# Santa Clara City Council, District 3 Compare records and positions simply between Eric Crutchlow or Kyle Madej for Santa Clara City Council, District 3 at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person would hold one of six seats on the Santa Clara City Council. They vote on city laws, the budget, and land use. Santa Clara is a Santa Clara County city of about 128,000 people. The city also has a separately elected, citywide Mayor, also on this ballot. Five other district Council members also serve. The term is four years, with a two-term limit. - Jurisdiction: City of Santa Clara - Election: November 3, 2026 California general election - Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements. - Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/santa-clara-city-council-3 - 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: August 31, 2026 - Source-objectivity score: 89 out of 100 (Strong), across 3 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology ## On the ballot - **Eric Crutchlow** - **Kyle Madej** A nonpartisan office: candidates do not run as Democrats or Republicans, and no party appears on the ballot. Two candidates are running for Santa Clara's open City Council District 3 seat. They are Eric Crutchlow and Kyle Madej. Unlike District 2, this seat is not open because of term limits. Incumbent Karen Hardy is running for Mayor instead of seeking re-election to her own seat. See that contest. Whoever gets the most votes wins outright. This is a plurality election, not ranked-choice. This person would hold Santa Clara's District 3 seat on the City Council. They vote on city ordinances, the budget, and land use in this Santa Clara County city of about 128,000, alongside a separately elected, citywide Mayor (also on this ballot -- six candidates, including Hardy, are running for that open seat) and five other district Council members. The term is four years, with a two-term limit. District 2 is also open this cycle (see that contest); Districts 1, 4, 5, and 6 -- held respectively by Albert Gonzalez, Kevin Park (also a 2026 mayoral candidate), Sudhanshu "Suds" Jain, and Kelly G. Cox -- aren't up again until 2028. Unlike District 2, this seat isn't open because of term limits: Hardy could have run again but chose the mayor's race instead. ## Eric Crutchlow Eric Crutchlow, 66, has lived in Santa Clara since 1984. He works as a product manager in cybersecurity at Lumen Technologies. He has worked in that field for about 25 years. He now chairs the city's Planning Commission, where he has served about three years. He also served on the Charter Review Committee. His campaign centers on city finances. He argues Santa Clara needs to plan and save for infrastructure maintenance. He says the city should not wait for facilities like the International Swim Center to deteriorate. He also calls for a more collaborative council culture. He contrasts what he calls council tension with the consensus-building he says marks the Planning Commission. No campaign committee was found under his name in the city's NetFile portal. So no financial record exists for his campaign. **Strengths:** Multi-year experience on the Planning Commission, which he now chairs, and the Charter Review Committee. That is arguably the most hands-on familiarity with city process of either candidate. **Trade-offs:** No campaign committee is registered at all. So no public financial disclosure exists to review. His cybersecurity career is a specific background with no obvious tie to municipal finance. **Keep in mind:** No record was found of either District 3 candidate having run for city office before. This is a genuinely fresh matchup for this seat. ## Kyle Madej Kyle Madej, 45, is a Santa Clara native. He was born and raised in District 3, where his family has lived since 1969. He has worked for both the city and Santa Clara Unified School District. He is now CEO of Sentinel Holdings Ltd. That company operates the security-services businesses Gladiator Solutions and United Security Specialists. He has also spent more than a decade on the Briarwood Little League board. He has been its president since 2023. He serves on the Santa Clara Youth Soccer League board. He coaches youth, high-school, and collegiate baseball and soccer. His priorities include expanding youth programs and recreational space. He would also fully fund police, fire and emergency services. He would invest specifically in District 3 neighborhoods and support small businesses. His campaign committee, Madej for City Council 2026, registered between July 17 and Aug. 31, 2026. It had filed no itemized Form 460. So no dollar figures are available. **Strengths:** Multi-decade roots in District 3. Also more than a decade of youth-sports civic leadership. That is community-organizing experience distinct from Crutchlow's commission background. **Trade-offs:** No fundraising record exists yet to compare against Crutchlow. His security-services business is a less obvious tie to city budgeting than Crutchlow's Planning Commission service. **Keep in mind:** His committee's most recent paperwork was filed Aug. 31, 2026. That makes his financial record the newest in this guide's Santa Clara coverage. ## Sources 1. [Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters -- the "City of Santa Clara" List-of-Officeholders page: confirms Mayor, City Clerk, and Chief of Police are elected at-large and City Council is six district seats (1-6), each a 4-year term, and shows Mayor Lisa M. Gillmor, District 2's Raj Chahal, and District 3's Karen Hardy all up for "NEXT ELECTION" in 2026, while Districts 1, 4, 5, and 6 (Albert Gonzalez, Kevin Park, Sudhanshu "Suds" Jain, Kelly G. Cox) aren't up again until 2028. A live fetch of the county elections domain 403s in this pass; retrieved instead via a Wayback Machine snapshot dated 2025-09-10.](https://vote.santaclaracounty.gov/city-santa-clara) 2. [San José Spotlight -- "Four candidates face off for two Santa Clara council seats" (Maryanne Casas-Perez, Aug. 20, 2026), read in full via a Wayback Machine snapshot (a live sanjosespotlight.com fetch 403s in this pass): confirms both District 2 seat candidates (Yvonne Inciarte, Kimberley Williams, running for the seat held by term-limited-out Raj Chahal) and both District 3 seat candidates (Eric Crutchlow, Kyle Madej, running for the seat Karen Hardy is vacating to run for mayor instead of seeking re-election), with ages, backgrounds, platforms, and a direct on-record quote from each.](https://sanjosespotlight.com/four-candidates-face-off-for-two-santa-clara-council-seats/) 3. [City of Santa Clara's own NetFile-hosted public campaign-finance portal (aid=CSC), queried directly by name via its own QuickNameSearch and filings/byCandidate JSON API (reverse-engineered from the portal's own downloaded JS bundle; this bundle version keys on aid/candidateId/agencyCode params, not the byFilerId variant an earlier pass in this file documented for a different NetFile bundle version), with each available candidate's Form 460 downloaded directly via the portal's own CampaignDocuments/download endpoint (one, Kathy Watanabe's, a scanned image PDF with no extractable text layer, read by rendering it to an image and reading the figures directly). Mayor's race: Watanabe reported $15,362.54 in total contributions ($10,362.54 monetary, $5,000 in loans) against $6,222.63 in expenditures, ending cash $9,139.91; Kertes reported $12,422.80 in total contributions ($950 monetary, $11,472.80 in loans -- per Schedule B, all of it loaned by Kertes to himself) against $11,462.80 in expenditures, ending cash $960.00 and $11,472.80 in outstanding debt owed to himself; Ferraris's committee, formed July 7, 2026, reported $0 in contributions and $0 in expenditures for the Jan.-June 2026 period; Hardy's committee has registered but filed no Form 460 yet; Park has no 2026 mayoral committee or filing on record at all (only a routine 2025 annual Form 470 tied to his existing District 4 officeholder committee); Wiltberger has no committee registered under any name searched. District 2: Inciarte has registered a committee but filed no Form 460 yet; Williams has no committee registered at all. District 3: Madej has registered a committee ("Madej for City Council 2026") but filed no Form 460 yet; Crutchlow has no committee registered at all. None of this is evidence of any candidate's final fundraising totals for the cycle -- it documents exactly what could and couldn't be confirmed as of this retrieval.](https://netfile.com/public/CSC/campaign) ## The rest of the ballot Santa Clara City Council, District 3 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, "Santa Clara City Council, District 3 — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/santa-clara-city-council-3 (sources last retrieved August 31, 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.