LOS ANGELES (KABC) — Los Angeles City Controller Kenneth Mejia is in a reelection fight against Zach Sokoloff, an asset manager for Hackman Capital Partners.<\/p>\n
Sokoloff, who has the endorsement of the L.A. Democratic Party, is questioning whether the city is delivering better services than before Mejia took office.<\/p>\n
Mejia left the Democratic Party last year. During his first term, he’s butted heads with other elected officials, including Mayor Karen Bass and City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto.<\/p>\n
“We are an outsider in City Hall who’s actually using my profession as a CPA auditor to open the books,” Mejia told Eyewitness News. “We’re showing everything.”<\/p>\n
Sokoloff said he thinks Mejia has “alienated the office.”<\/p>\n
“And I think taxpayers pay the price,” Sokoloff said. “When you have a mayor who would rather hire a third-party auditor to conduct an audit of the city as opposed to using her own city controller, Angelenos pay the cost of that.”<\/p>\n
In his first term, Mejia launched a homeless spending tracker and made the city’s finances more accessible to taxpayers.<\/p>\n
But Sokoloff says the majority of Angelenos don’t feel the city’s budget is better managed with less waste under Mejia.<\/p>\n
“If your job starts and stops with transparency, I think you are falling way short,” Sokoloff said. “In my view, transparency is the first step. Angelenos are tired of reports. They want to see results.”<\/p>\n
Since there’s only two candidates running in the race for L.A. controller, the winner will be decided on June 2. There’s no runoff in November.<\/p>\n
“We don’t have money like he does. You know, he has a ton of money,” Mejia said about his challenger. “His mom poured in $2.5 million to take me out of office. It’s nuts.”<\/p>\n
That money was donated to an independent expenditure supporting Sokoloff. Mejia says there’s nothing independent about that donation.<\/p>\n
“A record that he cannot defend, and so he’s resorted to personal attacks instead,” Sokoloff said.<\/p>\n
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