# Irwindale City Council Compare records and positions simply between H. Manuel Ortiz, Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien, and 1 more for Irwindale City Council at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person holds one of Irwindale's five at-large City Council seats. They vote on the city budget, land use, and city ordinances. Irwindale is one of the smallest incorporated cities in Los Angeles County. The term is four years. The council does not elect its mayor directly. Members choose one of their own to serve as mayor each year. That person also serves as mayor pro tem. That person leads meetings but casts only one vote, like every other member. - Jurisdiction: City of Irwindale - Election: November 3, 2026 California general election - Seats: 2 - Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements. - Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/irwindale-council - Full ballot: this page covers one race. Every contest on a voter's own ballot, by address, with the same breakdown for each: https://voteorelse.com/ - Sources last retrieved: August 31, 2026 - Source-objectivity score: 80 out of 100 (Strong), across 11 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology ## On the ballot - **H. Manuel Ortiz** — Incumbent - **Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien** - **Maricela Romero Frymark** A nonpartisan office: candidates do not run as Democrats or Republicans, and no party appears on the ballot. Two of Irwindale's five City Council seats are on the November 3 ballot. Incumbent Mayor H. Manuel Ortiz is seeking another term. Mayor Pro Tem Albert F. Ambriz, whose seat is also up, did not file for reelection. That leaves two challengers, Marguerite Lopez-Sapien and Maricela Romero Frymark, to compete for the open seat alongside Ortiz. Irwindale's council is five members, all elected citywide on staggered 4-year terms; the other three seats — held by Mark Breceda, Larry Burrola, and Manuel Garcia — aren't up this cycle. The council chooses one of its own to serve as mayor and mayor pro tem each year, so voters elect a councilmember, not a mayor directly. Whoever wins holds the seat for four years, setting the budget, land use, and city ordinances for a city of about 1,470 residents — one of the smallest and most industrial in Los Angeles County, built on sand-and-gravel quarrying, a sriracha factory, and a former MillerCoors brewery site rather than housing. With one incumbent, one repeat challenger, and one first-time candidate campaigning for two seats, this is a plurality race decided in a single round — the two highest vote-getters win outright. Ortiz is the only sitting officeholder in the field, so the practical question for voters is who takes the second seat: a candidate who narrowly lost a citywide race two years ago, or a political newcomer who already sits on the city's Planning Commission. ## H. Manuel Ortiz H. Manuel Ortiz is Irwindale's sitting mayor. He was first elected to the City Council in November 2005. He was reelected in 2009, 2013, 2018, and 2022, and now seeks a sixth term. He is running on the priorities his official council biography lists. Those are fiscal accountability, expanded youth and senior programs, public safety, and housing opportunities. His council colleagues have chosen him mayor four separate times, in 2006, 2009, 2020, and 2022. That is more than anyone else on the current council. **Strengths:** Two decades of council experience and four terms as mayor. That gives him more institutional knowledge of Irwindale's budget and its quarrying-dependent economy than either challenger. **Trade-offs:** Two decades in the same seat draws the standard incumbent critique. That means no fresh outside perspective. No independent reporting on his tenure surfaced to weigh against his own account. **Keep in mind:** Nothing adverse surfaced in coverage of his tenure. But coverage itself is thin. A city of about 1,470 people draws little independent local news. So most of what is known about his record comes from the city's own materials, not outside reporting. ## Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien is a repeat council candidate. They are running again after finishing fourth of four candidates for three seats in the November 2024 general election. No campaign platform, website, or public candidate statement for their 2026 run was found. They lost their 2024 bid by a thin margin. Election-night counts had them trailing the third-place finisher by 27 votes. All four candidates were separated by just 52 votes as ballots were still being tallied. **Strengths:** A second citywide run in two years gives Lopez-Sapien more name recognition than a true first-time candidate would have. That counts in a race this small, among Irwindale's roughly 1,470 residents. **Trade-offs:** They have never held elected or appointed office. No campaign website, platform, or public statement for this run was found. Voters have little besides their name and their narrow 2024 loss. **Keep in mind:** Their 2024 loss was close enough to read as a real base of support, not a token run. But no news coverage, finance filing, or public statement from their 2026 campaign was found. So their current platform is simply unknown. ## Maricela Romero Frymark Maricela Romero Frymark is a first-time council candidate who currently chairs Irwindale's Planning Commission, the appointed board that recommends land-use decisions to the City Council. No campaign website, platform statement, or news coverage of their candidacy turned up in this research. Their Planning Commission role is the one confirmed, substantive fact available about them going into this race. **Strengths:** As Planning Commission chair Romero Frymark has recent experience with land use and development. Those are the same questions the City Council decides. It is a credential neither opponent can claim. **Trade-offs:** They have never held elected office. No campaign website, platform statement, or independent news coverage of their 2026 candidacy was found. **Keep in mind:** Their Planning Commission chairmanship is confirmed by the city's own website. Nothing else about their platform could be confirmed. Their public record on the issues they would vote on as a councilmember is effectively blank. ## Sources 1. [City of Irwindale — City Council General Municipal Election page (candidate ballot order finalized Aug. 17, 2026, and a Status of Candidate Filing table, last updated Aug. 6, 2026: H. Manuel Ortiz, Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien, and Maricela Romero Frymark all qualified for the City Council's 2 open seats)](https://www.irwindaleca.gov/589/City-Council-General-Municipal-Election-) 2. [City of Irwindale — Notice of Offices and Nominations for the Nov. 3, 2026 General Municipal Election (For Two (2) Members of the City Council, full 4-year term; nomination period July 13-Aug. 7, 2026; confirms one incumbent, H. Manuel Ortiz, had filed as of Aug. 3, with a second, unnamed eligible incumbent still required to file by the original Aug. 7 deadline)](https://www.irwindaleca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/13077/2026-NOTICE-OF-OFFICES-AND-NOMINATIONS) 3. [City of Irwindale — City Council (current roster and official biographies: Mayor H. Manuel Ortiz and Mayor Pro Tem Albert F. Ambriz, both with terms expiring Nov. 3, 2026, plus Councilmembers Mark A. Breceda, Larry G. Burrola, and Manuel R. Garcia, each with a term expiring Nov. 7, 2028 -- confirming Ambriz's, not Ortiz's, is the second seat in play since Ambriz is not on the qualified-candidate list)](https://www.irwindaleca.gov/132/City-Council) 4. [City of Irwindale — Planning Commission (current roster: Maricela Frymark, Chair; the appointed advisory board that recommends land-use decisions to the City Council, 4-year appointed terms)](https://www.irwindaleca.gov/130/Planning-Commission) 5. [San Gabriel Valley Tribune — "2024 Election Results: Several San Gabriel Valley, Whittier-area races on razor thin margins," naming Irwindale's 4-candidate, 3-seat 2024 City Council race and Marguerite Lopez-Sapien's fourth-place position, trailing the third-place finisher by 27 votes with all four candidates separated by 52 votes, as counting continued (not paywalled; full article read)](https://www.sgvtribune.com/2024/11/07/2024-election-results-several-san-gabriel-valley-whittier-area-races-on-razor-thin-margins/) 6. [San Gabriel Valley Tribune (Southern California News Group) — "Marguerite Lopez-Sapien, Irwindale City Council candidate, 2024 election questionnaire" (paywalled beyond its opening line; used only to corroborate that she ran and was covered by name in the 2024 cycle, not for any paywalled content)](https://www.sgvtribune.com/2024/10/15/marguerite-lopez-sapien-irwindale-city-council-candidate-2024-election-questionnaire/) 7. [Ballotpedia — Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien (Irwindale City Council At-large, California, candidate 2024): confirms she ran in the Nov. 5, 2024 general election (3 seats, 4 candidates) and did not complete Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey; the page itself states Ballotpedia "did not receive biographical information for this candidate"](https://ballotpedia.org/Marguerite_S._Lopez-Sapien_(Irwindale_City_Council_At-large,_California,_candidate_2024)) 8. [The Ballot Book — City of Irwindale Candidates (unofficial, automated-monitoring aggregator; independently returns the identical 3-candidate field for the city's 1 open office)](https://theballotbook.com/jurisdictions/730/candidates) 9. [The Ballot Book — Marguerite S. Lopez-Sapien (person profile: finished 4th in the Nov. 5, 2024 general election; no election committees found on record)](https://theballotbook.com/people/103346) 10. [The Ballot Book — Maricela Romero Frymark (person profile: no prior election history and no election committees found on record, consistent with a first-time candidate)](https://theballotbook.com/people/103345) 11. [Wikipedia — Irwindale, California (council-manager city government with a five-member, at-large City Council; 2020 census population of 1,472; economic profile built on sand-and-gravel quarrying, a Huy Fong Foods sriracha factory, and a former MillerCoors brewery site)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irwindale,_California) ## The rest of the ballot Irwindale City Council is one contest among the many a California voter decides on November 3, 2026 — Congress, the Legislature, county, city, and school board races differ by address. Vote or Else builds the full list for any California address and breaks down each contest the way this page does, with no account and without storing the address: https://voteorelse.com/ ## How to cite this page Vote or Else, "Irwindale City Council — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/irwindale-council (sources last retrieved August 31, 2026). Link the canonical page above rather than this Markdown file. Coverage is updated as the race develops, so quote it with its retrieval date.