BY AMELIA BISCARDI
Daily Post Staff Writer
Lissette Espinoza Garnica, the Redwood City Council member who represents Friendly Acres, is facing a challenge from Planning Commissioner Isabella Chu for the District 3 seat.
The other competitive race for Redwood City Council is in District 7, the westernmost sector surrounding Farm Hill Road. With no incumbent, former councilwoman Diana Reddy and Parks and Recreation Commissioner Marcella Padilla are facing off.
Chu, 56, is a Planning Commissioner and wants the city to have more parks and make traveling by bike or walking much safer.
Chu wants to focus on policies that benefit the residents in her district, such has having safer and quieter neighborhoods and making it easier for small businesses to get started. She believes she would be more effective in doing that than Espinoza Garnica.
“Crossing Woodside (Road) is harrowing on foot,” Chu said. “Broadway is very loud and unpleasant to walk along and there’s constantly people whipping in and out of the driveways really quickly. You have to have eyes in the back of your head.”
While Chu owns a car, she prefers taking public transportation to work and walking or biking to get around town when possible. But Chu says for those who don’t own a car, it can be difficult to get around.
As an associate director at the Stanford Healthcare Center, Chu says she understands how hard it is to ensure the homeless are cared for. If elected she wants to provide more wrap around services such as more substance abuse services for those wanting to get clean.
Incumbent Espinoza Garnica, 28, did not respond to the Post’s request to schedule an interview.
Espinoza Garnica currently works as a care provider organization as a care provider.
Espinoza Garnica’s candidate website says she wants to focus on decreasing the housing crisis by building more affordable housing and Espinoza Garnica endorses grassroots organization Affordable Redwood City who was backing a rent control measure that didn’t get enough signatures to make it to the November ballot.
Elected in 2020, Espinoza Garnica has approved emergency and permanent housing for homeless. Espinoza Garnica says on her website that she wants to focus on promoting public transportation.
In District 7, candidate Marcella Padilla, 37, who has been on the Parks and Recreation Commission for 12 years. Candidate Diane Reddy, 76, was on city council from 2018-2022./p>
The seat which is currently held by Alicia Aguirre, 69, who has been on council since 2005 and has decided not to run. Aguirre has endorsed Padilla./p>
Padilla is currently volunteering at her daughter’s school with an art program and used to work as a chief of staff at a marketing company. Padilla has been on the Parks and Recreation Commission for 12 years and started getting involved when she realized not enough funding was being set aside by developers for parks./p>
“In Redwood City right now we are ‘park deficient,’” Padilla said. “It is really a fight for us to get park impact fees from developers when they build.”/p>
Padilla wants the city to provide more activities for families to do together. “I’m running for the kids,” Padilla said. “I wish they could vote, they’re so passionate and informed and I want our community and our schools and everything to be better for them.”/p>
Padilla wants to find ways to encourage drivers to slow down. One of her daughter’s friends had both her parents killed in an accident on El Camino because of a teenager speeding./p>
Padilla is also concerned for the safety of the homeless people and wants to city to be doing more about encampments./p>
“I do think cities need to be more proactive with the clearing of encampments,” Padilla said. “We can’t have hazardous waste running into our water.(…) I have compassion for everyone, but I think sometimes help is hard and it doesn’t look great but you need to help people when it’s difficult.”/p>
Reddy wants to focus on affordable housing, public safety and expanding mental health treatment for the homeless./p>
Reddy left council due when the city was carved up into districts and she ended up in Aguirre’s district./p>
Reddy worked in the Sequoia Union High School district for 32 years and now describes herself as a community organizer./p>
Reddy grew up in Redwood City and wants to be accessible to the community, even if they’re not in her district./p>
Reddy has been campaigning for affordable housing, especially extremely low-income people because she says those are the people most likely to be homeless./p>
“I don’t assume that I have all the answers,” Reddy said. “I like to ask the professionals what they recommend and then circle back to residents.” Reddy says that the issues that makes one homeless has changed a lot over the past 20 years but those who are especially hesitant to accept help need more mental health support as she sees a additional need for that in the homeless community./p>
Reddy supports the county’s program that has mental health clinicians building relationships with the homeless population. She wants the program expanded to weekends and evenings./p>
When on the council, Reddy pushed for getting a parking lot for those living in their RVs. While it took a year to open it, Reddy is proud of it and says that many living there were able to transition many into low income housing./p>
Reddy wants more affordable housing and especially wants to ensure that they are near public transportation to decrease carbon emissions./p>
Reddy says there needs to be reminders to dangerous drivers that their driving impacts others. She says that speed bumps don’t always work but perhaps further enforcement and speaking with the police office will help./p>
Incumbents without competitors who will still appear on the ballot are Jeff Gee, in District 1, which represents Redwood Shores, and Elmer Martinez Saballos, in District 4, which includes the Palm Park and Central neighborhoods.
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