On the issues: Eric Guerra, Stephanie Nguyen, Tecoy Porter, Eric Rigard, D10 senate seat

The following interview was conducted by members of The Sacramento Bee Editorial Board and the four leading candidates for the District 10 State Senate seat, Elk Grove city councilmember Stephanie Nguyen, Sacramento Mayor Pro Tem Eric Guerra, Genesis Church senior pastor Tecoy Porter and Elk Grove resident Eric Rigard. It has been edited for length and clarity.

The Sacramento Bee: Tell us about yourself and why you wanted to run.

Guerra: I’m a local council member, I grew up picking fruit as early as the age of five, I joined my mother in the fields working 12 hours a day in the sun. I earned my engineering degree here in Sac State and was then appointed by Gov. Davis to the Board of Trustees for the California State University system. I spent 18 years working in the legislature fighting for working families and with my local experience, I know how to get things done in the Capitol. I’ve chaired our County Planning Commission and fought against NIMBYism to build housing for working families. I championed the human trafficking ordinance to go after illegal massage parlors in our county. And then, when elected to the council, I drafted the ordinance to stop that modern-day slavery for women. And I used my state experience to bring down $1.2 million in state funding to address human trafficking for our county. I know what it’s like to be homeless and live in my car. That’s why I worked with WEAVE and St. John’s to get the first Project Homekey application and build St. John Square so homeless families and children can have a future. I was the maker of the motion of the comprehensive siting plan and the maker of the motion of our housing trust fund for affordable housing in last year’s budget. I’ve drafted language for SB 41 to use vacant property on Stockton Boulevard for affordable housing and childcare. I’m proud to say we’re starting construction soon. And as chair of our County Air Quality Management District, I fought for the environment, making Elk Grove Unified and Twin Rivers Unified the largest electric school bus fleet in the nation and created the most expansive air quality monitoring system. As chair of our county’s Employment Training Agency and our county library I fought to make sure that funding goes to low-income families and low-income communities for adult learning, workforce development and creating our county’s childcare taskforce. I know what it’s like not to have health care, I know what it’s like not to have child care and I know what it’s like to work hard. I want to use those experiences and my years in the legislature to start day one fighting for working families.

Nguyen: I’m an executive director of a nonprofit organization here in town, but I’m also a council member for the city of Elk Grove. The entire city will be in this district. I am a daughter of Vietnamese war refugees. My parents came here during the fall of Saigon, and we relied on every single public assistance program there was available – I was a MediCal baby, a food stamp child. I know exactly what it’s like to struggle, which is why for the last 15 years, I’ve worked in a nonprofit to uplift struggling families. I’ve worked directly with communities on the ground, ensuring that they have access to resources and services to get them one step closer to self sufficiency. In the last 10 years, I’ve led this organization, which means that during the last two years of this pandemic, many families were struggling. We worked to make sure that they had access to culturally appropriate food. We made sure that our families had access to food so we knew they would eat. Additionally, during the pandemic, when the county had $5 million to get out and they didn’t know how to get that money out it was my organization that connected with all these communities all across the county to get people funding to be able to pay for rent and utilities and kept them inside their homes and safe. During this pandemic, the AAPI community was blamed for this entire pandemic, which meant that many of our community members felt unsafe. They were being attacked, they were being targeted. So we had to ensure that our community found ways to be able to stay safe. I do this work every day, not just on the weekends, not just in the evenings. On the weekends, I’m working to ensure that our families have access to vaccines, and that they’re getting their taxes prepared. I was a council member in District 4 – I would say I’m the largest district in the entire city.

Porter: I serve as the senior pastor of the Genesis Church in South Sacramento. I’ve been doing that for 22 years, and I come from a long line of servant leaders. I’m a third generation pastor. I’ve also lived in Elk Grove for over 30 years and I’ve had the opportunity to see Elk Grove grow from a rural agricultural community, to the thriving city that it is today. The church that I pastor in is in the heart of the Sacramento community. In my 22 years of pastoring there, I’ve created various outreach programs to address food and clothing insecurity, educational and health inequities along with after school programs for our youth like youth athletic leagues to get our kids off the street. In March of 2018, after the tragic death of Stephon Clark, I created a local social justice and civil rights chapter in partnership with Rev. Al Sharpton called the National Action Network of Sacramento. Through that experience, I’ve been on the front lines of criminal justice reform to create inclusion and equal opportunities at the city, state and even federal levels. I’ve also advocated to remove laws that address systemic racism and addressed inequities found in our health education systems. Through my political advocacy, my organization has led police and social justice reform legislation in the state.

Rigard: I’m conservative and I’m Christian. I grew up in Los Angeles, California and moved to the Bay Area in 1982. In ’98, my wife and I moved to Sacramento where we live just outside of Elk Grove. We went up to El Dorado Hills and then came back down because my daughter was going to school and they were going through the whole transgender thing, didn’t know what they wanted to do. So I brought her down here and went to Bradshaw Christian and she graduated from Cosumnes River High School. And that’s what brings me here today. I see some things that are being passed and being done where parents’ rights are being taken from them. And we are usurping our God-given rights – they’re taken from us little by little, small things that we don’t really think about and then we find ourselves so far away from what our original intent was. I am the only Republican on the panel here. And I’m a Republican because of one thing I read in the Republican platform, and that was racial justice and racial reconciliation. I believe in that wholeheartedly. I’m in the process of starting a crisis pregnancy center here in Sacramento, and would love to be involved with anybody who’s willing to work on that. My wife is a refugee from Korea.

The Sacramento Bee: California has a massive housing shortage, and the legislature has struggled to make much of a dent in that. The most recent success was to legalize duplexes and four-plexes in most of the state, but that’s facing a lot of resistance already from local governments. Even if it does proceed in most places, it’s going to be a relatively incremental difference in terms of the number of units. What would each of you do as a legislator to speed up the kind of massive construction of multifamily housing we need?

Rigard: I’d like to change some of the regulations. I believe that developers are burdened with regulations. In order to build, that needs to be lifted. If we’re expecting them to roll up their sleeves and get involved with building for us and helping get those units built, we need to take some of that regulation and set it aside for the purpose of building these new homes. Regulation is a huge thing that the legislator could definitely help with.

Porter: We have to work with our providers, our developers and streamline the process to build here in California. We know we’re very encumbered in that area. And so we need to streamline that. We also need to seek out innovative ways of how to create not just more housing, but repurposed housing. I support the fourplexes and duplexes, we need to keep pushing that. We just need to go ahead and work together with everyone to make sure that this is done. We have to get this done, because we need to make California a place where everybody can afford a home.

Nguyen: We just approved, in the city of Elk Grove, our housing element, and what we saw all across the city was that we had very low numbers of affordable housing. So one of the things we’ve done is take a look at how we can build more affordable housing complexes in our city. What I’ve talked to our city about is making sure that they’re not all concentrated in one area and that they’re spread across the entire city. Mr. Rigard and Mr. Porter talked about a pathway, which I completely understand. There needs to be a streamlined pathway for these houses to be available. The duplexes and fourplexes are great. We look at homelessness – once upon a time, when you turned 18, you went to college, you got a job, you bought a house, you moved out of the apartments so that the next person can come in. We don’t have that anymore. We don’t have enough apartment complexes. We don’t have enough affordable housing, hence the homelessness issue that we have. So we really need to do whatever we can to take a look, all across the city, to see where we can build more affordable housing duplexes. They’re a great way for folks who are in apartment complexes to move into the next step and maybe into a small home, but even if you’re a small family in a home now looking to move into something bigger, those aren’t available right now. So I think we need to look for a pathway for builders to be able to build faster and be able to build at a rate they can afford. Because right now it’s not affordable.

Guerra: First, I think replicating some of the things that the city of Sacramento has already done, which is the ministerial approval process, so we can expedite those projects. We set that standard and we made it clear to the community how we can move these projects faster. Second, before we can even build a drawer, we’re still paying for the wet stuff – the water, stormwater drainage, that’s all public infrastructure. Right now, we have a $31 billion surplus, we should be using that to fund public infrastructure for infill projects. We have vacant lots on Stockton Boulevard, on Franklin Boulevard – areas where we could actually put some of that state surplus, which is also public work, so we’re getting people back to work. Addressing the gap (in) funds when we want to look at affordable housing. Most of these projects have significant gap finances. We need the state in our budget every year, setting a commitment on how much will go to tackle that. If not, we’ll never get these projects off the ground. We’re starting Mercy Housing, that’s a $50 million gap (in) finance. We need to make sure we allow and put more pressure so zoning has more options. Not everybody, for their first home, can have a four-bedroom, two-bathroom, three-car garage, we have to expand the different types of housing so people can start in a smaller home. By doing that, we have to make sure the zoning laws allow for that. Finally, we have to address the workforce shortage. There’s an opportunity right now because we have a retiring building trades community to begin to expand them. I’ve worked with the Charles A. Jones Center and, as chair of the Employee Training Committee, I’ve been pushing to put more funding into workforce training. That’s why I’m endorsed by many of the construction trades, finally holding cities accountable that are not doing their part. The reason we see a lot of pressure in Sacramento is because too many small cities and other parts of the state and in the Bay Area are not doing their part.

The Sacramento Bee: Where do you fall on the debate regarding local control? Do you think counties and cities and governments at the local level should have as much discretion?

Guerra: Not everything can be cookie cutter. That’s why in our ministerial approval process, we do have avenues for local engagement. And that’s critical. I think if you don’t have that, then you have projects that don’t fit that area. But the fact is that the current amount of overall discretion right now is creating that pressure, where some cities don’t do their part. And so that’s where I do feel that we have to change and put more requirements on cities and also to follow through on their general plan requirements, making sure that they are actually building the work. Frankly, I think it can be done at the regional level, because that really is what affects housing. If we can solve those at the regional level, that would have more of an impact.

Nguyen: I do think there are some areas in which we need to have local control, there’s a reason why we have different cities, there’s a reason why we have drawn lines for districts. There’s a reason why we put different types of areas together where we’re all separated by different districts, and how each one of us represents a certain district, a certain city, because they’re all different. They all have different communities that live there, they all have different needs. They all have different requirements. And so as an elected person in our city, that’s our job – to be able to hear from our people, hear from our district and understand them. We as an elected body, as a city, should be able to have control, have a say in what happens in our city. Councilmember Guerra, I agree with him – there’s no cookie cutter solution. There’s areas in which we do need to have a county make a decision, or even statewide. During the pandemic, I worked very closely with the county and thought it was great that there were mask mandates and ordinances. That’s something I believe needs to be done as a county. I also know that we all look at, regionally, how we can impact our community. We have these conversations where each representative is from different cities, coming together to talk about how we can work together. But we all understand that our cities are different. I may be a council member for the city of Elk Grove, and I work in South Sacramento. But I also understand that there are two different areas and they have two different needs – two different values, different beliefs. And that’s why I think it’s best that there are some areas where there needs to be local control and other areas where there needs to be county and statewide. It just depends on the issue and the topic.

Porter: Cities and counties need to be held accountable for the funding that’s given to them by the state and nationally. What we’ve found during the pandemic is that not all the money got to where it was needed. They have to be held accountable for making sure that the funding gets to where it’s supposed to go. We’ve seen it where the county got sued because the CARE money didn’t get to the place that needed to go. There’s more concern about that happening than other things. I live in Elk Grove and I work in South Sacramento. It’s a tale of two cities. Elk Grove has its fair share of prosperity, but South Sacramento struggles, and it has struggled for years. And that’s in part due to our local elected officials not being held accountable for those funds coming down. For these areas, I think if you received funds from the state, make sure you’re held accountable. And that’s what I’m gonna do.

Rigard: I believe that the cities and counties should have their own set of a vision of what they want their municipality to look like. However, I think it’s incumbent upon each and every one of us on this panel to go beyond that, and to touch the people that are living in this district in Elk Grove in South Sacramento, and communicate back and forth with them. Because people will give you good feedback. They understand that it’s a problem. And it’s something that needs to be addressed. If you talk to them, if you seek out what they want to have done, they’ll be able to give you some wise counsel as to what to do and how to move forward. And we can employ some of that. And then the people will recognize that we’re now listening to them, we’re listening to their voice and we’re employing some of the things that they want to have happen within the district.

The Sacramento Bee: California has more, and tougher, gun laws than most states, but legislators are still looking for ways to stem the sort of violence that has wracked Sacramento this year. Do you believe the legislature should pass an excise tax on guns to fund gun violence prevention programs, a version of which died last year for lack of support? And if not, what else can state lawmakers do about this?

Guerra: Yes, we need to do more education and intervention. Making sure we look at education and our youth is important. I’ve been working with Moms Demand Action on safe gun storage. You’d be surprised at how many people I talk to who bought their guns legally but don’t store them safely. Accidents can happen, let alone if the gun is stolen. We need to tackle that issue. The other piece is engaging in youth intervention early on and making sure we’re talking about the value of life. Yes, I do think there are other tactics like Moms Demand Action to find data outcome solutions.

Porter: America is the most violent developed country in the world. It’s crazy, and we have to do something in regards to gun trafficking and drug trafficking. And that’s what we have not heard throughout this whole mass shooting. Paying attention to the gangs and all that, but we have not heard anything about gun trafficking. How are these guns and drugs getting to these neighborhoods, because they’re not just popping up. And this again, has gone on for years and years and I don’t know if the excise tax on guns will help – I’m not really sure, because we have to address the root of the issue which is drug trafficking and gun trafficking. There’s also deep-seated poverty in these areas that we have not addressed, and we see that throughout everything we do – housing, health care, the list goes on and on. I think we have to do even more than that. We have to work with our federal government in making sure that we stop gun trafficking and drug trafficking in California.

Rigard: Gun trafficking and drug trafficking definitely have to be addressed, but the “ghost guns” that are out there, the guns that have no serial numbers, the guns that are used illicitly in crimes, they’re not the registered gun owners who know how to handle their guns who do lock them up. Some of them may not, and they do need to be educated about that. But for the most part, that’s not the issue. It’s those random guns that are out there, that are running around that people are using, and they’re using without thinking of any particular result. And part of the training and part of the education that we need to do is we’ve got to drive home the fact that if you have a gun and it’s registered and it’s constitutionally protected, everything is great. Take care of it, keep it up, do what you need to, but if you use a gun to commit a crime that’s something that really tears us down as a society. And we’ve got to get rid of those. We’ve got to get rid of that. A lot of it is used quite often in lower economic communities. And lower and poverty stricken communities, but we’ve got to drive home the point that they’re unacceptable and we cannot have that out there. It can’t be assigned to you or else it will target you forever.

Nguyen: I’m married to a police officer who worked for the city of Elk Grove for nearly 15 years now and I can hear him in the back of my head saying, ‘Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. And when the guns get in the wrong hands, that’s what we come across.’ Taking the funds and moving it toward youth – I completely agree with that. My office is a safe place for young people. You can’t understand this if you don’t know the situation. But if you’re from a family that is in a gang – if your grandpa was in one or your uncle or your dad was in one, you are going to be one. That’s the way it works. And there are some young kids I come across and they don’t want that life but they have nowhere else to go. Sometimes they want to skip school, sometimes they don’t want to be there. We’ve opened up our doors for them and said, ‘Hey, come here. Don’t get yourself in trouble.’ I’ve always said an at-risk youth isn’t just youth that comes from low-income communities or youth from gang families, an at-risk youth is a youth that has absolutely nothing to do. Yes, they come from low-income impoverished communities, but like us as adults, we’re at-risk when we have nothing to do because we start looking for things to get in trouble. And so young people are exactly the same way. But we need to find ways in which we have places for these young folks to go to and feel safe. And while we can’t keep them safe all night long because they eventually have to go home, we can at least give them an avenue. They can go home and guide them in the right direction as it relates to gun control. I agree with Mr. Rigard and Mr. Porter. My family’s from South Sacramento and we needed access to a gun to protect ourselves. Home invasions were happening. So you do have families that need access to guns to protect themselves.

The Sacramento Bee: The Public Utilities Commission is considering reforming the rooftop solar program to give generous subsidies to households and make it easier for widespread adoption. Utility companies say that the costs of these programs would get pushed on to lower income communities and residents. Where do you stand on this issue and what role does rooftop solar play in California’s clean energy transition?

Rigard: I think rooftop solar is excellent. I think it’s a viable method of reducing our energy needs. And I do see how changing the subsidy landscape to help those who are a little bit down on their luck or who are of the lower economic stage in life to be able to afford it, because we want to have as many people employ that technology as possible. Let’s do something to help them out. Help get them there, while not taking it away from those who are using it currently. Let’s get something that balances that thing out and allows them access to it so that they’re able to utilize it. Do I see it as being a panacea for everything? No. Our energy is so convoluted right now that we need all of the energy we possibly have. We here in the United States burn gasoline, which I know is taboo, cleaner than anybody in the world. But we do need to transition to renewable energy sources and we need those renewable energy sources to cost us a little bit less to actually enter in to be able to participate. So yes, I’d say let’s make sure we can readjust that so that more people can participate. And it doesn’t cost them so much.

Nguyen: I happen to know – just because of the organization and the amount of families that we serve – that many come through our doors asking for utility discounts, and they have to reapply again every year and get it renewed. When that happens, they do come in and they do ask for the discount services. It’s definitely the number one thing that the communities that I work with and that I serve rely on is that utility discount program. As far as making sure that we reform and give these discounts to these communities so that they can have access, I would definitely be on board with that. We’re in California – the sun is here, and we need to take advantage of the fact that we have that and use that. If we’re looking to move forward in this world, clean energy and getting to a path where my kids and grandkids can breathe this air. We need to put those programs in place so that everyone has access to it without these discounted programs. Without these incentives, we’ll never get there, especially the communities that I work with will be left behind. I think they play a big role in this as we take a look at climate change and how we’re moving forward.

Porter: The rooftop solar program does play a vital role in the transition to clean, renewable and sustainable energy. We just want to make sure it’s equitable. We want to make sure that there’s not a sun tax if we’re moving toward this rate for renewable energy. I do agree with Eric and Stephanie on this. We have to make sure that it’s accessible to everybody, especially our low-income Black and brown communities where they have been just hammered with environmental hazards and limited access to healthy foods. We want to make sure it’s equitable.

Guerra: If there’s anything I learned in engineering school, it’s that our policy should not be technology-specific. Something may come up in the future that has a better application. What the PUC is trying to resolve is the cost of infrastructure and the maintenance of infrastructure that happens with the current rooftop solar program. I do think there is a way to help and assist those middle and lower income families who are the early ones who said, ‘I want to check out the rooftop solar program.’ And because of that, there’s a subsidy for that. We should figure out how to honor those folks, but not subsidize those that are well off. There were early commitments made. Does rooftop solar play a role? Yes, it does. But we should not be technology specific either. There are advancements in distributive energy, and the fact that now SMUD and in my role in the air district we’re looking at solar waste and ways to reduce the overall cost of reducing solar energy. We should be open to those and make sure that they’re equitable, not wasted. Look at how we build in the future. We’re learning each time and making sure that as we move forward, we’re looking at other options right now. The biggest thing, I think, is how does hydrogen both in fuel sectors play a huge role in distributed energy? Rooftop solar is an option. We shouldn’t be technology specific. We should figure out how the burden and the cost of infrastructure does impact the lowest income people. So moving forward, we can figure out how to address that.

The Sacramento Bee: What do you think of the proposals to help people with gas prices that have ranged from suspending gas taxes altogether to providing cash rebates across the board? What is the right policy, if any? Does it make sense to ease gas consumption giving the repercussions for the climate and does it make sense to provide rebates across the board or should they be limited by income?

Nguyen: There are a lot of families struggling right now – families still have to go to work, and so this gas increase has definitely impacted many working families. Something needs to be done. We should do something to help with some of the relief in what they’re paying. What should be done? I’ll be honest, I don’t know. I know we need to do something. We need to make sure that working families that need to go to work every single day and take their kids to school are able to go to the supermarket to shop for their kids and their families. We need to do something to help these families. I would say taking a look at everything and considering everything before something is put on the table. So I do believe something needs to be done, but what that looks like I don’t know yet. But we need to consider everything and how it’s going to impact everybody. Where does the money come from? I think we need to look at everything.

Guerra: If we were to give back rebates, where it’s most effective is those at the very bottom rung. Janitors, landscape folks, people who have to get to work and don’t have options in our public transportation system, I think that’s who we have to prioritize. I’d like to see us use that money for the scrapping replacement program and making sure we expand it because most of the time when we talk about low-income families they have jalopies, cars that are the worst at polluting. They’re breaking down all the time. They’re unreliable. So expanding on the current program or programs where we give people public transportation. Being able to get people a new electric vehicle that’s reliable versus just rebating that might be a better use of our dollars. We need to look at how one budget action has an impact on the entire budget. Yes, we have a problem right now with escalating gas prices and costs, but we also have challenges in our education, challenges to find more childcare providers, making sure that those childcare providers don’t close down. What does that mean for other cost pressures before we just hand out everybody a check to go spend it out?

Porter: Let’s hand out the checks. Let’s go ahead and do that. Right now we’re seeing people discuss this and throw out all these ideas and, as we discuss it, nothing is happening. People are still suffering under these high gas prices, trying to figure things out. That’s one of the things I believe people are tired of – all the debate that goes behind something that’s probably really simple. If we do that, we have to make sure we don’t make it cumbersome. A lot of times trying to get a stimulus or get into this funding, we’ve seen during the pandemic, it’s been a cumbersome process. So we need to streamline the process. Make it opt-in, keep it simple. But the more important point is do something now so people can feel it. Then it’ll be a win.

Regard: I see this as being multifaceted. What brings the quickest relief the fastest and for those people who are on the bottom rung who really need to help. I guess a tax holiday would be great. We’ve taken an extra 15 cents on gas. Our governor has said he’s not using it to fix the roads. He’s going to put it in the general fund. But at the same time, we’ve got people that are suffering under the current gas prices that we have now. So I would like to see them have some relief. The second proposal that came up from the legislature is really just a handout. The one that the governor came up with that tied it to the actual registration of the vehicles seemed a little bit more plausible. However, we’ve got to do something. We’ve got the highest gas taxes in the nation. And we need to do something that’s going to help bring some relief to those people who are on the roads trying to get back and forth to work. Those who cannot afford to make an adjustment and who’ve got to get to work need some help. And we’ve got to be able to help them out. We need to use a gas tax holiday and refund them or give them some money based on the number of cars they’ve got registered.

The Sacramento Bee: Where do you stand on legislation that would require COVID vaccinations in schools?

Nguyen: My staff does vaccines in partnership with the county. I’ve seen during the weekly COVID testing folks that come through who are not vaccinated. I’ve seen what this virus does to communities and what it does to families. The minute my kids were available to get vaccinated, I signed them up and I got them vaccinated right away. As a matter of fact, within our own agency we made it so that everybody must be vaccinated in order to work for the organization. We do ask that you are vaccinated to be able to come into the agency to receive services because I have a duty to protect the community that we work with and the folks that come into the organization. When my kids go to school, I know that they’re around other kids that may not be vaccinated and other individuals, too. So I worry as a mother, I worry for my children as well. The fact that people are dying because of this is real. I work with the Pacific Islander community and their numbers skyrocketed because there are multiple families living under one roof. I’ve watched as they bury their mothers, sisters and brothers in one funeral service. I’ve seen this. I would be all in favor of vaccine mandates. Absolutely. I think it protects our community. It protects all of us – it protects my family and protects your family. We need to control this so we don’t see another variant.

Porter: I have worked with communities in regards to vaccination distribution texts. Zip codes 95832 and 33 were highly impacted from COVID. And we’ve worked very hard to make sure people are tested and vaccinated there. COVID disproportionately hits certain communities, not just health-wise but in terms of jobs, education, business and all that. We say that it’s ending but I think it’s here to stay. And we have to figure out that. Whatever mandates we need to make to keep people safe, we need to do that. It’s about learning to live with it. We cannot ignore it. We have to watch out for misinformation. We’re in a campaign focused on family and kids to make sure they get vaccinated and we need to stay vigilant and do all we can to make sure people stay safe, especially in our lower income Black and brown communities.

Rigard: I see vaccines and vaccine mandates as necessary for certain portions of the population – those who have co-morbidities and weakened immune systems. Science is clear on what the needs are. But science is also flexing a little bit on natural immunity, people who have had COVID before. There is still an element of choice that’s needed. They can assess their own responsibility and their own susceptibility to COVID and I think people need to still have that choice. I would never want to tell anyone not to have a vaccine, I would tell them to get one. If you have any questions or doubts, go ahead and get it. But if you’re moving right along, you’re doing fine, then you can make that judgment on your own. People should have that personal freedom.

Guerra: First, I’ve got two kids under the vaccination age and the fact that there are many people who are not vaccinated, it puts a lot of families at risk. Unless you have kids under that age or people with compromised immunity, you have no idea the level of stress people go through. I do support vaccine mandates and I do support masking mandates. As an assemblymember, we have to make sure we empower and give the freedom for public health officials to guide. Having worked in the legislature for so many years, public opinion can guide health policy, but we need science and public health expertise to guide public health policy. I do think making sure we’re empowering our health officers at the state and local level. We were concerned these numbers would affect the Latino community and low-income communities, and sure enough we saw spikes there. That’s a role elected officials can play. When it comes to health policy, we need to support our public health workers. And I do support mask mandates when the cases go up. If we can manage that, we can reduce mandates and school closures.

This story was originally published May 19, 2022 at 6:00 AM.