Patty Lopez' Assembly district

[Brian]

New Assembly member Patty Lopez

I wrote about the stunning defeat of first term Assemblyman Raul Bocanegra by political unknown Patty Lopez in last November's election thread on the Montrose Peace Vigil message board. Bocanegra will be remembered for decades around the state Capitol for his epic campaign negligence. If he had just turned out 468 more votes, he would be back in Sacramento. I still believe that Lopez won because she received the votes of Republicans who turn out more reliably -- they had two Democrats to choose from, so they inked the dot next to the non-incumbent. I saw the proof recently in a Sacramento Bee map of the 39th District race that broke down the vote margins for each candidate by precinct.  The poorer Democratic majority precincts went for Bocanegra while the higher income precincts like mine that have more Republicans favored Lopez.

Anyway, the 2016 election kicked off the day those votes were certified. And Lopez' term begins auspiciously, according to this disturbing screed on the LA Progressive website:

www.laprogressive.com/assemblywoman-patty-lopez/

Most Montrose Peace Vigil regulars don't have to worry about their Assembly member because they live in Mike Gatto's district. For Rosalind, Anni and myself, I'll keep track of Patty Lopez in this thread and talk about what we need to do as her constituents.

[Sharon W]

Thanks for posting the link to the LA Progressive article - I didn't know about Patty Lopez's Republican advisers. I've been giving her credit for grassroots campaigning.

In case you didn't already know, Patty Lopez will be at a Town Hall meeting Sat., Jan 31 at the North Valley City Hall, 7747 Foothill Blvd., Tujunga, from 11 am to 12:30 pm. They plan to discuss the Canyon Park development, High Speed Rail, and the 10046 Samoa Ave. project. The flyer says doors open 10 am and refreshments served.

[Brian]

The Sunland-Tujunga Neighborhood Council hosted a near capacity audience at North Valley City Hall on January 31 for a Town Hall on three land use proposals -- the Canyon Park and the Samoa Avenue housing developments and the High Speed Rail project.  In attendance were staff from the offices of Rep. Adam Schiff, State Senator Carol Liu, Mayor Eric Garcetti and Councilmember Felipe Fuentes.

For now, I'm just here to write about the "keynote speaker," Assemblymember Patty Lopez.  She spoke for about two minutes.  After a spirited round of applause, Lopez started by expressing her gratitude as an immigrant for this wonderful country and for our assembly district, mentioning that she rides horses.  She said, "I want to put the Samoa project on hold," then added that because it was a city zoning issue, there really wasn't much she could do.  Addressing the High Speed Rail proposals, she's "in favor to go back and do homework right."  Lopez ended her remarks by saying, "I give my word that I will protect the district one hundred percent."

Before the program, Anni was talking to a young mother who said that she had never heard of Patty Lopez until she was recruited to take part in a focus group to research a recall effort.  A man seated in front of us turned around and identified himself as a Lopez staff member.  He told us that Patty wants to hear from her constituents, so she was going to make herself available on Fridays at North Valley City Hall and on Saturdays at her district office in Arleta.  Then he got up and brought Patty Lopez over to meet us and shake our hands.

Only lately have we seen pieces like this one by Rosemary Jenkins, which was posted on the LA Progressive and CityWatch websites, questioning Lopez' fitness for office and floating a recall campaign.  The long Facebook post by Lopez supporter Nina Royal that Sharon told me about at the vigil on Friday -- and, frankly, everything else that I've read -- do not refute the facts asserted by Jenkins or by Mario Solis-Marich in the article I linked earlier in this thread.  Still, I am against any recall now.  I don't need to drag yet another sample ballot with the names of Raul Bocanegra and Richard Alarcon for Assembly to my polling place -- for a special election in 2015.

[Sharon W]

Copied from Facebook, posted by Constance Gibson: Video from the Sunland-Tujunga Neighborhood Council Town Hall event on Saturday January 31, 2015 at North Valley City Hall. Topics included the Canyon Park Homes development, the Samoa project and the Goliath threatening our Foothill communities, the High Speed Rail. Watch and share the event here:

Brian and Anni are featured during the pledge of allegiance

[Brian]

The recall effort appears to be over. Raul Bocanegra seems to be spending what's left of the $1.2 million he raised for his 2014 re-election on getting elected again in 2016. The Sacramento Bee interviewed Assemblymember Patty Lopez, among others, for an excellent article it ran on Monday about her background -- and her improbable incumbency:

www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/article10488347.html

[Brian]

Feb 18, 2015 0:42:52 GMT -8 Brian said:

The recall effort appears to be over.

Only to be replaced by a campaign calling for Assemblymember Patty Lopez to resign:

www.stoppattylopez.com/

Yikes.  I remember when supporters of candidates like Raul Bocanegra conducted their opposition research and spewed attack ads before the election, not four months after their candidate's defeat.

If she doesn't resign, the North San Fernando Valley Voters to Stop Patty Lopez "will be forced to exercise our constitutional rights to begin the steps to recall her from office!"  No individuals are named on the site, although they say they were mostly Bocanegra voters on the Who Are We? page.  My favorite line:  "Once Patty Lopez was elected, we wanted to know more about her, so we took a closer look."

The filing deadline for the 2016 election is only 12 months from now.

[Sharon W]

The latest article on Patty Lopez, www.latimes.com/local/politics/la-me-pol-patty-lopez-20150414-story.html

[Brian]

Once again I thank Sharon for posting a link to an essential article in the Los Angeles Times that I would have missed otherwise. Even though it ran prominently above the fold in the second section of the paper, it was April 14, the busiest day of my year. Best piece I've read to date.