Battle for control: Grover Beach's mayoral race highlights city's current division 

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Civil unrest at City Council meetings and a growing divide in the community mark a pivotal election year in Grover Beach as three candidates vie to become mayor.

Current Mayor Karen Bright, Grover H2O spokesperson and former Mayor Debbie Peterson, current City Councilmember Robert Robert, and local business owner Kassi Dee sat down with New Times.

Mayor Karen Bright

Mayor Bright took her shot at becoming Grover Beach mayor in 2022 and won, but the two-year term hasn't been a smooth ride and she isn't running again.

The aftermath of the council's vote to raise water rates to fund the Central Coast Blue project was a recall attempt against her and fellow Councilmembers Daniel Rushing and Zach Zimmerman and the beginning of disruption at council meetings. Bright said she can't help but blame Peterson for the issues.

"That's the result of Debbie Peterson in the way she does business," she said. "Truly, if she's not disrupting or sowing seeds of distrust, she's just not doing her job."

The council later voted to opt out of the project and revert water rates to what they were. However, the disruptors started to complain about things like a lack of transparency.

"I've always been trying to be as accessible as I can; my phone number's on the website, email address is on the website, anyone can call me, email me," she said.

Bright said Grover H2O, a group that Peterson helped found to oppose the city's water rates increase, makes locals uneasy about sharing opposing views at council meetings.

"If someone gets up and says something that they don't particularly agree with they're snickering in the background," she said. "Everybody has a right to their opinion and whether it agrees with yours or not, they have the right to speak it."

If Peterson gets elected, Bright said she believes the city will move in a backward direction while either Dee or Robert would be a better choice to help lead the city forward.

"They're both good people, honest, and I think they truly want what's best for the city."

Debbie Peterson

"I was asked to run time and time and time and time again over the last 11 months by people in the city," she said. "I had the track record and the experience to go in and make some changes that people would like to see happen at City Hall."

Running for a repeat of her 2012 victory, Peterson claimed that when she was mayor Grover Beach residents used less water, she instituted a gray water ordinance, and managed to help pass Measure K-14 to fix the streets. She resigned from her position in 2019, citing concerns over corruption at the city and in SLO County.

This time her focus is on sustainable solutions to capture rainwater for times of drought, reopening City Hall on Fridays, and video recording every public meeting.

"When I talked to the people in Grover Beach ... and we said to people, 'What are the three most important things to you?' I was very surprised at the response," she said. "First I expected the usual things in Grover Beach like streets and public safety; those are really the No. 1 thing, and then most recently people have been concerned about Pismo putting a wastewater treatment plant in South Grover but none of those things were on the top three."

Instead, the people she spoke to said transparency from City Hall and the council, giving residents a voice, and the cost of government were the most important issues.

There's a need for real change in the city, Peterson said, and as mayor her job is to represent the people and carry out their wishes. One of those wishes, she said, is to move public comment for items not on the agenda back to the beginning of meetings.

"What is the most important thing in government? It's representing the people, and if you put the people last, that sends a message," she said. "You can't govern if you don't know what the people want."

Kassi Dee

Energetic and full of ideas, Dee is a fourth-generation resident, local business owner, and the youngest person running for mayor.

"I know that you're supposed to climb the ladder, but I feel like I've done my part in doing that," she said.

Dee is currently on the Grover Beach Parks and Recreation Commission, she sits on the Five Cities Homeless Coalition board, is a Grover Beach Community Foundation board member; she's sat on the SLO County Commission on the Status of Women and Girls, was an ambassador with the South County chambers, and was awarded Woman of the Year from 30th District Assemblymember Dawn Addis in 2021.

"I have three pillars and one of them is community engagement and making sure ... that we can follow the rules but also be really active and be really engaging," she said.

Dee's other two pillars focus on upgrading public safety resources and improving economic development by supporting small businesses and applying for block grants that help property owners update buildings to allow new business to come in.

"The average response time from the Grover Beach Police Department is two minutes and 23 seconds, and I think that's an incredible achievement," she said. "In addition to that, they provide so many resources and programs for youth and for the community. ... I would really love to see more resource training and opportunities for police and fire to encourage self-care, because that's a hard job."

Dee said if she became mayor, she would use community engagement to help close the divide in Grover Beach and bring community members closer to the council.

"There does need to be a decorum. There does need to be something that changes so that everybody can come to the council in a respectful way, and that's just bottom line," she said. "I think that people are kind of forced right now to come to the council meetings and talk about what they're having issues with, which is great—that's a forum to do that, but we can have other forums as well."

Robert Robert

As a council member for four years, Robert said he's on City Council because he loves his community, not because he's trying to move up the political ladder.

"My desire is to help the community, for it to be a better place for all of us to live," he said. "The council makes goals every two years; we review them every year, and we're 97 percent through achieving our goals."

Robert originally voted against raising water rates to help pay for the Central Coast Blue project, but he said the city is going to have to increase water rates eventually. He wants those increases to roll out slowly and the city to educate the community.

"It's my desire not to hurt people more than they already are economically because it's tough to make a living out here, especially in California," he said. "As far as any other major policies, I think we're doing pretty good. We've got the infrastructure we're working on, we've got new buildings coming in, we've got a new hotel going on, so all these things that we've built for the infrastructure helps our local citizens."

Better communication between the council and constituents, Robert said, would help bring more community involvement.

"We want people involved and to come and volunteer and do things that can help make the city a more pleasant place to live," he said. "I think the Central Coast Blue thing and the people against the water increase is our biggest divide right now, but it's working itself out." Δ

Reach Staff Writer Samantha Herrera at [email protected].