Meet Japjeet Uppal, a City Council Candidate in Livingston, CA

Japjeet Uppal is a non-partisan, GoodParty.org Certified candidate for city council in Livingston, California. At just 21 years old, Uppal is poised to bring a fresh perspective to Livingston’s city council.

GoodParty.org spoke with Uppal about his campaign, community service, and the issues he feels are most pressing for the Livingston City Council to address.

Japjeet Uppal: A Non-Partisan Candidate for Livingston, California

Livingston is a small city in the San Joaquin Valley of central California, in northern Merced County. As of the 2020 census, the population of Livingston was 14,172. 

Livingston is a center for immigrant communities, especially those from Mexico and Punjab, India. A lifelong native of Livingston, Uppal comes from a family of Punjabi immigrants.

Uppal recently graduated from the University of California, Merced with a bachelor’s degree in public health. Since then, he has begun pursuing a master’s degree in Public Policy and Administration from the University of Redlands.

“I'm very passionate about public policy, very passionate about systemic change and about community organizing. For that reason, I'm at a point where I want to get into office and have a seat at the table where change can be made,” Uppal said.

Two at-large city council seats are up for election in Livingston on November 5, 2024. Of the two incumbent officeholders, one has recently resigned, and the other has not yet announced her candidacy.

A Passion for Making an Impact

One of the main factors that inspired Uppal to run for office was his dedication to service. He said he first became interested in politics during his senior year of high school, when the COVID-19 pandemic began. Uppal began by listening to podcasts related to politics, and soon became invested in learning as much as possible about how the U.S. government works.

“Where is our taxpayer money being spent? People in positions of power, what exactly are they doing, whether it's good or bad? Very quickly, I started going down rabbit holes. I learned a bunch of stuff that, at the moment, I was kind of shocked to learn,” Uppal said.

From there, he began thinking about ways to make an impact locally.

“When I saw the tie-in of things I was learning that I felt were systemically wrong taking place, [I asked myself,] how is that impacting myself, my family, people in my community, people in our area, and our country as a whole?” Uppal said. “It doesn't have to be like this. It really doesn't have to be, and if there are people that are willing to push against it, that is the only way anything can change. I really felt a calling from it.”

Uppal said he has always planned on pursuing a career that helps people, and running for office feels like the right place to start.

“I feel that if we get people that are willing to take action, then you don't have to change the world; even just to make small changes in the community around you, things can improve,” he said.

Outside of his city council campaign, Uppal has a variety of experience serving his community. For example, he coaches football at the high school where he used to attend. Uppal said he is glad to be able to support the students on the football team.

“Even though that's not a formal public service role, I feel it's very important to do. A lot of our kids are either living in poverty, don't have both parents in the home, or are dealing with a lot of other stuff that is just really unfortunate for a kid to be dealing with,” Uppal said. “It's not like I'm changing their lives and providing them a financial backbone, but giving a kid two to three hours to not have to worry about anything and just be able to work on themselves, on a team, to enjoy a practice or game and have somebody that they can lean on, to me is very important.

“When I was in high school, football was the only place that I felt like I could just be myself, not have to worry about literally anything else in the world, and just play the sport that I thought was the most fun thing in the world. I looked up to my coaches a lot. They were the closest thing that I had to legit father figures. I learned a lot from them. They pushed me very hard, and I appreciated that. So I always wanted to coach at some point.”

Uppal also gives back through Neighbors Unidos, a community group based in the neighboring city of Merced. Neighbors Unidos serves as a liaison between the city council and residents.

“The goal is to give residents an ability to voice their concerns and talk to city council members in a manner that is actually conducive to change, rather than just going up and giving public comments, being very frustrated for three minutes, and not getting anything out of it,” Uppal explained. “It's very intimidating to give public comments. It’s hard to go up there and speak, especially given that there's an inherent power struggle that exists, even if it's minor.”

Neighbors Unidos also gives residents a place where they can go to set up meetings with city council members, prepare for those meetings, and find volunteers who will attend the meetings with them.

In addition, Uppal has been involved with the organization Young Invincibles since 2022, when he joined the Young Advocates Program. He is now part of the 2024 California Youth Advisory Board. This board meets to discuss the organization’s policy direction and mentor current members of the Young Advocates Program.

Outside of any organization or team, Uppal said he also dedicates time to personal advocacy, including sending in public comments and holding local elected officials accountable.

Running for Office as a Non-Partisan Candidate

Uppal shared that he is passionate about keeping partisan politics out of local elections.

“I'm not a fan of either party,” Uppal said. “I personally feel the two-party system is broken. I have strong issues with Democrats. I have strong issues with Republicans. It's kind of unfortunate that they take money from, oftentimes, the same people, and folks forget to recognize that they're taking money from the same people.”

In Livingston’s non-partisan election for city council, Uppal plans to focus on the issues, not on politics.

“I don't necessarily plan to side with one side or the other. I want it to be very policy-focused, very-issue focused. My fellow people tend to agree more on the policy issues than when they get lost in the politics. For that reason, I don't really identify with either party, although my ideals do very much lean to the left and to the Libertarian side,” Uppal said.

Addressing Local Issues in Livingston

Uppal named two issues that stand out as particularly important for Livingston’s city council to address. First, he described the importance of providing clean drinking water for the community.

Livingston’s drinking water contains levels of the chemical TCP that exceed the Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL). The city has acknowledged that drinking contaminated water over the course of years can increase the risk of cancer. However, Uppal said that elected officials have not followed through on their promises to fix the city’s water system.

He noted that while a main roadblock to progress is the city’s budget, there are ways that local leaders can move toward solutions.

“Are we just going to sit here and continue to drink water that has TCP, or are we going to find a way to get something done?” Uppal said. “The state of California has a lot of money. The federal government has a lot of money. Even though we can't vote on it here, we can advocate for it, we can build coalitions, we can organize our community, and we can make sure that we have clean water. We can make a budget request. There are ways to apply pressure on officials who have that ability. 

“Personally, I feel like in the United States of America, in the richest country in the world, there should not be a single person drinking water that's not clean. We should have the most pristine water on the planet. We have more resources to accomplish that than anybody else.”

Uppal said he has observed how community pressure and state-level advocacy can work to solve local problems.

“Our water is a local issue. However, it's due to a system-wide problem of not making sure through public policy that we ensure that everybody has access to clean water. We don't have enough money for it, but somebody does. We're putting our money into that fund, too, and we should fight to make sure that we have access to it,” Uppal said.

Another issue close to the heart of Uppal’s campaign comes in response to the decision to close Livingston’s fire station on October 1, 2024. The County Board of Supervisors recently voted to close multiple fire stations, including the one in Livingston, because they were not meeting minimum staffing requirements. Uppal said that the reason the fire station was understaffed was because of budget limitations. Without the ability to increase the station’s budget, it may be forced to close — even though the station is one of the busiest in Merced County.

“In terms of a risk assessment, it is completely illogical and unreasonable to have closed this station,” Uppal said. “From all the folks that I've talked to, from electeds to folks that work in the station to people in the community, this was very much a political move. It was very much the county board of supervisors doing it because they could. However, that does not absolve everything from the city council's level, because from what I've heard in the past, the city council also did not act in great faith with the board of supervisors, and the relationship was kind of broken. Now who's going to suffer is the people of Livingston.”

Uppal said that the fire department is typically the first emergency response department to reach people who are experiencing health crises.

“Without a fire station, our average emergency response time is going to be about 10 to 12 minutes, which is not enough time to save somebody if they're having a heart attack. That's just unacceptable,” he said.

Uppal noted that the county has found funds for other recent projects, such as the construction of a correctional facility. To him, essential emergency services should be prioritized before other types of expenses.

“If I had to pick one, I would make sure that all of our fire stations are staffed, because it is an essential emergency service that we are now about to lose,” Uppal said. “This is something that I'm in the works of building advocacy around now. Whether or not I get onto the city council won't matter; I would rather have a fire station than have a seat at a table.”

Uppal emphasized the direct impact that the fire station’s closure will have on residents’ lives.

“There will be people that will die in town because we don't have an emergency response at that rate,” he said. “That's something that is very locally grounded and needs a local response. That's something that I plan on advocating around now, and then, hopefully, if I do get a seat on the city council, I can make sure that's something that we never have to worry about again. There is no point, ever, where you should lose your emergency services.”

Overall, Uppal said he is passionate about collaborating with different members of the local government to provide citizens with meaningful solutions.

The Movement for Non-Partisan Representation

As a GoodParty.org Certified candidate, Uppal is one of hundreds of non-partisan and independent candidates across the United States who are running people-powered, anti-corruption campaigns. All of these candidates are focused on serving their communities with integrity.

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