7 vie for 3 seats on the Sonoma City Council

Cannabis, housing, historic preservation and a general plan update - all are issues the Sonoma City Council will grapple with in the next four years. Three council seats are up for grabs in the Nov. 6 election, which features a competitive field of seven candidates, including two incumbents and five challengers.

Councilwoman Rachel Hundley and Mayor Madolyn Agrimonti are vying to retain their seats, while Councilman Gary Edwards decided not to run for a second term, opening up the third seat for contention.

The five other candidates include James Cribb, Jack Ding, Logan Harvey, Chris Petlock and Jack Wagner. Here's a look at the field, in alphabetical order:

Madolyn Agrimonti

Agrimonti, the city's current mayor, was first elected to the City Council in 2014. Previously, she served 12 years on the Daly City Council, stepping down in 2002 before moving to Sonoma in 2004. Agrimonti, 71, is a retired fundraiser and past president of the Sonoma Valley Woman's Club Foundation. She's also been a member of Sonoma Splash, the group dedicated to bringing a community swim center to Sonoma Valley. Her work with Splash stems from her advocacy for increased city recreation services, a priority she's championed since joining the council.

As mayor, she was a key supporter of the Sonoma Overnight Support's winter shelter, which was denied county funding earlier in the year, until elected officials including Agrimonti stepped in to lend their endorsement. The group eventually secured $60,000 needed to run the homeless shelter in 2019.

If re-elected, Agrimonti said she'd like to see an electric vehicle shuttle service established through Sooma Valley, and would press for the city to commit to requiring all-compostable dinningware at public events on the Plaza. She's been a consistent cannabis skeptic during her first term, voting against both commercial sales and outdoor cultivation proposals.

Asked to describe her strengths as a councilwoman, Agrimonti said simply: “I have core values.”

James Cribb

Cribb and his wife own Sonoma Dog Camp and he is an appointee on the Sonoma Planning Commission.

If elected Cribb, 62, said he would promote development of affordable housing, including second units on existing residential properties and larger projects such as the planned Altamira Apartments on Broadway.

Cribb, who as a planning commissioner took part in drafting the city's 2016 blueprint for vehicle and pedestrian traffic, says that partnerships with the private sector could help alleviate the downtown parking shortage. For example, he estimates approximately 200 parking spaces exist in churches surrounding the Plaza.

As a council member, Cribb said he wouldn't outright oppose a marijuana dispensary, but would draw the line at manufacturing facilities and large-scale grows. “We're going to be surrounded by (cannabis throughout the county),” he said. “But there seems to be a strong public desire.”

Appointed by Councilman Gary Edwards to the Planning Commission, Cribb took issue with an overhaul in the citywide system that forced existing appointees to reapply. “I saw the change as politicizing the Planning Commission,” said Cribb.

He said he wouldn't come to the council with any particular agenda, but just as “a reasonable guy.”

“I like data, facts and information,” he said.

Jack Ding

Ding, 59, is the owner and president of Unicom Tax Services, a consultancy serving businesses and individuals. He has campaigned on a message urging Sonoma to adopt “a wider vision,” that identifies common ground and understanding among residents. “Be open minded, and then open your heart,” said Ding, who is making his first run at elected office.

He serves on the Sonoma Valley Citizens Advisory Commission and has touted his tax acumen as expertise that would help steward the city's finances and economic development. More than half of the jobs in the city are concentrated in the service industry, he said.

He'd put a priority on attracting higher-wage, “high-tax companies” to Sonoma. “The City Council is like a salesperson,” Ding said. “We need to sell Sonoma.”

“Our city spirit is innovation,” he added.

Nevertheless, he remains skeptical of the cannabis industry, calling dispensaries a “tax liability.” He said he'd consider dispensaries on a case-by-case basis, but has previously voted against two dispensary proposals on the valley advisory commission.

Ding called housing a “fundamental human right” but said the city shouldn't look solely to affordable housing projects to solve the shortage. “High-quality, high-end developers” should also be in the mix, he said.

Logan Harvey

Housing affordability would be Harvey's top priority if elected to represent Sonoma. “I understand these housing issues because I live them,” said the 30-year-old Yahoo analyst.

Harvey grew up in Sonoma and, like others raised in the area, he'd like stay. The city needs to add a balance of affordable and market-rate housing, he said, and to do so, he's called for the creation of a special housing trust supported by hotel bed taxes collected by the city. Funds would be used to partner with developers to offset expenses tied to creating additional affordable housing, he said.

He also sees limits on rent costs and just-cause eviction policies as justified measures to stabilize the rental market.

“The goal of rent control is not to lower rent prices in the community,” Harvey said. “The goal of rent control is to keep people in the community.”

Harvey's platform also calls for stepped-up environmental protection - more bikes and less plastics - and improving the City Hall communications and transparency.

“We want our community to feel aware of what's going on in Sonoma, so they don't feel blindsided by new projects when they break ground,” he wrote in a statement on his website.

Chris Petlock

Petlock has been a City Council watchdog and has served nine years on the Community Services and Environment Commission. As the administration and finance director at the Valley of the Moon Water Agency, he also has a keen eye on budgets and public works projects.

Two years ago, he called out the city on a now-unlawful transfer the city was making from its water fund to the general fund. The city subsequently put an end to the transfers.

Petlock, 44, would like to see more transparency from the city in its financial reporting.

Another priority, Petlock told the Index- Tribune, is “more investment in recreation.” He's talking upgrades to equipment, sports fields, bike paths and parks.

To get anything done, however, Petlock believes the City Council needs to take more control. He says too many week-to-week priorities are set by city staff because council members aren't directing staff on their own priorities.

“The City Council needs to take back the agenda,” said Petlock.

Rachel Hundley

Hundley is running for her second term after four years confronting issues that included curbs on leaf blowers, new housing developments, the emergence of legalized cannabis and limits on wine-tasting rooms.

Hundley, 35, is a municipal law attorney at the Santa Rosa-based law firm Meyers Nave.

Housing, she said, is Sonoma's most pressing issue.

In her tenure on the council, members have “never agreed on what ‘housing' means,” she said. In her view, they should focus on workforce housing, for lower- and middle-income families. She, too, supports establishing a housing trust to spur such developments.

Hundley is inspired by European villages with their “tight city centers - dense, but nice and charming.”

Before the community will be amenable to more density, Sonoma needs to find ways to address parking and traffic issues, she said.

She's proud to have championed the trial run of Sonoma Overnight Support's homeless parking program, which didn't fully pan out but brought the city's homeless problem to light. “Homelessness was not a conversation topic” before then, she said.

She supports allowing a cannabis dispensary in town and has pointed to the Mercy Wellness dispensary in Cotati as a successful model to follow. Sonoma should address the proliferation of tasting rooms in town, she said, calling for closer oversight of the business makeup in downtown.

Hundley would like to see Sonoma work “more holistically” with other jurisdictions - from the school and health care districts to larger agencies across the county to solve shared problems.

“The world has evolved,” said Hundley. “And everybody is going to have to grow.”

Jack Wagner

Wagner, 38, is making his third bid for a council seat, having previously run in 2014 and 2016.

The video game designer was born and raised in Sonoma and has been a council watchdog for several years. He serves on the Community Services and Environment Commission and is a server and barkeep at the Swiss Hotel.

A Green Party member, he would like to make Sonoma the “greenest small town in America.” He also favors no-waste Plaza events, improved access for bicyclists through town and city funding for a local shuttle. As a councilman, he'd “promote the town as being a green city - low waste, low energy.”

The city must also “lead in dealing with the housing crisis that affects our entire state.”

Wagner supports allowing a cannabis dispensary in town - “not to capitalize on (tax revenue) seems silly,” he said - and believes a limit should be set on the number of tasting rooms in the downtown.

Wagner supports the upcoming initiative to raise the city's hotel bed tax by 2 percent and points out that he's been calling for just such a hike since 2014. He said revenue from the tax should cover the entire budget of the Sonoma Valley Visitors Bureau, which would save the city the $100,000 it now puts toward bureau operations.