Q&A: Marni von Wilpert, candidate for San Diego City Council District 5

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The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board interviewed four candidates in the San Diego City Council District 5 race ahead of the March 3, 2020, primary election in which the top two vote-getters race will advance to a runoff election in November. Below is the transcript of our Oct. 19, 2019, interview with Marni von Wilpert, who is running to succeed Mark Kersey in a district that represents residents in Black Mountain Ranch, Rancho Bernardo, Rancho Peñasquitos, San Pasqual, Torrey Highlands and other communities. This interview was transcribed using the digital transcription service Temi and checked for accuracy by a staffer. To call any errors to our attention or to ask any questions about our interviews, please email matthew.hall@sduniontribune.com with the subject line “election interviews.”

Union-Tribune: Thanks for joining us, Marni. Tell us why you decided to run for district five.

Von Wilpert: Well first I want to say thank you to you guys. I grew up reading the Union-Tribune and I’m a subscriber and I’m actually really worried about what our current president is saying about the media in terms of being an enemy of the people and that couldn’t be farther from the truth. And I see him really turning a lot of his party that way. So I think local journalism is incredibly important, especially now more than ever. So I just wanted to put that on the record and say thank you for what you do. You hold the city and governments accountable? ... So my name is Marni von Wilpert. I am running for San Diego city council district five. I grew up in the district in Scripps Ranch and then went to all public schools, all my life here in San Diego. And I want to make sure that every kid and every family in San Diego has the same opportunity for a brighter future that I did. And to me that means making sure that we take care of our environment and fight climate change, it means we make sure we have real solutions to homelessness and housing affordability and making sure we’re attracting jobs that pay people enough to live in the houses that we have for them here. And very important to me is making sure we have leadership in our government that says, you know, no matter what gender you are, what you look like, what religion you have, you deserve to be treated with dignity and respect and given an equal opportunity to thrive in our country. And so that’s the kind of leadership I want to reflect in city hall.

Meet other candidates in the race below:

Q: What, uh, what’s your plan to address the homelessness issue? What do you think the city’s, of the city’s efforts so far in particular? The most recent plan?

A: So, uh, I’m a deputy city attorney and I actually currently work on homelessness every single day in my job. Um, a lot of my job is to work with our San Diego police department, our environmental services department for clean and safe streets programs. So I, I do work on it every single day. I can’t breach, um, attorney client confidentiality. So I can’t go into too much detail of those specifics of what I do. But I can tell you about what I think and what my general values are in this. So one thing that I’m glad to see the city have done is to put a strategic plan in place. We didn’t have that for a long time. I think it’s a great start. I don’t think the strategic plan that came out goes far enough. I liked the goals of having reducing homeless unsheltered homelessness by 50% in three years. It’s good that we have a new numerical goal we can aspire to, but I don’t see us doing connecting the dots in the right way. So ... the main things that I’m talking about on the campaign trail with homelessness is, yes, we need housing. People can afford to live in and it all skills of the income spectrum, middle of the middle income, low income, all of it. But housing is only one part of the solution. We’re not, if we only call it homelessness, that presupposes the solution is only housing. It is also mental health where you’re not doing enough to provide people with mental health resources in the city. And I’ve been on ride alongs with police officers in my district up in Northeastern division where everyone thinks that homelessness is not as much of an issue. It’s there, it’s just hidden. We had almost 4,000 students who are homeless enrolled in the Poway school district last year... a school board member told me this, and, when I’m on the campaign trail, people will say, I’m glad you spoke about homelessness. I have a young girl living on my couch. She goes to high school with my daughter because her parents are going through mental health issues or opioid addiction.

(K.C. Alfred / San Diego Union-Tribune)

She can’t be home. Or students who say, I’ve come out as LGBTQ to my parents and they kicked me out. It’s happening up in district five, but we’re not talking about as much. We’re not addressing it. But we went to a 5150 call, which is, you know, somebody who can’t, um, it’s a danger to themselves or others can’t help themselves. And we go on a police, I’m on a ride along and our PERT officers are with us, and I know y’all know what PERT is, but for everybody, it’s our psychiatric emergency response team of clinicians and we’re in Rancho Penasquitos in a very beautiful community. And the police officer turns to me and says, Marni, I’ve been to his house before. I know what’s going to happen. This young man has schizophrenia, he’s 24. This woman, she’s a single mom, has two other kids. She has no options. We’re going to take him to an emergency room because I guarantee you she’s calling because he stopped his meds again. And then we’re going to sit there for four hours and have the police officer and me off the beat for four hours while we wait for an emergency room bed to open. And that’s their only solution. And then he’s going to be treated and brought right back to where he is. So we need to make sure we have actual mental health crisis centers that are not attached to a hospital because the ER is the most expensive way to treat somebody and a place where police can actually drop off folks and they don’t have to stay and it provides real treatment and family members can self identify it and bring folks in. I know the county has to work on that and that’s one of the things I liked about the strategic plan that just came out is they noted that the county and the city are not working together like they should. And the state audit on our hepatitis A crisis said the same thing.

So I’m glad Todd Gloria’s bill came in to clarify the role of public health officers and next time we have a public health emergency, um, the grand jury report found the same thing. The county and the city are not working well enough together. So I’m glad to see they want closer collaboration. But beyond housing and mental health, it’s also addiction. We’re not calling it addiction and we should be, I know there was some talk about substance use treatment in navigating folks to substance use treatment in the plan, but not nearly enough. I mean I’m one of the lead litigators for the city of San Diego on the opioid lawsuit. I am suing Purdue pharmaceuticals, the Sackler family and McKesson, Johnson, & Johnson, all of them, for what the opioid crisis has done to our community. And we’ve had over 2,000 overdose deaths in the county alone in the last year. And we’re not talking as much about addiction on our streets as we need to be. So where do you bring somebody who’s suffering from addiction? I strongly believe that medicated assisted treatment is a great way out of our addiction crisis, Suboxone, whatever we need to get folks on in doctor’s care. But if we go to, if we only have a housing navigation center that supposes we’re only navigating to housing, and that’s what I’m saying, we’re only calling it hello housing and homelessness. We need that navigation center to navigate immediately to assisted treatment and care immediately to mental health resources. So one of the programs I’m really happy to see the city doing is our SMART program. And I apologize, I’m probably gonna ruin the acronym. It’s a misdemeanant assessment treatment program. SMART is the acronym, I can get you the actual word, but we, the city through a lot of grant funding, bought a motel down near Otay Mesa and they retrofitted it to be for misdemeanants who are in and out of our criminal justice system. A lot of homeless folks, low level crimes to support their habits, either alcoholism or drugs. And so it’s housing for them. So it’s an old motel that we retrofitted, but it’s also supportive services. So you can be in there for six months to two years. So you’re off the street, but we’re not just putting you in a room where you can then overdose in the room or have a mental health, you know, hallucination in the room. You’re actually getting services to get back on your feet. And that’s what I want to see us doing. So housing first is great. I believe in that, but not housing only. So these are the things I think we should be doing. I also think we need to work with the state government a lot more effectively. I am on all of the HUD listservs for the state since I work on homelessness here at the city. And I see daily the grant awards that are coming out. And Governor Newsom just signed a whole slew of housing and homelessness bills to try and help. But we need to make sure we have relationships with our city, our county in our state that are all working together. And that’s one of the reasons I think I’m the best candidate for this seat is because I am already making relationships in Sacramento. So I’ve been endorsed by Brian Maienschein, state assembly member, Toni Atkins, state Senate president pro tem, Lorena Gonzales. And when I’ve been knocking doors in my community, especially in Scripps Ranch, I’ve been talking to neighbors and fire safety’s a big deal for us. Um, I was a junior in college. My father called me in 2003 and said, honey, what do you want from your bedroom? We’re being evacuated. Your friends’ houses burned. And I said, I don’t know, my dog and my little brother. And he said, they’re in the car already. What else do you want? And uh, luckily our home was safe, but a lot, we lost almost 500 homes. So I’m talking to folks and they’re telling me, Marni, we’re losing our homeowners insurance. They’re cutting it because we’re at [fire risk]. So I heard this five, six, 10 times at the door. So the first thing I did was call Brian Maienschein’s chief of staff, Lance. I said, hey, can we have coffee? I want to tell you what I’m hearing from our community because Brian was really great in [dealing with the] fires and people still tell me that when I knocked doors. And so we did it. We had coffee. He said, listen, I’ve been hearing this too. I’m glad you told me. We’re going to have Brian meet with Ricardo, the head of the state insurance commission, and we’re going to talk about what to do. And those are the kinds of relationships we need statewide to really serve our city. And those are the favorite, the relationships that I have already.

Q: One quick question on homelessness. What do you think about conservatorship? This concept?

A: I think it’s a, it’s a tool we need to investigate and very carefully because we have to balance making sure that people’s liberties aren’t taken away without due process, without any right to make sure it’s actually going to be a good solution for them. I mean liberty’s a very important value for all of us, but it could be a good tool in the tool belt to help reduce our homelessness on the street. Cause there are people who are unable to make decisions for themselves a lot of the time. And I believe in compassion, but I don’t think it’s compassionate to let people with severe mental illness ride on our streets by themselves. And so if a conservatorship is the right tool for that person, then I think it’s something we should consider and should be used. But that goes back to my original point about we have to make sure once we take someone in the conservatorship, we have the mental health resources. They need to actually get better, not just putting them in an institution that doesn’t actually solve their problems. Um, you know, one of the other issues I think we need to really work on homelessness is making sure that we have a really balanced approach to public safety and health and compassion. So I work with the police every day. Um, and they’ll actually be a new story soon that you will probably see cause one of your reporters just called our office. Um, we’re submitting a settlement agreement today about some of the, um, issues we’ve been working on with police enforcement. And I think our neighborhood policing division is doing a really great job. They’ve changed completely since 2017. The new police chief David Nisleit created an entire new division called the neighborhood policing division. They have a homeless outreach team that goes out seven days a week now. I’ve actually been downtown at 5:00 AM regularly with our homeless outreach workers from our police team because I need to do that for my job. And I see what they do, what they go through. I see how they’re bringing service priors together, which is great because I know a lot of people can operate in silos, which has been a big issue. Um, so making sure we work to do compassion, but balance that with the need for enforcement because we do need clean and safe streets, you know,

Q: Without getting the mayor’s permission, the Los Angeles city attorney filed an amicus brief in the Boise case, San Diego did not. What do you think about the Boise case and whether it should be allowed to stand or be challenged?

A: Uh, I actually am working on that with the city and I advise the city council and it met in closed session, so I can’t speak about it publicly because of the attorney client privilege. But, um, I can say that I don’t believe homelessness is going to be solved in a courtroom. And that’s what I see a lot happening throughout the state of California and the West Coast. And we need to be a lot more proactive because that’s what’s happening. We’re being forced into courtrooms and sometimes you can have some good outcomes. So you know, we have a really great outcome that’s going to come out today with the settlement with the police and homeless individuals that everyone is happy with. Um, I’m sure of course we’ll get criticized cause that we should, we should continually start to strive, strive to be better. But that’s about all I can say about the Boise case since I’m advising the council on that.

Q: There is a, increasingly, it seems to me kind of fatigue about the homelessness problem. In San Francisco, they’ve tried the kitchen sink approach and nothing seems to work. And if you read our letter writers, I think there’s more frustration over the effect of the homeless on the way of life here than there is sympathy for the homeless. So that’s kind of an interesting dynamic. It’s kind of like housing where we’re all for more housing except when we’re not. So do you, you really think that the solutions are more resources? Because it didn’t work in San Francisco.

A: Yeah, well I think we’re not using our resources right at all. I mean, like I keep going back to, if we’re going to be navigating people to housing, why are we not navigating immediately to Medicaid assisted drug treatment? But the thing is we don’t have enough resources for that. So I actually have a friend here in San Diego who was addicted to opioids and overdosed multiple times, and I took that person to rehab, um, up near Sharp on Genesee and they turned us away the first time after we’d had an intervention and the person had sobered up and they said, if you come in and you’re sober, you have to come back in three days and make an appointment while we check your insurance and see if you’re covered. He wasn’t coming back in three days. He was going to be back out in the streets. But if you come in and you’re currently intoxicated, they could take you right away because they can bill insurance for your medical detox. And so I understand that our health facilities need to be paid for their services. I completely get it, but why are we not working on that? And making sure that when someone comes to the door of a rehab center, they are immediately accepted? If we have to work out how insurance covers that, let’s do that the state level. But we shouldn’t be turning folks away who need the help. And so that’s part of the issue is we have resources. We’re not deploying them effectively.

Q: Do first responders here have access to Naloxone?

A: Uh, most of them do. Yes. Um, you know, funny story about Naloxone. When I’m working on this opioid lawsuit, I’m talking to our, without disclosing attorney client privilege, I’m talking to our fire EMS folks about their cost, how many overdoses they’ve had to respond to. I’m talking to the coroner about how many bodies have stacked up that we’ve had to service, I’m talking to the police about what they’ve had to do with law enforcement. And I get a call from the libraries, the head librarian, and he said, hey, you need to listen to what happened, what’s happening to us. And they’re having multiple overdoses a week downtown. And, um, they’re having people who coming into work and finding deceased people out in front of the libraries because they overdosed overnight. And so we’re having a debate over whether librarians have to carry Naloxone, but they’re librarians. That’s not their job. And so instead of actually addressing our homelessness and mental health and addiction crisis by providing actual treatment when it’s needed, we’re talking about putting security in libraries. And so I just don’t see us planning forward enough and really calling these things for what they are and destigmatizing them. I mean, I wonder maybe the reason we’re not talking more about this is because it’s stigmatized. When I went on that, right along with the Northeastern division, we had two overdose calls in gated communities in district five, very wealthy homes and neighbors out in the street, police, fire everywhere. A neighbor had come down to do CPR and he said, people don’t believe it exists here, but it exists everywhere. And so it shouldn’t be a stigma. My friend who I took to the rehab clinic shouldn’t have had no one to call but me because he was afraid to tell his family. And so that’s what I want to talk about is we can all help each other and make sure we’re using resources effectively. But if people are afraid to use the resource, if we’re not using them the right way, we’re not actually gonna make a dent. So I also agree that we can’t force anyone to shelters because we have liberties and that’s important, but we can make sure they have better choices. And one is making sure that shelters are actually working for them. So a lot of them are low barrier. Now I have toured almost all of them. I have been very impressed with the state of our shelters, our bridge tents. I don’t know if you’ve all been, they are very clean. They have storage under every single bed. So it’s not, I can’t come in because of my belongings ... we have places to put them there. I’m working on opening another um, a storage facility. That’s one of the things we’re seeing is you can’t solve one problem. Sure. Does storage solve housing? No. But is it one tool in the tool belt? Yes. We’ve seen people graduate from our storage facilities already because they can put their belongings, their shopping cart, their bags somewhere during the day. We have students using those facilities who put their belongings there, may have to live in their cars and then graduate ... and then get jobs and graduate out. We have people go to job interviews because they now have a place to put their belongings. So is that the ultimate solution? No, but it’s a tool.

One of the things about homelessness that’s so hard is that each individual needs different things. If you have a domestic violence victim living in her van with her two kids, cause that’s all she could do to get out of her house when her husband had a gun against her head, she needs something very different for shelter than the 14 year old who got evicted by his parents because he told them he was gay. Or the the veteran who’s been on the streets for 20 years and has chronic substance abuse. Everyone needs a different solution. And that’s really been the hard part about tackling this problem. But I agree with what the report or the, um, strategic plan says is that we need to start figuring out how to cater solutions to individuals. But I like keep coming back to it, all we navigate to is just housing, which we need to talk about as well and how it makes sure we have housing available. We’re not going to navigate them to all the things they need holistically to be a person in society who can be back on their feet. I’ve seen recovering alcoholics when I clerked on the fifth circuit court of appeals in Mississippi, I’m not obviously going to disclose his name, but I had, um, someone in the courthouse, a very well esteemed lawyer who had confided in me that he was a recovering heroin addict and he went to a various esteemed law school and was four time homeless because of his addiction. And once he got the treatment he needed, he was able to get, he’s a very successful lawyer now in the South. And so that’s what I keep saying is we have, we’re not using the resources we have. You know, there are people who can be successfully housed in the housing we have right now. If they can get off these horrible addictions.

Q: I’d like to ask about affordable housing. San Francisco right now is considering a $600 million affordable housing [project]. The most expensive in city history because they’re looking at affordable housing units that cost $700,000 per unit, which is an outrage. San Diego is considering a $900 million dollar bond, Housing Federation bond. Do you support that bond and do you think that that the amount of money that it costs to build an affordable housing unit makes any sense whatsoever?

A: Um, I think it is too expensive to build housing. I agree. Um, and I’ve read your reporting on it and I appreciate it. Um, you know, it should be less than $400,000 to build affordable housing. I mean, we need to work on this from not just one perspective and I’d have to know more about the bond to weigh in on it. I don’t know the specific details, but we need to reduce the regulatory costs and the permitting cost of building housing in the city. Um, you know, I’ve been seeing what a lot of the unintended consequences are of litigation that’s unnecessary. And I see that as a lawyer. I actually care a lot about litigation against the city as a deputy city attorney. And I go in and defend us from really frivolous litigation against taxpayers every day. And I’ve gotten cases thrown out of court where they’re asking for $100,000 from the city and I’ve gotten dismissed and gotten our costs back because it’s not right. But, um, you know, planning is important so we can’t just throw out all the planning requirements necessary. I mean I was knocking doors in Rancho Penasquitos on this weekend and I’m talking to a teacher who answers the door and says, yeah, Marni, we’re getting a new housing development in Rancho Penasquitos, you know, I’m glad cause I think we need more housing. But the school district came to us and said, we now have to have six to seven more students in our classroom. And .... so that doesn’t mean we don’t build the housing, but it means that I understand why sometimes people don’t want it in their backyard because we’re not thinking about it holistically. If we have more housing, we need more schools. If we have more housing, it should be closer to transit so we have less traffic. And so I understand that. But in terms of reducing costs, yes, I agree. We need to reduce the cost, figure out how to streamline permitting systems. Before we talk about the lack of affordable housing, that’s one of the biggest things that I’ve seen in the city and I’m happy to be working on that.

(K.C. Alfred / San Diego Union-Tribune)

Q: But why doesn’t San Diego copy what’s worked elsewhere? In Tokyo, they have dorm style housing and the adult workers quickly get used to it. And in Japan and in Great Britain, prefab housing is now like one sixth to one seventh of the market. And yet we never do the obvious things that other places are doing. It’s frustrating.

A: Yeah. Well, I mean I’m open to learning about all those things and talk about all of them. . .. I mean, obviously we have to make sure all of these things are safe. You know, fire safety is a huge issue when we saw what happened in London ... the affordable housing complex that was burned and families died. So I don’t just want to build housing willy nilly without any kind of making safety requirements, but I’m open to talking about all of those things. I think we should be thinking out of the box .

Q: At the northwest corner of interstate 15 and Mira Mesa Boulevard is that massive [new] apartment complex. It’s been built right next to the bus stop area. There’s nothing like that in your district. Should there be?

A: Ah, well we actually, we’re going to be getting, um, [construction on] the school district, uh, site in Scripps Ranch, uh, this, the, yes, they sold the land, so they’re gonna be building their, um, I mean, I’m a renter. I live in an apartment in Scripps Ranch. I... I love it. It’s a very nice apartment. Uh, I was looking for apartments, so I wish could I just find a regular apartment? Everything was luxury. ... I don’t need a luxury. I just got a regular apartment. Does anybody rent those? Um, and that’s part of the issue is having middle income housing. But yeah, I mean another issue we see is a lot of older folks, my community is aging and I have a lot of seniors in my community who may want to downsize and have a place to go in district five in Rancho Bernardo, Scripps Ranch, because they don’t need assisted living. But they may want a smaller place that’s going to be a beautiful complex that we see in Scripps Ranch ranch that the school district builds. That may be a great place for them to go. And then younger families will have a more, a bigger stable housing supply that they could move into cause they might need the three or four bedroom homes. So I think there’s a lot of room in my community to talk about the housing spectrum. I mean we have, teachers can’t afford to live in, in my community, police officers can’t afford to live. There are firefighters can’t afford to live there. And those are folks we want to be living in our community. So housing affordability really hits every spectrum. ...

Q: About .... San Diego Unified. How do you feel about the city council giving away the San Diego High School land at the same time it’s striking a hard bargain with San Diego State over city land?

A: You know, I, I don’t know all the details on what happened with San Diego High School ...

Q: The city extended the sweetheart deal for 50 years or whatever for the land. It’s extremely valuable . [This was] despite promises that were made in 1974 that they would build a new high school elsewhere. I don’t understand how the city council can simultaneously drive a hard bargain with one institution, San Diego State, while giving a giving away stuff to another institution ....

A: Yeah. I mean you made a good point. I honestly don’t know enough about the deal to, to make a good comment on it. But that’s something that I would think I could bring to the table as a city attorney. I know how to read municipal contracts, which are very different than private sector contracts. I know municipal law very well. I know ... . How would you call every head of department here? Cause I’ve had to talk to them because the lawsuits against the city, um, I know exactly what the procedures are and what we need to do to make sure that we do a good land deal. So that’s what I would bring to the table when I evaluate those contracts in the future.

Q: What do you think the city council should do with SDSU West?

A: Well, they’ve got to make sure that we do abide by the will of the voters. You know, I mean, they ... have to make sure that we’re not giving away a very valuable piece of city land for something that’s for less than we should be getting. I mean, this is a huge deal for us and it can be a vast improvement, but it needs to be done right. So I’m glad to see the city council considering it very carefully. Uh, but we’ll just have to see how the negotiations unfold.

Q: Where do you, I mean there’s the spectrum of dollar value was out there with the IBA report. Where do you come down on that?

A: Uh, well our office is working on that, you know, we’re evaluating it right now, so I’m, I don’t want to create any conflict of interest so I can’t, until our ... report comes out, I can’t actually weigh in publicly, but all I can say is I really want to make sure that we do get the best value for that land because this is a huge asset that we are giving up. So it needs to be done right.

Q: Your district is a perfect example of where the, uh, transit new roads versus mass transit debate plays out. Where do you come down on what, what your district needs and what the city at large needs?

A: Well for me, like I said earlier, climate change and taking care of environment is a huge issue for me. And I know that half of our greenhouse gas emissions in San Diego come from cars and trucks on the roads. So transit is very important to me. Um, I actually to reduce my own green footprint and to get my emails done before I get to work. I take the bus when I can. It’s great. I can go, I live right by the Miramar college transit station. I just go over there, it’s free parking. Downtown, I pay 180 bucks a month, the park. Okay. And I take the 110 express bus and there are no stops. And I know that cause when I sleep in a little bit and miss the bus, I follow it in my car all the way downtown. But it stops running to come back at 5:15 PM? When do I get out of work ? At 5:15 PM and it uses the infrastructure we’ve already built, the I -15 carpool lane. So one thing I want to say about transit is we can make it better. I read the article, I don’t know if it was op ed or an article yesterday that the Union-Tribune put out about transit ridership being down nationwide. And I agree with your point about, you know, we have to make it harder to drive, but on the flip side we have to make it easier to take transit. An easier way to do that is also to make sure that commuters like me can use the bus more frequently. And this actually resonates in my district. So when I’ve gone to, I’ve gone to almost all the town planning councils and the town planning boards to introduce myself, talk about my priorities. And people will come up to me after and say, I take the 110 express bus, too. And they’ll say, what time do you go? And I’ve had a wonderful older woman come up to me in Rancho Bernardo and say, yes, well that’s wonderful, but I’m retired. I’m not commuting, so what do I need the bus for? And I said, I agree, but this is about options. Imagine people like me and other commuters are off your roads in the morning, especially getting on that Sabre Springs Parkway to the 15 there’s always traffic there, isn’t there? She said, Oh yes, I hate the traffic every morning. Well that’s what the bus is good for. Getting people like me out of that traffic. And she said, Oh, I like the bus now. And so it’s having these conversations with my district in a way that provides options. I don’t think he’s ever been had before. But in terms of the roads versus transit, we need better transit citywide. I completely agree. Um, and we are going to have to expand roads in some places. So I understand that, you know, the 56 for example, we’re not going to get a trolley in there anytime soon. And we see the traffic patterns. We have people coming from Carmel Mountain, Sabre Springs, Rancho Bernardo going west in the morning out to Sorrento Valley, a major employment hub, and then the bumper to bumper going east, back home. We already have a transit center set up. It’s ... a whole parking garage. So if we’re going to build a third or middle lanes in on a 56 which we have room to do, why not make them either HOV only or bus only lanes for carpools during commuting times when we know the traffic is bad and then opening up to regular driving during the day? So we have these creative solutions we can do with both roads and transit because I’m open to, but as an actual transit user in our city and knowing, saying yes, you can do it from district five and a lot of my coworkers here in Civic Center Plaza also take the express bus from Sabre Springs cause I see them at the bus stops. It will resonate if we just talked to our community about it in the way that we haven’t done so before in my district.

Q: But Wendell Cox, he’s a transportation expert who helped plan the San Diego trolley and was on the Los Angeles transportation commission, says we’re not New York City. He says this over and over again to people when we talk about transit, we’re not New York City. In New York City, transit works because it’s packed and it’s not the case in California that we’re packed. We rarely have cities that are that dense. So I just wish that transit talk had this realism. We’re not New York City. And it doesn’t . Like Josh’s story yesterday that shows transit is not popular by and large. And yet we keep imagining that somehow something will change and it will become popular.

A: Yes. So it’s not popular yet. And I agree with you and we’re not New York City ... I mean I went to law school in New York City. I completely understand that. Uh, but one of the things I’m pushing the city on for example, is making transit convenient when you want it, but driving when you need it. So as a city employee, I am given an option between a parking pass downtown or a transit pass. So before I had parking, cause you have a whole wait list when you get hired as city employee, I got the transit pass so I could take the bus back and forth. Now that I am campaigning, I rarely go home after work. So it needs to be all over the city. So I drive quite a bit. But they made me give up my ... transit pass when I got my parking pass and I said, why? What if I want to take the bus once or twice a week, which I can? So I started talking to my coworkers and a lot of them said the same things. Oh yeah, I take the bus at least twice a week, but I have child care three times a week, so I can’t pick up my kids from preschool. So I said, why is this an all or nothing option? We’re not making it easy to use transit. And I completely agree with your point. So one of the things I’m actually pushing the city on right now is don’t make it all or nothing. We have 11,000 employees in the city of San Diego. If all of them are able to take transit when they want it, even once a week, that’s thousands of trips on transit that we didn’t have before. But if you force them to give up their parking, which we know they need, since we’re not New York City to choose transit, it doesn’t make it easy to choose transit. So that’s one of the things I’m working on is nudging behavior change slowly. And it’s great when I’m on the bus, I have my laptop out, I get my emails done before I get to work. I’m not paying for these high gas prices we have. It’s great, but we don’t have enough of it. Why don’t we have outlets on our buses? Why don’t we have wi-fi on our buses? We live in a tech hub. We have wonderful folks here. Qualcomm, Apple, what not, who could help us find the solutions to these problems.

Q: But taxpayers already subsidize a huge portion of the fares. Would you be open to the thought of having free transit for everybody or at least some people, students, seniors?

A: Um, I will, there’s no way we’re going to be able to fund our transit system if everything is free. So I understand that we do need transit fares. Um, I do think the opportunity program for youth who want to take transit is a very interesting idea. Um, and I’d be open to, to thinking about that more. Um, you know, and it’s not just city employees that I’ve been talking to. I mean, I talked to the downtown partnership about that and they said, Oh yeah, we do the same thing. We say that our employees can only have transit or parking. It’s either or. And um, they said maybe we should rethink that. But no, I think, you know, we need to find a way to balance it because, you know, financial responsibility and fiscal responsibility is huge to me. you know, I know the Democrats get blamed a lot for not talking enough about that, but I work for a paycheck that stretches thinner and thinner every month. I pay an exorbitant rent and I don’t want a dime of my taxpayer dollar wasted. We have way too much in the city to be doing to waste money. And another issue that I want to talk about in terms of wasting money is infrastructure. So a lot of what I see come in are lawsuits against the city for infrastructure that we have neglected and we could have fixed much cheaper on the front end than waiting for an emergency or a flood or a pipe to burst at a building floods or someone gets severely hurt on sidewalks or streets that we know have been a problems because someone was hurt before. But we don’t prioritize those and fix them up front. And then when the lawsuits happen, we’re paying millions of dollars in litigation fees on the back end. Cause I see them. So what I want the city to be doing is identifying the top 10 infrastructure projects that we know are legal land mines and our folks in city hall or in our staff departments know what they are because we have our eyes on them. And so we could fix things for much cheaper up front, including some of the storm drains we’re watching $50,000 estimate to fix it now $2 million to fix it if we have litigation and damages. So we need to prioritize things that’ll save us money so that we can use it for other infrastructure projects or transit or things we need to be doing and doing much better with these things so that we can finally reach the priorities that we want to.

Q: So I don’t know if you can even answer this question, but do you think we, we’ve seen the recent settlements with the, you know, the, the sidewalk cracks, slippers and things like that. Um, do you think the city settles too quickly on these cases?

A: You’re right. That’s a very tough question for me to answer as a city attorney. Um, honestly, the way the law is I, in terms of how liable the city can be, I know that our city attorneys do a very good job evaluating these cases. The cost of trial is enormous and I believe that what the reforms we have to make aren’t in whether we settle cases or not. Because believe me, we have very intense meetings and we do a lot of calculations about how many millions it could be if we go to trial, just the trial. And then if we lose what the damages are. If we win, we still spend millions on trial. So, um, the, the cost of litigation is a huge problem, which we should talk about, but also making sure that cities don’t have to bear this liability that we don’t need to be bearing. So there could be changes in state law that protect governments from lawsuits that are frivolous that we need to work on, which is again,why I want to have relationships in Sacramento. We, like I said, we could be prioritizing fixing things that we know are legal liabilities for the city.

Q: Most cities have triage systems where they do evaluate that. DeMaio tried to start something like that when he was on the city council. And we don’t have that in San Diego.

A: Well we’re not acting on it like we should be. So, uh, I mean our staff does a great job about keeping an eye on things, but I know that we’re not acting on it like we should because we’re not prioritizing them. So if we were, we wouldn’t have as many lawsuits. But ... I can say our city attorneys do a great job because I’m in the internal conversations on these things. However, some of these issues, by the time they get to our desk, someone has been severely hurt on that sidewalk twice and it hasn’t been fixed in years. Why not? Why if we already had reports, has that been prioritized? And so that’s what I mean, even if we do have lists, we’re not acting on them the right way to save the city money.

Q: Speaking of liabilities and sidewalks, the scooter issue, the danger of the, you know, [financial risks to] the city [from] those accidents and kind of the regulations that are already in place, what do you think of how the city has handled them?

A: Uh, yeah. .... The first thing I was very happy to see in the scooter regulations was an indemnity clause that says a scooter companies will indemnify the city in any lawsuit. That needed to be in place from day one. I mean we have that with a lot of different entities throughout the city. Um, I had a trip and fall at the zoo for example, um, which I think was not the zoo’s fault, but the zoo has agreed to indemnify the city. So we don’t waste legal fees on these, you know. If you’re going to operate a program in the city of San Diego, it is your responsibility to have attorneys and defend the city in these programs. Um, I think ... the scooter regulations definitely are still a work in progress. Um, I see both sides of the issue. Uh, one I think we definitely need to have alternate mobility options. I’m a big fan of the dedicated bike lanes. .... I love how we’re doing from parallel parking to diagonal, so we can still accommodate cars and scooters and bikes. I think that’s wonderful. But I also see that scooters could be a hazard, um, you know, especially in high density places and that they shouldn’t be strewn all over the street for people to trip on or people, wheelchairs or strollers not to access. So I think we need to do, we can continue to improve on how we adjust to scooters. And this is just the beginning and who knows what other technological improvements or things will hit our city? ... And that’s why one of the reasons I’m running for city council now is decisions we make now are going to affect our transit patterns and our traffic patterns and our climate 20 years from now. You know, if we don’t get on this now and we’re, we’re at a point where we have a lot of government agencies who want to make these crucial decisions -- SANDAG, MTS, city government ... the county even talking about clean vehicle fleets, well that’s wonderful. If we want clean vehicles on the road, I get it. And we want to have housing that people can afford. Wonderful. But what about building charging stations for electric vehicles into those housing units? Because if we build affordable housing and say, oh, well yeah, now everyone should buy electric cars. If we build all this housing that doesn’t have charging stations, where are people gonna plug in their cars? So actually a friend of mine just moved over here from Austin, Texas to work at Apple, the new Apple office. They’re starting here and he has a Tesla and he said to me, Marni, in Austin, I had a charging station at work and I had one at home, and he lives downtown and one of the new condos in Little Italy, no charging stations. He works up in UTC in a beautiful office building, no electric vehicle charging station. And so he has to go out of his way to find one and sit in his car for half an hour. And so it’s just, those are the things we ended up planning now to make sure that we’re ready for that in the future. So I’m glad to see the county, for example, getting into clean fleets. I think that’s a great idea. I think the city of San Diego should clean up our vehicle fleets as well, have electric and clean energy vehicles. But like we said, the infrastructural planning for that has to be prioritized as well. And that’s also a great way to create green jobs. You know, I see a lot of folks talking about, well great, we’re training folks. We have great apprenticeship programs for green jobs, so let’s use those. Let’s give them an opportunity to build the infrastructure needed in our city.

Q: The indemnification you spoke of, does that include if somebody just trips over one on the sidewalk?

A: I believe I’d have to look at the contract. ... I believe it does, but I’m not positive. So I’d have to double check

Q: On bike lanes, the city envisions 18% of the population in large parts of the city, including Sorrento Valley, using bikes in 2032 or so. Don’t we need to have plans that are realistic? There’s not 18% use anywhere, anywhere in America, not even close. And we have an aging workforce and a hotter climate. So do you think it’s realistic to have 18% and have that as a formal goal written into law?

A: Well, I think it’s certainly aspirational and we need aspirational goals. Um, and I think there’s ways that we can increase bike ridership. Uh, you know, I can say that I’ve increased my use of bikes on the city streets because we have protected lanes. I feel much safer. Um, my father is an avid biker and was once, you know, driven off the road, um, by a car because those are just strips of paint on the streets. So I think there’s ways we can get closer to that, but that can’t be our only goal. I agree. Uh, so that’s why I keep going back to what are the ways we can nudge behavior change all around, you know, getting people out of their cars into better transit options onto bikes, but it’s a holistic approach. So where are we getting this electricity from? That’s why I really think the joint powers agreement and the climate action plan and, and clean choice energy are great ideas because sure, then everyone plugs into electric vehicles. If it comes from a coal plant, maybe that energy isn’t so clean. So all of these ideas together are things we can work on. And that will be one of my priorities on city councils, making sure that we do meet our climate action change goals and that we do pursue realistic solutions because, you know, it would be nice if 18% of people rode bikes, but I agree we might not be able to get there in time.

Q: What do you think of the convention center proposed expansion?

A: I’m behind it. Um, I think that we need to make sure we keep Comic-Con for example, which has been such a boon to the city and is so much fun. I go down there, I love it. Uh, there’s other conventions who want to come here and we need to make sure we can accommodate them. Um, I want to make sure that it creates good jobs for workers here in the city when we build it. And you know, investments in infrastructure and homelessness are huge priorities. So I think it’s great. I love that there’s a huge coalition around it. I mean, people ask me, oh, how is a Democrat ever going to win in district five? And I say, hey, the Chamber of Commerce is even talking about housing affordability as a major issue and have an economic impact on our city. You know, a lot of my campaign is a, it’s my slogan is people over politics and really being focused together who thinks they might be farther apart than they are. And so that’s what I say is, you know, the convention center, look at that coalition we’re building around it. We can do the same thing around housing. Uh, we can do the same thing around transit. And you know, a lot of my career has been, it’s all been in public service. I worked at government entities throughout my career and getting different nonprofits, getting governments, getting folks together to tables where you wouldn’t think they could. So I worked for years at the National Labor Relations Board on enforcing workers’ rights all throughout the country, but enforcing the law. So sometimes employers broke it, sometimes union broke it, we enforce it against them, sometimes workers broke it. But a lot of my job is also brokering solutions between huge companies and their employees. I’d be on the ground negotiating major deals between these companies and we’re going to need that on city council. You know, we have issues coming up against with Prop B in pensions and city employee pay. And so you want someone like me on city council who knows how to negotiate those deals and knows how to work with city workers. So I’m really excited to use the experience I’ve had in my life to come to city council and do these things.

Q: How would you negotiate a deal with Airbnb on short-term vacation rentals?

A: Yep. Uh, so the Airbnb issue I want to talk about in general is something that I think we need to figure out as a state with our, the way that we legislate and do work. So it really worries me that a private company, no matter if they’re Airbnb, Uber or Lyft can through the force of the wealth they have as a company, go out into the community and do a huge ballot campaign and overturn a law of the eighth largest city in the country. That worries me. Um, you know, what we see in Sacramento with some of the new regulations around labor and the gig economy, some of the biggest companies in our state have said, we’re not going to abide by that law.

Q: They’re going to try to use state law to overcome it. Why is direct democracy, why is political speech bad?

A: No, no, no, no, no. I think it’s wonderful. I think direct democracy, I think political speech is wonderful. We should use it, but what I worry about is that if we’re not able to negotiate a deal that brings everyone to the table, we’re going to keep going in these circles. You know, we have a law and so it’s overpassed. We have a law and so it’s overpassed. We have a law and it’s overpassed. And so that’s what I worry about. No, I do not believe we should get rid of direct democracy. I think voters should have a say. I think that’s wonderful. What I’m saying is we need to figure out a way to get out of these cycles of passing laws and overturning and passing laws and overturning them. You know, we see that with the bail reform as well. And so that’s one of the things, the reasons that I will be good on city council is because I will be able to work with communities, with other council members and with companies, huge companies to negotiate deals. Cause that’s what I do all the time. Um, I mean this deal I’m working on with the police department on homelessness was a huge lift. Having a federal judge involved, homeless people on side of the table, the chief of police next to me on the other side of the table and working out a deal. It’s been two and a half years litigation and you’ll see news reports come out today. We got it done, we got it solved for a very low dollar amount for the city. We’re not even paying out damages, but it takes patience and it takes courage and that’s what I’m going to be able to do. I.

Q: But the city council didn’t have to rescind that ordinance, it could have allowed it to go to a vote, and ultimately it’s going to have to go to a vote I think to get something like that passed. So the idea that there was something untoward about what Airbnb did when it qualified that referendum, I don’t buy it. If they’re able to use the tools of direct democracy, I don’t see why they should have less rights . And it’s the council’s cowardice to me that’s the issue, not the, the, the bullying of Airbnb. Why don’t do we let the public vote on it?

A: Okay, well please don’t get me wrong. I do not, don’t, I’m not saying that I’m against direct direct democracy. So that’s all that I’m saying.

Q: You framed it as saying you’re against these powerful companies being able to use the, to overcome obstacles.

A: No, I’m ... please let me clarify what I said is I am worried about this constant cycle of trying to pass a law, whether it be the local government or the state government and it doesn’t work out and then we have to rescind it or we get signatures to rescind it. I know. I believe voters should have a direct voice completely. I agree with you. And what, Oh, what Airbnb did is completely legal. What I’m saying is we need to figure out a way to make sure that doesn’t keep happening. I’m not against direct democracy and I’m not against what Airbnb did. What I’m saying is it’s wasting a lot of our time and effort to go through this process and try and reach a consensus. And that doesn’t end up working out. Now I agree with you. The city council could continue and maybe we should and maybe that’s the solution is standing up to big companies, but at the same time, I think we can find a way to make this work. I mean Airbnb was originally intended for people who live in their homes to rent out their spare bedroom. And why isn’t that what it’s used for? {Now we’re seeing] you know, buying up houses that are empty that we can be using to actually have families who need housing in San Diego live there. And so that’s a balance that I think we have to strike. Um, and I think we can’ get there. Uh, but please don’t, don’t quote me saying I’m against direct democracy cause that’s not at all what I am .

Q: Your boss, the city attorney, said that short term vacation rentals are illegal. Do you agree with that assessment?

A: Once again, since I’m in the city attorney’s office and we’re going to be reviewing this again, I can’t create a conflict of interest by weighing in on the legal opinion of the city. Um, but I really do think we need to find a strategy to make sure that it’s not, these rentals are not being used to take up valuable housing that we need in our city and over speculating of housing that increases the price. And, um, you know, so that’s all I can say about that is I can’t comment on the city’s policy.

Q: Uh, police department has been in the news quite a bit. You mentioned repeatedly working with the chief. What do you, how would you assess the chief’s job so far?,

A: Well, I think the chief has actually been doing a good job of trying to do recruitment and retention. So we’re facing obstacles to recruitment and retention crisis in our police force. Um, you know, I see what they do every day. They work really hard and they have very dangerous jobs. And what we’re facing is a lot of folks who come in and go through a police academy, get trained and then they have a lot more experience under the belt and then they’ll leave and go to other counties, other municipal governments around us who have better compensation packages. So I’m glad to see him focusing on recruitment and retention. I think it’s a big issue. Um, I’m glad to see what he’s with. The neighborhood policing division, that’s also a big issue. Uh, community policing is something I think we all want and are all working on. And I see and hear a lot of officers telling me, yes, I’d love to be better community police officers, but I can’t afford to live in Scripps Ranch or Rancho Bernardo or Peñasquitos. So my kids can’t go to the schools that my community goes to. And I can’t be at the PTA nights that my community goes to. So if we want better community policing, I think we need to figure out how to get police in a position where they can afford to live in our communities. So I’m glad to see things that we’re working on with down payment assistance. You know, part of the issue is, you know, I’m an older millennial, I am saddled with student debt and I became an attorney. I can’t afford to buy a home in the community I grew up in. And part of it is I don’t have $100,000 to throw on a down payment. I could make the monthly mortgage payments cause they’re pretty similar to rent payments, but who has that down payment nest-egg in their twenties and thirties or if you’ve been in public service your whole life, like I have? My student lender certainly has that. You can call them and ask them for all that money. But so thinking of creative ways to make sure we do have down payment assistance for first responders, teachers. I mean we do it for veterans a lot. Um, I know that a lot of private companies could come in and say, Hey, we'`ll match those funds. You know, we’ll make sure that we can get better interest rates for folks and whatnot. So those are creative solutions. We need to put people in the housing stock we have. ....

Q: So about Proposition B, how you feel about the way the city handled that and where do you think it’s going or what should it be doing?

A: Yep. So there’s two things I think about Proposition B. One is our economy is very different than it has been. Um, like I said, we have people entering the workforce who are settling student debt, who can’t afford to buy homes. Um, two, we need to have secure retirement for folks in the city of San Diego. Uh, we’re losing people not to private sector, but to other public entities. Like a lot of folks thought when we press Prop B, other cities and governments would follow. That they’d all rescind their pensions. Well they didn’t. So, you know, my story is I’m a city attorney and I see a lot of my colleagues, dozens of them walking out the door to other county governments, to other city governments. They’re not going to the private sector. They’re going to places like ... I don’t have Social Security or a pension. Uh, which worries my father a lot. He says, what do you mean you don’t even have Social Security? So I understand it’s about our total compensation package as a whole. Um, and I think you guys have done great reporting on that. I loved your front page story one day about why we don’t have or can’t fill vacancies in the city and there’s thousands of jobs that are going unfilled. I appreciate that. So we definitely need defined secure retirement for our workers, but I understand there were a lot of abuses in the past. I mean, the pensions of the past would not be the pension in the future. We need stability for our city and our budget and make sure that we’re not abusing any kind of system whatsoever. But we need to make sure our workers do have decent pay and secure retirement because we’re going to continue to lose people. So everyone says, oh, Prop B was going to save the city money. Well, we’ve seen that it hasn’t, but second, there are other costs to not having good compensation for our city employees. And a lot of it is in the cost we pay to hire folks. Recruitment takes a lot of money, getting out, getting people to apply, train them, have them worked for a few years, and then they leave. That’s costing us a lot of money. But when we talk about costs, all we talk about is pension costs. Well, if we don’t have a good defined retirement benefit for city employees where they’re going to stay, we’re going to keep losing money on the front end, over and over and over. And so I look at this more holistically. Um, and I’m fresh to this. You know, when I get on city council, I’m going to be a good person to help broker these deals because I’m not involved in any of the past abuses and all the things that, but I’m aware of them and they need to stay in the past. But I also am a city employee and know how to work with the city employee unions and know how to speak their language. And so I` think I would be the perfect person to sit and negotiate with our folks, see what other city governments are doing. You know, we do comp studies every year to see what other cities are doing around us and counties are doing around us and it shows that we pay quite a bit less and that’s why we’re losing folks. So I’m just really excited to get into this issue and find a fair and balanced way to do city compensation benefit packages. And that’s one of the issues I want to take on when I get there.

Q: I’ve been in a Twitter discussion last couple of days about some locals who want to see the Chargers return to San Diego. Would you be open to seeing an NFL team in San Diego? Or do you think that ship’s sailed?

A: Um, I mean I, I’m open to anything, you know, if, if the Chargers want to come back and you know, strike a fair deal with the city and the people want it, I’m open to talk about anything. Um, you know, I mean I think I’m really glad that we have great opportunities for recreation tourism such as Petco Park and others. And so, hey, I’m open.

Q: What, let’s talk a fair deal and what one would even look like?

A: That’s a great question. I mean, making sure that the city gets equal benefit out of it as a sports team. I mean, and that’s one of the things I want to make sure is as a city, as a city attorney now, every deal that I strike, I make sure the city gets a good deal. You know, I look at our liabilities and what could happen. I say, wait, nope, this is not a deal. Should make this, this is, and I would just use that same practice I use now. Um, and things have changed and the charges left. So there’s no, there’s new rules and hey, we’ll see. It is fun though. The old Chargers facility, we, we use it now as city employees. And so you go in there and you see the bolts and you see them [and] where they used to watch the games. ... So it’s kind of nostalgic to get to go in there.

Q: The practice field?

A: Yeah, and the training facility.

Q: What does the city use it for?

A: So yeah, we use it for training now. So I’ve been in there for, you know, environmental services and whatnot and it’s just a building we can use now. So might as well put it to use. ... .

Q: You mentioned Brian Maienschein, so you have his support. He has not always been a Democrat and the person who you’re looking to replace, uh, used to be Republican is now no longer a Republican, but he’s not a Democrat. What do you think of their party changes?

A: Well, I think that’s the way the city is going. Um, you know, we saw a district five flip to majority Democratic registration for the first time a few weeks ago. And I was surprised. I thought it would happen before the primary, but I mean, I grew up there and I went to Scripps Ranch high school and all of my friends’ parents were very conservative Republicans. And now Democrats are, are in the majority. Um, and I tell people that when they say, oh, a Democrat could never went in district five, my elected representatives are no longer Republicans. My city council member is now an independent, uh, my, you know, state assembly member is now a Democrat. Uh, so people are, yeah, they’re already leaving the Republican Party. Um, but I think that’s one of the things that I talk about is ... partisanship shouldn’t be stymieing city hall. You know, and that’s why my slogan is people over politics. Um, my strategy in my district for people who don’t agree with me is to sit down, shut up, and listen. And I’ve done that my whole life. So I worked in Mississippi for years. Um, helping people who couldn’t get access to health care. I started a civil rights clinic to help folks. Uh, Jackson, Mississippi. Um, right. So my whole history is after I graduated from high school, I then went to UC Berkeley for college and 9-11 happened two weeks into my freshman year and that changed everything for us. A lot of my friends who were in high school ROTC suddenly get deployed to a war abroad. Um, we see national security become a huge issue and I got very interested in international relations. So after college I joined the Peace Corps and I [went] to Botswana for two and a half years helping kids who are born, children who were born with HIV and AIDS. Cause while Tijuana had the second highest rate of AIDS in the world at the time, most people my age in their 20s were dead. I was going to funerals every weekend and my job was to get these kids medication they needed to live. And we did. Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation came and they gave a lot of money to make sure his kids had access to treatment and I could get them medicine, food, clothing. The one thing I could not do was protect them from the stigma and discrimination they were going to face their whole lives because of a medical condition they were born with. They had no control over. So I saw kids who are expelled from school at sixth grade because they start to show symptoms on their face of their disease. And that was it, the end of their education at sixth grade because of this. So I decided to go to law school. Um, I would hitchhike two and a half hours into town to find the internet and I would type out my law school application essays and my mother here in San Diego would put them out for me and send them to school, set up the country. And that’s how I found out.

I got into Fordham law school in New York. And then immediately on grad, I graduated top of my class. I won moot court competitions. I was on law review. I loved it. But my dream was to do what I had done abroad for my own country. So I’d not even interviewed with a single law firm in New York. I went straight to Mississippi and I got grant funding from Skadden, Arps to start a clinic career of low income folks who needed to health care. And I helped a lot of folks who, um, were contracting HIV in Mississippi cause it has the fourth highest rate in the country. HIV has become a poverty disease. We don’t talk about it as much, but uh, people couldn’t get access to, dentists wouldn’t treat their cavities. Employers were firing them. Uh, they couldn’t go to hospitals because doctors didn’t want to treat them. That turned into going after payday lenders because of Mississippi. If you’re working minimum wage, you do not get insurance. But if you get into a car accident, you have to pay those medical bills. Who do you go to? A payday lender. So we started saying nobody should go into bankruptcy because they have to pay their chemotherapy bills. So in the clinic I started is still running to this day, which is great, but I couldn’t live in Mississippi forever. I then went to Washington, D.C. And I worked in Congress for a year. I worked for the National Labor Relations Board and federal government. I couldn’t work for the current administration. I wouldn’t have been a good fit. So I left and came home and I’m, I’m working here, but I say all that to say I have operated in many environments where people do not agree with me. And I mean Mississippi was a very conservative place to be and I got the state government there to open that clinic with me. It’s run by the University of Mississippi medical center and the general counsel of the Mississippi state department of health sat down with me and negotiated a deal to make sure that people had access to their legal rights. And I did that through a lot of sitting down, shutting up and listening. I got turned away a lot by government entities down there and by hospitals down there and I didn’t give up. And I made sure to have patience and grace to listen so that we can find the things we agree on. And so that’s why I think I am going to be the first Democrat to win my district because not only is it great to have home field advantage. When I knock on doors, I can’t tell you how many people say, oh, Marni, you were in high school band with my son. Yes, Mrs. Fitzpatrick, please do not bring up that picture. The campaign’s going well, we do not need high school band pictures out, but not only do people know me and know I’m from there, um, I also know how to listen and how to bring people together. I mean, believe me, bringing um, homeless individuals and their advocates who I think are doing a great job holding people accountable together with the chief of police, um, in negotiating a good deal for everyone, takes patience and grace and courage. You know, I don’t back down. I’m very nice person and seem very nice, but I am a tough litigator and I know how to negotiate a good deal.

Q: How happy are you that it’s not widely known that Trump went to Fordham for two years? [Laughter]

A: Oh well now everyone knows. Yeah, he did not go to Fordham law school though. So we’ll keep, we’ll keep that one aside. But uh, yeah, I actually, I love being a [lawyer. I’m relieved that I picked this career. Um, that’s actually one of the reasons when I first realized I wanted to run for office was um, because I became a lawyer. So I thought I might want to be a judge for a while. And so I clerked for a judge on the fifth circuit court of appeals, Judge James Graves. He was the, first Obama appointee, uh, first, um, black man ever to be appointed from Mississippi to the fifth circuit. And he was wonderful. But it taught me that the cases that you get, you can make a big impact in, but you have to wait for them to come to you. I like being out in the community and meeting with folks and seeing what their problems are and using the law to solve their problems. And so when I worked in Congress and for, for Bobby Scott from Virginia, he was the head of the, or he’s now the chairman of the education workforce committee. I loved it. I got to sit down with employers, the heads of major companies, with unions, with non-unionized workers and with just people who cared about ports. For example, I negotiated deals on ports. I got to negotiate new laws on making sure that workers rights were respected, but we have employers who are able to keep their management rights as well. I just, I thought it was fabulous. It’s what I love doing. And so that’s why I’m going to be a good city council person because I love talking to folks and using the law to solve our problems and that’s what we should be doing on city council. And the fact that I am a municipal lawyer and I understand municiapl law very well, it means that I do not have a huge learning curve. When I get there, I will be able to hit the ground running. I already have relationships there and in the county and in Sacramento. So I’m really excited to use these skills to help not only my district, but the city as a whole.

Q: So do you see yourself going back to Washington to be a representative beyond San Diego?

A: No, I, I’m happy to be home. Um, one I can’t take another winter is not good, um, at the winters in New York or in D.C., But I’m really happy to be home. Um, and believe me, taking the California bar was no joke. So I’m glad I got to pass that. But I, everyone has been asking me, you know, you lived in D.C., why don’t you run for Congress? I have no, I believe that the way that we’re gonna fix government is that the local level and it’s neighbor to neighbor. And so I deliberately want to run for local office. Um, I deliberately think that the way that we’re gonna make changes nationally is at the local level and being closest to your voters. Cause right now people are really upset. People are really angry and divided and that’s not good for our country or our city. And so making sure that we do have forge relationships, again, if people believe in their government again is a big deal for me. Um, and public servants should want to be close to their voters.

Q: Any other questions? You’ve given a good, a pretty good wrap up. Um, uh, any last thoughts you want to want to share with us?

A: Yes. Uh, having grown up in this city, you know, I’m running because I want to make sure that every kid and every family has a shot at a brighter future just like I did, has access to good public education just like I did and can thrive and have good jobs. Um, and make sure that they have an environment where they have clean air to breathe, clean water to swim in, beaches that we make sure we take care of and don’t just pollute. We need to update our storm water and transportation infrastructure. I want to make sure that everyone here has housing they can afford to live in. And that’s a double-sided coin that’s not only building affordable housing on each level of income, that’s making sure people earn enough to pay for that housing. So good jobs that pay fair wages are very important to me and I want to make sure that everyone here in our city feels respected and feels like they’re treated with dignity. Hate crimes are going up and we need to stop that. We need, it’s not just about being in city council and having a vote on important issues. It’s about leadership. It’s about setting a good example and showing that you can actually lead and have grace in a city and say, hey, I’m sick of this division and I’m sick of the way we’re turning against each other. Let’s talk about dignity and equality and equal opportunity. So that’s the way I want to lead with kindness and compassion. I strongly believe in the golden rule, which I think we need to bring back, but I’m also a really good lawyer. And I know the city, I know how it works, and I want to bring those talents to the table too. So thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed this. It’s great to have tough conversations and lean into them, so I appreciate you.