Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/david-penaloza/)
Santa Ana City Council members late Thursday night approved a $9 million police spending increase for the next fiscal year along with the rest of the city budget in an initial vote.
Hundreds of public comments on spending pushed the Tuesday meeting into Wednesday.
Aggressive police unions, spending on law enforcement over youth programs and few citizen oversight boards — activists and leaders say OC’s debate is years in the making.
Public speakers were unanimous in their calls to move money away from police and reinvest in youth, park and community programs.
Santa Ana residents — responding to social media posts calling on the community to help clean up — appeared at the sites of the protest the night before.
What happens today could set the stage for the November general election, and impact the future of Santa Ana politics. If voters want Iglesias out, they’ll have three different replacement candidates, all backed by different people, to choose from.
City Council members on Tuesday night voted to repeal their initial approval of 2525, a much-contested apartments project in north Santa Ana, and authorized a request by developer Mike Harrah to add up to 415 apartments to his tower at One Broadway Plaza, which has been in development for at least 15 years.
Council members Vicente Sarmiento and David Penaloza have flipped on the project, forming a clear majority against the controversial apartments as a decision makes its way to council members’ desks on whether or not to turn the project over to voters – or rescind their original vote entirely.
After city staff said the council didn’t have the legal authority to rescind or suspend the sales tax increase, which voters approved in 2018, council members David Penaloza and Phil Bacerra criticized Iglesias for bringing up the issue.
The union in a memo to the council last month criticized Villegas and Iglesias and requested their removal from the public safety board, questioning their commitment to the city’s police officers and their ability to make key public safety policy decisions.