Los Angeles voters in City Council District 6 – once represented by former Council President Nury Martinez, until she resigned last October for her role in a racist conversation that was secretly recorded and leaked to the public – will soon decide who represents them next.
Vote-by-mail ballots for the April 4 special election to fill the seat vacated by Martinez will begin going out to voters on Monday, March 6.
District 6 includes the San Fernando Valley communities of Arleta, Lake Balboa, North Hills, North Hollywood, Panorama City, Sun Valley and Van Nuys.
Seven candidates will appear on the ballot in this order:
– Isaac Kim, a small business owner.
– Imelda Padilla, a community engagement manager who previously worked as a community organizer and a field deputy for the city of L.A.
– Rose Grigoryan, a social activist and journalist who’s worked for Armenian television stations.
– Marisa Alcaraz, the environmental policy director and deputy chief of staff to L.A. City Councilmember Curren Price.
– Antoinette Scully, an activist and community organizer who’s worked with the NoHo Home Alliance.
– Douglas Sierra, a business consultant who’s worked as a nonprofit leader at A Place Called Home.
– Marco Santana, the director of engagement for LA Family Housing. He previously worked as a staffer for U.S. Rep. Tony Cárdenas and state Sen. Bob Hertzberg.
If no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote in April, the top two vote-getters will advance to a runoff election in June. The winner will finish out what was Nury Martinez’s term in office, which expires in December 2024.
Martinez made history in December 2019, becoming the first Latina L.A. City Council president.
But last October, she resigned in disgrace following a leaked audio, recorded a year earlier, of her making racist and demeaning comments about Blacks and other groups. The comments were made during a backroom conversation with two other current or former councilmembers and a former labor leader who discussed how to potentially rig a process for redrawing city council district boundaries.