From housing to water, here’s where District 2 candidates stand on SLO County issues
The primary election is right around the corner, and four candidates are fighting to win your vote to represent District 2 on the Board of Supervisors.
Incumbent Bruce Gibson is competing for his fifth term on the board. Gibson said he’s running because he believes the board majority is “undermining democracy” when they ignore policy experts “who’s opinions conflict with their own.”
“That is not good democracy,” Gibson said. “We’re elected to do the business of the people. We should practice good, fact-based, solid policymaking.”
Also on the ballot is Atascadero business owner Geoff Auslen. He wants to maintain the county’s quality of life and says his experience in the county will help him do that.
“I grew up here. I know the area. I have a successful brick-and-mortar business,” Auslen said. “I’ve called the county out before. I’ve called the cities out before. I’ve really been an advocate for businesses and individuals.”
John Whitworth, a Marine Corps veteran and business owner, is also in the race for District 2. He said he is a constitutional conservative who supports “common-sense solutions.” He wants to make county government more efficient and transparent.
“I love this country, and that’s why I’m doing this,” Whitworth said.
Bruce Jones, a retired orthopedic surgeon who moved to Templeton in 2017, is the fourth candidate on the ballot. He declined to do an interview with the Tribune.
Here’s a look at where the candidates stand on a range of issues, from water to homelessness.
Want to hear about their stances on other topics? Let The Tribune know what you want candidates in all SLO County races to be talking about ahead of the primaries at https://bit.ly/3Fam4Ry.
How will the candidates address homelessness?
Gibson said the county is “playing catch-up” with its response to homelessness, but he’s proud of programs like the Kansas Avenue Safe Parking Program and the 20 pallet homes approved for Grover Beach.
Gibson believes in a housing-first model for addressing homelessness, which is when people are placed in housing before addressing mental health, addiction and employment. The county should invest in different types of shelter, including safe parking programs, pallet shelters and tiny homes, transitional and supportive housing, and permanent housing that’s affordable, he said.
“We need to provide them a stable, safe, sanitary place to live, and then we need to bring services to them,” he said.
Gibson noted that people are homeless for different reasons: from addiction, to mental health, to bad luck — and county services must address those differences. He’d like to tap into more state funding for these services, he said.
Auslen said the board shouldn’t have let the 2008 plan to end homelessness fail.
“That’s a failure of our tax revenue and bad management,” Auslen said.
He supports the county’s new five-year plan to reduce homelessness by half, but he wants the county to use more state and federal funds to finance the project instead of adjusting the county’s budget.
The county also should help families pay for necessities like food, gas and rent before they lose their homes, he said.
“It’s cheaper for us to keep families in homes, than for them to be sleeping in their vehicles and us having to find a way to re-house them,” Auslen said.
Auslen supports tiny homes, as long as they are built in areas with enough parking and don’t take up space for commercial real estate. He thinks the county should provide more funding for addiction and mental health services.
However, Auslen said he’s concerned that increasing housing and services will attract more unhoused folks to the county.
“If you build it, they will come,” Auslen said. “It can be a negative.”
At a debate in April, Whitworth said that San Luis Obispo County is growing more expensive — from rent to car payments to gas prices — which could put more people on the street.
Whitworth supports subsidizing a tiny home village, and he wants it to feel like a community — complete with a community garden, he said.
Whitworth’s priority is treating mental health and addiction, he said, which is “tied together” with homelessness. Whitworth agreed with Gibson that people are homeless for different reasons, and need to have a variety of services available to them.
Where do they stand on housing and affordability?
The county needs to recruit more head-of-household jobs so San Luis Obispo residents can afford housing, Auslen said.
Auslen said the county also needs more workforce housing all over District 2 — from Cambria to Creston to Atascadero. The county must reduce regulations on developments so they’re cheaper and easier to build, he said.
Whitworth agreed with Auslen: He supports fewer regulations on developers. He also wants to revise the permitting process for building homes — so it’s quicker and easier to get a permit.
Whitworth also wants to “build responsibly,” ensuring that developments match the character of their surrounding area while also being large enough to allow for population growth.
In 2019, the Board of Supervisors updated the county’s inclusionary housing ordinance, which required developers to make 8% of their projects affordable housing or pay a fee. Fees were placed in a fund for affordable housing projects.
In March, the board voted to take steps to repeal the ordinance.
Auslen would have voted with the board to repeal the ordinance, he said, because developers will pass the fee onto home buyers, making housing more expensive in the county.
“Housing prices have to come down,” Auslen said. “We’re the No. 1 place in the state of California people want to live.”
Whitworth shares Auslen’s concern that the ordinance would make housing more expensive.
“I am in favor of helping people with affordable housing,” Whitworth said, but he doesn’t think this ordinance is the right solution.
Gibson disagrees with his opponents. The fee only applies to developments larger than 2,200 square feet — much larger than the average size of a single-family home, he said. As a result, the fee only impacts higher-end developments, not affordable homes, Gibson said.
When the board revised the ordinance in 2019, Gibson said it started to serve its purpose. The program helped build at least 220 units and generated about $1.2 million over the past two fiscal years. This money could be given to affordable housing developers like People’s Self-Help Housing, “who can leverage that money to actually put buildings on the ground,” Gibson said. He doesn’t think the county should end the program.
“We’re taking a huge step backwards here,” Gibson said.
To replace the funding lost, Gibson said he supports placing a housing bond on the ballot. Because the board hasn’t developed the bond yet, it’s unlikely to land on the November ballot, he said, so the county will be missing funding for affordable housing for the foreseeable future.
“You don’t pull this inclusionary housing ordinance until we have the alternative in place,” he said. “That’s just poor governance.”
When it comes to housing, Gibson said he’s also concerned about investors converting single-family homes into rentals. District 2 has the largest concentration of vacation rentals in the county, Gibson said, as Cambria and Cayucus have between 300 and 400 rentals each.
“It turns them into motels, when in fact we need housing for residents,” Gibson said.
Los Osos recently limited the number of vacation rentals to 50 units out of about 5,000, and Gibson said he wants to see more policies like this in the county.
Should Diablo Canyon stay open?
In 2016, PG&E announced plans to close Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant when the last license for its reactors expires in 2025. Gov. Gavin Newsom, however, recently said he’s interested in finding funding to keep the plant open.
Still, the future of the plant is uncertain.
Diablo Canyon generates about 6% of California’s electricity, and Auslen wants to keep the plant open for another 10 years so California has time to develop energy sources to replace it.
“We don’t have enough power to keep the lights on in our county,” Auslen said. “Our technology for green energy and storage is just coming on board.”
Whitworth also wants to keep the power plant open because it generates so much electricity, he said.
“If PG&E doesn’t want to do it, then we can bring in somebody else to run it,” Whitworth said.
Gibson, however, doesn’t think the county should put more money, time and energy into keeping the plant open.
“I would rather put our energy into accelerating our conversion to truly renewable energy,” Gibson said.
The county accepted $85 million from the state to compensate for the loss of jobs and property taxes from Diablo Canyon’s closure.
“I’m not opposed to Diablo staying open. I don’t have any objection to nuclear power,” Gibson said. But he’s concerned about the county getting penalized for accepting the $85 million if the plant stays open.
If PG&E, the state or federal government can work out a way to keep the plant open, however, Gibson said he would support it.
Auslen, Gibson and Whitworth all support developing more solar and wind energy in the county — though Whitworth said he’s concerned about properly disposing of waste related to renewable energy, such as lithium in solar panel batteries.
How will candidates protect the water supply?
Water levels in the Paso Robles and the San Luis Obispo Valley groundwater basins are lower than is sustainable due to overpumping and the drought. Meanwhile, the county has now slipped back into “extreme” and “severe” drought conditions. All three candidates want to protect the water supply, but in different ways.
Auslen said he would work to secure state funding to build new reservoirs for water storage, and would prioritize increasing the holding capacity of Santa Margarita Lake. He also wants to use Lake Nacimiento water to recharge the groundwater basins.
Whitworth’s priority is to protect the water rights of property owners, he said.
“If a guy can’t flush his toilet and use water to drink, then he’s the first guy I’m going to fight to protect,” he said.
He’s concerned about large organizations buying water rights and pricing out small property owners.
“I’m very concerned about big, big, big money, and they’re buying up this land right now and controlling the water,” Whitworth said. “I’m for the little guy.”
Whitworth said he wants to collaborate with all water stakeholders, including vineyards, homeowners and everyone in between.
“I want to be fair with everybody,” he said.
At the San Luis Valley basin, Gibson and Supervisor Ortiz-Legg have been looking at a number of solutions for pumping water back into the basin — including treated wastewater, water from Lake Nacimiento, the State Water Project, or water discharged from the Arroyo Grande Oil Field, he said. For the Paso Robles basin, Gibson said it’s critical to install meters on the wells to track water usage.
As a former orange farmer, Gibson said he understands that agriculture requires a lot of water. But some vineyards use twice as much water than others.
“Trying to understand what’s a reasonable and allowable amount of water is one thing that can cut back the use,” he said.
Gibson said the county could bring more water into Paso Robles for agriculture, such as treated wastewater or water from Lake Nacimiento.
How should the county handle vacant elected positions, redistricting?
Last week, the Board of Supervisors voted against the draft of an election charter, which would require vacancies in elected county offices to be filled by an election instead of appointment.
Some speakers at public comment said they were worried amendments to the charter would would create more committees to handle responsibilities that currently belong to the Board of Supervisors — causing separation between voters and the board.
Auslen and Whitworth agreed with those concerns, and said they would have voted to terminate the charter. Whitworth also said wouldn’t want amendments to the charter to reduce the sheriff’s authority.
Gibson voted against the charter for different reasons.
According to the charter draft, if an elected official left their position with more than a year remaining in their term, the board would call for a special election. If there was less than a year left on the term, the position would stay vacant until the next regularly scheduled election.
“A year is a very long time to be short a supervisor,” Gibson said. “That’s one-fifth of our county that doesn’t have representation.”
Gibson said he thinks the system to fill vacancies works well as it is — with the governor filling empty seats on the Board of Supervisors.
“I don’t think it’s anti-democratic,” Gibson said. “I think it’s efficient government to try to get somebody into that seat fairly soon.”
Gibson said he likes the idea of elections filling vacant offices, but he’s concerned that gerrymandered district lines would prevent a fair election.
In December, the board voted to adopt a controversial district map drawn by Arroyo Grande resident Richard Patten. A Tribune analysis found that the map favors Republican voters.
SLO County Citizens for Good Government filed a lawsuit against the county, saying the map violated the Fair Maps Act by gerrymandering the districts to favor Republicans and splitting communities of interest. They asked the court to prevent the county from using the map in upcoming elections.
In February, San Luis Obispo Superior Court Judge Rita Federman ruled to allow the county to use the map in the upcoming primaries.
Some members of the public suggested the county form an appointed, nonpartisan commission that would examine district boundaries when the time came again for redistricting. The board voted 3-2 on April 6 to exclude a commission from the proposed county charter.
Gibson said he would only support the charter if it included a redistricting commission. Alternatively, Auslen and Whitworth wouldn’t support a redistricting commission.
Whitworth said the Board of Supervisors is “closer to the people” than a commission would be, so he thinks redistricting should remain their responsibility.
Auslen said he doesn’t think an independent commission could judge a district map as well as the Board of Supervisors.
“I don’t believe that they have the education to actually understand how to do it properly,” Auslen said.
He said he didn’t like how the state’s independent redistricting commission re-drew the county’s congressional lines, as it splits the county into two districts.
“It took the power away from the people, the residents of here,” Auslen said.
He noted that the northern part of the county was pushed into District 19, which also includes Monterey, Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties — which have large populations.
“They’re going to dictate what goes on, how the funding goes,”Auslen said. “It’s taken away from us.”
This story was originally published June 1, 2022 at 9:00 AM.
