Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/vicente-sarmiento/)
Santa Ana City Attorney Sonia Carvalho adjourned Tuesday’s city council meeting in the middle of public comment while people were still waiting — some for four hours — to address a half-empty dais.
A federal appeals court this week supports what U.S. District Judge David O. Carter has been warning county and city leaders about for six months: If they don’t offer a realistic option for homeless people to stay overnight, police can’t enforce anti-camping ordinances. On Friday, Carter is bringing OC civic leaders back to court to gauge progress.
City officials say they need the extra $63 million to maintain existing service levels and fix aging infrastructure. Most of the increase apparently would go toward maintaining existing services and the pension cost increases for the existing workforce and retirees.
Most of the council moved toward placing a sales tax increase on the November ballot, but didn’t explain what the tens of millions of extra dollars would be used for.
The suit seeks to ban the city from holding any more at-large elections for City Council members, and require the city to adopt “fairly constituted districts” that don’t dilute Asian American voting power.
The move could grant U.S. District Judge David O. Carter the ability to follow through on his warnings about banning enforcement of anti-camping laws if city officials, particularly south county mayors and city managers, don’t make progress in picking one or more shelter locations.
Santa Ana council members and residents have said the three cities’ refusal to accept emergency shelters revealed a double standard: It’s okay to put shelters near poor kids in Santa Ana but not near kids from wealthier families.
The effort to have district elections in place for November seems to have been killed, according to Councilman Vicente Sarmiento, who supports the proposed voting system change.
A proposed June ballot measure on Santa Ana district elections appeared less likely Monday to make it to the ballot, with Mayor Miguel Pulido increasing his legal action against it and little time left for the City Council members who support the measure to ask the courts to put it on the ballot.
It was unclear Friday whether the measure will go before voters in June. The ruling left a potential door open for further round of legal arguments by city officials and the mayor.