Santa Ana Council member Sal Tinajero is the city’s new Mayor Pro Tem by a unanimous vote of the City Council at last night’s meeting. This is the result of a deal hammered out last summer after both Tinajero and Council member David Benavides pulled papers to run for Mayor and Tinajero withdrew to join the Santa Ana Spring.
According to the Voice of OC story on the event, it appears Mayor Miguel Pulido is making overtures to the new Council majority in order to be able to work them, but the only real vote the Mayor can count on is his own.
From the story:
During he election, voters approved a term limit for the mayor’s seat. Councilman Vincent Sarmiento described the election as a clear sign that the voters want decentralization of power on the council.
“The message was loud and clear,” Sarmiento said. “They want this to be a body that’s not unilateral.”
Pulido said that he had a conversation about “many things” with Sarmiento and was looking forward to working with the new council. Pulido also thanked Benavides for congratulating him on his reelection.
“We all have the interests of this city at heart,” Pulido said.
New council member Angelica Amezcua told the Orange County Register that she wasn’t going to be taking sides with the Mayor or the City Council majority but would instead align herself with issues she feels strongly about.
So it appears while Pulido was re-elected, there are several new sheriffs in town. This new council will test Pulido’s ability to form coalitions in order to continue running Santa Ana in the manner he’s been accustomed to.
Tinajero said he’d give up the Mayor Pro Tem title in two years when he’s up for re-election in Ward 6, but he’s already the subject of rumors of a possible run for State Assembly against Tom Daly in AD-69. For Tinajero to be successful in beating a Democratic incumbent, he’d need a massive infusion of funds from labor organizations as his own fundraising efforts for previous city council runs was tepid at best.
The council honored outgoing Mayor Pro Tem Claudia Alvarez, but not former Ward 3 council member Carlos Bustamante who will be headed to trial next year for a variety of sex abuse charges.
Are you saying that Benavides promised Tinajero his support for Tinajero as Mayor Pro Tem after Tinajero dropped out of the race?
I’m saying the conventional thinking by the Santa Ana Spring was to united behind one candidate for Mayor. With the one who dropped out propped for Mayor Pro Tem. Was there a Brown Act violation here? Probably, but its not like it hasn’t happened before in Santa Ana or won’t happen again.
There was no Santa Ana spring because Mr. Tinajero worked against it. You all will see that he worked with the Mayor and Claudia. He even endorsed Claudia. Dont trust him.
I think we saw the future of Santa Ana very clearly, when Michelle Martinez suggested a tribute to a recently killed latin pop singer.
This is about as serious as a eighth grade twitter war, it only promises to get worse with the caliber of officials (save Angie), who appears to be a little more mature than the “Springers”.
Heaven help the council and the people they represent.
Mike Ayers,
Who is this recently killed Latin pop singer and what do you think Michele’s reasoning for the suggestion was.
What do you think the future of Santa Ana is based on this suggested tribute?