I was working on a database of the part affiliation of all Orange County local elected officials. Finally, I have completed the project with all of the special districts and county seats being added. I also fixed some errors in the previous versions (here, here, and here) and have combined the database into one post.
We have added a button on the menu bar for our readers to always be able to access this database and use it for whatever research/political needs that they may have. Due to the length of th epost you are going to have to click the below link to read the rest of the post.
Chris Nguyen did a great job putting together a local database of all party affiliations for candidates running for local office. I thought that I would take the time to expand on his post and show a database of all Orange County Councilmembers (Also OC Board of Supervisors) that will be serving on City Councils starting next month and what party they are affiliated with.
Please note that a couple of races could potentially change based on a close finish and not all votes being counted. This post will be added to our website in a permanent tab that we will be creating at the top of the site.
Democrat Jay Chen is challenging Republican Representative Ed Royce
151,311 voters live in the City of Anaheim: 10,196 voters live in Ed Royce’s 39th Congressional District, 27,431 live in John Campbell’s 45th Congressional District, and 113,684 live in Loretta Sanchez’s 46th Congressional District. You’ve seen Emami’s endless mail count on the Anaheim City Council race, but he has the good fortune to be one of the 27,431 Anaheim voters in CD-45. This is a tale of the mailboxes for the 10,196 Anaheim voters in CD-39.
(For those of you wondering, Gail Eastman lives in Sanchez’s CD-46, Harry Sidhu lives in Royce’s CD-39, and Lorri Galloway, Kris Murray, and Tom Tait live in Campbell’s CD-45. For those of you wondering for even more info, Steve Chavez Lodge lives in Campbell’s CD-45 while Lucille Kring, John Leos, and Jordan Brandman all live in Sanchez’s CD-46.)
Before I get into the mail, I should note there are precinct walkers and phone bankers from both camps scurrying and calling across CD-39.
An OC Political friend passed on a transcript he made of a phone call he received from the Jay Chen campaign in October. The content of this script is clearly geared toward Republicans, and the OC Political friend who transcribed this call is a high-propensity Republican in a pure Republican household.
Here’s the transcript…
Hi. Good afternoon. My name is Andrew and I am a volunteer with the Jay Chen for Congress Campaign.
I’m calling you today to tell you a little bit about Jay and about his campaign for congress in your district.
Jay is a small businessman, a school board member and US Naval Reserves intelligence officer who is running to represent you in Congress.
Unlike his opponent, Ed Royce, Jay volunteered to serve our country and he will protect our veterans when they come home.
Jay was recruited right out of Harvard University to work for Bain and Company, a section of the successful Bain Capital, and he has valuable experience balancing the books and improving results without raising taxes.
Jay is clearly the right person to serve this district in Washington. For more information about Jay or our campaign, please visit our website at chenforcongress.com. And since you are registered to vote by mail your ballots will be arriving around October 8th. Please remember to vote and sent them back in.
Thank you for very much your time and I hope you vote for Jay in the upcoming November election.
Here’s an excerpt from Chen’s 2011 school board re-election campaign biography:
In 2002 Jay joined Bain & Company, a global business consulting firm. While at Bain he worked closely with top executives of Fortune 500 companies to develop and implement crucial business strategies. He managed the roll-out and evaluation of new products for a global logistics company and analyzed the cost-savings for a mergers and acquisition in the technology space with a combined value of over $1 billion. Jay believes his financial and business experience will be of great value to the school board, which manages an operating budget of over $360 million dollars and nearly 3000 employees.
Anyone else find it fun that Democrat Jay Chen is touting his Bain experience while Republican Mitt Romney is getting trashed for his Bain experienced by national Democrats?
Now, on to the money: From July 1 to October 17, Royce spent $1,232,479 while Chen spent $406,351. However, Super PAC America Shining (run by Chen’s brother) has spent $762,316, with $65,894 supporting Chen and $696,162 against Royce.
In other words, between America Shining and Jay Chen, the pro-Chen/anti-Royce spending since July 1 has reached $1,458,478 while Ed Royce has spent $1,232,479.
For both candidates, over 60% of their direct contributions came from individual citizens. However, if you account for America Shining, the pro-Chen/anti-Royce money received has been 52% from PACs, and 33% from individual citizens, while pro-Royce/anti-Chen money that’s been received is 62% from individual citizens and 36% from PACs.
While Emami religiously scans each piece of mail that falls into his hand, I’m just going to take a picture of all the mail. For my father, who is likely in the most coveted demographic group in all of CD-39 (high-propensity Asian independent), this is what $2.7 million of campaign spending looks like:
My poor father was inundated with CD-39 mail
He’s received 36 mailers, and there’s still three more mailing days before Election Day (today, tomorrow, and Monday). I “only” received 15 mailers, and my Republican mother “only” received 8 mailers. Inexplicably, my independent sister only got 1 mailer (it was pro-Royce).
I should note my 52-year-old father was not pleased to receive the America Shining piece entitled, “Senior News.”
Here are other ways to look at the 36 mailers sent to Dad:
Stacked on top of each other, they are 1/2 inch thick.
They weigh a combined 1 lb. 7 oz.
Laid end to end, they are 41 feet, 3 inches long.
They have achieved near-perfect parity in Dad’s collection:
18 from Royce’s side, 18 from Chen’s side
6 pro-Royce, 4 pro-Chen
12 anti-Chen, 14 anti-Royce
From my father’s mail: For every pro-Royce, there were exactly two anti-Chen pieces. For every pro-Chen piece, there were more than three anti-Royce pieces. While both sides have sent virtually the same amount of mail and both have been pretty negative, Chen’s side has sent out more negative mail and less positive mail than Royce’s side.
Apparently, as registered Republicans, my mother and I were each ignored by Chen. All 15 of my mailers and all 8 of hers were from Royce. I received 6 pro-Royce and 9 anti-Chen. Mom received 2 pro-Royce and 6 anti-Chen.
The anti-Chen pieces are making an impact on regular voters: one of my mother’s co-workers dislikes Chen because he seems so creepy because he’s always behind sunglasses in his pictures. None of Chen’s photos have him behind sunglasses, except the one being used on Royce’s anti-Chen pieces.
In CD-39, postal workers and mailhouses are getting together to throw a big party about the post offices saved from closure and the mailhouses’ unexpected 2012 profits, but somewhere, there’s an environmentalist crying about the forests that Chen and Royce destroyed.
On a final note, my father’s siding with the family Republicans: Dad’s voting for Royce.
The mere suggestion that Brian Chuchua might one day get endorsed by Tait was enough to get the Central Committee to vote to endorse Chuchua with an amazing 72.5% of the vote.
Reading about the discussion on the Anaheim endorsement, it was clear that Mayor Tait’s endorsement was the single most important item of discussion in Chuchua’s endorsement request.
What’s also amazing is that Tait has received little blowback from the anti-union Republican Party for endorsing the union-backed John Leos for Anaheim City Council. This is a sign of the great esteem in which Tait is held that Republicans are largely refusing to criticize Tait for doing what many other Republicans have been hanged, drawn and quartered for.
Why is Tait held in such high regard?
It is because, more than any other person, Tom Tait is the conscience of Orange County Republicans.
When the controversial TOT scheme was proposed, Harry Sidhu, Gail Eastman, and Kris Murray fell to big business pressure and Lorri Galloway fell to union pressure. While Galloway voted with him, Tait was the sole councilmember to truly stick to his principles. Tait is a true blue, limited government conservative.
Tom Tait had originally endorsed Steve Lodge, but when he saw Lodge was more of the same big business, TOT supporter type, Tait pulled his endorsement. When Lodge got raked over the coals by the Endorsements Committee, he realized Tait’s principles are the Republican Party’s principles, so Lodge withdrew his request for an endorsement.
That is the power of Tom Tait’s quiet conservative principles.
Anaheimers chose well when they elected Tom Tait as Mayor in 2010, and they did a service for all of Orange County when they elected this noble public servant.
Anaheim Councilwoman Gail Eastman really stepped in it after the recent Anaheim riots. According to the Voice of OC article Eastman declared that, “In spite of how it happened, it was a big time win for all who opposed seeing that placed on the November ballot.” Regardless of how this might have been taken out of context it should not have been said. Eastman is referring to the Anaheim TOT item that was potentially going to be placed on the ballot which I will explain later.
Eastman is the one Councilmember that currently does not live in East Anaheim. Chris Nguyen and Emami constantly refer to this region as Anaheim Hills despite their being no such geographic region as Anaheim Hills. She was elected back in 2008 coming in as the top vote getter over Kris Murray who was also elected out of a field of 14 candidates.
Since I do not actually live in Anaheim I took the opportunity to watch the Council meeting online and was amazed at how much stuff was actually being discussed during public comment. The recent police shootings, Anaheim TOT, and creating districts for City Council elections. Watching the Councilmembers it felt like they were going to get whiplash from all the bouncing around of items during the public comment period.
I felt that most commenters on the Anaheim shootings were professional in the way they laid out their concerns to what is obviously a very frustrating issue for many people in the community. The real problem was the idiots outside of th meeting that were instigating violence. It helped that Tom Tait announced at the beginning of the meeting that the U.S. Attorneys office would be conducting an independent investigation into the actions by the Anaheim Police Department (Hey Fullerton, how do you like them apples).
The second issue up for discussion was the Transient Occupancy Tax discussion over the hotel developer that got a huge subsidy to build a hotel in the Garden Walk area. It appears that a lot of organized labor came out in support of Councilmembers Sidhu, Eastman, and Murray. Due to the riots outside shortening the meeting this item was unable to be voted on (placing it on the ballot). This was the item that Eastman commented on and got herself into hot water.
Creating wards in Anaheim wat the third item that was discussed by people during public comment and it was an absolute circus. The majority of people speaking on the need for wards did not appear to actually live in Anaheim it appeared to mostly be the LULAC crowd that comes to all the meetings to speak when LULAC runs their drill. Although some speakers from Anaheim spoke in a very passionate way as to why Anaheim needed to draw wards for representation purposes others came across as for lack of a better term “Latino Supremacists.” Due to the rioting outside this item was also unable to be placed on the ballot for November.
Eastman clearly did not help her cause but in reality the rioters outside of the meeting are the ones that cost the residents of Anaheim the ability to vote on 2 items that I believe they should have had the opportunity to vote on.
It has been brought to my attention that some misinformed people are pushing for a system that would separate Anaheim into different wards for the City Council races. I will disclose up front that I am a resident of Anaheim Hills and an appointed member of the Anaheim Housing Commission. The concept of putting wards in place is simply a waste of time and resources.
Only 3 other Cities use a Ward system in Orange County (Santa Ana, Newport Beach, and Seal Beach) and Santa Ana has a bizarre system where the entire City votes for the Councilmembers despite the fact that they have to live in the wards.
Anaheim currently has 4 members of the Council (including the Mayor) that live in Anaheim Hills and one minority on the Council. These members were all fairly elected to the Council by the entire City, whether you like them or not they and according to the 2010 Orange County Registrar of Voters Statement of Votes Kris Murray, Gail Eastman, and Tom Tait all won the area covered by the Anaheim Union High School District (http://www.ocvote.com/fileadmin/user_upload/sov/gen2010/sov-web.pdf).
Lets take a look back at the winning candidates for Anaheim City Council/Mayor going back to 2002:
2002- Curt Pringle, Bob Hernandez, & Richard Chavez (All 3 did not live in Anaheim Hills)
2004- Lorri Galloway & Harry Sidhu (Both do live in Anaheim Hills)
2006- Curt Pringle, Lucille Kring, & Bob Hernandez (Only 1 lived in Anaheim Hills)
2008- Lorri Galloway & Harry Sidhu (Both do live in Anaheim Hills)
2010- Tom Tait, Kris Murray, & Gail Eastman (2 live in Anaheim Hills)
(All data comes from http://www.ocvote.com/)
These numbers show that both candidates from Anaheim Hills and the flatlands win races for the City Council and Mayor. It is not some conspiracy that has been put together to keep candidates on the City Council that only live in Anaheim Hills as 2010-2012 is the only time frame i the past 10 years where we have seen 4 Councilmembers living in Anaheim Hills.
Voters should have a right to vote for the best candidates running for City Council regardless of where they live and what race that they are. In my opinion this not only should be the rule for Anaheim but any City including Santa Ana, Seal Beach, and Newport Beach.
Arguably the 2 front-runners for Anaheim City Council in November are Lucille Kring and Steve Chavez-Lodge (neither on lives in Anaheim Hills). Much like the stock market Councilmembers in terms of where they live are cyclical. Sometimes candidates from the flatlands win and other times candidates from the hills win.
I can’t believe that I am saying this but one of the better articles that I have seen on statistical reasoning against switching to a ward system comes from Gustavo Arellano at the OC Weekly who penned this http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2012/06/aclu_anaheim_lawsuit_latinos.php. He and I may not agree on much in terms of policy but he absolutely hit it out of the park with this story even though I don’t agree with some of the ways he expressed his position in the article.
Hopefully the system in Anaheim stays the same and we can continue to simply vote for candidates that will represent all of Anaheim not just their specific wards.
I am getting sick of all the junk mail being sent to my mailbox this early in campaign season. OCEA has yet again put out a hit piece on Anaheim Councilmembers Harry Sidhu, Kris Murray, and Gail Eastman. Needless to say this is getting really old , really fast. Here is a copy of the mailer that arrived in my mailbox yesterday:
The strategy just simply does not make sense to me. They are obviously looking to win 2 seats in the November election with what appears to be the slate of John Leos and Jose Moreno (not the same one trying to run for Assembly.
I guarantee you that they will beat Sidhu who is not on the ballot due to term limits, but good luck beating Murray or Eastman when they won’t even be on the ballot until 2014
Things are really starting to get heated in Anaheim in a war between OCEA and the Anaheim Chamber of commerce over a City Council vote to give a tax break to a developer looking to build a hotel at the Anaheim Garden Walk.
We first covered the story with a post that I made here talking about what had been taking place prior to us launching the blog.
Chris Nguyen then had a blog post about a robocall that OCEA put out encouraging Anaheim residents to show up to a town hall meeting being organized by KABC 7. I followed up later that day with our first post of a mail piece that went out attacking the three Councilmembers.
I then posted about the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce then fired back at OCEA with a mail piece that supported the three Councilmembers.
Finally Chris Nguyen posted another robocall from OCEA that went out to Anaheim residents urging them to show up at the Anaheim City Council meeting that night.
Now OCEA is back in the mail with another mail piece attacking Harry Sidhu, Kris Murray, and Gail Eastman.
Essentially, these robocalls and mailers are the result of a 3-2 Anaheim City Council (Mayor Tom Tait and Mayor Pro Tem Lorri Galloway dissenting) for a $158 million tax plan favoring GardenWalk Hotel I, LCC on January 24. How the plan works in a nutshell is that GardenWalk Hotel I, LCC will retain 80% of the Transient Occupancy Tax money from the GardenWalk Hotel for the next 15 years. (The Transient Occupancy Tax is known colloquially as the hotel bed tax.) My post here explains the controversy.
Well, yesterday at 2:58 PM, the OCEA launched another robocall targetting Murray, Eastman, and Sidhu. Read the transcript below or click to play:
Hello, I’m Larry Larsen, your Anaheim neighbor and local businessman.
If you want to tell Anaheim Councilmembers Murray, Eastman, and Sidhu it’s wrong to give wealthy corporate developers 158 million tax dollars while they cut public safety, libraries, and parks, now’s your chance: join us at Tuesday’s council meeting.
Tell them to give Anaheim citizens the right to vote and stop the giveaway. Demand your vote! Tell them to put it on the ballot.
Here’s the transcript…
