Meet Larry Turner, the SDPD officer looking to become San Diego's next mayor

Driving the news: An SDPD officer since 2016, Turner has focused his mayoral campaign on homelessness, saying he is dismayed by the disarray he saw on San Diego's streets when he returned from a career in the Marine Corps.

• "Some neighborhoods just looked like third-world countries," he told Axios. "The humanitarian crisis was just off the charts."

The big picture: Turner spends a lot of his time on the campaign trail talking about the issue, which routinely polls near the top of resident concerns and dominates City Hall.

• He rallied with Middletown residents protesting Gloria's proposed 1,000-bed shelter in the neighborhood.
• Turner has proposed a 350-bed shelter for homeless veterans at the city-owned H Barracks property near the airport, while Gloria is eyeing the same land for a safe parking lot that has generated significant neighborhood pushback.

What he's saying: He supported Gloria's 2023 prohibition on homeless encampments in much of the city despite seeing it as "severely flawed." Turner viewed it as a starting point that could be expanded upon.

• The ordinance's fatal flaw, Turner said, is that it makes an arrest possible only after police contact a person three times.
• "If we were able to make a decisive action on first contact, you would have seen a difference by now," he said.

Yes, but: Turner isn't sure SDPD needs more officers.

• "A lot of those calls should be to social workers," he said.

What he's saying: Turner bristles at homeless experts and advocates who cite statistics or studies indicating addiction is not driving the homelessness crisis. He instead values his anecdotal experience on the beat, where he sees addiction and homelessness as one.

• "They are just surviving and dying slow, and I'm done seeing that, man," he said. "If they want to do that, they can go do that in L.A., go do it in Riverside … not in San Diego."

Beyond homelessness

During a recent sit-down with Axios, Turner outlined his position on four other big issues facing the city.

New sales tax

Turner will appear on the same ballot as a measure that would increase sales taxes in the city by 1 cent to pay for general services, but that he opposes.

• The city doesn't have enough money for everything it needs to cover, Turner acknowledged, but he says that's because of wasteful expenditures, like the 101 Ash Street acquisition.

• "We have all the money to do the stuff we do now, but we can't pay for all that crap, too."

Transit expansion

Turner believes the San Diego Association of Governments does not need to expand its transit network.

• "Do we need it eventually? Yeah. But people don't use the Trolley enough right now, so it wouldn't justify it."

New sports arena

He said the city needs a new sports arena — but the project selected by the city for an arena and associated development in Midway is a boondoggle. He wants to revisit a reported offer from developers to build one near Snapdragon Stadium.

• "I want the NBA, I want the NHL — I want it all."

Police resources

SDPD resources are not efficiently deployed, he said.

• "In the northern division, a couple calls come in at a time. In the central division, there's probably 30 calls on hold right now.
• Turner said he has faith that new SDPD Chief Scott Wahl "will reorganize that in a way that'll get the officers where they should be."

What's next: Gloria and Turner last week agreed to only two televised debates ahead of the election.

• One will tape Sept. 17 and air the following day on 10News.
• The other will air live Oct. 3 on KPBS.