Vote November 6th: Chamber Endorsements

Dedicated to the success of business

Next Tuesday, we will have a chance to elect Santa Rosa City Council members and a District 1 Sonoma County Supervisor who will lead our community for the next four years. Your Chamber has always been a strong voice for business as we advocate for our members and a positive business climate.

This year, we have again endorsed candidates and ballot issues that will be before you on November 6th. Please review our endorsements below. We urge your support.

Thank you,

Santa Rosa Chamber Board of Directors

Candidate Endorsements

The Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors supports those candidates whose positions and backgrounds are best suited to helping our member businesses and the community as a whole. Therefore, the Board has endorsed Don Taylor, Ernesto Olivares, Hans Dippel and Erin Carlstrom for Santa Rosa City Council, and John Sawyer in his bid for Sonoma County Supervisor, 1st District.

View the Chamber-endorsed Candidates’ statements to the membership:

Ballot Recommendations

Support State Proposition 30: This proposition would help balance the State budget and ensure funds for both K-12 and post-secondary education with a quarter-percent sales tax increase and by increasing income taxes for those earning over $250,000. Without passage of this Proposition, local schools would have to cut three weeks of education time.

Oppose Measure Q: This measure would create District Elections in Santa Rosa. The Advocacy Council believes that this would actually disenfranchise voters who could vote only once every four years for one Council Member versus the current opportunity to vote for three or four every two years. Further, the Districts that would be created would each be larger than the Town of Windsor which hardly creates any real neighborhood representation.

Support Measure R: This is one of three recommendations from the Charter Review Committee. It would improve our Binding Arbitration system by better defining the City’s ability to pay. This measure is supported by all sides as a step in improving Arbitration for both the City and employee unions.

Support Measure S: This measure would permit the City Council to develop ordinances to implement a Design Build approach to certain city public works projects. If done correctly, it would save taxpayers money. We support this measure and will be at the table during the critical conversations about how the ordinance will be actually written.