Mike Clark, Athena Aguiar to face off again in Eugene’s Ward 5 runoff

A five-term incumbent and the challenger who advanced from the May primary will again face off in November’s runoff election to represent Ward 5 on the Eugene City Council.

Councilor Mike Clark, a conservative-leaning voice who has held his council seat since 2006, faces a Nov. 3 rematch with progressive activist and first-time candidate Athena Aguiar. The winner will represent parts of the Cal Young, Goodpasture Island and Santa Clara neighborhoods in north Eugene. 

Neither Clark nor Aguiar won more than half the total vote in May, so both candidates will appear on the November ballot. Clark received about 40% of the vote, Aguiar 38%. That race also included third-place candidate Jasmine Hatmaker, who did not advance to the general election runoff.

The eight-member council is Eugene’s representative legislative body, responsible for proposing and passing local laws, setting policy, and hiring the city manager, independent police auditor and presiding municipal court judge. Each councilor represents about 20,000 residents.

As the election nears, Clark and Aguiar said they are leaning into their campaign ground games — knocking on doors across their ward, posting yard signs and networking with local groups — as they spell out the contrasts between them. 

Clark, 62, is touting his experience and budget-conscious approach, arguing that he would make Eugene more affordable — which he defined as voters’ biggest priority — by resisting new taxes and fees.

In addition to his service on the council, he has sat on Eugene’s Budget Committee, Police Commission, Human Rights Commission and the Eugene Springfield Fire Governance Review Panel. He works as a mortgage loan specialist.

“That’s my obvious focus, is to make things more affordable by not increasing the price of things through the actions of the city of Eugene,” he said. “We need to live within our means and focus on core services.”

Aguiar, 25, is framing herself as a voice for younger and more progressive residents who don’t feel represented by Clark.

She has pledged to protect the city’s Library, Recreation and Cultural Services Department from budget cuts, support a building vacancy tax and bring back a fully funded crisis response service like CAHOOTS. She currently works as a canvasser for Eugene’s Clean Energy Fund, which would require corporations with stores or operations in Eugene to pay fees to fund green projects. That initiative will also be on the November ballot. 

“People are still saying, ‘Hey, I really, really miss CAHOOTS. Hey, why is there a vacant house next to me and a homeless person a few streets away? That those two don’t make sense in combination,’” she said. 

Clark says his opponent is less sensitive to tacking costs back onto residents, pointing to her support of Eugene’s ill-fated fire services fee last year and of the Clean Energy Fund ballot measure.

He said services like police, fire and emergency response are his main budget priorities, and that he’d support an effort to “trim and look for creative new ways” to provide other services if necessary. 

“For someone who talks about affordability, she seems to have a much higher degree of comfort wanting to take more money from people on behalf of the city than I do,” Clark said.

Aguiar said she is more responsive to constituents and in-touch with the issues compared to her opponent. 

Her campaign philosophy is that the “personal is political,” she said, pointing to her focus on housing affordability amid her own struggle to find permanent housing within Ward 5. She said neighborhood residents have told her that they have a hard time reaching Clark to talk about issues they care about, an experience she said she shared before she ran for his seat. 

“I emailed my city councilor and did not receive any response, and I emailed him again and did not receive any response personally before any of this, and that is an experience I’m hearing reflected over and over again,” she said.

Campaign cash

As of Tuesday, Oct. 6, Clark’s campaign had $13,792.38 in cash on hand, according to campaign finance records, trailing Aguiar’s campaign, which had $18,422.81 in cash on hand. 

Thus far, Clark’s campaign has brought in $56,355.80 in cash contributions this year, roughly $15,000 more than the $40,943.67 raised by Aguiar’s campaign within the same period.

Clark’s campaign has also outspent Aguiar’s — spending $46,501.05 in cash so far this year, almost $20,000 more than Aguiar’s reported expenditures of $26,471.13.

Alongside small, individual donations, Clark has raked in thousands from the political action committee for the Eugene Chamber of Commerce, Eugene Realtors, Wildish Land Co., Sierra Pacific Industries, Oregonians for Affordable Housing and a company tied to Lane County board of commissioners candidate Jake Pelroy.

Most of the contributions to Aguiar’s campaign have been smaller in size, and from individual donors. Notable names include former Eugene Mayor Lucy Vinis, incoming Ward 3 City Councilor Jennifer Smith and Lane Community College board members Zachary Mulholland and Austin Fölnagy. She has also recently received $5,000 from actress Jane Fonda’s Climate PAC.  

The odds?

Clark said he feels “very confident” he will prevail in the race.

“The decision is the people who live in Ward 5,” he said. “It’s theirs. It belongs to them. I’m asking if I can continue to be their voice, because I think I’ve done a decent job doing it.”

On her odds of winning the race, Aguiar said she “feels good.” But she said her broader goal in running was to empower people to get involved with local government and view its decisions as their own — and ones capable of changing. 

Regardless of the results of her City Council campaign, Aguiar said she plans to take part in a “pressure campaign” to allocate funding generated by the Community Safety Payroll Tax to a crisis response service like CAHOOTS. More than half of the fund currently goes to police.

“I think my goal was not just, ‘Athena get elected.’ My goal was kind of like, ‘Anyone can run,’ and to show people that,” she said. “Anyone can participate.”

Mike Clark

Age: 62

Residence: Cal Young neighborhood

Education: Bachelor’s degree in political science and government from the University of Oregon

Occupation: Mortgage loan specialist

Prior elected experience: Five terms on the Eugene City Council, Budget Committee, Police Commission, Human Rights Commission, Eugene Springfield Fire Governance Review Panel

Athena Aguiar

Age: 25

Residence: Short-term housing in Ward 5

Education: Bachelor’s degree in biology from Coe College 

Occupation: Canvasser for Clean Energy Fund

Prior elected experience: None