Tom Daly is a threat to Latinos in the 69th Assembly District

O.C. Clerk-Recorder Tom Daly held a fundraiser last night, at Original Mike’s in Santa Ana, although he is still being coy as to whether or not he will actually run for the 69th Assembly District, which has a distinctly Latino voter base.

Daly trotted out Santa Ana bookstore owner Rueben Martinez, who told the few people that were there that “Daly was good to Latinos when he was mayor of Anaheim, appointing many to prominent commissions,” according to the Voice of OC .

That is actually not true.  Martinez is either lying or misinformed.

The last time Daly was talking about running for another office, his former colleague on the Anaheim City Council, Richard Chavez, ripped him for being anti-Latino.  Here are Chavez’ comments, which I found over at the Orange Juice blog:

I as a former firefighter and Councilmember in Anaheim will never endorse Tom Daly.

When I was the President of the Anaheim Firefighters Union, I had one conversation with Mayor Daly. In that conversation he told me that the homeless population living in motels should “be moved to Riverside somewhere.”

He refused to talk about issues regarding the firefighters. At the time we had a lack of vital safety equipment in the fire stations, which led to the death of a young firefighter; Daly refused to even return my calls to discuss fixing the problem, or discuss any issues actually. Entry level firefighters were making $10.27 an hour, it took 4 years to resolve our contract under Daly, and it was settled only after an arbitrator ruled in our favor.

Daly voted to close Anaheim’s only shelter for abuse children (Eli Home). The Anaheim Firefighters helped build the shelter. While the shelter had not had a single code violation, Daly sided with a small group that indicated the shelter “should be in Santa Ana”. The decision was heart breaking; the children and their mothers had no place to go, except perhaps back to the violence they had tried to escape. The Federal Government stepped in and overruled Daly’s decision, Anaheim was violating the rights of those children. The shelter is still open today – and saving children’s lives.

Daly had made a priority out of privatizing city jobs. Under Daly’s leadership, more good paying jobs were outsourced than ever in the history of Anaheim (read the council minutes of Jan. 5, 1993).

Daly supported bringing Walmart to Anaheim, and opposed a Latino oriented grocery story, Gigante. He had openly tried to get Gigante to open somewhere other than Anaheim, and then found a way to abstain from voting on the issue.

On the issue of diversity, Daly’s history in Anaheim was abysmal. When I was elected I was appalled by the fact that under Daly only about six people of color had been appointed to Anaheim boards and commissions; of 250 plus positions!

Worse yet, under Daly the Anaheim Police Department conducted covert investigations of Latino Community Leaders, including Amin David. Daly could have put a stop to it early; but didn’t. Again, the Federal Government found that Anaheim under Tom Daly was violating the rights of its citizens. The Federal Lawsuit was settled while I was in office.

Tom Daly was a key witness for Anaheim in trying to save the Anaheim Angels team name; he negotiated the contract that allowed the name to be changed. When asked in court (I was there) about the intent of the contract language regarding the Anaheim name, he could not physically articulate an answer. He just stammered, and stuttered. He was Anaheim’s worse witness; it was embarrassing. The case was over at that point, and L.A. is still the name of the team that plays in Anaheim.

The wreckage caused by Tom Daly is far greater than what I post here. The unfortunate truth is that most of the damage and pain caused was to those that needed him the most.

Endorsing someone simply because of politics or a title, is simply wrong.

O.C. Register columnist Steven Greenhut ripped Daly too, in the Orange Punch blog: “Daly was an enemy of property rights as he tried to use the city’s power to shut down old motels (and throw out people who were one step away from homelessness).”

As Chavez noted, Daly opposed the opening of a new Gigante Supermarket in Anaheim – and he abstained when it came time to vote to approve their liquor license.  Here is how the L.A. Times reported this:

Gigante’s chairman, who flew to Anaheim from Mexico City, charged city officials with violating international trade agreements and of slighting a well-respected company just because it’s based in Mexico.

“You know and I know that this is not about liquor licenses,” said Angel Losada, chairman of the billion-dollar, Mexico-based supermarket chain’s parent company, Grupo Gigante.

Another L.A. Times article explained exactly how Daly’s administration in Anaheim opposed Gigante’s opening in Anaheim:

Gigante USA has three stores in Southern California. But in its attempts to expand into Orange County, the business met resistance from Anaheim’s Redevelopment Agency, which found Gigante to be too Latino for Anaheim Plaza, an outdoor mall north of Disneyland. The chain had also been waved away from another location by Mayor Tom Daly, who wanted a store with a greater tax base.

Another stumbling block came in June when the Planning Commission unanimously rejected a liquor license application.

Gigante filed an appeal and mounted a public relations campaign that attracted national media attention. Community activists considered the city’s actions “market racial profiling” and a throwback to days when landlords turned down tenants based on ethnicity.

And, check out what Daly’s police department did to Latino activists in Anaheim:

And many Latino leaders complained to the City Council last year after discovering that the Anaheim police chief had compiled a 36-page report documenting activities of community members, and creating a “family tree” that detailed interconnected relationships among the activists.

According to the new “Trouble with Tom” blog, O.C. Register columnist Steve Greenhut called Tom’s behavior “distasteful” and rightly asks if “OC Latino voters remember this episode?”

Apparently Rueben Martinez doesn’t.  But we do!  Daly is a threat to Orange County’s Latinos, period.

Latino voters have a choice however.  They need to disregard Rueben Martinez’ bad advice and consider the Latino candidates for the 69th Assembly District, Michele Martinez and Julio Perez.  While I am supporting Michele Martinez, I would rather see folks vote for Perez than Daly, it they have an issue with Martinez.