After announcing his candidacy on social media several months ago, Richard Bailey launched his campaign in more familiar style last week by holding a meet and greet at the home of Jeff and Candy Tyler on what turned out to be a cold and blustery night.
Even so, over 120 people attended representing a wide swath of Coronado residents. There were people from the Cays, the Village and the Shores.
Many were long time community leaders and activists, including Doug Metz, Francette Roeder, Ledge Hakes, Jean Roach, Jennie Portelli and Doug Brandt. One of the party’s hosts, Jeff Tyler, is the chair of the city’s cultural arts commission. Businessman Norm Funk is a member of the Parks and Recreation Commission. There was also a large contingent of young people wearing Bailey for Mayor t-shirts.
Many of the establishment types at the event pointed to Bailey’s youth, intelligence and openness to change in their reasons for supporting him. “He’s young, progressive, and smart,” Funk said. Even though Bailey is new to Coronado, “he understands the culture of Coronado.”
Bailey had been living here only three years when he ran for city council four years ago. Walking block after block, knocking on door after door Bailey asked people what issues concerned them. Once elected he set up an online survey to regularly gauge public opinion.
“After all, let’s face it, the best ideas don’t come from politicians. They come from people out here in this courtyard; they come from people in the community,” he told his supporters. One example he gave was Nixle, an application that lets people know when there’s an accident on the bridge, along with other relevant public safety alerts.
“A couple of years ago I asked people for suggestions of something simple that could make their lives just a little bit easier a little bit better and that was one of the suggestions that we got back,” he said.
When he contacted the police, Bailey learned that there was already a notification system that had been ‘sitting on the shelf’ for four or five years.
“All it took was for a resident to suggest it and someone else listening and implementing it,” Bailey said.
Besides bringing forward new ideas, he pledged to continue the city’s long tradition of fiscal frugality. “We are only one of nine agencies within the entire state of California that has an AAA bond rating,” he said.
With its strong reserves, the city has been able to invest in infrastructure and to pay down its mandated employee pension obligations. “We started doing it just a few years ago and it’s already saved us over a half a million dollars,” he pointed out.
Finance was his calling card when he first ran for council. At the time he was working as a financial analyst for Goodrich Aerospace. He now runs the day-to-day operations of a facility in San Diego that manufactures parts for the oil and gas industry.
Of late he’s been a stalwart advocate for traffic safety in the corridor between the San Diego–Coronado Bridge and Orange Ave, where just in the past few years there have been two people seriously injured and one person killed. Recently he put forward a plan to restrict cars coming off the bridge from making left-turns. He also tried but failed to persuade the city council to determine whether it was in the city’s interest for Caltrans to relinquish state highways 75 (Orange Avenue) and 282 (Fourth and Third Streets) to the city.
“For too long in my opinion our city has just accepted the status quo. We haven’t been willing to engage with Caltrans, to engage with the Navy, or with our community,” he said.
“The status quo isn’t acceptable. We have a lot of people here today that live along the corridor and I think if you were to ask them what’s one of the reasons you’re backing Richard Bailey, I think it’s because they’ve seen me out walking the corridors, so I understand what people go though who live in that corridor.”
Whatever the issue, Bailey sees himself not only as a voice of the people, but also as a consensus builder.
My roles have always been to work with people to bring people together, lead teams to find quantifiable results. When I look at the issues facing Coronado over the next four years, the next eight years, next twenty years I think those skill sets are going to come in handy,” he said.
It is the forward-looking streak that many of his supporters most admire. “He brings a fresh approach to issues,” said Metz, a former school board member who’s been active in local politics for many years.
