ALHAMBRA : Council Now All White; Candidate Blames Bigotry for Loss

Alhambra, which is nearly three-fourths Latino or Asian, now has an all-white City Council after this month’s election.

Latino Councilman Michael Blanco’s two-term limit on the council expired this year, preventing him from running. And the sole minority candidate, Louis Kuan, finished last in a field of five candidates running for three open seats.

“Now there is no representation (for minorities) in Alhambra, period,” Kuan said. “Seventy-five percent of the population has no representation.”

His opponent, incumbent Councilwoman Barbara Messina, and several members of the community, including Chinese Americans, denied Kuan’s claim that anti-immigrant sentiment embodied in Proposition 187 caused his loss.

But at least one other candidate bolsters his claim.

Elizabeth Mack, who ran and lost in the District 5 race against businessman Paul Talbot, ran on an informal slate with Kuan. Mack said business owners and residents on the campaign trail were willing to display her campaign signs, but told her they would not display Kuan’s signs, primarily because he is Chinese American.

Mack, who is white, took 44%, or 5,445 votes cast in the District 5 race. Kuan took only 33% of the votes in the District 2 race against Messina.

“I think Proposition 187 had a lot to do with it,” Kuan said. In Alhambra, the controversial measure to cut off many public services to illegal immigrants lost by 905 votes. “Certainly, being Asian didn’t help my cause.”

The Asian Pacific American Legal Defense Center will investigate Kuan’s claim that racial bigotry played a role in the election, said Stewart Kwoh, legal center executive director. The legal center, one of four civil rights groups suing the state to stop implementation of Proposition 187, will also look into whether Alhambra’s election process is unfair to the city’s minority communities, Kwoh said.

Unlike many other cities, Alhambra does not elect council members by district, a system that usually gives minority candidates an edge in heavily minority districts. While candidates must run in the district where they live, they are elected by the city at large.

The once predominantly white community has seen a 36% decrease in the number of white residents since 1980. It now is 36% Latino and 37% Asian American; the number of Asian Americans in the city has tripled in the last 14 years.

Kuan is the third Asian American to run for Alhambra council, and the third to lose.

Messina pointed out that she had the support of several prominent Chinese American business and community leaders, including the endorsement of Sophie Wong, the city’s only elected Asian American official. Wong won a second four-year term to the Alhambra School District Board of Education in the Nov. 8 election.

“Anyone of any race can run for office,” Messina said. “If they have any credibility they will be elected. Louis Kuan is a big crybaby. He had nothing to offer this community. He ran a terrible, terrible campaign.”

Wong said an Asian American candidate should not expect the support of the Asian community just because of their shared ethnic background.