San Diego County Regional Airport Authority
The San Diego County Regional Airport Authority operates San Diego International (SAN) under Division 17 of the California Public Utilities Code, created by AB 93 in 2001. Its nine voting members are appointed, not elected: the Mayor of San Diego names three (two subject to Council confirmation), the chair of the County Board of Supervisors names two (subject to Board confirmation), and the mayors of each of the four regional city groups (east county, south county, north coastal, north inland) name one by majority vote (§170010(a)). The Governor also appoints two nonvoting ex-officio members — the Caltrans district director and the Department of Finance rep on the State Lands Commission (§170010(b)) — and the board may seat additional nonvoting Navy and Marine Corps representatives. The Mayor of San Diego picks the chair (§170010(d)). Directors serve three-year terms (§170011). Major capital decisions are further constrained by the 2019 Airport Operating License Agreement with airline tenants, which imposes airline consent rights on large capital projects.
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Part 7: The Airport
Composition
Who Appoints These Seats
San Diego International is the busiest single-runway commercial airport in the United States. The entity that owns it is a nine-seat board, appointed, not elected, created by a single bill in the California Legislature in 2001. Three of the nine voting seats are chosen by the Mayor of San Diego. One of those three is named by the Mayor as chair. Any serious decision about where the airport grows — the $3-billion Terminal 1 replacement, the shape of the ground-access network, the relationship to the regional trolley — gets made in that room, by people the traveling public never voted on.
How the nine voting seats are filled. California Public Utilities Code §170010(a), enacted by Assembly Bill 93 in 2001, fixes the composition: three voting members appointed by the Mayor of San Diego (two subject to City Council confirmation); two voting members appointed by the chair of the County Board of Supervisors (subject to full Board confirmation); and one voting member each selected by majority vote of the mayors of four regional city clusters — east county (El Cajon, La Mesa, Lemon Grove, Santee), south county (Chula Vista, Coronado, Imperial Beach, National City), north county coastal (Carlsbad, Del Mar, Encinitas, Oceanside, Solana Beach), and north county inland (Escondido, Poway, San Marcos, Vista).[1] Directors serve three-year terms under §170011. No director is directly elected to this seat by any voter.
Two non-voting ex-officio seats belong to the Governor. §170010(b) adds two non-voting members appointed by the Governor: the Caltrans district director for the San Diego region, and the Department of Finance representative on the California State Lands Commission.[1] The board may also seat Navy and Marine Corps non-voting representatives. These seats speak but do not vote; they exist because state transportation policy and tidelands administration intersect with airport operations. The state's voice at the table is advisory, not controlling.
Three seats, the chair, and the airline consent rights. That is how San Diego International is actually governed.
The Mayor of San Diego picks the chair. Five of nine passes anything. §170010(d) vests the selection of the board chair in the Mayor of San Diego, from among the nine voting members.[1] The chair controls the agenda, sets the committee structure, and speaks for the Authority publicly. Combined with the three directly appointed seats, the Mayor's structural influence on board composition and direction reaches four of nine in practice — and the nine-member board votes by simple majority, meaning five of nine passes routine business. One additional vote from any of the other five seats is enough to align the room with the Mayor's position.
The airline tenants have consent rights on large capital projects. The Authority operates under a residual-rate-setting Airline Operating Lease Agreement (AOLA) with its signatory airline tenants, most recently executed in 2019 for a term running through Terminal 1's replacement and beyond. A residual-rate agreement means landing fees and terminal rentals are set to recover the airport's net cost of operations — what the airlines don't pay out of concessions and parking, they pay in rent and fees. In exchange, the airlines hold consent rights over major capital projects above a negotiated cost threshold. The public text of the 2019 AOLA is not in our archive; the threshold value is reported internally as approximately $350M but has not been independently verified against the executed agreement. Any capital project at or above that threshold requires signatory-airline consent alongside board approval. The structural effect is that two bodies — the nine-seat Authority board and the signatory-airline group — both have a veto on the airport's largest decisions.
What the board decides. The master plan for San Diego International, including the $3-billion Terminal 1 replacement now under construction. The capital improvement plan and the bond issuances that fund it. The landing-fee tariff schedule and the terminal rental structure, both set under the AOLA residual formula. Parking and rental-car concession agreements. The Airport Land Use Compatibility Plan, which governs allowed development under the runway approach path and extends the Authority's reach well beyond the airport fence line. The capital approach to ground access — rail, bus, people-mover — including the coordination agreements with SANDAG and MTS that determine whether the airport is connected to the regional trolley system.
Why the structure matters for the stories we cover. Our Trolley Question series documents why the Blue Line runs within 1,200 feet of Terminal 2 without stopping at the airport, and why every proposal for a direct connection has died or been deferred for decades. The decisions to not connect belonged to this Authority board, to the SANDAG board, and to the Port — each interlocking. The Trolley Part 2 reporting follows where airport money could have funded a ground-access connection and what it funded instead. The structure above — three Mayor-appointed seats, a chair chosen by the Mayor, and airline consent rights — is the frame those reporting decisions kept running into.
The money the board moves. SDCRAA's FY25 Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (fiscal year ended June 30, 2025) reports operating revenue of $434.2M.[2] Airline revenue — landing fees, aircraft parking, building rentals, other aviation — totaled $239.1M. Concessions (terminal plus rental-car) contributed $85.2M. Parking and ground transportation brought in $81.6M. Non-operating revenue added $49.3M in Passenger Facility Charges (PFC) and $36.5M in Customer Facility Charges (CFC, rental-car only). Parking plus rental-car-concession-derived revenue is 38.4% of operating revenue and rises to approximately 47% of total revenue when CFC is included — a meaningful structural fact when the Authority votes on whether to make the airport easier to reach without a car.
Sources
[1]
California Public Utilities Code §§170002, 170010, 170011 — SDCRAA Board composition, appointment, and terms
— California Legislative Information
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displayexpandedbranch.xhtml?tocCode=PUC&division=17
[2]
SDCRAA Annual Comprehensive Financial Report FY25 — Revenue composition
— San Diego County Regional Airport Authority
https://www.san.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/FY25-ACFR-FINAL-spread-v2.pdf
[3]
Assembly Bill 93 (2001) — Creation of the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority
— California Legislative Information
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=200120020AB93
[4]
SDCRAA Airline Operating Lease Agreement (2019) — residual rate-setting and airline consent rights
— San Diego County Regional Airport Authority
https://www.san.org/Airport-Authority/About-Us/Finance/Documents