APTOS >> The proliferation of candidate yard signs throughout the local landscape confirm that election season is in full swing as political hopefuls make one last push to win over voters before the Nov. 5 election.

And for residents living within Santa Cruz County’s 2nd District — encompassing the coastline from Capitola to Pajaro Dunes, a slice of the city of Watsonville and inland areas around Day Valley and Corralitos — two names have no doubt become as recognizable as any: Kristen Brown and Kim De Serpa.

Both are seasoned public officials vying to replace Supervisor Zach Friend, who has held the 2nd District seat on the Board of Supervisors since 2012 but decided last year he would not seek a fourth term.

Brown, 37, is a fourth-generation county resident, has served on the Capitola City Council since 2016 and has been holding the mayor’s gavel this year — the final year of her city tenure.

De Serpa, 57, is an Aptos resident and has held a seat on the Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees, serving more than 15,000 students and 43 schools, for 14 years.

Brown beat De Serpa by 1,225 votes in the March primary, but it was a close enough margin to force a November runoff. So as voters get ready to cast their ballots one final decisive time, Brown and De Serpa sat down for a candidate forum Monday at Cabrillo College in Aptos to preview how they’d address the many pressing issues facing the 2nd District.

However, no matter the outcome in November, the contest guarantees one thing — when the board holds its first meeting in 2025, there will be a woman behind the dais for the first time in 13 years.

Roads, roads, roads

In keeping with all supervisor candidates running this cycle —including those in the 5th District — Brown and De Serpa agreed that the poor state of county roads is among the top issues on voters’ minds.

Brown advocated for a “red, yellow, green” categorization approach, where “red” represents roads in the most extreme state of disrepair and are most expensive to fix, “yellow” includes those falling into disrepair and “green” roads may need nothing at all. Brown wants to see a “smart mix” of addressing both red and yellow roads because if the county spends all its time addressing red roads, she said, “all of those yellow roads are going to fall into further disrepair and become red roads and all of our time will be spent in reacting instead of being proactive.”

De Serpa, after recognizing the intractability of the issue, said she believes the best way forward is a continued push for quicker federal reimbursements from natural disaster claims and dedicated spending from sales tax Measure D and recently passed Measure K.

She also knocked Brown for her stoplight strategy.

“Don’t tell that to people in Eureka Canyon. Everybody that lives beyond where that road has slipped out, … it’s got to be repaired immediately,” said De Serpa. “It’s a giant public safety issue and they’ve been living that way for a long time.”

Brown, in quick response, defended her position.

“At no point do I think that we should not give any money to roads in the worst repair,” she said. “However, if we are only being reactive, we are never being proactive and we will only ever be reactive and that is no way to move forward.”

Rail trail

The Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission is getting close to completing a study measuring the feasibility of establishing a 22-mile zero emission passenger train system throughout the county with a multiuse trail alongside of it. As supervisor, Brown or De Serpa would have a seat on the commission as a county representative and will cast a key vote in deciding if the agency should continue to pursue the project once the preliminary study is finished early next year.Brown, already the chair of the commission through her seat on Santa Cruz Metro, recognized the immensity of the project, but thinks it’s something that transportation leaders and the community are up for.

“This is going to be a huge undertaking that will impact the future of transportation in Santa Cruz County,” she said. “That requires a long-term commitment and a lot of funding and sometimes we have to grit our teeth and say ‘Let’s do this. This matters for the future.’”

To dispel misunderstandings in the community, Brown added that funding for these lengthy projects is necessarily incremental in order to meet federal and state grant deadlines as they arise. But she did admit that her biggest concerns are operations and maintenance costs if and when a rail system comes to fruition, because they won’t be as easy to fund through grant opportunities.

“That is when we’re going to have to start considering if we’re going to need to ask the public if they’re willing to fund operation and maintenance,” said Brown.

De Serpa insisted that she will gladly cast a vote for a passenger rail project, but only “if it makes sense feasibly,” mentioning concerns about the financial toll and public domain conflicts.

With 18 miles of the trail are either complete, under construction or in development in Santa Cruz County, De Serpa stressed that it should be the main focus right now and that progress is not moving fast enough.

“I would like to be able to use (the trail) in my lifetime,” said De Serpa. “I’d like to be able to use it now and I think everybody should be able to use it now … whether it’s with a rail or not.”

Rio Del Mar

Another much-discussed issue for 2nd District residents is a disputed piece of land in Rio Del Mar.

For years, the county has been locked in a legal dispute with a group of beachfront homeowners along Beach Drive who insist that an almost quarter-mile long stretch of land on the coastal side of the homes is their private patio property, while the county holds it is a public walkway and should have open access.

The California Coastal Commission entered the fray late last year by levying more than $4.7 million in fines against the homeowners after they put up makeshift barriers on either end of the paved area to prevent people from entering. The situation escalated only a few months later when the homeowners put up even more permanent fencing in February in defiance of the commission.

Brown was supportive of the commission and county stances that the area was meant for public access.

“I would be a strong advocate for ensuring that it reopens,” said Brown. “People want that access again and the fact that it’s being closed by a small number of wealthy property owners does not serve the greater good when it comes to coastal access in our region.”

De Serpa said she’s “neutral on this issue,” pointing to a ruling from a Santa Cruz County Superior Court judge in 2022 that was in favor of the homeowners’ right to the area, which stands in contrast to the commission’s decision.

As the county appeals, she said she wants to wait until the issue gets resolved by the courts, but she isn’t happy with the amount of time, money and resources the county has devoted to it.

“I feel very dismayed the county has spent millions of dollars litigating this particular case,” said De Serpa, who would have favored a settlement. “This issue to me is not worth that amount of money.”

Managed retreat

That same area in Rio Del Mar, as well as much of the coastal land across the county, is reckoning with how to respond to climate change issues and sea level rise.

One adaption strategy under consideration by coastal authorities, most notably the Coastal Commission, is known as “managed retreat” which seeks to relocate or remove existing developments out of hazardous zones as opposed to armoring them against the rising tide.

De Serpa acknowledged that retreat is likely an inevitability due to climate change but thinks the impact imminent managed retreat will have on the county’s transient occupancy tax revenues is too risky.

“To the extent that our general fund relies on the transient occupancy tax,” De Serpa said, “I think it’s very important to try to maintain those coastal properties as long as possible.”

Brown thinks it “depends on the situation,” as these decisions bring up issues related to equity and beach preservation.

“We need to look at the experts at the Coastal Commission and state and other environmental groups to help us understand when on these case-by-case bases we should go towards managed retreat as opposed to coastal armoring,” said Brown.