Brandon Challenges Alvarado-Gil in State Senate Race

When Jaron Brandon says, “Main Street needs to be our home,” he means the kind of Main Street where, if you’re lucky or in the know, you can find a restaurant like Jarro Viejo, in Oakdale. That’s where I met him Tuesday.

You can get good Mexican food most anywhere in the San Joaquin Valley. Usually described as “authentic,” the quality from place to place is remarkably consistent and consistently remarkable. It’s not just authentic, it’s superb.

Even in that broad context of high quality, Jarro Viejo is special. Located in a small, converted house on the way to Yosemite National Park, it’s easily overlooked. Once inside the small dining room, one of the first things you notice is the atmosphere of conspiratorial camaraderie shared by food cognoscenti everywhere: If you’re there, you know.

You know that this is the place local residents favor,  especially the people who work hard and long and will only spend those hard-earned dollars on the real thing: food that doesn’t just fill, it comforts like home after a hard day.

Jaron Brandon is a Tuolumne County Supervisor serving his second term. When I walked into our meeting at Jarro Viejo, he had finished eating and was chasing his food with a bottle of Jarritos Mandarin and a large cup of black coffee. He looked like a blue-collar guy wearing a white shirt.

When he was elected to his first term, Brandon was among the youngest supervisors ever to have won office in the entire state. He’s still only thirty-three years old and has almost five years on-the-ground service to the Tuolumne County residents who’ve put him in office twice with overwhelming margins — 59.4% in the 2020 election, and a decisive 57.5% in last year’s primary.

Running alternately as a Democrat or No Party Preference candidate, Brandon has succeeded in a deep red county because he’s of the people. He’s the son of a local businessman and talented musical mother who played ten years with the Christy Minstrels. He’s a graduate of UC Merced who grew up in a trailer park. He knows the urgency of doing enough business the last Saturday of the month so that you can pay the rent. He knows the only way to make ends meet in these tough times is work, the hard kind.

Brandon is proud that during his terms in office Tuolumne County fire and sheriff’s departments have gone from major deficits in personnel and equipment to high performance standards featuring competitive pay and upgraded machinery.

As a supervisor, Jaron Brandon has been endorsed by the Tuolumne County Deputy Sheriff’s Association (2024), CALFIRE Local 2881 (2024), the North Valley Labor Federation (2020, 2024), Sierra Forward (2024), the Tuolumne County Building Industries Association (2020, 2024) and the Tuolumne County Association of Realtors (2020, 2024). Now he’s running for State Senate against incumbent Marie Alvarado-Gil.

Alvarado-Gil emerged from a crowded field in 2022 to gain office as a Democrat. Last year, she switched her party affiliation to Republican. Her term as been entirely in tune with today’s reality show politics, featuring evidence-free attacks on a Stanislaus County Supervisor and a lawsuit from a former campaign manager with more salacious details than a skid row peep-show.

Though not as deep red as Brandon’s Tuoulumne County district, Gil’s Senate district is nonetheless reliably red. That’s probably why she switched parties. It’s also a district of working people — people whose budgets have been stretched ever thinner by stagnant wages, rising rents, and escalating food prices.

For decades, Valley Democrats who’ve won and stayed in office have had three distinct characteristics: (1) They’ve all been locally born and raised; (2) they’ve all been willing to buck the party bosses in favor of their constituents; and (3) they’ve all been extraordinarily hard workers. Think back as far as Tony Coelho, through Adam Gray, and on to Josh Harder, and you find a tradition of local origins, humble beginnings, and fierce dedication to their constituents.

As for Jaron Brandon, my litmus test for California politicians is simple. I want to know whether or not they understand homelessness. Brandon didn’t just pass that test, he aced it.

“I initiated and pushed for a sanctioned camping site at the Justice Center because of Martin vs Boise and to avoid whackamole efforts where camps just move, and that got me kicked off the homeless committee,” said Brandon Tuesday.

“I wanted a three legged stool of housing, treatment services, and strict enforcement. The proposal was criticized by the left — ‘expensive services and housing only are needed’ — and right — ‘don’t do anything.’”

“Two years later, the same staff member running projects came to me and said, “You’re going to say I told you so but we need an authorized camp site and at that site.”

Brandon responded playfully, “It’s just about getting it done. But yes, I told you so.”

What Brandon was right about is the need to manage homelessness systematically, beginning with getting people off the streets and onto more secure ground. The first stage is the “streets to camp” strategy favored by officials like Modesto City Councilman Nick Bavaro, who has studied homelessness extensively.

Managing homelessness begins with facing the hard facts that we do not have enough housing. We do not have enough services. Those two critical realities need to be accompanied by a willingness to accept that better circumstances for homeless people and everyone else aren’t necessarily ideal or even good. They’re just better.

“We scoured the county looking for appropriate places for sanctioned camping,” said Brandon. “Finally, we came up with a place near the Law and Justice Center in Sonora.”

Known as “Camp Justice,” the Sonora homeless community shelters approximately 70 to 80 residents at a cost of around $2 per day per person.

While the low cost may be surprising, keep in mind this is a no services site serving only as a point of contact for campers who accept responsibility for keeping the premises clean and clear of trash.

“It is fully cleared twice per month by default, once per month if they keep it clean,” said Brandon.

Routine rules violations result in eviction from the camp. Security is provided by occasional visits from bailiffs stationed nearby and patrols by law enforcement. It’s since been cited by community partners and Sheriff Vasquez as a working program integral to local efforts, “as recently as two weeks ago,” said Brandon.

In 2019, before the City of Modesto shut down a similar program that served over 400 residents, the cost was estimated at $13 per person per day. Again, the low costs reflect a willingness on the part of city and county authorities and the homeless themselves to accept “better” as a standard rather than ideal. Better a sanctioned camp than the streets.

“After getting people off the streets, stage two is assessment and placement with dedicated staff and full service partnership with Behavioral Health,” said Brandon. That step includes transitional housing and there is far too little.

In Alvardo-Gil’s Senate District 4, the City of Modesto has made strides toward transitional housing with its new “Dignity Village” community, which features small but sturdy pallet-like shelters and nearby services. At 42 units, however, the village is much too small to accommodate Modesto’s hundreds of unhoused and unsheltered residents. In a similar effort, Tuolumne County has opened Rafferty Court as a 6 month transitional site; accepted residents must “graduate” into progressively more independent programs.

Stage 3 is back to independent housing or as close as possible. According to Brandon, it is also where the one driver of the problem starts, “a lack of affordable or at least achievable housing.”

Jaron Brandon is among many elected officials, Democrat and Republican, who believe Gavin Newsom has done a poor job managing homelessness throughout the state, in part because he’s blamed cities and counties for economic forces beyond their control. While he’s appreciative of state goals and resources, Brandon sees the “micromanaging and stick approach” as a failure, especially compared to “flexible, incentive based, locally derived plans.”

“We lack transparency and accountability,” said Brandon.

“After the billions of dollars we’ve spent, we have barely reduced homelessness statewide at all. We need to realize that the mentally ill and addicts shouldn’t be just walked by while forced into the streets because some people believe they have the right to ruin their lives, not intervening until they end up with a felony, in the emergency room, or dead from an overdose. We need to realize some of our sickest people need to be in safe and secure environments under supervised lockdown where they can receive the medicine and care they need. Despite statewide lack of success, in Tuolumne County we have effectively eliminated encampments, permanently housed over 150 people, and seen a marked drop in homelessness.”

As a supervisor, Jaron Brandon has pushed hard to improve safety and security for Tuolumne County residents and succeeded. Now, he wants to apply the same work ethic in Senate District 4, one of the largest districts in the state. He’s part of a new generation of young politicians willing to bring good government back from Wall Street to Main Street. He’s got the smarts and the energy to do it.

After a wide-ranging discussion of local politics and problems, I left my meeting with Supervisor Brandon carrying a large order of fish tacos and warm tortilla chips. Once home, my wife and I dug in. Eating was like recovering a lost memory of better times.*

*An earlier draft of this interview omitted some of Supervisor Brandon’s comments. They’ve since been added.