Election watch 2017 is upon us. Local elections will take place in Compton, Gardena, Inglewood and Los Angeles. Early endorsements have been received by local candidates and many have failed to identify a sound platform for running.
Compton
Will former Mayor Omar Bradley challenge incumbent Aja Brown? Nomination period closes today in the Hub.
Gardena
Councilwoman Tasha Cerda has secured the endorsement of the Gardena Police Officers Association. She also has the support of Mayors: Aja Brown, James Butts, Suzanne Fuentes, Manuel Lozano and Alex Vargas.
Charity Chandler-Cole has hired a well known political consultant and has her website up. She identifies “strenghtening community-police relations” as one of her platforms, yet, 2 Urban Girls recalls those issues being addressed under former Mayor Paul Tanaka.
Related: Turning around the City of Gardena
Shannon Lawrence is running on a platform of “educational equity” which would be nice if Gardena had their own school system. That is a LAUSD issue which 2 Urban Girls is not sure Gardena elected’s have a hand in changing. He has a plethora of pictures posted with many Black elected officials but they have yet to sign on as a supporter. Most notably, Sen. Steve Bradford.
Mark Henderson is mayor pro tem and has yet to secure the endorsement of anyone and Dan Medina doesn’t have a website up yet.
Inglewood
Political newcomer Odest Riley Jr.is running for IUSD Advisory Board and has secured the endorsement of Inglewood Mayor James Butts, Treasurer Wanda Brown and the majority of the city council. Unfortunately, Sen. Steve Bradford is endorsing Riley’s challenger, Dionne Faulk, for her help getting Bradford union support for his senate campaign.
Riley has hired Oliver Unaka as his campaign manager. Unaka’s experience in Inglewood ranges from being former PR to Inglewood Unified to working on campaigns for Darrius Leevy and George Dotson’s successful campaign for District 1.
Faulk is Riley’s opponent and she is running a second time with the support of Asm. Autumn Burke and school board member D’Artagnan Scorza. Faulk had their endorsement last go round, but has yet to make a firm position as to why she is running or have a website up and running.
She currently sits on the Measure GG Oversight Committee but Inglewood residents wouldn’t know that since she is failing on keeping us up to date on how taxpayers money is being spent. She offers no updates or discussion on the topic. Many say she thought this would be a cake walk and wouldn’t have to campaign since the incumbent failed to pull papers. Boy was she wrong.
Riley has also picked up the endorsement of incumbent Margaret Richard-Bowers and board members Carliss McGee and Melody Ngaue-Tuuholoaki.
Results
| Inglewood Unified School District, Seat 1 General Election, 2-year term, 2015 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan | Margaret Richards-Bowers | 61.9% | 3,412 | |
| Nonpartisan | Dionne Young Faulk | 38.1% | 2,100 | |
| Total Votes | 5,512 | |||
| Source: City of Inglewood, “General Municipal Election Tuesday, April 07, 2015: Official Results,” accessed April 28, 2015 |
Los Angeles
Somehow Curren Price Jr. has managed to garner the support of his former challenger, Ana Cubas. Price has also racked up a laundry list of endorsements, akin to former Sen. Isadore Hall but is it enough? What exactly has he done to better the quality of life for Inglewood and Los Angeles residents? Look around and tell me what your eyes see.
Jorge Nuno, Price’s opponent, has hired political juggernaut Mike Trujillo as his campaign manager. Trujillo recently went against the Black establishment and secured a victory for Nanette Barragan over Isadore Hall.
Dallas Fowler has picked up the endorsement from the CA Democratic Party against the incumbent Republican on the Community College District board of trustees. Based on numbers from the last election, Fowler has her work cut out for her. Folks are whispering how Mayor Eric Garcetti removed her from yet another commission he appointed her too. Why isn’t she deserving of a FULL term eric?
2 Urban Girls is noticing many candidates have websites up, which fail to delineate what their platform is and/or why they are running. The standard rhetoric about “being about their community” “working on police issues” “transparency” isn’t enough.
