By KATHERINE PETERSEN
Sunnyvale voters will have a lot to say about the makeup of the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors, depending on who they choose for District 3 on Nov. 5. The seat is currently held by Ron Gonzales, who is leaving the office because of term limits.
Former San Jose City Council member Patricia Sausedo and Milpitas Mayor Pete McHugh are vying for the District 3 seat, one of three open spots on the five-member board.
"It's a crucial election because the old board will be gone in essence, with two carry-over members. It's important to the direction of the board and the future of the county, especially with the welfare crisis crashing down on us," said Terry Christensen, a political science professor at San Jose State University.
McHugh, who has served as mayor and councilmember in Milpitas for 20 years, was the top vote-getter in the primary election. Christensen said the primary winners usually win in a runoff.
"I don't think Sausedo has put together enough of a campaign to overcome that. She is very well-qualified. I've watched her grow from a novice to a politician with an understanding of politics on a legislative body during her 12 years on San Jose City Council," he said.
He doesn't think the recent $35,000 in unauthorized long-distance calls on city phones in Milpitas will impact McHugh's campaign much, because he is not directly implicated.
Yet McHugh has faced other travails. He is under investigation by the Fair Political Practices Commission for allegedly writing his political consultant, Vic Ajalony, a $60,000 check with no official record indicating where the money was to go during the 1996 primary election. He's also being investigated for allegedly spending campaign funds for personal use in his 1994 mayor's race.
Both candidates are making a big leap from local government to county government, where they would be dealing with issues with which neither has had experience, Christensen said. The winner will also help oversee a $1.8 billion budget, nearly twice the size of San Jose's budget and 20 times bigger than Milpitas'.
Sausedo said she's ready to tackle the issue of welfare reform in the county head-on, an issue that will have a large impact on its 24,000 legal immigrants.
"It will be a big challenge. These 24,000 people will have to transition into jobs within two to five years or will have access to general assistance, which is supported by the county's taxpayers. Hopefully, we will see some modification of the bill. We will have to create a minimum of 20,000 minimum- to medium-skill jobs for people to transition into," she said.
Many of these jobs could come from suppliers to many of Silicon Valley's large companies, including Lockheed Martin, AMD, Cisco Systems and TRW, Sausedo said, adding that with no new revenue streams or reductions in services, the county can't afford to implement the welfare reform bill on its own.
McHugh agrees that the welfare reform bill requires modification. The county is encouraging as many legal immigrants to become citizens as possible, which is a step in the right direction, he said.
"We have a moral obligation to do as much as we can. If we do absorb the complete impact, it will mean reductions in other essentials. It will require a lot of hard work to cope," he said. Job training and creation and child care are essential, he said.
Social services and public health are the backbone of county government. Both Sausedo and McHugh applaud the work of a re-engineering program at Valley Medical Center, although it may mean some staffing cuts. Sausedo hopes to see Valley Medical Center and its physicians marketed to an insured client base. McHugh said he wants to see public health be more available in schools.
The candidates have both said they will stand behind the concerns of Sunnyvale and Mountain View residents concerning the future of Moffett Federal Airfield, and that they would like to see NASA remain at the complex.
Sausedo wants two programs that have been successful in San Jose introduced at the county level. One, Project Crackdown, is a multi-agency approach to reducing crime, graffiti, vandalism and drugs in neighborhoods.
"I also want to implement a chronic truancy-abatement program, whereby we hold kids and parents accountable for getting an education and being responsible adults. We're not going to sit back and say there's nothing we can do about it," she said.
While McHugh would also like to see a reduction in crime, one of his strongest commitments is to the preservation of the county's open space. He also wants to see the county fairgrounds transformed into a "mecca for youth," where kids can play all kinds of sports.
"We need to preserve as much open space as we can. The people of Sunnyvale are concerned about protecting open space. I've done some good things in Milpitas," he added, citing an ordinance whereby hillside homes in that city must be built on at least 10 acres of land.
This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, October 23, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.