East County Residents To Vote On Marijuana Tax, Development And Term Limit Measures

Speaker 1: 00:00 The biggest and most consequential election choices in San Diego East County this year are undoubtedly the 50th district congressional race and the choice of County supervisor in district two. Now we've covered both of those races frequently at KPBS, and you can find our coverage of them in the voter's guide section of our website, kpbs.org. But the two big races are not the only election stories coming out of the cities of alcohol and lemon Grove Santee. And Lamesa, there are many oral races, lots of city council seats up for grabs and propositions over development term limits and school bonds. Joining me is San Diego union Tribune, East County reporter Karen Perlman, and Karen, welcome to the program. Speaker 2: 00:45 Thanks for having me guys appreciate it. Speaker 1: 00:48 Now, before we get into the candidate races, let's talk about the issues on the ballot. Santee residents are voting on a proposition similar to a countywide one that was rejected by voters in March. What would proposition and do if passed, Speaker 2: 01:04 If pass it allow the voters in Santee to decide on plans that are going to change from the general plan. Speaker 1: 01:10 So it's basically about development. New gets to give the green light to it. Speaker 2: 01:14 Exactly. Instead of the city council, the, uh, the voters will have the say. Speaker 1: 01:19 Now Santi residents are also deciding between two measures that would set term limits for elected officials. What are the differences between those two measures Speaker 2: 01:29 Measure Q was started by citizens and it allows the mayor or city council to only have three consecutive four year terms, uh, and measure our, which the city put out in response to the other one, uh, establishes a limit of three consecutive four year terms for city council, but does not include the mayor. The mayor is separate and would have a limit of two consecutive four year terms. So the sign included with the citizens measure queue, but it would be separate for the mayor with measure R and I'm assuming, Speaker 1: 01:58 I mean, there are no term limits now on these. Okay. So Councilman Steven Houlihan has given up his council seat to challenge Santee mayor, John Minto. Can you tell us about that race? Speaker 2: 02:12 Yes. So Steven Houlihan has been on the city council since 2016 and he has been kind of the dissenting voice on the city council for a long time on things like development. He is more for smart developments and less governmental, uh, ruling about those kinds of things. Minto has been on the, uh, city council since, gosh, I want to say 2012, maybe, uh, he's been mayor for one term and he's going for his second term. And he feeling Speaker 1: 02:44 About who's got the advantage in this race. Speaker 2: 02:46 It's hard to say because of, uh, proposition N which is the one about the developments. Steven Houlihan was one of the people who wrote that measure up along with a guy named van Collins worth who runs a, uh, preserve Santee, which is a political action group, but it's environmentally based. So Houlihan has been kind of the, uh, anti-development, I shouldn't say anti-development because he's not against it. He just wants it to be in line with the general plan. And there's a lot of people who are of that mindset right now. They're unhappy about finito ranch, which is the 3000 home development that the city council passed a couple months ago. And he has been very outspoken about that project, not wanting it to have gone through the way that it did. So Minto, you know, he has a lot more years on the city council and he's got a lot more experience. He's a retired police officer with San Diego city and, uh, just different kinds of experience for the two of them and different viewpoints on things I would say. And it's really hard to tell right now because they both seem to have a lot of backers. Speaker 1: 03:50 Okay. Then let's move on to the city of lemon Grove. And they're deciding that city is deciding on a mayor and a couple of city council members is the city's economy. The big issue in this race. Speaker 2: 04:02 Yes, it is. I wrote a story last year about possibly them just incorporating because of the financial issues that have been really getting worse for them. They only have 25,000 people in that city and they don't have a real big business. Boom. So there's not a lot of taxes that they get from people. So their finances have been troubled for a while. They tried to pass a sales tax earlier this year in March and it didn't pass, but they put a measure on the ballot this year for putting tax on medical marijuana. Now, as far as I know, there's only one dispensary in the city, but they allowed it since 2016. And this way, if it passes, there'll be able to get some sales tax money from the medical marijuana. Speaker 1: 04:47 And that would be measured Jay, on the lemon Grove ballot. And how much money would that be expected to generate if it passes, Speaker 2: 04:55 It's expected to generate between $560,001.1 million and would go for municipal expenses, fire safety, Rose recreation Speaker 1: 05:05 In the city of Lamesa is the fallout from the civil unrest last summer, playing any role in the races for city council? I would say, Speaker 2: 05:13 Yes, there's been some chatter about different new candidates that are saying that they want more police accountability, but the people that are running for city council, the two incumbents, Christina, Alicia, and column parent have also expressed the same feelings they want more done for the police department to be more transparent. They've had quite a few meetings about the new police chief, the old police chief retired on August 13th, and they've been trying to find a replacement for him. And I would say that it's a very big topic, the social justice, um, and what happened in may in that city when a lot of the businesses were looted and there were two banks in a building that were set on fire and there was just a lot of unrest. So I would say that that's a big deal in that city, as far as you know, how they're responding to the police and the relationship between the police and the city, the police and the residents Speaker 1: 06:07 And East county's largest city alcohol. And there are two competitive council races. One of the big issues in those races Speaker 2: 06:15 [inaudible] has a homeless issue that they've been trying to deal with for a long time. I think that they've done actually more than other cities have done. They've got a couple of places where the homeless people would get taken care of. There's home, start this work with them. There's crisis house. They have the alcohol, excuse me, East County, transitional living center. I would say that that's part of what their concerns are. And also opening back up again. There's been some talk about the businesses. There's a lot of businesses and alcohol and a lot of mom and poppers that have struggled because of COVID-19 closure. So they've been talking about how to reopen the city safely so that their businesses can thrive again. Speaker 1: 06:54 And finally, is there any indication of what turnout has been like so far? Speaker 2: 06:59 Um, I don't know the answer to that. I hope that it's in line with the rest of the County. I think people are pretty involved and engaged, but I'm very tuned into the issues and, uh, more of the candidates and what they're saying about things as they go along this versus the people have they've voted already or not. So I really don't know what that's going to be like. And I'm, I'm interested in seeing that. Actually, Speaker 1: 07:21 I have been speaking with San Diego union Tribune, East County reporter, Karen Perlman. Karen, thank you so much. Speaker 2: 07:28 Thank you.