San Diego Clerk’s Office, 1900
Summary – Pt. Loma Democratic Club Meeting of Feb. 28, 2016
The meeting was called to order by President Susan Peinado with a full agenda awaiting the audience. Rather than go into much detail, the following is a brief synopsis of the meeting itself:
1. There was a petition to abolish the death penalty discussed by the originators of the petition. This is very similar to the one presented a few years back, but there are some changes that will make it more palatable this year, or so the originators think.
2. Lawrence Zynda made a brief presentation as to why he is thinking of running for mayor.
3. The campaign manager for Lori Saldana made a presentation as to her running for mayor as an Independent this year against the current mayor. It should be noted that she has always been a Democrat, but the party treated her poorly during the Filner fiasco, and although her beliefs are primarily those of the party, she will run as an Independent.
4. Martha Welch gave a very brief presentation as to why we should vote for her, but there was no literature about her campaign and I am not sure what office she is running for.
The main focus of this meeting was to meet the candidates that are running for City Attorney and hear why we should vote for them.
There are five individuals running for the office currently held by Jan Goldsmith. Four of those running were at the meeting, and each one was allowed time to speak and answer questions. Not in attendance was Robert Hickey, the only Republican running for the office at this time.
- Gil Cabrera is a private attorney who helped overhaul the city’s lobbying ordinance as chairman of the San Diego Ethics Commission.
- Rafael Castellanos is a private sector attorney that serves as a Port Commission board member and is a leader of the San Diego La Raza Lawyers association.
- Mara Elliott currently works in the Goldsmith office and helped reform city contracting policies.
- Bryan Pease is a private sector attorney with experience in government, nonprofit and private industries. He has areputation for being an environmentalist; a protector of human rights.
The four attorney’s were all impressive in their own rights. Each one of them had a different focus, but all agreed that there needs to be changes to the pension plan; the Charger proposed stadium; housing for the homeless.
The club members were asked to vote, using a secret ballot, to endorse of those speaking tonight. After four ballots, none of the attorney’s received enough votes to have the clubs endorsement.
The reason for that was that the majority of the audience felt that any of the speakers would be an asset to the City Attorney’s office, and it would be too difficult to make an intelligent decision after only hearing them speak for a few minutes tonight. The 5th and final vote was an interesting “all are acceptable.”
In other club information it was announced that our very own John Loughlin was named the “Volunteer of the Year 2016.” He will be given the award at the “Roosevelt Dinner” to be held on April 2nd at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront Hotel.
In one additional endorsement by the members, Chris Ward, Marty Block’s Chief of Staff, was endorsed for Representative for the 3rd district City Council distirct.
The next meeting will be held March 20th, at 4:00pm.
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