Residents seeking local office continue to pull papers and, as of Aug. 5, 18 individuals had requested an application to run for City Council.
Individuals that pull papers must gather at least 100 signatures from registered voters and pay a $25 fee to file. Pulling papers does not require an individual to follow through on the application and applicants have another week to file.
City Council
Four seats are up for election on City Council. All four incumbents (Gleam Davis, Ted Winterer, Tony Vazquez and Terry O'Day) have pulled papers to run. Davis and O'Day have returned the nomination packet and are waiting on verification to qualify.
As of Aug. 5, other individuals to pull council paperwork were: Linda Armstrong, Whitney Scott Bain, Oscar de la Torre, Jennifer Kennedy, Ken Kokin, Terence Later, Marc Lewis, Jon Mann, Armen Melkonians, Zoë Muntaner, Joel Barry Pollak, Mende Smith, James T. Watson and Kevin Wray.
Notable names to have pulled papers are de la Torre and Pollak.
De la Torre is a current member of the Santa Monica Malibu Unified School District. His SMMUSD term will be up in 2018 and he is part of a lawsuit alleging the city's at-large election system disenfranchises minority residents, specifically in the Pico neighborhood.
While he has previously solicited endorsements from local organizations for his school board campaigns, he said he plans to bypass traditional endorsements and run a grassroots campaign for council.
“As the only elected official in our City to publically endorse Bernie Sanders I understand fully the system is controlled by insiders who will support incumbents, some who owe their seats to Special Interests,” he said in a statement
Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and author of several books. He gained some notoriety during the early days of the 2016 presidential campaign when a Breibart reporter accused Corey Lewandowski of assault. Reporter Michelle Fields claimed Lewandowski forcefully prevented her from asking Donald Trump a question after a news conference. At that time, Lewandowski was Trump's campaign manager.
Following the incident, Pollak was accused of siding with the Trump campaign over his reporter. Fields and two others ultimately resigned over the incident.
Rent Control Board
Anastasia Foster is the first person to become an official candidate for the local election. The Rent Control Board incumbent pulled papers on July 18, returned them on July 25 and qualified on July 29. Also running for one of the two available seats are incumbent Christopher Walton and two challengers: Elaine Golden-Gealer and Caroline Torosis.
School Board
Four individuals have pulled papers for school board. The two incumbents are Maria Leon-Vazquez and Ralph Mechur. Challengers are Phil Brock and Jon Kean.
College Board
Four individuals have pulled, and returned, applications for three seats on the Santa Monica College Board. Incumbents are Susan Aminoff, Margaret Quinones-Perez and Rob Greenstein Rader. Sion Roy is the only challenger.
The City Clerk's office maintains a list of individuals that have pulled papers and their status at www.smvote.org. Potential candidates have through Aug. 12 to file paperwork unless an incumbent fails to file. In that case, the nomination period will be extended to Aug. 17.
