Dear Editor,

This letter from the Pico Neighborhood Association (PNA) Board of Directors is in response to the article titled "Council Takes Up Voting Rights Case Again." published on August 13, 2025.

The Santa Monica City Council has decided in closed session to continue wasting public dollars to pay their high-priced law firm, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, millions to protect their political machine’s control of power in the City of Santa Monica.

What makes this moment especially outrageous is the Council’s duplicity. On the very same evening that the City Council adopted a Citywide Equity Plan meant to heal past harms, build trust, and advance opportunity, they also voted in closed session to keep fighting in court against the California Voting Rights Act.

They speak equity in public while denying equity at the ballot box. And quietly, on that same night, a request for just $7,000 to help launch Latino Heritage Month was turned down for “lack of funds.” Somehow, millions can always be found for lawyers to fight fair elections, but not a few thousand to celebrate the very community most directly impacted by these inequities. Where, then, is the equity?

If the City had acted responsibly in 2016 when we first filed our complaint, the cost would have been $35,000. Instead, the Council refused, forcing us to file our CVRA lawsuit in 2016. In 2019, after a six-week trial, Judge Yvette Palazuelos ruled that Santa Monica’s at-large elections violated the California Voting Rights Act.

Yet the Council, which proudly proclaims its “progressiveness,” selfishly continues to funnel taxpayer dollars to maintain an exclusionary election system rooted in systemic racism. To date, the City has misspent $15 million of our tax dollars on this case, and with a new trial, another $10 million could be squandered. This money could have supported libraries, after-school programs, fire and police services, affordable housing, or seniors in need.

Last November, Superior Court Judge Daniel M. Crowley openly encouraged the City to settle, warning that another trial and appeals could last 4 to 5 years. The Council’s disregard for this advice shows that they do not care about the waste of public dollars or the harm inflicted on residents.

Instead, they continue to side with entrenched political interests -- SMRR, CEPS, Santa Monica Forward -- who want to protect their power over the city’s purse strings and development future. Even Councilmembers who live in Pico vote against district elections, choosing political loyalty to the machine over the interests of their own neighborhood.

It has been nine years since the Pico Neighborhood Association filed suit to challenge Santa Monica’s discriminatory at-large election system. Since its adoption in 1946, this system has kept Pico without true representation for 73 years.

The cost of that exclusion has been felt in unabated drug activity, gun violence, environmental racism, and neglect of basic needs. Before our lawsuit, only one African American and one Mexican American had ever been elected to the City Council. That history cannot be explained away -- it is the product of a rigged system.

Santa Monica cannot claim to lead on equity while denying the most fundamental equity of all: the right to fair elections and representation. The contradiction speaks for itself.

Chair: Tony Huizar
Vice Chair: Brian O’Neil
Secretary: Marisela Herrera
Treasurer: Maria Loya
Parliamentarian: Cris McLeod
PNA Board Members At Large:
Berenice Onofre
Mary Cornejo
Esther Hicks
Gina de Baca
Irma Santiago
Kiana Achoy
Freddy Luis

Editor's note: The Pico Neighborhood Association is a plaintiff in the voting rights case against the City.