As the Assemblymember from the newly redrawn 38th State Assembly District, Steve Bennett works hard on local issues in Sacramento — including preserving farms and open lands, water issues, campaign finance reform, managing the economic shifts to a greener economy.

He knows the district from the inside out, having served five terms as Ventura County Supervisor, and before that on the Ventura City Council. He began his career as an activist in the 1980s and 1990s, organizing grassroots efforts to preserve open space and for environmental causes, including the Save Our Agricultural Resources, which has protected the county's farmland against encroachment from neighboring Los Angeles County. At first, he would help recruit candidates to represent his group's positions, then realized it would be more efficient to do it himself. And so began his political career.

Born in Indiana, Bennett graduated from Brown University, then became a high school history teacher, including at Nordhoff High School here in Ojai. He's been serving in Sacramento since 2020, on the Budget, Elections, and Water, Parks & Wildlife, in addition to subcommittee work on climate crisis, fisheries and aquaculture.

We talked about pressing issues in governance, declining trust in institutions, political heros, what it takes to wrangle votes, a day in the life of a state assemblymember, the future of California and the nation, and much else. We did not talk about RuPaul's Drag Race, Canadian monster lore or the War of the Triple Alliance in South America.