Anaheim Observer Civic affairs in OC's largest city.

A militant hotel workers union hopes to place on the November 2024 ballot an initiative to impose a $25 an hour minimum wage on Anaheim hotels and event centers – while exempting hotels and event centers from that and other burdensome mandates if they agree to unionize. On August 29, UNITE-HERE Local 11 filed paperwork with the Anaheim City Clerk ...

On Monday, the Anaheim Planning Commission voted unanimously to approve the ocV!BE project – an ambitious, 95-acre sports/entertainment/dining/residential/office mixed development project proposed by Henry and Susan Samueli that will transform the space surrounding the Honda Center. The Samueli’s own the Anaheim Ducks hockey team and Anaheim Arena Management, the entity that manages the city-owned Honda Center arena.  The Samueli’s purchased ...

In an article on Monday about city council and school board races in Orange County, the Voice of OC quoted Fullerton College political science professor Jodi Balma: “Balma also noted there’s an organized effort to elect conservatives to local school boards, but no similar effort on the left.” Really? If so, that effort has overlooked the board of education for ...

Angels Baseball announced today that owner Arte Moreno is exploring selling the team, which he has owned for 20 years. The announcement was posted earlier today on the Angels Twitter account: The announcement comes on the heels of the implosion of the agreement with the city by Moreno-led SRB Management to buy the stadium site for $320 million and commit ...

One of the claims made by proponents of district elections used to make is they would spur greater political competition and encourage more residents to run for council. So far, there are barely enough candidates in each of Anaheim’s council districts to hold an election. In Districts 2 and 3, only two candidates qualified in each district. The filing deadline ...

Anaheim mayoral candidate Lorri Galloway has come out against Councilman Jose F. Moreno’s plan for a 2% gate tax on large entertainment, sports and recreation venues, which Moreno is asking the city council to place on the November 2022 ballot. “I am opposed to requiring a gate tax without a defined need to do so,” Galloway, a former two-term councilmember, ...

Tomorrow evening the Anaheim City Council will take up a proposal by Councilman Jose F. Moreno to place a 2% gate tax on the November ballot. Moreno has advocated for such a tax for years. It is highly unlikely Moreno’s gate tax proposal will make it to the ballot: the city charter requires at least a two-thirds majority vote by ...

State Treasurer Fiona Ma has endorsed former Councilwoman Lorri Galloway for mayor of Anaheim, according to a news release issued by the Galloway campaign. “With 39 years serving the most vulnerable women, children, and families in Anaheim, combined with 8 years of building consensus on the Anaheim City Council, I know Lorri Galloway will lead with integrity, experience and the ...

Anaheim mayoral candidate Ashleigh Aitken has raised $319,582 for her mayoral bid, according to a news release issued yesterday by her campaign. Aitken, a Democrat from Anaheim Hills, is an attorney, former federal prosecutor and member of the Orange County Fair Board. She ran for mayor in 2018, narrowly losing to Harry Sidhu. This November was going to be a ...

This Tuesday, the Anaheim City Council will vote on a version of the campaign finance ordinance that it rejected less than three weeks ago. At it’s June 21 meeting, the Anaheim City Council took up Councilman Jose F. Moreno’s proposal to impose restrictions on the ability of the business community to participate in city council campaigns. Moreno’s proposal exempts labor ...