Campaign to recall Sacramento Councilwoman Katie Valenzuela fails to hit deadline
Sacramento City Councilwoman Katie Valenzuela will not face a recall in a January special election.
A group of Land Park, East Sacramento and central city residents working to recall her did not collect enough signatures by Wednesday’s deadline to force a recall election on the timeline it wanted, said John Morales, an East Sacramento homeowner who is head of the group. The group plans to try again for a spring 2023 special election, he said.
The recall group often criticizes Valenzuela — a self-proclaimed Democratic socialist and the council’s most liberal member — over homeless encampments and her support for reducing police funding.
“With the recall toolbox, we have collected thousands of signatures and built a strong citizen-based campaign among neighbors personally touched by increasing assaults, theft, and drug addicts,” Morales of the group For a Better Sacramento said in a statement Wednesday. “We are going to harness the grassroots energy we generated from the recall campaign into ensuring that our community finally has a city council member that listens to its constituents.”
Valenzuela’s campaign has called the effort a waste of taxpayer money.
“There is complete agreement that crime and the need to address our unhoused residents are both critical issues,” her campaign said in a statement Wednesday. “These challenges, here long before my election, are complex, and require resources, partnerships, and tenacity to address ... This is what voters hired me to do. I will continue to push, and I won’t stop until we make a sincere impact. I invite this group to join us in the effort and genuinely support our community in moving forward.”
Valenzuela, elected in 2020, represents downtown, midtown and Land Park. Her district will look different if she runs for reelection in 2024 because of the city’s once-a-decade redistricting process. Her district would add East Sacramento but shed Land Park.
East Sacramento residents led the recall drive until the city attorney in April concluded only residents of the neighborhoods that elected Valenzuela could sign the petitions. That meant the signatures had to come from Land Park and the central city.
Morales said the group since May collected about 6,300 signatures from Land Park and central city residents represented by Valenzuela. That fell short of the roughly 7,800 signatures required.
The city has not verified the number of signatures the group collected because the group did not submit the petition to the city.
The group seeking to recall Valenzuela had received about $24,000 in donations by the end of July, while the committee to fight the recall received about $18,000, according to documents submitted to the city.
This story was originally published September 7, 2022 at 2:59 PM.
