After trailing most of the evening, Joan Hartmann secured a solid victory late Tuesday night in the race for the Third District seat on the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors.
With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Hartmann had garnered 54.0 percent of the vote compared to 45.8 for Bruce Porter.
“It’s been a long week and a long year,” she told Noozhawk. “And it’s been a tremendous experience.”
Earlier in the evening, Hartmann had trailed Porter, but she gained with each block of votes reported.
She will replace Doreen Farr on the dais in the only supervisor race being contested this general election.
“I’m looking forward to representing the interests of the Third District, which is a very complex district, but a really challenging and exciting one,” she said.
The candidacies of Hartmann, a former planning commissioner, and Porter, a board trustee with the Santa Ynez Valley Union High School District, were bolstered by lengthy resumes, and both touted their experience when making their cases to voters.
From 2012 to 2015, Hartmann was Farr’s appointed Third District planning commissioner.
The Buellton resident has taught at Claremont Graduate University and Oberlin College, and has work experience in legal and budget offices for governmental agencies and environmental nonprofits.
Porter, who resides in Santa Ynez, served for over 25 years in the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers before becoming a financial advisor and a school district board trustee.
He is a former chairman of the Santa Barbara chapter of the American Red Cross.
During the campaign, Porter emphasized the need to address the county’s pressing water needs with a county-wide planning effort that would include an embrace of desalination.
Working to improve the Sheriff Department’s drooping personnel levels and finding new sources of revenue for the county’s backlog of infrastructure needs were at the top of Porter’s to-do list.
11,511
100% Reporting Votes % Joan Hartmann 13,563 54.0 % Bruce Porter
45.8 %
Hartmann campaigned on boosting economic development and creating jobs.
Her top priorities include securing more locally produced, affordable and reliable sources of water, and moving the county away from oil-based energy toward renewable sources.
She said she would work to expand workforce housing and improve transit systems by coordinating local agencies and organizations.
“It has been a huge growth experience for me, and it was a wonderful opportunity for our team to pitch in,” Hartmann said. “All my friends, all my acquaintances, so many people have contributed just what we needed just when we needed it. And so in that sense it’s been a little bit magical.”
Porter’s campaign sent out an email Wednesday that congratulated Hartmann and thanked his supporters.
“There is much to be done to improve our county and those who live here. I call on all of us to unite behind Supervisor-elect Hartmann’s vision of a healthy economy with expanded opportunities for jobs, responsive government, and quality of life with a healthy environment,” he said in a statement.
The Third District — which stretches from Isla Vista and Goleta in the south, up to the Santa Ynez Valley, out to Vandenberg Village in the west and around to Guadalupe in the north — is more politically diverse than the other districts, and closest in political makeup to the county as a whole.
It’s the largest district in the county by area, has the second-most registered voters after the Second District, and is often the swing vote on divided board decisions.
Although the office technically is nonpartisan, Hartmann drew support mainly from liberal and Democratic quarters, while Porter was backed primarily by conservative and Republican constituencies.
Hartmann came out on top of June’s five-person primary with 43 percent of the vote, to Porter’s 34.9 percent.
Current state Assemblyman Das Williams won the First District seat outright in June, as did Fourth District incumbent Peter Adam.
— Noozhawk staff writer Sam Goldman can be reached at sgoldman@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
