The Speed Campaign event put on by the San Benito County Chamber
of Commerce this week at San Juan Oaks Golf Club called for all
nine candidates to shuffle among nine tables to give speeches on
why they are best for the jobs. They had five minutes at each table
and could use part of the time for questions, which most of them
did.
Speed dating usually is for people looking to go out with someone, but Wednesday the nine candidates for three open county offices spent the afternoon in a similar way trying to “speed campaign” their way to votes.
The two-hour event put on by the San Benito County Chamber of Commerce at San Juan Oaks Golf Club called for all nine candidates to shuffle among nine tables to give speeches on why they are best for the jobs. They had five minutes at each table and could use part of the time for questions, which most of them did.
More than 100 business owners and community members attended the event that allowed each person to have a face-to-face conversation with the candidates.
The candidates included incumbent Pat Loe and challenger Robert Rivas in District 3 for supervisor, incumbent Reb Monaco and challengers Phil Fortino and Jerry Muenzer in District 4 for supervisor, and sheriff contenders Robert Scattini, Darren Thompson, Pat Turturici and Ray Wood.
It kicked off just after 11:30 a.m. with a lunch that divided the room into 14 tables with roughly eight people at each spot.
Chamber board member Paul Rovella started the carousel of speeches while he walked around the room with a bull-horn. He used its siren to tell each candidate when to move to the next table.
Each candidate was assigned a table number to start the event. Speaking in front of around 10 people at a time, each went through his or her background and stated policies before answering questions.
Sheriff candidates
The four sheriff hopefuls spent a majority of their time talking about the need to crack down on the growing gang threat in Hollister.
“We need to be tougher on gangs,” said Turturici, the county undersheriff. “Get them when they’re young.”
To do that, Turturici wants the Hollister Police Department and the San Benito County Sheriff’s Office to work together and create a task force to help prevent the gangs from growing.
“Cutting the head off the snake,” is how Turturici described it.
Wood agreed.
“If we don’t take a strong stand, we could turn into Watsonville,” said Wood, a Hollister police sergeant.
Wood also thinks that talking to young kids about the dangers of gangs is the way to help deter their expansion.
Thompson knows the dangers well, meanwhile, because of his experience as a police lieutenant in Watsonville.
He noted how the county is an area where a lot of gang leaders lay low and that San Benito officials need to share information with neighboring counties to catch them.
Opening the lines of communication would allow the sheriff’s office to be more effective, Thompson said.
The final sheriff candidate, Scattini, talked about his experience and the “three quarters of his life” spent serving San Benito County.
Scattini also talked about the growing threat of medical marijuana and the legality of it.
“It could get out of control,” said Scattini, the county marshal.
District 3 candidates
District 3 supervisor candidates Pat Loe and Robert Rivas spent their five minutes talking about two different things. Loe, the incumbent seeking a third term, focused on her past and the things she believes she had accomplished, including improvement of Highway 25 and the establishment of an anti-bullying program.
Reading from a form, Loe went through her resume. Answering questions, she focused on the idea of Hollister Police Department and the county sheriff’s office consolidating into one.
“It’s up to the city if they want to go through with it,” she said.
Rivas talked about ideas and areas he hoped to change if elected.
“I’m not happy with the things our county does,” he said.
He listed helping kids find recreational activities and fixing the lack of economic progress as priorities.
Rivas called for innovation and creativity.
“We live in a state known for its imagination and innovation and we need that here,” he said. “We need to encourage creativity.”
His call for creativity started with being proactive in getting businesses to come to Hollister, instead of waiting for them.
District 4 candidates
The three District 4 candidates mostly talked about the economy and ways to fix it.
Monaco, the incumbent, talked about how the state is no longer the county’s ally but that San Benito was still surviving.
“We are one of the few counties that is financially solvent,” Monaco said.
But he warned that the state’s budget is a serious problem that will continue to hurt the county. In trying to alleviate the damage it could do, the county needs to better its economic development, he said.
Monaco thinks the best way to do that is to attract satellite industries from the greater Bay Area, he said.
Both Fortino and Muenzer hope to use their business backgrounds to help the county get out of a budget bind.
“We need to create a face for new business,” Fortino said.
Job creation was Fortino’s number one goal, he said, and to spur such economic development, the business-creation process needs to be cleaned up, he said.
Muenzer talked about his 100-year-old business, and his experience with the Hollister Downtown Association and the Tres Pinos school board, as reasons why he would be a good candidate.
He focused on the notion of merging the police and sheriff’s offices.
It would make sense because it would allow the sheriff’s office to go into a better building, he said.
‘They couldn’t side-step them’
In all, each candidate explained his or her positions, but almost all were cut off by the five-minute time limit. The attendees, though, said they gained a lot of information out of it.
The event helped some attendees make up their minds, while it introduced others to new candidates.
“I liked that we had the ability to ask questions and get answers,” attendee Mike Weltz said. “They couldn’t side-step them. But it wasn’t what was said – it was what wasn’t said.”
Weltz said the shuffling of the candidates allowed him to gain a better idea where each person was coming from, something he did not have before.
Attendee Charlie Bedolla said it went well other than being “too short.”
“But we need a bigger one of these,” he said. “Everyone had something good to say.”
Rovella was proud of how the event turned out and expects to see it again.
“It was a little exhausting, sure, but candidates got the opportunity to meet, interact and answer questions from the public,” he said. “Those in attendance got to listen and get a feel for candidates.”
