Not all in the GLBT community are licking their wounds following the decisive victory of Mayor-elect Jerry Sanders over Councilmember Donna Frye in Tuesday’s election. A portion of our community opted for Sanders and his pragmatic approach to solving the city’s financial woes. GLBT leaders supporting Sanders argue the state of the city’s current financial crisis outweighs community interest in this particular race. This split in the gay vote exemplifies an inevitable shift in gay politics: As the gay community becomes more mainstream, and as years of oppression are replaced with notions of perceived equality, gays will drift from their far-left safety zone to support moderate candidates.

Sanders supporters touted him a moderate and educable candidate. Though he does not support full marriage equality, Sanders has come out against discrimination, and said he would oppose any California initiative seeking to repeal domestic partnership rights, which is expected to appear on the 2006 ballot.

Gay activists backing Sanders as a gay-friendly candidate must now work with the new mayor and get him to come around on our issues, including the illegal Boy Scout’s preferential land lease with the city and domestic partnership rights for companies doing business with San Diego.

Sanders did win by a wide margin, yet Frye’s strong 46 percent must not be discounted. Her supporters represent a city disconnected from its elected officials; a sizable constituency alienated by its leadership and distrusting of City Hall. With the help of Frye and her much needed voice on the council, Sanders must bring Frye’s following into the fold and once again reunite the city.

Donna Frye has fought a good fight. Many have been critical of her campaign, including the Gay & Lesbian Times. With the exception of the negative turn both camps took during the end of the campaign, Frye remained true to herself and has earned the respect of the entire city. We sincerely thank Donna for her hard work over the last year, and her strong support of our rights throughout her campaign.

An advantage to the Frye-for-mayor scenario was her well-established working relationship with City Attorney Mike Aguirre. Both Sanders and Aguirre have said they are willing to work together. To be successful, however, Sanders must look beyond Aguirre’s oft-murcurial personality and embrace his passion to clean up politics downtown.

Aguirre is right on a lot of the issues, but lacks in his approach. No doubt Aguirre’s bully-pulpit politics will not work with the new strong mayor. Sanders should be given the benefit of the doubt as an honest outsider and be seen by Aguirre as an ally to change City Hall.

The infighting on the City Council must come to an end. With the shift to the strong-mayor form of governance, a newly elected mayor and two new council members scheduled to come on board in January, we have a real opportunity to transform the current school-yard dynamic back into a professional and respected government body.

Two races are still left to be decided: District 2 and 8, which will fill the seats of former Councilmembers Zucchet and Inzunza who were convicted on federal corruption charges in July.

Democrat Lorena Gonzalez, who is 100 percent on GLBT issues, will advance to the runoff, Jan. 10, to face Republican Kevin Faulconer. Faulconer, who captured 35 percent of the vote, has come out against clean-needle exchange and supports keeping the Boy Scouts in Balboa Park. Gonzalez’s voice is needed on the council to maintain its progressive Democratic majority.

In District 8, Democrat Ben Hueso was well ahead of the pack with 39 percent of the vote. Hueso, a relatively unknown to our community, needs to appear before us and take positions on our issues, giving us the opportunity to make an informed choice for District 8.