Why We Support San Diego’s Elected Community Planning Groups
By Larry Turner, Kate Callen, Terry Hoskins
For more than a half-century, San Diego’s community planning groups (CPGs) have been acclaimed as a national model of local democracy. As the City’s website states, CPGs elected by their communities have been “formal mechanisms [that] provide citizens with an opportunity for involvement.”
This model of democracy is now under siege.
Mayor Todd Gloria, with the complicity of all nine City Councilmembers, is poised to remove elected CPG members and replace them with unelected members of his own choosing.
That is not democracy. That is autocracy, and it is exactly why we are running as challengers to Mayor Gloria, Council President Sean Elo-Rivera, and Councilmember Stephen Whitburn in the March 2024 primaries.
The rationale given by Gloria and his building industry allies for overturning CPG elections is that the groups lack diversity. Some CPGs do need greater representation of renters, young people, and people of color. But diversity must be achieved by being inclusive, not by being exclusive.
We won’t have more diverse planning groups until we can persuade people from every demographic group to run for those seats. For years, all-volunteer CPG leaders have struggled to recruit underrepresented candidates. They have pleaded with City Hall for help in identifying and adopting “best practices” in diversity recruitment. The Mayor and the Council have ignored those pleas.
Disenfranchising people from serving in elected offices because they are the “wrong” age, ethnicity, and/or income group is completely unacceptable. If we are elected, we will fully support the autonomy of CPGs and their crucial role in local democracy.
Today, we call on Gloria, Elo-Rivera, and Whitburn to uphold the electoral process. Current planning groups were chosen by your constituents in communities you serve. As elected officials yourselves who are running to keep your seats, it is in your own best interests to embrace the work done by your planning groups. Please join our good-faith effort to foster their inclusivity and expand their impact.
The authors are candidates in the City of San Diego’s March 5 primary elections: Turner for mayor, Callen for Council District 3, and Hoskins for Council District 9.
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