By Robert Haugh
On Santa Clara City Councilmember Kevin Park’s personal website, he portrays himself as a successful engineer, family man, and someone with a record of fiscal responsibility.
Here’s what Park writes:
“I ran for council twice before finally getting elected in 2020. Since that time I have helped stabilize financial foundations, eliminating the debt incurred during the pandemic and finding new sources of revenue to help the City grow.”
But public records and Santa Clara News Online reporting tell a different story.
Park has been vague in reports about his professional career, and he has major unpaid debts.
In March 2025, SCNO reviewed Park’s bio as presented at a public event at the Triton Museum. It describes him as a veteran “scientist and engineer” with Caltech and Stanford credentials and recent leadership roles in AI startups.
But official forms show no financial trace of such success.
SCNO reported that his 2024 Statement of Economic Interests shows zero income and zero assets, except for a $1,420 travel gift. Park filed the annual form nearly 60 days late.
Furthermore, an SCNO investigation found that Park has not paid property taxes since 2023, despite owing late penalties and interest.
Park’s money problems may have started earlier.
Local political observers point to an email exchange in 2021 between Park and his political consultant, Jay Reed.
Reed managed Park’s City Council campaign in 2020. The 49ers spent a record-breaking amount to assist in getting Park elected, approximately $1 million. Six months after Park took his seat on the Council, Reed asked the 49ers to help Park financially.
Park’s apparent money troubles have led to some other unusual behavior for a City Councilmember.
SCNO revealed Park attended charitable fundraisers like the 2024 Librarypalooza but paid only early-bird admission for himself. He brought his daughter and another guest. Park left the nonprofit hundreds of dollars short.
Organizers say he promised a check that never fully arrived until after SCNO publicly reported how Park stiffed the charity.
SCNO also reported that Park regularly brought his daughter and another child to City Hall. Park sometimes left them unattended during meetings.
Staff reportedly had to call him to remind him to return before the building closed. While the City Manager said no formal rule barred elected officials from bringing children to City Hall, employees said Park’s actions appeared to be an exception and raised safety and liability concerns.
Whether it’s City Hall rules, filing disclosure forms accurately, or paying property taxes on time, Park appears to be ignoring well-established rules – even if he suggests a different image in his bio.
don’t know robert. don’t know the kelsays. don’t know park either. all i can say is robert’s stories are important. i think reporting on domestic violence is important. if there’s more it should be exposed. for too long the weinsteins, epsteins, and parks have gotten people to stick their heads in the sand
Robert,
This is your 3rd blog in 2 weeks regarding Kevin Park. You have not presented any new information that you have not already pointed out previously in earlier blogs.
What has Kevin done to you that has made you have a vendetta against him? It really seems small and petty to me.
Kevin is not perfect. One particularly cringy moment was when he paraphrased a book, and called it “All your friends have termed out” and read it from the dais to embarrass Kurt Vartan.
I think he should have taken out a billboard on the El Camino apologizing to Mr. Vartan.
However, when we contacted the City Council about problems our neighborhood experienced with flooding during the storms of February 2024, Kevin was the first one to come and meet the neighbors, even taking tours of a couple of basements. I need to point out that Kevin doesn’t represent our district, and took time out on a Saturday to meet with the neighborhood. Only after repeated requests to our councilmember, and reminders that other councilmembers had come to talk to the neighborhood did our District Five councilmember consent to come out.
All of this made me look at Kevin’s website. He has a whole section on Planning. He states that we should plan before we build. Here is an exact quote from his website:
Let us restore vision, emphasizing planning over mere development, to create new communities with homes and families while preserving the nature of existing neighborhoods. Let us return focus on infrastructure, including streets, sewers, and open space, so that future generations of Santa Clarans will have room to grow and reasons to stay.
So why not do a blog about the proposed six story building on the corner of Washington and Newhall where the Normandy House is? There was a presentation on Monday night about this proposal, you could have easily covered that, and then asked Kevin, if this is good planning or mere development?
In fact, there are many subject matters that you can cover besides repeating parts of previous blogs. You did a great one on the possibility of paid parking at Franklin Mall. You could have done one on tearing down St. Mark’s and building homes there. You could do one on why downtown is not moving forward. You could do one on the rumors swirling around about trading the City Hall property for Agnews. You could do a report on the number of break-ins in the Merry Mart shopping strip, and why did Starbucks leave? These are just the things that I see happening in my small part of Santa Clara, and I’m sure that there is a lot more in the rest of town.
I’m fulfilling my responsibility as a journalist because too many people are turning a blind eye to the corruption and ethical lapses in Santa Clara.
I’m convinced Kevin has made serious missteps, and there’s still more to uncover. If I have the chance to expose the truth, I won’t back down, even if it means facing personal attacks. The same thing happened when I was reporting on Anthony Becker.
Some of Becker’s defenders are defending Park now, and even resorting to the same tactics to undermine me.
That speaks volumes and motivates me, too.
Kevin Park
Suds Jain
Anthony Becker
Their philosophy life is is based in
BPR
BOVIAN
POSTERIOR
RESPONSE
Exactly Robert!
News about the “planning” for the future success of SC general plans, or the news about crime in SC are a classic smoke screen for yellow journalism. Thank you for not falling prey to these imposters.
Vision and planning for our city cannot occur under corrupt leadership – period. Never.
Park is no different than the people in Washington DC using smoke and mirrors to deviate from the truth. Shame on the Kelseys and Mary Drizzle for protecting people like Park who take advantage of the vulnerable. What does your post say to women who have been abused? Park is accused of DV and what else? Where there’s smoke there’s fire! Just like calls to disclose the Epstein files and expose abuse of power, the same thing needs to be done to Park. Keep at it, Robert! Just like the media continues a call to expose the Epstein rot! Let’s expose the Park rot!
“Let us restore vision, emphasizing planning over mere development, to create new communities with homes and families while preserving the nature of existing neighborhoods. Let us return focus on infrastructure, including streets, sewers, and open space, so that future generations of Santa Clarans will have room to grow and reasons to stay.” HAHA
Mark and Kathy have been fooled by Kevin. Kevin has given speeches about how we should be building hi rise towers. Kevin is a fraud. Kevin voted against the infrastructure bond last year because he was butt hurt that the Triton wasn’t getting enough money. Kevin is on the Triton board. Kevin wanted to kill the bond because of Kevin is petty. But Kevin is good at fooling some people.
Dear Community,
Robert is doing the “due diligence” need to keep possible corruption in the EYES OF THE VOTERS.
We did this in East San Jose.
With this information, that was not lying, Carrasco did not move forward to a seat on the Santa Clara County Board of Education, or win in District 2 , for the County Board of Supervisors.
The word Corrupt is like tomato or potato.
It has many different types – some worse than others – but either way, we have moved on in a much better direction with great leadership in San Jose District 5, and Santa Clara County District 2.
Maybe Carrasco hid Omar Torres, – is Park hiding something?
Just a question – are there similar things to discover?
Keeping issues in the Sunlight, is not a waisted effort.
Thank you for reading my opinion.
In Community Spirit,
Danny Garza
I have to claim credit for the Jay Reed email. Jay Reed charged Mt. View High School District 10 grand for one month work.
Assignment
Review High School Newspapers.
Reed fired from Cortese campaign for tweeting how women should keep men from playing with themselves
Dear Matt,
If you dig a little more you will find that Jay Reed worked for a school board candidate and this was the way he got paid. Have a nice day, Jay Reed.
School board candidate? Were they elected? More info please. ‘Cause when you listen to current trustees like Fairchild and Ryan…oh boy! Folks are very suspicious of their actions. It’s known they are tight with Park and the 49er 5. Gees, what else can you uncover, Robert? Inquiring minds and all that stuff.