PLACER COUNTY, Calif. — Three people are running this year for the Placer County Board of Supervisors' District 2 seat.
This is the first time in nearly 28 years the district would get a new supervisor since the seat has been filled since 1995 by Robert Weygandt.
District 2 is located in western Placer County and includes Lincoln and part of Roseville. The candidates running for the seat include a Roseville city councilman, a former Lincoln mayor and Weygandt's district director.
May 31 is the last day to request a ballot by mail. The primary election day is June 7.
Meet the Candidates
Scott Alvord
Alvord has served as a Roseville City Councilmember since 2016 and has a background in business.
"I started a software company in college. I've always had that on the side even when I had a corporate job for many years, and I ran a restaurant in downtown Roseville for 12 years and that got me involved [in] learning a lot more about Civic Projects and I was president of the Downtown Roseville Merchants for nine years and got really involved in revitalizing downtown and working with all the small business," Alvord said.
Learn more about Alvord HERE.
Paul Joiner
Joiner has served on the Lincoln City Council for 14 years, including three terms as a mayor of Lincoln. He said he sits on multiple local and regional boards and committees including the Placer County Transportation Planning Agency, South Placer Regional Transportation Planning Authority and others.
"My family came to the area in the late 1940s. We are very deeply rooted in Placer County. My wife's family has me beat. They came in the 1890s and had been on the same rice farm in South Placer ever since and continue to farm rice there," Joiner said.
Learn more about Joiner HERE.
Shanti Landon
Landon has served as the District Director for Robert Weygandt, the current supervisor in District 2, for five years.
"About six years ago, I became a little bit more interested in local government because our kids were getting a little bit older and I had a little more space in my life to get engaged. I think I always had this perspective that if you wanted to make a difference in politics you had to be a Congressperson or an assemblyperson, and I think the more research I did, it really is about the local level," Landon said.
Learn more about Landon HERE.
Here are each of the candidate's takes on major issues in Placer County including development, homelessness and affordable housing.
Development
Scott Alvord
Alvord said with all the development, it's important to grow wisely. He said when a city does the development, it's a partnership, but, when the county does the development, it becomes more of a competition.
"When the county does development on the border of the city, there's nothing that helps the city out. There's no tax share or anything. And so like if they build a shopping center on the border of a city, they're competing with the city. And so if our residents go buy something and the residents don't know where the boundaries are, they don't understand, but not a penny coming back to even help their own city."
Paul Joiner
Joiner said development is about balancing the growth and quality of life in Placer County. He said some of the approved projects in Placer County are on the borders of the cities, which causes competition with the cities.
"I think that you need to, whenever practical, be directing... those major developments to our cities and not spreading them out into the unincorporated county. There's sometimes where that's going to be unavoidable, and you just need to do that very, very wisely."
Shanti Landon
Landon said she participated in bringing the Placer County Conservation Program into implementation.
"The Placer County Conservation Program really is essentially a built-out vision for Placer County, so it lays out where the development will happen and where the conservation will happen. So it kind of takes a lot of that guesswork out, and so as long as you have a strong Board of Supervisors that aren't going to continually rezone their rural areas to be denser populations, I think we have a pretty good built out vision of what things are going to look like and so I think that's taken a lot of the work out for future boards for sure."
Here is a map of the boundaries for the districts in Placer County.
Homelessness
Scott Alvord
Alvord said he used to be on the Placer County Homeless Advisory Committee and was with a nonprofit organization studying solutions.
"The best model that we found nationwide is a campus model where you basically design a campus that has a lot of permanent supportive housing and emergency housing."
Alvord said when there are enough beds for every unhoused person in the county, they can begin enforcing camping ordinances.
"When I've worked with the homeless, especially for chronic, it can take 2-3 or even four years for the mentality of a person to get to the point where they believe they're worthy of changing because they've just been so degraded and they believe they're not worthy."
Of the county's recent Roomkey hotel purchase in Roseville, Alvord said it's great but doesn't really fix the problem because there aren't those comprehensive services.
Paul Joiner
Joiner said he's on an ad hoc committee with all the cities and the county looking specifically at addressing homelessness. He thinks the facility in Auburn should be expanded as a centrally located facility to handle different levels of homelessness.
"That centralized campus concept for me removes a lot of those potential points of failure because all you've got to do is walk across the campus to that office. And to that service, at least in the early stages of getting them into programs, getting them on their feet, helping them out as as as they get deeper into the care they need, get stabilized, move into something transitional in the way of housing, and eventually either totally out on their own."
In Roseville and south Placer County, Joiner said the services should be dispersed and would need some sort of dedicated transportation service.
"We all need to come together. Not each individual community doing their own thing. This needs this is a heavy lift for all of us. We need to partner on this and come up with solutions and even ordinances that are very, very similar between our jurisdictions."
Shanti Landon
Landon said homelessness is an emerging issue in the county and one that is near to her heart since her dad was schizophrenic and died while being unhoused. She said it wasn't due to lack of services or lack of support, but was about mental illness.
"I think most people now recognize that just housing people is not a solution to the problem. We really have to go to the core issues which are often drug addiction and mental illness and address those issues and housing is definitely a piece of that puzzle and, you know, I would love to see a collaboration between all of the cities in the county where we're all stakeholders and all kind of contributing financially as well as having seats at the table."
Landon said whatever the county does, it needs to be a collaboration.
Find more information about services for homelessness in Placer County HERE.
Affordable Housing
Scott Alvord
Alvord said the Regional Housing Needs Allocation numbers show a lot of affordable housing that needs to be built, according to the state. He said at a city level, Roseville has been filling different levels of affordable housing, but at a county level, they're "far behind."
"I think that affordable housing issue is really important that the county takes that seriously and the staff hold those developers accountable to make sure they build it in because we have some excellent developers in our community and you know, in the city they're pretty cooperative. They do what they need to do. But I just don't see those numbers coming out of the county yet, so I look forward to seeing that change."
Paul Joiner
In terms of affordable housing, Joiner said the county is behind the curve on providing housing, affordable or otherwise. He said it's important to look at building housing as quickly and as cost-effective as possible.
"We need to be able to partner to the degree we can with developers who are actually building these housing projects. Government, for the most part, doesn't and shouldn't be in the business of building houses."
Joiner said people need to be willing to look at different types of housing, including smaller lots or single-family homes.
Shanti Landon
Landon said as much urban development that can be done within city limits, the better.
"When it comes to the affordability, a couple of years ago, the county partnered with a nonprofit called Housing Trust Placer and I personally think that model is much better than having the government be the ones to try and construct housing or to have government-subsidized housing."
Landon said she thinks the private sector can do a better job of getting things done.
Why should people vote for you?
Scott Alvord
Alvord said he encourages people to do their own research on each candidate. He said his campaign is made up of both Democrats and Republicans and he is focused on a nonpartisan campaign.
"I'm not going to be a Roseville guy. I'm going to be a county guy representing that district and actually represent the whole county. I don't just represent District 5 in Roseville, I represent all of Roseville right now and I'm happy to take on and help, you know, different problems throughout our city. And same thing at the county level, it's not going to be an issue if I live in one city and you know representing another, I will give it my full attention, as well."
Learn more about Alvord's campaign HERE.
Paul Joiner
Joiner said he's been involved for a long time in addressing the big issues in Placer County such as development, homelessness, and housing. He said he would move the district office from its current place in Auburn to somewhere in District 2, possibly Lincoln.
"Without question, I am the most experienced, the most knowledgeable and the most ready to hit the ground running, to address the challenges that face Placer County over the next 10 years."
Learn more about Joiner's campaign HERE.
Shanti Landon
Landon said her position as District Director has prepared her for the position and she has a different perspective as someone with school-age kids.
"I'm not a politician, I'm just a mom and I'm someone who cares so much about our community. I just want to protect the quality of life that we have here in Plaster County and make sure that it's a great place for my kids and maybe your kids and future grandkids to enjoy."
Learn more about Landon's campaign HERE.
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