Fil-Am leader Juslyn Manalo runs for San Mateo County Supervisor
Photo from juslynmanalo.com
DALY CITY, Calif. – Last year’s Daly City Mayor Juslyn Manalo has made it official: After serving on the City Council for 9 years, she will run for the District 5 seat on San Mateo County Board of Supervisors in the 2028 race.
Manalo made the announcement Sunday afternoon, Feb. 23, at an arcade-restaurant in Daly City with her biggest endorsers, loyal supporters and closest relatives.
Her decision came from deep contemplation, she told Inquirer.net USA on the day of the launch.
“I prayed to God if this is the path for me because of my heart’s passion to serve, and believe it’s a calling to be able to make changes for the community in Northern San Mateo County representing Daly City, Colma, Brisbane, and some parts of South San Francisco and San Bruno.”
Being a wife, mother and daughter, she said she needed affirmation of her family’s commitment to stand by her as they always have.
“My family and most especially my husband is supportive of my run for Supervisor and I am grateful to have a partner by my side,” she said, emphasizing her immediate family’s understanding of her “passion to serve continuously.”
Daly City Mayor Juslyn Manalo underscores her concern for the succeeding generations of Filipino Americans in her quest for higher office. CONTRIBUTED
Waxing poetic, she said the community “ignited that flame” to serve in a larger capacity, having seen her “meaningful work and policy impact.”
She is particularly proud of the city approval of 900 units of affordable housing, staff and teacher housing for the elementary and high school district, and reinstatement and staffing of Fire Engine 95 among her recent accomplishments.
Seeking higher office requires strong alliances, which she said she is “extremely deeply humbled” to have built.
San Mateo Board of Supervisors President and District 5 Supervisor David Canepa, California Attorney General Rob Bonta, State Treasurer Fiona Ma and State Assemblymember Catherine Stefani lead her early endorsers.
Ready as can be
The timing of the announcement was unexpected, but the announcement itself surprised few, if at all.
“I didn’t know about the event until late Friday, but then I thought it was a matter of time before she confirmed the plan,” City Hall insider Perla Ibarrientos, a member of the Personnel Commission, shared with Inquirer.net USA.
“If anyone has proven herself electable, it’s Juslyn,” declared the woman hailed as Daly City community’s ninang or godmother. “I think she’ll make it.”
Three-time Daly City Mayor Juslyn Manalo (center) seeks to succeed her key ally Supervisor David Canepa with support from her real-life godmother Perla Ibarrientos. CONTRIBUTED
Election results align with the perception.
In the Nov. 5 elections, Manalo took 23,477 votes for 51 percent of the total, even with another Fil-Am, re-electionist Council Member Glenn Sylvester on the ballot taking in 17,085 votes.
Ibarrientos is actual godmother to Manalo, having been a principal sponsor at the politician’s wedding to fellow Filipino American Eluid Palamo.
Having been an actively engaged Daly City resident for 50-some years, Ibarrientos has mobilized support for Fil-Am politicos, both the notable and perhaps forgettable. Manalo is the one whose meteoric rise impresses her the most.
“She has been a public official for under 10 years, but she has learned fast and accomplished so much,” Ibarrientos said.
“Learned” Manalo did from her mentors like Ray Buenaventura, current Lake County Public Defender, who took her under his wing in her first campaign in 2016.
Daly City Mayor Rod Daus-Magbual (left) and Lake County Public Defender Ray Buenaventura lead Manalo’s boosters. CONTRIBUTED
At contentious Council meetings like the jampacked 6-hour gathering to draft the city resolution calling for an end to Israel’s military strikes on Gaza and the release of all hostages following the Oct. 10 attack by Hamas, Mayor Juslyn Manalo kept her composure amid sporadic cries of “recall,” directed at the officials by some pro-Israel members of the public.
She concluded the meeting with resolve that prompted applause from the opposing sides.
“This is what community looks like when we are able to work through tough issues and hear our communities,” she told Inquirer.net USA after the arduous discussion.
“The resolution for peace passed that evening with support from both pro-Palestine and pro-Israel groups.”
That concerned yet calm countenance was reminiscent of her ex-city Council peer Buenaventura, who gained his aplomb from years in court as a defense counselor.
Last year Manalo seemed to be everywhere, not just in San Mateo County – at the Pride celebration in Central Park, for one – but also San Francisco at the Pistahan parade and exposition.
Such ubiquity equaled the capacity of her role model and City Council predecessor David Canepa, current president of the Board of Supervisors, to be visible and accessible.
Years before, Canepa, too, had announced his campaign for County Supervisor before anyone else, prompting a longtime official to jest Canepa “has been campaigning for the past three years” for the board.
Although largely uncontested in his reelection bid last year, Canepa didn’t miss a beat or a sortie.
Might he have been campaigning for his would-be successor?
“I got to see how popular Juslyn is,” Canepa remarked to Inquirer.net USA last November. They were at an event where the crowd rushed over to the then-Mayor of Daly City, taking selfies, thanking her for making their city safe and responsive. “People love her,” gushed Canepa.
Juslyn Manalo worked closely with Canepa to stop Seton Medical Center from closure.
In 2020, San Mateo County committed to contributing $20 million to help an interested party purchase and operate the beleaguered enterprise.
Supervisor Canepa was most vocal in warning of dire consequences of the potential shuttering of Daly City’s largest employer, which serves 27,000 people annually, according to state records.
Level playing field
Daly City is one of the four most populous cities in San Mateo County. Until Census 2020, the northernmost city boasted more residents than the county’s eponymous city San Mateo, followed by the county seat of Redwood City and then South San Francisco.
Campaigning for a seat on the Board of Supervisors was prohibitive in the past when elections were countywide.
Optimism reigns at Manalo-for-Supervisor campaign launch. CONTRIBUTED
After the first decade of the 21st Century, change loomed. At that time San Mateo County was the only one of 58 counties in the Golden State still adhering to countywide election for the five members of the Board of Supervisors.
The Civil Grand Jury urged the County to put the issue on the ballot, let voters decide. The County did not heed the recommendation.
In response a group of legal and civil rights organizations in 2011 filed a lawsuit against the County at-large voting system on the basis of what it deemed as discriminatory impact on underserved populations. Where was the fairness, they asked, in pitting candidates from farms against those millionaires
Robert Rubin, director of litigation for the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, asserted that at-large system dilutes the ability of minority residents to elect representative candidates, a violation of the California Voting Rights Act.
No Asian and just one Latino had been elected to the board in 16 years at that time, the lawsuit emphasized.
Politically-forward Filipino Americans jumped at the possibility that the lawsuit would prosper, vetting potential candidates for the time when the “playing field would be leveled,” according to a Daly City resident attending one of the “unity” meetings.
Businessmen Guy Guerrero of Burlingame, Ray Satorre of Daly City and Francis Espiritu of Fremont agreed to support the most viable candidate to finally get a Filipino American on the governing body of the county with one of the highest concentrations of Filipinos on the US mainland.
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The civil rights lawyers were victorious, clearing the path for aspirants to test their electability.
Lawyer Michael Guingona, the first Filipino American elected to the City Council of Daly City, filed for candidacy. And so did his City Council colleague David Canepa. Primary results were inconclusive, forcing a runoff.
In the end, Canepa triumphed, a win eventually seen for the Fil-Am community given the new Supervisor’s support for the Filipino agenda.
That view seems clearer today as the current representative for District 5 on the Board of Supervisors proclaims full endorsement for the Filipina American who wants to succeed him.
