Miguel Pulido, mayor of Santa Ana for the past 20 years, this week moved a step closer to ending speculation about his political future when he picked up the paperwork to run for another term, according to city records, according to the Voice of OC.
I verified this by requesting a list of candidates who have pulled papers, from City Clerk Maria Huizar.
State Senator Lou Correa has been hotly rumored to be running but he has not yet filed any papers with Huizar. Continue reading
The Santa Ana City Clerk has re-posted the Council Members’ total compensation and benefits today however a key piece of the puzzle is missing. The Santa Ana Open Government website does not include how much the City Council Members are paid to serve on various County Commissions.
I emailed the City Clerk, Maria Huizar, about this discrepancy and she pointed me to a different page – the Mayor and City Council page, where this information is found when you click on “Form 806.” Who in the public would know what the heck that is? The good news is that Huizar said she will look into my recommendation to put this information with the Council’s pay, on the Open Government page. We need to make it easier, not harder, for the voters to find out how much the City Council members really are earning.
As we posted this weekend, the Santa Ana Council Members are going to try to place a measure on the November General Election ballot that will result in a huge increase in their pay. But shouldn’t the City of Santa Ana be more transparent about how much the Council Members really earn when you factor in the pay and benefits that stem from their service on various County Boards?
Here is what the Council Members make by serving on various Boards: Continue reading
Three Santa Ana City Council Members, including Michele Martinez, David Benavides and Angie Amezcua have placed an 85A item on the agenda for this Tuesday’s City Council meeting, regarding medical marijuana.
These Council Members would like to place a measure on the November General Election ballot that would allow voters to vote against the sale of medical marijuana by collectives/dispensaries. Continue reading
Roman Reyna and Carlos Bustamante
With Roman Reyna now thinking that his approximately 10th grade education is good enough to qualify him to be Mayor of Santa Ana, it’s time for the residents of this city to insist on changes to the city charter to protect them from the same political problems that took down the City of Bell.
To run for the President of the U.S. you need to be 35 years old and 14 years a resident. Why not have a few legal safeguards to protect cities? Mayors are essentially Chief Executives. Would any of you hire Reyna to run your company? Continue reading
Neighbors, community and business leaders are all asking one question: Did Santa Ana Councilman Roman Reyna, who is now running for Mayor, actually graduate from Santa Ana High School and if he did, why has he apparently refused to release his High School transcript? Santa Ana is the second largest city in Orange County and it serves as the County seat. Doesn’t Santa Ana deserve to have a Mayor that at least has a verifiable secondary education?
Roman claims to be working towards a bachelor’s degree in Youth Development from Springfield College in Los Angeles, and may some day actually get a piece of paper that says “graduate” but that still does not ease the minds of constituents who want to know if he actually has a high school degree and did he pass even the simplest high school classes? Continue reading
With the promise of a grass-roots campaign, Councilman Roman A. Reyna has announced he is running for mayor to unseat Miguel Pulido, who he said has grown out of touch with the city’s needs, according to the O.C. Register.
It is true that Pulido is a bit out of sorts nowadays. He has no allies on the Santa Ana City Council. The Council took away all of his appointments. And the Governor, his friend Jerry Brown, got rid of redevelopment, a tool Pulido used many times over the years to reshape the City.
But is Reyna really an improvement over Pulido? I don’t think so. He is running because he has two years left on his Council term, so he can lose the mayoral race and remain on the City Council. But so can Councilman Vince Sarmiento. So why isn’t Sarmiento running for Mayor instead? Continue reading
Santa Ana Councilman Roman Reyna, looking to unseat ten-term Mayor Miguel Pulido in the November election, will kick off his mayoral campaign Saturday pledging to stamp out “backroom deals” and increase City Hall transparency, according to the Voice of OC.
Reyna’s fundraiser features most, but not all, of his Council colleagues and will be held at Original Mike’s, at 100 South Main St., in Santa Ana, at 11 am today, Saturday, June 7. Be careful. Original Mike’s received three health violations in April, including “Lack of/Unsanitary/Condition Walls/Floors/Ceilings.” And they received six health violations in March, including “Evidence of Vermin Activity/Presence of Animals/Insects.” Yum!
He is holding the fundraiser on Garage Sale weekend so most of his supporters likely won’t be there. Continue reading
I am hearing from several sources that Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido is quite serious about defending himself as he is investigated for various issues stemming from campaign finances and real estate shenanigans. He is telling friends that his priority is his legal defense – so what if he ends up retiring from politics and not running again in November? Who will run?
First term Santa Ana Councilman Roman Reyna is in but no one is taking him very seriously. If Pulido pulls out you can expect much bigger names to jump in.
I am told that former Santa Ana Mayor Pro Tem Claudia Alvarez, an Assistant Orange County District Attorney who currently serves on the Rancho Santiago Community College District’s Board of Trustees, is already planning to run. Continue reading
As I was driving to work today I heard the allegations against Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido on talk radio. Just like that the story has jumped from the Voice of OC to the L.A. Times to talk radio.
Is it any surprise then that now the local TV stations have picked up the story? Click here to check out the CBS version of the scandal.
Will this story stick? Will this damage Pulido in the long term? Who knows? November is many months away. But if this does become a major chink in Pulido’s armor, are his enemies on the Santa Ana City Council prepared to take him out? Continue reading
Marc Payan wakes up just about every day well before the sun comes up, and drives to Downtown Santa Ana from his home in Irvine. He heads to a parking structure where he leads Santa Ana residents in free workouts that start at 5 am.
It is a nice story, that the L.A. Times touted in a recent article, where they opined that “in one of the nation’s densest cities, there are no beaches and hardly any parks. And, for many, paying $100 or more per month for a fitness group just isn’t an option”
That is of course complete B.S. Santa Ana has 35 parks, four joint use sites shared with the SAUSD, and 19 recreation facilities, according to the Santa Ana Parks and Recreation Agency – and we are not that far from the beach. And there is in fact a downside to the workouts, dubbed Payan X. They have been waking up residents of Downtown Santa Ana for quite a long time. Continue reading
I have been advocating for Ward-Specific City Council elections, here in Santa Ana, for many years. Our current system, which features six Wards, forces candidates to campaign in the entire city. That is a very expensive proposition. It leads to corruption as the candidates inevitably have to sell out to Special Interests in order to raise the humongous amounts of money needed to run for our City Council.
Just how corrupt our system is came to light today in a Voice of OC article that fingered three of our Council Members for allegedly accepting money under less than legal circumstances, from an apartment developer of course.
Hope is not lost however as I have discovered that there is in fact an effort underway to place a measure on the ballot to allow the voters of this city to opt for a Ward-Specific Council election system. In that scenario the Council candidates would only have to campaign in one Ward. They could conceivably walk that ward all on their own. They could meet all the voters and garner their support. The Special Interests? They would be out of luck. Continue reading
By now you have likely heard that apparently Councilman Roman Reyna is going to run against Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido in 2014. I can assure you that Pulido is not sweating the prospect of beating Reyna. But if Reyna was smart he would be running for a much bigger – and more winnable – office.
Assemblyman Tom Daly was elected to represent Orange County’s most Latino Assembly District, the 69th, last year when the previous incumbent, Jose Solorio, termed out. Daly ran last July in the Open Primary and was contested by a gaggle of Democrats that included Santa Ana Councilwoman Michele Martinez, labor hack Julio Perez, and befuddled auditor Francisco “Paco” Barragan. When the dust settled the three Latino candidates did what everyone expected them to do – they knocked each other out. Continue reading
Santa Ana City Councilman Roman Reyna, who was elected to his first term, in Ward 5, last year, is apparently going to run against popular Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido in 2014, according to a city insider.
Reyna, who touts that he is an “Orange County Department of Education Case Manager,” on his city bio, has previously worked at the Santa Ana Parks and Recreation Agency, the Santa Ana Boys and Girls Club, and the Santa Ana YMCA. He served one term on the Santa Ana Unified School District’s Board of Education, before running for the Santa Ana City Council, when longtime incumbent Claudia Alvarez termed out. Continue reading
Can you believe it? Our city is broke but on August 28, 2013, “officials from Santa Ana conducted a one-day site visit to learn more about the highly successful transit and streetcar system in Portland, Oregon.”
That’s right. We paid to send a bunch of Council Members and city staffers to Portland, Oregon, to look at their light rail system. Now why in the world would our city leaders do this? Well, they allege that “Out of the 15 systems currently operating and the 40 under design or construction throughout the country, Portland’s has been seen as a model that reflects the Transit Vision for Santa Ana’s proposed streetcar system.”
But is that true? Does Portland really have anything in common with Santa Ana? Continue reading
We recently took a look at the official City Calendars of each of our Santa Ana City Council Members. Now it is time to vote! Which one of our Council Members is the very worst of the bunch?