The raise was supposed to bring in new candidates. It didn't.

In March, the Folsom City Council voted 3-2 to raise its own salaries, and one justification stood out: Higher pay, we were told, would encourage more residents to run for office. I argued at the time, in public comment and in these pages, that this would not hold up. Incumbents with name recognition and donor networks were not going anywhere, and a $150 individual contribution limit does little to level the field for a newcomer, regardless of what the winning candidate is paid. The nomination period for the November 2026 election has now closed, and we no longer have to debate this in the abstract. Three council seats were on the ballot this cycle: District 1, District 3 and District 5. All three incumbents filed to run for reelection and qualified for the ballot. Against them: two challengers in District 1 (Chad Vander Veen and Paul Kerfeld), one in District 3 (myself), and one in District 5 (Justin Hurst). That is not the flood of new civic participation the salary increase was said to unlock. Folsom elects its council by district, and none of these races is an open seat. Four challengers across three districts, each against an incumbent running again, is the same modest pattern Folsom has seen for years, with or without a raise. One cycle is not a controlled experiment, and District 1 does have two challengers rather than one. It's possible a raise played some role in one of those decisions to file, and I would not claim to know every conversation that shaped someone's choice to run. But the Council did not present this as a modest, uncertain possibility. It was offered with confidence, while residents were also being told the city faced a structural deficit and was cutting positions to close a budget gap. If the rationale mattered enough to justify the vote, the outcome should matter enough to revisit. What the filings show is what I said they would show: Incumbency, not compensation, is the dominant force in these races. Sitting councilmembers keep their seats at a high rate because of relationships, name recognition and donor networks built over years in office. A modest stipend raise does not change that. If the goal is genuinely to broaden participation, the conversation needs to be about structural barriers that favor incumbents, not compensation that also benefits incumbents seeking reelection. One of those barriers came before the Council months after the salary vote, and points to what a real fix looks like. As part of the same charter review process, the Council placed Measure K on the November ballot, to raise Folsom's individual campaign contribution limit from $150 to $500, unchanged since 1994. I have argued, including in this space, that this actually helps a new candidate compete, by letting challengers raise real money instead of collecting checks capped at a number that hasn't moved in three decades. That is the difference between a policy built on hope and one built on removing an actual obstacle. If Folsom wants more competitive elections, this is the path: lower the barriers that keep challengers from running credible campaigns, rather than raise compensation for incumbents already in office. This matters beyond any one vote. Folsom is heading into a period where residents will be asked to trust city leadership on harder questions: closing a structural budget deficit, whether to ask voters for new revenue, and how to weigh the three charter measures now headed to the ballot. Trust is built, in part, by how leaders handle the smaller questions, and by whether they learn from decisions that don't hold up. When a stated justification fails, the responsible response is to say so plainly, adjust course, and not repeat the same mistake next time. I do not raise this to relitigate a vote that already happened. I raise it because residents deserve officials who test their reasoning against results, who are honest when results don't match the promise, and who carry that lesson forward instead of reaching for the same weak justification again. That is a small thing to ask, and one of the clearest tests of leadership we have. As Folsom voters watch these three council races this fall, I hope this is a reminder to ask not just what officials say their decisions will accomplish, but to follow up and ask whether they did. Accountability is not a one-time vote. It's a habit. Jag Nagendra is a Folsom resident, engineer, project manager, community leader and candidate for Folsom City Council District 3. He brings over 35 years of leadership experience across the private and public sectors and is an advocate for fiscal responsibility, transparent governance and community-centered leadership.