At a special meeting last night, the Santa Ana City Council took up findings by an outside investigation that Councilman Johnathan Hernandez violated the city’s charter and its ethics code with his conduct toward city staff regarding city-sponsored cultural events.
Hernandez himself refused to address those sustained charges, and instead insisted the investigation was somehow about him being Chicano and “of Native American descent.”
He began by declaring Santa Ana was built on “stolen land” inhabited by Native Americans “until they were victims of genocide and were forcefully pushed into reservations.”
Hernandez claimed he was a victim of “systemic racism” because he is of Mexican and Indigenous descent, and that the investigating is payback for his “advocacy” for “brown, Black and Indigenous peoples.”
The thirtysomething councilman was elected in 2020 in the wake of the George Floyd riots and COVID shutdowns, and is seeking re-election next week.
After vehement back-and-forth among the six councilmembers present – Councilmember Jessie Lopez was absent – the matter was continued to the November 19 council meeting.
In July of 2023, Parks and Recreation Department staff filed a complaint to then-City Manager Kristine Ridge enumerating multiple instances of Hernandez interfering with staff city-sponsored cultural events such as the Chicano Heritage Festival, the Juneteenth celebration and Indigenous Peoples Day. Staff alleged Hernandez was confronting staff members about their “lack of cultural sensitivity.”
The matter was referred to an ad hoc committee comprised of Mayor Valerie Amezcua and Councilmembers Ben Vazquez and Phil Bacerra. To avoid perceptions of bias, the ad hoc committee brought in an independent outside investigator to look into the staff’s complaints – along with Councilman Hernandez’s charge that Amezcua had committed Brown Act violations.
The independent investigator (and the Orange County District Attorney) concluded Hernandez’s allegations against Amezcua lacked merit.
City Attorney Sonia Carvalho publicly reported the findings at the October 15 council meeting. The next day, Councilman David Penaloza publicly called for the city to take action on the findings against Hernandez. Soon after, Mayor Amezcua called a special council meeting for October 28.
As noted, Hernandez’s strategy was simple: ignore the complaint from city staff and paint the whole investigation as a manifestation of “systemic racism” against People of Color like him.
“I have been slandered and discriminated against because of my advocacy to see black people empowered, and with Indigenous People’s Day,” Hernandez.
Not much of a strategy, but as a wag once said, when the only instrument in your orchestra is the tuba, you play the tuba.
Bacerra dismissed Hernandez’ racism narrative as “fantasies” and conspiracies, and Bacerra asked Hernandez point blank whether or not he thinks he violated the city charter.
Hernandez indicated he would reply during his next round of comments, but never did.
Penaloza bore down hard, quoting scathing passages about Hernandez from the investigator’s report:
“On balance the investigator did not find Councilman Hernandez to be credible. Hernandez’s explanations in defense of the allegations were self-serving, sanctimonious, and he displayed an apparent bias against city staff.”
“To start, Hernandez would often evade the investigator’s questions and go on long tangents causing the investigator to have to re-ask the question on multiple occasions.”
“Hernandez’s continuous attempts to skirt the investigator’s questions and frame the narrative in a manner favorable to him greatly undermined his credibility.”
“This is something that we’ve been seeing for the last four years,” said Penaloza. “This isn’t about picking on somebody. This is about following process and doing the job that we were elected to do.”
“Unfortunately, we’re here because of your constant interference with administrative matters,” Penaloza continued. “Ask all the Parks and Rec staff that have told us a hostile work environment was created. That is a fact – that isn’t a political attack.”
Penaloza stated that Hernandez, in his comments, was displaying precisely the behavior described by the investigator: crafting victim-based, sanctimonious narratives to deflect and justify.
Mayor Pro Tem Thai Phan employed a novel justification for her refusal to take any action: she had not read the investigator’s report. Phan complained the special meeting was called “out of the blue” and that she’d received the redacted version of the report that evening.
In fact, the unredacted report was made available to councilmembers three weeks earlier, on October 7.
According to sources, it takes less than an hour to read the report. But Phan – a contract city attorney by profession – was unable to find time during the preceding three weeks to review the findings of a high-profile investigation of two of her council colleagues.
Phan’s excuse did not go over well with Councilman Bacerra.
“For anybody up here to say they need more time to read it,” said Bacerra, “the city council who is deliberating on this item has had this available for review for weeks. Weeks.”
“Sadly, ethics and holding each other accountable is such a low priority for some folks that they couldn’t even be bothered to go read it,” and
“It’s not an EIR, for crying out loud,” said an exasperated Bacerra. “This is a pretty small report.”
“This is not a brown, Black issue,” said Mayor Amezcua. “This is about what happened in that investigation.”
“But because [Hernandez and his allies] don’t like the outcome of this investigation, that’s the bottom line here. So you have to point fingers at other people,” said Amezcua.
