MONTGOMERY STEPPE FOR COUNTY SUPERVISOR

San Diego County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher’s scandal-driven May 15 resignation left a vacancy in the board’s District 4, which stretches east from Clairemont and Bay Park in San Diego to La Mesa, Lemon Grove, Spring Valley and Rancho San Diego. Voting on his replacement, who will serve until January 2027, begins this week and ends Aug. 15.

While Fletcher ultimately let down constituents, he lived up to his promise in his 2018 campaign to end the complacency that had been the Republicandominated board’s defining trait for two decades. Especially after 2020’s election gave Democrats a board majority and led to Fletcher becoming chair, county government got better on many fronts — starting with increased access to mental health care and a much more active approach to homelessness.

In deciding whom to endorse to replace Fletcher, The San Diego Union-tribune Editorial Board considered which candidate would be most likely to continue the momentum and leave behind the era when the board cared more about the county’s bond rating than its nightmarish foster care system or mediocre constituent and social services. We were most impressed with two Democratic candidates.

Republican Paul Mcquigg, 46, a retired Marine gunnery sergeant who lives in Ridgeview-webster, made several strong points in his interview with the editorial board. His ideas about making sturdy, cheap prefabricated housing a part of the response to the housing crisis and having the Army Corps of Engineers help out with Tijuana’s broken sewage infrastructure are smart. But he showed less mastery of basic county issues than other candidates.

Republican Amy Reichert, 55, a licensed private investigator who lives in La Mesa and who lost to Fletcher in District 4 last November, was stronger in her interview. She says current supervisors haven’t done enough to respond to frustrations felt by many low- and middle-income households, and she speaks with insight about the need for public transit to improve “first- and last-mile” connections, especially for vulnerable populations. But she showed less of a grasp of government finance than others.

The two Democrats seem more likely to hit the ground running if elected. (If no candidate wins a majority of the vote, the top two make a fall runoff.) In interviews, Janessa Goldbeck, 37, the CEO of the nonprofit Vet Voice Foundation who lives in Talmadge, and Monica Montgomery Steppe, 44, a San Diego City Council member who lives in Skyline Hills, spoke with thoroughness and thoughtfulness.

Goldbeck — an energetic activist who serves on San Diego County’s Behavioral Health Advisory Board, the board of MANA de San Diego and the San Diego mayor’s LGBT task force — wants monthly updates from the Sheriff ’s Department on the health crisis in county jails where people are dying at disproportionate rates and is pushing for county employee workforce housing. The former captain in the Marines says local military families stretched thin by housing costs and forced to use food banks need much more county help. She would be the first openly LGBTQ female supervisor.

Montgomery Steppe — a lawyer who chairs the City Council’s budget committee and has served on city, county and state boards and task forces — wants the county to more aggressively address a huge shortfall in behavioral health workers and sees a need for “radical change” in the Sheriff ’s Department, starting with the release of reports on jail deaths that the agency won’t make public. While both essentially said possibly, her full answer on if staff should be searched to stop drugs entering jails was more specific and nuanced than Goldbeck’s. She would be the first Black female supervisor.

Overall, Montgomery Steppe has the track record in office that Goldbeck lacks, a record that includes her courageous fight for law enforcement reform despite demagogic attacks by the city’s police union. Her independence was also on display last month when she opposed Mayor Todd Gloria’s push for a homeless camping ban of dubious legality that was rushed through without an adequate enforcement plan. Yet her diplomacy was on display when she declined to comment to us directly on Sheriff Kelly Martinez until she talked to her.

The choice is close, but we recommend a vote for Monica Montgomery Steppe for county supervisor.