|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Election season is underway for the local candidates in this year’s June primary, with the filing deadline having passed last week for county and state election officials.
Residents in Pleasanton, Livermore and Dublin will be choosing from among eight candidates for four at-large positions on the Zone 7 Water Agency Board of Directors. The board is made up of seven directors who oversee the agency that provides flood control for the Alameda County part of the Tri-Valley and serves as the potable water wholesaler for the area.
Three incumbents are not running for reelection on the ballot. Director Dennis Gambs, who has served on the board since 2018 and had a long career working at the agency, confirmed to the Pleasanton Weekly that he would be stepping down after this term.
Director Cathy Brown, who was elected in 2024 to serve on a two-year term after former director Olivia Sanwong left the board prior to her four years being up, did not file papers to run in the election. Director Dawn Benson did pull papers, but her filing was listed as incomplete upon the incumbent candidate deadline of March 6.
The lone Zone 7 director to successfully file for a reelection bid was Sarah Palmer, a Livermore resident who has served on the board since 2006 and has a career background in biochemistry and the medical diagnostics industry.
As far as the seven challengers go, there are two familiar individuals vying for the open seats. Seema Badar, a Dublin resident with a background in community volunteering and nonprofit leadership, and Alan Burnham, a longtime Livermore resident and chemist who worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory for 35 years, will both be throwing their hat in the race once again after doing so unsuccessfully in 2024.
The five newcomers on the ballot are Jim Lehrman, a Pleasanton resident who is also a professional geologist and certified hydrogeologist; Patricia Muga, a real estate appraiser; business owner Rishabh “Rish” Rao; Sean Roberts, a computer engineer; and Heidi Turner-Zika, an information security officer, according to the county registrar of voters and individual campaign websites.
Elsewhere in Tri-Valley ballots, Alameda County’s appointed District Attorney Ursula Jones Dickson is competing to earn the seat outright against former DA Pamela Price, who was recalled in November 2024, and trial attorney Gopal Krishan.
A candidate for county office could win the position outright by getting more than 50% of the votes cast, otherwise the top two finishers in June would advance to a runoff in November.
Two Alameda County Superior Court judgeships are being contested on the ballot: civil rights attorney Cabral Bonner against consumer protection attorney Michael P. Johnson for judicial Office No. 13 and administrative law judge Patricia Miles against trial attorney Selia Warren for Office No. 19.
Another 25 judge positions up for regular election saw only the incumbents file, so they won’t appear on the ballot.
Incumbent Cheryl Cook-Kallio, a former Pleasanton councilwoman, is facing Sangeetha Shanbhogue, who is listed as a parent/homemaker, for Alameda County Board of Education 7th Trustee Area, which encompasses the Tri-Valley.
For county education board seats outside of the Tri-Valley, Area 4 Trustee Aisha Knowles is being challenged by Joseph Grcar, Mark Harvey and Luis Reynoso while Berkeley school board member Ana Vasudeo was unchallenged for Area 1.
Alameda County Superintendent of Schools Alysse Castro is unchallenged on the ballot.
Neither county Board of Supervisors position on the ballot in 2026 covers the Tri-Valley, but one incumbent does have challengers among those out-of-area races.
District 2 Supervisor Elisa Marquez is facing BART Director Liz Ames and business executive Rohan Marfatia. District 3 Supervisor Lena Tam will be on the ballot without an opponent.
None of the eight local ballot measures in the June election pertain to the Tri-Valley.
State and federal seats
Longtime California Democratic Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan will once again seek reelection to the Assembly District 16 seat, which represents the cities of Alamo, Danville, Dublin, Lafayette, Livermore, Moraga, Orinda, Pleasanton, San Ramon, and Walnut Creek.
Bauer-Kahan has held the position since first being elected in 2018.
Two challengers put in to challenge the longtime assemblymember: Joseph Rubay, an Alamo businessman and perennial Republican candidate in District 16, and Chirag Kathrani, a civic technology entrepreneur and former San Ramon mayoral candidate who is running with no party affiliation.
Although the filing deadline had passed, a final list of qualified candidates for state and federal races was not yet available, as of Friday afternoon.
Liz Ortega will be vying for reelection in the Assembly District 20 race, which represents Hayward, San Leandro, Union City, portions of Dublin and Pleasanton, and the unincorporated communities of Ashland, Cherryland, Fairview, and San Lorenzo.
Ortega, a Democrat, was first elected to the office in 2022.
She will be facing off against Muga, a Republican who is also running for one of the Zone 7 Board of Directors seats.
A third challenger, Grcar, also pulled papers but his filing was not complete, according to the registrar’s office.
A total of nine candidates are vying for Congressional District 14 to replace U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell as he competes in the state’s crowded gubernatorial race. That list consists of Democrats Melissa Hernandez, Matt Ortega, Abrar Qadir, Rakhi Israni, Carin Elam and Aisha Wahab, the latter of whom secured the party’s endorsement during its convention last month.
Republicans Dena Maldonado and Wendy Huang have also pulled candidacy papers for the District 14 race, but the California Republican Party has not endorsed a candidate for that seat, according to its website. Suzanne Chenault is the only no-party candidate in the race.
Prospective candidates Reynoso, Alison Hayden and Raymond Liu were listed Alameda County Registrar of Voters’ Office as having pulled papers for District 14 but failed to complete their filings in time.
According to filings with the Federal Election Commission, DeSaulnier – who has been in office since 2015 – is facing challenges from two fellow Democrats, Joshua Hamilton and Mitchell David Maisler. Republicans Jeffrey Frese and Katherine Piccinini – the latter of whom has run for the seat in 2022 and 2024, making it to the general election ballot in her second campaign – also pulled papers for Congressional District 10.
Swalwell is among the 10 gubernatorial candidates from the two major parties on the ballot in the upcoming primary. The list also consists of fellow Democrats Katie Porter, Tom Steyer, Xavier Becerra, Tony Thurmond, Matt Mahan, Antonio Villaraigosa and Betty Yee, and Republicans Steve Hilton and Chad Bianco.
It remained unclear as of Friday whether the candidate lists for the two congressional seats and gubernatorial race were final. The secretary of state is set to release a final list of gubernatorial candidates on March 21.
The top two vote-getters in each state and federal race will advance to the ballot in November’s general election.
