Democratic County Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer laid out her proposal to fight the Trump administration during the annual State of the County speech Wednesday night. The county’s two Republican supervisors say she didn’t invite them to the show.
But Lawson-Remer’s office says she did invite Supervisors Joel Anderson and Jim Desmond. Their offices failed to signal interest in attending as Lawson-Remer considered how to structure the event to comply with the state’s open meetings law.
The differing stories amount to the latest kerfuffle for the politically divided county Board of Supervisors.
The county has long hosted an annual State of the County address given by the chair of the Board of Supervisors. With the county board politically split 2-2, the board has failed to elect a chair, making Lawson-Remer the acting chair and Anderson the acting vice chair.
Lawson-Remer and county staff decided to proceed with an invitation-only annual State of the County address on Wednesday at the Natural History Museum in Balboa Park. Unlike in past years, the county communications office didn’t promote the speech in advance. The event also wasn’t publicly agendized on the county website, though Lawson-Remer’s office issued press invitations that spurred advance news coverage.
Anderson told Voice of San Diego he was initially told late last year to hold a date in March for the speech. The mid-March date came and went without additional information. Then the East County supervisor said he learned Tuesday afternoon that the annual county speech was happening Wednesday night. Anderson said he hadn’t been invited.
Anderson said he wanted to go, but staffers told him he couldn’t attend because doing so would amount to a state Brown Act violation given the format Lawson-Remer chose for the event.
“Republicans need not apply,” Anderson said. “Not to invite the vice chair is a huge faux pas.”
Desmond spokesperson Miles Himmel said the North County supervisor also wasn’t invited.
“We didn’t receive an invite,” Himmel wrote in a text message.
Lawson-Remer’s office says that’s not true.
“Everyone was invited to attend, and we would have also loved everyone to be there,” Lawson-Remer spokesperson Kevin Montes said.
A complication seems to have contributed to the confusion.
At some point earlier this year, Montes said county counsel informed Lawson-Remer’s office of an April 2024 state Attorney General’s Office opinion that a similar annual speech in Ventura would constitute a formal meeting under state Brown Act requirements if most councilmembers attended, thus triggering mandates such as public comment. The county decided it couldn’t rely on exemptions it had assumed in the past for the State of the County event.
Montes and fellow Lawson-Remer staffer Spencer Katz said the supervisor’s office contacted other supervisors’ offices to see if they’d like Lawson-Remer to switch up the traditional format of the annual speech so all or most supervisors could attend.
“At the time, no office confirmed an RSVP or indicated that they wanted us adapt a new format to allow them to attend,” Montes wrote in an email.
Lawson-Remer’s office continued planning an invitation-only address at the Natural History Museum that didn’t include public comment or formal public noticing.
On Wednesday, staff and volunteers set up a photo backsplash featuring Lawson-Remer’s name, a Power point featuring her accomplishments as supervisor and laid out booklets describing them too.
The program kicked off with invocations, a presentation of the colors and remarks by Democratic Rep. Juan Vargas.
Then Lawson-Remer gave a speech laying out a progressive policy playbook to fight back against Trump that stood out from more typical past recitations of bipartisan county accomplishments and plans for the year.
Attendees included fellow Democratic Supervisor Monica Montgomery Steppe, independent District Attorney Summer Stephan and Democratic San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria.
Anderson argued the format made the event inappropriately exclusive and left out county residents, including himself, who may have wanted to attend. He thinks the county should have proceeded as it did in past years given that the guidance came from an Attorney General’s opinion rather than a ruling – or simply incorporated other public meeting procedures to make the event more accessible to all.
“Where is the statesmanship?” Anderson said. “When do people start putting constituents first?”
Asked whether his staff had been asked about a potential format change months ago, Anderson said his team didn’t recall it.
Desmond’s spokesperson didn’t respond to Voice’s questions about conversations about the format of the event and simply repeated that Desmond wasn’t invited to the State of the County.
Katz acknowledged there may have been confusion and rejected the notion there were any partisan motivations behind the decisions. He said Lawson-Remer’s office would have adjusted the format if it had known Anderson and Desmond wanted to come.
“It must have been more of a logistical communications breakdown at some point in the process between our staff, their staff, between (Anderson) and his staff, us and our chief,” Katz said.
Katz also noted that Lawson-Remer shouted out a shallow rental subsidy program for seniors that Anderson championed in her speech, though she didn’t call him out by name.
“We would have loved to have Supervisor Anderson there,” Katz said.
I would die to find out the truth, the details and what the hell is going on.
another dumb tempest in a teapot for San Diego. sheesh.
REGARDING: “Local homeowners must use their direct democracy rights” LOCAL, LETTERS
(04.20) Mr. Weiler like so many other San Diegan’s, whistles past the graveyard while denying the truth. In
lamenting over fiscal overreach, there is no mention about the paltry 17% of voters who cast a ballot in the
last special election for county supervisor. This is not a good example of democracy. Year after year,
decade after decade, voters elect candidates who they are told to vote for, via party propaganda, this very
newspaper, and television. It’s a vicious circle. The political process is like an episode of Let’s Make a Deal.
There were two more letters published on abuse of taxpayer funds and the same people just don’t get it.
Daniel Smiechowski Bay Ho
I’m getting 88 D0llars consistently to deal with net. Q I’ve never accepted like it tends to be reachable anyway one of my most noteworthy buddy got D0llars 27,000 D0llars in three weeks working this basic task and she impacted me to avail…
Take A Look Here….> CLICK ON PROFILE
Because Rheem-Her was doing it.
It is either that the two GOP members weren’t invited or that they are lying about not being invited. Either way, we have Board members acting like teenage girls. Someone PRA those emails.