49ers owner Jed York sinks $3M into Santa Clara council elections

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — San Francisco 49ers owner Jed York has sunk a jaw-dropping $3 million into four City Council races in this Silicon Valley capital that's home to his team's glittering Levi's Stadium — a move that opponents say would turn Santa Clara into "Yorkville."

York, whose family grew the NFL team into a multibillion-dollar enterprise, is spending big political money after years of feuding with city leaders over everything from youth soccer fields to rent owed during coronavirus shutdowns. He's dropped $1.5 million in the last week alone, and his total campaign spending breaks down to $100 per registered voter in the City Council districts he's targeting. It's an unprecedented amount of cash in a city that has a voluntary candidate spending limit of $25,000.

The team owner has a ripe opportunity. Two open seats are on the Nov. 3 ballot, while two incumbents running for reelection face criticism for working with Mayor Lisa Gillmor to protect at-large city contests despite a 2018 Voting Rights Act order that intended to diversify the council by creating six districts. Five white members currently fill six seats, though white residents comprise only about 40 percent of the city's population.

York has thrown his weight behind challengers who say the city of 130,000 residents is long overdue for a council revamp that better reflects Santa Clara's diversity and its growing population of educated immigrants.

But his opponents say that's a pretense for an audacious move at local politics by a major U.S. sports team and one of the world’s most valuable sports franchises. And they note that York is taking aim at the city's female leadership, with five women in power, led by Gillmor.

“He sold the city people all these fantastic deals, and once the stadium was up, he reneged on his promises,’’ said Burt Field, a local businessman and longtime resident who’s become an activist against York. “He’s got a stadium — now he wants to buy the City Council.’’

In another measure of the high stakes, York has tapped heavyweight consultant Averell “Ace” Smith, the guru for a score of top California Democrats, including Sen. Kamala Harris during her presidential primary run and Gov. Gavin Newsom in his 2018 win.

Those supporting York defend his spending by saying he's helping to replace a “country club” of white council members with a slate that would better represent a city where Asian Americans now comprise 41 percent of residents and have only one seat. Three of the four candidates he's backing are Asian American.

They say the current leadership in March unsuccessfully tried to undermine a judge's order that found the city violated the California Voting Rights Act — one that ordered six districts to better represent minority voices. Voters have twice rejected incumbents' attempts to create fewer districts.

"Mayor Gillmor is once again supporting a slate of all white candidates while she spends millions of dollars in taxpayer money to upend voting rights to dilute minority representation. Her twice-failed ballot measures and legal fees have cost residents in excess of $4 million alone," 49ers spokesperson Rahul Chandhok said. "Her hypocrisy knows no bounds and we will not shy away from supporting diverse representation and upholding voting rights."

The political rift has split California’s historic “Mission City,’’ ranked as one of the most livable in the state and home to some of Silicon Valley's biggest players and the powerhouse Santa Clara Swim Club, which has produced 46 Olympic swimmers including the legendary Mark Spitz.

Though the 49ers played games about 40 miles north in San Francisco for most of the franchise's history, the team located its headquarters and practice facility in Santa Clara more than three decades ago. Frustrated with stadium efforts in San Francisco, the 49ers decided to move its football games there, too, starting in 2014.

It's not York's first big foray into the city's politics. This spring, he spent $524,000 to oppose a ballot measure backed by Gillmor and other council members to reduce districts from six to three, records show. Voters rejected the proposal.

York is seeking to unseat incumbents Teresa O'Neill and Kathy Watanabe, as well as fill two open seats. He backs the election of four new members — current planning commissioners Anthony Becker and Suds Jain, in addition to local activists Harbir Bhatia and Kevin Park. All four received the endorsement of The Mercury News, which argued that Gillmor has too much control over the council and questioned her opposition to the court's Voting Rights Act plan.

If the York-backed candidates win, the City Council would have an Asian American majority for the first time.

The 49ers contend that big unions, including police and fire, have put their muscle behind the current council, which has also gotten help from some powerful local developers.

“After seeing the reports of Mayor Gillmor orchestrating her developer allies to funnel money through the Police Union PAC, and the outcry from civic institutions like the NAACP and the Asian Law Alliance, we felt it necessary to make our support swift, open and transparent,’’ said Chandhok.

Gillmor was not available for comment.

Still, the amount spent by the police union PAC pales in comparison, between $11,000 and $14,000 for each of the four candidates it's backing against the York slate. And Council Member O'Neill argues the team's owner is making a blatantly cynical play.

She argues that his team’s efforts to repeatedly shortchange city coffers — and its own stadium workers’ pay — show that his commitment to Santa Clara’s communities of color is questionable, and that he’s looking for control of city leadership to help enrich his team, rather than making an earnest attempt to diversify the council.

"If Jed York cares so much about civil rights, why isn't Colin Kaepernick still playing for the 49ers?" she asked.

Candidate Kevin Park, an engineer running against O’Neill in the District 4 seat, rejects the notion that he and other candidates seeking change have been merely conduits for the 49ers’ interests.

“Are we in the pockets of a football team? I could just as easily ask, are council members in the pockets of developers and special interests?,’’ said Park at a virtual press conference this week with his fellow slate members. “The fact that the 49ers are willing to support candidates who have historically and continually opposed them — at every ballot, every ballot measure, every vote — is more telling of how bad the current council is for the relationships that benefit all of the city."

Meanwhile, the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission confirmed that its enforcement division has launched one investigation and is currently considering a second based on recent complaints from Santa Clara that both York and his committee failed to file timely quarterly campaign statements.

After Santa Clara taxpayers agreed in 2010 to borrow nearly $850 million to build the state-of-the-art, 68,500-seat Levi’s Stadium, the city created the Santa Clara Stadium Authority, mandating taxpayer funds couldn’t be used for the stadium’s maintenance and operations. The relationship soured after several high-profile disagreements over the team’s responsibility to shoulder stadium costs.

Field said locals were upset at the team’s bid to acquire the 11-acre local soccer park near the stadium for VIP parking and development. The team’s offer amounted to just a fraction of the value of land in the heart of Silicon Valley — and didn’t include replacing the existing facility used year-round by 2,000 kids in the city, which drew complaints from the Santa Clara Youth Soccer League, he said.

Last year, the City Council terminated the 49ers' management contract of the stadium for non-NFL events based upon allegations of wage theft of stadium workers — many of them people of color, O'Neill says — which were reported to the state Attorney General’s office. The 49ers have challenged the termination of their contract in court and said they were part of a "petty political vendetta."

York’s current campaign effort comes after the Santa Clara Stadium Authority in early September voted unanimously to seek $5 million in unpaid rent from the team. The team had notified the city that it wouldn’t pay 20 percent of the season’s bill after two exhibition games at Levi’s Stadium were canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, according to city attorney Brian Doyle. The 49ers countered that the team intended to meet the terms of the lease and cried foul, again singling out Gillmor for criticism.

Council Member O’Neill said York is banking on the hope that “people get bowled over and intimidated by this team’’ — and argues that firefighters and the police union back up city leaders because “they care deeply about the public safety structure" and services which have been threatened by loss of revenues.

A new ad from the Santa Clara Police Officers' Association this week echoes that claim, portraying York as a potentate aiming to transform the town into “Yorkville.’’

But the Rev. Jeff Moore, president of the San Jose/Silicon Valley NAACP, said the police union’s support of "an all-white field of candidates continues to reinforce that racist side of the Santa Clara Police Department ... and it’s reinforced by the police and big developers more than likely to get contracts.''

Wesley Mukoyama, a litigant in the Voting Rights Act lawsuit, agreed. “The City Council continues to support systemic racism,'' he said. "I’ve been living here 46 years, and until 2018, I never saw a person of color on the city council.”

O’Neill acknowledges that for decades, an old guard did run the city.

"I get it. I've been invested in this ... and I've been involved in trying to make change," said O'Neill, who served on the planning commission and school board, founded a local child nutrition project and taught catechism for 25 years at the local St. Justin’s Catholic parish. "But I've never been a member of a country club."

And now, she said, Santa Clara's elections have gone full "David and Goliath." Up against York’s latest $900,000 contribution, which has fueled TV ads, telephone surveys and robocalls, she said “we’ve got postcards printed with our email and phone numbers, we’re doing Facebook town halls..."

The postcard says, “I can’t fight Jed York’s millions — but I’ll always fight for you, Santa Clara.’’