Update: On Thursday, November 3rd, L.A. TACO received a statement from Michelle LeClerc, one of the three petition writers:
"We’d like to begin by thanking LA TACO for covering this story. As the petition writers, Miriam Velez Sanchez, Chiany Dri and I (Michelle Leclerc) never imagined it would receive so much attention. This movement is not anonymous. Every signature in the petition represents a name and a voice. Right now, there are over 1,200 voices asking for change.
Contrary to Sophia Miles, the co-owner of soon-to-be Tres Hermanas Restaurant in Ojai’s statements, we wish her restaurant well and look forward to her thriving business, which is why we designed our requests to be simple to implement before they launched a website or placed signage on their storefront. There’s a misconception that the petition was the only presence online that flagged issues of appropriation. We should point out that influencers on TikTok and Instagram as well as commenters on Instagram had been voicing concern in the days prior to the petition’s conception. Many of the comments on Tres Hermanas Ojai’s instagram were deleted, and the comments that remained disappeared when Tres Hermanas Ojai either archived or removed their Instagram page.
On September 8, we wrote the petition and spent the evening revising it without promotion. On September 9, we promoted and announced the petition, and it immediately began gathering signatures.
The meeting that we had planned for Saturday, Sept 17th with Sophia was designed to give suggestions on how these changes can be implemented with minimal costs in mind by providing suggestions based on our collective branding and DEI expertise. Unfortunately, Sophia canceled the meeting that day based on “outside advice and counsel and members of the community” whom she continues, “have all advised me not to meet with you.” Despite her clear indication that she would not meet with us, she had expressed a desire to meet in the future. Sophia has not requested a meeting since. We assumed she wished to address the petition concerns on her own, but if she wants or requires our assistance, we hope she reaches out. An Instagram DM is best.