State-Of-The-City by Mayor Gloria: Playing the Part vs. Doing the Job

By Kate Callen

San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria’s 2026 “State of the City” address began hitting turbulence on January 14, the day before he delivered it.

His long-time ally Voice of San Diego (VOSD) shocked the city that morning with a takedown of the mayor’s leadership. Will Huntsberry’s “Disappointment Follows Gloria Into Sixth Year” described an executive in free fall with few achievements and fewer friends.

Later that day, word filtered out that the City Council would hold a special meeting at 1:00 p.m., two hours before Gloria’s speech, to allow public comment on a talk that hadn’t yet been given.

The hastily arranged meeting was sparsely attended. Most speakers railed against Immigration and Customs Enforcement abuses, entirely off topic, but Council President Joe La Cava allowed it.

The few speakers who stayed on topic echoed themes in the VOSD article: The mayor has lost the people’s trust. He has squandered money on expensive hires. He prefers cutting ribbons to carrying out tough decisions.

When Gloria stepped to the podium, he was under intense pressure to give a pivotal speech. Would he squarely face the challenges that plague his city? Or would he spin his record, carp about obstacles, and weave a rosy picture of the future?

Take a guess.

Gloria is a gifted political performer. That was on display in the Chambers. One moment, he was heartfelt, feeling the pain of a distressed public. The next, he was bellicose in a Dirty Harry sort of way: Let me be crystal clear. That is completely unacceptable. We do not shrink from challenges; we rise to them.

But tough scripts only get you so far. At some point, you have to do the job, and your success or failure will be the bottom line. A mayor in his sixth year who expresses frustration with his city’s woes has lost all credibility.

And an Etch-A-Sketch leader who can neither admit nor learn from his mistakes will keep careening from one fiasco to another.

Take the Civic Center. In 2023, after Gloria announced a fast-track proposal to redevelop the 8-acre parcel, I wrote a Union-Tribune commentary urging him to consider questions raised in a report by the San Diego County Taxpayers Association.

The report offered a blueprint for avoiding another municipal failure: “The city must demonstrate a sustained high level of transparency, robust public involvement at each step of the process, a timeline sufficient to guarantee that public involvement, and safeguards to protect taxpayers from outcomes like we have seen at 101 Ash Street.”

After heeding none of that advice, and after his VIP Civic Center committee issued a 17-page paper with concepts like “Celebrate Democracy” and “Shift Paradigms,” Gloria abruptly shelved the project in December 2024. No explanations. No post-mortem analysis. He just moved on.

Now Civic Center redevelopment is back on the table. In a section of his state-of speech about building housing on city-owned land, Gloria said, “That also includes this Civic Center property where I know we can reimagine and activate it to the benefit of the people of San Diego.”

“Reimagine and activate” sounds lofty. But what exactly does that mean?

In his comprehensive VOSD reporting, Huntsberry emphasizes the gulf between Gloria’s exalted rhetoric and his meager successes.

“Throughout his career, he made big promises on public transit and climate change, but when presented with an opportunity to advance those goals, he caved.

He pledged to fix the city’s structural budget deficit once and for all. But despite passing controversial new fees and making cuts, the deficit remains — and threatens to cripple city services and investments in infrastructure.’

The most startling line in Huntsberry’s story is Gloria’s candid statement that “being a big city mayor is a difficult job.” He actually seems surprised by this.

It’s hard to see how this exasperated mayor will endure the final three years of a term that is off to a dreadful start. But there is a glimmer of hope on his horizon. He told his state-of audience that next year, he will assume the presidency of the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

“For the first time, San Diego will lead this organization,” he said, “and I will do so with a laser focus on building more homes and bringing costs down.”

Gloria has always had national ambitions. His talents as a political performer should help him thrive in this largely ceremonial post. Perhaps a new stage will provide an escape from his difficult job here at home.