In a letter dated Wednesday, April 19, to Acting City Manager City Manager Gerardo Mouet and obtained Thursday by the Register, Rojas noted he had served the city for more than 27 years. He called for the appointment of an acting police chief to “allow for a seamless transition as I separate from the department.”

The action comes amid recent criticism by some City Hall elected officials over a rise in shootings and an ongoing discussion by a sharply divided City Council of the department’s performance and leadership. The November city election, which focused in large part on crime and trends in shootings, reduced Rojas’ support on the council.

Also on Thursday, the Santa Ana Police Officers’ Association announced it was moving forward with a vote of no confidence on Rojas. The police union agreed to proceed with the vote last week, the group’s president, Gerry Serrano, wrote in an email to city officials.

Newly elected Councilman Jose Solorio, who had police union backing in the November election, said in an email to the Register Thursday that “maybe the POA won’t need to do a vote of no confidence.”

Councilman David Benavides, a Rojas ally, expressed gratitude for the chief’s service to the city, beginning as a patrol officer and ending as the city’s first Latino chief.

“I believe he was a strong and effective leader. It’s unfortunate that the police union leadership and its allies on the City Council have made the police chief’s job difficult over the last several months, and I can understand the chief’s decision to go to a place where he might be allowed to be more effective.”

In a statement, Serrano, the police union president, thanked Rojas for his service, adding: “Now we need a Chief with a new problem-solving and community-oriented policing strategy to address the spike in gang shootings and morale at the Santa Ana Police Department.”

The agency was “once recognized as a leader Nationally in Community Oriented Policing,” he said, and “with the right leadership can once again make the city of Santa Ana a safer community for the families, business stakeholders and city employees to work in.”

City police Cpl. Anthony Bertagna said Rojas “is not currently discussing his employment status.”

A source close to the police department said Rojas is expected Friday, April 21, to be named police chief of BART, the Bay Area transit agency. The San Francisco Chronicle, citing multiple sources, reported Thursday that Rojas would be appointed chief of the BART force leading a department with 227 sworn officers.

Mouet said he received the resignation letter Thursday morning and was beginning meetings with personnel officials on a process for selecting an acting police chief. He said he believes there are “a lot of individuals internally” who may seek the job, but the search could be opened to external candidates, as well.

The police union email to city officials on the no-confidence vote, provided to the Register, says the union tabled plans for a no confidence vote more than a year ago, “in fairness, to allow Chief Rojas to address the issues.”

“A year has elapsed and gang shootings are up to historic numbers, mismanagement of resources and the morale at the police department has worsened to near unrecoverable levels,” Serrano wrote. “There has been no change in all of the areas of concern, and as new issues arise, the association has decided it is now time to move forward.”

The new development comes days after council members directed city staff to pursue, at the chief’s urging, what was characterized as a multi-pronged holistic approach, involving community groups, to combat shootings and gang violence.

“Gang prevention is a big challenge for us,” Rojas told the council. “With that comes the increase in shootings we’ve seen.”

“We can’t arrest ourselves out of the problem,” he added.

Mayor Pro Tem Michele Martinez, who had called for Tuesday’s discussion on gang shootings and violence, said she wishes the city could have continued efforts to reduce crime with Rojas.

“We had a good working relationship and appreciated his efforts to change the culture in the [police department] and hold his officers accountable, and his willingness to partner with the community,” Martinez wrote in a text message. “A big loss to the city family.”

There were 55 shootings in the first 50 days of 2016, a five-year high for Orange County’s second-largest city. Shortly afterward, the police department stopped releasing the number of shootings – which include attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon and firing into an inhabited dwelling or vehicle – citing problems tracking from multiple databases.

Figures released by the police department last month showed shootings in May and June last year exceeded the pace of shootings in the beginning of the year, and that the trend eased before climbing back to about one-per-day in January of this year. More broadly, shootings increased 183 percent from 2013 to 2016 to 292 incidents, according to the report. Many were gang-related

The surge in shootings and the department’s handling of crime data became an issue in the council campaign later in the year, with the police union spending nearly $300,000 to help elect candidates who voiced concerns about the strategies and leadership of the department.

After the election, Rojas’ allies claimed publicly that the union wanted candidates it supported to remove both the former city manager, who agreed to depart in January, and the police chief. Serrano, the police union president, has said such decisions rest with the City Council and his association’s involvement in the campaign wasn’t unusual.

On Thursday, Benavides said that “everything that was suggested, that there were promises made, is all coming to fruition as was said, so it’s difficult to think otherwise.”

He added that it is now “very important for us as a council to provide clear direction to the acting city manager. That focus is the safety of our community, quality of life and that we don’t [fall into] allowing politics to drive decisions of the police department or city.”

In his email, Solorio noted the chief worked many years for Santa Ana “and we are thankful for his service and commitment to our city.”

Rojas was named the 20th Police Chief in May 2014. He served at the rank of corporal, sergeant, commander and deputy chief. Rojas developed the Homeland Security Division after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, according to the city’s website.

Rojas is a Medal of Valor recipient from the United States Customs Service, Santa Ana Police Department and the Federal Bar Association. He has a Master’s Degree in criminal justice from Chapman University and a Bachelor’s degree from California State University, Long Beach.

https://www.ocregister.com/2017/04/20/amid-controversy-over-rise-in-shootings-santa-ana-police-chief-resigns-says-he-has-new-job/

Race has long played a significant role in the politics, demographics and social landscape of Compton.

And the controversy developing around a new voting system proposed for electing city officials puts a delicate topic on the table—how prevalent racism is in the only city in south Los Angeles County where Latinos are the majority of the population but hold no seats in the City Council.

Compton Mayor Eric Perrodin recognizes that the city’s racial dynamic involves blacks wanting to maintain power and viewing Latinos as the group looking to take it away from them. Racism exists, he said, but “to a degree.”

“I don’t believe it’s as prevalent as people say,” he said.

Tensions have been on the rise since three Latina voters sued the city alleging that its at-large election system, in which council seats are decided through votes across the city, prevents Latino voters from electing the candidate of their choice.

Although some political analysts say Latinos tend to vote for their own race, one plaintiff, Enelida Alvarez, 30, said, “It’s not a race issue.”

A handful of Latinos who have emerged as leaders of the Committee “Yes on Measure B, for Democracy in Compton”—which has already met twice and will gather again Thursday—all say change is justified because it is long overdue. Less than a month and a half remains until the vote on Measure B, which would change the method of electing the four council members from at-large to by district.

In Compton, Latinos made up 21 percent of the population in 1980, while blacks made up 75 percent. By 2000, Latinos became the majority at 59 percent, overtaking blacks at 40 percent, and in 2010 the Latino population almost doubled that of blacks, 65 percent to 33 percent. Whites held the majority before 1970.

The fact that Latinos now represent two-thirds of the population prompted Jose Serrato, 61, a political organizer for the city since the 1960s, to say, “Compton is 50 years in the past.”

“I used to say, ‘We’re going to give it to them!’” Serrato said with a laugh. “Now I’m more conservative. I don’t want to say, ‘We’re going to kick their ass,’ but it’s slang for, ‘Let’s beat them at all costs.’”

Just as controversial as Serrato’s comment on Latinos seeking political power from blacks, is the question of what a fair distribution of power would look like.

“Why attack Compton when they already have Lynwood, South Gate, Huntington Park?” said Royce Esters, 74, president of the National Association for Equal Justice in America and a Compton resident since 1956. “We have to have a level playing field here.”

Race entered the debate with a lawsuit on the city’s current election system, which has only seen black council members win seats in the past few decades. Claims by District 1 Councilwoman Janna Zurita that she had a Spanish grandmother and by District 3 Councilwoman Yvonne Arceneaux that she had a Mexican father don’t go unchallenged.

Arceneaux’s husband Herbert, 69, said whites did not let him walk through certain parts of the city as a resident in 1960. “Hell yeah, it’s visible,” he said when asked about racism among blacks and Latinos.

“A few weeks ago, a Hispanic man was showing a house in the 400 block of Raymond and when my wife and I came, he not only shut the door, he slammed it,” he said.

But Lorraine Cervantes, 70, a Compton resident for 59 years, said she’s proud that Latinos have preserved their language and hope to gain political power.

“Why does it happen that when I raise my voice for my people, you (blacks) call me racist?” she said. “It’s not our fault that the whites made you lose power. I never, ever have been discriminated against by a white person as I have by African Americans.”

The lawsuit against the city, settled in late February, puts Measure B on the ballot for the June 5 election and again in November if it fails to pass initially. It’s not the first time Latino voters have gone to court because they feel they lack representation.

In mid-2011, brothers Alex and Luis Landeros sued the Compton Community College District because the two Compton seats were decided through an at-large election. Their lawyer, Joaquin Avila, born and raised in Compton, alleged violation of the California Voting Rights Act of 2001 for lack of representation, the same grounds that the lawyers in the latest lawsuit used.

The settlement agreement with the community college district delayed elections in 2011 and instituted a vote by district in 2013.

“We saw an injustice because we could never really have balanced elections,” said Luis Landeros, 42.

“There are three layers: the city, the college and the next step will be the Compton unified school district,” added Alex Landeros, 55. “It might be us or it could be other plaintiffs, but as far as if it will be done, it will be done.”

But Herbert Arceneaux said that going to court “does not do any good.” Blacks waited their turn to get elected through the at-large system, he said, and lawsuits “I think push the wedge even farther apart” between blacks and Latinos.

According to Census data analysis by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO), a nonprofit organization that facilitates the participation of Latinos in politics, Latinos who are U.S. citizens and of voting age represent 28 percent of all Latinos living in Compton. In other words, only about one in four Latinos are eligible to vote.

Furthermore, the NALEO analysis showed that in the November 2010 elections, the 2,091 Latinos who voted made up only 17 percent of voters in Compton and 19 percent of registered Latino voters. By comparison, non-Latinos made up 83 percent of voters and had a 65 percent turnout. Some see change coming, but the question remains how near in the future.

“I see a change in another four to eight years,” Herbert Arceneaux said. “As the young kids get out of high school and claim their domain and say they want representation. All schools are predominantly Hispanic.”

Perrodin, who supports Measure B for representation and fiscal reasons, optimistically concluded: “We’re all American.”

But he added that the easiest way to see if one’s position is consistent is to switch roles with those deemed the adversaries.

“If the majority of the population were black and all elected officials were Latino, would you as a black continue to want voting to be at-large? If you can say yes, then your position would be consistent,” he said. “But I don’t believe that is the case.”

https://laopinion.com/2012/04/24/tema-racial-es-factor-crucial-en-debate-politico/