O’Connor Is New Mayor of San Diego

SAN DIEGO —  Former City Councilwoman Maureen F. O’Connor, who rose from a Cinderella beginning in politics to become one of this city’s most powerful public figures, on Tuesday was elected San Diego’s first woman mayor.

A moderate Democrat perhaps best known for her key role in developing the San Diego Trolley, O’Connor, 39, became the mayor-elect by defeating Republican Councilman Bill Cleator in a special race--the city’s sixth mayoral contest in the last three years--to replace former Mayor Roger Hedgecock. The victory allows O’Connor to serve the 2 1/2 years remaining in the term of Hedgecock, who resigned last December after his 13-count felony conviction on campaign-law violations.

Late returns showed O’Connor, who narrowly lost to Hedgecock in 1983, running comfortably ahead of Cleator in the nominally nonpartisan race for the $50,000-a-year post in California’s second-largest city. O’Connor and Cleator qualified for Tuesday’s runoff by finishing first and second, respectively, 46% to 30%, in the 14-candidate Feb. 25 primary.

‘The City Is Changing’

“The city is changing and the people are speaking here tonight,” O’Connor told a cheering crowd at her election night headquarters. “By electing Maureen O’Connor, they want change at City Hall.”

O’Connor’s career began in 1971 at age 25. Running on a shoestring budget and aided by an army of volunteers from a Catholic girls high school where she taught physical education, she became the youngest person ever elected to the City Council.

During her two terms on the council, O’Connor gained a reputation as a feisty advocate for the underdog, particularly the poor and senior citizens. As a council appointee, she later served on the San Diego Unified Port Commission and the Metropolitan Transit Development Board.

The wife of businessman Robert O. Peterson, founder of the Jack in the Box fast-food chain, O’Connor narrowly lost to Hedgecock, 52% to 48%, in the special 1983 mayoral race to elect a successor to Sen. Pete Wilson (R-Calif.).

Cleator, 59, a millionaire businessman, succeeded O’Connor on the council in 1979. He has become recognized as head of the conservative coalition that dominates the council on most major issues.