In most elections, candidates try to avoid getting pie on their faces. In Cambria, it’s part of the campaign.
The tiny coastal town has revived one of its quirkiest traditions after more than two decades: the Honorary Mayor’s Race, an unofficial election where votes are purchased by the dollar, campaign promises don’t have to make any sense, and eating pie in front of a crowd is considered an acceptable political strategy.
“It’s literally an election that you can buy,” Cambria Chamber of Commerce President Renee Linn told New Times with a laugh.
As an unincorporated community, Cambria doesn’t have a mayor or city council. Decades ago, locals filled the void by inventing an office—not to govern, but to raise money, poke fun at politics, and celebrate the kind of eccentric personalities that seem to thrive in small coastal communities.
The tradition disappeared in the early 2000s before Linn decided it deserved another campaign this year.
“I remembered it from when [I] first moved here,” she said. “I thought, this is kind of a fun thing to do for the community. … I thought we all needed some fun these days.”
The race doubles as a fundraiser. The Cambria Chamber of Commerce keeps 75 percent of the money raised, while the winning candidate directs the remaining 25 percent to a nonprofit of their choosing.
This year’s ballot features Jim Bahringer for American Legion Post 432, Del Clegg for the Cambria Rotary Club, Barrett Stuart for the Cambria Tennis Club, and Dianne “Lady Tie Di” Brooke for the Cambria Grammar School PTA.
‘It’s literally an election you can buy.’
—Renee Linn, Cambria Chamber of Commerce president
Every dollar counts as one vote. There’s no limit.
“Vote early, vote often,” Linn joked.
As of July 13, candidates have raised roughly $9,000 collectively, with Brooke leading the race.
The campaign has already produced the kind of chaos organizers hoped for.
During Cambria’s Fourth of July Picnic in the Park, candidates delivered three-minute stump speeches before organizers casually informed them they would also be participating in a pie-eating contest.
“We all got roped into doing it,” Stuart said. “Thank goodness they used the small pies. There’s no way we would’ve done the big man-sized pies.”
The local tennis instructor admitted that competitive pie eating wasn’t something he expected when he agreed to run for honorary mayor.
“None of us really wanted to do it,” he said with a laugh. “But we all did it anyway.”
Before the contest even began, three of the candidates wandered over to a live band and started dancing together.
“It was kind of joyous,” Stuart said. “Lady Tie Di was out there dancing, my sister got me dancing, and eventually we convinced Jim to come out too. It was just a really nice moment.”
Brooke wasn’t surprised by the whimsy and camaraderie.
After 45 years in Cambria, she remembers when honorary mayor campaigns regularly embraced the absurd.
“We had Sparky the fire dog as mayor for a while,” she recalled. “One year Henry Cooper rode Harvey’s Honey Hut—a toilet—through the Fourth of July parade as his campaign float.”
She also remembers candidates proposing offshore parking and other intentionally ridiculous ideas.
“As more money has come into town, it’s gotten stodgier and stodgier,” Brooke said. “So it’s really nice to have something that’s just … silly.”
Known throughout town as Lady Tie Di thanks to decades of colorful clothing, tie-dye creations, and a hand-painted car, Brooke said she’s leaning fully into the role.
“If the light posts in Cambria are suddenly wrapped in tie-dye,” she joked, “I might have had something to do with that.”
Brooke is raising money for the Cambria Grammar School PTA, inspired by the return of both of her sons and their young families to the community.
“It’s the community that has kept me here,” she said. “When people move to town, I always tell them, ‘Volunteer for something.’ That’s how you get in.”
Bahringer, a veteran, former Cambria Community Services District board member, and longtime resident, has perhaps the race’s most ambitious platform.
“My campaign promise is to keep as much fog out of Cambria as possible,” he told New Times. “Especially at sunsets.”
If elected, he also pledges to “get a little taller” and lose five pounds.
Behind the jokes is a practical goal. Bahringer said he hopes the fundraiser helps the chamber eventually keep its visitor center staffed on the weekend.
“They don’t have anybody manning the office on Saturdays and Sundays,” he said. “That’s when all the tourists are here. Hopefully, as a result of the contest, they’ll be able to afford staffing for those days.”
For Stuart, the race has become another excuse to meet neighbors and celebrate the town he now calls home.
He teaches tennis, volunteers as an elephant seal docent at Piedras Blancas, and often rides an e-bike through town with tennis rackets sticking out of the back.
“I end up meeting people because I’m always on my bike,” Stuart said. “That wouldn’t happen if I were driving around in a car.”
His campaign supports the Cambria Tennis Club, whose volunteers maintain the public courts at Coast Union High School by replacing nets, patching cracks, and organizing volunteer workdays.
Whether he wins or loses hardly matters, Stuart said.
“It’s a win-win,” he said. “You raise money for your organization, you meet more people, and you get to be part of something that’s making the community smile.”
The campaign continues through the summer with candidate fundraisers, increasingly outlandish campaign promises, and an Aug. 18 debate that organizers promise will tackle “completely non-consequential issues” facing Cambria.
“The more outlandish the answers and the more outlandish the questions are, the better it’s going to be,” Linn said.
The honorary election concludes Sept. 5 during Pinedorado weekend at the inaugural Mayoral Inauguration Ball, where candidates will deliver one final stump speech before the last votes are counted. The winner won’t sign ordinances or approve budgets but will spend the next year representing Cambria at community events, parades, and celebrations as the town’s “official but unofficial” mayor.
“It has no official merit in terms of governance,” Linn said, “but it’s brought people together. It’s raised money for nonprofits. And it’s reminded us that politics—even fake politics—can still make people laugh.” ∆
Reach Staff Writer Chloë Hodge at chodge@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in July 16-23, 2026.
