by Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer
Hello neighbor. As a third-generation San Diegan who grew up in this beautiful region, I am so excited to be your new representative on the County Board of Supervisors.
Every 10 years, our district boundaries are redrawn to group communities together in ways that make sense based on our changing population, so I’m excited to welcome Ocean Beach to San Diego County District 3, which covers most of our coast from Carlsbad to Coronado, as well as Mira Mesa, Rancho Peñasquitos, and University City.
I look forward to working alongside you to champion the investments that Ocean Beach and Point Loma deserves! But first, let me tell you a little about myself.
I grew up in Mission Hills, graduated from La Jolla High, and earned my bachelor’s degree from Yale and both my law degree and my Ph.D. from New York University. Now I live in Encinitas while raising my nearly 3-year-old daughter.
I’ve worn many hats in my professional career, including as a senior advisor in President Obama’s administration, a professor of public policy and economics, a community organizer for environmental justice and civil rights, and an environmental legal expert for the World Bank.
More recently I started my own small business, led backpacking outdoor education trips for disadvantaged youth, and trained as a certified EMT (which came in handy when I helped to administer COVID-19 vaccinations last year!). As you might be able to tell, I am always looking for ways to make a difference, which is why I love serving our community as a County Supervisor.
I ran for office in 2020 because I believe that our County government can and must be a force for good to address the big problems facing our region, such as homelessness, traffic, climate change, housing affordability, and protecting our coastlines and open spaces.
I believe data is key to ensuring government agencies make smart decisions and achieve progress in solving problems. Facts and evidence are essential to making our County more efficient, effective, and fair.
Take homelessness for example. We need more services and housing, especially for people suffering from mental illness, but right now our region’s top provider of homeless beds and mental health services isn’t a hospital or non-profit — it’s San Diego County jails. Putting people who are sick, poor, or without a home behind bars costs taxpayers a lot of money while doing nothing to address the root causes of these problems.
Last year the County Board of Supervisors approved my proposal to analyze public safety data to find alternatives to jailing people experiencing homelessness or mental health issues, so people can get more effective help and we can invest in more permanent solutions. We also launched a County-wide program to dispatch trained clinicians, instead of law enforcement, when someone is experiencing a mental health crisis.
Public safety is important to all of us. As a mom, I’m taking action to protect our community and children from gun violence. We recently passed an ordinance to partner with our District Attorney in cracking down on Ghost Guns, to keep these untraceable firearms out of the wrong hands.
I’m also a lifelong surfer, rock climber, and outdoor guide, so I am very focused on safeguarding our beaches and coastlines, fighting for our environment, and protecting our wild open spaces.
Keeping our beaches clean starts with keeping pollution out of the water. I’m making the repair of stormwater infrastructure a priority for the County so we can stop toxic runoff, fertilizers, and other chemicals from washing into our streams and oceans when it rains.
We recently approved a landmark comprehensive Native Plants plan to expand local vegetation, so we can protect our fragile and unique Southern California ecosystem, and make our backcountry and coastal habitats more resilient.
And I will continue to stand against sprawl development that increases fire risk and traffic and bulldozes our beautiful backcountry.
We live at the crossroads of this generation’s greatest challenge and greatest opportunity: climate change. After the previous Board’s climate action plan was thrown-out in court for being so meaningless that it didn’t even meet bare minimum state standards, we’re now working on a regional decarbonization plan to end carbon emissions in our region by 2035. San Diego’s economic future lies in the green economy, so our regional decarbonization plan is also a green jobs plan. In collaboration with global experts at UCSD and USD, we are working to ensure that people who make their livelihoods in carbon-emitting industries like natural gas land on their feet with good-paying careers in clean sectors like wind and solar.
Finally, I’m focused every day on strengthening our local economy and helping people and businesses devastated by the COVID-19 pandemic. I’ve joined my board colleagues to direct $50 million in relief money to struggling small businesses and launched a paid green jobs training program for local young people whose careers were interrupted by the pandemic. I am also partnering with leading employees in hi-tech and biotech to ensure our region can keep attracting the talent we need, and develop our local workforce.
I am honored to work with you to make the County work for all of us. Please feel free to contact me at terra.lawson-remer@sdcounty.ca.gov or call my office at 619-531-5533 if I can be of service.
With gratitude,
Terra
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Dear readers: here’s our chance to let Supervisor Lawson-Remer know what issues are important to OBceans and Point Lomans. You know, like OB Pier funding, saving palm trees, STVRs, the 30 foot height limit, … and pickleball?
Frank,
She is way up the coast in Encinitas, home to multi-million dolla homes, pretty beaches, fantastic restaurants, wine bars and wealthy people, that’s her peeps, not us,
Kev K-love Harris
With the exception of fantastic restaurants, that’s also OB.
Both of Terra’s parents, Larry and Shari, lived in OB during those heady days of the early seventies. And both were deeply involved in the anti-Vietnam war movement.
Hi Frank. Thanks for the shout-out to my mom and dad. I forgot to mention that I was born while my parents still lived in a little apartment in OB. Most Saturdays my Dad would take me to get a roast beef sandwich at Poma’s to eat at the end of the OB Pier. I like Encinitas because it reminds me a lot of OB when I was a kid. I am so stoked to have OB in District 3!!
Welcome, welcome. I know you once had a writing gig with the Nation mag. Carrying on your parents’ traditions, no doubt. Just a word of advice: stay tune to local issues and please weigh in if you think it’s appropriate (like the airport / FAA / City boondoggle with the palms). A lot of folks feel that government has passed them by. You can make them understand ‘someone’s listening.’
I have one easy solution (well I guess nothing is easy with Gov’t) for our new Supervisor related to public health and keeping our oceans clear – lobby the city to pick up trash from public bins more often, and make them more available!
I know with this crowd I don’t have to explain much…. just drive down Newport or Voltaire to see each public bin stuffed beyond capacity EVERY SINGLE DAY. Like… literally every single day. It’s so bad now that even by my house off upper Voltaire the bins are always overstuffed. It all goes right into the storm drains. And we are still using the same (!!!) bins on the beaches that were there decades ago!
Match that against other major tourist cities, and I have never seen such poor trash infrastructure as I have in San Diego. It’s mystifying.