DEL MAR: TERRY GAASTERLAND IS YOUR PROBLEM

DEL MAR'S REGIONAL INFLUENCE IS ON THE BALLOT

October 4, 2026

To my friends in Del Mar:



During the past few years Del Mar has lost respect at the regional level and has struggled to find support from elected officials who have significant power over the city.  I try to stay positive, but the biggest reason is Terry Gaasterland. I have close friends in Del Mar, I spend a lot of time in Del Mar, and I believe the city deserves a change in leadership.

Like it or not, elected Democrats control all the regional power bases in the County.  This includes the Board of Supervisors and SANDAG (The San Diego Association of Governments).  Effective leaders must build strong alliances to get anything done.   Otherwise, a small city like Del Mar has no power to get anyone to take the concerns of the city seriously.  

As someone who has been intimately involved in County-wide Democratic politics for over 18 years, including as a member of the Del Mar Fair Board, president of the Rancho Santa Fe Democratic Club, and member of the Democratic Party’s North Coastal Area Caucus, I’ve watched Gaasterland destroy the relationships that Del Mar had and needs to rebuild to get support from regional leaders. 

Gaasterland, who is seeking a third term of City Council, has left a trail of damaged relationships in her wake.  Here is the truth:

• Gaasterland asked the Democratic Party for an endorsement earlier this year.  The vote against her by the San Diego County Democratic Party Central Committee’s approximately 80 members was a unanimous “NO.”  These are the people who best understand the inner workings of leadership - some are themselves elected officials - and they rejected her.  That is not a fluke. That is a verdict.  

• SANDAG, which will determine the new route of the train through Del Mar, is controlled by elected Democrats from across the county. Gaasterland has alienated those elected leaders in numerous ways (see below).  A SANDAG representative must be able to influence SANDAG’s Democratic members. Instead of building bridges there, Gaasterland has burned them again and again. 

• When other Council candidates at a recent forum remarked that Del Mar’s relationships with the SANDAG board were fractured and needed rebuilding, Gaasterland said the proof of her effectiveness after six years of Board service was that she had everyone’s cell phone number. Leaving aside that such a list is likely available to Board members upon request, the real question is whether anyone would pick up if she called. Based on what I know, I doubt many would. 

•  At the Fairgrounds Board, we found Gaasterland to be at best unreliable in her public statements, inconsistent in her positions, and unable to see any viewpoint but her own. The generation of that kind of widespread distrust and distaste for a sitting elected official is not something I encounter often. 

• The people who know her best, her campaign teams from past races and local and national elected officials who had endorsed her in 2022 are not on her side this year.  She’s lost virtually all that support. These are local community volunteer and elected leaders who know her best and have decided to walk away.

This November, Del Mar faces an important choice for City Council:  four more years of disastrous consequences because of Gaasterland or select two of the three other candidates on the ballot for the two open seats.   Two are endorsed by the Democratic Party, and one is a registered Republican.  While I would prefer you elect the Democrats, a vote for any two of those three will be a vote that recognizes the need to rebuild relationships and elevate Del Mar’s clout in the county. 

Del Mar needs City Council members who are in it for their city and residents, not for themselves, and who can build trust with the people who control the county and state. Del Mar’s future depends on resolving issues like affordable housing mandates and the new rail alignment in its favor.  That won’t happen unless voters make a change.

Sincerely,

Michael Gelfand

Michael Gelfand

Michael Gelfand is president and founder of the Rancho Santa Fe Democratic Club, where members from Carmel Valley, Del Mar, Encinitas, Solana Beach and Rancho Santa Fe come to get involved politically.   He has been involved in federal, state, county and local politics here for nearly two decades, and is frequently asked to help members make informed decisions by offering insider-perspective on the candidates and the issues.

This is the opinion of Michael Gelfand.

The Rancho Santa Fe Democratic Club has not taken a position on the issue. 

DETAILS:

For those who want more detail: Gaasterland, who ran as an endorsed democrat in 2022, has shown her lack of integrity. Her actions aren’t a matter of opinion but of public record. Below are specific, documented examples of how she has created ill will and lost the confidence of her constituents and fellow elected officials:

GAASTERLAND JOINED AN ORCHESTRATED REPUBLICAN-LED WALKOUT IN PROTEST OVER THE ELECTION OF OFFICERS

After a SANDAG Board vote on January 13, 2023, electing Solana Beach Mayor Lesa Heebner, a Democrat, and not Terry Gaasterland, as Second Vice Chair, Gaasterland participated in an orchestrated walk-out by eight mostly Republican SANDAG board members.  (6 were Republicans, 1 was NPP, with Gaasterland as the only registered Democrat).  Before the walkout, Gaasterland supported a substitute motion to elect Republican Poway Mayor Steve Vaus as Vice Chair, and she also supported a substitute motion to elect herself as Chair.  Democrats Nora Vargas and Sean Elo-Rivera were elected as Chair and Vice Chair, respectively, despite these Republican-supported substitute motions. Heebner is a Democrat and the Mayor of Solana Beach.

GAASTERLAND VOTED TO APPOINT A LESSER-QUALIFIED REPUBLICAN OVER A DEMOCRAT TO THE AIR POLLUTION CONTROL DISTRICT

On March 10, 2025, Gaasterland cast the deciding vote to appoint Republican John Duncan rather than Democratic Carlsbad Councilmember Teresa Acosta.  Acosta is a highly qualified candidate for appointment to the APCD because of her subject-matter experience.  She has a strong record as an environmental champion and was a former consultant to the South Coast Air Quality Management District.  Before the vote, the Del Mar City Council divided 2-2 on whether to instruct Gaasterland to support Acosta following the testimony of several environmental groups and activists and Del Mar residents had attended a City Council meeting to ask Del Mar to support Acosta.  The Del Mar City Attorney said in writing that Gaasterland should abstain from voting on this appointment on March 10 at the City Selection Committee.  Gaasterland ignored the City Attorney’s instruction and cast the deciding vote to appoint John Duncan to this important environmental position.

GAASTERLAND HAS ALIGNED HERSELF WITH REPUBLICAN COUNCIL MEMBER DAN QUIRK TO SUPPORT APPOINTING A REPUBLICAN TO FILL DWIGHT WORDEN’S DEL MAR CITY COUNCIL SEAT IN NOVEMBER 2024

When Dwight Worden, current president of the Torrey Pines Democratic Club, stepped down in Nov 2024 due to health concerns, there were a series of City Council votes to replace him.  In each of these votes, Gaasterland consistently supported Republican Jeff Sturgis, who as a founder and principal of “The Woodpecker” regularly attacked Worden throughout his time on Council. Then Council members Tracy Martinez and Dave Druker, both Democrats, voted against Sturgis, preventing Worden’s seat from being filled by a Republican whose values are diametrically opposed to those of Worden and the Democratic Party.  (The Council could not muster three votes to appoint any applicant or to call a special election, so Worden’s seat has been vacant since his resignation in September 2024. This causes many unnecessary stalemates on the City Council). Also, Gaasterland has all but endorsed Republican Sturgis as her running mate in the November 2026 Del Mar City Council race.

GAASTERLAND SUPPORTED REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE DAN QUIRK INSTEAD OF DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATES 

Even after becoming a Democrat, Gaasterland has failed to support Democratic candidates in key elections. For example, in the 2020 election, she sent an eblast encouraging voters to cast a vote for Republican Dan Quirk, and throughout that campaign, she refused to support two Democrats in that race (Bob Gans and Glenn Warren). Note that Del Mar does not have City Council districts, so all candidates run at large, with the top vote-getters elected to the open seats.

GAASTERLAND HAS FLIP-FLOPPED ON COUNCIL MEMBER QUIRK’S 2024 CENSURE  

Despite being the council leader in a stern censure of Council member Quirk in 2024 Gaasterland decided in early 2025 that her political future rested with now aligning with Quirk.  When Quirk started in 2025 to act out again in disregard of his censure, the Council brought an item to reaffirm the censure as a means of trying to get Quirk to curb his poor behavior toward staff.  Gaasterland unsuccessfully sought a delay in that vote, and then, when the Clerk called the roll, she said, “I absolutely cannot vote…so I am going to recuse myself and abstain.”  Clearly flustered, she then walked out of the Council chamber.  Details of the Quirk censure are here:  bit.ly/quirk-censure. 

GAASTERLAND IS UNDER INVESTIGATION BY THE FAIR POLITICAL PRACTICES COMMISSION FOR HER ACTIONS AROUND DEL MAR’S SHORT-TERM RENTAL ORDINANCE DEVELOPMENT

Gaasterland tried in vain to influence a short-term rentals ordinance to benefit herself and her political consultants.  She participated in the Fall 2024 drafting of Del Mar’s short-term rentals ordinance without disclosing she herself had been a short-term rental landlord.  After the ordinance was passed, she waited until Dec 31, 2024, the deadline to do so and a day City Hall was closed for a holiday, to slip two of her Del Mar condos onto the city’s registry for permit applications claiming she had rented both as short-term in the recent years before the ordinance was approved.  When this was revealed, she abandoned her effort to gain a short-term rental permit.  The Council majority, concerned that her apparent conflict of interest could put at risk the California Coastal Commission approval of the ordinance, referred this case to the Fair Political Practices Commission to determine if Gaasterland violated any conflict-of-interest rules.  That investigation by the FPPC is ongoing.