BY AMELIA BISCARDI
Daily Post Staff Writer
The six candidates seeking two seats on the Belmont City Council will have to balance residents’ love for parks and open space while also making sure more housing gets built and making sure the city gets a good deal when Stanford comes to town.
There are two competitive races this year in Belmont — one for District 2, where former appointed councilwoman Cathy Jordan and firefighter Ken Loo are facing off, and in District 4, where two incumbents are facing two challengers for one seat.
There is no election for mayor. Nobody is challenging sitting mayor Julia Mates.
Council switched from being elected at-large, where residents can vote for all five council members, to by-district, where the city is split up into four districts and have one at-large mayor. The city made the switch after being threatened with a lawsuit.
Jordan, 53, is running against Loo for the District 2 seat which spans from 6th Avenue to Alameda de las Pulgas. She is seeking to return to council after being appointed as a council member in 2014. She decided not to seek election in 2015 after her now ex-husband was arrested for child molestation charges and later served six years in prison. Since then, she’s served on the Belmont-Redwood Shores School Board for eight years and is currently on the Mid-Peninsula Water Board.
Jordan’s goals this time around are ensuring sports fields in town are updated and to renovate the Barrett Community Center. Jordan said that she wants to ensure that new developments do not impede on open space and parks.
Jordan is excited for the potential of adding Stanford to Belmont saying she is especially excited to see any educational opportunities it could bring to the community. Stanford is proposing purchasing the Notre Dame de Namur University campus on Ralston Avenue. Stanford wants to use and expand the campus as an annex of The Farm.
Loo, 46, ran for council in 2020 and for the Sequoia Healthcare Board in 2022. He is a firefighter in the East Bay and says working as a public employee for 27 years is one of the things that qualifies him. Loo’s goals include streamlining the city’s permitting process.
Loo said he is excited for Stanford’s purchase of NDNU, but said he has not seen any of Stanford’s proposals.
A reason Loo is running is to see upgrades at the city’s playing fields. He said a youth sports group he works with had offered to pay for the upgrade of a field but was turned down by the city. Instead of following the city’s current plan to make sure it has the money to upgrade all the fields at once, Loo is OK with a piecemeal approach.
Incumbents Tom McCune and Davina Hurt are running against environmental activist Pat Cuviello and newcomer Arina Merkulova for District 4, which spans from Lyall Way to the city’s western boundaries.
Cuviello, 64 ran for city council in 2020 and is a retired resident who started the group Friends of Water Dog Preserve, which works to protect the habitat at the park and limit trail erosion. Cuviello sued the city in May of this year after the city told his volunteer group to stop removing what the group deemed invasive plants in parks. Cuviello’s wife, Deniz Bobol, ran for council in 2018.
Cuviello says he is running because he believes the city doesn’t do anything for environmental protection. Cuviello believes Stanford is a good option for taking over Notre Dame de Namur but says he has not been to a council meeting in a long time and is not familiar with traffic concerns some have raised about Stanford.
Incumbent McCune, 70, has been on council for five years and is currently a Chief Financial Officer at an architecture and planning group.
McCune wants to continue improving and repairing streets. McCune says that for around 30 years the city ignored the streets and is now making significant improvements.
“There’s a lot that needs to be done,” McCune said. “We’re gonna be playing catch up for another five or six years before we kind of get to a sustainable condition.”
McCune also wants to keep an eye on Stanford’s traffic concerns, noting that a good option to mitigate potential traffic could be a roundabout. As well he wants to encourage potential students or staff there to use the Caltrain station which he said plans on making more stops in Belmont in the future.
Hurt, 48, has been on the council for 15 years and is looking to keep her seat at the dais.
As an attorney, Hurt says she enjoys being able to synthesize city documentation and communicate what she has learned to residents. She says she considers the city and its residents her clients.
Hurt supports Stanford’s proposed takeover of Notre Dame de Namur’s campus but wants to make sure there are mass transit options. She specifically supports easy transfers between buses in the area.
When looking at affordable housing she wants to prioritize sites near public transportation lines. “We’re in a space right now where we really do need to focus on creating a city of the future,” Hurt said.
“That focuses on affordable housing and the transportation corridor and that protects and revitalizes our open spaces.”
Merkulova, 34 did not respond to the Post’s requests for an interview.
Merkulova works as Vice President and Treasurer for Monadnock Valley Group, an organization in New York City that helps formerly incarcerated people with business skills and resources such as loans, business counseling and networking.
According to her candidate statement, she wants to improve parks, be transparent with tax dollars and empower small businesses.
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