On a recent Friday, Alan Wapner held a meet and greet at a brewery in the City of Ontario. He’s an incumbent for District 3 and is running for another term. But that wasn’t his initial plan for this election.
Wapner, who has been in office since 1994, had his house searched by the FBI in July. Before news of the raid broke out, he was running in the mayor’s race but eventually dropped out.
Wapner said the investigations were a distraction that forced him to reconsider. He regrets his decision to drop out, but said he’s moving on and encourages constituents to reach out and ask questions about the incident.
“In hindsight, I probably should have stayed there,” Wapner said. “Because people really want me as mayor.”
Wapner now faces competition from three political hopefuls, who are using transparency and the recent FBI raid as wedge issues to take the seat from him.
Meet the candidates of District 3
Ontario’s District 3 is home to almost 45,000 people. In recent times, the area has seen a growth of homes and warehousing. It’s also where the newly built ONT Field sits, which is home to the Dodger’s affiliate, the Ontario Tower Buzzers. Adjacent to the field is the Ontario Sports Empire, which opened earlier this month.
Wapner said his aim is to improve city infrastructure and make Ontario more walkable. In the past, Wapner was a major proponent of warehouse development, but he said he’s in support of slowing that development to improve quality of life.
“Warehouses are good for the economy,” Wapner said. “They create a lot of jobs and economic activity. We are the logistics capital of Southern California because of the three interstate, the airport [and] the two railroad lines. But enough is enough.”
Michael Rios, a 37-year-old software engineer, filed to run for the seat after the news of the raids came out. This is Rios’ first time running for any sort of office, but he’s been active in city politics advocating for everything from fiscal responsibility to promoting city services on social media.
At a campaign event earlier this month at a home bordering Westwind Park, roughly ten residents talked with Rios about him running on affordability, banning warehousing and the same FBI raids that landed him in this race.
“Prior to the FBI raids, somebody like me would have no chance running in this race,” Rios said. “A campaign like mine where I’ve only raised a few thousand dollars actually kind of has a chance in this race against somebody like Alan Wapner.”
If elected to the council, Rios wants to focus on transparency by packaging info from city meetings in a more accessible way for residents.
“The city really needs to put in more effort into summarizing and making it much more digestible of what the city’s doing for us,” Rios said.
D’Andre Lampkin, a deputy sheriff for Los Angeles County, has been serving as an Ontario city planning commissioner for the past six years. He said he agrees that the city can do a better job with how it provides information to the public.
Lampkin has a dashboard on his campaign website that details the status of developer applications sent to the city. “Rather than me talking about transparency, I am executing on it before I come into office,” Lampkin said.
Lampkin said opponents that support a warehouse ban could leave the city open for lawsuits. If elected, he said he’ll push to revise the general plan to create a legal pathway to curb warehouse development. Lampkin calls this responsible development, and like Wapner, wants to make sure infrastructure keeps up with the growth of the city.
“And that’s a discussion nobody’s having,” Lampkin said. “I will reach out to every council member and ask that we review and look at the Ontario plan.”
For Lampkin, responsible development includes disaster preparedness.
“We’re currently in a season where we’re talking about the 100-year earthquake or the 100-year flood,” Lampkin said.
Larry Trinidad, the fourth candidate vying for the District 3 seat, did not respond to requests for an interview. He’s a registered nurse who served in the Army. On his website, Trinidad also advocates for responsible development in Ontario.
Tensions continue over FBI raid
At Wapner’s meet and greet, Wapner told KVCR he hasn’t heard back from the FBI about the investigations. He also made claims that the investigation involved other council members.
“Every single member of the city council had their phones and their iPads taken away,” Wapner said.” ‘Nobody talks about that.”
Wapner also said it’s not uncommon for law enforcement to execute search warrants that don’t lead to any criminal prosecutions.
“I've never been identified as a suspect. The FBI requested information with cooperation giving the information they wanted. That's all I know,” Wapner said. “The [campaign] mailers going out…they're taking advantage of headlines and stuff like that.”
Dan Bell, a spokesperson for the city, said Wapner’s claims are false, adding that the FBI did not confiscate any devices from the city council members or the mayor.
Incumbent Mayor Paul Leon had stronger words.
“I want this on record,” Leon said. “He’s an absolute liar when he says that the council members’ electronics were taken away.”
The FBI did not respond to KVCR’s requests for comment on the investigation into Wapner.
Wapner’s contender, Michael Rios, is suspicious.
“I can’t say a lot because it’s still under investigation,” Rios said. “But I will say that nobody is raided by the FBI for no reason.”