Your Aliso Viejo City Council Candidates for 2014

Two incumbents, a cop, a photographer and an I don’t know (yet).

These are candidates qualified for the November ballot for Aliso Viejo City Council.

The incumbents: Founding City Council Member Carmen Cave and (rotating) Mayor Phillip Tsunoda.

The cop: OC Sheriff’s Sergeant David Harrington.

The photographer: Andrew Abrecht.

The I don’t know (and don’t possess and email address): Gary Miller

The campaigns: Phillip Tsunoda began his reelection campaign in earnest in January with the “Aliso Proud” program, where various local wunderkind from concert pianist to Eagle Scouts are trotting into City Council meetings along with their hopefully registered voter friends and family to receive breathless recognition. The City has also approved funds for the purchase of a new scoreboard at Aliso Niguel High School so look for an unveiling ceremony at around the time the vote by mail (“VBM”) ballots drop.

In the case of Sergeant Harrington, his campaign has adopted the innovative and relatively cheap strategy of paying Facebook to push his campaign page through local users’ news feeds on a daily basis. Here we are treated to a picture of Sergeant Harrington and his extremely attractive family, including a spouse who is a local real estate agent active in Republican politics and two adopted children from Ethiopia. I have also found the same image on slick three color campaign cards in rubbish bins around the Aliso Viejo Town Center.

For Messrs. Abrecht and Miller, no indications of a campaign yet.

Over the next couple of weeks I will endeavor to find out from the non-incumbents their motivations for running.  And since it appears that Sergeant Harrington is the only challenger mounting a serious campaign, is he attempting to knock off Carmen Cave or Mayor Tsunoda?