Morning Report: Election Results 

This post has been updated.

Even before results began to roll in, yesterday’s primary didn’t seem to offer many chances for big surprises. That lukewarm, dare we say boring, forecast largely turned out to be true.

Incumbents have racked up big leads, there are no real partisan flip flops in the electorate and name recognition has paid off.

There are some significant takeaways, so here’s what you need to know.

D4: City Council Seat 

In the District Four race to replace newly-minted Supervisor Monica Montgomery-Steppe, the former councilmember’s deputy, Henry Foster III opened a wide lead over Chida Warren-Darby, Mayor Todd Gloria’s director of boards and commissions. Last night’s drop showed Foster with 54 percent of the vote against Warren-Darby’s 27 percent.

Background: Montgomery Steppe vacated this seat after getting elected to the County Board of Supervisors. The City Council district includes the neighborhoods of Encanto, Paradise Hills, Lincoln Park, Oak Park, Mountain View, Valencia Park and Webster. 

Mayor and City Council Races in San Diego 

Early results show Mayor Todd Gloria will face police officer Larry Turner in November. Gloria and Turner were the top two vote-getters as of Tuesday 8:30 p.m.  Attorney Geneviéve Jones-Wright was trailing Turner by about nine points.

Something to keep in mind: The lawsuit challenging Turner’s residency just got more interesting. Allies of Mayor Gloria accused Turner of not living in San Diego at the time he filed papers to run for mayor. He owns a home in East County but registered to vote last year using an address of a condo downtown. A judge last month ruled that he could remain on the ballot for the primary. A trial date is set for March 29.  City leaders said if he is disqualified, the third-place finisher, which will be Geneviéve Jones-Wright, would move to the runoff. 

District 3: Incumbent Stephen Whitburn held a commanding lead in his council race with 55 percent of the vote. He will move on to the general election with either homeless advocate and attorney Coleen Cusack or former journalist Kate Callen, who had 18 and 17 percent respectively.

District 9: Council President Sean Elo-Rivera has also built up a comfortable lead, still, he’s the only council candidate who didn’t yet have a majority of the vote. With about 48 percent of the vote, Elo-Rivera is set to go up against former San Diego police officer Terry Hoskins, who so far has about 34 percent.

City attorney: There are only two candidates running for San Diego city attorney and that means they will both make it to the runoff. So nothing was at stake. Or maybe a lot was at stake.

Brian Maienschein, who used to be on the San Diego City Council and later ran and lost a race for city attorney before winning a state Assembly seat several times, looks like he came in a few points behind Heather Ferbert, the chief deputy city attorney who has never won an election before.

Maienschein had the support of the Democratic Party, Mayor Todd Gloria and many other high profile institutions and donors. Ferbert had the support of current City Attorney Mara Elliott, Ferbert’s boss and the largest union of city employees, the Municipal Employees Association.

But Ferbert had something her boss also had that vaulted her above her rivals eight years ago: the title of chief deputy city attorney. Will new endorsements now follow a good primary showing?

There’s Still Time for Chula Vista Council Race to Shift in Cardenas’ Favor

It’s unclear if Chula Vista voters will dump former Councilwoman Andrea Cardenas. She was in third place as of Tuesday night, but it could take several days for that race to resolve. 

Chula Vista Elementary School District trustee Cesar Fernandez was leading the race, former Chula Vista Councilman Rudy Ramirez was in second with Cardenas less than 20 votes behind.  

Remember: Late last month, Cardenas pleaded guilty to two counts of grand theft for fraudulently obtaining thousands in Covid-relief funds. She’s set to return to court for a sentencing hearing in August. 

75th Assembly District

Leading the race for the 75th Assembly District is Carl DeMaio, a Republican talk show host and former San Diego councilmember. The district encompasses a vast portion of northern and eastern San Diego County. 

Democrat Kevin Juza was in second and Republican Andrew Hayes in third as of Tuesday night. The seat is typically a safe Republican seat, so the race could lean in DeMaio’s favor in November if he faces off against Juza. As our Deborah Brennan reported, that’s sort of what DeMaio was banking on in the first place. 

79th Assembly District

Assemblywoman Akilah Weber is well positioned to take over the state Senate seat that Senate President Toni Atkins will be vacating. But the race to replace Weber in the 79th Assembly District is going to be a big intra-Democratic Party battle. Colin Parent will advance to the runoff but the count to join him there is too close to call. The latest count has La Mesa Mayor Racquel Vasquez leading LaShae Sharp-Collins by 4 percentage points. 

49th Congressional District 

Three-term incumbent Democrat Rep. Mike Levin and Republican business owner Matt Gunderson took early leads in San Diego and Orange County. The coastal North County and Orange County congressional district is considered the region’s most competitive. Republican Margarita Wilkinson, a former media executive, had spent heavily and criticized Gunderson. 

Funding to Shift to Mental Health and Addiction Treatment Facilities 

Early returns on Tuesday night show voter support for a mental health ballot measure that would fund mental health and drug treatment facilities. It was leading by 51 percent to 49 percent, but it’s still too early to call. Our Lisa Halverstadt dug into what this proposition would mean for San Diego, if it passes. Read more here. 

City Auditor’s Report: Housing Commission Overpaid for Hotel

The San Diego Housing Commission likely paid about $6.7 million more than it should have for a Mission Valley Hotel it purchased in 2020 to convert to housing for homeless people. That’s according to a report released Tuesday by San Diego’s Office of the City Auditor on the agency’s scandal-plagued acquisition of the Hotel Circle Residence Inn. 

That overpayment came because, despite purchasing the Hotel Circle Residence Inn in August 2020, the Housing Commission based the price on a valuation from February 2020, a month before the Covid pandemic sent hotel prices into decline, as former Managing Editor Andrew Keatts revealed in 2021.

Background: Longtime Voice readers will remember this scandal we uncovered. Keatts revealed that the Housing Commission hired a broker, Jim Neil, to help it buy two hotels. The broker then invested in the company that owned one of the hotels he later recommended the Commission purchase. Then the Housing Commission paid what the auditor now confirms was a price inflated by the decision to appraise it by its status before the pandemic. 

Read more about the auditor’s report here. 

Song of the Week 

San Pedro El Cortez, “Asco”: San Pedro’s knack for hooky, crunchy garage punk is on full display in “Asco.” It’s the kind of sound supercharged by youth and bad decisions. It’s all simple enough but delivered with a genuineness that’s not easily faked. That’s part of what makes San Pedro’s music so good – the sense that the only thing they really give a damn about is playing loud and having a damn good time. 

Read more about the Song of the Week here. 

Like what you hear? Check out San Pedro El Cortez at Tower Bar on Saturday, March 10. 

Do you have a “Song of the Week” suggestion? Shoot us an email and a sentence or two about why you’ve been bumping this song lately. Friendly reminder: all songs should be by local artists. 

In Other News 

• Opinion: As a coalition of rodeo-supporters mobilize to oppose Councilmember Kent Lee’s ban on rodeos within city limits, one Chilean UCSD professor with Native American roots who supports the ban argues in an op-ed for Voice that “it is possible for us to both cherish history and culture, while also supporting progressive ideas such as cruelty free entertainment.”
• The other side: Local tribal leaders argue in response that San Diego’s City Council needs to consider the importance of rodeos in the traditions of indigenous people. They write that the city of Los Angeles failed to engage with the community when pursuing a ban on rodeos. They don’t want San Diego to make that mistake, they write in an op-ed for Voice. 
• While emergency repairs to a stretch of railroad tracks in San Clemente alone could carry a $200 million price tag, Orange County transit authorities are monitoring six other sections of track that could be at risk. (Union-Tribune)
• The Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians has become one of fewer than a dozen tribes to gain EPA approval to enforce its own water quality standards on reservation-land. (Union-Tribune)
• A new 48-person homeless shelter just outside of Vista’s city limits is now accepting residents. (KPBS)
• A San Diego resident is the first American to have been arrested and charged with smuggling the greenhouse gases hydrofluorocarbons into the country via regulations adopted in 2020. (CBS)
• Correction: In the original version of this post, we wrote that the Municipal Employees Association had spent on behalf of Heather Ferbert, a candidate for San Diego city attorney. The union endorsed her but had not spent money to support her. 
• Correction: In the original version of this post, incorrectly described Racquel Vasquez. She is the mayor of Lemon Grove.

The Morning Report was written by Andrea Lopez-Villafaña, Tigist Layne and Jakob McWhinney. It was edited by Andrea Lopez-Villafaña and Scott Lewis.