Newly elected District 5 Supervisor Kate Daniels is sworn in.

It was standing room only at the County Board of Supervisors meeting on Tuesday morning, Jan. 7, filled with joyful tears and culminating in a performance by mariachi band Nuevo Jalisco and tacos for all.

Newly elected District 5 Supervisor Kate Daniels was sworn in by State Sen. John Laird, D-Santa Cruz, followed by the re-elected District 1 Supervisor Luis Alejo and District 4 Supervisor Wendy Root Askew.

Daniels replaces former Supervisor Mary Adams, who chose not to run for a third term and endorsed Daniels, along with supervisors Askew, Chris Lopez and Glenn Church. Daniels' history in government includes working as Adams' chief of staff for two years before being appointed to the Monterey County Planning Commission in 2020. Before running for elected office, she worked as a policy adviser for Sen. Laird.

“It feels very much like a continuation of the stuff that I have been working on,” Daniels says, over the backdrop of mariachi music. “It’s a new me. It’s a new opportunity to really move the big things that we have been setting our vision on.”

Daniels' campaign trail was largely focused on issues of housing and homelessness, fortifying communities to be resilient against floods, fires and other disasters, as well as continuing efforts to protect the natural landscapes and coastlines of Big Sur, Carmel and Del Monte Forest. 

Perhaps one of her loftier, immediate goals, includes reopening Highway 1 at the Regents Slide in Big Sur, which has been shut down for nearly two years. So far, she has appointed former Salinas Mayor Kimbley Craig as chief of staff as well as Claudia Link, who previously worked for Supervisor Adams, as her policy analyst. 

“We put a team together that’s going to allow you to access us, to create the opportunity to navigate the challenges that we have in Monterey County and to move forward on the issues that you all care about,“ Daniels said to the crowd. “Whether it’s getting Regents Slide in Big Sur open—those are nearly impossible challenges. We put a team together to address challenges that are that big.”

The morning was not without a few jokes. Sheriff Tina Nieto began her public comment addressing the Board of Supervisors: “I’m here to talk to Supervisor Mary Adams about the trees,” to which former Supervisor Adams responded in her own public comment, “I’m not here to talk about trees, I just wanted to see what it feels like to be on this side of the dais.”

As for what has prepared her most, Daniels believes it stems from being from this area and witnessing how it’s changed. She began as an environmentally focused teen, starting the first environmental club at Carmel High School. She also ran an international news publication (Women's International Perspective) and taught Women’s Studies at Monterey Peninsula College, and comes from a family with a strong social work background; her mother was a therapist and her father, a lawyer, have both been active in the nonprofit space. In 2019, Daniels served as interim executive director of Gathering for Women, a nonprofit serving women experiencing homelessness in Monterey.

In her first weeks on the board, Daniels says her goals are to establish a system so that people know how to reach her, and to work on outreach to communities to create a list of goals to accomplish.

As for what motivates her: “Seeing how difficult it has become for so many of our residents, on so many different levels, to live here,” she says. “Whether it’s cost of living, whether it’s cost of housing. The work I did for Gathering for Women was transformative for me to really see how vulnerable senior women are on the Monterey Peninsula.

“All of that gave me the idea that these are the challenges we need to address, but also carrying the belief that change can happen.”