“When I took office 6 years ago, I vowed that I will always put the community first and will not allow any corruption or mishandling of our city’s finances because our residents deserve transparency and every single city employee will be held to the highest level of service to include honesty and integrity as they work for the residents of Huntington Park,” said the former Mayor of Huntington Park, Graciela Ortiz in 2021, who locals protested against speculating corruption.
Many citizens feel history repeating, as when former Mayor Ortiz stepped down, Huntington Park’s current Mayor Macias filled in, already being a part of the council.
Now 4 years later, Karina Macias, mayor of Huntington Park finds herself in a similar predicament. She has stated, “I feel very confident where I stand… The aquatic center/pool project is not an illusion in the community and will soon be a reality.”
Thousands of citizens in Huntington Park are wondering where the $23 million for the aquatic center in Salt Lake Park went. This led to the 2022 initial operation of “Operation Dirty Pond”, the investigation into ongoing mismanagement of city funds.
On February 26, 2025, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office filed search warrants for City Hall, Residences of Mayor Karina Macias, Council member Eddie Martinez, City manager Graciela Ortiz and Marilyn Sanabria, Edvin Tsaturyan and Sona Vardikyan the owners of JT Construction Group, and business office of Unified Consulting Services, LLC in Huntington Park.
The Monday after the search shut down City Hall, Huntington Park members cancelled the City Council meeting due to lack of people available. Soon after, on February 28 after search warrants the city attorney, Arnold Alvarez-Glasman resigned and the city council appointed Andrew Sarega as the new city attorney.
On March 17, 6pm PST there was a meeting to elect a new mayor and vice mayor. Arturo Flores, an ongoing member of the city council since September 2022 was selected as the new mayor of Huntington Park. Eduardo Martinez was elected as the new vice mayor, serving the city council since 2020.
“We need new people to help our community.” stated Esperanza Rogdriguez, a 30-year resident of Huntington Park who originally supported Mayor Macias felt deceived. “You should be in office for a maximum of five years so you don’t fall in love with power.”
Netizens feel as if the current council for Huntington Park is a revolving door, as when one steps down, someone else a part of the board comes rushing in during “scandals” to fill in the gaps or positions.
In 2021, there were major controversies over HP mismanaging funds and accusations of local corruption. The community wore bright yellow shirts in bold, “Rompe la cadena de corrupción,” (Break the chain of corruption), demanding an audit to know where taxpayer’s money is going.
These investigations run as deep as 2018 where Huntington Park was in deep water over concerns about pay-to-play. Which essentially is the campaigners (city council) accepting gifts and donations for their campaigns, usually have a strong correlation to maintaining contracts to establish future projects for companies. There are laws implemented to prevent the crowdout from extreme pay-to-play.
“Several companies that donated to Huntington Park council members received city contracts. Sean McMorris, the policy and organizing consultant for California Common Cause, said the campaign report indicates a “classic culture of pay-to-play.” stated Erick Cabrer, Reporter & Staff at The University Times.
Many citizens and family business-owners, like Miguel Molina, are not ‘surprised’ arguing, “they’re all just donating to each [other] to keep everyone’s position secure.”
Despite data showing HP’s contracts tied to campaign funding, they have not legally done anything wrong and have not been charged.
Though this does not mean financial managers haven’t been fired or put on the backburner.
On April 8th, 2021, Teresa Garcia, a budget analyst for 16 years was arrested by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department due to security breaches of electronic financial records of Huntington Park City hall according to the city.
Shortly after, almost the entirety of the finance department were placed on leave, many left confused and reasoning mainly unexplained.
“Oshea Orchid, an attorney representing the workers on leave, said her clients have done nothing wrong and were targeted in an attempt to cover up suspicious bank transfers and city contracts that some employees allege were being improperly awarded.” reported by Latimes.
Those trials are still ongoing with the newest document updates from March 2024, and to now the ongoing trials i.e. “Operation Dirty Pond” is yet to have any additional statements from officials.
Written by Anonymous Staff Writer