# El Segundo City Council Compare records and positions simply between John Pickhaver, Chris Pimentel, or Ryan W. Baldino for El Segundo City Council at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person holds one of El Segundo's five at-large City Council seats. They vote on the city budget, zoning, development rules, and city laws. The term is four years. The council does not elect its mayor directly. Members choose one of their own to be mayor each year. They also choose a mayor pro tem. The mayor runs meetings but gets only one vote, like every other member. - Jurisdiction: City of El Segundo - Election: November 3, 2026 California general election - Seats: 2 - Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements. - Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/el-segundo-council - Full ballot: this page covers one race. Every contest on a voter's own ballot, by address, with the same breakdown for each: https://voteorelse.com/ - Sources last retrieved: August 31, 2026 - Source-objectivity score: 82 out of 100 (Strong), across 11 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology ## On the ballot - **John Pickhaver** - **Chris Pimentel** — Incumbent - **Ryan W. Baldino** — Incumbent A nonpartisan office: candidates do not run as Democrats or Republicans, and no party appears on the ballot. Three candidates are running for El Segundo's two open City Council seats on November 3. Incumbents Chris Pimentel and Ryan Baldino are both seeking another term. Pimentel is the city's mayor and Baldino is the mayor pro tem. They face John Pickhaver, a community organizer. He lost a bid for one of three seats in 2024 and is running again. El Segundo's council is five members, all elected citywide rather than by district, on staggered 4-year terms; the other three seats aren't up this cycle. The council chooses one of its own to serve as mayor and mayor pro tem each year, so voters elect a councilmember, not a mayor directly. Whoever wins holds the seat for four years, setting the budget, zoning, and city ordinances for a small, commercially dense city of roughly 17,000 people wedged between LAX and the coast, with an aerospace-and-tech corporate base a city-cited economic-development effort calls the densest hard-tech cluster in Southern California. Both incumbents are campaigning on continuity: Pimentel's pitch is a deliberate focus on core city services over regional fights, Baldino's is finishing what his term started, from the city budget to the fight over odors from a neighboring wastewater plant. Pickhaver, running again after 2024, argues the council doesn't reflect the city's own diversity and wants more outside scrutiny of industrial operators. With two seats and three names on the ballot, this is a plurality race decided in one round — weigh whether you want continuity from both incumbents, or a change on at least one seat. ## Chris Pimentel Chris Pimentel is a technology executive and former Marine Corps infantry officer. He has served on the council since 2018 and as mayor since 2024. He is running on what he calls "staying in our lane." He means keeping city government focused on fast permitting, predictable rules, and core services. He would leave regional or national fights aside. A nonprofit civic-media outlet credits his tenure with resolving a roughly half-billion-dollar pension liability. It says he did so through renegotiated labor deals and bond financing. **Strengths:** Two full terms of citywide experience. He also has a specific fiscal claim, the pension deal, that a first-time candidate could not point to. **Trade-offs:** His "stay in your lane" approach is a deliberate choice. He does not weigh in on regional housing, transit, or immigration fights. Those fights increasingly reach a small city like El Segundo. **Keep in mind:** The pension-savings and economic-activity figures come from a nonprofit outlet's interview with him. They are not from an independent audit. Nothing adverse surfaced elsewhere in coverage of his tenure. ## Ryan W. Baldino Ryan Baldino is a construction and real estate litigation attorney. He has served on the council since 2022 and as mayor pro tem since December 2024. Before that he spent 14 years on the city's Planning Commission. He is running on balancing the city budget. He also wants to reinvest in parks and the long-shuttered Plunge swim stadium. He would continue the fight over odors from the Hyperion water-reclamation plant. He led the council subcommittee that pushed for AB 1216. That 2023 state law requires real-time, public air-quality monitoring at Hyperion's fence line. **Strengths:** Fourteen years on the Planning Commission plus a first council term. That gives him the longest hands-on land-use record of the three. He also has a concrete legislative win in AB 1216. **Trade-offs:** His day job is construction and real estate litigation. Those are the same industries his land-use votes touch. It is a standing overlap for him to disclose, not a documented conflict. **Keep in mind:** Nothing adverse surfaced in coverage of his first term. His own campaign materials, more than independent reporting, are the source for most of his platform detail. ## John Pickhaver John Pickhaver is a community organizer and chair of the city's Arts & Culture Committee. He lost a bid for one of three council seats in 2024 and is running again. He is campaigning on adding voices to a council he says does not reflect the city's diversity. He is also campaigning on housing and on more scrutiny of industrial operators. That includes a data-center proposal he helped organize opposition to. He says he would be the only registered Democrat on the officially nonpartisan council if elected. **Strengths:** A second run gives him a documented platform and name recognition from 2024. He also has direct organizing experience against a data-center proposal and for pedestrian safety. **Trade-offs:** He has never held elected office. Unlike his two opponents, he has no council voting record or citywide administrative experience. **Keep in mind:** He lost his 2024 bid for one of three seats to three other candidates. Running for one of two seats against two incumbents this time is a steeper climb, not an easier one. ## Review notes - Ryan Baldino for El Segundo City Council and John Pickhaver for El Segundo City Council may have more bias because they are advocacy voter guides compared to other formal government and nonprofit journalism sources. ## Sources 1. [City of El Segundo — City Clerk Election page (nomination papers pulled/returned for City Council, 2 open seats, nomination period July 13-Aug. 7, 2026)](https://www.elsegundo.gov/government/departments/city-clerk/election) 2. [City of El Segundo — City Council/Elected Officials (current roster: Mayor Chris Pimentel, Mayor Pro Tem Ryan Baldino, Councilmembers Drew Boyles, Lance Giroux, Michelle Keldorf)](https://www.elsegundo.gov/government/departments/elected-officials) 3. [City of El Segundo — Mayor Chris Pimentel (official council-member bio: technology executive, former Marine Corps infantry officer, elected 2018, mayor since 2024)](https://www.elsegundo.gov/government/departments/city-council-elected-officials/councilmember-chris-pimentel) 4. [City of El Segundo — Mayor Pro Tem Ryan Baldino (official council-member bio: construction/real estate litigation attorney, 14 years on the Planning Commission, first elected Dec. 2022, Mayor Pro Tem since Dec. 2024)](https://www.elsegundo.gov/government/departments/city-council-elected-officials/councilmember-ryan-baldino) 5. [Ryan Baldino for El Segundo City Council — campaign site (platform, Hyperion/AB 1216 record)](https://baldinoforelsegundo.com/) 6. [John Pickhaver for El Segundo City Council — campaign site (bio, platform)](https://www.johnpickhaver.com/) 7. [Good Government Institute — "El Segundo's Mayor: 'Stay in Your Lane' to Run Cities That Work," on Mayor Chris Pimentel](https://www.goodgovinstitute.org/el-segundos-mayor-stay-in-your-lane-run-cities) 8. [The Ballot Book — City of El Segundo Candidates (unofficial, automated-monitoring aggregator; independently returns the same 3-candidate field for the city's 1 open office)](https://theballotbook.com/jurisdictions/662/candidates) 9. [Ballotpedia — John Pickhaver (El Segundo City Council At-large, California, candidate 2024), including his Candidate Connection survey responses](https://ballotpedia.org/John_Pickhaver_(El_Segundo_City_Council_At-large,_California,_candidate_2024)) 10. [Daily Breeze (Southern California News Group) — "John Pickhaver, El Segundo City Council candidate, 2024 election questionnaire" (paywalled beyond its teaser; used only to corroborate that he ran and was covered in 2024, not for any paywalled content)](https://www.dailybreeze.com/2024/10/15/john-pickhaver-el-segundo-city-council-candidate-2024-election-questionnaire/) 11. [City of El Segundo — NetFile Public Portal for Campaign Finance (Candidates & Officeholders; checked for Pimentel, Baldino, and Pickhaver on 2026-08-31, no 2026-cycle filings on record for any of the three)](https://netfile.com/public/SEG/campaign/persons) ## The rest of the ballot El Segundo City Council is one contest among the many a California voter decides on November 3, 2026 — Congress, the Legislature, county, city, and school board races differ by address. Vote or Else builds the full list for any California address and breaks down each contest the way this page does, with no account and without storing the address: https://voteorelse.com/ ## How to cite this page Vote or Else, "El Segundo City Council — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/el-segundo-council (sources last retrieved August 31, 2026). Link the canonical page above rather than this Markdown file. Coverage is updated as the race develops, so quote it with its retrieval date.