Slashing city jobs, taking money from developers, carpetbagging and whether there’s a need for contrarian voices at San Diego City Hall are some of the key issues in the City Council runoff between Nicole Crosby and Richard Bailey.
The battle to represent Clairemont, Point Loma and nearby areas has also focused on Crosby’s connections to Mayor Todd Gloria, the future of the Ocean Beach Pier and how the city handles homelessness and trash.
Crosby, a Democrat, appears to be the favorite over Bailey, a longtime Republican who is no longer affiliated with a political party, in a district where registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans 42,000 to 23,000.
But Bailey says voters should focus on policy over politics, contending Crosby would continue the status quo at City Hall instead of making fundamental changes he says are needed.
“This race is really a referendum on the direction Mayor Todd Gloria and the City Council are taking the city,” said Bailey, a business owner who previously served two terms as mayor of Coronado.
Crosby, a deputy city attorney with strong roots in the district, said the race is about looking out for working people and the residents of District 2 communities.
“I am the only candidate who has stood up for our neighborhoods and fought the mayor on issues like mega-ADU complexes,” said Crosby, who also served on the Clairemont Town Council and a local parent-teacher association.
The most controversial issue in the race is Bailey’s proposal to cut city staffing back to 2015 levels in an effort to solve the city’s budget problems and shrink its long-term pension debt.
Crosby says Bailey is cherry picking by choosing a year when salaries were artificially low because of a later-invalidated 2012 ballot measure that prohibited employee pay raises for five years.
Bailey counters that in 2015, even with fewer staff making much less money, the city was doing better on emergency response times, paving roads and other measures called key performance indicators.
Crosby says response times are worse because emergency call volume has jumped sharply.
On developer donations, supporters of Crosby sent out a mailer recently featuring a long list of real estate developers and apartment building owners who have made large contributions to Bailey’s campaign.
“We’ve raised funds from a very diverse group,” Bailey said.
He also stressed that his fundraising total from individual donors is more than five times Crosby’s, contending that’s why she is getting so much outside support from committees funded by labor unions.
Crosby said unions support her because Bailey advocates for corporate interests and wants to fire thousands of employees.
“He’s just anti-city worker,” she said. “We need people to fill potholes, fix streetlights and be police officers.”
Many supporters of Bailey say that even if you disagree with him, it would be worthwhile to have a different voice at City Hall.
“This one-group mindset has not produced good results for the city,” said Bailey, stressing his experience in business and leading Coronado. “I bring a perspective that is sorely missed.”
Crosby said she’s all for new voices, but not when it’s someone with extreme views.
“We don’t need MAGA at City Hall,” she said. “We need someone who is willing to do the work to get us out of the ditch.”
Crosby has focused on Bailey’s arrival in the district just last year, calling him a carpetbagger who has almost no connection to the neighborhoods he would represent.
She also called his move to Point Loma so he could run for the seat evidence that Bailey is a career politician, contending that she is instead an ordinary citizen trying to step up and help her community.
Bailey countered that he is a lifelong resident of the San Diego region, also contending that there are more important things than a long history in the district.
“I know the issues better than her,” he said. “It doesn’t matter how long you’ve lived here if you support bad policies.”
Bailey has tried to connect Crosby with the mayor, who is generally unpopular with many voters.
One online ad features the mayor thanking Crosby for her help getting City Council approval and neighborhood support for Clairemont’s new development blueprint last year.
And a pro-Bailey mailer says “Mayor Todd Gloria pulls the strings, Nicole Crosby dances to the tune.”
Crosby stressed that the mayor has not endorsed her and that she’s been highly critical of many of his policies. She said the mayor would have thanked any Clairemont Town Council president for playing a role in finalizing the neighborhood’s new development blueprint.
The candidates have also clashed on the long-closed Ocean Beach Pier, with Crosby suggesting it could be rebuilt with grant money and Bailey saying some sort of public-private partnership will be necessary.
Bailey supports tougher enforcement of the city’s anti-camping ordinance to get homeless people off the streets. Crosby said money spent on enforcement would be better spent on support services and housing.
On city trash pickup, Crosby said customers should be billed monthly instead of twice a year on property tax bills. Bailey said he would go much further and privatize the entire service.
The race has attracted an unusually large amount of campaign cash.
Independent expenditure committees supporting either Bailey or Crosby spent more than $750,000 during the most recent disclosure period, which covered Sept. 20 through Oct. 17.
The race also got a large injection of cash from Point Loma attorney Steven Richter, who contributed $450,000 to a committee supporting Bailey.
Since the start of the year, committees favoring Crosby and Bailey have both raised roughly $700,000 each.
The committees supporting Crosby are almost entirely funded by labor unions, but they’ve also gotten contributions from the Sycuan tribe, the county Democratic Party and Sempra.
The committees supporting Bailey have gotten their money from wealthy individual donors like Richter and developer Tom Sudberry, companies like Verizon and business organizations like the Lincoln Club and the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce.
Bailey, 40, lives in Point Loma. Crosby, 46, lives in Clairemont. District 2 also includes Mission Beach, Ocean Beach and Old Town.
In the June primary, Bailey finished first with 14,800 votes, while Crosby was second with 14,325. But two other well-funded Democrats — Josh Coyne and Mandy Havlik — finished third and fourth and drew more than 10,000 votes between the two of them.