I ran for City Council in 2016. In that election, the City wisely hired a “Democracy Consultant”, Fred Keeley.
That year the Santa Clara Votes program held two candidate forums for the 6 offices that were on the ballot. Fred Keeley held an Accountability Forum in late October to hold candidates accountable. In that election, there were 13 complaints of ethics violations. It seems very odd to me that the City has chosen not to hire an ethics consultant for this election to handle complaints nor does the City seem to have any plans to support candidate forums. Prior to Fred Keeley, the City had engaged Dr. Tom Shanks
to oversee elections. I have requested that the City engage a consultant during public presentations at a City Council meeting but my appeal seems to have fallen on deaf ears.
Suds Jain
District 5 Council Candidate
