Inglewood residents are on track to return the incumbents to the city council in a sign they want to keep the team together. Early returns show the incumbents with a decent lead over their opponents.
The numbers also indicate Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts Jr.’s popularity is waning.
District 1 Councilman George Dotson benefitted from a crowded field that saw him remain the top vote-getter after results were updated at 4 am. Gloria Gray and Yolanda Davidson rounded out the top three vote-getters.
Dotson has 32% of the total votes cast and Gray has 24%.
There is much speculation that Dotson could ultimately resign from his seat allowing for an appointment to be made to conclude his term unless he is forced into a runoff and loses outright if he doesn’t receive over 50% of the votes.
District 2 Councilman Alex Padilla overwhelmingly defeated challenger Bobby Brown after receiving 1,411 votes representing 70% of the votes cast.
What was most shocking was the low turnout for three-time Mayor James Butts.
In the last two elections, Butts received in excess of 10,000 votes. In 2014, he received 13,193 votes and in 2018 he received 13,193.
In those elections, he benefited from an influx of campaign funds from NFL and NBA interests seeking to build in the City. In this election cycle, Butts’ main benefactors are those seeking to build the Inglewood Transit Connector and WOW Media who has digital billboards littered throughout the city, some having never been turned on since they were erected.
Butts has received 6,432 votes as of the last update representing 55% of the total votes cast. Fredrisha “Sha” Dixon is in second place with 16% and Miya Walker with 13%.
Dixon regularly clashed with the mayor during this election, particularly during the public comment portion of the weekly city council meetings where she blasted him for not doing enough to curtail crime in the city.
We previously pondered that in the previous elections, the mayor was driving more residents to the polls to vote against him and this year they sat this one out.
According to the County Registrar’s office, the next update of voting totals will be made on Friday, Nov. 11.
The Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk’s office on Wednesday estimated that roughly 1 million ballots remain to be counted. The office estimated there are 985,000 vote-by-mail ballots, 21,000 conditional voter-registration ballots, and 300 provisional, or questioned ballots.
2 Comments
Until there is a viable alternative, the mayor will probably win the 2026 election too.
Let us hope at some point that residents believe it is better to have a group of five who independently and genuinely care about the residents of this community rather than someone and his puppets (2 admitted they strive no to use their own brains but rather to please him) who are focused on pleasing campaign donors.
That 2 council members admitted that they “vote as they are told” is something none of us should tolerate. While James Butts is annoyed when someone says he bought the seats for the Councilmembers of District 1 and 2, he did in fact provide the financing for their campaign signs, campaign mailers, and campaign workers in expectation of their unwavering devotion. This should never be considered acceptable.
Unfortunately the majority of residents do not watch council meetings and see “ their representatives” betray their trust to please James Butts.
Our ccommunity would be in a far better state if residents would watch council meetings and build their awareness of how the city council makes decisions which impact us all!
Sadly too many comments from the young candidates suggest they believe their limited knowledge exceeds the vast experience awareness and knowledge of the senior activists in our midst….Yes children when you insult the old people they will have little confidence you understand anything complicated if you have not learned that basic concepts of listening and respecting.
Inglewood was a community where residents worked together to build a thriving diverse communities
The destruction of this community has occurred largely during the years with BUTTS iand to a limited degree with Dorn in the mayoral chair. The expansion and merging of “redevelopment zones” destroyed thriving businesses by making maintenance and improvement loans almost impossible because of the threat of pending eminent domain!!
Unfortunately many can trace the greed right back to the 400% Salary increase which changed the council from a group of people who cared about their community doing what was best for neighbors to a group of money hungry opportunist, drunk with the power to please billionaires instead of the impacted neighbors