By Michael Hernandez
VENTURA—The City Council is set to decide the fate of the Junipero Serra statue Wednesday at a special meeting starting at 6 p.m. in the aftermath of a special meeting held on July 7 in which a decision was postponed after technical (no environmental report) and legal issues (potential lawsuits) were raised. At that meeting, Councilmember Jim Friedman (District 5) asked if the final decision could be placed before voters in the November general election.
(Editor’s Note: To see a Citizens Journal story from the July 7th special meeting go to: https://www.citizensjournal.us/ventura-postpones-decision-on-junipero-serra-statue-to-july-15-after-technical-and-legal-issues-raised-looking-into-placing-issue-before-general-election-voters/.)
The City had been poised to make its ruling after rejecting that the bronze statue was a historical landmark because that designation pertained to earlier Junipero Serra statues (the first statue erected in 1936 and the second in 1974 as Historic Landmark 3) and not to the more recent bronze statue erected in 1989 according to a meeting of the Historic Preservation Committee on July 1st. The statue stands on public land in front of the Ventura City Hall.
The statue has generated both protestors and defenders in two separate rallies held on June 20 and July 4. Four petitions (two for and two against) have garnered 16,778 signatures on the progressive petition site: change.org which does not monitor neither the signatures nor the residence of those signing petitions. Some 10,748 signatures to remove the statue and 6,030 signatures have been gathered to keep the statue. This is an unprecedented number of signatures for either keeping or removing a monument on this petition site. Likewise, the city clerk has been inundated with emails on the issue.
Persons wishing to make public comments can before 4 p.m. Wednesday by going to:
https://www.cityofventura.ca.gov/1829/City-CouncilMeeting-Electronic-Comment-
or sending an email to [email protected] (up to 1000 characters). Those wishing to join the meeting live can do so by going to: https://bit.ly/FatherSerraMeeting
or for audio only by going to: 1-408-418-9388 / Access Code 126 228 9208 or can watch on Cable TV Channel 15.
Michael Hernandez, Co-Founder of the Citizens Journal—Ventura County’s online news service; editor of the History Makers Report and founder of History Makers International—a community nonprofit serving youth and families in Ventura County, is a former Southern California daily newspaper journalist and religion and news editor. He worked 25 years as a middle school teacher in Monrovia and Los Angeles Unified School Districts. Mr. Hernandez can be contacted by email at [email protected].
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