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City of Big Bear Lake · Statewide General Election

Big Bear Lake City Council, District 2

Draft candidate list — early preview until the state’s official list publishes on August 27, 2026.

This is one contest. Enter your address to see every race on your November ballot, and keep track of your picks.

On the ballot

This person holds your district's seat on Big Bear Lake's 5-member City Council: city ordinances, the budget, and land use for this mountain resort city. Big Bear Lake is a charter city with a council-manager government -- an appointed City Manager runs day-to-day operations, and the council appoints a Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem from among its own members each year. Councilmembers are elected by-district; the city shifted from at-large elections to five single-member districts in 2018 in response to a California Voting Rights Act challenge. A 4-year term.

Two candidates are running for Big Bear Lake's District 2 City Council seat: Sonia Ibarra and Kara Flietstra. Neither is the sitting district's incumbent -- Rick Herrick, whose term expires this year, did not file for re-election -- so, like all three Big Bear Lake council races this November, District 2 is an open seat.

Each winner serves a 4-year term on Big Bear Lake's 5-member City Council, a charter-city government that sets the budget, land use, and municipal ordinances for this mountain resort city on the shore of Big Bear Lake. An appointed City Manager runs day-to-day operations, and the council appoints a Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem from among its own members each year rather than electing either title directly.

Councilmembers have been elected by-district only since 2018, when the city replaced an at-large system with five single-member districts in response to a threatened California Voting Rights Act challenge; Districts 2, 3, and 4 come up together every four years, which is why these three seats are on this November's ballot. This is also a rare full-turnover cycle: all three sitting members whose terms expire this year -- Rick Herrick (District 2), Mayor Randall Putz (District 3), and Perri Melnick (District 4) -- did not file to run again, so none of the six candidates on the ballot currently holds a council seat.

Sonia Ibarra

Sonia Ibarra filed for the District 2 seat with the ballot designation "Retired School Administrator." No independent biographical coverage or campaign platform statement was found for this dataset, so her professional background beyond that filed designation is not otherwise documented here.

Strengths

Her filed designation, Retired School Administrator, suggests experience in local schools, though it isn't independently confirmed.

Trade-offs

No campaign platform, prior public-office record, or independent news coverage was found for this cycle, leaving little beyond the filed designation to weigh.

Keep in mind

Big Bear Lake is a small mountain-resort city; local candidates commonly run with limited media coverage, so this information gap doesn't necessarily reflect anything about the candidate herself.

Kara Flietstra

Kara Flietstra filed for the same seat with the ballot designation "Small Business Owner." As with Ibarra, no independent biographical coverage or campaign platform statement was found for this dataset.

Strengths

Her filed designation, Small Business Owner, suggests a local business stake in the city, though it isn't independently confirmed.

Trade-offs

No campaign platform, prior public-office record, or independent news coverage was found for this cycle, leaving little beyond the filed designation to weigh.

Keep in mind

The same limited-coverage pattern applies here as with Ibarra -- not a reflection on the candidate specifically.

Source review: Mixed (74/100) · 5 cited sources

Only procedural records are cited (candidate lists, results, finance filings); no source describes the candidates, so the score is capped.

Review note: No cited source describes the candidates; add descriptive coverage to lift the cap.

  • uploads.rov.sbcounty.gov (opens in a new tab)San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters -- "Offices Up for Election, November 3, 2026, General Election": lists County Board of Education Areas A, B, and D (under the School category) as the county's only expiring-term seats this cycle -- no Board of Supervisors, row office, or Superior Court seat appears anywhere in the 11-page document
  • uploads.rov.sbcounty.gov (opens in a new tab)San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters -- statewide "Report_CandidateList.pdf" candidate-filing report linked from the county's own November 3, 2026 candidates page: within the San Bernardino County section, only Area B carries any candidates (Rita Fernandez-Loof, Miki R. Inbody, Kimberly L. Watson); Areas A and D, both confirmed expiring this cycle by the county's own Offices Up for Election document, have no candidates anywhere in the report and will not appear on the November ballot
  • web.archive.org (opens in a new tab)City of Big Bear Lake -- City Council page (via a July 16, 2026 Wayback Machine snapshot; a live fetch of the city's own site returns a WAF 403 to this dataset's fetchers): names the sitting council -- Kendi Segovia (Mayor Pro Tem, District 1, term 2024-2028), Rick Herrick (Councilmember, District 2, term 2022-2026), Randall Putz (Mayor, District 3, term 2022-2026), Perri Melnick (Councilmember, District 4, term 2022-2026), and Charles Hicks, Jr. (Councilmember, District 5, term 2024-2028) -- and states the council structure: 5 members elected by-district, with Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem appointed annually from among the council, under an appointed City Manager
  • web.archive.org (opens in a new tab)City of Big Bear Lake -- Elections info page (same Wayback Machine access path as the council page above): confirms City Council elections are held every even-numbered November, councilmembers must reside in and be registered voters within their district, and candidates file FPPC campaign-finance forms directly with the City Clerk's Office rather than through a separate online portal
  • web.archive.org (opens in a new tab)City of Big Bear Lake -- Ordinance No. 2018-459 (same Wayback Machine access path): adopted "in response to threatened litigation regarding alleged non-compliance with the California Voting Rights Act," replacing at-large council elections with five single-member districts; schedules District 2, 3, and 4 for election "In 2018, and every four years thereafter" and District 1 and 5 for "In 2020, and every four years thereafter" -- the primary-source reason Districts 2, 3, and 4 (not 1 and 5) are the three seats up in November 2026

Last updated August 31, 2026.