Voters Reject Recall of 2 on Monterey Park City Council

Voters in Monterey Park on Tuesday refused to recall two white City Council members who had been accused of making a racist attack on Asian and Latinos, a charge the council members denied.

With all 22 precincts counted in the city, which has had heavy Asian immigration in recent years, Council member Barry L. Hatch and Patricia Reichenberger had more than 60% of the vote.

The final, unofficial tally showed 3,211 votes to recall Hatch and 5,136 against his recall, and 3,222 votes to recall Reichenberger and 5,163 against. Voter turnout was 36%.

The recall campaign was organized by the Assn. for Better Cityhood, led by Stephen Tan, an insurance agent, and Kevin Smith, a businessman, who accused Hatch and Reichenberger of making a racist attack on immigrants by advocating strict enforcement of immigration laws and by discouraging development projects serving the needs of Asian residents.

Charge Backfired

Hatch said the charges of racism backfired.

“People, were repulsed by it,” he said.

Reichenberger was even more definite.

“People discovered the racism charge was a lot of baloney,” she said.

Monterey Park has grown into America’s first suburban Chinatown, with the highest concentration of Asian residents--40%--of any city in the country. An estimated 37% of its 60,200 residents are Latino.

The council’s only Chinese-born member and its only two Latino members lost their seats in a municipal election 14 months ago. They were replaced by Hatch, 50; Reichenberger, 42, and another political newcomer, Chris Houseman, 28, who had accused their opponents of poor planning that resulted in crowded streets, condominiums they called ugly and cluttered commercial strips.

Building Moratorium

The new council upset developers by imposing a moratorium on multifamily residential and commercial construction and by hiring consultants to revise the city’s general plan and revamp zoning laws. The council stiffened standards for apartment and condominium projects in April and will submit new commercial zoning regulations to voters in September.

Critics have accused Hatch and Reichenberger of trying to discourage more Chinese immigration under the guise of slowing growth by raising development standards. The two council members, arguing that the city needs more chain stores and fewer ethnic shops, have contended that they are not opposed to Chinese immigrants or to Chinese developers, only to poorly planned projects.

The complaint of racism intensified a year ago when the council adopted a resolution that advocated federal action to “remove aliens who are residing in the United States illegally” and urged that English be made the nation’s official language.

Passage of the controversial resolution brought protests from residents who labeled it a racist attack on Asian and Latino immigrants.

Later, Mayor Cam Briglio, who had joined Hatch and Reichenberger in voting for the resolution, withdrew his support. The resolution was rescinded in October by a 3-2 vote.

Although Hatch and Reichenberger denied that racial motives were behind the measure, the resolution triggered the campaign to recall them. The election was set after more than 4,500 registered voters signed recall petitions.