Six year councilman challenged by businessman in Santa Barbara’s District 3 race

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. – The Santa Barbara's City Council race for District 3 has voters in the densely populated Westside area of the city over to a section that connects with State Street downtown.

Oscar Gutierrez is the incumbent who was first elected in 2018. He is being challenged by Tony Becerra a business owner on the westside.

When asked about big issues, housing costs and safety were priorities.

"Long term would be the cost of housing and available affordable housing and I have been doing a lot of work with my colleagues in the last few years protecting tenants rights and making sure that they know that if they are able to obtain housing in the third district or the city overall, they will be protected against being evicted for no reason," said Gutierrez.

Looking at his neighborhood, Becerra says, "people don't feel safe walking up and down the street, especially during when we have heavy homeless in the area, so the lighting was important, the safety of the sidewalks. I have some people trip on the sidewalk and come and tell me. Recently we had something in front of Foodland and the city repaired it very quickly, within a week, that's great to see."

The city's financial report in June showed a deficit estimated at $7 million, or more. 

The candidates differ on what caused this and how to address it.

Becerra said, "I can take the ability to look at finances from the real perspective of responsibility and that's the thing with our city hall. They don't have that responsibility, they feel like they have an open checkbook and that's just not the case."

Gutierrez works in City Hall and says when he sees the financial options, "in order to have a fully staffed experienced firefighting department and also police department, we need to pay them accordingly so the majority of our budget went to that."

The challenging times with inflation, job insecurity, and rising home costs have residents looking to leaders to help. To that, each candidate has a different approach.

Gutierrez says, "people are amazed when I go to their door and they tell me there's this issue over here that hasn't been taken care of and I say 'well let me know, just send me a message'. So they send me a message and a day later they say 'wow I literally didn't expect it to happen the next day.' I say 'all you have to do is ask!'"

Unifying the public is what Becerra says he can bring to the table. "The idea is to just know to give them the vision of hope and show the steps that I am going to do it so they can see in real time the steps and get to the goal line and cross it together as a community."

Working on the city council requires a certain skill to get a unanimous vote on key city issues. Becerra says, "I have lived my life that way. Being the youngest of 12, you learn how to negotiate quick. You know with those skills, I didn't think they would help me out later in life. They have helped me in business, they helped me in coaching, you know, mentoring, things I have done my whole adult life."

With his time on the council, Gutierrez said, "we know how to talk to each other we know how to communicate and get things done fairly efficiently and quickly so I would continue that."

( A full copy of each interview can be found at KEYT.com)