By admin 
Four local races on the upcoming ballot will shape decisions on your street — from where shelter sites land to which North Natomas projects move forward to how fast new housing gets built near Oak Park. The Sacramento Bee Editorial Board has weighed in on all four, and for longtime homeowners trying to balance neighborhood concerns with citywide demands, the endorsements deliver a clear message: the board wants councilmembers who will accept their share of the homelessness load, not push it off on someone else’s block.
Read more What happened to Fresno County’s most notorious killers? Here’s where they are now
Here’s what’s at stake in your district.
North Natomas and downtown: A push for change at the county
In the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors District 1 race — which covers downtown and North Natomas — The Bee endorses public health expert Flojaune Cofer to replace longtime Supervisor Phil Serna, who is leaving after four terms.
The board, according to The Bee’s editorial, “does not meet regularly with the city on homelessness,” is “not adequately providing care for mentally ill and addicted residents living on the streets,” and unlike the city, is “not showing any interest in finding more shelter sites, as if the crisis is over.”
For Natomas homeowners watching three new projects that Serna is championing in their neighborhood on his way out, Cofer’s position is direct: she opposes them and what The Bee calls “the rotten political culture behind them.”
The race also includes Sacramento City Councilmember Eric Guerra, former state legislator Deborah Ortiz and computer programmer Tim Riley. The Bee acknowledged Guerra and Ortiz as highly qualified, but argued Cofer’s public health background fits a board that “must oversee the county’s delivery of these services” yet “lacks a professional with a social service background.”
The editorial also flagged a structural reality worth knowing: “No incumbent supervisor in Sacramento County has lost in a bid for reelection in decades. The only time there is true competition for a seat is when it is open.”
Natomas City Council: A reversed endorsement
The most dramatic shift came in Sacramento City Council District 1, where The Bee withdrew its 2022 endorsement of Lisa Kaplan and instead backed her opponent, former FBI investigative specialist Jennifer Chawla.
The reason cuts to the heart of the “not-in-my-backyard” debate playing out across Natomas: Kaplan encouraged her constituents to take legal action against a city plan for a 40-unit micro-community of tiny homes — each 120 square feet — at Arena Boulevard and El Centro Road. Constituents filed a temporary restraining order in March. On April 17, a Sacramento Superior Court judge denied it.
In court documents, the city did not mince words: “This petition is not motivated by civic duty, concern for city governance, or concern for the environment. This action is NIMBYism at its most cynical.”
The Bee’s editorial went further, arguing Kaplan’s behavior “mirrors that of Democrats across the state who talk about compassion and community while exercising exclusionary practices that exacerbate the very crisis they pledge to fight.”
Chawla, 40, came to the U.S. from India with her family in 1987, was the first in her family to attend a four-year university and spent 13 years at the FBI. She told the board the city’s current homelessness efforts are “a drop in the bucket of what we actually need,” and said “rapid development” in District 1 has not been matched with “roads, schools, traffic planning (or) public safety resources” — concerns familiar to any Natomas homeowner who has watched their commute lengthen.
Notably, Mayor Kevin McCarty and Vice Mayor Karina Talamantes both endorsed Chawla over a sitting councilmember. McCarty said at a March town hall he had never seen a city councilmember behave as Kaplan has in his more than 20 years on the local scene.
Oak Park, Meadowview and Valley Hi: Re-elect Maple
In Sacramento City Council District 5, which The Bee calls “a microcosm of the city’s present challenges and opportunities,” the board endorses incumbent Caity Maple for re-election over challengers Henry Harry, a retired Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office employee, and Sergio Morales, a state analyst.
Read more Tyler Ritter dominates as Roseville Tigers repeat as CIF section baseball champs
For Oak Park homeowners watching their neighborhood transform — and for residents of Fruitridge Manor still waiting on road repairs and Valley Hi and Meadowview families wanting more attention — Maple, 34, has championed a tiny home community for unhoused seniors aged 55 and up, set to open near Sacramento Executive Airport.
“We do not have enough places for people to go,” Maple said. “There are not enough housing units, and there are not enough shelter beds. We currently have thousands and thousands of people on the wait list, including families and children, and so space is really important.”
On housing development — a hot topic in neighborhoods grappling with both growth and affordability — Maple pointed to a recent zoning overhaul: “We passed one of the most progressive general plan updates about a year and a half ago, which really stripped away things like single-family only zoning, making sure that we can build more dense communities around transit.”
She also framed faster home-building as a cultural shift at City Hall: “I think it’s really also a culture change where we need to say our priority is to get housing built faster. And so how do we get to yes?”
The Bee endorsed Maple with a clear hope she will grow “into more decisive leadership — taking initiative and shaping solutions to the city’s most pressing challenges.”
Land Park, Pocket-Greenhaven and Curtis Park: Jennings, with reservations
The most pointed endorsement landed in Sacramento City Council District 7, home to Land Park, Upper Land Park, South Land Park, Curtis Park, the Pocket and Greenhaven. The Bee endorsed incumbent Rick Jennings — who has served since 2014, longer than any current councilmember — but called him “The Bee’s endorsement is by default more than by design.”
Jennings touted the December completion of the Del Rio Trail, the 4.8-mile car-free path connecting Sutterville Road to the Pocket and Meadowview between Freeport Boulevard and Interstate 5. The trail passes the Sacramento Zoo, William Land Regional Park, Argonaut Park and Edwin L. Z’Berg Park. The board credited him for “playing a role in this planning triumph.”
But the editorial’s concerns went to a single, defining failure: “Four years after Sacramento required each council district to site homeless housing, Councilmember Rick Jennings’ district — spanning Land Park, Curtis Park and the Pocket and Greenhaven neighborhoods — still has none.”
Asked about city-county coordination on homelessness, Jennings said: “I wish I could tell you that I knew a whole lot more.” He blamed the California Brown Act’s open-meeting restrictions, but The Bee dismissed that as “an excuse to not do the right thing or have his district be part of the solution.”
Running against Mark R. Velasquez and Scott Lau, Jennings remains the most qualified candidate — but the endorsement reads as a warning.
For voters across all four districts, the through-line is hard to miss: the board is rewarding councilmembers who accept neighborhood-level responsibility for citywide problems, and penalizing those who don’t.
This report was produced with the assistance of a proprietary tool powered by artificial intelligence based on our own originally reported, written and published content. Before publishing, journalists reviewed this content in compliance with McClatchy Media’s AI policy.
Read more Sacramento State celebrates largest graduating class. Meet some of the graduates