There are four seats on the nine-member Retirement Board that are elected by the SDCERA membership. These seats include the second and third seats, both elected by General members, the seventh seat elected by Safety members and the eighth seat elected by Retired members. Each trustee must belong to the same membership group that the trustee represents, and serve a term of three years.

Elections are conducted by the Registrar of Voters and ballots are sent to the membership representing the seat prior to the expiration of the term. A complete event calendar for this election will be posted on this page prior to the election.

Any active County employee is eligible to participate in their respective elections. Prospective candidates may obtain nomination petitions from the SDCERA office. The petitions must be picked up in person, and members must show picture identification such as a County of San Diego ID badge, or a valid driver's license. Candidates' signatures will also be verified against their sworn statement cards.

When nomination petitions are returned, they are time and date stamped immediately. This ensures that the petitions are on file by the deadline. In addition, signatures of all 40 (or 20, depending upon the election) nominators are verified against the membership of SDCERA to determine authenticity and member status (i.e. General member vs. Safety member).

SDCERA will compile the list of eligible candidates for the election ballots. The Registrar of Voters assists SDCERA in printing and distributing the ballots along with any statements from the candidates. In all elections, with the exception of the retiree election, the County mail system is used to both send and receive ballots. Each department will be responsible for ensuring prompt delivery of the ballots to each member and should return undelivered ballots to the Registrar of Voters for those persons no longer working in their departments. For the retiree election, ballots will be mailed directly to the retired members' home.

The Registrar of Voters will canvass the votes cast by a specific date and time (depending upon the date of Election Day), and will certify the results to the County Board of Supervisors on the following Friday. The candidate receiving a plurality (the most votes) will be declared the winner and will commence their term as scheduled. Look for election updates and results on the SDCERA web site.