County of Santa Barbara

About Us

Supervisor Das Williams was elected to represent the First District of Santa Barbara County in June 2016. Williams previously represented the area, along with over half of Santa Barbara County and a quarter of Ventura County in the California State Assembly from 2010-2106. Prior to his service in the Assembly, Williams served 7 years on the Santa Barbara City Council from 2003-2010 and also served as a trustee for Peabody Charter School in Santa Barbara.
During his extensive public service, Williams has earned a reputation as a champion for renewable energy and the reduction of green house gas emissions. In the Assembly, Williams helped successfully advocate for a requirements that 33% of the state's energy come from renewable sources by 2020. With the state on track to hit that goal, Williams has authored legislation to increase the renewable energy goal to 50% by 2030.
A lifelong advocate for our coast, Williams championed required testing of groundwater before, during, and after hydraulic fracturing, which was included in California's regulations on fracking and authored legislation to expand groundwater monitoring to other types of injection wells to protect underground sources of drinking water from oil and gas wastewater disposal.
Williams also took leadership to ensure statewide resources would be spent locally to provide relief from the drought, including securing funds for the Lake Cachuma pump project and supporting funding for water recycling and conservation efforts. He's also been a leader on emergency preparedness, hosting an emergency preparedness fair every year since he took office and working to ensure 911 calls are correct routed to cut down on response time.
Williams grew up in Santa Barbara County and attended local schools. In addition to his service in elected office, he taught at Antioch University in Santa Barbara, worked as a junior high school teacher, as well as a legislative aid to California State Assemblymember Hannah-Beth Jackson