Ask Ricardo Valencia why people see him as a leader, and he points to a simple principle: showing up.
That commitment, he said, shaped his career as a high school teacher, his advocacy for working families, his six years on the Santa Maria-Bonita school board—and now his campaign for Fifth District Santa Barbara County supervisor.
“As a kid, I remember moving around a lot because my parents couldn’t afford a home of our own,” Valencia said. “We lived with other families. We lived with neighbors. And at one point we even lived in a shelter here in Santa Maria.”
As his critics on the campaign trail critique his style and record—painting Valencia as too ideological and overly concerned with national issues—he routinely connects his passions to a platform he frames as unapologetically progressive.
The race pits Valencia’s vision against the more pragmatic, business-oriented tack of Santa Maria City Councilmember Maribel Aguilera, who previously served eight years on the city’s Planning Commission. An independent and self-described proud centrist, she’s endorsed by the Santa Barbara County Republican Party.
A win by Valencia, 43, would represent a powerful shift in the historically right-leaning Fifth District. The candidates are battling to succeed Supervisor Steve Lavagnino, an independent and former Republican who’s retiring after 16 years.
“I’m running,” Valencia said, “so everyone in our county can live with dignity, knowing that their human needs are going to be met and that they have the opportunity to thrive right here in the 805.”
Local roots
Valencia grew up in Guadalupe and Santa Maria, the son of undocumented immigrants from Mexico. His father sewed clothes in small factories, according to the campaign, and his mother worked for decades as a seamstress and later as a caregiver.
Valencia and his three sisters spent much of their childhood shuffling between rentals and relatives’ garages, and at one point lived in the Good Samaritan Homeless Shelter on West Church Street, he said.
“The fear of deportation was real,” he said.
As a Santa Maria High School student, Valencia engaged with academics, sports and public service, he said, recalling how he phone-banked in support of the bond measure that funded the construction of Pioneer Valley High School.
During Valencia’s junior year, his father died—strengthening his belief that every family deserves stability and access to quality healthcare, he said.
The first in his family to graduate from college, Valencia earned a bachelor’s degree in ethnic studies in 2006 from UC Berkeley. He later received a full scholarship to complete a master’s degree in teaching at Tufts University.
After graduate school, Valencia returned to Santa Maria and in 2010 began teaching ethnic studies at Santa Maria High, his alma mater.
He’s currently on leave from his job to focus on the campaign. His wife and longtime educator Elizabeth Cortez recently became a Santa Maria High assistant principal. To avoid a conflict of interest, Valencia said if he doesn’t win he’ll transfer to a teaching job at Righetti High School.
In 2020, Valencia won election to the Santa Maria-Bonita school board. In 2024, he won again. Last year, Future Leaders of America named him North County Leader of the Year at the organization’s Latino Legacy Awards.
‘Leave no worker behind’
In addition to the Santa Barbara County Democratic Party, Valencia is endorsed by organizations that include the Sierra Club, Planned Parenthood, the Central Coast Labor Council and several labor unions including SEIU Local 620, which represents nearly 2,200 employees across every county department.
Valencia strongly opposes Trump Administration immigration policies and ICE deportations.
He wants greater oversight of ICE activities on county properties, including hearings examining how the federal agency gains access to inmates in county jails. He would also push, he said, for a policy modeled on one passed in Los Angeles County, which prohibits transferring inmates to ICE without a judicial warrant.
In addition, Valencia says he wants to preserve access to healthcare for undocumented immigrants and protect the county’s social safety net amid federal funding cuts.
Affordable housing and green energy jobs
On affordable housing, Valencia said he strongly supports developing county-owned land through partnerships with local, state and federal agencies. He cited the Escalante Meadows redevelopment project in Guadalupe as a model.
He favors mixed-income, mixed-use developments near public transit that offer negotiated community benefits such as child care, parks and playgrounds.
For the Solomon Hills development proposed along Highway 101 between Los Alamos and Orcutt, Valencia said any project approved there should include at least 25% affordable units.
On an issue particularly impactful to the North County economy, Valencia supports phasing out oil and gas production in favor of clean energy. But the county, he said, needs to do it with a plan.
“We will not transition from fossil fuels and oil off the backs of workers,” he said. “We can invest in clean energy jobs that pay just as well, pay union wages with benefits so that we leave no worker behind.”
While Valencia says he wants to replace oil industry jobs with good-paying union jobs, Aguilera questions whether displaced oil workers without college degrees would in fact find new opportunities.
Budgets, a bond and teachers
Reflecting on his six years on the Santa Maria-Bonita school board, Valencia points to accomplishments that include maintaining balanced budgets, supporting school bond measures, expanding dual-language immersion programs and creating pathways for increasing the number of local teachers.
Valencia contrasts the district’s balanced budgets with Santa Maria’s ongoing structural deficit of $7 million in each of the next two fiscal years, which he’s criticized as evidence of Aguilera’s fiscal record. In response, she noted the city has successfully closed the gap by $17 million.
This year, Valencia took heat for supporting a contract that shifted after-school programming at 13 Santa Maria public school campuses to the Los Angeles-based nonprofit Think Together. The move reduced the number of schools served by longtime local providers, including the YMCA and Boys & Girls Club.
Richard Batalla, a candidate for Santa Maria City Council and a YMCA youth director, said the decision supported by Valencia harmed local workers.
Valencia defended the decision, saying the new provider would provide more complete services at a higher value. He emphasized that the district continues to contract to a lesser degree with the YMCA and Boys & Girls Club.
‘It’s the vibes’
While Aguilera grew up under similar circumstances as Valencia—working alongside her immigrant parents in strawberry fields—the two have developed sharply different political identities.
Aguilera at last count had reported raising $200,220 this year through Sept. 19, plus an additional $61,986 in large donations of $1,000 or more through Oct. 13.
Valencia reported raising $198,599 this year through Sept. 19, plus an additional since then $16,150 in large donations. He’s also benefited from small donors whose contributions over the past month aren’t yet public.
Their financial backers reflect their political differences, with Valencia drawing substantial support from organized labor and Democrats. Aguilera has received contributions from labor, business, agriculture and public-safety interests.
A business and real estate attorney, Aguilera describes Valencia as more concerned with generating enthusiasm than demonstrating how he’d govern.
“He likes to talk about things that are hot button issues. It’s the vibes, what’s popular,” Aguilera said. “At the end of the day, I think people need to decide ‘If I had to hire somebody for this job, who’s most knowledgeable?’”
‘I refuse to dehumanize’
Valencia questions Aguilera’s political independence.
“She wants to play both sides,” he said. “In this environment we’re in right now, you can’t do that… If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”
Despite their differences, Valencia insists that political opponents should be able to disagree without dehumanizing one another. He’s repeatedly criticized an AI-generated political attack ad circulated by Aguilera’s Republican party supporters in May that depicted him as a sad-faced clown caricature.
“I refuse to dehumanize another person in that way,” Valencia said. “I’d rather run with integrity.”
Aguilera said she had no advance knowledge of the ad and criticized its content.
As Election Day approaches, Valencia says his campaign is focused on reaching residents who feel overlooked, including young people.
Valencia finished first in the June primary with 41.87% of the vote, followed by Aguilera with 31.15%. Cory Bantilan, a top aide to the outgoing Lavagnino, claimed 26.59%. None of the candidates won a majority, triggering the upcoming Nov. 3 runoff.
‘Money where our mouth is’
The Fifth District primary turned out 27.89% of registered voters, significantly below the countywide rate of 44.63%, meaning a large pool of potential voters sat on the sidelines.
While Valencia prevailed in the primary, Aguilera and Bantilan competed for more conservative voters, raising questions about how Bantilan supporters might swing now that he’s out of the race.
It all adds up to an important calculation: engaging new and infrequent voters could be key to Valencia’s ultimate success.
As his campaign marches toward Election Day, Valencia has enlisted more than a dozen high school and community college students from Santa Maria and Guadalupe, paying them $25 an hour to help him spread his message, he said.
“I think people give up on the youth way too easily,” Valencia said. “If we pay attention and we engage them at the doors, they do want to participate. We’re putting our money where our mouth is.”
