Is Michelle Martinez Buying Positive Blog Coverage?

We’ve spent the past few days reviewing the financial reports of various candidates for office throughout Orange County.  And something on Michelle Martinez, an unopposed candidate for re-election for Santa Ana City Council, jumped out at us. 

Michelle paid $385 to Pedroza and Associates for “campaign consulting.”  This is interesting because Pedroza and Associates, run by SAUSD decline-to-state candidate/Orange Juice Blog publisher Art Pedroza, is a safety consulting company. A quick look at Martinez’s website and blog shows the same design elements and copywriting style Pedroza uses on OJ and the New Santa Ana blog; there’s considerable shared content, so perhaps Pedroza and Associates have expanded their services.

So we have to ask: Is Michelle Martinez paying Pedroza and Associates for positive blog coverage? And should Pedroza disclose that he is a paid consultant to the campaign to have Martinez re-elected to City Council.  Martinez won’t return emails or phone calls to us at the encouragement of Pedroza and Mill, so there goes her ofted-stated stance that she’s open and accessible for questions.  What’s the ethical thing to do here? 

So I emailed both Martinez and Pedroza about the expenditure; Pedroza replied and dragged his toady Sean Mill into the fray right away.  Both advised Martinez not to communicate with me since I don’t live in Santa Ana (but of course, that’s never stopped Pedroza or Mill from writing about Irvine, Anaheim, Costa Mesa, Orange and any other community in Orange County).

Here’s a portion of our exchange with Michelle’s campaign consultants, begining with the first reply from Pedroza:

Dan,

You are not a reporter and even if you were I would not answer any of your questions.  I have advised Councilmember Martinez to likewise ignore you.  You live in Irvine.  Prevatt lives in Long Beach.  If you lived here in Santa Ana I might be inclined to answer you, but you don’t, so I won’t.

 Art Pedroza

A note: I have a credentialed press identification issued by the Orange County sheriff’s department. And as for noting living in Santa Ana, the Register’s Santa Ana beat reporter Doug Irving doesn’t live in the city either; does this mean Martinez won’t speak with him?

Here’s a complete string, so scroll down and read up (email addresses deleted, but Martinez is copied on each of these):

We can write about whatever we want.  But we don’t expect or demand that people talk to us.  And for the record, your lame blog is practically dead.  Check out our readership data.  That’s more like it.  Congrats on killing your blog.

Art

****

Please don’t lecture me about bias Sean.  The councilwoman can speak for herself.

(from DC)

From: seanhmill
Sent: Wednesday, October 06, 2010 6:07 PM
To: Dan Chmielewski; chrisprevatt; ‘Art Pedroza’
Cc: ‘Michele Martinez’
Subject: Re: question

Dan,
I am sure she can but my advice to her is to ignore you, Prevatt and the unhinged Gallegos. You are not journalists, you are not constituents and you are not unbiased.

She has nothing to gain by responding to you, you people will do a hatchet job on her and her allies no matter what she says.

if she is smart she will ignore you as will the rest of the council.

Sean

From: “Dan Chmielewski”

Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2010 18:03:23 -0700

To: <seanhmill>; <chrisprevatt>; ‘Art Pedroza'<Cc: ‘Michele Martinez’Subject: RE: question

Sean —

The Councilwoman can speak for herself. I have never given her a reason not to.

Two simple questions for Ms. Martinez:  what was the nature of the consulting work done by a safety company for an elective office and why wasn’t Councilman Benavides included in a campaign video featuring other Democratic candidates for council and current Democratic council members not up for re-election.  If she refuses to answer, then her previous contention about being honest and open simply isn’t true.

 Dan

From: seanhmill

Sent: Wednesday, October 06, 2010 5:56 PM
To: Dan Chmielewski; chrisprevatt; ‘Art Pedroza’
Cc: ‘Michele Martinez’
Subject: Re: question

Michele,
Do yourself a favor and ignore these characters. They have an agenda that includes attacking you and your allies.

They will write what they are going to write whether you answer or not.

Sean

****

And here’s my favorite message from Art (start down at my message and scroll up for context):

What campaign?  She is unopposed you moron.

Art

sent from my AT&T Smartphone by HTC

—– Reply message —–
From: “Dan Chmielewski”

Date: Wed, Oct 6, 2010 7:38 pm
Subject: question
To: apedroza

So Art, back to the question.  When Matt Cunningham has a client who pays him and he blogs about it, he discloses the information that he’s a paid consultant to the campaign.  The question is why don’t you do the same thing in regards to the Martinez campaign?  Do you think you are being ethical by blogging about her and not disclosing the paid relationship?

Now Art’s message is moronic on a number of levels. Martinez has raised money and spent money on a campaign where she has no opponent; so if she has no campaign, as her consultant alleges, exactly who is the moron writing a check to Pedroza and Associates and what is the check for? 

Since Martinez is the subject of often flattering posts on blogs run by Pedroza, is it because he truly believes she’s doing a great job or because he’s been paid to say she’s doing a great job?  The Orange Juice hasn’t published a single negative post about anyone on the Santa Ana city council except for Council member David Benavides and Council member Carlos Bustamante. And Martinez and Council member Sal Tinajero have been the subject of a number of posts here about accepting campaign donations and voting on projects related to these donations — these posts have been written by others here and not me. 

Martinez might not like it, but we’re an established member of the OC media and she’s had nearly 48 hours to get back to multiple messages left by me.  If she’s paid for media relations advice from Pedorza and Mill, she ought to ask for her money back.

I’ve viewed the “I’m Santa Ana and Santa Ana is Great” video on Martinez’s blog, and have to question why Council member David Benavides wasn’t included, as he is up for re-election, but Mayor Pro Tem Claudia Alavarez and Council member Vince Sarmiento — who are not up for re-election, are in the video with Mayor Miguel Pulido and Council member Sal Tinajero.  It’s unclear who produced the video but all fingers were pointing to Martinez for the answer.  She’s declined.

I’m fully prepared to accept Council member Martinez’s explanation that she hired Pedroza and Associates to set up her blog.  But given the significant amount of shared content — all glowing — and Art’s current financial situation (a home in foreclosure and multiple credit card fraud lawsuits filed against him this year), one has to wonder who sold out to whom?  Martinez IS a sitting member of the city council; is she really taking marching orders from Pedroza and Mill or is she her own person?  Did she pay for fawning blog coverage to cover her role in accepting illegal contributions from parties related to projects she voted on? Or are both parties in this little relationship morally and ethically bankrupt?

So I’ll pose this question to Art:  If I cut you a check for $385, does it mean you’ll give us fawning coverage on your blog?  There’s a word for that….let me ponder it….(readers, can you guess?)