ENCINITAS COUNCIL TO FILL VACANT SEAT VIA APPOINTMENT

Special, mail-in election would have cost $200K-$300K

Encinitas will pursue appointing someone to fill the council seat newly vacated by Jody Hubbard, rather than holding a special election, the City Council decided Wednesday.

“I think the city has been well served by the appointment process,” Councilman Tony Kranz said, mentioning that it’s been used to fill unexpected council vacancies multiple times recently.

Councilman Joe Mosca called appointing someone a “reasonable path,” given that an appointee would be selected by mid-march and could start work immediside ately, while a special election couldn’t take place until late summer.

“To me ... time is of the essence,” Councilwoman Kellie Shay Hinze said, mentioning that she wants someone engaging as soon as possible with the city’s Cardiff community the way Hubbard did.

Hubbard, 64, had served the city’s District 3 for two years when she announced her resignation last week. Her term in office was scheduled to end December 2022. She resigned due to health issues; she was diagnosed last year with non-smoker, non-small cell adenocarcinoma, and said last week that her cancer had spread.

The district she has represented covers much of Cardiff, as well as part of the city’s mid-section along Encinitas Boulevard, and her replacement will need to rein that section of the city. In addition to being a District 3 resident, eligible applicants must be at least 18 years old, a registered voter in Encinitas and a California state citizen, City Clerk Kathy Hollywood said.

Hollywood said the deadline to submit the paperwork will be Feb. 11, and the council is expected to review the applicants at a Feb. 24 meeting. Under state law, the council must fill the spot within 60 days — in this case by March 14 — if it goes the appointee route, rather than holding a special election.

A special, mail-in-only election would likely cost the city $200,000 to $300,000, Hollywood said.

Mayor Catherine Blakespear said the council has received numerous emails from people who wanted to go the special election route. They called the appointment process “undemocratic,” a charge Blakespear said she didn’t agree with, saying that it’s frequently done by cities. She also mentioned that the state’s governor just appointed a new senator to fill out the term of Kamala Harris, who was sworn in as the nation’s vice president Wednesday.

The council heard from two public speakers on the issue and both opposed using the appointment process to fill the District 3 seat.

Barbara Murray, who has lived in Cardiff for 35 years, said the people in her community should have “a representative they have chosen themselves” and the council could get by with four members instead of five until late August when a mail-in-only election could be held under the county election rules.

Ken Harrison, a lifelong Cardiff resident, said the Cardiff community is unique in Encinitas because it has its own ZIP code and school district, and “we want representation.”

“Appointing is nothing more than politics,” he said, later adding, “It is not democracy; democracy is voting.”