Meet David Canepa, Candidate For 15th Congressional District Seat

SAN MATEO COUNTY, CA — David Canepa, a San Mateo County Supervisor and Daly City resident, is running to represent the 15th Congressional District, a redrawn district held by the outgoing Jackie Speier (D-San Mateo).

Speier announced that she wouldn't be running for reelection after representing most of San Mateo County and parts of San Francisco since 2008. Her predecessor, Tom Lantos, had held the seat from 1991-2008. The redrawn district stretches from San Francisco down to East Palo Alto, with parts of Menlo Park and Atherton included.

Canepa is one of six candidates running for the open seat. The primary is June 7, narrowing the field to two candidates before the Nov. 8 general election.

Learn more about Canepa and his goals for the district as voters cast their ballots before and on Election Day June 7th in the following exclusive Q&A with Patch.

Age (as of Election Day)

46

Party Affiliation

Democrat

Family

Ana Canepa and David Piero Canepa (4 years old)

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government?

No

Education

I have a bachelor’s degree from the University of San Francisco in politics and graduated from Skyline College in San Bruno before that.

Occupation

Supervisor of District 5, San Mateo County Board of Supervisors. I also serve as a commissioner on the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, a director on the City/County Association of Governments (C/CAG), the Vice Chair of the San Mateo County Transportation Authority, and as a Director on the Bay Area Air Quality Management District representing 20 cities.

I also serve on boards such as the Health Plan of San Mateo, San Mateo County Medical Center, the Commission on Aging, Community Corrections Partnership, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Commission and the Association of Bay Area Governments.

Previous or Current Elected or Appointed Office

Supervisor of District 5, San Mateo County Board of Supervisors

Past: served on the Daly City Council from 2008 through 2016 and served as Mayor in 2014.

Campaign website

davidcanepa.com

Why are you seeking elective office?

I am running for congress to restore faith in Congress. I believe if Washington invests in communities, cities and counties again with spending and policies that voters can see with their own eyes, faith can be restored in Congress.

My focus is to not only listen to the voices of our community members but empower and amplify their voices. I am not an establishment candidate who has spent the past two years in the Assembly or Congress. I am a grassroots candidate who wants to serve one of the most diverse Congressional districts in the United States and to ensure their voices are amplified in the halls of Congress.

What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?

I am the only candidate in this race who has pledged not to accept PAC money from corporations.

Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform.

My top three priorities include improving health care costs and accessibility, providing free community college to every student in the nation and tackling climate change and particularly sea level rise as San Mateo County is at great risk of future flooding.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

Prior to the pandemic, I spearheaded the effort to keep Seton Medical Center in Daly City from closure by voting to commit $15 million for seismic upgrades and operations in January 2017. In early 2020, just prior to the pandemic as the hospital was in bankruptcy proceedings and threatened to be closed by billionaire and Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, I brokered a deal to support new owners AHMC with a $10 million commitment in county funds for operations.

And as COVID became a reality in California, I supported Gov. Gavin Newsom’s effort to make Seton a COVID Command Center, caring for inmates from San Quentin prison, passengers on cruise ships stranded in the Bay and early patients inflicted with the coronavirus despite fierce political opposition.

In November 2021, I sponsored a resolution to affirm support for reproductive freedom following actions by the state of Texas to curtail a woman’s right to choose. As states around the country enact laws that violate the fundamental right to decide whether or not to terminate a pregnancy, the County of San Mateo serves as a model to defend and fight for reproductive freedom and welcome all those seeking to fully exercise their reproductive rights and access safe legal abortion.

In June 2018, The San Mateo County Board of Supervisors adopted a resolution that I sponsored that will end the collections of fees accrued by juveniles while they were incarcerated. Approximately 6,000 families will have $12.6 million in debt wiped away. The resolution implements the requirements of Senate Bill 190, which became law Jan. 1, 2018, and takes it a step further by ceasing collections of past due debts.

Children were previously being charged $30 a day to pay for their own incarceration and between $220 to $319 each for private defender representation. The San Mateo County Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Commission, which I am the Board liaison to, urged the board to take the action after it researched SB 190 and surveyed California’s 58 counties on the law’s implementation. It discovered that black youth are 18.8 times more likely to be placed in detention than white youth and that Latino youth are 5.2 times more likely to be detained than white youth.

What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions?

During the past two years of the pandemic, the most challenging times any of us have ever encountered, I feel like I helped inspire the county’s residents to do everything in our power to save lives, prevent illness and to help our hard-hit businesses to recover. It’s enabled me to have the confidence to represent our county’s values in Washington D.C.