# Benicia City Council

Compare records and positions simply between Justin Zollars, Terry Scott, or Kari Birdseye for Benicia City Council at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person would hold one of two at-large seats on Benicia's five-member City Council. It sets the citywide budget, land use rules, and oversight of city staff. Benicia is in Solano County and has 27,131 residents. A directly elected Mayor sits on the council but isn't part of this race. A professional city manager runs day-to-day operations.

- Jurisdiction: City of Benicia
- Election: November 3, 2026 California general election
- Seats: 2
- Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements.
- Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/benicia-council
- Full ballot: this page covers one race. Every contest on a voter's own ballot, by address, with the same breakdown for each: https://voteorelse.com/
- Sources last retrieved: September 1, 2026
- Source-objectivity score: 80 out of 100 (Strong), across 10 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology

## On the ballot

- **Justin Zollars** — Software Engineer
- **Terry Scott** — Incumbent
- **Kari Birdseye** — Incumbent

A nonpartisan office: candidates do not run as Democrats or Republicans, and no party appears on the ballot.

Three candidates are running for two at-large seats on Benicia's City Council: incumbents Terry Scott and Kari Birdseye against challenger Justin Zollars. Vote for up to two -- no primary.

Council seats are elected at-large and citywide. Benicia also has a directly elected Mayor, Steve Young, who was re-elected in 2024. He is not part of this race. In some Solano County cities the Council chooses a Mayor from its own members. Benicia's voters elect the Mayor separately. Winners join the rest of Benicia's 5-member Council. The Council sets the city budget and land use, and oversees city staff. Benicia is a Solano County city of 27,131 residents, per the 2020 Census. A professional city manager runs day-to-day operations. Council seats carry 4-year terms. Both incumbents in this race were elected in November 2022. Scott's own filed statement describes the seat as a coming "four years."

Two incumbents and one challenger are competing for two seats. The practical question is whether Zollars should replace either sitting Councilmember. The other option is that Scott and Birdseye continue together. Both incumbents filed official statements. Both also received dedicated coverage from Benicia Independent, a local news site. That coverage describes their records and platforms. Zollars is a first-time candidate for city office. Their filed statement is the only source found describing their background. It centers on their opposition to the city's use of Flock Safety license plate reader cameras. All three candidates' terms would begin after Valero's refinery closure and the resulting city revenue gap. Every candidate's statement addresses that theme in some form.

## Terry Scott

Terry Scott is the Council's incumbent and former Vice Mayor; his filed ballot designation is "Incumbent." He is a businessman and philanthropist who spent 14 years as Senior Vice President and Global Head of Brand Creative Services at Hasbro Inc., leading more than 700 employees and a $1.7 billion budget, before retiring to Benicia; he co-founded the Benicia Community Foundation and holds a B.S. from Kent State University plus executive studies at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business. He chairs SolTrans (the regional transit agency board) and sits on the Solano County housing roundtable. His campaign centers on a six-point platform: closing the roughly $7 million revenue gap left by Valero's closure through disciplined budgeting and business recruitment; streamlining city permitting and technology; directing the $82 million Bay Area Air Quality Management District settlement with Valero toward home energy assistance, school air quality, and health investments; using his regional relationships to secure transportation and economic-development funding; protecting services for seniors and vulnerable residents; and investing in parks, schools, and safe streets.

**Strengths:** A full term as sitting Councilmember, plus three terms chairing SolTrans. That is relevant to his transportation funding priority.

**Trade-offs:** His $7M revenue gap and $82M settlement figures are his own account. No independent budget reporting was found to check them.

**Keep in mind:** He is an incumbent. A vote for him is partly a referendum on the sitting Council's post-Valero record.

## Kari Birdseye

Kari Birdseye is the Council's incumbent; her filed ballot designation is "Incumbent." She has lived in Benicia for 26 years with her husband James and their two children, Julia and Joey. She holds a Master of Science in Environmental Management from the University of San Francisco and a B.A. in Journalism from San Francisco State, and spent 11 years as a CNN journalist -- part of an Emmy Award-winning team covering the 1996 Olympic Park bombing -- before moving into nonprofit communications work, including for the Wine Institute, Earthjustice, and currently the Natural Resources Defense Council. In Benicia, she served on the city's Human Services Board starting in 2012 and was later appointed to, and chaired, the Planning Commission, including during its 2016 rejection of Valero's crude-by-rail proposal. On the current Council she says she helped lead the city's Industrial Health and Safety Ordinance and chaired a task force coordinating the Benicia Industrial Park and the Port of Benicia on the refinery site's transition, including exploring offshore wind manufacturing. Her platform centers on guiding redevelopment of the former refinery site, protecting Benicia's air and water, and stabilizing city finances for the long term.

**Strengths:** Over a decade of appointed city service before her Council term. She sat on the Human Services Board, then chaired the Planning Commission.

**Trade-offs:** Her account of Council accomplishments comes from her own statement. No independent reporting was found to check it against.

**Keep in mind:** Like Scott, she is an incumbent. A vote for her is partly a referendum on the sitting Council's record. Her platform emphasizes environmental oversight.

## Justin Zollars

Justin Zollars is a software engineer and the race's only challenger; their filed ballot designation is "Software Engineer." Their statement describes them as a Benicia homeowner and civic advocate who has spent 15 years in technology at companies including Adobe and Veracyte, where they currently work as a software engineer in cancer genomics; they describe themselves as a startup founder with experience managing budgets across engineers, partners, and customers. They state they were an elected delegate to a 2008 presidential nominating convention. Their statement centers on having led local opposition to the Benicia Police Department's use of Flock Safety automated license-plate-reader cameras, which they describe as tracking drivers' movements indefinitely with potential exposure to warrantless federal data requests; they pledge to remove the cameras from Benicia if elected. They also state they would focus on parks, roads, and budgets, and on protecting the city's small-town character as it grows.

**Strengths:** A specific, independently reported local campaign against Flock Safety license plate cameras. The incumbents run on broader platforms.

**Trade-offs:** No prior city role, campaign site, dedicated news coverage, or FPPC registered committee was found. That is unlike both incumbents.

**Keep in mind:** Zollars is the only non-incumbent. Their win would change the Council's makeup rather than continue it.

## Review notes

- Kari Birdseye's own campaign site (votekaribirdseye.com): self-authored biography and platform, plus a self-disclosed FPPC filer number (#1403514) for her own committee. and Terry Scott's own campaign site (terryscott2026.com): self-authored biography and platform, plus a self-disclosed FPPC filer number (#1444533) and committee name ("Committee to Elect Terry Scott for Benicia City Council 2026"). may have more bias because they are advocacy voter guides compared to other formal government and nonprofit journalism sources.

## Sources

1. [Solano County Registrar of Voters -- official "Candidate Filed Log -- November 3, 2026 General Election" (as of 8/20/2026): its "CITY OF BENICIA" section lists exactly one contest, Councilmember (Vote for 2, voted at-large), with three candidates -- incumbents Terry Scott and Kari Birdseye plus challenger Justin Zollars -- the identical document cited by the county-level shard's own "solano-candidate-log-2026," re-downloaded fresh this session and confirmed unchanged against the county's own live current-election page](https://content.solanocounty.gov/sites/default/files/2026-07/CANDIDATE_FILED_LOG_Nov_3_2026_7.13.26.pdf)
2. [Solano County Registrar of Voters -- "November 3, 2026 General Election Candidate Guide," its own countywide incumbent table: lists "City of Benicia Councilmember -- Terry Scott" and "...Kari Birdseye," each unmarked (an elected, not appointed, incumbent), and lists no separate City of Benicia Mayor row at all -- independently corroborating the candidate log's own incumbent flags and that the Mayor's own seat is not up this cycle](https://content.solanocounty.gov/sites/default/files/2026-06/Candidate_Guide_Nov_3_2026_v4.pdf)
3. [Solano County Registrar of Voters -- November 2026 Voter Information Guide, Ballot Type 17 (the booklet covering City of Benicia races): carries the official, filed Statement of Candidate for all three Benicia Council candidates under Elections Code 13307 -- the candidates' own words on background and platform, for the entire field](https://content.solanocounty.gov/sites/default/files/2026-08/SOLA11031017_-_VIG_17_ES.pdf)
4. [City of Benicia's own official site (ci.benicia.ca.us/citycouncil): lists Mayor Steve Young (re-elected 2024) as directly and separately elected from four at-large Councilmembers -- Vice Mayor Trevor Macenski, Kari Birdseye, Lionel Largaespada, and Terry Scott -- five total seats; its reference to a City Manager department indicates a council-manager government; Birdseye and Scott were both elected in November 2022, corroborating a 4-year term for the seats up this cycle](https://www.ci.benicia.ca.us/citycouncil)
5. [Wikipedia -- "Benicia, California": used narrowly for the 2020 Census population (27,131); does not itself describe the government structure or cover the 2026 election](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benicia,_California)
6. [Benicia Independent -- "Kari Birdseye Announces Campaign for Reelection to Benicia City Council" (2026-08-01): hyperlocal news coverage of her candidacy, giving biography, career background (NRDC, CNN, Wine Institute, Earthjustice), and platform priorities beyond her filed statement alone](https://beniciaindependent.com/kari-birdseye-announces-campaign-for-reelection-to-benicia-city-council/)
7. [Benicia Independent -- "Terry Scott Announces Bid for Re-Election to Benicia City Council" (2026-07-11): hyperlocal news coverage of his candidacy, giving biography, career background (Hasbro, Benicia Community Foundation), and his six-point platform beyond his filed statement alone](https://beniciaindependent.com/terry-scott-announces-bid-for-re-election-to-benicia-city-council/)
8. [Kari Birdseye's own campaign site (votekaribirdseye.com): self-authored biography and platform, plus a self-disclosed FPPC filer number (#1403514) for her own committee](https://votekaribirdseye.com)
9. [Terry Scott's own campaign site (terryscott2026.com): self-authored biography and platform, plus a self-disclosed FPPC filer number (#1444533) and committee name ("Committee to Elect Terry Scott for Benicia City Council 2026")](https://terryscott2026.com)
10. [California Secretary of State CAL-ACCESS -- the site's own Incapsula bot-protection challenge blocked every automated query attempted this session before any of the three Benicia Council candidates' names could actually be searched against the state's own database -- the same documented technical access gap encountered by every other Solano County city shard built this session (Fairfield, Suisun City); Birdseye's and Scott's own campaign sites separately self-disclose FPPC filer numbers not independently confirmed against Cal-Access this pass, and no financial disclosure of any kind was found for Justin Zollars](https://cal-access.sos.ca.gov/Campaign/Committees/list.aspx)

## The rest of the ballot

Benicia City Council is one contest among the many a California voter decides on November 3, 2026 — Congress, the Legislature, county, city, and school board races differ by address. Vote or Else builds the full list for any California address and breaks down each contest the way this page does, with no account and without storing the address: https://voteorelse.com/

## How to cite this page

Vote or Else, "Benicia City Council — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/benicia-council (sources last retrieved September 1, 2026).

Link the canonical page above rather than this Markdown file. Coverage is updated as the race develops, so quote it with its retrieval date.