WATSONVILLE — Incumbent Greg Caput is facing off against Jimmy Dutra for the Santa Cruz County Supervisor District 4 seat after the pair finished in the top two in the June election.
In the five-person race, Caput finished with about 33 percent of the vote, while Dutra trailed with 27 percent. The two were separated by under 400 votes.
“The fact that it was so close was what was really rewarding,” Dutra said. “Sixty-eight percent voting against the incumbent was a huge statement. People recognize that there needs to be change.”
Caput, 68, said his campaign has been going well since the June election, but added that even though he came out ahead in the June election, he is not taking anything for granted.
“You never know in politics,” he said. “I’m not going to tempt fate. I’m just going to keep doing what I’m doing. I’m giving it all I got.”
Caput attended local schools, and graduated from Watsonville High School, Cabrillo College and Santa Clara University. He earned a law degree and served as an officer in the National Guard and Army Reserve.
He was first elected to the Board of Supervisors in 2010, and completed a successful re-election bid in 2014.
Among his top priorities, Caput said he will continue to fight for the Pajaro River levee project, which would, among other things, construct 7.3 miles of new levees along the lower Pajaro River as well as five miles of levees on Salsipuedes and Corralitos creeks.
The county has made strides in recent years to reduce the river’s flood risk, Caput said. This includes removing more than 300,000 cubic yards of sediment and recently, crews repaired 17 sites along the levee damaged in the 2017 storms.
During those storms, Caput said he was “proud to be on the board” when the supervisors voted to fund a $1.1 million project that reinforced the levees with rocks after it had come dangerously close to flooding.
“We didn’t have the funding, but we had to do something,” said Caput, who also serves on the Pajaro River Flood Prevention Authority. “If that water overflowed, it would’ve flooded the senior village.”
Caput added that affordable housing is another issue he wants to keep pushing for, while making sure the rest of the county builds its “fair share” of units, rather than forcing South County to take on the entirety of them.
Veteran services is something Caput said will remain on the top of his priorities, and recently he helped add staff in South County four days a week dedicated to helping veterans.
Over his eight years as supervisor, Caput said he has donated more than $130,000 of his salary to local charities and schools, and if elected, said he will continue to push for infrastructure improvements, public safety and immigration services, among other things.
“I’ve been speaking up, being a voice for South County,” he said. “I’ve always presented what I believe is good for the whole county and what I believe is good for us here.”
Dutra, 43, currently sits on the Watsonville City Council, a post he was elected to in 2014. He graduated from Watsonville High School and Santa Clara University, and earned a master’s degree from the University of Southern California’s Sol Price School of Public Policy.
While on the city council, Dutra helped spearhead a new community center and park in the Carey-Davis neighborhood in 2015, cleaned up Struve Slough at Ohlone Parkway and Harkins Slough Road, and voted to approve more than 350 housing units.
He serves on the Santa Cruz METRO Board of Directors, and during his time as chair in 2017, METRO hired a full-time bilingual customer service representative for the Watsonville Transit Center. Dutra is also the board president of Pajaro Valley Shelter Services, which ties into three of the issues he said he would focus on if elected: the homeless crisis, mental health and drug abuse.
If elected, Dutra said another issue he plans on addressing is South County’s crumbling roads, advocating for funding at the county level to repair the infrastructure.
“I feel the community has been neglected for so many years on local concerns,” he said. “It’s going to be up to the voters to figure out if they want to try something new, try a fresh vision.”
By running for supervisor, Dutra will not be seeking re-election for the Watsonville City Council District 4 seat, which, under voter-approved Measure I in 2014, will be the mayor’s seat in 2019.
He said it was “not an easy decision to come to.”
“Being mayor in the city I love would’ve been quite an honor,” Dutra said. “But I know that we could not go another four years living in the same situation at the county level that we have been. It was more important to me to make sure that I could get funding down to the city.
“I have proven leadership. I’m a big voice. As county supervisor, I will make sure that we only move forward.”
The Fourth District ranges from Hazel Dell and Mount Madonna roads in the north, the Pajaro River to the south and Green Valley Road to the west.
•••
Cabrillo College, Trustee Area 6
Two challengers are facing off in the Cabrillo College Governing Board Trustee Area 6 race: J. Dan Rothwell and Lou Tuosto.
Trustee Area 6 covers Aptos, Corralitos, La Selva Beach and parts of Watsonville.
• J. Dan Rothwell retired from teaching at Cabrillo College in 2016, capping off a career that spanned 47 years as a communications studies college professor, and 30 years as chair of the Communication Studies department at Cabrillo.
“The college has always been exceptional in terms of the quality of the teaching and the quality of the staff,” he said. “In all the years I was at Cabrillo College, I was always proud of the quality of the product we were producing.”
Now, Rothwell wants to use his experience and know-how of the community college to represent Area 6 on Cabrillo’s Governing Board.
Rothwell’s Cabrillo career also included 22 years on the Faculty Senate, 10 years on the College Planning Council, and 10 years on the Cabrillo College Federation of Teachers Council.
“I got to know the inner workings of the college, and all it did was simply reinforce what a great college Cabrillo is,” he said.
He said Cabrillo has steadily veered away from the original 1960 Master Plan for community colleges, putting a cap on the number of times lifelong learning students can take classes, such as for music and art. Instead, Cabrillo is becoming a junior college, only preparing students to transfer and attend a four-year university, he noted.
As a result, Cabrillo’s attendance has experienced a “precipitous drop,” he said. According to Rothwell, Cabrillo’s attendance last year was roughly 12,200 students, about the same as it was when he first started in 1986, dropping from a high of 16,900 years ago.
As a trustee, Rothwell said he would work with his fellow trustees, as well as those from other community colleges, to band together and petition the state legislature to loosen the restrictions and harken back to a community college model.
He added that he will be open-minded in his reasoning, making decisions based on the best evidence and arguments.
“I sometimes take on challenges that seem hopeless,” he said. “If you keep sticking at it and persist, you may start making some impact on the state level. If we do nothing, we will continue to go on the same path.”
• A resident of Santa Cruz County for more than 40 years with experience serving on numerous school boards, the Capitola-Soquel Chamber of Commerce, the Capitola Finance Committee and more, as well as being a former Cabrillo College Extension instructor, Lou Tuosto said he is ready to take the next step.
Tuosto is in the running for the position of Cabrillo College Area 6 Trustee in the November election.
“I’m deeply indebted to Cabrillo,” Tuosto said. “It’s had a huge impact on me and my family. I’m excited to put all my decades of experience to use for a place I’ve loved for so long.”
Tuosto said he wants to improve communication between the college and the community at large. He hopes to work with college-bound students, encouraging them and their parents to consider starting their higher education at Cabrillo.
“I want our community to know the excellent education available at Cabrillo,” Tuosto said. “And that by attending it first you can save money while taking your lower-division courses.”
Tuosto declared he has a plan to keep funding at Cabrillo on a steady place, and is confident that if implemented, it will address the school’s current enrollment challenges.
In addition, the school’s instructors are in need of more support, he said.
“Our teachers are some of the lowest paid employees in the county,” Tuosto said. “But they decide to remain here. We should give them reasons to continue being loyal to our community.”
Tuosto pointed out that he is in a position that doesn’t restrict him on voting on personnel and salary issues, ones that he described as “crucial to the future of the college.” This, along with his prior experience on school governing boards and many community connections, would make him an ideal fit for trustee, he said.
“I’m also familiar with working with large budgets and the education code,” Tuosto said. “I understand how things work. There is a lot to know.”
With an A.A., A.S., B.A., and two master’s degrees, Tuosto said he understands the value of a good education.
“I believe that education helps people think more clearly, thoughtfully,” he said. “They can articulate their positions better. Schools like Cabrillo make sure of that.”
•••
Other candidates on the ballot:
• Watsonville City Council, District 3: Lowell Hurst (unopposed)
• Watsonville City Council, District 4: Francisco Estrada, Jenny Sarmiento (profile published in Oct. 5-11 edition, tinyurl.com/y7d2jwd5)
• Watsonville City Council, District 5: Rebecca Garcia, Casey Clark (profile published in Sept. 28-Oct. 4 edition, tinyurl.com/y9kzndnh)
• Watsonville City Council, District 7: Ari Parker, Lupe Rivas, Steve Trujillo (profile published in Sept. 21-27 edition, tinyurl.com/y86wwops)
• Pajaro Valley Unified School District, Area 4: Willie Yahiro, Daniel Dodge Jr., Jenni Veitch-Olson (profile published in Sept. 7-13 edition, tinyurl.com/y7s7rhjz)
• Pajaro Valley Unified School District, Area 5: Leslie De Rose, Jennifer Schacher (profile published in Aug. 31-Sept. 6 edition, tinyurl.com/ycytv5gt)
• Pajaro Valley Unified School District, Area 7: Bill Beecher, Jennifer Holm (profile published in Aug. 24-30 edition, tinyurl.com/y7926z5c)
• U.S. Congress, District 20: Jimmy Panetta, Ronald Paul Kabat
• State Assembly, District 30: Neil Kitchens, Robert Rivas
