With the election to replace former Los Angeles City Councilmember Nury Martinez less than three weeks away, the two candidates vying to represent Angelenos in Council District 6 both went on the attack this week as they made their cases for why voters should elect them.
During a candidates forum in Van Nuys on Wednesday, June 8, candidates Imelda Padilla and Marisa Alcaraz, who came in first and second, respectively, in the April primary election, addressed issues ranging from homelessness and development to public safety and how they plan to engage with the local Armenian community if elected. The forum was hosted by the Armenian National Committee of America Western Region.
Both candidates grew up in San Fernando Valley and have at least one parent who immigrated from Mexico. Padilla, 35, has a master’s degree in public administration. Alcaraz, a 38-year-old single mom, has a master’s in public policy.
Both have advocated on similar issues, including raising the minimum wage and environmental justice, though the roles they’ve played have differed, with Padilla advocating as a community organizer while Alcaraz has spent 15 years in City Hall, mainly working to draft policies. Neither of them supports defunding the police department but they agree that alternative, unarmed responses should be part of a comprehensive public safety program.
With the June 27 runoff election approaching fast, the candidates, who appear similar on paper in many respects, used this week’s forum to try to differentiate themselves — at times going on the offense.
“I have never worked for Nury Martinez or anyone from her political machine, unlike my opponent,” Alcaraz said at the start of the forum.
Alcaraz, a top aide to Councilmember Curren Price, who is Black, was referring to the former city council president who resigned in disgrace last October after being caught making racist and demeaning comments about Blacks and other groups of people in a secretly recorded conversation. Martinez’s resignation led to the current special election to fill her seat.
Padilla worked as a field deputy in Panorama City for Martinez a decade ago and long before the leaked audio scandal occurred, and has condemned her former boss’ racist comments. But she also defended the roughly 18 months she worked under Martinez, saying she helped organize about 10 community cleanups, fixed up the library and hosted an arts and cultural fair.
“While some people might not see that as something positive,” Padilla said in reference to having worked for Martinez, “I will always cherish … those months that I was the Council District 6 deputy. I think it speaks more to my work ethic versus the elected leader that I (worked) for.”
Padilla noted at one point that Martinez wasn’t a fan of building interim housing for people facing homelessness. In contrast, she said she plans to partner with organizations like Hope the Mission to build more housing to address homelessness.
Alcaraz agreed that the previous councilmember for District 6 was not a strong supporter of housing for the homeless and said she would operate differently by embracing permanent and affordable housing for those facing housing insecurity as well as workforce housing for middle-class Angelenos. Alcaraz said she’s been endorsed by the Southwest Mountain States Regional Council of Carpenters union.
While both candidates agree that more housing must be built to address homelessness and housing affordability, and that mental health services should be provided to the unhoused population, one policy area they differ in is whether the city should allow more “by-right developments”. Those are developments that don’t require discretionary review by the city planning department because they follow city standards and comply with zoning regulations.
By-right developments allow projects to be fast-tracked and reduce the cost of construction, which could result in building more housing units.
Alcaraz supports by-right developments, saying it would reduce the power councilmembers have during the discretionary review process to essentially approve or hold up a building application in a city that has seen multiple corruption scandals involving officials related to planning and land-use decisions.
“If you take some of that discretion away, I think it will help to improve not just the public’s viewpoint of what’s going on there (in City Hall), but it really will cut down on some of the problems,” Alcaraz said.
But Padilla said she’s not yet completely convinced about by-right developments. She’s worried, she said, that if the discretionary review process is eliminated, developers will build projects without providing community benefits city officials may request, such as green space, better accessibility for disabled people, water runoff mitigations or ample parking spaces.
“I have not been sold on this by-right campaign that is being pushed by the carpenters entirely, because I just don’t feel like it’s flushed out,” Padilla said. “But I’m ready to talk about it.”
In terms of supporting the local Armenian community, both candidates pledged to speak out against hate crimes directed at Armenians and Armenian Americans and spoke of how they plan to have regular communication with members of the local community. L.A. County is home to the largest number of Armenians outside of Armenia.
Padilla said she would create a community council made up of representatives from the Armenian community to ensure regular lines of communication with her and she would hire a member of the Armenian community to join her staff.
Alcaraz said she would ensure that at least two members of her staff are fluent in Armenian who could bridge language barriers with the local Armenian community and she said she wanted to hold more Armenian events and other community events at Van Nuys Civic Center.
During the forum, both candidates mentioned members of the local Armenian community who have endorsed them. Alcaraz is endorsed by City Council President Paul Krekorian and former state Assemblymember Adrin Nazarian. Padilla has the support of former Council District 6 candidate Rose Grigoryan.
Padilla also noted that she’s endorsed by various business groups. They include the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce and the political action committees for BizFed, the Valley Industry & Commerce Association and the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce.
She pointed out that their endorsements, despite her previous advocacy to raise L.A.’s minimum wage, demonstrate her ability to be a coalition builder.
Alcaraz had also worked on that and other campaigns to raise wages or improve conditions for workers, including hotel and grocery workers. She is endorsed by various unions representing such workers. The veteran City Hall employee said that at a time when L.A. is facing multiple challenges, it is critical to elect someone who already has an understanding of how property acquisitions, developments and budgets work.
“Experience matters,” Alcaraz said.
That opened the door for Padilla to attack her opponent.
Padilla said she, too, has experience in property acquisitions and in dealing with budgets from her previous roles as a field deputy for Council District 6 and with the L.A. County’s Chief Executive Office, where she helped develop the Women & Girls Initiative. She also highlighted a youth leadership conference she started after college.
“What I don’t have experience in is working for one government agency for my entire career and having nothing to say about the specific things that were done in this community that I’m trying to represent,” she said, referring to Alcaraz. “I’ve done a lot for this community,” said Padilla, who previously served on the Sun Valley Area Neighborhood Council.
Alcaraz responded by listing policies she’s worked on that she said helped residents in Council District 6.
“I think the thousands of workers in CD6 that have had pay raises because of our citywide minimum wage (policy), who got ‘‘hero pay’ during the pandemic, who had been protected by (the) ‘fair work week’ (policy) in our city … I think they would disagree with my opponent about my work not impacting this community,” Alcaraz said.
Council District 6 represents the San Fernando Valley communities of Arleta, Lake Balboa, North Hills, North Hollywood, Panorama City, Sun Valley and Van Nuys.
Vote-by-mail ballots have already started going out to registered voters.
Monday is the last day for those eligible to register to vote in the election. Visit registertovote.ca.gov to sign up to vote.
The last day to vote is June 27.
