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At the start of the 2026 campaign season, with eight offices at stake, a divided San Benito County Board of Supervisors approved changes to the county’s campaign finance rules.
At its Dec. 16 meeting, the board voted to reduce contribution limits and reduce the threshold for disclosing donations.
Until now, San Benito County had no local campaign finance ordinance and instead followed state law. Donors were allowed to give up to $5,900 per election, with contributions publicly disclosed once they reached $100.
Under the new rules, proposed by Supervisors Kollin Kosmicki and Dom Zanger, someone may contribute up to $2,500 per election to a county campaign, and donations of $25 or more must be disclosed. The changes are set to take effect in February, after candidates have begun fundraising.
Kosmicki said he campaigned on the issue and has pushed for the changes since joining the board, arguing they would limit the influence of special interests in local elections.
“This is an attempt to really even the playing field,” Kosmicki said. “So people who don’t want connections with special interests can still go out and raise reasonable donation amounts.”
Counties and cities are allowed to set their own contribution rules, and more than 20 counties have done so. San Francisco, Santa Cruz, and Santa Clara, for example, cap individual contributions at $500, though Santa Clara allows donations of up to $1,000 if a candidate agrees to a voluntary spending limit.
Fresno County allows a per-person contribution cap of $30,000, but also has the $25-disclosure-threshold San Benito County just passed. San Francisco, Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties require disclosure of contributions of $100 or more.
“To me, there’s no logic in a county of our size to have the same rules as much larger counties,” Kosmicki said. “We’re a small county. It reasonably costs roughly $10,000 if you do a campaign the right way.”
Kosmicki and Zanger proposed campaign contribution changes in November. The initial version of the ordinance would have lowered the contribution limit to $1,000 and included the provision that if a candidate for a county office—out of their own pockets—contributed more than that to their campaign, contribution limits would no longer apply to other candidates running for that same office.
The initial proposal was rejected by Supervisors Mindy Sotelo, Angela Curro and Ignacio Velazquez. All three will be campaigning to keep their seats next year, as Sotelo and Curro seek reelection in regular races and Velazquez faces a recall.
Sotelo and Curro pushed to raise the contribution limit to $2,500 or $3,000, while Velazquez argued for eliminating the contribution caps when a candidate self-funds beyond $1,000. Velazquez mostly funded his 2024 campaign himself, lending to his campaign more than $38,000.
In their 2022 campaigns, Sotelo and Curro raised $45,000 and $26,000, respectively. Though Curro and her husband loaned about $7,000 to her campaign, most of what both supervisors collected were contributions from others.
Despite the modifications, Sotelo and Curro maintained their opposition. Sotelo argued that if the county was going to limit contributions, it should also cap how much candidates can contribute to their own campaigns. In line with state law, candidates may loan up to $100,000 to their campaigns under the new ordinance.
“I do not think it’s fair that just because you can fund your own campaign, you’re able to spend 20, 40, $100,000,” Sotelo said. “If we’re really concerned about special interests, we need to be wary about self-funded campaigns coming in.”
Velazquez said he couldn’t support placing a cap on self funding. He argued there are “special interest groups” pouring “big money” into local campaigns to build thousands of houses in the county, and he needed to stand up against them.
Curro said campaign costs have risen in the past years and she worried the new rules may discourage candidates who are unable to self-fund. She suggested delaying implementation until January 2027, after the current election cycle, to give candidates time to prepare.
“It’s going to take education from the elections office, from candidates, to ensure that everyone knows what the rules are in advance,” she said.
County Clerk, Recorder and Registrar of Voters Francisco Diaz said his office is preparing educational mailers to inform candidates and residents. But he pointed out that changing the rules in the middle of the campaign was going to be challenging for candidates.
“It is going to be a little bit complicated for candidates because they’re going to have to clearly delineate between the previous and the current,” Diaz said. “So it does create a little bit of an issue in the tracking for the candidates and the treasurers.”
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