LOS ANGELES, CA — Some people are asking “Are we really throwing Los Angeles city councilmember Gil Cedillo under the bus by calling for his resignation after the leaked phone recording of racist comments in a meeting at the offices of the California Federation of Labor? Even after he was terribly defeated in the June elections and will be out in December, does he deserve to be put through this anyway?”
I would like to discuss my recollection of the Cedillo slide into oblivion.
Just a few days before the last June election, Cedillo was spearheading one of the most cruel city ordinances ever voted for by city elected officials. 41:18 is a new law against the homeless tent dwellers that the police use to destroy their belongings, impound their cars in which they may live, and leave them in the cold with their dogs and no food.
On the day the council voted almost unanimously for 41:18 we were outside City Hall listening to Gil Cedillo inside laughing at us and acting like a bully as he mocked the homeless advocates, calling us “scorched earth activists”. How did this guy go from protecting the undocumented drivers to sending brutal police to take homeless people’s belongings, including their cars?
A few weeks later Cedillo was voted out by his constituents, and today he seems to have taken a deeper turn into oblivion by supporting the mayoral campaign of a Republican billionaire who claims the Republicans changed on him and he is now a Democrat. Cedillo has suffered a terrible election loss and is hoping he can have a job working with the rich mayor if he wins. This is sad.
The whole Council looked the other way under a Nury Martinez presidency. Police abuses against Black Lives Matter-LA [BLMLA] were ignored, as well as the whole issue of police killings. Since then, we have learned that Cedillo, Nury Martinez and Monica Rodriquez have received the most police monies on record.
The influence of police money and the inability of Cedillo and Nury Maritnez to act against police brutality is stunning! I was traumatized by this reality. After learning of the police culture of anti-gay and racist bigotry coming from her mouth in the released secret recording, and after hearing rumors that she may be married to a cop, we can understand why they ignored the torture and SWAT teams used against Professor Melina Abdullah and Bubba Akili of BLMLA. This reality is traumatic.
During this period of weekly BLMLA protests at the Police Commission and at the DA’s offices, and even before the trial of Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd, we began to learn how the Latino councilmembers and local congresspersons like Jimmy Gomez had accepted large amounts of Police Association (LAPPL) money (not to mention from prison guard unions), and we begin to understand why the whole City Council under the leadership of President Nury Martinez decided to ignore the protests, ignore the abuses at Police Commission meetings, and not even make any statements to support the families who were crying out for accountability. This police money issue remains to be studied and audited.
I, Johnavalos, would take a bus downtown and see the amazing highrises for the rich going up and becoming more and more infuriated. I still live in a garage waiting for affordable housing. My affordability is not the same as what the Council calls affordable.
My personal visits to Cedillo’s HLP [Housing, Land and Property] field office made me concerned. The police were harassing me just for sitting on the benches at the giant war memorial flag on the corner of N. Figueroa and York. It’s funny how today those benches at the memorial plaque have been removed and I cannot sit anymore. I would love sitting there and reflecting on the plaque which was a list of the soldiers killed in Viet Nam from Northeast Los Angeles. Most of them are Chicanos. It sure feels as if the Chicano contribution and experience is being ignored and covered up.
Cedillo did not build housing for us, his people, although our family members fought and died in the wars. My uncles died in WWII and six of my siblings joined the service. Wow. No place to live in Highland Park, a barrio back in the 60s. Alas, Cedillo and Jose Huizar somehow must have lost all that housing money we voted for 6 years ago or used it to please the developers who wanted highrises for the rich downtown in preparation for the Olympics.
A few years back while I was still teaching and working as a lecturer at UC Riverside, I began to wonder if I would be able to find a place to live as a single disabled elder with a dog and medical marijuana needs. I did not know where to start. I have yet to find housing as a senior in these council districts of Cedillo and DeLeon. I even tried calling DeLeon’s field office and spoke with his highly paid staff director to ask for help. All she could suggest is that I move into their Tiny Home Village that recently opened up near the freeway in Eagle Rock. No way.
Gil Cedillo failed us after we voted in Proposition HHH [which raised 1.2 billion dollars in bonds for permanent supportive housing for homeless people] a few years back. So many promises. A failed housing system has occurred while he has held the chair position and Nury Martinez as President was not about to hold him accountable for the homeless crisis.
I have become convinced that Cedillo, Jose Huizar, and their developer friends have decided not to build senior and affordable housing in their own council districts. The housing website is forced to send the Chicanos to North Hollywood or to the Taylor yards along the Industrial site of railroads and MetroLink commuter trains. We are truly pushed out and gentrified out of our home and our liberty.
The tiny home village next to the Pasadena 110/Arroyo Seco Freeway. It
is in former Councilmember Cedillo’s district.
Photo by Johnavalos Rios
