Betty Duong knocks on the door of an East San Jose porch wearing a big floppy sun hat and white sneakers. She chats with the man who opens the door in Vietnamese about her run for the District 2 seat on the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors when suddenly the man’s wife sees her and exclaims “Betty!” Hanh Nguyen is a waitress at one of Duong’s favorite pho restaurants in Lion Plaza.
The two embrace like they’ve known each other forever, laughing and joking around, before Duong continues canvassing the Lanai Avenue neighborhood, one of the more densely packed and underserved areas citywide.
Duong, a first-time candidate for office and chief of staff for Supervisor Cindy Chavez, is running for her boss’ seat. Chavez terms out in December and with an open seat, Duong is battling with former San Jose Vice Mayor Madison Nguyen for the job. Duong led the March primaries by a slim margin in District 2, encompassing East San Jose and parts of downtown with a large Vietnamese population.
She aims to connect with each person she meets, sharing her love of horror media such as her favorite book, “Frankenstein,” and complimenting motorcycles parked next to a resident’s door. Come November, either Duong or Nguyen will be the first Vietnamese American woman to sit on the board of supervisors — and Duong, 43, wants it to be her.
“Every day in the campaign, I feel the greater sense of importance here that this is a calling, this is a true responsibility,” she told San José Spotlight. “The next supervisor, it has to be someone that could hit the ground running from day one, that will live this mission every single day.”
Running for supervisor is personal to Duong, who grew up in downtown and East San Jose and lived in Section 8 housing for part of her childhood. Her family arrived in the U.S. in 1979 from Vietnam and relied on county support.
“Voice and agency was not something I felt like I had control over in our lives. We had to rely on support systems and services, so our world was always determined and decided by someone else,” she said. “Now I have agency, I have voice, I have a lot of privileges. That’s a current-day reality that’s beyond whatever I imagined for myself.”
Duong said she feels more attuned to residents’ needs since she began her campaign in 2023.
Her priorities include combatting homelessness with a focus on prevention and bolstering affordable housing and public safety. She aims to partially clear unhoused encampments using the county’s conservatorship program, allowing trained professionals to place homeless residents in mental health treatment facilities if they refuse help and are deemed unable to make a necessary decision for their health.
Duong said as someone with about 11 years of experience working in government — including as the campaign manager for the $950 million Measure A housing bond approved by voters in 2016 — she knows how to secure state and federal funding for affordable housing. When it comes to law enforcement, Duong said she would order a staffing study to better understand the needs of the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office.
Her experience working in the county led to the opening of Vietnamese American Service Center. She served as the spokesperson for the county’s Emergency Operations Center during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Asian American studies from University of California, Berkeley and a law degree from University of California, Davis.
Jim Beall, a former state senator and county supervisor who now serves on Valley Water’s board of directors, endorsed Duong largely because he said no other candidate did as much as she did during the pandemic. He met her about 12 years ago through Chavez and said she was impressive then.
“Betty is running not because she wants to become a politician or elected official. In that sense, I think she’s right, because she really loves working on the issues of the county,” Beall told San José Spotlight. “My feeling is, if we elect Betty, she’ll be there long term. You want somebody who’s going to stick around and become knowledgeable.”
In the race’s final stretch, Duong is spending her time knocking on doors like Hanh Nguyen’s. She walks with residents on streets where cars have etched donuts and asks their children’s names.
East Side resident Maritza Calderon opened her door to Duong. After meeting her in person, Calderon said she’s voting for her.
“Stopping by, that brings more attention,” Calderon said to Duong. “Because I did see your flyers around, I was like, interested.”
Duong doesn’t take meeting people like Nguyen and Calderon lightly and will continue walking the neighborhoods she grew up in until the election ends.
“The District 2 supervisor, dare I say, has a greater responsibility in these areas to their residents because so many of the folks are going to be affected by the solutions and the policies you come up with,” Duong told San José Spotlight.
Contact Annalise Freimarck at [email protected] or follow @annalise_ellen on X, formerly known as Twitter.
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