San Diego’s Mixed Electoral Results
It Was Bedtime for the Lincoln Club but also for Local Tax Measures
It turns out that even a million-dollar miracle was not enough to elevate Larry Turner to competitive status with a relatively unpopular mayor, which made the Lincoln Club sad and left local NIMBYs nothing to celebrate but the failure of measures G and E and the future gutting of city services for folks in less affluent areas of the city.
As Michael Smolens pointed out in the San Diego Union-Tribune, it appears measure E got more support from underserved communities of concern that have historically gotten the short end of the stick when it comes to parks, libraries, and other things, which voters in more affluent areas already enjoy:
The geographic breakdown on the Measure E vote in San Diego shows a familiar split. Its strongest support came from less-affluent, ethnically diverse Democratic communities south of Interstate 8 — areas that often have long complained about being short-changed on public services. Opposition was strongest in more affluent, less Democratic northern neighborhoods with better city services, along with some coastal areas.
On a purely economic level, that may seem counterintuitive. The people who likely are most stressed by the high cost of living were the most game to raise their own taxes.
Thus, rather than San Diego getting a chance to show how Democratic rule can succeed here and (hopefully) elsewhere in blue states as an alternative model to Trumpism, we’ll likely be faced with budget cuts and scarcity that will fall most heavily on the backs of the poor. Historically speaking, this is simply San Diego returning to its norm where the quality of life south of I-8 and east of I-5 simply matters less than it does in the picture postcard communities by the coast and in the more affluent suburbs.
California has, since the days of Proposition 13, tended to want big things without having to pay for them. Now that history will repeat itself, and we may have to go through a generation of busted budgets to relearn an old lesson. The national election has surely bought us an assault on all things “blue state” so local Democratic officials across the board have a tough road in front of them.
How will we provide much needed infrastructure, improve city services, and provide a socially just, sustainable future without the adequate funds to do so? The answer is that we may have a bigger hole to crawl out from for a generation to come, making it harder for San Diego’s Democratic supermajority at the city level and the thin majority at the county level to not just hold the line against Trumpian assaults but also to attempt to reverse the paralyzing effects of generations of Republican rule that came before them.
On a positive note, we will not have to deal with the cartoonish Larry Turner nor the serial loser Kevin Faulconer for four years as local comic relief from the dystopian Trump circus at the national level. With Terra Lawson-Remer on the San Diego Country Board of Supervisors we have a real progressive leader to help chart the course through difficult waters. The re-election of Sean Elo-Rivera is also an encouraging sign for those looking for a champion for social justice at the city level armed with an entirely Democratic City Council.
In sum, all is not lost.