Tafoya to Run Again for College Board

Pete Tafoya, an outspoken board member of the Ventura County Community College District, has announced his bid for reelection.

A former community college student and community college instructor, Tafoya, 45, said his objective for a second term as a trustee is to better manage the district’s increasingly strained financial resources.

“One of the most critical things we have to do is to keep whatever resources we do have directed toward the classroom,” Tafoya said Monday.

Tafoya has often clashed with some of the district’s more conservative board members. He voted against endorsing a controversial ballot initiative that would have provided public funds for private schools through a voucher program, which a majority of the board supported. He also advocated lowering fees for foreign students, while other board members voted to raise them.

A resident of Port Hueneme, Tafoya will run for the Area 5 seat, which represents the cities of Oxnard and Port Hueneme, and the El Rio area. He works as an engineering manager for the Navy.

He studied at College of the Sequoias in Visalia before graduating from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo with a bachelor’s degree in engineering. He also has a master’s degree from the University of Idaho and is completing his doctorate in engineering at UC Santa Barbara.