Upset by the San Fernando City Council’s vote to reject becoming a “sanctuary city,” community members are discussing possible recall efforts for the three councilmembers who voted against the designation.
During a lengthy City Council meeting on April 7, Mayor Mary Mendoza and Councilmembers Joel Fajardo and Victoria Garcia voted to oppose the title or pass ordinances to further protect immigrants, while Vice Mayor Mary Solorio and Councilwoman Patty Lopez voted in favor.
There was an outpouring of community support for sanctuary city status at the City Council meeting, with dozens of public comments, written comments, student letters and one open letter from Lopez.
“It was really disheartening,” said Justan Torres, a third-generation City of San Fernando resident, about the council meeting. “I felt kind of blindsided.”
Torres is a proponent of increasing immigrants’ rights and protections as much as possible, especially in a city where 92% of the population is Latino and 34% are foreign-born, according to United States Census Data.
Beyond the vote, he was disturbed by some of the councilmembers’ attitudes and actions during the meeting, including “snickering,” “pretending not to understand questions” and disregarding the community’s comments.
“It was very off-putting,” said Torres. “It seemed like they were just in their own bubble, they had already made their decisions [prior to the meeting] and … they were just going through the motions.”
He hopes these recall discussions will make the council reconsider their actions and provoke them to engage more with the community.
“The councilmembers seem really out of touch with the community,” said Torres, adding that they should “have an investment in communicating with the community and being a part of the community, and not just this body that thinks that they know better and is gonna base their decisions off of their preconceived biases.”
The preliminary recall discussion was held at The Midnight Hour Records on Wednesday evening, which owner Sergio Amalfitano described as more of a strategy session.
“If you’re supposed to be a leader, you should lead. You shouldn’t cower, you shouldn’t be afraid,” said Amalfitano. “These are elected officials who are supposed to be the leaders moving the City of San Fernando forward, and I haven’t seen that since I’ve had a business in San Fernando.”
With such an overwhelming show of support from residents for the sanctuary city designation, Amalfitano described the councilmembers’ decision to “go against the wishes of the constituents” as “an abuse of power.”
At the very least, he hopes the recall can “shame them publicly on the record,” adding that this is more importantly an opportunity to discuss how to move forward as a politically engaged constituency that holds their elected representatives to account.
A recall can be initiated by any registered voter within the City of San Fernando, and paperwork must be filed separately for each official. It is a semi-lengthy process that requires petition signatures from at least 20% of registered voters (2,499 valid signatures) to move forward with a vote.
“All three of them in some way, shape or form, are going to get backlash from this, whether it’s bad press, or running candidates against them when they do come up for re-election, or being part of the recall process,” said Amalfitano.
The three councilmembers have already experienced bad press and community backlash from their vote.
A week later, Fajardo has changed his tune and decided to readdress the matter at Monday’s City Council meeting.
“The only reason I would bring this back for reconsideration is if it’s the right thing to do,” said Fajardo, dismissing claims that it is due to negative comments or the recall discussion. He added that in the days following the vote, his conversations with a former commissioner “provided a fresh perspective and highlighted areas where our policies may not be as clear or protective as they should be.”
At the prior council meeting, Fajardo questioned why they would create policy for “something that hasn’t happened,” but said that he now has more clarity and understanding on why “the city should have clear policies on how it handles people’s personal data and clear policies for permissible uses of our facilities and parking lots.”
According to information presented by city staff, the City of San Fernando has three fewer official protections for immigrants than the city of Los Angeles. These include prohibiting immigration authorities from using city land or property without a warrant, prohibiting city personnel from sharing data with immigration enforcement and prohibiting personnel from collecting immigration status unless required by law.
Because of pushback from the opposing councilmembers, Solorio suggested forsaking the term “sanctuary city” at the last council meeting and instead moving forward with action to pass legislation that simply enshrines these legal safeguards, which was the intent of the final council vote.
Fajardo felt “there was tremendous confusion on what we were voting on,” and is essentially re-presenting the same motion – “reconsideration of city policies regarding protection and collection of personal data, facility use and related items” – with what he believes is more concise language and direction.
He still opposes the “sanctuary city” designation. People have different interpretations of what the term sanctuary city means, said Fajardo, “and without there being a general understanding of what a word means, I would rather use clear language so that we can have more people on board for what we do for our community, than using a term that many people find to be divisive.”
Amalfitano agrees that practically the sanctuary city title is just a term and that “realistically, it comes down to the ordinances,” but that the designation “sends a clear signal to the community that you are willing to fight.”
“It sends a clear signal not just to San Fernando, but to all the people around San Fernando who come into San Fernando to do business or for leisure or for family,” continued Amalfitano. “It sends a message to the community, at the very least, that we care, we’re here, we’re going to fight for you, and we’re going to do everything that we can to protect you.”