# Poway City Council, District 3 Compare records and positions simply between Peter De Hoff or Bob Walder for Poway City Council, District 3 at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person holds your district's seat on Poway's 5-member City Council, alongside the citywide-elected mayor. They vote on city ordinances, the budget, and land use. The term is four years. - Jurisdiction: City of Poway - Election: November 3, 2026 California general election - Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements. - Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/poway-council-3 - 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: September 7, 2026 - Source-objectivity score: 95 out of 100 (Very strong), across 7 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology ## On the ballot - **Peter De Hoff** — Incumbent - **Bob Walder** A nonpartisan office: candidates do not run as Democrats or Republicans, and no party appears on the ballot. Incumbent Peter De Hoff faces challenger Bob Walder for Poway City Council, District 3. Whichever candidate gets the most votes on November 3 wins outright. There is no runoff. This person holds District 3's seat on Poway's 5-member City Council, alongside the citywide-elected mayor. They vote on city ordinances, the budget, and land use. District 3 covers east of Twin Peaks and Community roads, encompassing Midland Road, Tierra Bonita Road, Del Poniente Road, and northern Pomerado Road. The term is four years. De Hoff is campaigning on his first term's record -- balanced budgets, open-space acquisition, and two ordinances he initiated -- while Walder, a first-time candidate, argues recent development hasn't followed the city's own Poway Road Corridor Specific Plan and should be held to it more strictly. De Hoff also spent part of his term entangled in a colleague's scandal: then-Councilmember Tony Blain, later charged with four felonies including an alleged vote-trading scheme, proposed dropping a recall effort against De Hoff and voting to make him deputy mayor in exchange for De Hoff's support on an unrelated special-election question. De Hoff did not take the deal; Blain resigned in November 2025, days after voters supported his own recall. This is context about the surrounding council turmoil, not a reflection on De Hoff's own conduct -- he was the target of the offer, not its author. ## Peter De Hoff Incumbent Peter De Hoff, 51, has lived in District 3 for 17 years. He works as a molecular-biology scientist. He has spent the last 10 of his 18-year career at UC San Diego. There he manages a biomarker program for early detection of pregnancy disorders. He also manages a CDC-funded respiratory-disease-testing program. He was first elected in 2022 on a platform of fiscal discipline, public safety, and infrastructure. He points to balanced budgets with no service cuts as results. He also cites more than 300 acres of open-space acquisition, a hillside Dark Sky Ordinance, and a Pickleball Noise Ordinance. He's endorsed again by the Deputy Sheriffs' Association and the Poway Firefighters Association. He says his next-term priority is expanding the open-space protections he's already secured. **Strengths:** A first term with concrete results, including open-space acreage and two named ordinances. He also has renewed law-enforcement and firefighter endorsements. **Trade-offs:** He was the target, not the source, of a vote-trading offer. It came from an ex-colleague later charged with felonies and recalled. De Hoff declined the offer. See context above. **Keep in mind:** He has an ACTIVE Cal-Access committee for 2026. See Financial info. A separate, terminated Cal-Access committee shows he also faced his own recall push around the same period. ## Bob Walder Challenger Bob Walder, 74, has lived in District 3 for 28 years. He is a retired healthcare executive and physician's assistant. He was formerly a cardiopulmonary perfusionist who ran heart-lung bypass machines during surgery. He's running because he believes the city isn't following its own Poway Road Corridor Specific Plan as development proceeds. He wants new projects held to that plan's standards. He says he isn't opposed to development itself, just development that doesn't match what the plan describes. He has run the Rancho Bernardo Retired Senior Volunteer Patrol for a decade. He rebuilds classic muscle cars. **Strengths:** A specific, checkable critique. He says development strays from the city's own Poway Road Corridor plan. That is not a blanket anti-development stance. **Trade-offs:** No prior elected or appointed government experience. No outside record of civic involvement with city planning bodies was found. **Keep in mind:** No Cal-Access committee was found under his name. See Financial info. ## Sources 1. [San Diego County Registrar of Voters -- Candidate List, November 3, 2026 General Election (current through the 8/24/2026 2:44pm snapshot): confirms Mayor, City Council Districts 1 and 3, City Clerk, and City Treasurer as Carlsbad's five November 2026 races, and Mayor plus City Council Districts 1 and 3 as Poway's three November 2026 races, each Vote for 1](https://www.sdvote.com/content/dam/rov/en/election/nov-3-2026-gubernatorial-general-election/candidate-list.pdf) 2. [City of Poway -- Election Information page: confirms the Nov. 3, 2026 General Municipal Election fills an at-large Mayor seat plus one Councilmember each from Districts 1 and 3, each a 4-year term; council districts adopted 2017](https://poway.org/164/Elections) 3. [City of Poway -- Candidate Roster, November 3, 2026 General Municipal Election (PDF, dated Aug. 13, 2026): lists all six qualified candidates by office -- Dellena Olps, Steve Vaus, and Jenny Maeda for Mayor; Chris Pikus for District 1; Peter De Hoff and Bob Walder for District 3](https://poway.org/2026-Official-Candidate-Status) 4. [San Diego Union-Tribune / Pomerado News (Julie Gallant) -- "Six campaigning for Poway City Council seats": detailed residency, age, occupation, platform, and biographical profiles of all six candidates across Mayor, District 1, and District 3](https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/2026/08/18/six-campaigning-for-poway-city-council-seats/) 5. [CAL-ACCESS filer search for "Hoff": an ACTIVE "De Hoff for Poway City Council District 3, 2026" committee, alongside a terminated 2022 committee for the same seat and a terminated "Neighbors in Support of Peter De Hoff" recall-related committee](https://cal-access.sos.ca.gov/Misc/filerSearch.aspx?SEARCH=Hoff) 6. [CAL-ACCESS filer search for "Walder": no results -- no campaign committee registered with the state under his name](https://cal-access.sos.ca.gov/Misc/filerSearch.aspx?SEARCH=Walder) 7. [KPBS -- "Poway Councilmember Tony Blain charged with four felonies": Blain accused of offering to drop a recall effort against Councilmember Peter De Hoff and vote for De Hoff as deputy mayor in exchange for De Hoff's support on a District 1 special-election question; Blain resigned Nov. 2025 after voters supported his own recall](https://www.kpbs.org/news/politics/2025/10/24/poway-councilmember-tony-blain-charged-with-four-felonies-ahead-of-recall) ## The rest of the ballot Poway City Council, District 3 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, "Poway City Council, District 3 — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/poway-council-3 (sources last retrieved September 7, 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.