Mayor of Encinitas (Short Term)

The incumbent, seeking a second term after defeating Tony Kranz in November 2024. A 42-year Encinitas resident (Olivenhain) and Purdue-trained engineer who founded a company later sold to Blackstone Equity, Ehlers spent decades in local civic life before running for office himself: he managed former Councilmember Maggie Houlihan's campaigns, served two stints on the Planning Commission (2002-2004 and 2017-2022, including as chairman), sat on the Olivenhain Town Council from 1998 to 2003, and was elected to the City Council itself in 2022. He wrote 2013's Proposition A, a growth-management initiative requiring a public vote on zoning density and height increases, and later testified in its successful defense when the City Council sued to overturn it. In his first mayoral term he points to 15 miles of roads paved in 2025 with 18 more planned, Leucadia flood-mitigation work, lowered speed limits with more enforcement, and reductions in several categories of crime; he's campaigning for a second term on local control over land use, infrastructure, and public safety.

A San Dieguito Union High School District trustee since 2022 and, before that, an Encinitas Union School District trustee from 2016 to 2020 -- a decade of local school-board service but no prior city office. An Old Encinitas resident, she told The Coast News her campaign centers on safer streets and traffic, housing solutions, addressing homelessness "from a regional perspective," and climate resilience, and that she's deliberately holding off on specific campaign promises this early: "I want my campaign to be about bringing together different voices, versus me coming in saying, 'Here's precisely what I think is the solution.'" She's framed her run partly as a response to what she calls a divisive online political climate, contrasting it with the more cordial conversations she says she has with residents face to face.