HG's “Your Slate” City Council Candidates Knee Deep in Corruption, Dirty Politics
HAWAIIAN GARDENS - In their bid for three available City Council seats, nine candidates are locked in a vicious battle. One faction has become infamous for their unethical and crooked election tactics.
Three candidates banding together under the banner of "Your Slate" are seeking and destroying the signs of opposition candidates, and undermining the election by trying to replace a key city elections official. These candidates are Victor Farfan, Myra Maravilla, and Maria Teresa Del Rio.
Dirty Politics
Behind their slick videos, the three candidates known for their tagline #yourslate have been seeking out the signs of opposition candidates and cutting them or tearing them up. According to ethics professors around the world, this breaks Rule #1 of campaigning and probably life in general: Don't be a jerk.
According to Washington Post's Jaime Fuller, there's plenty of ways to win a political campaign: raising money, being an incumbent (one of the 'Your Slate' candidates is an incumbent, and another is filling an appointed seat), looking like George Clooney, and even kissing babies. But tearing up signs and replacing them with yours isn't one of them. The reason: once it gets out into public (and it will), jerks will eventually lose popularity.
Fuller was writing about the case of Riverside County District Attorney incumbent who in 2014 was running for re-election. He lost big, which is rare for an incumbent.
HG's Municipal Code states that political signs may be removed if they violate certain protocol, but the owners of the sign (especially political signs) must be notified. Apparently, the City's own City Manager Ernie Hernandez ordered these signs to be removed because they were on private property. However, no attempt was made to contact the owners of the signs and they were apparently destroyed immediately. Eye on Pioneer tried to contact Hernandez to get his side on these allegations, but to this date, he has not responded.
But this is actually a minor example of dirty politics that have been committed by the 'Your Slate' group. The other example negatively impacted the livelihood of an employee.
City Clerk Tries to Stop Ballot Error Caused by 'Your Slate' Candidates
City Clerk Lucie Colombo is the union president of the Hawaiian Gardens management union, Local 36 of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). Eye on Pioneer was unable to speak to her. However, we were able to speak with the shop stewards and the AFSCME Business Representative.
Joe Colombo is a shop steward for Local 36. He is the Community Development Director for the City. “It started with a ballot designation error for one of the candidates - Victor Farfan.”
Farfan is currently an appointed councilmember, filling in the remainder of the term of former councilmember Monica Rodriguez, who suddenly resigned from her seat in September 2019. At this date, there are still two years left before that seat expires. Farfan is one of the 'Your Slate' candidates.
According to Joe Colombo, the ballot error arose when Farfan tried to have himself listed as an appointed incumbent on the ballot. The City Clerk spoke up because as the City’s election official, she recognized that the term was inaccurate. Joe explained, “Farfan decided that rather than run for the unexpired two-year seat, instead he would run for one of the regular four-year seats that were opening up. He was sitting as an appointee to an unexpired seat that still had two years left, but because he decided to run for the four year, he’s not an incumbent.”
What qualifies as an ‘incumbent’? It’s an elected official who is holding an office. Joe explained, “Being that Farfan was not elected or appointed to the 4-year position, he’s not an incumbent for that position. If he would have ran for the 2 year, which still had two more years before it expired, he could have been considered an ‘appointed incumbent’.”
When the City Clerk brought this up to the City Manager Ernie Hernandez, there was some discussion as to what to do. Apparently, Councilmember Myra Maravilla, another one of the 'Your Slate' candidates, was behind some of these discussions. Finally, the City Manager went off a suggestion from City Attorney Megan Garibaldi to list Farfan as an “appointed incumbent.”
Joe added that Myra also challenged the candidate statements and filed complaints against four of the candidates’ statements. The law allows someone to get a writ of mandate to correct false statements, but Myra, using her status as councilmember, wanted the City Clerk to make the corrections without her having to file a writ. By doing it through the City Clerk, Myra did not have to spend money out of her own pocket to file a lawsuit for the writ. The City Manager and City Attorney therefore interfered with the election and overruled the City Clerk who is the only Election Official per the Election Code of the State of California for the City of Hawaiian Gardens. Joe also added that the County of Los Angeles County Clerk’s Office has also sided with the City Clerk via e-mails indicating the City Clerk was following proper protocols that occurs in Los Angles County.
Since Councilmember Myra Maravilla’s name was brought up several times during the course of Eye on Pioneer’s investigation, we reached out to her. She initially was interested in taking questions, but later did not keep her appointment.
Schmidt said, “The City Clerk was doing what she was supposed to do. She saw a problem with a ballot error, and moved to fix the situation. Later, she followed the City Manager’s direction. The accusations are baseless.”
As stated earlier, Eye on Pioneer reached out to City Manager Ernie Hernandez for his clarification on the issue, but has so far received no response.
Candidate’s Coworker Ran Elections
Poonam Davis, a former City Clerk for the City of Long Beach was hired on as a contractor by the City, and to run the election.
Several members of the employee and management union, at least four City Council candidates, and community activists are saying this is suspicious. Why? As stated earlier, the City Clerk is the official who conducts elections within the City. One of the candidates running for office, Myra Maravilla, was allegedly instrumental in bringing in Davis to run the election.
The union and several candidates are pointing out that Davis is probably not an appropriate person for the job because of her relation to Maravilla.
A search on Transparent
California confirms that the two worked together at the same time in
Long Beach‘s City Clerk office.
The union contends there are several things wrong with this scenario.
Business Representative Luis Schmidt said, “The contract between the City and the union says that the City must lay off contractors first, before laying off employees. That hasn’t been done. Also, in this case they are laying off an employee and then replacing that employee with a contractor,” said Schmidt.
City Council Candidate Joe Cabrera Zermeno also points that this entire situation is suspicious.
City Manager Hernandez attempted to counter the public outcry after Davis' hiring. Hernandez said during public comments of the September 22 City Council meeting that he is the one who hired Davis, and that her hiring should not be reflective of Maravilla's influence.
As stated earlier, Eye on Pioneer tried to reach out to both Ernie Hernandez and Myra Maravilla for their side of the story.
Why the Dirty Politics?
The reasons for the tactics coming from the 'Your Slate' candidates seem to be self serving.
The suggestion to list Victor Farfan as an incumbent is mainly to give him an edge. Statistically, incumbents have an 85 percent chance of winning, according to Ken Drum of the American Association of Public Consultants. Most campaign strategists seem to think this 85 percent is automatic, but according to Drum’s article “Assessing Reelection Chances”, the reasons are that most incumbents do not have a contender, and by being in office they have already had some media coverage and thus their names are more easily recognized. This year, there are nine candidates running for office.
As for the attempts the attempts to quiet the City Clerk, Joe Colombo put it eloquently. Basically, it’s self preservation. “Megan (City Attorney) was hired by Myra, Ernie (City Manager) was hired by Myra. There are nine people who are running for City Council. Ernie knows that if the wrong people go in, his job is in jeopardy.”
But that’s not all, next time Eye on Pioneer is going to dig deeper into Hawaiian Gardens’ politics, and shine a light on how one city employee, a Code Enforcement Officer, seems to have undue influence over the City Council, the 'Your Slate' candidates, the City Manager, and therefore the entire City itself.
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