San Diego City Swearing in Ceremony

By Alison St John / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published December 8, 2008 at 10:00 AM PST

This story was published more than 15 years ago.

San Diego mayor Jerry Sanders was sworn in today for a second term, along with four brand new city council members and new city attorney, Jan Goldsmith. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders was sworn in today for a second term, along with four brand new city councilmembers and new city attorney, Jan Goldsmith. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

Sanders says he’ll wait till the State of City address in January to lay out his vision. Today he asked for cooperation and said political differences between himself and the new council are trivial when seen in the context of what he calls, “one of the most volatile times in our life time.”

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New city attorney Jan Goldsmith set a tone of stability and cooperation, and contrasted that to the turbulent years under previous city attorney, Mike Aguirre .

Goldsmith : We are proud to represent the city of San Diego and will never forget that we are accountable to the people of san diego, we are attorneys and not politicians. The last four years have been difficult; the city attorney's office must be rebuilt into a well run municipal law firm.

The city council met this afternoon, but because one new member was called away to the site of the fighter jet crash, they postponed a vote on a new council president until tomorrow.

Alison St John, KPBS News.

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.