Self-proclaimed tech evangelist Bill Roth and former Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition leader Shiloh Ballard are competing for a seat on the Santa Clara Valley Water board of directors this November.
Ballard and Roth are vying for the District 2 seat, the only competitive race, with Director Barbara Keegan terming out at the end of the year. Two other seats up for election have no challengers, automatically giving District 3 Director Richard Santos and District 5 Director Nai Hsueh another four years on the board.
District 2 includes all of downtown San Jose through West San Jose and a large portion of Santa Clara.
The board of directors is charged with ensuring the district provides clean water, flood management, creek restoration and more to Santa Clara County’s 1.8 million residents. The district also manages 10 dams and surface water reservoirs, three water treatment plants, a water quality laboratory, nearly 400 acres of groundwater recharge ponds, more than 275 miles of streams and the new Silicon Valley Advanced Water Purification Center — the largest plant of its kind in Northern California.
This year’s candidates, if elected, would focus on a range of issues from water safety and homelessness to greater collaboration among various government agencies. San José Spotlight spoke with Ballard and Roth individually to find out what drove them to compete for the open seat.
Shiloh Ballard
Ballard, 49, said she was introduced to environmental issues while attending De Anza College in Cupertino. She organized students to rally against the Lehigh Cement Plant and Quarry that had been slapped with a long list of environment violations. Santa Clara County officials have since shut down the operation. Ballard said the campaign for closure got residents to pay attention to their water and air quality.
It was more difficult getting residents engaged with environmental issues, she said, in a world before former Vice President Al Gore’s 2006 documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” sought to introduce mainstream audiences to the modern challenges of global warming.
“People didn’t necessarily get degrees in environmental studies, it was kind of like a new thing,” Ballard told San José Spotlight. “Then (environmental issues) like Love Canal and polluted Superfund sites started happening where people saw we were contaminating our land and people were getting cancer from the contaminated drinking water.”
After volunteering for environmental causes, she took a job as a field representative for famed environmentalist state Sen. Byron Sher.
Shortly after, Ballard donned a new hat as senior vice president of housing policy for the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, a business association that represents hundreds of innovative companies. She said she prides herself on being a versatile public servant ready to adapt to any situation.
“I’m hoping to bring to the water district this multi-jurisdictional understanding of things, bringing a broad perspective of having worked in affordable housing, transportation and environmental policy,” Ballard said.
She said she helped address post-pandemic pollution from homeless residents along the creeks by mobilizing Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition members and supporters to collect trash and address safety concerns.
Valley Water should prioritize trail access and maintenance, Ballard said, and she plans to support such efforts if elected.
“You have these places where a trail can meet multiple goals, but an agency is acting in a way that is very narrow and not picking up its head to look around and say, ‘Where are those places where we overlap and can be doing things together?’ which is part of what I hope to bring to the district,” she told San José Spotlight.
Bill Roth
Roth, 59, said Valley Water needs to be more aware of its cybersecurity since such agencies have been hit by cyber criminals in recent years, including BART which was the victim of a ransomware attack by hackers last year.
Along with a plan to cut wasteful spending at the water district, Roth said he is running because he wants to safeguard the county’s water system from local, national and foreign threats.
“At least three municipal water systems in the United States have been hacked by foreign powers since January — I’m not sure that the water district is ready, nor do they have the expertise on the board to raise that issue,” Roth told San José Spotlight. “Imagine if a foreign power gets into, say, the Almaden Dam and opens all the gates. You’d have 10 feet of water on Hicks Road. So I think it’s pretty serious.”
With a career in tech spanning three decades, he said the district’s board of directors needs an IT expert to responsibly address technology spending and point out where vendors might be taking advantage.
Roth’s experience goes beyond tech, however, as he was board treasurer at Sacred Heart Community Service in the aftermath of the 2017 floods across District 2 in San Jose. He said he helped keep a continuous flow of services, short-term housing, food and more to residents who lost their homes and belongings in the flood.
In 2022, Valley Water agreed to pay $8.25 million to victims of the devastating flood after storm water breached a dam managed by the district.
This is where he said he learned firsthand how government can be a force for good during an environmental disaster, but only when everyone is working together toward a common goal.
Roth said he would also advocate for a more collaborative approach between San Jose and the water district to address homelessness and pollution along the creeks — mentioning that an update to the district’s mission allows them to address housing.
“People often don’t have the best relationships, and that slows down, ameliorating the situation. I hope I can bridge the gap between different groups so that we can make progress,” he told San José Spotlight. “Government can be effective, especially when going through great nonprofits like Sacred Heart.”
Contact Vicente Vera at [email protected] or follow @VicenteJVera on X, formerly known as Twitter.
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