Tension among members of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors sometimes reached a fever pitch in 2020. Faced with a global pandemic and a divisive election year that would determine the political balance of the board, disagreements among the county’s five supervisors often played out in public. Despite those conflicts, the board was able to navigate some of its biggest challenges in 2020, including becoming one of the first counties in the country to declare a local emergency in response to COVID-19 in February and later passing a $6.5 billion annual budget — the largest in county history. While every board member deserves some credit for that, one board member most often functioned as the board’s peacemaker: Supervisor Greg Cox. Cox chaired the board during a year unlike any other in his 26-year tenure on the board.