Former Santa Maria-Bonita School District board member Will Smith is running for his third time against longtime incumbent Santa Maria Mayor Alice Patino.
The two will be joined in this general election by former Santa Maria Joint Union High School board member Diana Perez and first-time candidate Andrew Foster.
The Sun featured Patino and Perez in the Aug. 1 article “Looking to the future: Diana Perez faces Alice Patino in Santa Maria mayoral race.”
Smith lost to Patino in 2016 and 2020. This time around, Smith said he supports annexation to expand the city’s boundaries and make room for housing, creating a resource center for the city’s homeless population, building a new events center to bring the city additional revenue, and taking another look at the budget to pay the city’s firefighters higher wages.
“We’re not where we should be. … Santa Maria was trying to keep this small-city mentality, but it’s so big and we have to expand because we’re imploding,” he said. “We need to take a look at where we can expand, even using eminent domain if we have to because we are going at such an alarming pace right now.”
Santa Maria is anticipating about 35,000 new residents by 2050. Eminent domain is the government’s authority to take private property and convert it into public use.
Smith said he’d like to see the city expand east of Highway 101 into unincorporated land to make room for more housing. Smith said he understands that there are current annexation efforts playing out for the Richard’s Ranch development, but “Orcutt residents are not very keen on that idea.”
“We have to find a way to think creatively to prepare for the future. We are a small city and have that small-city charm, but 120,000 to 130,000 people projected to grow, you have to get out of that small-town model,” Smith said.
By investing and building an events center, the city could see alternative revenue sources that can help the city address its projected budget deficit, he added.
“I feel that people should vote for me because I’m consistent. I’ve fought the school district up to the Supreme Court. It didn’t turn out the way I wanted to,” Smith said.
Before running for mayor, Smith taught in the Santa Maria-Bonita district for nine years, resigned in July 2010, and won election to the school board shortly after, where he served until 2014—losing his seat to Ricky Lara. A failed recall attempt occurred in 2012 after a community group alleged that he made poor financial decisions for the district, according to previous Sun reporting.
His teaching license was revoked in 2013 after he was suspended from his school site several times for alleged misconduct, including physically and verbally assaulting students and misusing a computer, according to previous Sun reporting. He fought the decision in trial court, but he lost in 2017 when the court maintained the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing’s decision.
“While I got a lot of things done, there were a lot of false accusations and I had to fight against the district,” he said. “It’s a close, tight community, if they like you they push you. If they don’t like you, they dog you.”
Foster said he is running for mayor because he believes “the people have lost sight of the Constitution, and it seems to be rampantly abused by businesses, local law enforcement, and just in general,” he said.
“We need an education program throughout the city. Both employees and citizens, we need to learn our duties and responsibilities as citizens and public employees,” Foster said.
If elected, Foster said he wants the city to provide more of its services in-person rather than through technology, cut city spending to get the city “out of debt,” and fight against state housing mandates like accessory dwelling unit development.
“I don’t think the state can force it on us. I don’t think it’s legal; I don’t think it’s constitutional. I think we can say, ‘We don’t have to follow an illegal law,’” Foster said.
If you “accept it’s a true law” then the state can force it on the city. If the city says no, “they won’t do it,” Foster said. The state has serious consequences, like loss of local control, if jurisdictions don’t abide by housing development law.
He supported expanding toward the Garey and Sisquoc areas to make room for more housing development and “maybe raising the cost of housing to keep people from buying here,” he said.
“I think we could control a lot of the problems if we get people learning what the Constitution is. Let’s start quoting the Constitution,” Foster said. “They don’t care because they weren’t taught to care. … We need to get the people back to mentally and physically being citizens.”
