For Pacific Beach’s 2026 Honorary Mayor, serving, loving and supporting the PB community comes as second nature.
Denise Willett Friedman was born and raised in and around Pacific Beach. Chosen by the PB Town Council and announced at its 75th annual installation dinner on Jan. 23, the surprise honor was a full circle moment for her after years serving as a community volunteer.
“I was born in Crown Point and growing up, I got to know all the families here. We moved around several times, but always ended up back in San Diego,” said Friedman, whose father was a Navy pilot. “There is no community like PB. It has truly engaged residents. They care.”
Some of her education was in the area. She attended St. Brigid’s School in PB for third and fourth grade, and for high school the Academy of Our Lady of Peace in San Diego.
With a deep love for uplifting the communities she is part of, working towards end goals that benefit everyone is engrained in what Friedman does and it always has been that way, she said.
After meeting her late husband, Dr. William F. Friedman, she settled in Los Angeles, where she spent 30 years.
“He was recruited to be the chairman of pediatrics at UCLA, so we moved up there,” she said.
While her husband worked in medicine, Denise Friedman took a different career path that was topically intertwined with his.
“My job experiences (were) with SeaWorld, marketing and in college textbook publishing, researching what professors were looking for in a textbook,” she said. “(These experiences) taught me how to ask questions and seek answers.”
In 1993, Gov. Pete Wilson appointed her to the State Board of Directors of the California Science Center. In 1995, she was appointed to the Board of Advisors of the UCLA Medical Center and in 1997 to the Board of Visitors of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.
“I brought (my career skills) to academic medicine, asking what patients want and need,” Friedman said. “I’m not a doctor, (so) I brought the consumer perspective to the boards of the UCLA Medical Center and UCLA School of Medicine. That’s how I have approached all of my nonprofit work.”
She added, “Defining a need and communicating it is the solution. This applies to any organizations, any problem and any challenge. You need to put ideas and needs out there.”
Friedman spent years doing outreach and board work in Los Angeles. But after her husband died, she decided to move back to Pacific Beach in 2011.
“I wanted to be in a place where people knew me for me,” Friedman said.
Denise Friedman, the 2026 Pacific Beach Honorary Mayor. (Milan Kovacevic)
She returned to her childhood home and began the process of rebuilding it. But following the completion of renovations, she was struck with a dilemma — a short-term rental unit right next door.
“I got on the phone and started asking everyone ‘How can they do this?’” Friedman recalled. “That is exactly what got me into politics.”
Confronted with her neighborhood’s rapid changes, Friedman said in 2014 she decided it was time to do something about it.
“I joined PB Town Council and my first battle was homes being converted into vacation rentals,” Friedman said.
Determined not to stop there, she dove headfirst into community outreach and volunteering, striving to complete one simple goal — making PB a “clean, safe and beautiful place to live and raise a family.”
In 2014, Friedman was not only elected to the town council’s Board of Directors, but she also began serving as a San Diego Police Department Captain’s Advisory Board member and joined the San Diego Police Foundation.
An inside look at the police department’s workings and direct access to PB Town Council prompted her involvement with PAESAN, the council’s Police and Emergency Services Appreciation Night, where the community honors all those who serve the community and fundraise for one public service group annually.
The beneficiary group rotates between the city’s police, fire rescue, lifeguards and park rangers.
“It was amazing to me how front and center community-oriented policing was,” Friedman said. “That was the beginning of my learning curve, figuring out what it means to give back. When I began working with PAESAN, we didn’t feature just one group, but I knew this was a way to dig in deep and get to know the issues and challenges each first responder group deals with. There is no community that does what we do.”
Last year, Friedman donated $50,000 to the police foundation, a move that will kickstart a new process of training and organizing for community resource officers across San Diego. Seeing the action that local officers have taken in Pacific Beach sparked this donation, Friedman said, adding that she hopes other neighborhoods will see similar positive results.
Looking ahead at her role as the 2026 Pacific Beach Honorary Mayor, Friedman said she intends to keep the funding, awareness and contributions going. Her first order of business will be local parks.
“This next chapter will come back to bringing the community even closer,” she said. “As we look ahead at tightened budgets, the local parks will be really hit because they are not a critical public safety issue.
“While we intend to continue our PAESAN celebration of individual groups, I want to bring our community together regarding the parks,” she said. “My goal is to get different local groups to adopt a park and help. From monthly clean ups to community events in parks, I want the parks department to feel supported.”
Heading into warmer months, Friedman said she is hopeful this initiative will spread to tourists, visitors and locals alike, garnering a sense of involvement.
“Let’s take some pride in our community,” Friedman said.
Fostering a sense of togetherness, ambition and a can-do mentality is precisely why Friedman was chosen for the role, said PB Town Council President Charlie Nieto.
“Beyond the scope of her official volunteer duties, Denny has always been there when the community needs her,” Nieto said. “Denny is someone who is always looking for ways to bring people together, foster connections and create new partnerships. She has served as an invaluable advocate, a wise adviser and our neighborhood’s number one cheerleader.
“Her integrity and enduring commitment to doing the right thing is something that I greatly admire,” Nieto said. “For these reasons and more, Denny is more than deserving of this honor and I encourage everyone to congratulate her the next time they see her.”