OPINION | IRVINE CITY COUNCIL, DISTRICT 6

Two yard signs say a lot about how seriously one campaign is taking the job it is asking voters to give her. Drive through District 6 and you will spot two of Kathleen Treseder’s yard signs. One reads “Wildlife for Kathleen Treseder,” above an illustration of a deer, a monarch butterfly, a fox, a squirrel, a raccoon, and a bobcat. The other reads “Pups & Kitties for Kathleen Treseder,” above two cats and a dog. Both carry the same small print: Treseder for City Council 2026, FPPC# 1479854.

They are charming. They are also the whole message, and that is the problem.

A yard sign is a campaign’s first impression. In Treseder’s case, she has been on the Council for four years with a very disappointing record. A yard sign has one job. In about three seconds, from a moving car, it tells a neighbor who is running and why that person deserves a vote. Candidates get a few words and one image to work with, so every choice is a statement of priorities. Here, the choice was cute animals. Not housing costs, traffic, public safety, park maintenance, development, or the city budget. Not even a slogan about experience or leadership. The design spends its limited space on animals that cannot vote, cannot pay taxes, and will never appear before the council to ask for anything. This sums up who we think should vote for Treseder for another four years – no one.

The council seat is a serious job
Irvine’s city council decides land use, approves budgets, oversees public safety spending, and shapes how a growing city of a quarter million people develops for decades. Those decisions land on real households and real small businesses. A candidate who understood the weight of that responsibility would have used her most visible piece of campaign real estate to signal at least one concrete priority. Instead, two different signs have now been printed, produced, and planted, and neither one tells a voter a single thing about what she would do in office. Producing two distinct designs takes planning and money. That the plan landed on cute animals twice suggests a campaign that is comfortable coasting on likability, a bold move for an elected official who is so unlikable.

Name recognition is not a platform
To be fair, the signs do accomplish one thing. They make the name Treseder easy to remember, and friendly imagery is a time-tested way to get noticed. But name recognition is the bare minimum of a campaign, not the goal of it. A lawn sign that could just as easily advertise an animal shelter fundraiser or a pet adoption event treats the ballot like a popularity contest. Voters in District 6 are being asked to choose who will speak for them on the dais. They deserve a candidate who shows up ready to talk about the issues, and whose public materials reflect that she knows what the job involves.

What voters should do
Enjoy the artwork, then ask the harder question. What is Kathleen Treseder’s position on the budget overruns she voted for? How would she balance the budget? What would she do about the issues you actually face on your street? Why has she been shown to be dishonest so many times? If the answers are as obtuse as the signs, that tells you what you need to know. An election is not an adoption drive. The people of District 6 are not looking for a mascot. They are electing a councilmember.

Irvine City News endorses Scotty Hong for District 6 Councilmember.