By Katia Lopez-Hodoyan
Anthony Bernal never imagined he would be living in San Diego or running for a City Council seat, but the 35 year old is now doing both. After being involved in local politics for the last seven years, he’s taking a step forward, knocking from door to door, talking to constituents and hoping to get elected as the next Council Member for District 3.
“Instead of complaining to neighbors about issues, I want residents to reach out to me,” says Bernal. “I’m a doer. I don’t like talking a big game. I like delivering results.”
Anthony currently works for Council President Todd Gloria, as the Director of Business and Community Projects, which includes neighborhoods in North Park, South Park, Golden Hills, Hillcrest, Mission Hill and Downtown. Since Gloria can’t run for re-election because of term limits, Bernal says he was encouraged to take the leap and campaign for the seat. For the last 32 weeks he has been doing just that, tackling issues like city infrastructure, housing, small businesses, water supply and homelessness.
“I love seeing results,” says Bernal. “I love to see changes in the community. It is what drives me.”
Bernal is all about San Diego; from running half marathons to checking out new breweries, this is the town he calls home. He lives with his wife in downtown’s Cortez Hill, but he was born and raised in the Central Valley. His father was a grocery store clerk and his mother a farm worker.
“When I was four years old, my mother would take me to pre-school, which was about three miles away from our house.” says Bernal. “We only had one car, so my mom would take me on a bike, drop me off and then ride back home to get ready for work.”
Eventually his parents purchased their own neighborhood market, where Bernal was expected to chip in, be it by stocking shelves or sweeping floors after school. When he was just 10 years old, he says he indirectly got his first lesson in business and city management. Bernal says his father was fined $500 for having a sign out on the sidewalk, without a permit.
“I kept on thinking that money could have gone toward our school clothing, to buy us books or whatever,” recalls Bernal. “That incident makes me want to work even more with small businesses in District 3.”
Bernal received his bachelor’s degree from the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, making him the first person in his family to graduate from college. He then started working as a project manager with “El Concilio,” a non-profit affiliate of the National Council of La Raza. There, he was involved in projects to help working class families, primarily Hispanics. From there, a job with an Engineering and Construction Management Firm followed. It is here that Bernal realized, he was driven, first and foremost, by results.
“The reason I got involved in city government was because I was frustrated,” says Bernal. “We always had these great ideas [in the private sector] but they would never get implemented. When it was time to get things rolling, the city codes had changed and we had to start all over again.”
The construction firm, he says, would lock in a lot of city contracts. One of his main responsibilities was to coordinate with different agencies that provided services to the city.
“My background in project management taught me this early on,” says Bernal. “It is about listening to the communities and then being able to troubleshoot and bring all the agencies together to get things done.”
When Bernal moved to San Diego in 2003, the city was going through some serious financial problems caused by reckless money management.
The scandal triggered national attention, leading the New York Times to describe the city as ‘Enron by the Sea.’ The term referenced an American energy company that declared bankruptcy after deliberately mismanaging its funds. The City of San Diego has come a long way since then. Bernal says, there is no stopping now.
“The City had made some really poor financial decisions back then,” says Bernal. “We had to dig ourselves out of that hole. Fast forward and National Geographic recently described San Diego as one of the world’s smartest cities.”
Looking ahead, he says the wants the city and more specifically his district, to lead the way in making smart investments, especially those that will benefit small businesses. District 3 is filled with mom and pop shops, restaurants and most notably a booming brewery industry that has really taken off in the last few years.
As far as holding office, Bernal says it’s not exactly what he had envisioned for himself, but he feels the call to give back.
“I never would have imagined being in politics, but I have always seen myself as a problem solver,” says Bernal. “It’s not to put my name out there, or even for the power, it’s about the neighborhood.”