Who Will Replace Imperial Beach Mayor?

Media
Jul 15
4 min read

City Council will likely appoint someone to finish Aguirre’s term

Imperial Beach, a small, but resilient city confronting a decades-long environmental crisis, is losing its first-term mayor and its strongest voice in the fight against the Tijuana River sewage crisis.

Paloma Aguirre became the first Latina mayor of California’s southernmost, coastal community when voters elected her in 2022. But voters have selected her for a new job; starting July 22, she will represent District 1 on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors. Her attention will be pulled in several other directions as she’ll now represent hundreds of thousands of other constituents with vast needs.

The move will leave the rest of the City Council with a big decision: Who and how will she be replaced? Will that next person look to follow in Aguirre’s footsteps or shift tactics? And, more importantly, what do residents want to see?

Officials will likely appoint someone to fill the vacancy, as stipulated by state code. But they will only have two months to decide or be forced to call an election, something many Imperial Beach residents find too costly for a city with a tight budget and for a term that expires next November.

Councilmember Mitch McKay, the only City Council member who responded to repeated requests for comment, said he expects the issue of replacing the mayor “will appear on an upcoming City Council agenda and thereby provide ample opportunity for pubic input and discussion by the current Council.” He trusts the City Council will reach a consensus, he added.

Imperial Beach is not a strong-mayor city, meaning that the mayor’s vote is equally weighted with the rest of the council. Some people said that they don’t believe the 16-month appointment will make a significant difference. But others see this moment as a potential turning point for the city, particularly as it relates to the sewage crisis.

Libi Uremovic, a longtime resident, said everyone in Imperial Beach can agree that cross-border pollution is the top local issue. She’s devastated by how badly water and air pollution have affected businesses, tourism and overall quality of life. She thinks previous attempts, including Aguirre’s trips to Washington, D.C., to lobby Congress for more infrastructure funding, have not yielded a complete solution.

She wants no more U.S. taxpayer money invested in the issue and instead more pressure on Mexico to stem the pollution that spills over the border and floats up the coastline. That stricter approach is a Republican-backed promise from Lee Zeldin, the new administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. And the City Council should support that, she said.

“No more money going out. Stop that sewage from coming in and once we get that done, we can clean it up.” —Libi Uremovic

Uremovic thinks McKay would make a good candidate for mayor, which would trigger a vacancy in his District 3 seat.

McKay successfully proposed a City Council resolution in April that calls for stricter enforcement of international water and environmental treaties with Mexico and for Congress to restrict commercial border crossings and limit the export of potable water to Tijuana, tactics aimed at ensuring Mexico feels the urgency of controlling its sewage.

Aguirre was the only one on the council to oppose the resolution. She agreed with every measure except for restricting border crossings as a form of penalty, arguing that the language mixed the sewage crisis with partisan politics on immigration and that such limitations could affect the local economy.

Karl Bradley, a resident of more than 10 years, worries that if someone with similar views to the council’s conservative majority is appointed, more resolutions with language that is “very hostile towards Mexico in general” will get approved.

Sandy Brillhart, who has also lived in Imperial Beach for over a decade, agrees.

“I’m concerned that the new council will want to pursue more different pressures on Mexico that I think would actually be detrimental. I would like to see someone who would be able to pick up where she (Aguirre) left off. She’s really elevated the issue to a national level. It definitely is a federal issue, but I don’t think the federal government was even aware of the severity of the issue until Mayor Aguirre elevated it to a federal issue.” —Sandy Brillhart

Angela Frank is an Imperial Beach-based real estate agent who last year shut down her old-fashioned candy store on Palm Avenue because of declining revenue, which she attributed to the beach closures.

She thinks Aguirre will be a strong advocate for struggling businesses on the county board and, locally, McKay the best fit to advocate for businesses, she said.

“He (Mitch McKay) is a very strong advocate on the water crisis. I think a lot of the businesses feel the same way. And he’s very proactive. He comes into the businesses and gives us his business. He comes in and actually talks to us.” —Angela Frank

Though Brillhart prefers an open election, she said she hopes that the City Council will have a transparent appointment process where it will solicit applications and allow the public to comment.