After protests demanding the resignation of the three City Council members involved in the racism scandal at City Hall led to Friday’s meeting being canceled, Acting Council President Mitch O’Farrell announced today that the council meetings next Tuesday and Wednesday, Oct. 18 and 19, will take place virtually due to a COVID-19 exposure in the chamber.
Councilman Mike Bonin tested positive for COVID-19 this week and was present at Tuesday’s meeting. A news release from O’Farrell’s office did not mention the controversy over the leaked tapes or the fact that all three meetings this week were either delayed, adjourned or canceled due to the protests.
Nury Martinez resigned her council seat this week, but councilmen Kevin de León and Gil Cedillo — the other two council members on the tape — have yet to resign. Protests were expected again in the Council Chamber again next Tuesday if de León and Cedillo did not resign by then.
O’Farrell, in a statement, said it is “possible, if not likely, that there will be more positive cases.”
“With the possibility that there will be more positive cases, out of an abundance of caution, we will hold both Tuesday and Wednesday’s meetings virtually, as we did for over a year during the height of the pandemic,” O’Farrell said. “I urge everyone who was in Council Chambers this week to get tested beginning Sunday, and continue testing.”
Public comment will be taken remotely. The agenda on Tuesday includes several major items, including the election of a new Council president following Martinez’s resignation.