San Diego voters appear to have endorsed the existing leadership team at City Hall on Tuesday, with early election returns suggesting they had re-elected three incumbents by comfortable margins and chosen the outgoing city attorney’s preferred successor for the only open job.
The incumbents say the early returns show voters are pleased with the incremental progress they’ve made on challenges like homelessness, housing costs and crumbling infrastructure — pleased enough to give the leaders four more years to work toward solutions.
“We have been a good team,” said Councilmember Stephen Whitburn, who was re-elected in central urban District 3. “We have worked well together as a council and we have worked well together with the mayor.”
Mayor Todd Gloria said voters had spoken loudly that they wanted this team to continue its efforts on the steep challenges San Diego faces.
“We have so much more work ahead of us,” he said. “The challenges our great city faces are very, very real. But I’m more confident than ever we have the ability to come together and tackle every single one of them.”
There are 590,000 ballots uncounted countywide, including an estimated 250,000 within the city. But the margins are wide enough that the leading candidates appear very likely to win.
Gloria challenger Larry Turner, however, declined to concede Wednesday. Turner said he believes he’s in a strong position to close the gap.
Council President Sean Elo-Rivera said great opportunity comes with the additional four-year terms voters have given Gloria and five council members first elected in 2020.
“We started at the peak of the pandemic in December 2020 — we didn’t get to work together in council chambers for 15 months,” Elo-Rivera said.
The group will now start their second terms with more experience and potentially a lot more resources, Elo-Rivera said.
He’s referring to Measure E, a sales tax hike on Tuesday’s ballot that could provide about $400 million a year in new revenue. Measure E was trailing by a small margin, but supporters say they are confident late-arriving ballots will push it over the 50% threshold it needs to pass.
Elo-Rivera said he was proud to be re-elected in mid-city District 9, the city’s most ethnically diverse district.
“There’s a lot of different needs and desires, and we’ve got some very vocal folks in all parts of the district,” he said.
The city’s police officers labor union had endorsed his opponent, police officer Terry Hoskins.
“I would not be doing my job if I didn’t sometimes push back and ask questions about how we are approaching public safety,” Elo-Rivera said of the endorsement.
Elo-Rivera said he appreciates the work police officers do and is upbeat about working with new Police Chief Scott Wahl.
The fourth city leader who appeared on track for election was Deputy City Attorney Heather Ferbert, who was leading in the race to replace her longtime boss, City Attorney Mara Elliott.
Ferbert was endorsed by Elliott, but Gloria and most of the council — including Elo-Rivera and Whitburn — endorsed her opponent, Assemblymember Brian Maienschein.
Ferbert said she expects to work well with Gloria, Elo-Rivera and the rest of the council.
“I’m going to tell them I want to represent the city and provide good legal work for them, and I’m going to say I don’t take it personally that they endorsed my opponent,” she said. “It’s politics. No hard feelings, and I’m excited to work with them.”
While Ferbert isn’t expected to make major changes in the city attorney’s office because she has been one of Elliott’s top lieutenants, she said she has a few changes in mind.
They include creating a housing protection unit to focus on preventing subsidized and naturally occurring affordable housing from being torn down, redeveloped or sold.
Ferbert said she might also consolidate the city attorney’s office’s homelessness efforts under one umbrella.
In the latest vote counts from Wednesday morning, Gloria was leading challenger Larry Turner 54.59% to 45.41%, and Ferbert led Maienschein 56.3% to 43.7%.
In the council races, Elo-Rivera was leading Hoskins by 16 percentage points, and Whitburn was leading challenger Coleen Cusack by a nearly 20-point margin.
Cusack acknowledged her loss in a statement to supporters Wednesday morning. “I’m disappointed in the outcome, but proud of the fact-based, volunteer-led campaign we ran,” she said.
