The Nov. 5 general elections were a success for Democrats and incumbents seeking reelection for Santa Barbara County and Isla Vista races.
The Nov. 5 General elections were a success for Democrats and incumbents seeking reelection. Hichem El Besseghi /Daily Nexus
Voter turnout increased significantly from the 2022 midterms, as Santa Barbara County (SBC) had 135,992 ballots cast out of 244,943 registered voters, a 55.49% turnout rate of eligible voters. In the 2022 midterms, 31.88% of eligible voters voted, though it is typical for less people to turn out for the midterm elections as compared to general elections.
Several California propositions on the ballot did not pass, including measures to make involuntary servitude by incarcerated people illegal, introduce local bonds for affordable housing and public infrastructure and raise the state minimum wage.
Elections in I.V. had a significantly low voter turnout, and the Isla Vista Recreation & Park District (IVRPD) election in I.V. was decided by margins of less than 50 votes.
U.S. Representative, 24th District
Incumbent Democratic Congressman Salud Carbajal kept his seat as the 24th district representative with 63.7% of the vote against Republican candidate Thomas Cole, an analyst, builder and developer. Carbajal attained 155,980 votes out of 248,655, and is going on to serve his fifth term as the 24th District U.S. Representative of California.
State Assembly, 37th District
Incumbent Democratic state assemblyman Gregg Hart won the bid for the 37th district against Republican Sari Domingues, a business analyst, with 61% of the votes. Hart is going on to serve his second term in the State Assembly.
Isla Vista Recreation & Park District
In local elections, the IVRPD board of directors had three seats to fill this election cycle.
Second-year economics major Finn Zilles received the most votes of any candidate. He received 666 votes, or 22.65% of the total, and will be a first-time IVRPD director. According to Zilles, he had very little experience with the IVRPD prior to last summer, when he began attending IVRPD meetings as an observer as often as he could because he wanted to make an impact in the I.V. community, taking an interest in bluff safety.
The bluffs have receded significantly in the past 35 years, putting cliffside houses in danger and posing a health risk to I.V. residents. Zilles said he expects bluff safety to be one of his key issues during his two-year term as IVRPD director.
Zilles said that as a student, he had very little means of community outreach or advertising before his campaign. To balance this lack of outreach in the community, Zilles was endorsed by the Democratic Party in Santa Barbara.
“I think having the student ballot designation helped a lot … I think [the student designation and Democratic endorsement] were the main two things that helped me get elected,” Zilles said.
Greg Ortiz, a Santa Barbara native, received the second-most votes in the election with 605 votes or 20.57%. A former auto repair shop owner and commissioner for the Housing Authority for SBC, Ortiz, 53, is a first-time candidate and said his motivation comes from a want to be of service to the community and from his religious faith.
Ortiz said he was strongly influenced to run for this position by his relationship with the late Santa Barbara pastor John Hedges who died in 2021. Hedges served on the Isla Vista Community Services District (IVCSD) board in 2o16 and was known for his community involvement in I.V. Ortiz said he is trying to help fill the shoes that Hedges left behind.
“Initially, my meeting with Father John Hedges, who passed away, got me very involved in the community here in Isla Vista. And since this passing, I’ve noticed a void here in Isla Vista that I think needs to be addressed. Church involvement, community involvement, things of that nature,” Ortiz said.
Ortiz said one of his main goals for his term was to help orient I.V. to be a more inclusive town for all lifestyles, not just for college students.
“There’s a lot of activities for young people, very little for senior citizens. Since I’m also a commissioner for the Housing Authority for the County of Santa Barbara, I do work a lot with [the] elderly. I would love to see more activities for the elderly as well,” Ortiz said.
Ortiz was endorsed by the Democratic Party and was also featured in their voter guide.
Ash Valenti was an incumbent candidate, seeking their second term as a director after first being elected in 2020. This year, Valenti received 502 votes or 17.07% of total votes. They said they are prioritizing community engagement and environmental stewardship in their second term as an IVRPD director.
Valenti works with the Isla Vista Compost Collective and in the community gardens, and is generally “out and about” in the community.
They said they didn’t think they would need to do much differently than normal to be reelected.
“I did very little campaigning, to be honest. I put up a few flyers and talked to people from around town,” Valenti said.
Valenti beat the fourth-place candidate, Development Coordinator for UCSB’s Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics Demi Cain by 37 votes.
Santa Barbara County Board of Education Trustee, District 6
In the SBC Board of Education race for District 6, Katya Armistead won with 66.07% of the vote against Nicholas Sebastian, a long-time resident of District 6. The County Board of Education District 6 is between I.V. and Santa Barbara, and the race is nonpartisan.
Armsitead is the Associate Vice Chancellor of Student Life & Belonging at UC Santa Barbara and has been an educator on campus for over 30 years. She previously served on the board of the Family Service Agency for 10 years, including three years as chair. She is also a board member and facilitator of the Emerging Leaders Program with Leading from Within, and a member of the Women’s Economic Ventures board.
She campaigned on a platform prioritizing access in education and ensuring that people on the board had an avenue to voice their concerns. Specifically, she said she wants to see if the board’s meeting time at 12 p.m. on Wednesdays is conducive for people being able to participate, as it’s in the afternoon on a weekday, which is inaccessible to community members with full-time jobs.
Armistead was endorsed by the Santa Barbara Democratic Party, the Democratic Women of Santa Barbara County, Santa Barbara Women’s Political Committee, Gregg Hart and Planned Parenthood.
“I have a doctorate in educational leadership. I have been in education for over 34 years. My children went through the school district and I volunteered in every single school that they attended,” Armistead said.
She had already been familiar with the county superintendent, Susan Salcido, for several years before the election due to working with her on the nonprofit Leading from Within. Salcedo expressed to Armistead the desire to diversify the board at the time, and notified her when the seat was open this year.
Armistead also felt that running was a practice of putting her “money where [her] mouth is,” as she currently teaches a leadership and civic engagement class at UCSB.
“This was a great opportunity for me to model that, where I am learning and evolving into a new territory that I never thought that I would do. But that’s what I tell other people to do, to stretch themselves and try new things. And so I did that,” Armistead said.
While she was grateful to learn that she won her bid for the seat on election night, she said she was initially “disheartened” due to the results of the U.S. general election that night, when she was observing the results at a Democratic Women of Santa Barbara County watch party.
“So I tried to be really in gratitude, but I was pretty sad with the national election. So when I found out, it was like, ‘yay,’ but I’m not ready to celebrate,” Armistead said.
With her main capacity as the Associate Vice Chancellor of Student Life & Belonging, Armistead said she believes she can balance her work on the board and at UCSB as the board meetings are once a month.
“Probably what will be time consuming is me being available to meet with people who want to share anything with me, and that would be over coffee, in the evening or the weekend, you know. So it’s not going to really take me out of the office,” Armistead said.
Armistead said she is grateful to everyone who supported her throughout the election emotionally and financially and thanked those who passed out information about her and endorsed her.
“So just as my mantra has been as an Associate Vice Chancellor, Dean of Students, working at admissions, it’s about access, and that’s that’s something I’m going to continue to focus on and realize that I will be representative of trustee area six for the SBC Board of Education for all students, all families,” she said.
A version of this article appeared on p. 1 of the Nov. 14, 2024 edition of the Daily Nexus.
