Are SAUSD Trustee Rob Richardson’s days numbered?
An injunction following “a lawsuit earlier this year against the Madera Unified School District aimed at greater Latino participation on the school board in the San Joaquin Valley town,” forcing Madera Unified, which is 82% Latino, to change the way it elects its board, according to the L.A. Times.
“The decision has already begun to reshape school boards, city councils and special districts throughout California. Dozens of jurisdictions have Latino majorities with few, if any, Latino elected officials — the very conditions that led to the ruling that the Madera district’s electoral system had fostered “racially polarized voting” in violation of the California Voting Rights Act.”
This injunction is forcing ward-specific elections in school districts with high minority populations, but with few Latino elected officials.
Would such a system result in the ouster of SAUSD Trustees Rob Richardson and Audrey Noji? Hard to say, but the facts speak for themselves. Over 94% of the students in the SAUSD are Latino, and only 3% are Asian, according to SAUSD data. So how do you explain the success of Richardson and Noji?
Richardson benefited this year from a large field of Latino candidates, who did him the favor of splitting the Latino vote. Some of them appeared to have run because they were prodded to do so by Richardson’s ally, Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido. I would include Gregory Barraza and Roman Reyna in that number. Unfortunately Reyna ended up winning, because his name was near the top of the ballot. Most folks expect him to ally with Richardson and Noji.
Some of the Latino candidates this year simply were not ready for prime time – the best example of this was Mike Gonzalez, a business owner who threw a ton of money into the race. But by his own admission he had no idea what he would do as a Trustee. He said at one candidates’ debate that he was “reading books about it.”
Cecilia Aguinaga ran for the second time, and lost again. I am told she is going to run again in two years – and most likely she will split the Latino vote again and allow Noji to win again.
The best of the Latino candidates this year were Valerie Amezcua, Gloria Alvarado and Irene Ibarra. But after Richardson and his fellow incumbent, Jose Hernandez, locked up two of the open three seats, these ladies were left to vie with a half dozen other Latinos for the last seat. Reyna barely won, beating out Amezcua by a handful of votes.
So would ward-specific elections help us get rid of Richardson and Noji? I think they might. We need to pursue this ASAP. An organization called the “Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law” has taken the lead on suing school districts that need to change over to ward-specific elections. Their L.A. CEO, Daniel Grunfeld, may be contacted at this link.
This injunction could also bring change to the Rancho Santiago Community College District’s Board of Education. Two great Latino candidates were defeated this past November, in Art Lomeli and Lynette Verino. But they would have won in ward-specific voting. At-large voting doomed them.
The only downside to all this is the example set by the Santa Ana City Council, where an all-Latino Council, with several immigrants, is reliably anti-immigrant. Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido may as well be a Republican as he seems to particularly loathe immigrants, even though Pulido was himself born in Mexico. So ward-specific elections may not be a cure-all, however it would be easier for activists like Amezcua and Alvarado to win in a ward-specific system. It would certainly be cheaper to reach out to residents in one ward instead of having to spend a small fortune to send mailers to the entire city.
I hope “diversity” also include:Asians, Blacks, Whites,Native Americans,and not only latinos!.
Lets hope for the best.
Art –
SAUSD is long overdue for ward specific elections.
Mary,
Your brand of diversity appears to exclude our gay and transgender brothers and sisters.
Art – Are you saying that Latino voters are racist?
anon – Art’s brand of diversity is .. well, .. no diversity.
junior,
That is quite a dramatic statement – and it is utterly false. I would venture to guess that my ballot picks were a lot more diverse than yours were, last year.
No one promoted Jim Walker, here in Santa Ana, more than I did – I even added him to my blog team. And he ran against a Latino – Vince Sarmiento. I also co-endorsed George Collins and Michele Martinez for Mayor, and I helped them both.
I voted for Gary Pritchard for the State Senate, and for Cam Mangels for the Assembly. The latter ran against Jose Solorio.
I voted for Bob Barr for President.
So tell me, how does that make my brand of diversity “no diversity?” That seems like a crazy thing to say when you consider that I voted for Democrats, Republicans and Libertarians last November – and they included white and Latino candidates.
I don’t think I voted for any Asian candidates last year as none ran in my area. Well, a Viet fellow did run for the Rancho Board, but I voted for Dr. Art Lomeli.
So how diverse was YOUR ballot? And when you consider that you voted FOR Prop. 8, doesn’t that make you the one that does not back diversity?
I was, by the way, endorsed as a Council candidate by Latinos Unidos, Planned Parenthood, ECCO, and the OC Libertarian Party. How is that for diversity?
Finally, look no further than my blog team for evidence of my support of diversity. My team includes Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians and a member of the Green Party. My team includes women, men, whites and Latinos. We have in the past also had Asian bloggers and would welcome more of them.
#2 if you are thinking that sexual preference has to take in consideration for any office that is your idea. For me etnicithy is enought and it does no matter any sexual preference,that is part of your private life and I do not care about it unless you are pedophile or rapist. Do not mix things.
Currently Santa Ana has two school board members who live North of 17th Street and two school board members who live South of Alton Street. I think it is time that SAUSD have ward specific representation.
I think the GG and Anaheim city councils, school boards deserve the eye of this civil rights group.
I will be pushing that we don’t continue to dilute the 1st Supervisorial district by have the BOS push a West to East district map than what the State and federal electied office boundries show in the central county should be a south to north drawn map which does not dilute the Hispanic vote.
Enough is Enough. It a shame that Janet Nguyen was elected because she clearly has no consideration for Hipanics or the working class(she doesn’t even have a Hispanic working in her office- instead, I heard she did hire her sister)and people in the central Orange County will fight the next time(with legal groups as aforemnetioned)after the census numbers come in for a non-hispanic diluting 1st Supervisorial District.
junior,
Art Pedroza is advocating a representative form of government in the sense that in this thread’s example a majority constituency is not being represented.
Any race can represent the needs of a majority or minority culture. The question here, on this thread, is that it is not occurring, so leadership decided to do ward elections because there is a greater opportunity for representation in this manner than was occurring in the past.
It doe not mean that Latinos are racist any more than why Italian,Vietnamese, Gay, Black, Asian, Liberal, Conservative and other special interest communities elect their representatives. THEY ELECTED THEM TO REPRESENT THEIR BEST INTEREST.
So Latinos pursuing this method is just joining the crowd.
Santa Anas’ past and present voters with the strongest representation will oppose ward elections for the fear of representation and protection of the ward resident’s best interests which are not theirs.
Santa Ana Having 100% Latino Council is irrelevant in the representation of the majority constituency because of the historical voter composition of the city – ANGLO. The council members as a majority are politicians, mostly interest in their political future.
Ward elections would eliminate the political hacks and produce non politicians representing their wards and so provide progress.
Art said: “So tell me, how does that make my brand of diversity “no diversity?”
The thrust of your article is that with SAUSD Ward specific elections you believe and desire that the white guy and the Asian lady will likely be voted out and therefore only Latino School Board Trustees will be elected.
That is how your brand is “no diversity.”
Mary, I think the civil rights act includes sexual orientation (gay and trans) as a protected classification but certainly true sexual preference (sex with blondes – blondophillia , sex with children – pedophilia, and sex with violence and non-consent – rape) will continue to be outside the realm of protection envisioned by the civil rights act.
Obviously with the protection of marriage act passing as it did it highlights a problem. Most people consider sexual preference to be a choice and therefore not a bonafide protected class that we shouldn’t discriminate against. We voted to deny them marriage, that’s clearly discrimination. The courts will decide if it’s legal discrimination.
The challenge for the equality of marriage supporters will be to get people to examine their own feelings about homosexuality, see that it is identical to the outlawed discrimination of people of color and decide to embrace those folks and their lifestyle as a viable category deserving of our protection.
You would be better off by pushing for legal residences to become US citizens so they too can vote.
A required course in high school should be a citizenship class for resident aliens children so at the age of 18 they can become US citizens instead of illegal aliens.
Junior, get a hold of yourself. You rant as though you’ve been served Kool-Aid by the Usual Suspects. Think rationally for a moment.
I Love Brown Children Richardson vs John Palacio
and
College President Audry Wanna Be vs I’m Legal Now Hernandez
Who do you really suppose would win election?????
That’s right. The White Guy and The Asian Girl.
Wouldn’t this please the Ususal Suspects? Is this who you are? A Usual Suspect?
Leave to beaver!
Nicely done Cook, kind of a reverse backhand?
Mary what a great idea. Recreate ‘Leave it to Beaver’ and have them deal with sexuality exclusively. Brilliant!
Or did you mean the other kind of beaver?
The ward idea might be a good idea, not for ethnic diversity, but to encourage more good people to step forward and run. It makes it much more possible and less costly to become known and trusted (or distrusted) by the community of a ward 1/5 the size of Santa Ana. This might reduce the inherent incumbant advantage and big money advantage.
Although it is a popular assumption, in my personal experience I haven’t seen that Latino prefer candidates with Hispanic surnames. What’s your experience in this, Art?
Art Lomeli said: “It does not mean that Latinos are racist any more than why Italian,Vietnamese, Gay, Black, Asian, Liberal, Conservative and other special interest communities elect their representatives. THEY ELECTED THEM TO REPRESENT THEIR BEST INTEREST.”
“So Latinos pursuing this method is just joining the crowd.”
I agree with you Art Lomeli. However, from Art Pedroza’s articles and comments, he seems to believe that only white people vote for those whom they believe will represent their “community’s” best interest.
That is what I keep saying to Art Pedroza – that to a certain extent every group is racist. You have explained that very well.
“Diversity” in the correct definition as it applies to this thread is in governing.
The point here is diversity – representing a variety of interest associated with a variety of constituents making up a city.
A governing board looking after the best interest of one group while neglecting others has no diversity irrelevant of it’s racial makeup.
A racialy diverse board or not (Santa Ana Council)can be seated and neglect a large section of the residents because the strong voter group demands it.
Junior,
A “racist” is a individual that believes his/her ethnic group is superior over other ethnic groups.
My explanation is based on best interests of the groups mentioned and nothing to do with the belief that the group’s ethnicity is superior to that of others. Racism and protecting the best interests are not the same concept.
Irvine electing the city’s first Asian Mayor has nothing to do with the argument that Irvine’s voters are saying Asians are superior to others.
He was elected to look after their best interests while also addressing the needs of other groups. I believe they voted so in orther to guarantee protection of their interests. NO RACISM!!!!!
It would be a racist election outcome if the intent was to neglect others and only champion Asian culture and values.
This does happen. There are many examples in our own backyard.
Claudia – you know that I am not a usual suspect.
Art Lomeli – I think that we are saying the same thing. I do not see where we would disagree on this issue.
And Claudia (if that is who you really are) – what is your point?
Besides attempting to belittle people, as you did to Councilwoman Michelle Martinez.
This (in my view) is a huge red herring.
the real issue is should non citizens be able to vote in community elections.
New Yrk has allowed non citizens to vote in electons. I have discussed this in the past and quite frankly it scares the shit out of the “usual suspects” and the “positioned players” (I just coined that one for the dem wannabe’s).
Arely Meza, Mother of three good students at Santiago ES has everybit (if not more)right to choose her school board member (which I doubt would be Rob Richardson, but who knows)as does Brett Franklin, Steve Doughty or Phil Schaffer.
It’s painfully obvious that the opposition of the inevitable has harmed the schools.
And let’s not forget that many of the “latino” infused policies adopted by SAUSD were taken from Mendota, Merced, Madera and other “latino centric” districts.
Junior. Go back and read my post. My point is that the White Guy and the Asian girl would win election against the Spaniard (Palacio) and the Mexican (Hernandez).
The Usual Suspects would of course be content because non-hispanics would be elected. I do not belittle Michele. She is a self-admitted Drug Dealer.
Claudia (if that is who you really are, which is not likely, but I will refer to you in that manner if you wish):
What the h*ll are you talking about?? Why would those people you mentioned be running against one-another? They are all currently serving on the SAUSD Board.
You do not know what you are talking about – you are not Claudia – she is much smarter than you. You make no sense.
I love it, Michele is a self-admitted drug dealer in the same way Claudia is a failed attempt at an orgasm.
Both happened long ago.
Will they require that voters educate themselves on the issues and candidates and not rely on door hangers and slate mailers for their information? Oh and require the citizens to vote? If not all they will succeed in doing as Art points out, is make the elections cheaper to win.
Junior do you have a problem with readng comprehension? Go back and read the 1st sentence of paragraph 4 of the posted story. After that scroll down to your post #9. Gee Whiz. FYI, I have no problem with Michelle. We are friends now.
To the person calling his/herself Claudia Alvarez,
Please postulate a coherent argument.