Kamei fails to garner 50 percent of vote, forcing runoff with
second-place finisher
Gilroy – Political novice and water expert Ram Singh has forced a November runoff election for a spot on the governing board of the Santa Clara Valley Water District, a regional agency under increasing criticism for its spending habits.
The professor of water resources management at San Jose State University only began campaigning for the District 1 seat last month. Despite doing little more than plastering South County with campaign signs, he still managed to finish second with nearly 22 percent of the vote. The failure of three-term incumbent Rosemary Kamei to get half of all ballots cast – she finished with nearly 49.2 percent – triggered a fall runoff between the candidates.
“I was a little bit down this morning because it was not an outright win,” Singh said. “But I started to be more encouraged because people called and said ‘You have done a greater miracle than anyone expected.’ People are saying I made so many (campaign) mistakes, but those who came to know of my qualifications – that’s why they voted for me.”
Kamei, who calculated that she would have only needed 640 more votes to avoid the runoff, was not worried about the November race.
“But I do know that I need to work, and that’s okay,” she said. “I have an opportunity to get out and talk to people and get them before they send their absentees in. I’m going to work very hard and this is very important to me and it will be another opportunity to talk to people who didn’t vote, who normally don’t vote in a primary but do in November.”
Singh differentiated himself from two other candidates hoping to unseat Kamei by highlighting his 45 years of experience in water resources management, a career that spans everything from designing dams and levees to helping pubic officials budget for water resources.
The professor and water consultant has criticized incumbent Kamei and other members of the district’s board of directors for failing to rein in runaway spending. The district, which now has a $260 million budget, has beefed up its staff from 500 to 800 people in the last 12 years and doubled water rates in half that time.
Kamei said the district has “leveled off” in terms of hiring.
“The change in terms of the expenditures on salaries has been due to other factors, like health insurance,” she said. “Those are the kinds of costs that are really increasing tremendously. And it’s not just the water district. Everybody’s facing this.”
In anticipation of the fall race, Singh plans to get serious about fundraising and canvassing the rest of the sprawling district, which stretches from Los Gatos to the southern border of South County. He plans to hire a political consultant and see if he can pull down endorsements that he missed out on this spring due to a late start on the campaign trail.
Singh has already received an early nod of support from Terry Mahurin, a fellow candidate and harsh critic of district spending who said he would support the professor in a fall runoff. The comment came late Tuesday as Mahurin watched his third place finish firm up in the polls.
Singh also plans to ask for an endorsement from fourth-place finisher Johne Baird, a Morgan Hill rancher.
A swing of votes from those candidates to Singh would have put him in a dead heat with Kamei.
She declined to speculate on the electoral math, but offered a glimpse on how she may fend off a challenge from a candidate with hefty credentials.
“One of the things about being a director as opposed to being a consultant is that you do a lot more policy work,” she said. “I’m not building the bridges. That’s why you have staff. I think it’s wonderful that he has experience in that, but I have more community activism and policy experience. It isn’t just a matter of engineering. It’s a matter of working with the community.”
