TWO JUDICIAL CANDIDATES SPEAK IN ALPINE

By Miriam Raftery

October 12, 2022 (Alpine) – Voters are often frustrated in trying to get information on judicial candidates since they are prohibited from answering questions on any issues that may come before them in court. But during the Candidates to Constituents forum in Alpine recently, Superior Court judicial candidates Pete Singer and Rebeca Kanter provided details on their backgrounds and experience that provided clear insights into their core values and qualifications.

Pete Singer is running for Superior Court Seat 36, which is currently vacant.

“Of all the people you vote for, judges are most likely to touch your life,” says Singer.

“I’m the one with judicial experience. My opponent has none,” he says.

For the past eight years, Singer has served as a San Diego Superior Court Commissioner. Commissioners are the “worker bees” of the court and are elected by judges, says Singer.

He also serves on the faculty of California’s Judicial College, where he teaches judicial orientation for new judges and commissioners. In 2019, he was honored as California Court Commissioner of the Year.

While he’s currently handling criminal infractions as a commissioner, he previously worked in private practice in civil matters, real estate, and conservatorships including working with people facing mental health and homelessness challenges, as well as drug addiction.

Governor Newsom’s newly approved Care Court is set to roll out in San Diego next summer, to assure that mentally ill and addicted individuals get help to get off the streets.  “That’s my goal. That’s where I need to be.  The Superior Court will need several judges to fill this role,” he disclosed.

Singer says he’s also spent his “whole life” as a community volunteer, and continues volunteering in his teaching capacity. His volunteer service includes the Downtown Lions Club, where he’s helped to get 131 units of low-income senior housing.

He notes that the bench is currently tipped toward more prosecutors than judges from other walks of life. He voiced concerns over high fines that can be more than some can afford to pay for minor infractions—fines so high that paying them could mean not being able to pay the rent, for some defendants.

“Everybody that comes before me has options,” he says.  That could include picking up trash instead of paying a fine. He won’t issue fines for minors because he doesn’t want parents writing a check; instead he requires those under 18 to do community service.  In one case, however, where a health condition made that impossible, he required a teen girl to write a report on the danger of teenage driving. “She came back to me a week later and asked to read it out loud,” he recalled.  “She got a standing ovation from everyone in court. She learned a lesson, and so did the others.”

Although judicial races are nonpartisan, he is endorsed by the Democratic Party, the San Diego County-Imperial County Labor Council, as well as by many judges and commissioners.

“To be a good judge on the bench, you have to like people,” he concludes, adding that means looking out for the interests of people, not corporations or organizations.  “We deal with people in the worst circumstances of their lives,” he says, adding that his campaign is primarily self-funded.

He ended his presentation by quoting from the poet Rabindranath Tagore, winner of a Nobel Prize in Literature: “I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.”

Learn more: https://www.petersinger.com/

Rebeca Kanter is running for Superior Court Seat 35.

“Now, more than ever, decisions being made by judges can affect your life,” she says.

She’s served as an assistant U.S. Attorney for 16 years and is currently handling major fraud and public corruption cases.  She has also served as the Civil Rights Coordinator and Ethics Advisor for the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

She has prosecuted hate crimes, civil rights violations, and a fraud case in which taxpayers were defrauded of money meant for veteran-owned businesses. 

After graduating from UCLA School of Law, she  served as a judicial law clerk and in private practice. She teaches as an Adjunct at USD School of Law and previously taught in the UCLA Women’s Studies Program. Currently, she is a volunteer Judge Pro Tem in San Diego’s Superior Court. She has also won service awards from the county and federal Bar associations.

​“My opponent only has experience in criminal law,” she says. “I bring experience in civil and criminal law.” She says “intellectual curiosity” is also an important trait for a judge.

She has been an active volunteer in numerous organizations, including serving on the board of the Lawyers Club and the Association of Women Lawyers. She cochaired the Reproductive Rights and Advocacy  Committee to support the rights of girls and women. She also cofounded the San Diego Leadership Alliance.

Her father was a marine biologist, who taught her the values of protecting our environment. Her mother worked in the auto industry in Detroit. Kanter has been active in the Labor Pay Day program and says she’s long been committed to advancing opportunities for women.

She is endorsed by 35 current or former judges and was ranked well qualified by the San Diego County Bar Association. She is also endorsed by Congressional members Sara Jacobs and Mike Levin, as well as by the Labor Council.

She voices concern over unlimited corporate donations in judicial races.  “My opponent had a single corporation donate $50,000 and put in about $20,000 of his own,” she notes, adding that despite this, she has raised more funds than her opponent for the judicial race which is countywide and has more voters than Congressional districts.

Superior Court judges are elected for six-year terms, but are rarely challenged and nearly always reelected, so “realistically, you are putting them in position for a lot longer than six years,” Kanter observes. 

Learn more:  https://www.kanter4judge.org/