Anaheim Observer Civic affairs in OC's largest city.

The District 5 council race is the scene of some questionable vote-buying by the Kenneth Batiste campaign, plus a related bout of left-wing cancel culture. On Facebook this Sunday, Yesenia Rojas, a union member and community activist who has generally sided with the Tait-Moreno side in Anaheim’s civic battles, called out left-wing blogger Vern Nelson for putting Kenneth Batiste campaign ...

Councilman Jose F. Moreno is already telegraphing his plan to vote against using $4 million in federal CARES Act funding to extend eviction protection, support for local businesses and COVID-19 testing. His vehicle: cynical alternative ideas for the $4 million which he admits aren’t realistic. Item 14 on tonight’s council agenda would expand the Anaheim Community and Economic Recovery Plan ...

This Tuesday, the Anaheim City Council will vote on expanding the Anaheim Community and Economic Recovery Plan, including the extension of eviction protections, more support for local businesses and increased funding for COVID-19 testing and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). The expansion would tap up to $4 million of the $33 million in CARES Act funding the city received from the ...

The Westin Anaheim Resort is holding a series of job fairs in order to fill 400 positions at the 4-Diamond hotel, located across from the Disneyland Resort and slated to open in October 2020. The $245-million, 618-room luxury hotel is owned by Wincome Properties, and is the first new Westin built in Southern California in a quarter century. The first ...

District 1 Councilmember and life-long Republican Denise Barnes switched parties on June 12 and is running for re-election as a newly-minted Democrat. However, her bid for the Democratic Party of Orange County Central Committee endorsement was rejected last night on a split vote. 30 committee members voted for and 23 members voted against endorsement, with 7 members abstaining, according to ...

Several short weeks after switching her party affiliation from life-long Republican to Democrat, District 1 Councilwoman Denise Barnes is trying to secure the endorsement of the Democratic Party of Orange County Central Committee, which will vote on it tonight. Whether she gets it is another matter, since a number of Central Committee members object to the party giving consideration to ...

Among the items on tonight’s Anaheim City Council agenda are informational presentations on the Office of Independent Review Group report and Police Review Board 2019 Annual Report. Councilman Jose F. Moreno will doubtless use the occasion to press his #defundthepolice agenda (while trying to explain that he doesn’t really mean defund the police). District 1 Councilmember Denise Barnes is Moreno’s ...

Are campus safety officers “bullies in blue”? Are they part of a “school-to-prison” pipeline? A manifestation of “systemic racism” that victimizes minority students? Some elected members of the Anaheim Elementary School District Board of Trustees think so. Trustee Juan Alvarez co-authored a June 8 op-ed in the Voice of OC advocating “defunding” campus safety officers, calling them “repressive” and “contributing ...

Another aspirant to represent District 1 on the Anaheim City Council has thrown his hat into the ring: Jose Diaz. Diaz is a Cuban immigrant who has lived for the last 21 yeas in Anaheim, where he and his wife have raised their four children. He works for the City of Orange, where he manages the Water Division of the ...

Councilman Jose F. Moreno posted this meme on Facebook on Monday. It is less a statement that Black lives matter – on that we can all agree – so much as claiming the American Founding was racist, and the signers of the Declaration of Independence did not believe its principles applied to all people, particularly Black people. Moreno’s claim is ...