DEL MAR — The San Diego Association of Governments Board of Directors unanimously elected Del Mar City Councilman Terry Sinnott as the new chair of the agency’s board. Poway Mayor Steve Vaus was elected as vice chair. Each will serve a one-year term which began Jan. 1.
Sinnott, who served as vice chair for the last two years, has been a Del Mar resident since 1976. He has been on the Del Mar City Council for seven years. He is a board member of the Regional Solid Waste Association and the LOSSAN Rail Corridor Agency (Los Angeles-San Diego-San Luis Obispo Rail Corridor).
“We are at a crossroads. I want to be an instrument to help improve SANDAG, while at the same time staying focused on our core mission of improving mobility in the region,” Sinnott said. “The coming year will be an important one. We will be selecting a new executive director and engaging a multitude of stakeholders to update our Regional Plan. We will continue to learn from our past actions and work to make the right decisions as we move forward.”
The SANDAG board is made up of 21 voting members — the mayor of San Diego and a member of the San Diego City Council, two members of the County Board of Supervisors, and one member each from the 17 other city councils in the region.
Sinnott has taken a leadership role in the last year in forming the Plan of Excellence, a comprehensive approach to improving the agency’s processes and transparency after errors were discovered in SANDAG’s revenue forecasts. He grew up in Mission Hills and attended Pomona College. Following graduation in 1967, he was commissioned as a Naval officer in 1968, serving on the U.S.S. Bon Homme Richard in Vietnam and at the Fleet Training Center in San Diego.
In 1972, Sinnott joined San Diego Gas & Electric, retiring 22 years later to establish his own management consulting business. He has been active in Del Mar for more than 13 years, serving on the city’s Finance Committee and the boards of Del Mar Community Connections and the Friends of Del Mar Parks.
