The April 4 election is what’s called a “special election” — it’s an election held outside the usual two-year schedule due to a unique circumstance. In this case, it’s to fill an empty City Council seat for L.A.’s Council District 6.
Last fall, an anonymous source leaked a secret recording of a private conversation capturing racist and homophobic exchanges between three city councilmembers and the president of the L.A. County Federation of Labor. One of those councilmembers was Nury Martinez, who represented District 6 and also served as city council president. Martinez resigned a few days later under intense public pressure. Since then, District 6 has had a temporary caretaker with non-voting powers.
Voters will choose a new councilmember to officially replace Martinez for the remainder of her term, which ends in 2024. Under L.A. election laws, any candidate who wins more than 50% of the vote can win this race outright, but with seven candidates on the ballot and three write-in candidates, those chances are slim. If no candidate gets a majority of the votes, there will be a runoff election in June.
Council District 6 in the San Fernando Valley stretches from Sun Valley on the eastern edge of San Fernando Valley to Lake Balboa, west of the 405. It includes Arleta, Panorama City, Van Nuys, Sun Valley, Lake Balboa, and parts of North Hollywood and North Hills. Input your address here to find out whether you live in this district.
Like previous elections, all registered voters will get a ballot in the mail. They should start arriving on or around March 6. If you live in the district and don’t get a ballot in the mail within a week or two of this date, double check your voter registration or get in touch with the L.A. County Registrar’s office.
Those who follow city government closely say Los Angeles’ City Council is the most powerful City Council in the U.S. At just 15 members, each member represents about 260,000 residents.
How does that stack up against other big cities? Well, the two other biggest cities in the nation — New York and Chicago — have 51 and 50 city council members, respectively.
Back in 1925, when the city made the switch from at-large representation to districts, each council member represented fewer than 39,000 people. Some observers of L.A. politics, including the Los Angeles Times editorial board, argue it’s time to expand the council. But for right now, we’re talking about 15 council seats — and only one is up for election.
With so much power in relatively few hands, the relationship the mayor has with the council is particularly important. The mayor needs the council's support to enact policy. Think of the council as L.A.'s legislature. The council:
You can read more about the City Council’s powers here, and read short bios of the other 14 councilmembers.
Councilmembers also do district-specific work. They can focus on specific priorities within their district via a discretionary budget — that is, money that is not earmarked for any specific purpose.
For instance, former Councilmember Martinez used discretionary funds to pay for two full-time employees and two trucks to pick up bulky items from curbs and handle illegal dumping across District 6, rather than rely solely on city departments, which often have large service backlogs. Councilmembers can also use these funds to offer overtime pay for city departments to increase their services for a period of time.
Members also have tremendous influence over real estate development and land use in their districts, including temporary shelters and affordable housing. Since developers need councilmembers’ approval before projects can move forward, the members can negotiate over the details of those projects and even offer to advocate for tax breaks or zoning exemptions.
The new councilmember for District 6 will join the council in a time of major change. Nearly half the councilmembers are new members, having won their elections in 2022. Six are women, the most the council has ever had. And this council is poised to be the most ideologically diverse in history, with three progressive members.
In a February survey and follow-up listening session, we asked District 6 residents to describe their top concerns about their neighborhoods. Here are some of the issues they brought up:
City services: Everyday street-level problems like potholes, bulky items left on streets, gopher holes in parks, broken street lamps, and crumbling sidewalks don’t get prompt attention from city departments, residents say. When these problems are left unaddressed for weeks or months, they build up and become even more expensive to fix — but a city councilmember can exert influence over city departments to give them more attention.
Homelessness: More than 3,200 people are unhoused in District 6, according to the most recent L.A. Homeless Count — more than any other city council district in the San Fernando Valley. Roughly half of them are unsheltered. Many people who are unhoused live in RVs, which can be fined or towed if they pose traffic or public health hazards or if they’re parked overnight on residential streets. There is a particularly high concentration of RVs parked along the 405 Freeway.
Pollution: Air pollution from landfills, industrial plants and truck traffic on freeways has long been a problem for District 6 residents. The Van Nuys Airport has also generated complaints over exhaust fumes and jet noise from private plane traffic.
Other issues the next councilmember will have to address:
Seven candidates are in the ballot. None of them have ever held elected office before. Three candidates — Marisa Alcaraz, Imelda Padilla, and Marco Santana — have backgrounds working for local elected officials, while the remaining four — Rose Grigoryan, Isaac Kim, Antoinette Scully and Douglas Sierra — have never worked in government.
In candidate forums, interviews and public statements, most or all of the candidates supported building more housing and temporary shelters to address homelessness, adding new bike lanes in the district, and implementing the city’s Mobility Plan 2035 to install new bike, bus and pedestrian safety improvements. Nearly all the candidates also support expanding the L.A. City Council and the creation of an independent redistricting commission.
Notably, they differ when it comes to L.A.’s anti-camping ordinance, which prohibits unhoused people from camping on public property near schools, daycares, libraries, parks, and other areas. Alcaraz and Padilla support it as an enforcement tool, while Kim, Santana and Scully have characterized it as inhumane or ineffective. Sierra has said he would amend the ordinance to be more consistent across the city.
And while most of the candidates support diverting mental health calls away from L.A. police officers, only one candidate, Antoinette Scully, has openly called for decreasing the number of police.
Here are more details on the candidates’ backgrounds and stances on specific issues, sourced from their campaign websites, public statements, local news coverage and candidate forums. Some forums have been recorded, and you can watch them in full via the links at the bottom of this page.
Environmental Policy Director
Website: marisaforla.com
Endorsements: List of endorsements (campaign website)
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions and independent expenditures
Marisa Alcaraz is currently the environmental policy director and deputy chief of staff to City Councilmember Curren Price, and has worked in Price’s office since 2013. Prior to joining Price, Alcaraz developed policy on business, economic development, art/culture, health, and poverty for Richard Alarcón when he served on the city council from 2009-13.
Alcaraz points to her many years of experience in L.A. city government as something that differentiates her. According to her campaign website, Alcaraz spearheaded L.A.’s guaranteed basic income program, brought a homelessness prevention to the city, secured millions of dollars in funding to repair and upgrade parks, and worked on initiatives to raise the minimum wage, create the city’s first green alley network and provide more healthy food options to neighborhoods.
On homelessness: To bring more unhoused people into shelters and housing, Alcaraz says we need more outreach workers and multidisciplinary teams that include health care workers and they need to be paid fair wages. She points to her experience bringing the homelessness prevention program, Solid Ground, to L.A., and says she would double down on similar prevention efforts. Alcaraz supports CARE Courts, Gov. Newsom’s plan to refer people with severe mental illness to a court-ordered two- care plan, which could be followed by hospitalization or conservatorship if the care plan fails.
If elected, she says she would create a “by-right” program for L.A., in which developers who want to build certain types of housing — like affordable housing, permanent supportive housing or housing for specific workforces — could bypass certain parts of the public approval process to get their project fast-tracked.
Alcaraz supports L.A.’s anti-camping ordinance, saying that as a mother, she doesn’t think encampments should be near places like schools or daycares. However, she says the ordinance should only be used as a last resort, and that outreach and street engagement should come first. “It’s a tool in a toolbox, it’s not the first thing you use,” she said at a Feb. 15 forum.
On illegal dumping: Alcaraz says the city needs to address a staffing shortage in the L.A. sanitation department. She also supports programs like L.A.’s Clean & Green partnership with the L.A. Conservation Corps, which hires youth to work in L.A. sanitation. She says she would advocate for a pipeline to get those youth into city sanitation jobs down the line.
On law enforcement and public safety: Alcaraz supports hiring more officers for the LAPD, and says we need to find ways to retain the officers we have. She also supports investing in “alternative models of policing,” citing two city programs, CIRCLE and SMART, which allow trained outreach or mental health professionals to respond to non-violent and mental health specific calls instead of law enforcement. Alcaraz also wants to expand the LAPD’s community policing program, known as Community Safety Partnerships.
On pollution and the Van Nuys Airport: Alcaraz supports expanding the Quieter Nights Program, which calls for the decrease of flights at night, and transitioning the airport to solar panels and cleaner fuel. She says Los Angeles World Airports, the authority that operates the Van Nuys airport, needs to conduct community engagement roundtables with residents in Van Nuys in the same way it’s done with residents near LAX to find out what they need.
More resources:
Social Activist/Journalist
Website: rose4la.com
Endorsements: None listed on campaign website
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions
Rose Grigoryan says on her campaign website that she immigrated to the U.S. in 2012. She worked at US Armenia, a local TV station, and then for more than seven years at ARTN-Shant, a national Armenian TV network. “Meanwhile I established a marketing company that began to thrive,” she says. “Being able to support myself, I started to spend at least half of my day on educating my community on important issues,” including about assistance programs available during the pandemic.”
Although Grigoryan didn't participate in any of the February candidate forums, she did appear in one on March 1, where she addressed her thoughts on homelessness and policing. She also conducted an interview with radio station KPFK in Dec. 2022 outlining some of her priorities, which include homelessness and drug-free schools.
On homelessness: Grigoryan said on KPFK it’s “inhumane” to leave unhoused people on the street. She said she would work to create transitional units for the unhoused while working on building permanent ones. She said she would fight for the city of L.A. to have its own health department and contract with the county, rather than relying on the county health department, in order to get health services to unhoused people who need it. Grigoryan also said developers must add affordable units to their projects, though she didn't offer details about how she would try to make that happen.
She says she would maintain and enforce L.A.’s anti-camping law in order. “Libraries, schools, daycares are sensitive places, and we need to keep them clean, safe and accessible for everybody,” she said at a March 1 forum. But she also said unsheltered people must “feel cared for” and have adequate services available to them.
On law enforcement and public safety: Grigoryan says police should have “all the resources” they need to keep communities safe, including training and educational programs to teach them how to deal with community members with mental illnesses.
On drug-free schools: Highlighting cases of students overdosing on pills potentially laced with fentanyl, as well as the hospitalization of several students at Van Nuys Middle School in December for suspected overdoses, Grigoryan said she would work to create “drug abuse resistance education” programs for students from kindergarten through high school. The programs would be led by addiction prevention specialists.
Grigoryan also said in the KPFK interview that she wants more accessible and affordable public transit in District 6, including more bus stops, and that she also supports help for immigrants and seniors facing food insecurity.
Small Business Owner
Website: isaacforthevalley.com
Endorsements: None listed on campaign website
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions
Issac Kim is a Van Nuys resident who runs an online men’s grooming and skin care business, a job he’s had for the past five years. He previously worked in operations and forecasting for a number of other companies, and has no prior experience in government.
Among Kim’s top priorities are focusing on city services, which he describes on his website as “getting the small things done right and on time,” and promoting transparency with the public. One of the ways Kim seeks to rebuild trust with the community in the wake of the City Hall recording scandal is to have weekly virtual meetings where constituents can speak directly with him. He also wants the city to stop data sharing with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and expand voting rights for noncitizens. “I thought I was a moderate Democrat, but when I reflect on it issue by issue it turns out I’m positioned as progressive, and to be fair, that sort of comes as a surprise to me,” he said in an interview.
On homelessness: Kim supports turning abandoned buildings into interim or public housing, and points to the city controller’s recent report identifying 26 city-owned buildings that could be turned into facilities or services for unhoused people. He also “applauds” the City Council’s recent expansion of tenants’ protections and L.A. County’s extension of the eviction moratorium, though he says at some point these measures will have to be phased out. Kim said in at least two forums that he would repeal, replace or revise L.A.’s anti-camping ordinance, because it’s “what Jesus would do.” On Twitter, he has called for repealing the ordinance.
On city services and illegal dumping: Kim wants stronger punishments for those caught for illegal dumping. He also says one of his priorities is to be more responsive with city services, from bulky item pickup to tree trimming, though he hasn’t gone into detail about how to improve the city’s responsiveness.
On law enforcement and public safety: In an interview, Kim said he is “not in favor of expanding or retracting” LAPD’s budget. However, in a Feb. 18 forum he said he would support “reviewing and reinvesting” part of LAPD’s budget toward mental health professionals for outreach to unhoused communities.
On pollution and the Van Nuys Airport: On his campaign website, Kim says he wants to “hold the corporations that dump pollution into our communities accountable.” He also says he supports stricter regulations on Van Nuys Airport, though he hasn’t provided details, and advocates keeping the Whiteman and Santa Monica Airports open so that plane congestion doesn’t pile up at Van Nuys Airport. (The Santa Monica Airport is due to close in 2028.)
More resources:
Community Relations Manager
Website: imeldapadilla.com
Endorsements: List of endorsements (campaign website)
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions
Imelda Padilla, a lifelong Sun Valley resident, describes herself as a community organizer whose work history includes jobs with L.A. city, L.A. County and a number of nonprofit organizations. She’s worked in community engagement with the L.A. County’s Women and Girls Initiative, the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy and environmental justice organization Pacoima Beautiful, where former District 6 councilmember Nury Martinez used to serve as executive director. (Padilla’s sister is Pacoima Beautiful’s current executive director.) She also spent over a year as a field deputy for Martinez’s council office. In 2016, Padilla unsuccessfully ran for a seat on the L.A. Unified School District board. She is president of the L.A. Valley College Foundation board.
Padilla says the combination of her experience in city and county government, as well as her work “in the trenches” with District 6 communities, makes her well positioned for the council seat.
On homelessness: Along with calling for more action to house the unsheltered, Padilla says on her website she would “address the unintended consequences of municipal code 85.02 [which regulates where people can live in their vehicles], which pushed RVs into our industrial corridors, causing a lack of parking for business owners, customers and workers.”
She has been critical of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA). Padilla calls for an audit of the agency, and suggests that rather than reallocating LAPD funding for mental health professionals to do outreach to unhoused people, the money could be redirected from LAHSA instead.
She also supports L.A.’s anti-camping ordinance, while saying the city is forced to utilize it because of lack of accountability from LAHSA. “If people felt like agencies in charge of homelessness were doing their jobs, people wouldn’t call LAPD,” she said at a Feb. 8 forum.
On city services and illegal dumping: Padilla said during a Feb. 18 forum that the district needs to be more aggressive in reducing illegal dumping, especially by construction companies. She says when she was a field deputy in Panorama City, she brought together apartment managers to create a neighborhood watch and learn how to report bulky items on the street to be taken away.
Padilla told LAist that for immediate concerns like potholes and trash, she would work to find funding to repave roads, and use discretionary funds for sanitation trucks dedicated to District 6 to make bulky item pickup more efficient. She said when it comes to streetlight repair, she would work to address "rising theft of copper wire in the streetlight poles," which has been causing a backlog. Overall, however, Padilla said she wants to increase the power of constituents by creating a community-based council and business council that can notify the city council office when the city is not being quick enough to respond to service requests.
On law enforcement and public safety: Padilla supports increasing the number of LAPD officers but says they should focus on violent crimes and human trafficking cases and not on mental health calls, truancy or noise complaints. She also said at a March 1 forum that the best way to keep people safe is to “invest in young people” through after school programming, anti-drug education, employment opportunities and more.
On pollution and the Van Nuys Airport: Padilla says she would bring different stakeholders around the airport together to figure out how to balance the economic benefits of the airport with its environmental effects and make sure everyone feels heard. She also supports measures like residential soundproofing programs that the Los Angeles World Airports has for communities near LAX.
More resources:
Director, Housing Nonprofit
Website: marcoforla.com
Endorsements: List of endorsements (campaign website)
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions
Marco Santana is director of engagement at LA Family Housing, a nonprofit that provides housing and supportive services to unhoused people. He has been vice president of the San Fernando Valley Young Democrats and Controller for the San Fernando Valley Democratic Party, and served as a local staffer for U.S. Rep. Tony Cárdenas and State Sen. Bob Hertzberg. Santana is a board member for the Mid-Valley YMCA and ICON CDC, a nonprofit that helps with small business development.
He says what differentiates him from the other candidates is that his work — through jobs he’s held and boards he sits on — has all been focused on District 6. “My history shows that, uniquely, I’ve continued to give back to the people here,” he said at a Feb. 18 forum.
On homelessness: Santana’s campaign website has a detailed list of policy prescriptions to address homelessness, including pushing for homelessness to be treated as a regional issue, rather than one siloed by council districts, and exploring the creation of a city-run public health department to better respond to mental health needs.
Santana said we “need to empower agencies like LAHSA to do better instead of pulling them apart, because that’s what the city and county government have done. They just point the finger.” He has also suggested looking into the appointment of a homelessness czar.
To create more housing, Santana says we need to push for adaptive reuse — using existing buildings and repurposing them for housing and services — and find ways to cut red tape for approving new affordable housing development. He proposes waiving site plan review, an additional review and approval process for buildings that have more than 50 units.
He does not support L.A.’s anti-camping law, calling it a Band-Aid solution that doesn’t tackle the root issue of homelessness.
On city services and illegal dumping: Santana told LAist he would assign staff to communities across the district to follow up with city departments on service requests and identify "areas of need" that have issues that haven't been reported. He also says the city needs to better educate residents on using services like My311, L.A.’s service request portal.
On law enforcement and public safety: Santana supports reallocating LAPD funding for mental health professionals to do outreach for unhoused communities. He supports L.A.’s CIRCLE program, which diverts nonviolent 911 calls to unarmed mental health professionals rather than police.
On pollution and the Van Nuys Airport: Santana calls for finding ways to make the airport more energy efficient, including solar panels, electrifying vehicles and securing cleaner burning fuel for planes. He also wants to analyze the potential environmental impact of proposals like prohibiting extremely short-haul flights to and from Van Nuys Airport. He says it’s important to include community input when discussing the airport especially because it produces quality jobs that particularly benefit low-income communities of color.
More resources:
Community Organizer/Mother
Website: antoinetteforla.com
Endorsements: List of endorsements (campaign website)
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions
Scully’s background is in racial justice consulting work and advocacy for environmental and disability justice. She is a national organizer for the Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation. She is the founder of the Black & Bookish literary collective and the Valley Justice Collective, and is co-founder of More Than Sex-Ed, a sexual health education nonprofit for tweens, teens, and families. Scully created a satellite location of the Homelessness Resource Drop-In Center Program in Studio City with the NoHo Home Alliance, and previously worked as a field case worker and housing coordinator for unhoused people. She lives on the border of Van Nuys and Lake Balboa.
Scully says her emphasis on inclusivity in her work separates her from the other candidates. “The work that I do is to center the people who need it the most so we all get what we need,” she said at a Feb. 18 forum.
On homelessness: Scully says there aren’t enough services being offered to unhoused people, such as a place to receive mail for IDs, access to public food benefits, and showers. She points to her work creating a drop-in center for unhoused people in Studio City, saying similar sites can be set up with council discretionary funding, volunteers and nonprofit support to offer services for a few hours a day without having to wait for shelters or housing to be completed. Scully says the city needs to provide longer-term funding for these types of services.
Scully says she would introduce legislation for rent stabilization across all of L.A, regardless of a building’s age (the city’s current rent stabilization ordinance only applies to buildings built before 1978).
She wants to repeal L.A.’s anti-camping ordinance, saying homelessness is not a criminal justice issue.
On city services and illegal dumping: Scully told LAist she would want to "move money from the bloated LAPD budget" to hire more staff for city services and purchase any needed equipment. She also said there is "likely room to improve communication and accountability networks within and between departments." At the Feb. 18 forum she also said that reallocating funding to address issues like homelessness can also reduce illegal dumping.
On law enforcement and public safety: At a Feb. 15 forum, Scully said she backs reducing the size of the LAPD, arguing that would reduce police violence against communities of color. Reforms like implicit bias training and hiring more officers of color don’t work, she said — what works is reallocating funding toward providing services to people and solving the issues behind crimes.
On pollution and the Van Nuys Airport: She says the district “has long been used as a sacrifice zone (a part of town ignored because of who lives there) for pollution.” She calls for ways to decrease and cap the Sun Valley Landfill.
For those living near the Van Nuys Airport and along the flight path, she supports retrofits for residences like window reinforcements so people aren’t breathing polluted air inside. She opposes redirecting flights from the Santa Monica and Whiteman airports toward Van Nuys, particularly with the closure of the Santa Monica Airport. “We should be pushing to make sure there are equitable solutions so people who are earning the most money, the one percenters, aren’t raining down pollution on residents,” she said at the Feb. 15 forum.
More resources:
Father/Business Consultant
Website: votedouglas.com
Endorsements: See endorsements on his campaign website
Campaign finance: See a list of campaign contributions
Douglas Sierra said in an interview that in recent years he was a consultant at Deloitte Consulting, a business analyst at the nonprofit Child Care Resource Center, and educational services coordinator/facilities coordinator for the nonprofit A Place Called Home.
He highlights his business acumen, saying that he has experience with financial prudence and cutting inefficiencies. He also says his status as a candidate without any political experience is an asset, calling L.A. a “modern day Tammany Hall.”
On homelessness: Sierra says city government is not very good at spending the money allocated for tackling homelessness and that a lot of it is wasted on consultants. He supports legislation that would make it easier for sites like churches to build housing on their land and expedite the permitting process. He also says the city needs to be held accountable for failing to apply for federal funds to address homelessness.
Sierra says he would amend L.A.’s anti-camping ordinance, which has been “abused.” “District 6 suffers because the surrounding districts put the problems to our district,” he said at a Feb. 8 forum, saying he would support amending the ordinance for more consistency across L.A. He said in an interview he would only enforce the ordinance if housing were being offered first.
When it comes to law enforcement and unhoused communities more generally, Sierra said we “cannot have a repeat of Echo Park,” referring to the mass clearing of encampments there in 2021.
On city services and illegal dumping: Sierra said he’s “tired of CD-6 getting the short end of the stick” compared with other parts of L.A. when it comes to getting prompt city responses to dumping and bulky item pickups. Though he praised the 311 service request portal, he said there should be accountable metrics. Sierra wants to see statistics on how long it takes for trash to be picked up when a request is made, and whether those pickup times are different in District 6 communities compared with other parts of the Valley.
He also told LAist that within his first 60 days in office he would use discretionary funds to create a 24/7 cleanup task force "so that residents see the immediate impact of my policies but more so set the culture of encouraging residents to keep their [neighborhoods] safe and clean."
On law enforcement and public safety: Sierra said he does not believe in cutting LAPD funding but wants to audit the department to make sure its current spending is justified. He also said he is not in favor of decreasing the number of officers. “In Sun Valley, where I grew up, historically a bad neighborhood, when you hear the police sirens you know the cavalry is coming. They are welcome,” he said in an interview.
On pollution and the Van Nuys Airport: Sierra has not made any public statements about either of these issues (he was not present at the forum where other candidates addressed their stances on Van Nuys Airport).
More resources:
If you do not want to vote for any of the candidates listed on your ballot, you can vote for a write-in candidate instead. But in California, candidates have to file paperwork and qualify to be write-in candidates, and your vote will only count if you write in the name of someone who has qualified.
Here’s the list of qualified write-in candidates for the Council District 6 race:
The Valley Alliance of Neighborhood Councils hosted a mini-forum with Minasova, Serrano and Thum on Feb. 18, which you can watch here.
Three candidate forums were available to watch online as of early March. Here’s where you can watch them in full. We’ve also included a list of specific questions asked and their corresponding time markers.
February 2, 2023 forum hosted by Streets For All
Feb. 15, 2023 forum hosted by Black Los Angeles Young Democrats, Democratic Party of San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles County Young Democrats and San Fernando Valley Young Democrats
Feb. 18, 2023 forum hosted by the Valley Alliance of Neighborhood Councils
March 1, 2023 forum hosted by L.A. New Liberals
