22 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY OCTOBER 8-14, 2026 www.montereycountynow.com nomic development, linking the Dunes and potential hotel and Mercedes dealership with the manufacturing taking place at Joby Aviation and the opportunities that CSU Monterey Bay provides. She is also the only one of the three candidates who supports Measure Q, a utility users tax that is needed to help fund new police and fire stations suitable to this growing city. She strikes a good balance between economic development booster and neighborhood ambassador. Moeller has impressed us for his commitment to volunteerism and understanding of the budget, getting very involved in Marina civic life. But his and Acevedo-Cabrera’s suggestions for how to get a police and fire station built without Measure Q left us nonplussed. Theirs are campaigns of opposition, despite generally positive trends we see in Marina with lively new businesses, new construction, new parks and a new city manager. Visscher’s mayoral run means she is exiting her District 4 council seat, and three candidates are running to replace her. Planning Commissioner Mike Simmons is the best prepared to do that, with a keen understanding of the city’s fiscal needs—he is the only candidate who supports Measure Q. Like all three, he is opposed to Cal Am’s desal project. He wants to see workforce housing expanded, and points to Cypress Knolls as the best development opportunity for that. We are impressed by Athena Burciaga’s passion and acute awareness of the challenges that rising costs pose to regular working people. She is the only candidate who shares our concern that Marina is at risk of becoming a bedroom community for Silicon Valley workers with Silicon Valley salaries. But we are puzzled by her hardline view that Marina residents should not be taxed (how else can Marina pay for the services its residents deserve?) and her dismissal of “the political establishment” when incumbent leaders are doing a good job. Simmons says, “I am proud of the direction this city has taken and I think it needs to continue.” We agree. Monterey MAYOR | TYLLER WILLIAMSON CITY COUNCIL | DISTRICT 1 | KIM BARBER CITY COUNCIL | DISTRICT 2 | ALEC MANAS When we interviewed Vince Malfitano in a candidate forum in August, he came across as a well intentioned political neophyte who just wanted to get along. Our reporting since then has shown that he indeed has no political experience, but he does have a long history of business experience that’s resulted in official investigations of his work as a dentist, a casino operator and the owner of an assisted living facility. His response to that reporting has been to try and intimidate the reporter and editor. He clearly does not understand the role of the free press nor the responsibility for transparency from an elected leader. He is a deeply flawed candidate who has demonstrated both through his current conduct and his past that he is wildly unprepared to hold public office. Incumbent Tyller Williamson has worked collaboratively as a member of the council from 2018-22 and as mayor since then. He has demonstrated leadership to tackle the housing crisis with a rental registry and a rental assistance program. The next mayor faces a larger challenge in the coming term as the council must get out from under a $12 million structural deficit. We are supportive of the mayor’s willingness to confront this head-on, and Malfitano offers no counter-proposal. We are impressed by the new city manager, who is leading a series of public listening sessions to approach the budget realities. But Williamson’s take that employee layoffs are essentially off the table is the wrong thinking. “This is our Monterey family,” he told us about city staff. Actually, they are not family but taxpayer-funded staff, and the responsibility of approaching this deficit may well require cuts. (It is no coincidence that his proudest endorsements come from organized labor.) Incumbent Kim Barber is our choice for District 1. She demonstrates a commitment to the plight of renters, and doing the people’s business in the open. Her advocacy for the rental assistance program and affordable housing developments have produced tangible results and we think she deserves another term to continue this work. Her opponent, Tom Reeves, is a former city engineer and deeply invested in the community. He is thoughtful and smart, but we think his notion to privatize city assets like the Sports Center or dedicate $1 million from the city’s neighborhood improvement fund to workforce housing—not enough to build it—seems misaligned with the realities of the task at hand. Three candidates are running for District 2 to replace outgoing Ed Smith. There is a clear front-runner here in Alec Manas, who in his day job works as a project manager for housing developer CHISPA and has experience working on constituent issues in the office of former Assemblymember Mark Stone. Manas knows he has a lot to learn but pledges to be open-minded and transparent and hopes to focus on what matters—he wants to see fewer polarizing culture wars issues, like painting crosswalks. “We should focus more on the meat and potatoes—the budget, clean streets,” he says. Vicki Nohrden is a repeat political candidate for statewide office who has bashed California as a horrible place. We think she’s wrong. Newcomer Jeff Whitmoyer is unprepared and does not seem to understand what the job entails. Pacific Grove MAYOR | NICK SMITH CITY COUNCIL | AT-LARGE MEMBER | LORI MCDONNELL CITY COUNCIL | DISTRICT 1 | CYNTHIA GARFIELD CITY COUNCIL | DISTRICT 3 | TARA LEWELING For a small city of just 15,000, Pacific Grove has a lot of political participation. This is generally a good thing, but in P.G., it also has a tendency to turn nasty. People get involved in issues they care about and too often, we’ve seen it become a polarizing battle, even over something like whether or not to build a skate park in an existing park. Those dynamics mean we want to see not just candidates who bring forward good ideas, but also who we think can be even-tempered, cooperative leaders. As downtown has come to life in recent years, growing tension between live entertainment and residents is a conflict that needs thoughtful leadership, and we endorse the candidates we think are most able to strike that balance—not just on noise but other thorny issues. For mayor, incumbent Nick Smith deserves another term. Luke Coletti, a former councilmember who lost his reelection bid in 2024, is super smart and he’s chosen to apply his smarts to city government—he can cite city code sections from memory. As a watchdog, he is often on point (and always nitpicky). But watchdogs do not necessarily make good or inspiring leaders. When he served on council from NIK BLASKOVICH Alec Manas | Monterey City Council “WE NEED VIBRANT BUSINESS DISTRICTS DOWNTOWN.”
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