Montebello Mayor and 32nd Senate Candidate Vanessa Delgado Tied to Arman Gabaee

BY BRIAN HEWS

Hews Media Group Community News has learned that 32^ndSenate Candidate and current Montebello Mayor Vanessa Delgado consulted and worked with Arman Gabaee, the Beverly Hill real estate developer who was arrested this week on felony charges of bribing a Los Angeles County employee to secure a $45 million government lease.

HMG-CN contacted Delgado who confirmed she worked with Gabaee from 2016-2017.

“My firm was a consultant to his development company in 2016 and I was paid for a set scope of work, it was a mixed-use project and a grocery-anchored shopping center in Downtown Pomona,” Delgado said.

Delgado would not elaborate on the length and breadth of the “scope of work” but sources are telling HMG-CN that it was a very large project that included a Smart and Final grocery outlet and several bargain-type department stores such as Ross and TJ Maxx.

According to the criminal complaint filed last week, Gabaee provided the employee $1,000 a month over a six-year period in exchange for leases and other benefits.

The complaint stated, the employee began cooperating with the FBI in 2016, recording conversations with Gabaee and “others.”

The complaint stated that agents intercepted several phone calls by Gabaee to “other” people.

The recordings were during the time Delgado was working with Gabaee, but it unknown if Delgado was one of the “others” that was recorded.

This has been an eventful week for Delgado.

It was revealed by HMG-CN that the Delgado campaign received over $398,000 in support from three different independent expenditure committees.

Major donors included Chevron Oil, Houston-based CRC Services, Tesoro Oil, and Valero Oil.

In addition, her tenure as Mayor of Montebello will include an order by the state to audit city’s finances.

The audit should be finished in three to four months.