Two years ago Candy Morales was a political newcomer and ran for National City City Council.
In her first ever race, she went up against two incumbents and lost.
However, this year’s election cycle has only one incumbent in the city council race.
Councilwoman Mona Rios is seeking re-election and Councilman Albert Mendivil isn’t going for his second term.
The fact that Mendivil’s seat is now open convinced Morales enough to run for city council once again.
“It’s been a very long time (since an incumbent is not seeking re-election),” she said. “It’s very hard to run against incumbents.”
Morales is one of six city council candidates on the November ballot.
Morales, a social worker with the County of San Diego, said her campaign is one that is community and safety focus. She said National City is safer today than it was about 20 years ago. She said people are safe jogging at night, when that was not the case two decades ago.
Morales said if elected she wants to keep that community safety focus efforts going.
Another item Morales said she wants to improve if elected is outreach efforts in helping residents becoming more civically engaged. She said there’s a lot of issues that the city council discusses during city council meetings. She said she would like to spend time educating and informing the community on major issues that will come before the city council.
When it comes to economic growth in National City, Morales said there are some pockets in National City that the city can rebrand and redevelop such as eighth street, the downtown area.
“I would like to focus on bringing out our culture and bringing out our tradition but at the same time do something different,” Morales said.
The city council candidate is an advocate for medicinal marijuana. She said she would like to see regulated medicinal dispensaries in National City and that, if taxed, could bring in lots of revenue to the city and that money could be used to help with the city’s revitalization projects. In November, voters will also decide on Measure W, a measure for rent control. Morales said she is against the measure as it is written. She said she is for more affordable housing and agrees that there needs to be a cap on rent increases, however, Measure W will hurt both landlords and tenants.
“This measure is one sided, it’s not balanced,” she said. “Tenants and landlords would be both affected.”
Morales said her background in social work will be a benefit on the dais because as a social worker she has worked with people of diverse populations and different walks of life.
“That’s the beauty of being in the field of social work is you learn to work with people,” she said. “And (sometimes) you agree to disagree and you’re open to whatever happens.”
