My family moved to Cardiff in the 1920s and my great-grandfather, L.P. McChesney, was a local inventor and former President of the San Dieguito Irrigation District (now the San Dieguito Water District). My grandfather, William McChesney, was the town plumber and an avid gardener. He built his family home near Stone Steps in the 1950s in the Seaside Gardens neighborhood and it was from there that he led his campaign to save Torrey Pine trees. My mother, Grace McChesney, was born and raised in Encinitas, but moved to Riverside after being the first person in her family to attend college. I was raised in Riverside, and always looked forward to spending summer vacations in Encinitas with my aunt and uncle, Bina and Bill McChesney (also a local plumber). Because of our strong family ties to Encinitas, I have had the great opportunity to see it grow from a sleepy little beach town to the thriving coastal city it is today.
I attended the University of California, Berkeley, where I received my bachelor’s degree in Political Science in 1995 and received my master’s degree from Claremont Graduate University in International Studies. As part of my doctoral work I studied at the Humbolt University in Berlin, Germany, where I met my husband in 2002 and we married in 2005. After several years of living in European cities, my husband and I moved to Encinitas in 2012 to raise our children near my family.
With both of these perspectives, I understand people who have lived in Encinitas a long time as well as those who have adopted Encinitas as their home. I love that my children attend Paul Ecke Central Elementary School just like my mother, and that we are raising our children in the house that my grandfather built in the 1950s. But I also appreciate the many places I have been able to live, so I know how special it is to call Encinitas home. As a third-generation Encinitan, I have a deep respect for our natural environment that forms the basis of our high quality of life.
