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February 4, 2025

Race to fill District 3 seat continues

Gabby Chavez-Lopez, special election District 3 candidate, participates in ribbon cutting ceremony for new Downtown San José restaurant El Apartamento on Friday.

As the special election for San José’s  District 3 city council seat soon approaches, candidates are reaching out to as many voters as they can, hoping to be the next representative of the district. 

The seat is open because former council member Omar Torres getting arrested for child sex abuse, according to a Nov. 19, 2024 article from the Spartan Daily.

On Friday, Gabby Chavez-Lopez, special election candidate and executive director of the Latina Coalition of Silicon Valley,   came out to the grand opening of the new restaurant El Apartamento at San José’s Downtown Food Hall.

“I think anytime that we see new businesses opening downtown is a good sign and we like to see that activity,” Chavez-Lopez said. “It’s really exciting to be able to see an entrepreneur’s dream come true.”

As a District 3 resident, Chavez-Lopez said the top priority that she wishes to address is houselessness.

She has lived in the district for 22 years and in that time she has helped secure funding for affordable housing, according to her campaign website

“I worked in housing advocacy and policy fighting to make sure that we keep people housed in the first place,” she said. “That we're working on prevention, looking at it through a lens of how do we prevent people from entering into homelessness (houselessness), and how do we move them through different options of where they can live.”

Chavez-Lopez urges constituents to speak out and connect with local government leaders and officials to ensure their voices are heard. 

She has hosted meet and greets with constituents in different parts of the district which can be seen on her campaign page on Instagram.

“If we don’t continue to uplift those challenges there’s no way that we can get our elected officials to come up with solutions,” Chavez-Lopez said. “We all have to continue to keep our communication channels open and understand that you have a lot of power and you should make sure that people (who) are making decisions about your everyday life know what you’re experiencing.”

In this race, Chavez-Lopez has a team of people working on her campaign who hope to see her become the next city council member in District 3.

One of these members includes Chima Nwokolo, San José State University’s Associated Students (A.S.) vice president, serving as the community engagement lead.

“I chose to work with (Chavez-Lopez) because she is the most qualified person to be the city councilperson for District 3,” Nwokolo said. “She’s the one who has the most energy and is taking the time to go around downtown and talk to small business owners, community organizers and students and connect and empathize with them about their issues.”

Chavez-Lopez is endorsed by the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers Local 21, a democratic union that helps public sector workers raise wages and benefits, according to her campaign page.

Like Chavez-Lopez, Nwokolo urges students to get involved in local politics and give themselves a voice in this special election.

“Politics, in general, is in your life, but local politics (is) even more so because it has a direct impact on you, your friends, your family and the community,” Nwokolo said.

The following day, candidate Matthew Quevedo, Mayor Matt Mahan’s deputy chief of staff, hosted an event at Backesto Park where endorser and trustee of San José Evergreen Community College District, Clayton Hale, talked to canvassing volunteers and community residents about supporting Quevedo.

Quevedo also visited Japantown San José to talk to constituents about his priorities for the community, his special election campaign and to engage in Lunar New Year celebrations.

“I was glad to see the well-roundedness of the campaign where you can do that direct outreach and then connect with folks at a more celebratory type of event and build relationships that way,” Quevedo said.

The San José State alumnus’s main priority to address is also houselessness. More than  6,250 people were unhoused in the city on any given day and nearly 4,500 lived outdoors in 2023, according to a San José government website

“On our streets on any given night, we have 5,000 unhoused individuals who have nowhere to go,” he said. “They don’t have shelter (and are) left to their own devices (and) as a city government, we have to do more to address that.”

As deputy chief of staff, Quevedo said he plans to work with Mayor Mahan to try to alleviate the issues in the city.

“I will be focused on the essentials that people want to see solved,” Quevedo said. “It’s ending street homelessness (houselessness), rebuilding our police department, supporting small businesses and building the housing we want to see.”