Santa Clara elections continue to grapple with the influence of outside spending from independent expenditure committees. A Santa Clara resident and co-founder of the grassroots group Santa Clara Plays Fair, Michele Ryan, notes that outside money has been a significant factor in local races for a long time. Ryan highlighted this context while discussing the District 2 council race, pointing to candidate Kimberley Williams's approach to campaign finance and her broader qualifications.
Ryan, who helped found Santa Clara Plays Fair in 2007, organized against a public subsidy for a 49ers stadium, a fight that became Measure J in 2010. In that campaign, the grassroots group was outspent by the team, facing more than $4 million from the team against their roughly $25,000, and lost. Ryan noted that the team added another player to a system already shaped by outside money. For years prior, the Santa Clara Police Officers Association and various development interests were the dominant outside spenders in city elections, contributing hundreds of thousands of dollars to City Council races.
Independent expenditure committees make their own decisions, which can shift over time. Ryan noted that in past elections, the team’s committees supported Karen Hardy in 2022 and Kevin Park in 2024. However, with both now running for mayor, the team’s committee is backing a different candidate. By law, these committees are prohibited from coordinating with any campaign. A candidate cannot direct them, cannot stop them, and does not answer to them.
What a candidate can control is her own campaign, according to Ryan, and Kimberley Williams has made specific choices in this regard. Williams agreed to the city’s voluntary spending limit, while her opponent did not. Additionally, Williams is the only District 2 council candidate publicly supporting Proposition 4, a measure that would allow for public financing of elections. Public financing aims to minimize the impact of special interest money and create viable pathways for candidates who might not otherwise have the financial means to run. New York City’s public financing program, for example, helped elect Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
Ryan described Williams's extensive background, noting her more than 15 years in higher education leadership, where she gained experience in bringing diverse priorities together to find lasting solutions. Long before her current campaign, Williams dedicated years to volunteer service through PTA leadership at local, council, district, and state levels. She currently sits on the California State PTA Board of Managers and its Legislative Action Committee, and she is president of the Santa Clara Schools Foundation. Ryan emphasized that this record was “built over more than a decade, not assembled for an election.”
Santa Clara’s council has grown more diverse in recent election cycles, better reflecting the Asian American community, which constitutes a substantial share of the city. As the mother of a biracial child, Williams is raising her family in Santa Clara and understands what it means for a council to reflect its community. Ryan acknowledged that outside spending can unsettle people, and voters deserve accessible information about who funds what. However, a campaign focused solely on spending totals, Ryan stated, “tells residents nothing about who will show up to meetings prepared, return their calls and make sound decisions.”
Ryan encouraged Santa Clara voters to look past a narrative rooted in past disagreements concerning the 49ers and to instead evaluate District 2 candidates based on their skills, temperament, and their record of showing up for the community. Voters are encouraged to watch recordings of candidate forums, such as the Chamber of Commerce candidate forum, co-sponsored by San José Spotlight, and to judge each candidate on what they actually said rather than on a tally of outside spending.
