Critic of San Mateo Highway Widening Keeps Role on Transportation Committee

In a surprising turn, a San Mateo climate advocate was named to another term on a transportation advisory committee on Thursday evening after residents and some elected officials had raised concerns he could be pushed out due to his advocacy.

Mike Swire, who is currently vice chair of the Community Advisory Committee for the San Mateo County Transportation Authority, was reappointed for another three years in a 4–2 vote by the Transportation Authority board.

Before the vote, Swire had said two board members were leading a push to oppose his reappointment, at least in part because of his advocacy against highway widening projects in San Mateo County. He has also pressed for increased safety measures for bicyclists and pedestrians.

“I’m very excited, of course, for myself and my ability to continue to serve on the CAC and be able to speak out on behalf of San Mateo residents, but I also think it’s a victory for San Mateo County residents,” Swire said. “The vote affirms our advisory committee’s role as an independent watchdog.”

The discussion over whether Swire should be reappointed ended up largely focused on fresh concerns about a lack of transparency in the process of interviewing and selecting committee members.

Board members Rico Medina, who is also the mayor of San Bruno, and Mark Nagales, a council member in South San Francisco, voted against renewing Swire’s term, saying they had concerns that his advocacy work didn’t fit with his role as an advisory body member.

“There’s been times where those lines have been blurred and I’ve been really concerned about that,” Nagales said during the board meeting.

Medina and Nagales sit on a three-member nominating subcommittee and recommended to the board that Swire not be renewed. The third member of the subcommittee, Board Chair Carlos Romero, a council member in East Palo Alto, supported Swire.

Swire said that Romero told him one of the reasons he was targeted in the nominating subcommittee is that he showed up to a 2023 event celebrating the completion of a Highway 101 widening and express lane project to voice his opposition.

That project added a new express lane to 22 miles of 101 between the Santa Clara County line and Interstate 380, near the San Francisco International Airport. Swire has also opposed a continuation of that work, which would extend the new lanes and widen north of 380.

He has also spoken out at San Mateo City Council meetings against a project that would add a direct connector from the 101 express lane to Highway 92. Swire said much of his opposition is rooted in equity concerns, as more highway lanes could lead to more traffic, and more polluted air for lower-income and disadvantaged communities near highways.

Swire said he felt some board members were trying to remove him because of his advocacy and, in doing so, were stifling differing viewpoints on how to improve transportation locally.

Everyone who volunteers for a county committee or board is an advocate in one way or another, Swire said.

“Everybody advocates, and when you advocate for things that certain people like, it doesn’t seem to be a problem. But when you advocate for minority opinions or things that other people like, that is questioned. So, you can’t have that inconsistency,” he said after the vote.

Medina and Nagales did not respond to requests for comment on Thursday, but during the board meeting, they sought to emphasize that diversity of opinion is something they value, and they said the recommendation to not reappoint Swire wasn’t based on disagreement with his views.

But other board members questioned the reasoning behind the recommendation against Swire and said he is a plus to the community.

“I have not heard any specific rule that was violated or even a timeline. I was honestly surprised to hear that this was even a recommendation,” board member Noelia Corzo, a county supervisor, said at the meeting.

Jackie Speier, a board member and county supervisor who previously served in Congress, said Swire “has galvanized a lot of interest from people in the community. And I’m particularly impressed by the fact that he has ignited in young people an interest in being participatory.”

Board member Julia Mates, the mayor of Belmont, abstained from voting because she didn’t have enough information about the interview process by the subcommittee.

Swire said hundreds of people sent letters to the board in his support, and about 15 people spoke about the issue during the meeting, mostly in favor of reappointing him.

“This kind of censorship is very worrying to me,” Mollie Carter, a new member of the Congestion Management and Environmental Quality Committee in San Mateo County, said to the board. “It sets a really harmful precedent to remove committee members because of their views or because it may cause some confusion.”

The Community Advisory Committee’s charge is to act “as a liaison between the public and the Board of directors, providing valuable input to the board on the projects and programs,” funded through two different countywide sales tax measures, according to its website.

While it is intended to have 15 members from around the county, in recent months it’s been operating with 12. In addition to reappointing Swire and two other members on Thursday night, the board also appointed two new members to replace two who stepped down at its last meeting.