Copyright San Diego Union-Tribune
The next treasurer-tax collector of San Diego County could be someone who sees the job as a temporary caretaker role or as a stepping stone to run for a full term in office next fall. On Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors will consider four finalists to appoint as the county’s top financial official following the retirement of longtime Treasurer-Tax Collector Dan McAllister in August. In September, the board interviewed a field of nine candidates and narrowed it to four. Supervisor Joel Anderson has recused himself from the process, saying he’s mulling a campaign for the post in next year’s election. A low-profile but crucial role in county government, the treasurer-tax collector manages the county’s investment pool and oversees the collection of billions of dollars in property taxes each year. Two of the finalists — David Baker and Detra Williams — know plenty about the inner workings of the office. Baker, the chief deputy tax collector, and Williams, the office’s special functions manager, have each worked in the office for decades and want a steady, experienced hand to lead it for the next year. Neither plans to run in 2026. “I’m concerned about major changes for just one year,” Williams said in an interview Thursday during a public forum with the candidates. She noted it would take someone new to the office years to fully understand its operations and the money it oversees. New technological changes have come recently to the office, too. Only weeks ago, its 30-year-old legacy property tax system was replaced with an upgraded system that integrates records between the tax collector, the county assessor and controller Baker agreed the office doesn’t need more disruptive change right now. “I feel my position is to get the team through this transition,” he said. One finalist for the job has different thoughts. “This position has been dramatically underutilized,” said Larry Cohen, chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Juan Vargas, a South Bay Democrat. Cohen was a San Diego City Hall staffer in the 1990s, then worked for pharmaceutical and life science companies, before taking the helm of Vargas’ congressional office in 2020. He aims to take an activist mindset as treasurer-tax collector. The treasurer-tax collector could do more to screen investments to make sure the county isn’t investing in companies that don’t share its environmental and social values, Cohen said. He also wants to bring that effort to the county employee pension system. The county treasurer-tax collector holds a seat on the San Diego County Employee Retirement Association’s nine-member board. “I’m not going to be a caretaker,” said Cohen, who plans to run for the office in 2026 only if appointed. “None of the candidates have talked about vision or anything beyond managing daily operations.” Finalist Christian Peacox, now Carlsbad treasurer, also plans to run for the seat in 2026 if supervisors choose him. He’ll run for re-election otherwise. Peacox points to his record on transparency in his time as his city’s top financial official. After being elected to his current post last year, Peacox said he discovered investments the city had made that were illegal under state law. He got them reversed at no cost to the city. “It’s not my goal to fix something that’s broken,” Peacox said of the treasurer-tax collector’s office at Thursday’s forum. “It’s to build on that legacy and make it better through technology, efficiency and increased transparency.” The forum, held at the county’s operations center in Kearny Mesa, was attended largely by employees of the treasurer-tax collector’s office who were hoping to hear more from the finalists who could become their new boss. But attendee John Conrad, an accountant at UCSD Health, said he’d feel satisfied with the supervisors appointing any of the final four candidates. “If it were up to me to make a decision, it would be hard,” he said.
