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The two candidates vying for the District 4 seat on the San Ramon City Council weighed in the city’s development, budget priorities and economic growth at a public forum earlier this month.
At the Oct. 7 event, hosted by the San Ramon Chamber of Commerce and moderated by DanvilleSanRamon, incumbent and Vice Mayor Marisol Rubio highlighted her achievements since taking office in 2022. Challenger Jeffrey Joh said he would bring a fresh perspective to the council and emphasized his commitment to his hometown.
“I am the only candidate in my race with proven leadership to have served and accomplished any outcomes for this city,” Rubio said.
Rubio listed her work on numerous regional and advisory committees, her previous role as Division 1 director for the Dublin San Ramon Services District and the accolades earned by the city during her tenure as among her major accomplishments.
“Since assuming office, on every measure of quality of life, we have improved and dramatically outperformed cities across the nation, state and county,” Rubio said.
Despite being a first-time candidate, Joh said his interest in city politics dates back to his childhood.
“When a lot of kids were doing after school sports or tutoring or whatever, I was the kid knocking on doors,” Joh said. “I signed up to volunteer for any campaign that needed a volunteer.”
Joh said that at the time he “honestly didn’t care who the candidate was” and welcomed any and all opportunities to be involved in local campaigns.
“If you needed a volunteer, I was your volunteer,” Joh said. “I’ve always wanted to be part of that process, and San Ramon is my home. I grew up here. I went to our local public schools here.”
Joh said he was motivated to launch his own campaign after returning home from years abroad working at tech startups, seeking to leverage what he’d learned during his travels and career and to engage further with his hometown’s changing landscape.
Among those changes is the ongoing redevelopment of Bishop Ranch from an office hub into what developers and city officials are touting as a modern, mixed-use downtown neighborhood.
Joh said he has reservations about the process.
“I don’t want our definition of downtown to be the mall we have over there,” Joh said. “It looks kind of like a cheese grater to me.”
Joh contrasted the central San Ramon neighborhood with downtown Danville and Walnut Creek but said his primary concerns with Bishop Ranch go beyond architecture and business offerings.
“What’s important to me is that one developer, or that our City Council alone, doesn’t really dictate what happens for the next generation,” Joh said. “Once the building is built, it’s going to be there for a long time. I mean, once it’s built, I’ll more than likely be driving past that building until I die.”
“It’s really going to stick around, and this is really something that the community should help design through genuine public workshops and public review, and the city has, over time, really diminished that ability by chipping away at public review.”
Rubio said that was a mischaracterization and “public review has not been removed.”
“If a developer or anybody feels that we are trying to prevent a rightful application that meets all the objective design standards, The city can get sued and will get sued,” Rubio said.“That’s why it was updated, so it meets the current state laws.”
She added that the city and developers had already taken inspiration from other downtown neighborhoods, and that additional dining, retail and other businesses were part of the ongoing plan.
“The Orchards and Marketplace are both mixed-use, and The Orchards specifically is going to be very much like a replica of Santana Row,” Rubio said, referring to the upscale residential and commercial district in San Jose. “So we are going to bring business as well as mixed income (housing). We also updated our design standards with more setbacks and integrated green space, so that no longer is an issue either.
“I think we are definitely listening to our residents and doing what they want, and we are following the law,” she continued. “Every appeal that has come forward has failed, not only in the council, but it has failed in court. So I think it speaks for itself.”
One of the most prominent appeals to come before the council in recent years was from Citizens Against Market Place Apartment Development, a group formed in opposition to the pending redevelopment of a portion of the shopping center into apartment units. After the council denied the appeal, the group took the case to court. A judge ruled in favor of the city, and a subsequent appeal of that ruling was denied.
Joh said he felt differently about the appeal process and outcomes.
“Just because somebody does not win an appeal does not mean that that appeal was not valuable, because that process is the hallmark of our democracy and our transparency,” Joh said. “Even if they don’t win, they convey information through that appeal that could potentially open new ideas and shift the narrative in a different direction that could result in a better outcome for the city.”
He called for the redevelopment of Bishop Ranch to be “true mixed-use.”
“We need to also think about what type of quality of life we want to offer to the residents and why we’re building the homes that we’re building, and one of the reasons that we are building these homes is because of the loss of business and corporate activity downtown right?” Joh said. “And so they just need to kind of close these fiscal gaps out of the city. And I think we need to have a bit more focus on trying to get more businesses back to the City Center.”
Rubio said the city was already focused on boosting economic activity and balancing its budget, and it is seeing results.
“As far as fiscal gaps, we actually have a general reserve surplus right now, a pretty large, sizable one when we only get 1% of the base sales tax,” Rubio said. “Before Measure N, that was leaving us with very little to work with post-Covid. That 1% that we added still keeps us 0.5% below the rest of the Tri-Valley cities. So we are well below three other cities, to be specific.
“As far as the jobs, we are actually increasing jobs in technology and in software and in healthcare,” Rubio said, pointing to the ongoing development of a diagnostic building for John Muir Health as one example.
The two candidates also differed in their perspectives on retail activity in the city. Joh said a lack of retail offerings meant that residents such as himself were often spending their money in neighboring cities.
“I don’t really remember the last time I bought anything in San Ramon – maybe occasionally at the Target, or maybe I got a beer at the Fieldworks, but normally, I buy stuff at the Costco, which is in Danville, or go down to Dublin for the Asian supermarket,” he said. “So all of our tax revenue is leaking out over there across the border, and they’re taking advantage of our money.”
Rubio said 30% of sales in San Ramon come from residents in other cities, “so people are shopping in San Ramon.”
“One of the things that we have already done is we have driven economic growth aligned with resident needs and interest,” Rubio said. “San Ramon has experienced growth in technology, cloud software, healthcare and medical technology, energy production, clean tech, renewable energy startups, professional services and retail entertainment sectors.”
Growth in those sectors is expected to continue, she said, with additional retail offerings on the horizon as part of the Bishop Ranch redevelopment.
“Approved developments include more mixed-use housing and businesses to drive revenues and create more jobs that align with our residents’ personal needs and professional development interests,” Rubio said.
Other topics discussed at the forum included public safety, traffic and public transportation. A video of the event is available here.
