A challenging future faces California and the region. Local leaders try to make sense of it.

Erik Chalhoub here, thinking back to nearly a year ago, when I attended the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership’s State of the Region. At that time, it was just a week after the election, and many were still in a daze about what had happened at the national level.

What would it all mean? How are things going to play out? Uncertainty was a theme of the event, especially during a panel discussion led by former Santa Cruz County Supervisor Zach Friend with those in the political space.

So this year, I wanted to sit in on Friend’s panel again to get a sense of how the vibe has shifted one year after the election, which took place this morning, Oct. 17 at CSU Monterey Bay during MBEP’s State of the Region. This time, Friend was joined by former California Assemblymember Ian Calderon, political data consultant Paul Mitchell and Santa Cruz County’s Assistant County Administrative Officer Elissa Benson.

Uncertainty in 2024 has flipped to certainty in 2025—certainty that things are not only challenging now, but look to be more difficult come 2026.

That was the underlying message during most of the morning sessions at the State of the Region, which gathered government, business and nonprofit leaders from Monterey, Santa Cruz and San Benito counties. Dr. Allen Radner, president and CEO of Salinas Valley Health, set the tone with his keynote speech about the numerous challenges facing health care after President Donald Trump signed his “One Big Beautiful Bill” in July. You can read more about the local impacts through Weekly Staff Writer Pam Marino’s reporting.

Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas was in town to give an update on the state legislature’s activities. The takeaway? “This was the most challenging year in my time in office,” he said. “Our job isn’t just pushing back on Donald Trump, but about making real progress for California. As California Democrats, we have to do a much better job improving the lives of the residents who live here.”

Calderon said local city and county government leaders need to get creative in their funding asks for the state legislature in 2026. Federal funding is no longer reliable, so California needs to somehow “D.C.-proof” itself and control its own destiny, he said.

“There are a lot of bleak realities we are going to have to face,” he said. “2026 is going to be a very impactful, pivotal year, informing what the next three-plus years are going to look like in the State of California.”

(Calderon, who lives in Orange County, threw his hat into the ring for the 2026 race for California governor as a Democrat about three weeks ago. He told me after the panel that he stepped down from politics earlier this decade to focus on his young family, but now he’s running after seeing first-hand the financial struggles facing other young families.)

Ironically, the stories of challenges I heard today come a week after I attended a presentation by economist Christopher Thornberg, who concluded that data shows the economy is in a good place and that fears of a recession were overblown. And there was some hopeful discussion happening during the State of the Region, such as the talks on advanced air mobility and the promise of high-wage jobs and workforce development pouring into our communities. (I experienced this while reporting on a story about Joby Aviation earlier this year.)

In modern society, it appears the unexpected is the only thing certain.