Rimga Viskanta's Record: Steady Leadership Through a Pandemic and a Boardroom in Crisis

Rimga Viskanta, candidate for Encinitas Mayor 2026

Rimga Viskanta for Encinitas Mayor 2026

Rimga Viskanta knows how to lead in a crisis — calm and steady during COVID, and the one who restored order to a chaotic school board.

ENCINITAS, CA, UNITED STATES, June 30, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Twice in the past six years, Encinitas mayoral candidate Rimga Viskanta has stepped into local leadership at a moment of real public pressure and provided steady, level-headed governance — first as a school board president guiding her district through the pandemic, and again as a trustee who helped calm the board of the high school district serving the same community, one that had become a regional symbol of dysfunction. Both moments called for the same thing from her: a fair process, a focus on students, and a willingness to lower the temperature when emotions ran hot.

Viskanta served on the Encinitas Union School District board from 2016 to 2020, holding the presidency in her final year — 2020, the year COVID-19 upended public education. EUSD was already a high-performing, well-run district, and that foundation helped it weather the disruption better than most. But the moment still demanded a steady hand: as president, Viskanta helped guide the district through intense community pressure and deep division over mask mandates and how quickly to bring children back to campus. Under her leadership, EUSD returned students to in-person instruction in a hybrid model in the fall of 2020 — while many districts stayed fully remote into 2021 — and kept a notably larger share of its students learning on campus than neighboring districts did.

The second test came in 2022, when Viskanta ran for and won a seat on the San Dieguito Union High School District board. She entered a district in turmoil: it had cycled through five superintendents in seven years, it was embroiled in a contested redistricting process, and after a trustee resigned that April the board had deadlocked over a replacement and spent months operating one member short. Years of escalating acrimony had made its meetings so contentious that the district was drawing headlines for dysfunction rather than for being one of the highest-performing districts in the county. Within weeks of taking office that December, Viskanta's new colleagues elected her board president.

Her unofficial campaign motto had been deceptively simple: make school board meetings boring again. It was shorthand for a serious idea — that when governance works, it doesn't make news. As president, she focused on the fundamentals: orderly process, predictable rules for public comment, decorum on the dais, and a clear line between the policy role of elected officials and the professional role of district staff. Under her leadership, the board ended years of leadership churn by hiring a permanent superintendent in 2023.

The shift drew notice. In a December 2023 column, longtime education writer Marsha Sutton observed that San Dieguito — after years of toxic public discourse — might now model how to handle sharp disagreements respectfully, and could one day see its meetings "become boring again."
"Good governance, done well, is almost invisible — even a little boring. That's the point," said Viskanta. "When the process is fair and predictable, people can disagree and still trust the outcome. It's rewarding to watch that take hold."

Viskanta argues the same steadying approach is what Encinitas City Hall needs now. She has been openly critical of a council climate in which, she says, elected officials too often override staff expertise or try to design technical projects from the dais.
"I've twice walked into a public body in crisis and helped bring back order and respect," Viskanta said. "I'm not interested in rocking the boat — I want to steady the ship. That's the experience I'll bring to the mayor's office."

About Rimga Viskanta
Rimga Viskanta is a candidate for Mayor of Encinitas running on the theme of Building Community Through Local Action. A longtime Encinitas resident, she brings nearly a decade of city government experience in finance and sustainability and two terms of elected school board service — including three times elected board president — to her campaign for mayor. Learn more at www.voteforviskanta.com.

Rimga Viskanta
Rimga Viskanta for Encinitas Mayor 2026
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