be front of mind for many residents, and
then there are concerns about pavement quality, trails, bicycle lanes, and of
course, e-bikes. What are your top goals for street maintenance and road safety in
San Ramon, and how will you work to help residents and businesses address street
concerns in their neighborhoods?
Traffic.
It's traffic. We don't even know what's going to happen in the next year or so with
everything that's building downtown.
And one thing to consider sometimes is we can dispatch.
We can separate ourselves if you don't live downtown San Ramon and say, "Oh, I live
in the side where I can have a yard, more space, et cetera, and that is not going
to devalue my property value." Everything is connected in a city.
Traffic is one of them. Right now, in order to measure traffic, they're using the
VMT, which is the vehicle mile traveled, which is not an accurate
measure to see if this kind of building is going to have an effect,
negative or positive. It's more about the mileage to travel, and it
doesn't show congestion, and it's not real in time that it can actually help us.
Now, as far as our neighborhoods and our residents, how we can protect, as I said,
when there's a deficit, we need to prioritize
where we need to bring money and how high is the impact of the thing
that we need to work on. Thank you.
Thank you. Mark Armstrong.
Sure. Traffic is a real concern I hear all the time from residents, so we
definitely have to take a look at that.
I just think back when Chevron was here in full force, the traffic actually was
worse when you look at the commute times in the morning or in the evenings.
But with all the new development coming over, this current development that we have
right now and over the next 10, 20, and even 30 years, there's going to be more
traffic, so we have to figure out how to thoughtfully deal with that.
But that land use strategy that I was talking about before, focusing on our city
core, that really matters. That helps to put the growth and any
new traffic potentially in this area where it's close to 680, the on and off the
freeways. That growth also puts the housing near retail.
It puts it near recreation, near parks, and things like that, so people don't
necessarily have to get onto the roads.
We also have improvements we made with infrastructure, with the Iron Horse Trail,
Bollinger Canyon Overcrossing, to help reduce traffic conflict with our pedestrians
and our bicyclists, and we're going to do the same thing with a future bridge, a
butterfly arch design at Crow Canyon and Iron Horse Trail.
So there's different things that we can do. But it is a concern.
It's a real concern. I hear it all the time, and it's something that is evaluated
with every individual project that's being considered.
Thank you. Emma Chibu.
I think the overarching answer to this traffic problem is to carefully study the
effects in real time. First of all, the actual quantitative effects, and then
also speaking to residents about their experiences and what that commute feels like
for them. Practically, I think we do need to be looking at our light cycles.
With new development comes reevaluating our light cycles and how that is a
detriment to us by keeping what we already have.
I think also we should be talking to parents specifically.
When we look at this new development, I think what some people are not considering
is how this might already affect the already existing school traffic and school
congestion. A lot of our students are already facing treacherous conditions to get
to their school campus, and parents are already concerned about what that might
mean with more congestion coming.
Will their commute to take their child to school become longer?
Will it become more hazardous? Are we protecting our children as they're walking?
Are we investing in public transportation for our students K through 12 to ensure
that they have a safe alternative way to get to school even with these new
developments?
Thank you. Our next question, we will start with Mark Armstrong.
The city of San Ramon must interact with a number of different public agencies and
private service providers in and around its boundaries.
The school district, two sewer districts, the water districts, East Bay Parks,
PG&E, the fire district are just a few that come to mind right away, but there are
others too. How will you strive to foster effective working relationships with
these agencies? Which one relationship is most important or needs the most
improvement?
Well, I already maintain a strong relationship with all the special districts that
you mentioned. I regularly interact with not only members that are aboard, but also
different activities. We ask those special districts to come to our city council
meetings and give us presentations and annual updates on things that are going on,
and the council can question those districts directly as to concerns we're hearing
from residents and how they might address some of those concerns.
So I think we have a strong relationship with our special districts, especially our
school district. We understand their concerns with the declining enrollment.
We also understand they are concentrating on some of the new development
that we have, and they've got a demographer that takes a look at the new
development and the potential impacts on how the lines are drawn with the school
districts.
Our fire district is outstanding. It's the best, probably in the Bay Area.
We have an outstanding relationship between our police department as well as the
fire district. And like I said, the water districts, we have two water districts,
Dublin-San Ramon Services District, as well as East Bay MUD, and we regularly
interact with them. We understand what the concerns are with the aging
infrastructure, as well as our water quality and our water infrastructure and
supply.
Thank you. Emma Chibu.
I think there are two districts in particular that we have to have an incredibly
strong relationship with. SRVUSD is one of them.
As we step into this new time where we will be seeing increased housing in our city
core, we should be looking at the connection between more families, more children,
more students, more traffic in school areas, and the connection between SRVUSD and
how this impacts them. I think also the fire department is incredibly important
because we have always been a city that has needed to be prepared in case of
emergencies, and we have always been a city that has had excellent responses.
And so I think continuing to foster a great relationship with those two districts
will be incredibly crucial as we step into this new time, because with more
families comes more people calling for emergency response and comes more students
in our local district.
Thank you. Paschalis Datsos.
I would say two departments, as I mentioned before, emergency preparedness for our
city is number one priority, and that includes our fire department, which
is one of the best, and also the Contra Costa District, which is
preparedness for seismic and earthquakes.
So wildfires and earthquakes is our number one priority.
And then as far as with the rest of the departments, private sectors, we just need
to be proactive, create plan ahead.
As far as it goes with the school district, even though there is separate entities,
the school district can get affected around the development that can have around
schools, traffic, and safety. So as long as we have good
communication and partnerships where we understand each other and we move forward
for the safety and the better idea of our city, that's number one priority.
Partnerships in everything. That's how we move forward, not only with these
departments, with other cities. Understand their vulnerabilities, their
weaknesses, their strengths, and be in communication that we can move forward
together. Same way it goes with how the state mandates with a lot of things.
State says, "What do we do? Do we push back?
Do we have a question if we do things the right way?
Or we just accept our fate?" So challenging and accepting is two
different things. Thank you.
Thank you. Emma Chibu will be first up on this one.
We hear a lot of chatter about trust in the city government.
Transparency ranked high on our online survey.
How will you ensure transparency from the city and build trust with residents
yourself? Walk us through what steps you would take and what your objectives will
be.
First of all, as we're in this new era, as I've said multiple times, we need to be
considering the perspectives of already existing families in San Ramon.
So many of you have had incredible lived experiences in our city that impact how
you view our next steps as we go into this new time.
And so I believe that it is necessary that we hear from you, that we are sending
you out information, information that is easily legible and readable to
all of our residents. It cannot simply be for city council to understand.
It must be that everyone is able to read this information and understand how
it may impact them. That is one of the biggest things that I hear, is that there's
so much information and I'm not receiving any of it, or it's there and it is not
being translated into language that is accessible to me.
The other thing I think needs to happen is that we are purposefully engaging
every demographic in City Hall meetings.
That includes our young professionals, that includes young families, and that
includes everyone who will be incredibly impacted by this new season of San Ramon.
It is not enough that the City Hall meetings are just open.
If we are not intentionally engaging people and inviting them into this
conversation, we lose out on so many perspectives that will be crucial as we go
into this new time.
Thank you. Paschalis Datsos.
Transparency. If that pops up a lot
as a question within our city, then we have to wonder what exactly
we're doing wrong, and we inspire that feeling.
I'll give you an example.
Financial reports, which includes the increased fees for the fiscal year of
'26, '27.
In a public hearing presented, it shows most of them is going to show you a
2.89 CPI, consumer price index, increase.
And then with the fine print,
it's going to say round up to the dollar,
which means in some occasions, it's going to go from another 5.8%
up to maybe 16% for non-residents
Now, as a resident reading these financial reports,
what did I do wrong that I don't get a simplified explanation of my increases
and what exactly is happening when I see things?
So what we're supposed to do is simplify language, either you call a municipal
code, you very call,
anything that includes communication with the city, simplify language, don't hide
elements that is not supposed to be there, and be transparent and real with your
residents. Thank you.
Thank you.
Mark Armstrong.
So, engagement with the residents needs to start long before we have a city council
meeting, and I've been doing it. I've been on city council for six years now, the
last two years as the mayor, and I've engaged with a lot of people, and I hear from
people all the time as what their concerns are. I work with the city manager.
I provide those concerns to the city manager for resolution or answers back
on what the issues are. I hold a personal monthly mayor's
breakfast where I invite the public to those breakfasts and community leaders.
I have a thing I call a Mark in the Park event, where you can come see me in the
park. I'll talk to you in sort of an open session.
Some of our other council members have had other town hall type events out in parks
and that sort of thing. We offer programs where we can have
internships or Youth Government 101.
But what I'm trying to say is that I do engage with the public, so
my participation is transparent, that their communication to me is
understood, and then our
council meetings are two-way communication. We follow the Brown Act with that.
The rules have changed on that recently, and so we do have the requirement to
provide
council packets in different languages, as well as ensure that communication can
come in.
Thank you.
Let's stay.
By all means. Yeah. Thank you.
Our next question, we will start with Scalas Tatsos.
Public transportation and transit connectivity continue to be major areas of need
in San Ramon. Do you support the regional transit sales tax measure on the November
ballot, which would include Contra Costa County?
And what should happen to improve public transit serving San Ramon, regardless of
whether the so-called RTM ballot measure passes or fails?
It's a no. I don't support it. I think government needs to do a better
governance. They need to stop pushing the
taxpayers to ask for more money from the moment they cannot control their own
budget, and from the moment their salaries and fee increases in bonuses are
beyond reality. So that's number one.
As far as
if I would think about changing something into that, if I think that we reach a
point where we feel pressure because the alternate is to
make less frequent
transportation and times,
I don't accept that. By the end, we keep pushing and we keep pushing,
and it never ends well.
So we need to feel that we don't have any other option. So it's a no.
Thank you. Mark Armstrong.
Well, I'll just speak on a personal level. I'm not speaking on behalf of the city.
The city hasn't taken a position on this, but I will say that I am in favor of the
regional transit measure. What I'm concerned about, and I understand what people
are saying about how BART, for example, has been managed in the past, and they
don't feel they've managed their resources well. I get that.
But I've also seen,
since COVID, a change in cleanliness. They've got the new fare gates.
They've got a much safer BART experience.
I've ridden BART several times since COVID.
They've made some significant changes, and I think they can continue to do that.
What I worry about for San Ramon residents, and what you ought to be worried about,
is what happens if we don't get the regional transit measure passed, and then BART
has to shut down the blue line that goes to Dublin Pleasanton BART.
That's going to jam up 680, and then if you think your commute is bad now or trying
to get to Walnut Creek in the afternoon, it's going to be much worse in the future.
Or getting through the Caldecott Tunnel, or across the bridge into the city, or
your commute down in Silicon Valley.
So, these aren't just doomsday scenarios that they're passing out there.
These are real. I sit on the Contra Costa Transportation Authority board, and I see
this all the time, and I understand from the transit operators what some of the
concerns are and what some of the improvements are, and what the impact of not
getting this regional transit measure passed will have on our residents here in San
Ramon.
Thank you. Emma Chibou.
I will first speak on BART. BART is incredibly necessary, even though in
recent years, post-COVID, we have seen the lowest ridership.
So that being said, while I have not completely taken a stance on this specific
tax, I do think there are practical benefits to investing our money into
the continued growth and regrowth of the BART system.
But what I want to speak about the most when it comes to public transportation is
actually within our city, not Dublin.
I think when we're looking at the city core and so many new businesses and housing
that will be there, I think something that could be incredibly beneficial is a
local circulator that takes our residents from these different places, so that they
are not pressured to be on the road, so that they do not have to contribute to the
congestion that we are foreseeing.
I think it would be incredibly beneficial for people to be connected to the
businesses and their housing and our city center, and for it to be something that,
if possible, if the residents feel it is a good use of city funds, to be free.
Because then we would be seeing an increase in revenue from all the people that can
easily access these businesses, while also promoting using public transportation in
our city. Public transportation is already fantastic in our city.
We have so many different lines that run through that are outside of BART, and I
think that it is important that we continue investing in it and seeing where else
we can go with it.
Thank you.
We've come to our final question of the evening, and we will start with Mark
Armstrong. Public parks and the senior center are a major draw for residents and
visitors. The performing art centers are a point of pride, too, but programming
there has seemed inconsistent. Has the city of San Ramon done a good job
maintaining and leveraging its public facilities for the benefit and enjoyment of
the community? And what goals related to parks and recreation do you have for the
next four years?
Well, no, I think we have great community centers, and I think they do serve the
needs of our community. You mentioned the Dougherty Station Community Arts Center.
That used to be just a regular community center.
That's converted into a fantastic art center now as well, offering classes,
different studios, different galleries, and different community events there.
Our senior center, I go there often to different events at the senior center to
talk to
the visitors of our senior center.
There are people that come to our senior center from Danville, Dublin, Pleasanton,
other places, because they love our senior center, and it's just top-notch compared
to some of the other cities. So those community centers are great.
Our regular community center over by Central Park, again, a lot of
different activities in there, always booked up.
Always different family events, community events, social events, cultural events,
and so I think we are meeting the needs of our diverse population with our
different community centers, young, old, different cultural events alike,
that we have a great thing going on and we need to continue to fund those services
and programs that are offered at those centers.
Thank you. Emma Chibu.
I will have to agree with Mayor Armstrong that we, as a city, have done a fantastic
job with having so many events that engage so many different demographics in San
Ramon. One thing I will note is that sometimes our promotion of these events does
fall short. Sometimes residents are not even aware that these things are happening
in their city. That being said, we have turned our spaces into lively centers for
so many events, so many performances, and we are creating a space that I think
could be improved on, specifically when it comes to our youth.
I wonder if we're engaging them enough to have events that they can come to, low
cost for parents, so that they have somewhere to be after school, an activity to be
engaged in. But overall, I think we have done a fantastic job with keeping San
Ramon not just a safe city or a prosperous city, but a lively city, and I
think we can continue to improve on that.
Thank you. Paschalis Datsos.
Emily, can you please repeat the question?
I can.
Has the city of San Ramon done a good job maintaining and leveraging its public
facilities for the benefit and enjoyment of the community?
And what goals related to parks and recreation do you have for the next four years?
Sometimes I'm thinking of a question to reply, and another question is popping up
in my brain. I will ask Daniella, which is the president of the Chamber of
Commerce, and say
if you have a business,
what are the steps that you're going to do to attract more customers?
And that makes you think and challenge yourself and think about the services that
you can actually provide.
Because whatever revenue and income you create, this is how much you can feed your
family, which
one week can be great, next week can be terrible.
A couple of weeks ago, I received an Instagram post from the city of San Ramon
which says, "Hey, give us your feedback.
What do you want to see in our city to be developed?"
Now,
if Daniella were going to think about making an Instagram post, we'll say, "Okay, I
need to find these customers and talk to them in person and take advantage of the
opportunity that whoever's in our city have access, knowledge, and the
ability to inform, educate me, and make me better as a salesperson."
So that means instead of trying to figure out how in an
Instagram post, you have, the city has the resources, it has great stuff.
I have worked with parks and commissions for many years through the swim lessons
programs, and we just underutilize the resources that we have.
Thank you.
Now we'll move on to closing statements.
Each candidate will have up to three minutes to provide closing comments, and we'll
go in reverse alphabetical order, so we will start with Paschalis Datsos.
When I was younger,
I was a competitive athlete, did it for 23 years.
It was extremely strong experience. Learned from my mistakes.
I am goal oriented. When I put a goal down, I know the
significance of partnerships. I know how my team can support me and how I can
support them,
and then I move forward and learn most of it from my mistakes.
Today's debate is not about planning and thinking about what can happen in the
future. We cannot think about what the city is right now and build
a future plan without losing the significance of what we have in between,
and in between, we have our residents. This is our moving power here.
So for the past three decades,
being involved with sports in a different capacity as a director and as a
business owner,
I do the same thing. I plan. I make goals.
I work every single day, 24/7, to support and defend
and encourage my community,
and this is the only thing I know how to do.
I can place hard questions. I will take my answers, and the goal is to move
together forward for a better San Ramon.
Thank you.
Thank you. Emma Chibu.
It is time to envision San Ramon's future and what that means for all of us.
One of my friends, her family loved the education and the excellence that San Ramon
provided. However, they could not afford to live in our beautiful city, so their
daughter commuted from Pittsburgh via BART, via our transit system, and
walked to get to our school every day.
If that does not show you the value of what we have built here in that city, I
don't know what will. There is something powerful about what we have in the city,
and it is time to not just maintain it, but to further it, to see what we can
do to better invest in the programs and infrastructures we already have, so that we
are not a city that is not prepared for decades to come.
We must look at what this means for businesses. San Ramon is an employment hub.
We have the potential to draw our own residents into jobs in our city and residents
from other cities who recognize the potential that San Ramon has.
We have the ability to draw in families.
There's a reason why so many of you have raised your families in our city.
We have young families who would love that same opportunity to do the same thing
for their children as you have done with your kids, as my parents were blessed to
be able to do. I think we have to envision the future of our safety.
With more businesses, with more houses, comes the responsibility to make sure that
we do not let up on what has always made San Ramon so enticing, that we are
safe for our businesses, for our families, for our young children, and for our
seniors. The future is beginning right now in the sense that the little steps that
we make right now will impact what happens in the decades to come, and I want
every resident to be involved in that conversation.
I want every demographic to feel that they have been invited to share their
perspective, to share what it is about San Ramon that they would like to maintain
and what it is they believe can change.
San Ramon is a beautiful city, and it will continue to be a beautiful city, and I
want to be the one that leads us into this new season of growth, of prosperity, and
of change.
Thank you. Mark Armstrong.
All right. Thank you to the moderators, to everyone who's here tonight, and those
who are watching from home. So you've heard a lot tonight about some of the
challenges facing San Ramon, and many are complicated.
There are rarely simple answers, but I believe there is a clear way forward.
We can meet our state housing requirements while still protecting the character of
our community, and my approach, as I've said, is to focus that required growth
in the city core. That's close to jobs, close to shopping, transit, freeway access,
rather than focusing on high density development in our existing neighborhoods or
our open spaces. As we continue to grow, though, we also have to make sure that the
infrastructure that we have and the services keep pace with that.
We can maintain the services that you value while putting our finances on a
sustainable path. Measure N gave San Ramon some important resources,
but it was never a substitute for disciplined budgeting.
We must control ongoing costs. We've got to improve our efficiency.
We've got to grow our revenues responsibly, and we've got to make sure that any new
commitments have a long term way of paying for themselves.
We can remain one of the safest communities in California by continuing to give our
police department the staffing, the training, and the technology it needs while
maintaining strong oversight and public trust.
And we can strengthen our economy by retaining existing employers, helping small
businesses succeed, and attracting a more diverse mix of businesses.
The answer to a changing office market cannot simply be replacing empty offices
with more housing. Throughout my career in the Army, at FEMA, on the city council,
and now as mayor, I've managed complex organizations.
I've made consequential decisions, and I take responsibility for the outcome.
Everyone running for mayor cares about San Ramon.
The choice for voters is who's prepared to lead through the changes ahead while
protecting the quality of life that we all value.
And I believe that my record, my experience, and my commitment to this community
have prepared me to continue that work from day one.
It's been an honor to serve as your mayor, and I respectfully ask for your vote so
we can keep San Ramon safe, financially strong, welcome to businesses, and an
exceptional place to work, to live, and to raise a family. Thank you.
Thank you to Mark Armstrong, Emma Chibou, and Paschalis Datsos.
We will now take a break and welcome the city council candidates in about five
minutes.
Welcome back for the second half of our forum, featuring the candidates for San
Ramon City Council. We have four candidates with us tonight.
As a reminder, the city of San Ramon elects council members by district instead of
at large. This year, we have two contested district races on the November ballot,
District 2 and District 4. District 2 candidates are incumbent Richard Adler and
challenger Chirag Kathrani. District 4 candidates are incumbent Marisol
Rubio and challenger Jeffrey Zhou.
For tonight's forum, we are having all the candidates participate at the same time,
regardless of district. While only voters in District 2 and District 4 will be able
to cast a ballot for their preferred candidate, council members represent the
entire city. It's important that all residents get to know the candidates and hear
about their views, values, and vision for the future of San Ramon.
Again, I'm Jeremy Walsh, associate publisher and editorial director for Embarcadero
Media Foundation's East Bay Division, which includes your hometown,
danvillesanramon.com, livermorevine.com, and the "Pleasanton Weekly." My
co-moderator this evening is our new editor, Emily Laven.
Our reporter, Janita Lyman, will be covering tonight's forum, and our photographer,
Chuck Decker, is in the room tonight taking pictures.
We will start the council program with two-minute opening statements from each
candidate, and each candidate will have up to 90 seconds to respond to questions.
Our timekeeper will signal them when they have 30 seconds remaining,
and again when time is up.
In the interest of time and allowing as many questions to be posed as possible,
we've asked the candidates to save any rebuttals for their closing remarks.
We have some prepared questions tonight and some questions that were submitted via
our online survey. We are also accepting questions in the room tonight.
Out front and in the lobby, there were blank index cards.
Feel free to fill one out just from your seat, raise it up, and one of our runners
will grab it and then walk it up to us here at the stage.
We consolidate questions on similar subjects, and we ask as many questions as time
allows, but please understand, we cannot ask every question.
At the end, each candidate will have up to three minutes for closing remarks.
Out of respect for the candidates and others, let's agree that all audience members
will be polite, attentive, and as quiet as possible.
No cheering or booing, distractions, or outbursts, please.
We will start in alphabetical order by area, with Richard Adler, District 2, giving
his opening statement first. We will alternate who speaks first during the
questioning portion of the program. Richard Adler, District 2.
Thank you very much. It works. My name is Richard Adler.
Thank you, Jeremy, and thank you, Emily, and also the Chamber of Commerce and
Bishop Ranch for hosting this important event to get to know the candidates.
Thanks also for you in the audience who are attending and also online.
Again, I'm Richard Adler. It's been an honor and a privilege to represent the folks
of the
San Ramon City Council for District 2.
I was appointed to fulfill the last two years of Mark Armstrong's term when he was
elected mayor in 2024. He still had two years left.
And
I'm a
graduate of UC Berkeley, long-suffering Cal fan.
I've been married to my wife for 45 years.
We have two kids that grew up here in San Ramon and attended the local schools.
And I'm running for a full term because I want to do my level best to
keep San Ramon the special place that it is today, a special place to live, work,
and raise a family. My service and leadership started before I was appointed.
I was involved as a chair of the San Ramon Senior Advisory Committee.
I was president of the Dougherty Valley Rotary Club, and I made it my
goal to talk about mental health during that year in the Rotary Club.
I like to go out and listen to the residents of the community and hear what they
have to say. I understand the concerns having to do with growth, and I want to ask
the right questions when I'm on the city council so that I can make the right
decisions for the voters of San Ramon. So, thank you very much.
I would appreciate your vote for City Council on November 3rd. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Chirag Kathrani, District 2.
Hello. Okay, this works. Hi, this is Chirag Kathrani.
A lot of people would know that I ran for the mayor of San Ramon previously in
2024, and if you remember, I had like 31% votes during which
Richard Adler was appointed. Imagine 30% of people are ignored right here.
During that time, 350 people showed up, and our council never responded.
The role of the council is to represent you guys,
make you as an executive. That's what I believe.
And since then, I have been actively involved in San Ramon, and I've been going
through multiple topics that are concerns.
One of the significantly important topic that was brought up was Measure G, which
was a voter-approved law protecting our open space, and main thing, it
needed super majority for any major decisions, as well as three council and three
planning commission meetings. In one last year, during this time, the entire
law was deleted from the San Ramon books, including the spirit of it, which is like
super majority was removed. The three council meeting was turned into just one.
This was like fundamentally a voter-approved law, cannot be deleted without going
back to voters. This was said by the council member on the dais, but when
this came to the table, we were completely ignored.
All the including past mayors and council members showed up.
They were just shut off. It was passed in the consent calendar, which is I think
it's a fundamental issues with the city of San Ramon, and I'm here to bring your
voice. Thank you.
Thank you. Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
Hi, good evening, everyone. I'm Jeffrey Zhou.
And I remember when I was young, when a lot of kids were doing after-school
sports or tutoring or whatever, I was that kid knocking on doors.
I signed up to volunteer for any campaign that needed a volunteer, and I'd go
around at the young age of, I don't know, 10 or 11 or whatever, and I was knocking
on doors for all the candidates at the time.
I honestly didn't care who the candidate was.
If you need a volunteer, I was your volunteer.
I've always wanted to be part of that process, and San Ramon is my home.
I grew up here. I went to our local public schools here.
And I remember being a student down at the country club and Walt Disney and Iron
Horse here. And
yeah, I went out to Berkeley, spent nearly a decade in Europe, and go Bears, by the
way, too, Mr. Adler, and also Ms. Rubio, by the way.
We're all Berkeley Bears here, coincidentally. So go Bears.
It's homecoming this week.
But yes, I'm from Berkeley. I went on to nearly a decade in Europe and worked in
tech and startups and traveled around the world quite a bit.
And
when I got back,
San Ramon has changed quite dramatically in that decade away.
We've
changed from a small town into a thriving, bustling city, really.
And we're at an important turning point here, because we're planning thousands of
new homes, but we've lost a lot of corporate employers, most visibly Chevron and
others, and our budget is tight to say the least.
And we're making decisions today that'll affect us for generations and probably at
least for the remainder of my life.
And so I'm running to preserve what made San Ramon special and what made my home
special growing up. I want a beautiful city, I want thriving businesses, and
I want to-
Thank you
... protect our towns and-
That is time.
Thank you. Thank you very much, and I look forward to your questions.
Thank you. And lastly, Marisol Rubio, District 4.
Thank you. Hi, I'm Vice Mayor Marisol Rubio, and I'm running for re-election to the
San Ramon City Council District 4.
It has been my honor and privilege to serve our beautiful city of San Ramon.
I am the only candidate in my race with proven leadership to have served and
accomplished any outcomes for the city.
Since assuming office in December 2022, I have served not only as your vice mayor
and council member, but on 20 regional, 10 advisory, three foundation, and three
council committees and boards. Before then, as director and vice president of
Dublin San Ramon Services Water District, I served on three liaison and one joint
powers association committees. The significance of this experience is evident
in the accomplishments we have achieved in San Ramon over the past four years,
including ranking number one for quality of life in the nation, number one best
place to live and raise a family in the county, number 17 out of 1,850 best places
to raise a family in California, number seven best places to live in California,
number one overall sustainability roll-up score from 2023 through to 2025.
Hence, since assuming office, on every measure of quality of life, we improved and
dramatically outperformed cities across the nation, state, and county. How?
I personally led the charge to establish the first ever sustainability advisory
committee to help us monitor our evolving city needs and to implement the recently
updated climate action plan that for the first time included direct input from key
community stakeholders. First, free childcare in San Ramon for incoming working
families to ensure that every family in San Ramon thrives.
Offered year-round internship opportunities and approved the first youth ride free
bus program for teens. Improved paratransit services, timeliness, and support for
seniors and people with disabilities.
Oh, and as it pertains to Chevron, they were planning to move as far back as 10
years ago. If you want to continue on the best path for San Ramon, the choice is
clear. Vote for me, Marisol Rubio, for San Ramon City Council District 4.
Thank you.
Thank you. And our first question, we'll start with Chirag Kachani, District
2, and we will begin with the elephant in the room.
The redevelopment of Bishop Ranch from a vast office park to a mixed-use
neighborhood is arguably the most important project in modern San Ramon history.
What do you think of the plans built and approved to date, as well as those coming
down the pike? And speaking specifically on the new Bishop Ranch, has the city done
a good job balancing the demands of the developers, the residents, and the state
mandates?
Well, I believe the city has not done a job in this particular aspect, because
this Bishop Ranch development was initially planned to be mixed-use housing, where
we'll have retail as well as walkability in our city.
But this plan was changed last year.
It was implemented in 2024, but was changed right in 2025, a few months later.
And during this change in plan,
Sunset Development Company had applied for it, which had only 1% ownership of that
land. So 200 acres land was rezoned with just a 1% owner applicant,
and 99% owners were listed as various.
And this was particularly removing all the affordable liability into turning into
an affordable rental, which was affordable rental and real rental are no different
over here. So it was basically a 200 million giveaway, which our city did to
various companies, which includes KB Homes, True Mark Builder.
And during this period, we also did a referendum because in our city, we cannot
appeal. This is a city where appeal fees are infinite.
So that was the reason we did a referendum, and we had some 1,300 signatures
collected. And so I believe this plan needs to be redone
properly. It has to be mixed-use housing.
This will bring our younger families in our city, increasing our business and
retail space so that we have
real business in our city.
Thank you.
Thank you. Jeffrey Jo.
For Bishop Ranch, I want a real downtown, a real mixed use downtown,
and proper public review and comment.
I don't want our definition of downtown to be the mall we have over there.
It kind of looks like a cheese grater to me.
You go to downtown Danville or Walnut Creek, and it's beautiful with actual streets
and businesses on the sidewalks, narrow storefronts, zero line setbacks, and a
real mixed use design with a parking offset from the center.
It's just eloquently designed and a beautiful downtown over there, and just
magnificent over there. And I'm not saying we should copy that over here or
anything like that. San Ramon needs its own identity.
But it is nice to just look at what the other cities have developed and to think
about what we could potentially do.
But on my end, I'm not here to really try to say what our downtown should look like
or not. That's just the downtown I would love to imagine, and I think it's
beautiful, but we could go many different ways.
What's important to me is that one developer, or that our city council alone
doesn't really dictate what happens for the next generation.
Once a building is built, it's going to be there for a long time.
Once it's built, I'll more than likely be driving past that building until I die.
It's really going to stick around.
And this is really something that the community should help design through genuine
public workshops and public review.
And the city has, over time, really diminished that ability by chipping away at
public review, and so I want to bring that back.
Thank you. Marisol Rubio, District 4.
Thank you. So first and foremost, public review has not been removed.
We have laws that prohibit us from following a four out of five vote planning
commission doing that, because if a developer, anybody feels that we are trying
to prevent a rightful application that meets all the
objective design standards, the city can get sued and will get sued.
So that's why it was updated, so it meets the current state laws.
Secondly, the affordable aspect is really important.
The reason the floor area ratio was adjusted was to make sure that we had enough
affordable units
in that Bishop Ranch area, as well as being able to increase the number of
affordable housing. Because out of the 5,111 units that were given to us, over
60% has to be affordable. That's a huge lift.
And the orchards at Marketplace are both mixed use, and the orchard specifically is
going to be very much like a replica of Santana Row.
So we are going to bring business as well as mixed income.
That's all going to be mixed income.
So we also updated our design standards with more setbacks and integrated green
space, so that no longer is an issue either.
So I think we are definitely listening to our residents and doing what they want,
and we are following the law. Every appeal that has come forward has failed, not
only in the council, but it has failed in court. So I think it speaks for itself.
Thank you. Richard Adler, District 2.
Yeah, thank you for that question.
I think when the city was faced with where are we going to build The RHNA
requirements, which is the Regional Housing Needs Allocation.
So we had to find
units of housing, and we know that the residents of San Ramon don't want to put
these units up on the hill. We love our open space, we love our hills.
So the idea is, let's put it in an area where we've got businesses, a lot of them
haven't been used for a while, and it's in a kind of condensed area, but it also
allows access to our
main roads, Crow Canyon and Bollinger, and we're very close
to the freeway. So I know our neighbors are concerned about the traffic, but
we're using a lot of smart technology to solve these problems,
and it has to do with metering, it has to do with traffic flow, and it's
interesting to note that even though we're going to have new residents over a
period of time,
when you look at what was there before, and you look at Chevron, you would have a
time during the day when people would get out of work, and the traffic would really
be disruptive in the city. But actually, they have determined
that the traffic should be better than it was prior to building homes in that
area. So I'm encouraged, I hope that's the case.
And we want residents to be able to walk to businesses.
So I think it's set up in a way that's going to be good.
Thank you.
Question two, we will start with Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
Beyond Bishop Ranch, San Ramon continues to evolve when it comes to new housing and
development. What are your goals related to new housing in San Ramon overall
and in your district specifically, including options that are truly attainable for
residents across all socioeconomic levels?
Thank you for your question. I think
for the housing that we develop, I think we've got to realize that we want to
try to achieve a true mixed use. And we need to also think about
what type of quality of life we want to offer to the residents, and
why we're building the homes that we are building.
And one of the reasons that we are building these homes is because of the loss of
commercial economic activity, or rather corporate activity downtown, right?
And
there's this need to kind of close these fiscal gaps out of the city.
And I think we need to have a bit more focus on trying to get more businesses back
to the city center and have true mixed use.
What we have is that these housings that we're separating with this idea of it
being a walkable downtown,
most of us are not going to be able to walk anywhere from these new housing that
we're building downtown. It needs to be tightly integrated with actual jobs that
people can get to, rather than being another kind of a bedroom community.
I fear that our city is really turning into a bedroom community long term.
And
when we look at the housing numbers that have been approved, then really,
it seems to be going that way. So I'm going to kind of leave it at that, to really
try to pursue true mixed use and job centers that are truly integrated
with our housing centers.
Thank you. Marisol Rubio, District 4.
Thank you. So I'm not really sure what true mixed use with transportation means
because all of this development is happening in the city core between the two main
veins of the city, which means that's public transportation.
We also have a bus hub right there to facilitate that.
We also have the Iron Horse Trail to make sure our city's more walkable and
bikeable. And so in terms of how people get to their jobs, there's many options,
and we intend to continue to grow that.
And as I mentioned, I actually helped establish, through the County Connection as a
board member there, the Youth Ride Free program, which helped our teens be able to
get to and from where they need to go during the summer.
So
those things will continue to improve.
And as far as fiscal gaps, we actually have a surplus, a general reserve surplus
right now, a pretty sizable one. When we only get 1% of the base sales tax before
we measure in, that was leaving us with very little to work with post-COVID.
That 1% that we added still keeps us 0.5% below the rest of the Tri-Valley city.
So we are well below three other cities, to be specific.
And also, as far as the jobs, we are actually increasing jobs in technology and
in software and in healthcare. Actually, John Muir is in the middle of developing
its second phase of
diagnostic building, so it will have all the different MRIs, CT machines, et
cetera. So I don't know-
Thank you. That is time.
Yep. Thank you so much.
Next, Richard Adler, District 2. Remember, we had asked about housing.
All right. Thank you for that question.
We had to,
as I think I indicated before, we had to come up with 5,111
units of housing, and about 61%, or about
3,111 of those units, had to be below income.
So low income,
four different levels. And a lot of people were concerned about that, but when I
lived in Palo Alto many years ago when my wife and I were first married,
we
couldn't afford a house in Palo Alto, so we were able to get on a below income
on a pool of that. And so it was fantastic for us, and I think it's fantastic for
our kids and our grandkids to be able to come in and use those, hopefully, more
affordable units. And I believe that this area
is going to be accessible. It's already been mentioned, the Iron Horse Trail is
going to be close by. People are going to be able to walk over to the city center,
and there's going to be businesses that we don't even know about yet that haven't
been built, not only in the core, but also kind of on
the Orchards part of it. They're going to be able to walk over and use those
businesses, and people are going to want to come to San Ramon, and hopefully
they'll be able to stay. Later at night, the businesses will stay open.
So I think we're going to have a thriving economy. Thank you.
Thank you. Chirag Kathrani, District 2.
So let's talk about the mixed-use housing.
There's a lot of mischaracterization that happens when we say affordable housing,
and almost all the affordable housing built in San Ramon are for rent.
Previously, they used to be affordable using the density bonus.
They used to give affordable housing for sale, but now most of them are for rent.
And this is where the key problem is.
If you only have rental affordable in one corner, we are actually creating a
Section 8 kind of a system, which we really believe is not the right thing for the
city. Other key challenges, we need to have a smaller starter home, affordable by
design. And this could be done very easily if we just enforce our general plan,
and our general plan has all those systems in place.
Unless we throw away our general plan, which happened back in 2025.
So I would come back and re-implement those important affordable by unit,
affordable by design, so that our young families, even our kids, can come back and
work here and live here. The businesses are dependent on people.
If we don't have people, the businesses will go away.
That's what we have seen in Bishop Ranch. Almost all the businesses have left.
Thank you.
Thank you. For this question, we'll start with Marisol Rubio, District 4.
We hear a lot of chatter about trust in the city government.
Transparency ranked high on our online survey.
How will you ensure transparency from the city and build trust with residents
yourself? Walk us through what steps you will take and what your objectives will
be. Well, the wonderful thing, I can actually walk you through the steps I've
taken. So I actually have hosted multiple
community events, and we've advertised it through the Patch.
I've worked with one of my fellow council members to make sure we're consistently
reaching out to the community to identify what their needs and concerns are during
every year in and out. The other thing is, when I mentioned that we do teen
internships, we're working with young people and making sure we're listening and
hearing back from young people. So
at every level... And I also have gone to meet with our seniors in my community to
hear what their concerns are and have advocated for them in my position as a
liaison for the senior advisory committee, as well as the senior foundation.
So
It's an ongoing process, and we have to approach the situation different ways
depending on the community we're reaching out to.
But I think when it comes to trust, when I was at the DSRSD, we
won an award for transparency. And I
think when I said we're number one in the nation, this was in 2025, '26.
This is an independent source, not an opinion.
They measured things that included
meeting basic needs, job opportunities.
These are not platitudes where I'm telling you my opinion, and I'm trying to find a
way to bring people down. I'm just trying to tell you the facts are the facts.
We're actually doing a great job.
Thank you. Richard Adler, District 2.
Yeah, that's a good question, and it's essential that people on the city
council, and I think people that are serving in San Ramon in various committees,
are accessible to the people who have a lot of questions.
And honestly, I've been on the council fewer months than anybody, and
I think looking back, there were times when I think we could have explained some of
the issues a little better, or our position on why we did what we did.
And we are dealing with legal issues and so on, and I think
if I have the honor of going on for another four years, I'm going to talk about the
reasons why. But I do talk to a lot of people.
I have a lot of high school kids that want to know about government, and
I've had people talking about our environmental issues. They'll come to the office.
We have a shared city council office.
So either through
talking to people in person or doing it on Zoom, I think it's essential that we
explain and hear from the residents of what their concerns are.
And, I've done it, and I will continue to do it if I'm fortunate enough to be
elected. Thank you.
Thank you. Chirag Katrani, District 2.
So accountability and transparency is core to my platform, and I
have been seeing in the last-- Well, our council member talk about people coming
and addressing their concerns. In last year, 2025, 700 plus people spoke
in the city council to be ignored, and this is where I see is a key problem.
And in fact, when the Measure G was getting deleted, we actually reached out as a
journalist to each and every council member. We never got any response.
So we have to have a live council who actually responds to people.
And that's the reason I started this newspaper, where we highlight all the key
issues in local jurisdictions, and we cover four or five cities right now in
this Tri-Valley area. We call it Tri-Valley Weekly, and this is just 18 weeks old.
And most of our journalists are people from the community members.
The reason we do that, because they get educated what is happening in the
community. We don't want somebody from New York or somewhere covering this area.
We want people living here and covering this area.
One more transparency point we really want to cover is the Brown Act.
We need to implement the Brown Act really strongly, and I think there's a lot of
violation of Brown Act in City of San Ramon. Thank you.
Thank you. Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
Yeah, I think trust is really built over time. Right?
Through a lot of relationships and with individuals and, I spent the day at the
senior center yesterday, and man, a lot of people have a lot of ideas that want to
talk. So, and I love listening to it.
I think in the city government level,
I think we really have to focus on protecting the process.
And process that Measure G that was alluded to by the other candidates,
is a voter-approved measure that the San Ramon voters
popularly voted that granted three
rounds of public review prior to planning commission, another three rounds of
public review prior to city council.
And
we have a strong tradition of protecting the voice.
But this process has been slowly chipped away, down to, well, the number three,
that requirement was removed via an ordinance passed two years ago.
And just because
somebody does not win an appeal, does not mean that that appeal is not valuable
because that process is the hallmark of our democracy and our transparency.
And even if they don't win, they convey information through that appeal that could
potentially open new ideas and shift the narrative in a different direction that
would result in a better outcome for the city.
Thank you.
Our next question will begin with Richard Adler, District 2.
Residents remain concerned about crime.
Just weeks ago, San Ramon was hit by a rash of burglaries that made headlines.
Plus, residential and vehicle break-ins and porch snatchings leave folks on edge.
Where does public safety sit on your list of campaign priorities?
What ideas do you have to improve public safety and crime prevention in San Ramon?
Thank you. That's a very good and timely question.
We have a great police department here. We have a new police chief, Becky Chestnut.
We had Devon Carlson, who's moved on to-- Now he's running for council in San
Ramon. But
safety is number one really priority. We have lived here with our families.
We value obviously our property, but we value our kids, and we want
them to be safe. And we were able to do more with less here in San Ramon.
By that, I mean we have 70 sworn officers on the payroll in San
Ramon for a population of about 86,200, I think.
And that is a lower number of officers.
When they look at the ratio, it's often like 2.2
officers per thousand, and so we were able to do better.
And we are thinking ahead. We were able to get the drone program a few years ago,
and we had that Heller break-in. We were able to
anticipate these
thieves coming into our town. We were able to get over the scene of the crime, and
we were able to arrest,
charge 19 of those. So we need more of these kind of
electronic license plate readers and so on. I think it's important.
And thank you very much. Thank you. Chirag Katrani, District 2.
So I think last year or two years ago, we had a Measure N, which was passed
by voters, and the key part of Measure N was public safety.
And when the Measure N was passed, still we are in deficit.
Most of the people who got raised were on the top level, not at the bottom level.
Instead of increasing the public safety staff, the top people got raised, which I
thought was incorrect. We got the extra dollars to our community was just to
protect us, and we were not doing our job.
And San Ramon is fortunate that it has its own police department.
We have a lot of control over how our police department will work.
As a council member, I will definitely look into all those negotiated contracts to
make sure that the funds are not misused.
In fact, I would say our police chief, just before resigning,
he got a raise, and within months, he resigned.
So,
that was just to get him a better pension.
That fund could be used better if we wouldn't have given him the raise. Thank you.
Thank you. Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
Public safety is a very high priority.
A lot of families move here for that reason, for the safety that we have.
And using targeted technology and coordination through the cities is a
strong priority and a way to accomplish better security for everyone.
But I also kind of need to point out that we've had
a rash of commercial burglaries very recently, and this happens in waves quite
throughout the year, and it is extremely difficult on our business owners, as well
as it's unnerving for a lot of the folks who live here.
And we have to realize that since Despite the excellent work of our police
department, they can't be everywhere all the time, right?
And so I believe as a city, we have the responsibility to promote, which our
police chief and our former police chief has heavily advocated, crime prevention
through design. Designing our buildings, our storefronts in a way that
minimizes the opportunity for crime, and a lot of our buildings have done that, and
a lot of them are on their way to doing that.
I think in addition to that, that the city could potentially offer is maybe a
consultancy for the business owners through the police department and
potentially grants and stuff, especially to help owners, businesses, and the
homeowners as well better understand and implement these technologies through the
city services.
Thank you. Mayor Sal Rubio, District 4.
Thank you. So safety is at the top of my priority because it directly
impacts our quality of life on a daily basis.
And as it pertains to, we were the first city to have, through a $5.6
million grant, to initiate the 988 hotline response when we're dealing with a
mental health issue and not a criminal issue.
And so,
that was a very transformative initiative that took place, and that kicked off in
2023. Now, we must continue to-- When I've been meeting with the community and
other opportunities where we've met with the communities to talk about safety, when
there's been a break-in, when anything's happened that might make the community
nervous, I and one of my fellow council members have worked together and brought
the police in as well to talk with our community and help them find solutions on
how to not be a victim. And the other thing is every crime that we've had has
been solved through some form of technology.
And so whatever and whenever our police have needed, in terms of
dealing with retail theft, we have provided that for them, which is why every
single case has been solved to date.
And going forward, we need to continue to work with our police department,
businesses, and community members to have an integrated approach.
Safety isn't simply about putting more police on the beat.
It's also about making sure that everybody's talking to each other and knows who to
go to when they need help.
Thank you. For our next question, we'll start with Chirag Katrani, District 2.
Traffic congestion and safety continue to be front of mind for many residents, and
then there are concerns about pavement quality, trails, bicycle lanes, and of
course, e-bikes. What are your top goals for street maintenance and road safety in
your district, and how will you work to help residents and
businesses address street concerns in their neighborhood?
Well, transportation and traffic is super important because the way the development
are happening here in core of the city, it will effectively disconnect the valley
from 680 because the Bollinger Canyon Road will be completely jammed.
Every town home that are coming here will need one or two cars.
So we probably need to mitigate through some kind of public transportation.
In fact, the public transportation right over here was also removed during the
rezoning of DMU North. So I think, I mean, core of the issue, we need to
take all this development, not one at a time, take it together and see the combined
impact on the traffic. And if we don't have a solution, please don't develop.
And at least pause some kind of development and change it to a different kind of
development. And I'll focus it a detailed traffic study because if we have proper
public transport, we have a better life.
And traffic in car, we don't want to spend our life in car. Thank you.
Thank you. Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
For transportation,
I think we need to be realistic about how folks really travel and get around in San
Ramon.
Most of us get around by car. I'm going to guess very few of us have been on
County Connection bus route on Bollinger or San Ramon Boulevard.
And we have to really keep that in mind as we plan our transportation for the
future.
And
I think a lot of our housing developments have been planned with the idea that it
could theoretically be walkable when realistically, most folks here in San Ramon
probably work in San Francisco or down in Silicon Valley and are going to have
extensive car needs or to shop at Costco, et cetera.
And so, I think we need to be realistic about these expectations and understand
that most trips will continue to happen by car in our city.
And while we of course continue to invest in our bike and pedestrian
infrastructure, like the Iron Horse Trail, and such.
I think some of the
ideas that I want to kind of dive into a little bit more though is first off, is
for a lot of workers really working with the companies that provide private
commuter transportation to really expand that service to reach more areas closer in
San Ramon, really,
the employees who work at these large companies that have these shuttles.
And secondly, for seniors. At the senior center, a lot of the seniors arrive by
public transport, and we need to make sure that's regional and not just city
borders.
Thank you. Mayor,
was that correct? Mayor Sal Rubio, District 4. Sorry.
It's okay. Thank you. So our street maintenance is actually really good.
We have a PCI score of 77, which is considered quite high.
We also, in terms of the e-bikes, we
have, working with our county supervisor to begin,
hopefully, she's already securing the funding for this, for a dual track along the
Iron Horse Trail to make sure that we have one side that's for pedestrians and the
other side for bikes. Of course, we also have to implement speed limits and make
sure that there's reminders along the way.
We also have to educate and proactively work with our school trustees to help
educate parents and children. And in terms of closing first and last mile
issues, we need to expand citywide our micro transit network, like Go San Ramon.
And in terms of other alternatives that exist for seniors and people with
disabilities is our County Connection Paratransit, which I helped to improve their
timeliness and their response services.
And we actually just
did a survey and got really positive feedback for our Paratransit services.
I think it was something like a 4.8 out of five.
So we're doing things already to meet those needs.
And of course, as always, there's requirement, there's more we can do, but are we
on the right path? 100%.
Thank you. Richard Adler, District 2.
Thank you for that question.
We've been able to do a lot of good things with our new bridge.
We have the Bollinger
Bridge that
crosses the Iron Horse Trail. And because of that bridge, it's provided a safety
element and it's provided an ease in transportation.
We've saved about three hours a day where cars used to have to stop for pedestrians
on the Iron Horse Trail, and they no longer have to do that.
And we're also going to have another bridge in a few years over at the Trow Canyon
area, which we expect will be able to do the same thing.
The city works with housing developers and regional agencies to handle
infrastructure, which includes transportation, which is very important.
Vice Mayor Rubio already mentioned, you talked about the street maintenance and
so on. We have a budget for that.
Our streets, our pavement quality index is about a 77, which is considered good.
And you want to make sure that the streets are maintained.
If you try to save money on the streets, then you're going to end up paying more
later. So we need to think ahead and
the Iron Horse Trail for bikes and so on is another thing, the dual tracking is
also coming up, as Candace Anderson has gotten money for that dual tracking so we
can keep bikes and pedestrians away from each other. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question, Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
What ideas do you have to promote economic development throughout San Ramon and in
your district specifically? We've talked a lot about Bishop Ranch tonight, but
there are many other retail and commercial centers and office areas that need
community support in San Ramon
Thanks for the question. I think I would start, first off,
looking at the different areas of commercial development here.
There's corporate and office style versus the retail development that we need.
And we also have the larger businesses and then the smaller businesses as well.
And these are very distinct in their own way.
I think,
with the challenge here is on the retail side, I would love for San Ramon to focus
more on those everyday businesses. Right?
I think about the amount of shopping I've done in San Ramon, and I don't really
remember the last time I bought anything in San Ramon.
Maybe occasionally at the Target or maybe I got a beer at the Fieldworks, but
normally I buy stuff at the Costco, which is Danville, or go down to Dublin for the
Asian supermarket. And so all of our tax money, revenue is leaking out over there
to across the border, and they're taking advantage of our money.
And so we need to really focus on everyday retail that we can build here in San
Ramon. And
then on the corporate side, also focus on corporate becoming a regional hub and
attracting tech companies to really become a tech hub, where when we look down at
the cities like Fremont or South Bay, they have no shortage of companies that want
to move there, and their employment numbers have gone up.
And a lot of these cities accomplish this through having a stronger city economic
development office, that I will push to create and impanel.
Thank you. Marisol Rubio, District 4.
Thank you. So,
one of the things that we have already done, we have driven economic growth aligned
with the resident needs and interests.
San Ramon experienced growth in technology, cloud software, healthcare and medical
technology, energy production, clean tech, renewable energy, startups, professional
services, and retail entertainment sectors.
Approved developments include more mixed-use housing and businesses to drive
revenues and create more jobs that align with our residents' personal needs and
professional development interests.
Also, 30% of our sales currently are from people who don't live in San Ramon, so
people are shopping in San Ramon.
Long term, I'd like to attract more competitive corporate and retail businesses to
create more local jobs, drive pedestrian traffic to shops, and increase tourism to
San Ramon, thereby raising business sales and transient occupancy taxes.
We should also continue to develop strong regional presence, economic presence, and
technology, healthcare, clean tech, renewable energy, startups, professional
services, and retail economic sectors.
So I just think at the end of the day, we just have to continue to work with our
businesses, continue to, as you may or may not know, the council itself, we cannot
actually invite a business in, but we can certainly talk with the people who have
the ability to do that, or the people who own those properties that can bring in
the business that we need and become more competitive.
But as we know, we have to create an environment that's appealing to those
businesses.
Thank you. Richard Adler, District 2.
Yeah, it's a very important question, and the solution is important because we need
to bring in more business so we can generate more tax revenue.
And
we have a very desirable area for businesses.
And
I think that we are a desirable city, and we need to attract more
businesses and restaurants and keep the residents spending within the city.
We are attracting a growing number of tech people, satellite
companies, startups, healthcare,
and it needs to continue,
because we're getting a lot of highly compensated executives that come in, and I
think we could be a mini Silicon Valley as a valley, frankly.
And because it's more inexpensive and I used to live on the Peninsula,
and we have beautiful area, and I think we can attract that, but we need to be more
creative. We need to have more events downtown.
We need to have things where they come in, and maybe the merchants can offer
different varieties of food to have people sample different kinds of cuisine.
We have so many cultures here. That would be a great idea.
And we need to have people come in on the weekend, on Friday night, and stay longer
and spend more money because they want to be here. They enjoy our restaurants.
We could do more of that. Thank you.
And Chirag Katrani, District 2.
Well, this is a core of my heart. I am a small business owner, and I have mentored
multiple businesses, at least 10 plus businesses from ground up to come into a
business, and a few of them are in San Ramon.
And one of the key problem over here in San Ramon is the ecosystem for the
business. We can be hopeful, like our council members talk about business, but we
don't have any strategy to build, bring the business.
One of the strategy which I really felt it was important, Jeff did mention, put a
light on it, but we need to have full-time staff, very focused, doing the outreach
to all the businesses. When I go knock every day, I'm knocking 200 doors, and I'm
finding some C-level executives in our city, so many youths, interested in
doing business. Most of the time I work with youths, so I want to build that youth
ecosystem so our kids, when they grow up, they do business here, live here, and
bring their families here. And it's quite possible.
It's not an hypothetical scenario.
If we just make the ecosystem work for ourselves, I think we have a great future
over here in San Ramon, and that's what I'm going to bring to the city when I'm a
council member, or regardless,
either I'm there or not. And I'm reaching out to every other businesses as well, as
our newspaper go to every local businesses. Thank you.
Thank you. This one will start with Marisol Rubio, District 4.
We have come to our final question of the evening, and we want to give you a chance
to speak directly to voters in District 2 and District 4, respectively.
What do you think is the most important issue in your district, and how will you
work to solve it?
Okay. So great. This is, for us in District 4, we are surrounded by open space.
And so obviously, as you have probably felt in the last few days, temperatures
continue to rise. And when that happens, our wildfire risk continues to rise.
And we also have issues with mudslides, heavy rains, which we've also been
experiencing more often. And I've already met with the chief of our fire department
to discuss options about how we can create more fire breaks and fortify, really,
that fence line community that's facing out to the open space and make sure that we
are prepared when there is a hazard.
And so I think that the other aspect is making sure that we're continuing to
educate the community. We had a community town hall on earthquakes, and we talked
about fire issues, and told them how they can protect themselves and fortify their
homes to be safer themselves. And we saw the stark difference,
what happened in Southern California, the homes that were protected and the ones
that weren't. So being proactive on that front is extremely important, and I'm
already doing that and working with them, and that's why I've been endorsed by the
San Ramon Valley Fire Department. Thank you.
Thank you. Richard Adler, District 2.
Thank you for that question. I think, in order to do what we want to do and keep
our residents happy and have the parks, that requires money to
maintain the parks, and we get back to financial sustainability, and
I think that's crucial. We have a great, I think, financial
person in Jennifer Wakeman, who is really using a kind of a common sense approach
to our finances. In other words, don't spend money we don't have, don't think we're
going to have the money later, so we're just going to go ahead and spend it if we
don't have the resources to do what we want to do.
So we've got to be smart with our money.
And
the residents passed Measure N because they do value all of the
amenities that our city provides. But the clock is ticking.
If we're not prudent with our finances, we're going to be in the same situation we
were two years ago. And we would like to be smart with our money,
and I think our residents expect us to do that.
We have been actually doing pretty well with the 1% tax.
We have been getting more money. We've been putting it away, and we need to
continue to do that so that we are, as we think ahead, we're going to be actually
saving the money so that we are not in the situation we were when we needed Measure
N. Thank you.
Thank you. Chirag Katrani, District 2.
I firmly believe that measurable differences are something that we should talk
about. If you're in the council, something should be measurable, like two years
down the line, one year down the line, what should happen?
Something that I'll immediately do is bring the appeal fee right to what other
cities are doing, like Danville or Dublin are present, and to $300, not keep it
infinite, whichever council has kept it infinite to discourage anybody to even
question them. The other thing I'll do is I'll bring back the spirit of Measure D.
And the third item which I'll do is remove the special provision which was given to
Sunset Development that their projects do not show up in the city council or
planning commission. In fact, this was a most critical 65 people, I call it as a
king's ordinance. Basically, that ordinance basically says that Sunset Development
Company, when they have a project, it shouldn't go to Planning Commission or the
city council. And both of them overwhelmingly, like all the city council did, yes
on that. And one more last point I want to say, my opponent was
appointed, and his appointment could be seen in a very measurable way.
In last two years, he's serving in the council, he has never said no.
In entire city of San Ramon, in last two years, there are only two times somebody
said no for any decision. So I'll be one of the voice which says no at times when
it is required, not just follow the quorum. Thank you.
Thank you. Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
Thank you.
So for our district, I think, well, for the city as a whole, the big priority
really is
improving our economic base. Especially for the folks in our district, which is
really largely filled with a lot of working families, highly skilled workers, and
families with very talented kids in our local schools.
We should be able to offer more employment opportunities for them, in our own city,
as they graduate from Berkeley or Stanford and come back to work
in San Ramon, hopefully. And we need to have the supply of jobs available through
both corporate presence as well as new startups and entrepreneurship and
tech companies that a lot of our constituents currently work in and really value.
And a second point is that most of us in our district rely on Bollinger Canyon
Road every day to get to work or to travel around the city.
These are the main corridors, and Bollinger Canyon Road has become a Bollinger
Canyon freeway. And a lot of us
don't want-- The freeway, it gets us everywhere quickly, but it's large and we are
worried about what the impacts of that would be as the urban core of the secondary
of San Ramon continues to be built out and developed.
And so this is my key priority is to protect our transportation patterns and
protect the life for the folks in our District 4, as well as building our economic
base.
Thank you. Now we will move on to closing statements.
Each candidate will have up to three minutes to provide final comments.
Going in reverse alphabetical order by area, we will start with Marisol Rubio,
District 4.
Thank you. As the only candidate with any elected or volunteer experience in San
Ramon who has lived and raised a family in San Ramon for the past nearly 13 years
and who has made a positive contribution to our city, the choice is clear.
My volunteer experience began 30 years ago at the Lurie Children's Hospital Chicago
Oncology Clinic. I've dedicated my life to giving back because I know that I can
and have made a positive difference in San Ramon, and improving people's lives is
my life's mission. In addition to maintaining our safety and high quality of life,
I will continue to ensure our city services and resources such as fire, police,
libraries, parks, and roads are well funded, improve our trails and traffic by
implementing county funded Iron Horse Trail dual tech system, enacting the e-bike
safety ordinance, expanding our micro transit network, extending our youth ride
free program from summer to year-round, establishing a Diablo Valley College campus
shuttle service, utilizing a $62 million federal grant for a city-wide fiber optic
network to help with traffic management and economic development.
Work with our fire department geological hazard abatement districts to protect our
open spaces from wildfires and mudslides, fortify fire breaks, and establish green
corridors to cool rising temperatures, improve air and soil quality, create open
air community gathering spaces, and manage stormwater runoff.
Despite our substantial general reserve fund surplus and tax rate that remains 0.5
below three other Tri-Valley cities, I will continue to be fiscally responsible,
not add debt without a trade-off, ensure developers contribute to our city
services, and work closely with Discover San Ramon and the chamber to attract
competitive corporate and retail businesses.
If you want to know someone's intentions, look at what they've done for our city
and look at who our trusted local leaders have supported.
That's why I'm proudly endorsed by the San Ramon Valley Firefighters Local 3546,
Sierra Club, Daniel Cook, president and CEO of San Ramon Chamber of Commerce,
Congressman Mark DeSaulnier, Board of Supervisor Candace Anderson, Community
College Trustee Andy Li, County Board of Education Mike Maxwell, former and current
San Ramon mayors Bill Clarkson and Mark Armstrong, council members Beros and Adler,
and most of our school trustees, and received the EveryTown for Gun Safety
distinction. I've worked with each individual, and they know firsthand the quality
of my work. These relationships are important to ensure San Ramon needs are met by
our representatives. We can't afford setbacks with inexperienced, unvetted people.
The choice is clear. Vote for me, your clean money candidate, Marisol Rubio for San
Ramon City Council District 4. Thank you, and please scan my QR code, which is in
the back, and connect with me and go to marisol4sanramon.com to learn more.
Thank you. Jeffrey Zhou, District 4.
Thank you to everybody for organizing.
Thank you very much and to fellow candidates.
I've always wanted to
run for office since I was a kid. And
from the door knocking days, I've always loved this whole process.
Every door I knock really brings me joy.
And I loved it so much that when I was 16, I skipped a year of school and went to
DC to work in Capitol Hill. And I poured a lot of water for congressmen and
pushed a lot of elevator buttons. No, I was so low in the totem pole, I was not
even allowed to operate the coffee machine, but water was okay.
And this was so much fun, and I absolutely loved it.
And I've carried that interest with me ever since.
After Berkeley, after living in Europe and around the world, and after working with
techs and startups and everything, I came back because this is my home.
My family's here. Our grandparents and aunts and uncles are all in the Tri-Valley
Corridor. This is my home.
And now that I'm home, I want to contribute to the next chapter of our city and
protect the life that we and my family all live here.
And I worry that we are becoming a bedroom community where we build thousands of
homes, but residents leave to Silicon Valley to work every day.
We're getting more residents, but the other cities are getting the
jobs, the retail stores. They're capturing the tax revenue from the
residents we're putting here, and we have to pay to
fund city services for. So I want major employers back here in San Ramon.
Tech companies, startups. I mean, here at Dougherty Valley, there's a kid from
Dougherty Valley who raised, like, 50 million in venture capital funding.
We have talent here in San Ramon, and they need to stay here to build their
companies. All right? I want a real downtown, not a mall that looks like a cheese
grater. I want a real downtown here that we design together with proper public
input and a public comment period that is protected by our city. All right?
And we face a financial deadline. I'm glad that the voters passed
Measure N and that we got a lot of breathing room to fix up the budget.
The city's budget is thankfully very balanced right now, but costs are increasing
faster than revenues, and this tax expires in eight years, and I don't expect the
voters to
approve that vote again. And so we will be seeing a tax decline
in eight years, and there'll be a fiscal cliff.
And we need to solve it before then by building up our economic base, by really
creating jobs here, and creating a destination here, and
above all, really
For me, I really want to preserve what made San Ramon special as a place to grow
up, our neighborhoods, and our hillsides, and our parks, and everything.
Thank you.
So, thank you very much, and elect Jeffrey Zhou to city council.
Thank you. Chirag Katrani, District 2.
Thank you. Thank you everyone to attend here, and I'm glad.
I also want to thank both of you guys for moderating as well as Pleasanton and
Danville, San Ramon to make this happen. It's a very hard job.
I tried it some time ago, and I know that it's not that easy to run this quorum.
I want to take this opportunity to highlight some of my key priorities, is we
need to fix the deficit. Even after Measure N, we are still in deficit.
So, this is very important how we fix it.
One way is we increase our revenue, and it can come from increasing the development
fees. If you compare the development fees in San Ramon versus Pleasanton,
San Ramon is cheaper for developers.
So we can basically be in the level of Pleasanton.
Then other important area we want to is increase our sales tax revenue.
As Jeff mentioned, everybody in San Ramon typically shops outside of San Ramon,
which doesn't give us the key revenue base which we want.
And city center, which I don't consider it as a really
business part because almost everything is as expensive as San Francisco.
And the next part is we need to remember that Measure N fund will disappear in
eight years. So we need to have alternate source.
So what I would also focus on, cutting some of the costs.
One of the important cost cutting, I would say, is budget overruns that we are
having in almost any development, like Iron Horse Bridge, the budget overrun was
probably more than $4 million. Some of the contracts which, if you've seen the
things that pass in the consent calendar, millions of dollars get passed in the
consent calendar. I'll question all those spending because once we start
questioning, I think we'll get a far
better control on our expenses. As a small business owner, I did all my businesses
from ground up. I never took any venture fund and built a business.
I built around six, seven businesses till now, and all of them
were from bootstrap. So that way I know how to keep the spending in limit, where to
get our revenue, what are our key focus, and I work really hard to bring businesses
inside our city, especially there are so many business owners living in San Ramon
but doing business outside of San Ramon. This they can easily be bring back in.
And last but not the least, I highly focus on good governance.
Good governance comes when your government responds to you.
Here is where the key problem is. In our city council, the response is almost
impossible to get. In fact, the Measure G, when it was deleted, past council member
and mayor came and showed up, and still the item was not moved from consent
calendar to normal discussion. That's the kind of thing I do not like, and I'll
get it fixed. Thank you.
Thank you. Richard Adler, District 2.
Thank you. And thank you, Jeremy and Emily, and the Chamber of Commerce, and all of
you here tonight in the audience. I did want to correct one thing about Measure
G, and I've heard a lot of pushback against that from Chirag.
And it wasn't because we didn't like the idea behind Measure G, but it was really a
procedural issue that
we found that we were in a situation where the planning commission was-- We
required four or five members of the planning commission and also the
town council. And we were in a situation where it looked like we were going to have
somebody preventing
an action to come up to the city council.
So that's a violation of both city law and state law, and that was the reason we
had to do the ordinance to change that.
Back to my regular closing statement.
I think San Ramon's a special city, obviously, that we all appreciate because of
our safe cities, our beautiful parks, and our miles of trails.
We love our recreation. We're a very competitive city.
We love to compete with swimming, baseball, cricket, tennis, or pickleball, and our
residents love to walk and be fit. And that's really why we wanted our parks
to be maintained, and that's why I supported Measure N.
Chirag did not support Measure N. Because I felt that the residents were
telling us they wanted these things, and I think we did the right thing to pass
that.
I think I'm the best candidate here because I know the city because I have
served on committees. I've gotten to know the residents.
When you serve on a committee, you get to know the people, the people that do
things in San Ramon, and we have a great city. We have a great staff.
And I served as chairman of the senior advisory committee.
I've worked with the seniors. I've also been on the team council advisory.
I've been the representative from the council.
So I've seen both the young and old, and I see how we work together, and we do
great things. And I understand, I share your concerns about our rapid growth in
the city. But I think when we're looking ahead, I think you want a leader that is
going to bring the people together and to bring out the best in our community.
And when I stand up on the memorial park and I look at that amazing eagle
sculpture, Liberty, and I see Mount Diablo and I see the plaque dedicated to the
fallen victims of the 9/11 attack, I'm grateful to live in San Ramon.
And when I go over to the Dougherty Valley Arts Center and I see these incredible
art projects that our youth do, our seniors do, I'm blown away by the
talent that we have in the city. So I think it's-
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
On behalf of danvillesanramon.com, I would like to thank all of the candidates for
coming out and participating this evening, all of you in the room for coming out,
one of our largest forum turnouts this year.
Thank you to the San Ramon Chamber of Commerce, and Danielle Cook in particular,
the Round House at Bishop Ranch for the venue,
to AAUW for their support and timekeeping, and VIP for the videography.
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