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City of Palm Springs · Statewide General Election

Palm Springs City Council, District 1

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 Palm Springs's 5-member City Council: city ordinances, the budget, and land use. A 4-year term. The council chooses one of its own members to serve as Mayor and another as Mayor Pro Tem each year by a council vote -- the titles rotate rather than being separately elected citywide.

Grace Garner, the City Council's most senior member and a former mayor, seeks a third term against first-time candidate Don Soja, a neighborhood-organization leader, for the District 1 seat.

This person holds your district's seat on Palm Springs's 5-member City Council: city ordinances, the budget, and land use. A 4-year term. The council chooses one of its own members to serve as Mayor and another as Mayor Pro Tem each year by a council vote -- the titles rotate rather than being separately elected citywide.

Garner's nomination was verified July 22, 2026; Soja's was verified July 29. No other candidate qualified for this seat. The Palm Springs Post is the only independent roster-and-biography source reached for Soja in the time available for this profile -- no campaign site, second news source, or official candidate-statement document was found.

Grace Garner

Grace Garner has served on the City Council since December 2019 -- the council's most senior member and the first Latina woman elected to it -- and served as mayor in 2023, including during Tropical Storm Hilary. A second-generation Palm Springs native, she previously served on the Planning Commission and the California Voting Rights Act Working Group, and currently works as senior policy advisor to Riverside County Supervisor V. Manuel Perez. She also sits on the boards of Desert Regional Medical Center and Cal State San Bernardino's Philanthropy Board. Her campaign centers on affordable housing, infrastructure, youth programming, and pedestrian/traffic safety, pointing to hundreds of affordable-housing units built in District 1 and the Tramview Heights specific plan as key to diversifying housing stock and bringing retail, including a grocery store, to northern Palm Springs.

Strengths

The council's longest-tenured member, with direct mayoral experience and a specific, sourced housing-and-infrastructure record to point to in her own district.

Trade-offs

A long incumbency means her record carries the city's accumulated trade-offs, and her day job as a county supervisor's policy advisor is a second public-sector role alongside her council seat.

Keep in mind

Her day job advising a county supervisor could overlap with city business in ways some voters want to weigh; no reporting found in this pass raised it as a conflict, but it wasn't specifically addressed either.

Don Soja

Don Soja is a Mountain Gate resident making his first run for elected office. He is a former vice chair of the city's Human Rights Commission, a founding member of Organized Neighborhoods of Palm Springs, and a former president of the Racquet Club West Neighborhood organization. He is running on "transparency, a balanced city budget, equal rights and opportunities," per the Palm Springs Post. No independent biography, campaign site, or additional platform detail beyond that was found in the time available for this profile.

Strengths

Years of hands-on neighborhood- and commission-level civic experience across two different organizations, plus prior appointed service on a city commission.

Trade-offs

No prior elected office, and no independently reported platform detail beyond the three broad priorities named above.

Keep in mind

His neighborhood-organization background suggests a bottom-up, resident-advocacy approach, which voters may want to weigh against Garner's institutional, county-level policy experience.

Source review: Strong (86/100) · 5 cited sources

Official records anchor this contest, with several source types checked for context.

  • voteinfo.net (opens in a new tab)Riverside County Registrar of Voters — 2026 Annual Election Calendar (lists every November 3, 2026 General Municipal Election office by city, including "City of Cathedral City: City Council District 3 / District 4 / District 5 / City Treasurer")
  • thepalmspringspost.com (opens in a new tab)The Palm Springs Post -- "Two challengers join three incumbents in Palm Springs City Council race" (Mark Talkington, Aug. 13, 2026; names all five qualified candidates across Districts 1, 2, and 3 with nomination-verification dates, challenger occupation/background notes, and the Nov. 3, 2026 general-election date)
  • thepalmspringspost.com (opens in a new tab)The Palm Springs Post -- "Naomi Soto sworn in as Palm Springs' 28th mayor, pledges inclusive city for all" (Mark Talkington, Dec. 10, 2025; states Soto "became Palm Springs' 28th mayor through a unanimous City Council vote" for a one-year term, with David Ready appointed Mayor Pro Tem -- confirms the rotating, council-selected Mayor/Mayor Pro Tem structure)
  • en.wikipedia.org (opens in a new tab)Wikipedia -- "Palm Springs, California": infobox lists the current City Council as of retrieval -- Mayor Naomi Soto, Mayor Pro Tem David Ready, and Councilmembers Grace Elena Garner, Jeffrey Bernstein, and Ron De Harte -- corroborating the five-person roster and confirming Garner/Bernstein/deHarte (the three Nov. 2026 candidates' shared incumbency) hold no Mayor/Mayor Pro Tem title this cycle.
  • thepalmspringspost.com (opens in a new tab)The Palm Springs Post -- "Garner seeks re-election with focus on affordable housing, infrastructure, youth programs" (Mark Talkington, Feb. 1, 2026; Garner first elected Dec. 2019, the council's most senior member and first Latina woman elected to it, served as mayor in 2023, currently senior policy advisor to Riverside County Supervisor V. Manuel Perez)

Last updated August 31, 2026.