Updated voting numbers show community organizer Imelda Padilla maintaining her lead in the special election to replace former Los Angeles City Councilmember Nury Martinez in the San Fernando Valley, while city council staffer Marisa Alcaraz has continued to hold second place.
With no candidate close to winning a majority of the votes in the April 4 election for Council District 6, the top two finishers will likely meet in a June 27 runoff.
Padilla is leading with 25.7% of the vote. Alcaraz has increased her total and now has 21.1%, and Marco Santana has surged into third place, with 18.9%. Rose Grigoryan has faded from third to fourth place, with 14.9%.
In the latest batch of votes reported by the County Registrar-Recorder’s office Friday, Padilla picked up the most: 1,133. Alcaraz picked up 1,089, Santa gained 947, and Grigoryan got 370.
Of the remaining candidates on the ballot, Isaac Kim has 11%, Antoinette Scully has 5.6%, and Douglas Sierra has 3%.
As of Friday, officials had tallied a bit more than 13,000 votes, about 11% of the more than 118,000 ballots sent to District 6 voters.
The registrar’s office says mail-in ballots that were postmarked by April 4 will be accepted until April 11.
The special election was called to replace Martinez, who resigned in October after she was heard on a secret audio recording making racist, homophobic and anti-indigenous remarks. District 6 stretches nearly 20 miles from Sun Valley west to Lake Balboa. It includes the Sun Valley Power Plant and Van Nuys Airport.
Here are the leading candidates:
Imelda Padilla
Padilla is a Sun Valley resident who has worked in community engagement with the L.A. County’s Women and Girls Initiative, the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy and environmental justice organization…
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