Political booths where candidates for city council can have an opportunity to campaign will not be present as they usually are at the 43rd Cypress Community Festival this week after concerns from city leaders that it will disadvantage Jewish candidates.
The festival – run by the Cypress Community Festival Association, a private nonprofit, which typically allows political candidates to pay to host a booth at the annual event – will be held on Saturday, Oct. 12, which is also the Jewish holiday Yom Kippur.
It also comes after city council candidate Mark Plager, who’s Jewish, publicly raised concerns about being at a disadvantage since the festival is on Yom Kippur.
Following pushback from city leaders including Mayor Scott Minikus and a $5,000 payment the festival was supposed to get from the city last year, organizers decided to axe political booths from the event.
Minikus said at a public meeting late last month that part of the reason he raised concerns with festival organizers about the political booths was because Jewish residents told him it was taking place on Yom Kippur.
“I’m the one who brought it up out of concerns that I received from citizens here in the city. They did not want political booths at the festival. The festival is a place where we’re supposed to have pride in our community and a sense of togetherness,” Minikus said at the Sept. 23 city council meeting.
In an open letter posted on Facebook on Sept. 27, festival organizers acknowledged picking October 12 was a mistake and that city staff was aware of the date selected and the presence of political booths months before concerns were brought up.
“Our board has implemented new procedures for date selection moving forward to ensure that this does not happen in the future. We sympathize with the Jewish community and extend our apologies for this oversight,” organizers wrote, noting they had not known the date was Yom Kippur when they picked it.
“At this time, our board has decided that removing all candidate political booths from the 2024 festival is the best course of action.”
Organizers said the decision to remove the booths so close to the event day will result in a $4,000 budget deficit for the nonprofit and much of their funding comes from booth fees.
At the Sept. 23 city council meeting, Plager said he told Minikus the event was being held on Yom Kippur, adding that he was “being handicapped against his competitors.”
“This shouldn’t be an issue. As soon as you heard it was Yom Kippur, my holiest day, and that you had two candidates who were Jewish, there shouldn’t have been an issue, said Plager, who is endorsed by Minikus.
At the same meeting, several residents including Bob Youngsma spoke out against council members interfering with whether the festival will hold political booths or not.
“That place has always had booths for people running for office,” Youngsma said at the Sept. 23 city council meeting. “Now somebody says we don’t want them anymore, and now you’re going to take taxpayer dollars to make up for the difference for them not to have it.”
More than a week after his remarks, a Santa Ana city council candidate debate was held on Rosh Hashanah, another Jewish holiday.
Jeff Katz, a candidate who is Jewish, informed organizers of the holiday but the debate proceeded. Katz did not attend.
[Read: What Does Santa Ana’s Youth Want Out of Their City’s Future Leaders?]
Cypress Officials Pay Festival $5,000
The organizer’s letter came days after a majority of city council members decided at their Sept. 23 meeting to give the festival $5,000 in carryover funds that they previously allocated to the festival from last year’s budget, but never spent.
Yet a staff report describes the taxpayer money as being a reimbursement “for revenue from political booths which will not be present at the Festival,” drawing the ire of Councilman David Burke, who lambasted the process as opaque and inappropriate.
“We’re being asked tonight to use public funds to pay the festival so they won’t have the political booths, but it wasn’t really based on any council direction,” said Burke, who is one of the festival association’s volunteer board members.
“What this is going to look like is that the city is using taxpayer dollars to pay off the community festival because one of the candidates that is endorsed by certain people can’t attend.”
He said that Minikus, a former police officer, met with festival organizers multiple times expressing his concerns about political booths – and one time with the City Attorney Fred Galante present told organizers they could be compensated for lost revenue if they remove the booths.
“That’s something that I think a lot of people would find fairly intimidating,” Burke said. “I feel comfortable saying that some of the festival board members are afraid of what might happen if they don’t agree to this.”
“I never at any time threatened them, gave the impression of threatening them in any way whatsoever so do not ever make that claim even slightly again,” Minikus responded.
Burke briefly stepped away from the dais after the remark and Minikus said he wasn’t threatening the councilman.
Galante also pushed back on Burke’s comments, saying he was present at the meeting because there were concerns that the event that received money from the city is excluding a group of people and whether that would create a legal problem for the city.
“I did not demand or insist that they remove any booths,” he said.
Councilwoman Bonnie Peat, who also endorsed Plager, said two council candidates are Jewish and it would be fair to all if the political booths were removed .
“As a city resident, as a city council member, I think it’s the right decision to make sure that we basically respect that it is a holiday,” she said at the September meeting.
Councilwoman Anne Mallari, who also endorsed Plager, said she is disappointed that the festival is on Yom Kippur, but it’s up to organizers to decide if they would include the booths or not and supported giving them the money that had previously been allocated for the festival.
In the end, the council voted 3-2 to allocate the money to the festival and remove any language that indicated the funds were to reimburse organizers for lost revenue over political booths.
Minikus and Peat were the dissenting votes.
Hosam Elattar is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at helattar@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @ElattarHosam.
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