School Board Hopeful Loses Backing
School board hopeful Christopher Arellano's troubles deepened Friday when the Los Angeles County Democratic Party angrily withdrew its support for him after learning that he lied about earning a graduate degree from USC.
Arellano, a political novice who is considered a front-runner in Tuesday's race for an open seat on the seven-member Los Angeles Board of Education, has said repeatedly that he received a dual master's degree in social work and urban planning from the university. And in at least two campaign fliers mailed to prospective voters, he claimed to have earned "two master's degrees from USC."
Documents provided by the university, however, show that although Arellano, 33, was enrolled between 2001 and 2005, he was not awarded either a dual degree or two separate degrees. University officials declined to specify what requirements Arellano had failed to complete.
Arellano declined to be interviewed Friday. In an e-mail sent by a campaign consultant, Arellano said he had completed all the requirements for the social work portion of the dual degree but acknowledged that he had "one semester of coursework" to do before completing the urban planning requirements.
Heather Repenning, Arellano's consultant, said Arellano thought "it was a kind of formality" that he had not finished the program. In the e-mail, Arellano said he was allowed to participate in the graduation ceremony and had completed the comprehensive exams for the urban planning degree.
Repenning added that Arellano intends to return to USC to complete the courses, but she did not specify when.
Sheriff Lee Baca, who had endorsed Arellano, called on the candidate Friday to withdraw from the race.
"You don't run for public office and deceive the public as to your qualifications. He should know better, and it's time for him to honorably withdraw from the process," Baca said. "To me there's no margin of error in this sort of thing. It's wrong to claim you've achieved a college degree when you have not. Puffing up your resume unnecessarily is a character issue."
The controversy surrounding the degrees came after Arellano acknowledged he had twice been convicted of shoplifting in the 1990s.
That revelation did not fracture the broad and powerful base of support Arellano has won in the campaign. United Teachers Los Angeles, the teachers union that has almost entirely funded Arellano's campaign, reaffirmed its support for him earlier this week. So did the county Democratic Party and others, saying he had turned his life around after a troubled youth.
