Regular City Council Meeting
The council asked the state legislature to let Santa Ana join the AB 645 speed safety camera pilot programme, passing four votes to two.
All held meetings in the years covered by this prototype are listed here—even when a public brief is not ready.
The council asked the state legislature to let Santa Ana join the AB 645 speed safety camera pilot programme, passing four votes to two.
Most of the evening turned on two questions: whether to accept the police department's annual report on its military equipment, and whether to fight a county plan to house people leaving jail in Santa Ana.
The council voted five to two to ask voters in November whether to remove the expiry date from the city's local sales tax.
The council voted five to two to abolish five of its citizen commissions, covering arts, environment and transport, historic buildings, parks, and youth.
The council heard that Rosita Elementary is being renamed for Frank and Irene Palomino, and agreed to look at renaming Rosita Park to match.
Before hearing from the public, the council voted four to three to cut each speaker's time from three minutes to one.
The council chose the preferred design for rebuilding First Street, the corridor it had studied earlier in the year.
A police commander presented the review of how the department handled the anti-immigration-raid demonstrations of June 2025, which the council had asked for in February.
The council voted to rename Cesar Chavez Campesino Park back to Campesino Park and to remove Chavez's name and likeness from city property.
The planned public hearing on raising water and sewer rates was cancelled and taken off the agenda.
The council handed the River View Golf Course to a new operator, and Councilmember Hernandez cast the only vote against.
The council agreed to sell the city-owned property on West Walnut Street to the community group already farming it, for less than its market value.
The council voted four to three to buy a drone system that sends a drone to emergency calls before officers arrive.
This special meeting was a work study on rewriting the ordinance that governs the city's Police Oversight Commission, and no vote was taken.
This was a goal setting session, the meeting where the council tells staff what it wants prioritised before any budget is written.
The main business of the night was choosing a Mayor Pro Tem for 2026, and the council split four to three over it.
The council added another $150,000 to the emergency fund helping residents affected by federal immigration enforcement.
The council changed the rules governing how the city commits money to affordable housing projects, six votes to one.
The council heard an update on the emergency fund set up in June 2025 to help residents affected by federal immigration enforcement.
The council debated in open session whether to begin censuring Councilmember Hernandez over allegations about comments he made regarding police officers.
The council held a work study on rewriting the Police Oversight Commission ordinance, two months after an attempt to amend it deadlocked three to three.
The council accepted three years of overdue police military equipment reports in one go, four votes to three.
Short-term rentals dominated public comment, with residents asking the council to keep tightening the rules after a recent moratorium.
The council tried again to rewrite the ordinance governing its Police Oversight Commission, and deadlocked three votes to three.
The council created an emergency fund for families affected by federal immigration enforcement, but only after two competing motions had failed.
A proposal to cancel the July meetings for a summer recess drew hours of angry public comment, coming as federal immigration raids were under way in the city.
The long-delayed rewrite of the Transit Zoning Code came back after being continued from April, and took nearly eighty minutes.
The council introduced an ordinance requiring councilmembers to disclose certain campaign enforcement actions taken against them, six votes to one.
This was a work study on the 2025-26 budget, where the council gives staff direction and takes no votes.
The council renewed its automated licence plate reader contracts four votes to three, with a one-year review of how well they work built into the motion.
A grant agreement to fund extra community engagement on the zoning code rewrite failed on a three to three tie.
The council approved an eight percent raise for city manager Alvaro Nunez, five votes to one.
The council spent nearly an hour on parking meters and structures downtown and could not agree how to take the decisions.
The council committed $9,807,571 of federal housing money in advance to an affordable housing project.
An appointment to the Police Oversight Commission failed, getting four votes when five were needed.
The council disbanded two of its own standing subcommittees and appointed members to a joint committee with the school district, four votes to three.
The council elected Councilmember Benjamin Vazquez as Mayor Pro Tem for 2025, on Councilmember Penaloza's nomination and without opposition.
The council adopted the ordinance restricting camping, sleeping and storing property in public that it had sent back for rewriting a month earlier.
The council certified the results of the November 2024 election, covering four ballot measures and the election of councilmembers.
The consent calendar carried seven votes to nothing, with Mayor Amezcua recording a no vote against one item.
This meeting ran past two in the morning and carried the heaviest agenda of the year.
This special meeting was called to decide what to do about an investigator's sustained findings against Councilmember Hernandez.
The consent calendar carried seven votes to nothing, with recusals recorded on two items.
The council approved contract staffing to run the rent stabilisation and just cause eviction programme, four votes to three.
The council voted unanimously to rescind the guidelines restricting filming, photography and recording at its own public meetings.
This meeting ran past eleven at night and ended with most of its remaining business pushed to a continuation the following Monday.
The council affirmed the city manager's employment agreement as part of a long consent calendar.
The consent calendar carried seven votes to nothing, with Councilmember Penaloza recording a no vote on one item.
The council decided who would write the ballot arguments for the four measures going to voters in November 2024.
This special meeting was the annual State of the City presentation rather than a working council meeting.
This was the meeting the council had decided on 4 June not to cancel, and it settled what Santa Ana voters would be asked in November.
The council introduced the 2024-25 budget after a public hearing that ran most of the afternoon.
The council extended its moratorium on new industrial uses, seven votes to nothing.
This was the work study on the 2024-25 budget, where the council gives staff direction and takes no votes.
The longest argument of the night was about the councilmembers' own aides and what they are allowed to do.
This was a short special meeting held only to go into closed session about the city manager's post.
The council adopted a resolution declaring its strenuous opposition to a needle exchange programme being established in the city.
The council adopted an urgency ordinance banning short-term rentals, but only after two separate motions on it had failed.
The city attorney reported out of closed session that the council had unanimously appointed Alvaro Nunez as acting city manager, effective when Tom Hatch leaves on 29 March.
Almost three hours of this meeting went to a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, brought forward by Councilmember Vazquez.
The public hearing on raising the sanitation charge was continued to 19 March, after members balked at taking the household charge from $5.32 to about $11.
The council elected Councilmember Phan as Mayor Pro Tem for 2024 over a competing nomination, on a four-to-three split.
A street outreach and engagement contract worth up to $3,841,845 with City Net, held over from 5 December, took an hour and a half and passed six votes to nothing.
A proposed resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza drew 763 written comments and filled the chamber for most of three hours.
Tom Hatch was appointed interim city manager with effect from that evening, seven votes to nothing.
The council adopted the resolution putting a charter amendment on noncitizen voting in municipal elections to the voters in November 2024, four votes to three.
A special meeting called to consider a letter from the county registrar of voters about the Ward 3 recall election set for 14 November.
The council voted four to three to ask voters in November 2024 to adopt the rent stabilization and just cause eviction ordinance, the same text it had just given a second reading.
A special closed session meeting at which the council accepted the resignation of its city manager, effective that day.
The council gave a first reading, six votes to one, to an ordinance making it an offence to knowingly attend or help at an illegal street race or reckless driving exhibition.
The police policy manual contract, which tied three to three on 29 August with the mayor absent, came back and passed four votes to three.
With Mayor Amezcua absent, a three year policy manual contract for the police department tied three votes to three twice and failed, so no action was taken.
The council accepted the recall certificate and called a special election in Ward 3 for 14 November, six votes to nothing.
The city clerk brought the council the certified recall petition against Mayor Pro Tem Lopez, who left the dais.
A $2,021,319 pre-commitment and eight housing vouchers for an intergenerational housing project on North Bewley Street failed three votes to three with Councilmember Phan recused, then passed four to two on the original motion.
The council approved a $5,343,125 crossing guard contract while directing staff to build a volunteer programme and to tell the school districts the paid service is being phased out from the 2023-24 school year.
The council signed a ten year community workforce agreement with the building trades, seven votes to nothing, after cutting the thresholds so that far more city work is covered.
The rental registry fee study was received and filed four votes to three, pointing towards a $100 a unit charge that would raise about $3,245,000 and fund 14.4 posts.
A special workshop on the 2023-24 budget, the last before the public hearing set for 6 June.
The council approved next year's federal housing and community development grants, worth $4,808,057 in block grant money plus housing and homelessness allocations.
Staff opened the budget cycle for 2023-24 and asked for early direction, reporting 796 responses to the public survey and residents ranking crime reduction, libraries, streets, parks and homelessness as their priorities.
The council refused to appoint Fernando Delgado to the police oversight commission, three votes to four, after hearing him answer for the social media posts shown at the previous meeting.
Councilmember Hernandez's nominee to the police oversight commission was held over after Councilmember Bacerra showed the chamber social media posts the nominee had shared, including an anti-police slogan and a photograph of a captured American pilot guarded by a Viet Cong militiawoman.
The council adopted a resolution on unpermitted sidewalk food vending five votes to two, urging the state to hand local control back to cities.
The council told staff to reopen negotiations with the building trades on a community workforce agreement that lapsed last autumn, and to bring a draft back within thirty days.
Public comment ran for two hours and was dominated by restaurant owners, several of them thirty years in business, saying pop-up taco stands outside their doors are taking their trade and leaving oil and rubbish behind.
Restaurant and food truck owners filled the chamber to say that unpermitted taco stands outside their doors are driving them out of business, one of them saying she had already closed and told her son to suspend his college studies.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
This was the meeting where the November 2022 election results were certified and the new council was sworn in.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
This was a work study session, where the council gives staff direction without taking any votes.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
This was a short special meeting called only so the council could go into closed session, and it ran about five minutes in public.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
The council gave first approval to the city budget for 2022-23, along with the seven-year plan for construction projects.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
This was a workshop on the draft city budget for 2022-23, where councilmembers tell staff what they want funded before a budget is written.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
This special meeting was called to settle the city's new ward boundaries, the lines that decide which councilmember represents each neighbourhood.
The council spent almost four hours trying to choose new ward boundaries and failed to choose any.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
This was one of a run of special meetings on redrawing the city's ward boundaries, held without Mayor Sarmiento, who had left for an off-site event.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.
No resident-facing brief has been published for this meeting yet.