Citizen About Town
Citizen About Town
By Nancy C Arcuri, Editor and Publisher
Email: nancyarcuri@thecitizensvoice.net
Monterey Park residents do you recall that in 2015 our City Councilmembers were Teresa Real Sebastian, Mitchell Ing, Stephen Lam, Peter Chan and Hans Liang?
During one of their Council Meetings Teresa Real Sebastian wanted our Council to declare us as a sanctuary city that would allow illegal immigrants the right to move into Monterey Park and not be challenged by the federal, state, county or local police departments.
After a very short discussion, the majority of the Councilmembers stated that Monterey Park should be called a Safe City for all of the residents, business owners and visitors who would be protected by our Fire Department and our Police Department.
If you recall Project Room Key during the Pandemic when the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors demanded that every city in their domain must find housing for homeless senior citizens.
Monterey Park made arraignments with the Lincoln Plaza Hotel and Garvey Inn to house homeless senior citizens at the request of the county.
Many residents called the Monterey Park City Council to voice their anger that we had to house the homeless in our city.
According to public records we the taxpayers paid for their room and board during the Pandemic.
Some residents still have issues with homeless people living in their neighborhoods.
Do you still wonder why we Monterey Park residents have to vote by districts for our Councilmember?
On March 7, 2018 Teresa Real Sebastian put on an agenda item on declaring that we could be sued by Kevin Shenkman and his clients, the Southwestern Voter Regulations Education Project from Texas. They claimed that many people of Hispanic heritage could not be elected into local government offices.
Monterey Park was declared the First Suburban Chinatown between 1970 and 1990 when many Asian residents moved into town.
Our Monterey Park Census for 2010 stated that 65.6% of our residents were Asian; 28.5% of our residents were Spanish or Hispanic; 14% of our residents were white, 4.9 % of our residents were of a mixed race and .07% of our residents were black.
We spent thousands of dollars on a consultant and drawing up maps that set up our residents into five voting districts by our general population.
On March 3,2020 Monterey Park residents living in Districts 2 or District 3 or District 4 were able to vote for their Councilmembers running in their district.
District 3 was declared the Hispanic district.
On November 8, 2022 Monterey Park residents living in District 1 or District 5 had a chance to vote for their Councilmembers living in their district as well as the general election for the City Clerk and City Treasurer who are elected at large.
To date our current City Councilmembers are Thomas Wong for District 1; Yvonne Yiu for District 2; Jose Sanchez for District 3; Henry Lo for District 4 and Vinh Ngo for District 5.
Teresa Real Sebastian was on our ballot in District 5 but she did not win a seat on our current City Council.
During the August 16th Council Meeting there was a slide show and presentation on the Residents Needs Assessment Survey Results that was taken from May 3rd to May 11th.
It was reported that 400 residents participated in the lengthy phone survey. The survey should be shown on the city’s website as requested by the Councilmembers for the public to review.
One comment that caught my attention is that the residents overall trusted their police department to keep them safe.
I am very happy to hear that since all the news stations seem to only report all of the mayhem and murder all across our world.
Yes, our Monterey Park Police Department and our Monterey Park Fire Department are on call 24/7 to keep us safe from danger.
Please thank them for their service to our community.
Have you been seeing all of the news stories about the “Flash Mobs” of people dressed in dark clothes, wearing hoodies and masks stealing thousands of dollars of merchandise from our many stores?
These thugs appear to be well organized as they attack our shopping centers for their own financial gains as their stolen merchandise is sold to anyone willing to pay their prices.
Residents who witness these thugs in action are videotaping them and turning over their evident to the local police departments.
These thugs although they are masked up, they seem to forget that people can identify them by the physical actions such as the way they walk.
Can you imagine that some parent, grandparent, school teacher or family friend say that thug looks like our Johnny or our Susie?
Do they call the police and report that one of the thugs is their family members or do they keep the bad news to themselves?
These thugs can be identified and arrested for their actions.
“Entering an open business with the intent to steal less than $950 worth of property is shoplifting under California state law (Penal Code 495.5). Shoplifting is usually treated as a misdemeanor — unless you have some major prior convictions — punishable by a half-year in county jail and fines of up to $1,000.”
Yet, these thugs steal from some shop or store every day.
We, the consumers end up paying higher prices to cover their stores’ financial loses.
These thugs are also stealing from us.
We must change any laws that allows these thugs to steal as a way to make their living.
Do they use their illegal profits to buy drugs, buy guns, buy properties, buy cars or anything else?
It is time to arrest these thugs and hold them in jail until their court date to help keep us all safe.
All of these thugs both adults and young thugs under the age of 18 should have their mug shots, their names and ages listed for all of the residents to see them in their prison dress.
Being a minor should not be a ticket to get out of jail early.
If these young thugs can commit the crimes, then they should serve time in jail.
Will our elected officials put our safety first instead of the letting these thugs destroy our United States of America?
Please meet with your elected officials before you vote them into office.
Ask yourself do they have the same political beliefs, same religious beliefs and same social beliefs as you do?
If you answer is NO then please do not vote them into office.
Your vote is your voice in our United States of America.
Do we still want to live “In the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave”?
Or do we decide to become a Communists or Socialist County where nobody is truly free and we must give our everything to our great leaders?
The future of our United States of America could be decided in the 2024 Presidential Election.
