2013 L.A. Municipal Election: Analyzing The Results

The results of yesterday's Los Angeles Municipal elections are in and it looks like Eric Garcetti and Wendy Greuel will be competing in the May 21 runoff (on my birthday!) The Los Angeles Times (and MadProfessah) had endorsed Garcetti, so we are happy about this result. Even if he loses and Greuel is Mayor, history would be made in having the first female Mayor of one of the Big 3 cities (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago), so as a feminist I would not be totally displeased with the result. Surprisingly, an openly gay candidate (who also happens to be a Republican) Kevin James looks to be placing third, which must be somewhat embarrassing for Jan Perry who seems to be coming in fourth place.

Here's what the results look like so far:

Garcetti is firstwith 32.9% of the vote, which is pretty good in basically a 5-person feel, more than 10,000 votes ahead of Greuel with 29.2% which is not too shabby either. James and Perry are just over 1,000 votes apart so its possible that margin could tighten.

In other important news, Mike Bonin was able to win his former boss's City Council District 11 seat, ensuring that the body will continue to have an openly gay member on it with an overwhelming 62% of the vote. In fact, it is likely that the 15-member body may have two openly gay members. In Garcetti's City Council District 13, openly gay Mitch O'Farrell (18.6%, 3535 votes) is a few hundred votes ahead of John Choi (16.4%, 3158 votes) while two other openly gay candidates Matt Szabo and Alexander Cruz de Ocampo failed to make the run-off. This was a disappointing result for Szabo, who was a Deputy Mayor in the Villaraigosa regime.

Openly gay candidate Ron Galperin (37.1%) is just squeaking ahead of City Councilman Dennis Zine (37.0%) to replace Greuel as Los Angeles City Controller.

In West Hollywood, openly gay members Jeffrey Prang and John Duran won re-election to the 5-member council, which will maintain its longtime openly gay majority.