county government

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Rebecca Ellis, Noah Goldberg and the esteemed Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

For nearly three years, Los Angeles City Controller Kenneth Mejia has been trying to use his office to dig deep on the city’s homelessness programs — how they’re run and, more importantly, how effective they are.

The road so far has been a bit bumpy.

Early in his tenure, Mejia sent staffers to the Westside to monitor Mayor Karen Bass’ Inside Safe program, which moves unhoused people into hotels and motels. He quickly pulled back after facing resistance within City Hall.

A year later, Mejia offered to have his office conduct a court-ordered audit of the city’s homelessness programs. The work went to a private firm instead, at a cost to taxpayers of nearly $3 million.

Mejia also promised to produce a “focused audit” on Inside Safe, the mayor’s signature homelessness initiative, which has not materialized.

At one point, he even posted an Instagram video of himself and his staff doing choreographed moves to Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” to explain why he hadn’t audited the program. The video displayed the words: “We tried. We tried. We tried.”

But this week, the city’s top accountant got his big break, securing a plum role in the high-stakes legal battle over homelessness between the city and the nonprofit L.A. Alliance for Human Rights. That fight hinges on whether the city is living up to its commitment, enshrined in a legal settlement, to clear encampments and build more homeless beds.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter assigned attorney Daniel Garrie, an expert in cybersecurity and computer forensics, as a new third-party monitor to determine whether the city is truly on track to open 12,915 new homeless beds and remove nearly 10,000 encampments, as required by the settlement.

Carter tapped Mejia to serve as a liaison between Garrie and the city, calling him the “most knowledgeable person” on homelessness funding. In a six-page order, the judge said the city controller would support Garrie by “facilitating data access.” He also said Mejia would be less expensive than former City Controller Ron Galperin, who was also under consideration and expected to charge $800 an hour.

The judge’s order was well-timed, coming at a moment of heightened scrutiny over homelessness initiatives in L.A. and across the region.

On Thursday, federal prosecutors accused two real estate executives of misappropriating millions of dollars in state funds allocated in the region’s fight against homelessness. According to prosecutors, one of them engaged in bank fraud, identity theft and money laundering — purchasing a property on L.A.’s Westside and quickly flipping it for more than double the price to Weingart Center Assn., a nonprofit housing developer that received city funds to build interim homeless housing.

Mayoral candidate Austin Beutner, the former schools superintendent who spent some time at City Hall, also turned up the heat, calling this week for Bass to let Mejia audit the city’s homeless programs. He made that pitch after Rand researchers concluded that the region’s yearly homeless count is not accurately tracking homeless people who don’t live in tents or cars.

“The Mayor is blocking the elected Controller from auditing the City’s efforts,” Beutner said on X. “We need an immediate audit to tell us how much is being spent, on what, and whether it’s having any impact.”

Bass spokesperson Clara Karger, in an email to The Times, said the mayor and the city controller “work well together” on various issues, including a recent audit of the city’s housing department.

Asked whether Bass refused to participate in Mejia’s planned Inside Safe audit last year, Karger replied: “A city elected official should not conduct a performance audit of another elected official.”

“Inside Safe has robust oversight systems in place,” she said. “There are hundreds of pages of publicly available reports on Inside Safe and an assessment of Inside Safe was completed under the Alliance settlement.”

City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto declined to weigh in on Carter’s order. But she has previously pointed to a 16-year-old legal ruling barring the city controller from conducting performance audits of other elected officials.

“The legal advice from the City Attorney’s Office is known to our clients and has not changed over the years,” said Feldstein Soto spokesperson Karen Richardson.

The judge’s order may only be the beginning.

Mejia has been urging the city’s Charter Reform Commission to propose language that clearly gives him the power to audit programs overseen by his fellow elected officials. Such a move would erase any doubts about whether he has the legal standing to scrutinize Inside Safe.

The debate over the powers of the city controller goes back decades. In 2008, then-City Controller Laura Chick clashed with City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo over her attempt to audit his office’s workers compensation unit. The following year, right before Chick left office, a judge sided with Delgadillo and found that the controller lacked the authority for the audit.

In the short term, Carter’s order could give Mejia new leeway to identify lax oversight of L.A.’s homelessness programs, offering the public fresh insight into how closely they are tracked, and possibly identifying waste or fraud.

Mejia declined interview requests from The Times. Last month in federal court, he dazzled Carter with his office’s online dashboards, which show expenditures not just for Inside Safe but many other homelessness programs.

Carter praised the work of Mejia and his team, according to a transcript of the proceedings. Mejia, in turn, said his office enjoys the work but sometimes struggles to carry it out with its existing staff.

“Some of these contracts are 400 pages,” he said. “And so right now, we have a two-person team who is doing all of that and putting all this together.”

Attorney Elizabeth Mitchell, who represents the L.A. Alliance, welcomed the selection of Mejia, saying he’s clearly been pushing to get more involved in the case.

“My only concern is, I don’t know if he will engender a lot of cooperation from the city, because they don’t seem inclined to cooperate with him,” Mitchell said.

That wasn’t the message from Councilmember Tim McOsker, who voiced alarm in recent months over the costly bills submitted by the outside law firm handling the L.A. Alliance case for the city. McOsker, who spent several years in the city attorney’s office, expressed confidence in Mejia’s abilities and said the decision to pick him would be cost effective.

“It is imperative that we give value to the taxpayers of the city of Los Angeles,” he said.

State of play

— BEUTNERPALOOZA: After weeks of speculation, Beutner jumped into the June 2026 race for mayor. His team got off to a choppy start last weekend, uploading “Austin for LA Mayor” images to his social media accounts before he had even made a formal announcement, then abruptly taking them down. Hours later, Beutner formally went public, blasting Bass over the city’s handling of the Palisades fire, which destroyed his mother-in-law’s home and severely damaged his Pacific Palisades home.

By Monday, Beutner had released a video announcing his campaign, which assailed Trump over his immigration crackdown. Two days later, he appeared with supporters in San Pedro, repeating his warning that the city is “adrift.”

— DEFINE ADRIFT: The following morning, Bass joined former Councilmember Mike Bonin, director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs, to discuss politics, leadership and her tenure. She took issue with Beutner’s characterization of L.A. as “adrift,” saying the city has been through “multiple shocks this year,” including a catastrophic firestorm and “being invaded” by federal authorities in June.

The talk took place on the 72nd floor of the U.S. Bank Tower, offering a staggeringly beautiful post-rain city view, which offers a good excuse to revisit former California poet laureate Dana Gioia’s classic poem, “Los Angeles After the Rain.”

— FIERCE AMBITION: Is L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath running for mayor of Los Angeles? The former West Hollywood mayor hasn’t ruled it out — and moved to the city a few months ago.

— WE’RE NOT IN TEXAS ANYMORE: Two more plaintiffs in L.A. County’s $4-billion sex abuse settlement have come forward to say they were told to invent their claims in exchange for cash. The allegations follow a Times investigation published earlier this month that found seven plaintiffs who claimed they received cash from recruiters to sue the county over sex abuse. Downtown LA Law Group, which filed cases for the plaintiffs, has denied involvement with the alleged recruiters.

— BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE: Meanwhile, the county is preparing to pay out an additional $828 million to another group of plaintiffs who say they were sexually abused in county facilities.

— GETTING OUT THE VOTE: Real estate developer Rick Caruso, the is-he-or-isn’t-he potential mayoral/gubernatorial candidate, is sending mailers to more than 45,000 voters who lived in fire-damaged sections of Pacific Palisades, Malibu and Altadena and now have temporary addresses. He advised them on how to update their voter registration by listing a temporary mailing address while also remaining in their original voting district, according to a Caruso spokesperson. Caruso is paying for the effort, which is nonpartisan and doesn’t mention any specific election. His team declined to provide the cost.

—SPEAKING OF CARUSO: Politico took a look at the mall magnate’s recent travels around the state, which have fueled speculation that he’s leaning toward a gubernatorial bid. The outlet reported that Caruso, who self-financed his 2022 mayoral campaign, recently met with Democratic megadonors Haim Saban and Ari Emanuel.

— THREE’S COMPANY: East Hollywood resident Dylan Kendall filed paperwork this week to challenge incumbent Hugo Soto–Martínez in next year’s race to represent Hollywood, Silver Lake, Echo Park and other neighborhoods. Kendall, a business owner who previously worked at the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, cited quality-of-life issues as the impetus for her candidacy. Political consultant Michael Trujillo and fundraiser Kat Connolly have joined her campaign. (One of Soto-Martínez’s upstairs neighbors, Colter Carlisle, is also running.)

— MORE FALLOUT FROM G: L.A. County Chief Executive Fesia Davenport received a $2-million payout this summer after telling the county supervisors she had experienced professional fallout from Measure G, a voter-approved ballot measure that will soon make her job obsolete.

— 1,000 DAYS LEFT: Bass reminded Angelenos on Friday that the start of the 2028 Olympic Games is just 1,000 days away. Appearing in Venice, she signed an executive directive streamlining preparations for the international event.

— BYE, JULIA: We are super bummed to report that this was erstwhile City Hall reporter Julia Wick‘s last week at The Times. She will miss all of you. But she says please keep in touch!

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to combat homelessness went to Hollywood this week, focusing on the area around Santa Monica Boulevard and Heliotrope Drive in Soto-Martínez’s district.
• On the docket next week: The council’s public works committee takes up the issue of long-delayed sidewalk repairs, including the city’s obligations to make them wheelchair accessible.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Rebecca Ellis with an assist from Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Los Angeles County’s Board of Supervisors met for hours in closed session with attorneys Tuesday to ponder a legal quandary about as thorny as they come.

What do you do with a $4-billion sex abuse settlement when some plaintiffs say they were paid to sue?

On one hand, the supervisors emphasized, they want victims to get the compensation they’re owed for abuse they suffered at the hands of county employees. That’s why they green-lighted the largest sex abuse settlement in U.S. history this April.

But the allegations of paid plaintiffs, surfaced by The Times last week, have also raised concerns about potential misconduct. The supervisors stated the obvious Tuesday: They do not want taxpayer money set aside for victims going to people who were never in county facilities.

“The entire process angers and sickens me,” said Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who first called for the investigation into the payout, at the meeting Tuesday. “We must ensure that nothing like this ever happens again.”

A Times investigation last week found seven people who said they were paid by recruiters to sue L.A. County for sex abuse. Two of them said they were explicitly told to fabricate claims. All the people who said they were paid had lawsuits filed by Downtown LA Law Group, or DTLA, which has about 2,700 clients in the settlement.

DTLA has denied paying anyone to file a lawsuit and said no representative of the firm had been authorized to make payments. The Times could not reach any of the representatives who allegedly made the payments for comment.

“We have always worked hard to present only meritorious claims and have systems in place to help weed out false or exaggerated allegations,” the firm said in a statement.

The allegations dropped a bomb on the nearly finalized legal settlement, leaving county attorneys and plaintiffs lawyers scrambling to figure out the best path forward.

Some have called for the county to get out of the settlement half a year after announcing it. Technically, it can. The settlement agreement, reviewed by The Times, has a clause that allows the county to pull out unless all but 120 of the plaintiffs agree to the terms — a number attorneys could almost certainly surpass with more than 11,000 plaintiffs.

But the county does not appear to be relishing the thought of blowing up a settlement that took months of negotiations, countless hours in a courtroom and one can only guess how much in billable attorney hours. Many of these cases, attorneys for the county warn, could cost tens of millions in a trial. Clearing them all at once for $4 billion could, believe it or not, end up sounding like a bargain.

No decision was made Tuesday after hours in closed session. The only news out of it was the announcement that Fesia Davenport, the chief executive, would be going on medical leave for the next few months. She will be temporarily replaced by Joe Nicchitta, the office’s second-in-command.

Davenport emphasized the reasons for her absence were personal and had nothing to do with the settlement after rumors immediately swirled connecting the two.

“I am deeply disappointed that I have to address baseless allegations that my leave is somehow related to the County’s AB 218 settlement — which it is not,” she said in a statement. “I am on medical leave and expect to return to work in early 2026.”

Next Tuesday, the supervisors plan to meet again in closed session to grapple with the settlement, according to the board agenda.

In the aftermath of the investigation, some county watchdogs have called for the government to better screen the claims it’s poised to pay out.

“There was a lack of the basics,” said Eric Preven, a local government observer, who said he’s worried about the effect of unvetted lawsuits on the government. “What have we done?”

“We’re glad the supervisors are finally doing their jobs, but what took them so long?” said the Daily News editorial board.

County counsel says they’re working on it. They’ve demanded “evidentiary statements” for each victim and search for whatever documentation exists, the office said in a statement.

“But the simple truth is this: Los Angeles County is facing more than 11,000 claims, most of which are decades old, where evidence is scarce or nonexistent,” the statement read. “Survivors and taxpayers deserve a process with integrity, not one that rewards coercion, shortcuts, or abuse of the system.”

Some victims say they’re concerned the allegations of paid plaintiffs will taint the settlement and delay justice for legitimate survivors.

Tanina Evans, 47, said she spent her childhood bouncing around county-run juvenile halls and group homes. She sued the county after she said she was sexually abused multiple times, including once at Eastlake Juvenile Hall, where she says she was forced to give a staff member oral sex in the shower. When she refused, she said, the staff member had the teenagers she was incarcerated with beat her up.

She said she worries experiences like hers will now be looked at with new skepticism.

“People are so quick to justify not penalizing anyone. Are they looking for a loophole?” Evans said. “And it’s like, no, you guys know it’s real.”

State of play

— PALISADES ARREST AND FALLOUT: Federal prosecutors filed charges Wednesday in the Palisades fire, accusing Jonathan Rinderknecht, 29, of starting the initial fire on New Year’s Day that rekindled to become the devastating blaze days later. This latest revelation is fueling debate over whether the city of L.A. or the state of California can be found civilly liable for its role in the fire, our colleague Jenny Jarvie reports.

—NEW FINDINGS: With the federal investigation tied up, Mayor Karen Bass’ office released a long-awaited after-action report finding that firefighters were hampered by an ineffective process for recalling them back to work, as well as poor communication, inexperienced leadership and a lack of resources.

—2022 NEVER ENDS, SCREENTIME EDITION: Speaking at Bloomberg’s Screentime conference Wednesday, Bass characterized her former mayoral opponent and frequent critic Rick Caruso as “sad and bitter.” Earlier in the day, Caruso had put out a statement in response to the charges filed against Rinderknecht that called the Palisades fire “a failure of government on an epic level, starting with Mayor Bass.” During a separate appearance at the Screentime conference, Caruso shot back at Bass, saying anger was an appropriate response to the contents of the report. Caruso still hasn’t said whether he plans to run for mayor or governor next year, or sit out the 2026 election.

—BUT THEY WEREN’T JUST FIGHTING! A day later, Bass called on the City Council to adopt an ordinance that would help establish a one-time exemption to Measure ULA, the city’s so-called “mansion tax,” for Palisades fire-affected properties, to speed up sales and spur rebuilding and rehabilitation of the area. Bass’ office said her letter to the council followed a meeting with Caruso, who had “proposed ideas to help address this issue.”

—FAREWELL, FORKISH: LAPD public information director Jennifer Forkish resigned Thursday at the request of Chief Jim McDonnell, amid accusations from the region’s top federal prosecutor that her office was leaking information. But Forkish vehemently denied the “baseless allegation” that she had leaked anything.

—GARBAGE MONEY: City Council voted Tuesday to finalize a dramatic fee increase for residential trash collection, after giving the fee hike preliminary approval back in April. This is the first time the fees have been raised in 17 years and the city was heavily subsidizing the program, at the cost of roughly $500,000 a day.

—PAYOUT IN SPOTLIGHT: The Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to launch an investigation into possible misconduct by “legal representatives” involved in sex abuse litigation. The county auditor’s office also will set up a hotline dedicated to tips from the public related to the lawsuits.

— MUSICAL CHAIRS: Former FBI agent Erroll Southers plans to step down from the L.A. Police Commission, my colleague Libor Jany reported Friday. Southers has been a member of the panel since 2023, when Bass picked him to serve out the term of a departing commissioner. His appointment to a full five-year term was supposed to come before the City Council a few weeks ago, but instead the council continued the matter — setting off a bizarre bureaucratic chain of events that led to Southers essentially being confirmed by default due to city rules and the council’s inaction (too complicated to fully summarize here, but Libor explained it all in his story at the time).

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? Bass’ initiative addressed an encampment on Lincoln Boulevard in Westchester, in partnership with Councilmember Traci Park’s office.
• On the docket next week: The board will vote on a state of emergency over recent federal immigration actions to provide the supervisors with more power to assist those affected by the flood of deportations. And, over in City Hall, the council’s public safety committee will consider the mayor’s appointment of Jeffrey Skobin to the police commission on Wednesday.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Julia Wick and David Zahniser, giving you the latest on city and county government.

It’s been a minute since Hugo Soto-Martínez and Colter Carlisle last bumped into each other in the laundry room of their apartment complex.

Not since before Carlisle, who serves as vice president of the East Hollywood Neighborhood Council, filed paperwork Monday to challenge Soto-Martínez for his L.A. City Council seat.

“I am wondering if it will be the most awkward moment of my entire life,” Carlisle said of his inevitable laundry room run-in with his new opponent. “But we’ll see how it goes.”

A sitting council member being challenged by a member of a neighborhood council is far from an unusual occurrence. But this is the first time, to our knowledge, that a council member will face off against their upstairs neighbor.

“I want to be clear that me running has zero to do with the fact that he’s my downstairs neighbor,” Carlisle said.

Carlisle, who works in freelance legal sales and has served on the neighborhood council since 2021, will face a vertiginously steep path in his quest to unseat Soto-Martínez.

Soto-Martínez ousted an incumbent in 2022, expanding the council’s left flank to represent a densely packed collection of neighborhoods that includes Silver Lake, Echo Park, Atwater Village and Hollywood.

A former union organizer, Soto-Martínez has deep support from the city’s powerful labor unions and the local chapter of Democratic Socialists of America. He is one of the few renters on the council and was running unopposed until Carlisle entered the race.

It was “a massive coincidence,” Carlisle said, that the neighborhood council member (who won his 2023 election with 16 votes) and the City Council member (who won his 2022 election with 38,069 votes) lived in the same East Hollywood complex in the first place.

“After he won, we were both kind of like, ‘Wait, are we, like, co-workers now?’” Carlisle recalled. “When that happened, it was sort of like, OK, I don’t want to bother him at home. I don’t want him to come home and worry he’s going to run into me. Both of us need to come home and decompress.”

Carlisle voted for Soto-Martínez for 2022, he said, but housing issues catalyzed his decision to challenge his neighbor in 2026.

Carlisle argues that the city’s push to build more housing is displacing long-term residents. He thinks the payouts the city requires for tenants who are pushed out by new construction are insufficient.

“I don’t believe that knocking down the rent-controlled apartments is going to lead to more affordability in Los Angeles,” Carlisle said.

He takes particular issue with Soto-Martínez’s support for Senate Bill 79 — a housing bill on Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk that would override local zoning and allow far more density near transit stops.

Carlisle vehemently opposes the bill, contending that new construction will come at the expense of existing rent-stabilized units. (The bill exempts most rent-stabilized buildings, but not duplexes.)

He also thinks Soto-Martínez should have fought a planned eight-story apartment building on Carlton Way. The development will require demolishing a number of small rent-stabilized apartment buildings to build 131 new apartment units — 17 of which will be set aside for low- or very low-income residents.

Soto-Martínez spokesperson Nick Barnes-Batista said the council member’s office had been working closely with the tenants on Carlton Way and that the project followed affordability guidelines. Although the remaining 114 units in the building will be market rate, they will all fall under the city’s rent-stabilization ordinance, Barnes-Batista said.

Barnes-Batista also clarified that his boss did not take an official position on SB 79: He merely voted to oppose a resolution opposing it, rather than voting to support it.

(We apologize that you will have to read the prior sentence twice, slowly, to understand what the heck it means. The semantic distinction is there, but it’s a narrow one.)

“Renters make up over 60% of the city, yet they’ve historically been left out of decision-making at City Hall. We’re changing that with a full-time team helping tenants facing eviction stay in their homes, and we have a motion in committee right now to hopefully cap rent increases at 3% for every rent-stabilized tenant in Los Angeles,” Soto-Martínez said in a written statement.

And for those keeping track at home, Councilmember Tim McOsker is now the only incumbent running unopposed.

State of play

— PAYING PLAINTIFFS? Seven people told The Times they were paid to sue Los Angeles County over sexual abuse at juvenile halls. The claims were part of a $4-billion payout — the largest sex abuse settlement in U.S. history. A Times investigation found that a nebulous network of vendors ushered people desperate for cash toward a law firm that could profit significantly from the business.

— SCRUTINIZING SB 79: Gov. Gavin Newsom still hasn’t decided the fate of Senate Bill 79, the aforementioned landmark housing bill that would upzone scores of neighborhoods across the city, paving the way for taller, denser buildings near public transit. But the scramble is already on by homeowners, renters’ rights advocates and even politicians to figure out which locations are covered by SB 79 — a task made difficult by the bill’s various exemptions and deferrals.

— HOUSING SLUMP: Apartment construction in L.A. has dropped by nearly a third over the last three years, as real estate developers struggle with unprofitable economics and continued uncertainty around city and state housing laws. “L.A. has been redlined by the majority of the investment community,” said Ari Kahan, a principal of California Landmark Group.

— RAISING THE WAGE: Speaking of new regulations, six members of the City Council are looking at increasing the hourly pay of private sector construction workers with a law that would give them a $32.35 per hour minimum wage and a $7.65 per hour healthcare credit. Under their proposal, the council would need to authorize a study of the idea first.

— AUTOMATIC APPROVAL: One of Mayor Karen Bass’ appointees on the Board of Police Commissioners has secured another term, but not because he was approved by the City Council. The mayor’s reappointment of Erroll Southers, a former FBI agent turned top USC security official, showed up on several council agendas. But the council, facing protesters at several meetings, never actually acted, allowing Southers’ approval to become automatic.

— FAREWELL, ZACH! Bass is losing her top press deputy. Deputy Mayor Zach Seidl has taken a job as managing director of Click Strategies, a political consulting firm based in L.A. run by former Newsom comms chief Nathan Click. Seidl, who departs Oct. 17, has been an aide to Bass over the last decade, working for her in the U.S. Congress, on the campaign trail and inside City Hall. Bass has named Samuel Jean, a communications strategist, as her interim communications director.

(Fun fact: Back in December, Seidl helped Click pull off his marriage proposal to his now-fiance and Seidl’s then-colleague, former Bass deputy mayor Joey Freeman, on the observation deck of City Hall.)

— RESISTING THE RVS: A proposed RV park in L.A.’s Harbor City neighborhood has been met with fierce opposition from local residents, spurring a lengthy battle inside and outside City Hall.

— FINDING THE BEDS: A new tracking system at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority was supposed to modernize an antiquated process for filling beds inside L.A. County’s homeless shelters, ensuring that more people get off the streets. But the nonprofits who run the shelters say the data produced by the system are often inaccurate.

— POLICE BLOTTER: LAPD officers apprehended a man on Friday who drove a car onto the Spring Street steps of City Hall and wouldn’t come out of his vehicle for about two hours.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to address homelessness did not launch any new encampment operations this week.
• On the docket next week: The City Council votes Tuesday on whether to finalize a big increase in trash fees for single-family homes and small apartments. Meetings will be canceled on Wednesday and Friday so members can attend the annual League of California Cities conference.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Noah Goldberg, with an assist from Rebecca Ellis, giving you the latest on city and county government.

A majority of the Los Angeles City Council believed that an expansion of the L.A. Convention Center was absolutely necessary.

The venue was losing out on event bookings to smaller cities like Anaheim and Las Vegas. But the expansion would be one of the most expensive publicly-financed projects in city history, and taxpayers would be paying down the debt for the next three decades.

The year was 1985. The number one song on the Billboard Hot 100 list was — and it couldn’t have been more apt — “We Built This City” by Starship.

That year, the council approved construction of the Convention Center’s South Hall, which Angelenos now know for its curving green facade facing the 110 Freeway. The project added hundreds of thousands of square feet of event space at a price tag of $310 million — though it ended up costing $500 million.

Now, history seems to be looping around again in last week’s debate about another Convention Center expansion, this time across Pico Boulevard to link the center’s two buildings.

The City Council voted last Friday to move forward with a $2.6-billion expansion that city budget advisers warned will draw taxpayer funds away from essential city services for decades. Any construction delays could endanger plans to host judo, wrestling and other Olympic competitions in 2028, triggering financial penalties if the venue isn’t ready in time.

In 1985, only Councilmember Joel Wachs voted against the expansion — though he told The Times he couldn’t remember the exact reason. It’s been 40 years, after all.

“That said, I’m not at all surprised I opposed it … as I did other projects where I felt the city would be on the hook for untold costs with no real meaningful assurances of benefits that could possibly justify it,” he said.

Wachs said that barring any convincing arguments on the other side, “I would also likely vote against it if I was on the council now.”

In 1985, Wachs was concerned about the long-term effects of the Convention Center upgrade on the city’s general fund.

The South Hall was finished in 1993, and the city made a nearly $42-million payment the next year, continuing to pay between $13.1 million and $48.4 million a year until 2023.

Just a few years after that old debt was finally paid off, the city is set to start payments on a similar project.

“History is repeating itself, because it’s become necessary to compete with other convention centers around the world again,” said Doane Liu, executive director of the city’s Tourism Department. “I’m certain it was a hard decision to make in [1985].”

While debating the new expansion, some on the City Council wondered how the two projects matched up and whether the 1985 vote could provide guidance for the current moment.

Councilmember Tim McOsker asked City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo to report on the cost of the 1985 expansion.

McOsker compared the numbers, arguing that the annual payments were similar, if adjusted for the growth of the city’s general fund over time.

The city’s first $42-million payment for the old expansion was about 1.7% of its $2.48-billion general fund.

Payments for the new expansion ratchet up over a three-year period, starting with around $40 million in 2029, then jumping by 2031 to about $192 million a year until 2055.

Each $192-million annual payment would be about 2.3% of the city’s current general fund.

The similarities go further than the general fund percentage, McOsker said, alluding to the nearly $1-billion deficit that city officials recently faced.

“You know what else we had in ‘94-’95 and ‘95-’96? A $1-billion deficit that we were struggling with,” he said at a council budget hearing on Sept. 16. “It was a tough time then, and I know that we may hear that maybe we shouldn’t have done it, but we did do it, and 30 years later, we have a Convention Center that needs it again.”

But was it worth it?

Former Councilmember Zev Yaroslavsky has come to regret his vote in favor of the 1993 expansion.

“I think I did make a mistake,” he said. “I regret that I drank the Kool-Aid.”

Yaroslavsky said the council was convinced in 1985 that the expanded convention center would generate enough revenue to pay off the bond issuance, and then some.

But after 30 years of payments, Yaroslavsky said he saw no evidence that he and his fellow council members were correct.

“That didn’t happen.”

State of play

— FRESNO-NO: Councilmember Ysabel Jurado found herself in the crosshairs of Fresno politicians this week after she suggested that L.A. should not be ceding major events to the city. “We can’t keep losing out to Fresno. Shakira ended her world tour in Fresno,” she said at a press conference in which she voiced support for the Convention Center expansion.

Fresno shot back. “There’s no need to degrade or make fun of other cities that literally feed Angelenos by picking the fruits and vegetables sold at the DTLA markets daily,” Fresno County Supervisor Luis Chavez wrote on Instagram.

— LAX DELAYS: The Automated People Mover that will connect travelers between airport terminals and the Metro could be delayed even further, the CEO of LAX told The Times. The train, which was supposed to open in January 2026, may now be delayed until June 2026 or later, imperiling the goal of opening in time for the World Cup.

— NO LAYOFFS: Mayor Karen Bass announced Tuesday that the city has managed to avert all 1,650 layoffs she proposed in April as part of her plan to close a nearly $1-billion deficit. Bass negotiated for months with labor unions, who made concessions to help stave off hundreds of the layoffs. Budget reductions from the City Council also helped save jobs.

— BATHROOM POOH-POOHED: The city’s plan to install a bathroom at popular hiking destination Runyon Canyon has come under fire from locals who worry it may bring unwanted smells and safety issues. Bass said the city has received requests from hikers for years asking for a bathroom in the park. The bathroom will be ready by summer 2026.

CHIMP INFANT: Two chimpanzees born at the L.A. Zoo in August and September and are the first chimp births at the zoo in 11 years. They do not yet have names.

DROPOUT: Last week’s newsletter mentioned Jake Rakov as a congressional candidate; he dropped out of the race earlier this month.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program hit two locations this week. On Tuesday, it brought people inside from West 88th Street and South Grand Boulevard in South Los Angeles. On Thursday, the program went to Roscoe and Balboa Boulevards in the San Fernando Valley. Over the two operations, nearly 60 Angelenos were brought off the street.
• On the docket next week: L.A. County supervisors will hear about the findings of a long-awaited report from the McChrystal Group into what went wrong during the Eaton fire. The 132-page report found that poor communication, understaffing and a lack of adequate planning amid the chaotic conditions contributed to the failures.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

There are now just two City Hall incumbents who remain unopposed in their bids for reelection.

So how did Councilmembers Tim McOsker and Hugo Soto–Martínez get so lucky, at least for now? And what do they have in common?

At first glance, not a ton. One is a boomer grandfather who has forgotten more about City Hall machinations than most of us will ever know.

The other is a millennial leftist who ousted an incumbent three years ago.

McOsker, the City Hall veteran and proud son of the San Pedro docks, hails from one of the more conservative districts in the city, which stretches from Watts through Harbor Gateway down to San Pedro. Soto-Martínez, the democratic socialist former union organizer, represents what is arguably the most progressive (and hippest) district in the city: a densely packed collection of neighborhoods that includes Silver Lake, Echo Park, Atwater and Hollywood.

In our new era of L.A. city politics, where incumbents are far less inviolable than they once were, it’s rare to see two go entirely unopposed.

Of course, it’s very possible that one or both of the men get opponents before the June primary, which is still more than eight months away. But in the meantime, let’s explore a few factors that may be keeping the wolves at bay:

• Both council members are heavily backed by labor, one of the most powerful forces in Los Angeles politics. (A dozen different union locals and labor groups have already contributed to McOsker’s reelection campaign; Soto-Martínez previously worked at Unite Here Local 11, a group with deep influence on the council.) That could be one component of what’s discouraging potential challengers, particularly because labor groups would be all but guaranteed to go hard in either race.

• Four members of the current council, including Soto-Martínez, won their seats by ousting an incumbent. All four hit their opponents from the left, with digital organizing savvy and the support of grassroots progressive groups.

  Sure, someone could technically oust an incumbent without being a millennial endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America. But no one’s done it in a couple of decades. Which brings us back to Soto-Martínez’s race: There’s not much room to challenge him from the left, given that he’s already been endorsed by the rest of the council’s left bloc. A more moderate challenger is arguably the likelier option, and there has been plenty of talk about a potential business-backed candidate. No takers yet, though.

• Moving our theorizing south to the harbor area, San Pedro doubles as the financial and power base of the 15th council district. It’s also a place where the McOsker name is ubiquitous — second, perhaps, only to Hahn in terms of local clout. The councilman also appears to be genuinely well-liked on his home turf.

  It’s certainly possible that an opponent could arise from Watts, Harbor Gateway, Harbor City or Wilmington. But it’s hard to imagine a San Pedran with the muscle necessary to wage a serious City Council campaign going against McOsker (and, by extension, the local San Pedro political machine).

All of which is a very long way of saying that anything could happen in the months to come. But for now, Soto-Martínez and McOsker are both on a glide path to another term.

“Since we took office, we’ve worked to grow our coalition to build a city that works for working people. We’ve proud of our first three years, but we know there’s so much more work ahead,” Soto-Martínez said Friday.

McOsker said he remained focused on bringing resources to every corner of the district, from Watts to the waterfront.

“Representing the people of the One-Five has been one of the greatest honors of my professional life, and, for as long as I’m entrusted with this responsibility, my focus will be on lifting up our neighborhoods and delivering as much as we can for our residents,” he added.

State of play

—CONVENTION CONTENTION: L.A.’s political leaders took what is, in the view of their own policy experts, a risky bet: pour billions of dollars into its aging Convention Center in the hope that it will breathe new life into downtown and the region’s economy. As my colleagues David Zahniser and Noah Goldberg report, the City Council approved a $2.6-billion expansion plan Friday in an 11-2 vote, despite warnings from their own advisors that the project will draw taxpayer funds away from city services for decades to come. There was huge pressure from labor to support the project. Only Councilmembers Nithya Raman and Katy Yaroslavsky opposed.

— MEJIA PLAYS DEFENSE Former state legislator Isadore Hall announced his bid for city controller this week, meaning Controller Kenneth Mejia may have an actual race ahead of him.

— WHITHER, MONICA? After whipping up a frenzy about her 2026 intentions, Councilmember Monica Rodriguez finally filed paperwork to fundraise for her council reelection. She did not answer when asked if this means she has ruled out a bid for controller or mayor.

— BILLABLE HOURS: Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher’s hefty legal bills submitted to the city on a high-stakes homelessness case drew the ire of some members of City Council. But despite those concerns, the council still approved a fivefold increase to its contract with the law firm this week.

— STILL NO PERMANENT FIRE CHIEF: The council voted Tuesday to extend interim Fire Chief Ronnie Villanueva‘s contract for another six months.

— MUZZLING CRITICISM? A new policy requires L.A. County oversight officials to have many communications “reviewed, approved and coordinated” before going public. As my colleague Connor Sheets reports, critics are raising concerns about the policy and its implications.

— VALLEY BATTLE: Encino Neighborhood Council member Josh Sautter announced Friday that he’ll challenge Rep. Brad Sherman in next year’s election. Jake Levine, a one-time special assistant at the National Security Council, is also trying to unseat the 70-year-old incumbent.

— COMPETITION INCOMING: We’ve learned a little more about the New York Post’s westward expansion in recent days, as they’ve dropped a number of job listings. The list includes a full-time reporter slated to cover Los Angeles City Hall.

— TAKE A SEAT: After a year of virtual meetings, the Boyle Heights Neighborhood Council will return to in-person meetings at Boyle Heights City Hall beginning next week, the Boyle Heights Beat reports.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? Bass’ initiative addressed an RV encampment in Harbor City, according to the mayor’s office.
• On the docket next week: City Council will be on recess Tuesday and Wednesday. Friday’s meeting will be in Van Nuys.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Noah Goldberg, with an assist from David Zahniser, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Los Angeles City Councilmember Monica Rodriguez does not run. As in, she is not a runner.

So why did she post an Instagram reel on a new personal account Tuesday of herself inside a Foot Locker, asking a salesperson for recommendations for a running shoe?

“I am an avid precinct walker,” Rodriguez said in an interview with The Times on Tuesday, hours after she posted the reel. “I needed a pair of new shoes — good supportive shoes for my run, and the announcements will be imminent.”

The North Valley councilmember bought the Cloud 6 On running shoes highlighted in the video. Now, rumors are flying around City Hall about what she may be considering running for — if not a marathon.

The three options being bandied about are a run to challenge Mayor Karen Bass in the upcoming 2026 election, a possible run for controller against Kenneth Mejia, or just a cheekily mysterious announcement of her reelection bid for her own council seat.

“It’s clear she’s weighing options which may include running for mayor against Mayor Bass,” said Sam Yebri, a lawyer who is board president of Thrive LA, a moderate PAC focused on quality-of-life issues in the city. (Yebri commented with a clapping hands emoji on Rodriguez’s Instagram post, and Thrive LA responded, “We’re ready!”)

Rodriguez would not say what her plans are for 2026, though she said that more social media posts will be forthcoming and that she is definitely running for something.

The councilmember has been a sharp critic of the mayor for years now. She has lambasted the mayor’s signature Inside Safe homelessness program, arguing that it lacks transparency. She has also repeatedly called for the council to end the mayor’s state of emergency on homelessness, even though she voted for it when it was first passed.

“We were supposed to get reports on what money was spent on. It took until 2024 that we were finally told how much Inside Safe was costing per room, per night,” Rodriguez said in an interview.

Rodriguez said she and other councilmembers had to fight to even get information released on where Inside Safe was conducting cleanup operations and where homeless residents were sent after the operations.

The councilmember also opposed the mayor’s ousting of Fire Chief Kristin Crowley following the January wildfires, saying that Bass used Crowley to deflect criticism of her own absence in Ghana at the start of the conflagrations. She also called on the mayor to reinstate Crowley.

“On Jan. 7, she was praising the fire chief and her response,” Rodriguez said at the time. “And then it appears, as the heat kicked up [over] her absence, she continued to try and attribute blame to someone else.”

Rodriguez was first elected in 2017 to the seventh district and was reelected in 2022.

If she were to announce a mayoral run, she would be Bass’ first major opponent.

There has also been speculation about Rick Caruso, the billionaire owner of the Grove shopping mall, potentially running against Bass again after losing to her last time, though he is also considering a bid for governor. Both he and Rodriguez are more conservative than Bass.

Rodriguez still has not filed for a reelection campaign for her seat, even as two others have joined the field.

“I know there were rumors she was considering a run for mayor. … So more or less, I’m seeing if she is going to run [for her council seat] or if she isn’t,” said Michael Ebenkamp, a former president of the North Hills Neighborhood Council who has filed to run for the District 7 council seat.

Rick Taylor, a political consultant, said that Rodriguez is interested in running for mayor but not likely to do it.

“She’s intrigued, don’t get me wrong. I just don’t think she’s going to pull the trigger,” he said.

A serious mayoral campaign is expensive, and Taylor said he doesn’t believe that Rodriguez can easily raise the $8 million to $10 million necessary to be a viable candidate.

“Monica is not Rick Caruso. She can’t put $100 million of her own in,” Taylor said. “I think most likely she will be councilwoman of the seventh district at the end of it all, but I think she’s keeping her options open.”

State of play

— SUPREME DECISION: The Supreme Court ruled Monday that U.S. immigration agents can stop and detain anyone they believe is in the country illegally, even if that suspicion is based solely on a person’s job, the language they speak or the color of their skin. The justices voted 6-3 to lift an L.A. judge’s order that had barred “roving patrols” from grabbing people off SoCal streets.

— FLAME OUT: It was a late night surprise: L.A.’s mayor, working with former State Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg, persuaded several lawmakers to carry a bill rewriting Measure ULA, the so-called mansion tax. Bass and Hertzberg said the changes would boost housing production while also cutting off support for an anti-tax measure being prepared for the ballot next year. But just as suddenly, Bass pulled the plug, saying the proposal needed more work. The plan is to bring it back in January.

— TAKE A (WAGE) HIKE: The business group seeking to repeal the hotel and airport workers’ minimum wage hike via a ballot measure failed to gather enough signatures, city officials said. The L.A. Alliance for Tourism, Jobs and Progress hoped to get voters to roll back the ordinance passed by the City Council in May but fell short of getting the measure on the ballot by 9,000 signatures.

— HOUSING BILL MARCHES ON: The controversial housing bill that would override local zoning laws and allow high-density buildings near public transit continued its march toward law Thursday. The California Assembly passed SB79 in a 41-17 vote. On Friday, the Senate approved it, 21 to 8. Now, it needs only the governor’s signature to become law.

— CHIEF UPDATE: Bass has hired Mitch Kamin to be her third chief of staff in just under three years. Kamin, a lawyer who has fought the Trump administration and provided legal services for underserved communities, will replace Carolyn Webb de Macias.

— UNCONVENTIONAL PRICE: The price tag for renovating the Los Angeles Convention Center has ballooned again. The City Council was informed this week that the project will cost $2.7 billion — an increase of nearly $500 million from six months ago.

— SaMo MONEY MO’ PROBLEMS: The city of Santa Monica could soon declare a fiscal emergency due to an ongoing budget crisis, due in part to more than $200 million in legal payouts related to an alleged sexual abuser who worked for the Police Department.

— LESS ‘LESS-LETHAL’: A U.S. district judge extended restrictions Tuesday that block federal agents and LAPD officers from targeting reporters and nonviolent protesters with crowd control weapons often known as “less-lethal munitions.”

— CLERKED IN: Bass appointed Patrice Lattimore to be the new city clerk. Lattimore has been a chief management analyst for the Office of the City Clerk since 2018, overseeing administrative, budget and personnel functions.

— LEADERSHIP MERGER: Two leadership programs that have produced civic leaders across the state are merging. Coro Southern California and Coro Northern California are becoming, simply, Coro California. Alumni include former Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Sen. Alex Padilla and L.A. City Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program was in Council District 9 this week, near the Brotherhood Crusade and an elementary school, clearing an encampment that was a safety concern for people in the area, the mayor’s office said.
• On the docket next week: A report from the mayor on Lattimore’s appointment as city clerk will go before the government operations committee on Tuesday.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Dakota Smith giving you the latest on city and county government during a short week.

When Los Angeles hosted the Olympics in 1984, the San Fernando Valley refused to take part.

Valley homeowners, fearing traffic and development, successfully blocked any Olympic competitions from taking place in the Sepulveda Basin. Environmentalists also objected to using the basin, a 2,000-acre flood plain that’s home to an array of birds.

Business owners, who had hoped for a surge from international visitors, lost out. Many tourists didn’t come across the hill, and some Valley locals stayed home to watch the Olympics on television, rather than shop, The Times reported in August 1984.

Now, the Olympics are coming to L.A. and the Valley, with BMX, skateboarding, 3×3 basketball and modern pentathlon planned for temporary venues at the Sepulveda Basin.

L.A. City Council members and business leaders are planning for a flurry of activity, including Olympics watch parties, youth sports clinics and pin-trading parties where athletes and fans swap pins and other Olympics memorabilia.

They are also hoping that stores, restaurants and other businesses in the Valley can benefit from the Games.

“During ’84, I remember being this young girl in the Northeast San Fernando Valley and feeling completely disconnected [from the Olympics],” said Councilmember Monica Rodriguez at a Greater San Fernando Valley Chamber of Commerce event Thursday.

Rodriguez and four other council members who represent San Fernando Valley neighborhoods (Bob Blumenfield, John Lee, Nithya Raman and Adrin Nazarian) weighed in on Olympics planning and other city issues during the panel, hosted by journalist Alex Cohen. (Councilmember Imelda Padilla, who represents the central and eastern Valley, was absent.)

Rodriguez said her father worked at a Los Angeles Fire Department station near USC and the Olympic Village, and would come home with stories about the festivities.

Blumenfield, whose district includes Reseda, Woodland Hills and Tarzana, recalled sneaking into a men’s gymnastics final in 1984 by walking the wrong way through an exit door. (His seats were very good: actor John Travolta was a few rows in front of him, he told The Times.)

During the 2028 Games, Blumenfield is planning watch parties in his district, with locals and visitors enjoying the Games on a big screen. He hopes visitors will take the G Line to Olympic events at the basin, and stop at stores and restaurants along the way.

“We want the Olympics to be part of the whole city, including the West Valley,” Blumenfield said in an interview.

Resistance to the ’84 Olympics wasn’t isolated to the Valley: Many Angelenos feared traffic from swarms of visitors and the threat of terrorism following the murders of 11 members of the Israeli Olympic team by a Palestinian militant group at the 1972 Munich Summer Games.

Still, the pushback by Valley residents traced to another event: Mayor Tom Bradley‘s effort in 1978 to move the Hollywood Park racetrack from Inglewood to the Sepulveda Basin. Dozens of homeowners and business groups fought the proposal, and Bradley eventually dropped it.

The same opponents coalesced again when Bradley supported swimming, archery, rowing and biking events in the basin.

Renee Weitzer was president of the Encino Homeowners Assn. during planning for the ’84 Games and helped fight the Hollywood Park project. But she later broke with those opponents and backed Olympic venues in the Valley.

Peter Ueberroth, head of the committee that brought the Games to Los Angeles in 1984, also lived in Encino at the time and told Weitzer that the committee couldn’t afford a long fight over Valley venues.

Ueberroth said, “ ‘I don’t have time for this. I am pulling out of the Valley,’ ” Weitzer said in a recent interview.

Ueberroth also claimed that anti-Olympic Valley residents threw poisoned meat to his dogs at his home.

Today, Weitzer thinks the Valley lost a big opportunity to transform the Sepulveda Basin with swimming pools and other venues that the committee would have paid for.

“It would have been fabulous, and it would have served the Valley well,” she said.

Bob Ronka, then a city council member from the northeast San Fernando Valley, led the effort to put a charter amendment on the ballot in 1978 to ensure that taxpayers didn’t foot the bill for the Olympics.

In the end, the ’84 Games generated a profit of more than $250 million dollars.

“He thought it would be a financial disaster for Los Angeles,” said Rich Perelman, former vice president of press operations for the L.A. Olympic organizing committee that Ueberroth chaired.

“So we didn’t put anything [in the Valley]. Why row the boat uphill?” said Perelman, who today runs The Sports Examiner, an online news site dedicated to Olympic sports.

Nor did Bradley want a fight with Valley council members over Olympic venues, recalled Zev Yaroslavsky, who was a council member representing the Westside and part of Sherman Oaks at the time.

“The Valley was left out of any part of the Games,” said Yaroslavsky. “Most people would probably say it was a mistake.”

While the Valley didn’t host any events, Birmingham High School in Van Nuys got a new synthetic-surface running track so Olympic athletes could train. (The school is now called Birmingham Community Charter, and the neighborhood is referred to as Lake Balboa.)

Nailing down venues in the Valley isn’t the only pressure faced by LA28, the private committee paying for and overseeing the Games.

Like other parts of L.A., the Valley today is far more ethnically, racially and culturally diverse than in 1984. Rodriguez, whose district includes Mission Hills, Sylmar and Pacoima — neighborhoods with large Latino populations — has repeatedly questioned whether Latinos will be adequately represented.

LA28’s “Los Angeles” portion of the closing ceremonies and handover event at the Paris Olympics included Billie Eilish, H.E.R., Red Hot Chili Peppers and Snoop Dogg, as well as appearances by Tom Cruise and Olympic athletes, sparking criticism on social media about the lack of Latino participants.

A coalition of Latino and Asian organizations also highlighted the dearth of diversity in a September 2024 letter to LA28 chair Casey Wasserman and Mayor Karen Bass.

At last week’s Ad Hoc Committee for the 2028 Olympics, Rodriguez asked LA28 leaders about the “glaring omission of the Latino community in the flag transfer ceremonies” during the 2024 Paris Games.

“I’ll be damned if that happens again with these Games, especially in light of what our community is going through,” Rodriguez said last week, referring to the recent federal immigration raids in L.A. that have overwhelmingly targeted Latinos.

State of play

— SETBACK FOR TRUMP: Mayor Karen Bass and other California political leaders cheered a federal judge’s decision Tuesday barring soldiers from aiding in immigration arrests and other civilian law enforcement in the state. The 9th Circuit or the Supreme Court could reverse the order.

— UP, UP, AND AWAY?: The price tag for the proposed Los Angeles Convention Center expansion keeps rising and is now an estimated $2.7 billion — an increase of $483 million from six months ago. The project would connect the two existing convention halls with a new building and add massive digital billboards, including some facing the freeways.

—BAD OWNER: City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto announced that the city is settling several lawsuits over alleged illegal short-term rentals and party houses in Hollywood. Among them is Franklin Apartments, a rent-stabilized building that turned 10 units into short-term rentals, and later, an underground hotel.

— MEET THE TRASHERS: Bass launched Shine LA to clean city streets in time for the 2028 Olympics. Meet the San Fernando Valley group whose members — mostly retirees in their 60s and 70s — are already volunteering their time.

— PADILLA TARGETED: A group of residents in City Councilmember Imelda Padilla‘s district on Tuesday filed a notice of their intention to seek her recall. The residents — some of whom have a connection to the Lake Balboa Neighborhood Council — didn’t respond to requests for comment. Padilla’s chief of staff, Ackley Padilla, told The Times that her office is “focused on the work at hand, improving the quality of life in our neighborhoods, keeping our youth, seniors and families safe.”

—GARCETTI REEMERGES: Former Mayor Eric Garcetti, in an email fundraising pitch for U.S. House of Representatives candidate Eileen Laubacher, who is trying to unseat Colorado’s Lauren Boebert, confirmed that he is now a Valley resident after returning from India, where he served as U.S. Ambassador. Garcetti, who spent some of his childhood in Encino, wrote that it’s “great to be home in our house in the San Fernando Valley (where my LA story began).”

Zine exits. Who didn’t see this coming?

Former City Councilmember Dennis Zine last week abruptly withdrew from consideration to serve on the commission tasked with changing L.A.’s charter.

Zine, a former LAPD sergeant who is now a reserve officer, served on a similar charter commission in the late 1990s. He is known as a bomb thrower who regularly skewers some city council members by referring to them as the “Crazy Train” in his CityWatch column.

Zine wrote in CityWatch that he met with two council members, including Ysabel Jurado, ahead of his nomination hearing and concluded that he could not work with a “hostile and anti-LAPD body of elected officials.”

In an interview, Zine said he has no ill will toward Jurado — who is among the council’s most progressive members — and plans to have lunch with her. Other council members relayed to him that the full council wouldn’t support his nomination, Zine said.

“I didn’t want to see a split vote on the council floor,” he said. “I didn’t want to see a dogfight.”

Zine, who represented the West Valley when he was a council member, said he is staunchly against some proposals pushed by advocates, including expanding the size of the City Council.

Blumenfield, who nominated Zine for the commission, mistakenly told him that the appointment didn’t need council approval, Zine said.

Blumenfield said he hadn’t anticipated the “difficult process” and said the former council member would have added “immense institutional memory and experience regarding how the city works.”

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? Inside Safe, Bass’ program to shelter homeless people, visited Skid Row this week, a Bass spokesperson said.
• On the docket next week: The City Council is expected to consider a vote on the Convention Center expansion. On Sept. 10, the council’s Transportation Committee will hear an update on transit plans for the 2028 Olympics.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Dakota Smith and Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

L.A.’s political leaders are facing a daunting and possibly insurmountable deadline. If they blow it, they could face all kinds of headaches — legal, financial and otherwise.

By June 2026, they must show a federal judge that they have removed 9,800 homeless encampments from streets, sidewalks and public rights of way. That means 9,800 tents, cars, RVs and makeshift structures — those created out of materials like cardboard or shopping carts — over a four-year period.

The city’s strategy for reaching that goal has become a huge source of friction in its long-running legal battle with the LA Alliance for Human Rights, which sued the city in 2020 over its handling of homelessness.

In recent months, the encampment removal plan has also become the subject of a second lawsuit — one alleging that the City Council approved it behind closed doors, then failed to disclose that fact, in violation of a state law requiring that government business be conducted in public view.

The encampment removal plan was “drafted and adopted without any notice to the public (which includes the owners of these tents, makeshift encampments, and RVs that the City has agreed to clear), let alone any public debate or discussion,” said the lawsuit filed by the Los Angeles Community Action Network, the homeless advocacy group also known as LA CAN, which is an intervenor in the LA Alliance case.

Lawyers for the city say they followed the Ralph M. Brown Act, which spells out disclosure requirements for decisions made behind closed doors by government bodies. In one filing, they said their actions were not only legal, but “reasonable and justified under the circumstances.”

As with everything surrounding the LA Alliance case, there is a tortured backstory.

The LA Alliance sued the city in 2020, alleging that too little was being done to address the homelessness crisis, particularly in Skid Row. The case was settled two years later, with the city agreeing to create 12,915 new shelter beds or other housing opportunities by June 2027.

After that deal was struck, the city began negotiating with the LA Alliance over an accompanying requirement to reduce the number of street encampments, with quarterly milestones in each council district.

The LA Alliance eventually ran out of patience, telling U.S. District Judge David O. Carter in February 2024 that the city was 447 days late in finalizing its plan. The group submitted to the court a copy of the encampment removal plan, saying it had been approved by the City Council on Jan. 31, 2024.

Two months later, City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto’s office also told Carter that the plan to remove 9,800 encampments, and the accompanying milestones, had gone before the council on Jan. 31.

The council “approved them without delay,” Feldstein Soto’s team said in a filing submitted jointly by the city and the LA Alliance.

Video from the Jan. 31 meeting shows that council members did in fact go behind closed doors for more than two hours to discuss the LA Alliance case. But when they returned, Deputy City Atty. Jonathan Groat said there was nothing to report from the closed session.

The encampment removal plan is a huge issue for LA CAN, which has warned that the 9,800 goal effectively creates a quota system for sanitation workers — one that could make them more likely to violate the property rights of unhoused residents.

At no point during the council’s deliberations did the public have the opportunity to weigh in on the harm that would be caused by seizing the belongings of thousands of unhoused people, said attorney Shayla Myers, who represents LA CAN. Beyond that, she said, the public was never told who supported the plan and who opposed it.

“The narrow exception in the Brown Act that allows a legislative body to confer with their attorneys in closed session was never intended to allow the City Council to shelter these kinds of controversial decisions from public view,” the lawsuit states.

LA CAN now wants a Superior Court judge to force the city to disclose any votes cast by council members on the encampment removal plan. The group also wants recordings and transcripts of those proceedings, as well as a declaration that the city violated the Brown Act in its handling of the matter.

Beyond that, the group alleges that the council violated the Brown Act a second time, in May 2024, by failing to disclose its approval of an agreement with L.A. County — again reached behind closed doors — over the delivery of services to homeless residents.

Assistant City Atty. Strefan Fauble pushed back on LA CAN’s assertions, saying “no settlement or agreement was voted on or approved” by the council on Jan. 31, 2024. In a letter to LA CAN last year, Fauble also said the agreement with the county was not disclosed at the time because it had not been finalized in federal court.

“The City has always complied with its post-closed session disclosure requirements under the Brown Act when a settlement or agreement is final,” he wrote. “It will continue to do so.”

Meanwhile, the fight over the encampment removal plan is getting messier.

Two months ago, Judge Carter spelled out restrictions on the types of tents that can be counted toward the 9,800. In a 62-page order, he said a tent discarded by sanitation workers could be counted toward the city’s goal only if its owner had been offered housing or a shelter bed beforehand.

The city is weighing an appeal of that assertion. In a memo to the council, Feldstein Soto said the judge had “reinterpreted” some of the city’s settlement obligations.

An appeal would be expensive, and Feldstein Soto is already in hot water over legal bills racked up in the LA Alliance case.

On Wednesday, the council balked at Feldstein Soto’s request for a $5-million increase to the city’s contract with the law firm Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, LLP, which would include work on an appeal and other tasks. The council sent the request to the budget committee for more review.

Some councilmembers voiced dismay that Gibson Dunn billed $3.2 million in less than three months, after the council had allocated an initial $900,000 for a two-year period.

State of play

— VA VOUCHERS: Los Angeles County housing authorities have more than enough federal rental subsidies to house all of the county’s homeless veterans. Yet chronic failures in a complicated bureaucracy of referral, leasing and support services have left those agencies treading water. About 4,000 vouchers are gathering dust while an estimated 3,400 veterans remain on the streets or inside shelters, The Times reported.

— TAKE THE STAIRS: Could new apartment buildings with only one staircase help solve L.A.’s housing crisis? Councilmember Nithya Raman favors such a change, saying it can be done without sacrificing safety.

— FILM FACTOTUM: More than two and a half years after taking office, Mayor Karen Bass fulfilled a longstanding campaign promise, announcing the selection of a new film liaison between City Hall and the entertainment industry. Steve Kang, president of the Board of Public Works, will serve as the primary point person for film and TV productions looking to shoot in L.A. He’ll be assisted by Dan Halden, who works out of the city’s Bureau of Street Services, and producer Amy Goldberg.

— VALLEY SHUFFLE? City Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who faces term limits next year, told The Times he’s considering a run for state Senate in 2028. If he gets in the race, the former state lawmaker would compete for the North Hollywood-to-Moorpark district currently represented by state Sen. Henry Stern, who faces term limits in 2028.

— PROTESTER PAYOUT: A Los Angeles filmmaker and his daughter were awarded more than $3 million after a jury found Los Angeles County negligent for injuries the man sustained when a sheriff’s deputy shot him in the face with a projectile during a protest against police brutality in 2020.

— CRIME SPREE: Police announced the arrest this week of several alleged gang members accused of burglarizing nearly 100 homes and businesses, largely on the Westside. The suspects are believed to be part of a South L.A. group that called itself the “Rich Rollin’ Burglary Crew” and focused on the theft of high-end jewelry, purses, watches, wallets, suitcases and guns, LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said.

— OFF THE BUS: Ridership on Metro’s network of buses continued to drop in July, weeks after federal immigration agents began a series of raids across L.A. County. Amid the decrease, Metro’s rail ridership grew by 6.5% over the same period.

— HOUSING WARS: After the L.A. City Council voted to oppose state Sen. Scott Wiener‘s new transit density bill, Councilmember Imelda Padilla joined Wiener and podcast host Jon Lovett (also a vocal supporter of the bill) to debate its merits on Pod Save America’s YouTube channel. The spirited conversation garnered more than 50,000 views, spawned numerous memes and sparked hundreds of replies on the r/losangeles subreddit.

At one point, Lovett appeared shocked when Padilla, who joined seven of her colleagues in opposing Senate Bill 79, boasted of getting a proposed six-story affordable housing project reduced to three stories. Padilla addressed her viral interview during Friday’s council meeting, saying she views the council’s role as one that seeks compromise “between the NIMBYs and the YIMBYs.”

— SHE’S (OFFICIALLY) RUNNING: L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis officially launched her campaign for a proposed new congressional district in southeast L.A. County, offering up a list of heavyweight backers, including Mayor Karen Bass, Sheriff Robert Luna, Supervisor Janice Hahn and civil rights icon Dolores Huerta.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to combat homelessness went to Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles, moving 10 people indoors, according to a Bass aide.
• On the docket for next week: The L.A. County Board of Supervisors will take up a proposed ordinance to streamline the process of rebuilding in Altadena in the wake of the Eaton fire.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Rebecca Ellis, with an assist from Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

L.A. County officials have been given a task: make sure the embarrassing blunder that led voters to accidentally wipe out a popular ballot measure never happens again.

The board is expected to soon review a policy to ensure “county charter is promptly updated” following the accidental repeal of Measure J — a 2020 ballot measure that promised hundreds of millions of dollars for services that keep people out of jail.

The mistake is complicated, but the root cause is simple: The county never added the measure to its charter, akin to the county constitution.

The county’s top lawyer, Dawyn Harrison, blames the failure squarely on the executive office, which supports the five politicians with the administrative parts of the job — including, apparently, keeping the county code fresh.

But Robert Bonner, the recently forced-out head of the sheriff’s oversight commission, said the county’s top lawyers learned long ago that parts of the code were outdated.

“I always thought it was weird that it would take so long for the county apparatus to get something in the code that the voters said was the law,” Bonner said.

Bonner said it took the county four years to incorporate a March 2020 ballot measure, known as Measure R, which gave his commission the power to investigate misconduct with subpoenas. For years, he said, the commission resorted to citing ballotpedia, an online encyclopedia with information about local measures, in its legal filings. The Times reviewed one such filing from November 2022 as the commission tried to force former Sheriff Alex Villanueva to obey deputy gang subpoenas.

County attorneys said they first discovered the issue in October 2023 and it was fixed by August 2024. It is not clear why it took ten months.

“This underscores the need to reform the system with clear safeguards and accountability,” county counsel said in a statement. “This breakdown made clear that our office must also be systematically included in the administrative process.”

“Fortunately, in our case, it didn’t lead to disaster,” Bonner said of the outdated code.

A few months later, it would.

In summer of 2024, county counsel got its marching orders: To create a ballot measure, known as Measure G, that would overhaul the county government, expand the five-person board of elected supervisors to nine and bring on a new elected executive who would act almost as a mayor of the county.

The office came up with a ballot measure that would repeal most of a section of the charter — called Article III — in 2028. That section details the powers of the board — and, most consequentially, includes the requirement from Measure J that the board funnel hundreds of millions toward anti-incarceration services.

County lawyers rewrote that chunk of the charter with the changes the board wanted in the county’s form of government — but left out the anti-incarceration funding. So when voters approved Measure G, they unwittingly repealed Measure J.

And it turns out, it’s not easy to get back a ballot measure after voters accidentally wipe it out.

The supervisors hoped they could just get a judge to tell them that, actually, Measure J was just fine. After all, voters had no idea they were repealing it — nobody did.

But the supervisors were recently told by their lawyers that getting relief from a judge — considered the easiest, cheapest option — would be legally tricky terrain. One month after the mistake came to light, they’ve yet to go to a judge.

Maybe the state could help by passing legislation that would make a correction to the county’s charter, officials hoped. Not so, according to a memo from Harrison and Chief Executive Fesia Davenport. For the state to help, it would need to pass legislation that mimicked the budget requirements of Measure J — potentially a bigger ask than a charter tweak.

“A court would likely strike down as unconstitutional any changes to the County Charter that were not approved by voters,” read the July 25 memo.

And then there’s the option of last resort: putting Measure J back on the ballot.

It’s high-stakes. It is, after all, no longer November 2020, when Measure J passed handily, buoyed by a wave of support for racial justice and disgust over police brutality after the killing of George Floyd. Voters have leaned in recently to tough-on-crime measures such as Proposition 36, which stiffened the penalties for some nonviolent crimes.

If the county needed proof the atmosphere has changed, the sheriff deputy union, which fought hard against Measure J, has plenty.

The union paid for a poll of 1,000 voters that suggests the measure wouldn’t pass if it were put up for a vote again. Only 43% of respondents said they would vote for the measure if it went back on the ballot, while 44% said they’d vote no. The measure passed in 2020 with 57% of the vote.

Voters weren’t big fans of the politicians in charge either. Almost half viewed the board unfavorably.

The union fought hard against Measure J, spending more than $3.5 million on advertising to fight it and following up with a court battle. It’s not not hankering for another go at it.

“Residents are clearly fed up with the shenanigans around Measure G and J,” said union President Richard Pippin. “The fix is to focus on investing in safe communities instead of half-baked ideas.”

The poll was conducted by David Binder Research, a San Francisco-based pollster frequently used by Democratic candidates, from Aug. 5 to Aug. 12, with a sampling error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. The Times was only sent a summary of the poll and did not view the original.

Some advocates argue that if anything goes on the ballot, it should be the measure that contained the poison pill.

“Why aren’t they considering [Measure] G?” asked Gabriela Vazquez, who campaigned for the anti-incarceration measure as a member of the nonprofit La Defensa. “Imagine all the fundraising folks would have to do to defend J if it was put back on the ballot.”

“The defect was in G not in J,” said former Duarte City Councilmember John Fasana, who voted against both measures and first noticed the county’s flub. “You’re overturning an election.”

But the overhaul of county government Take Two would also face an uphill battle, the poll suggests. The measure narrowly passed last November with 51% of the vote.

This time, only 45% of voters like the idea, while 40% said they’d vote no, according to the poll.

The Times asked all five supervisors what they wanted to do.

Supervisors Janice Hahn and Kathryn Barger did not respond. The other three appeared undecided.

Supervisor Holly Mitchell, a vocal supporter of Measure J and opponent of Measure G, said she wants to “explore all solutions” to keep the anti-incarceration measure in good standing. Supervisor Hilda Solis said she wanted to correct the error, but did not say how. Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, the force behind the government overhaul, said she’s not ruling out getting help from a judge and is moving forward with an ordinance that would mirror Measure J. Unlike a ballot measure, an ordinance could be undone by a future board.

She says going to the ballot is the last resort.

“My commitment to fixing this mess hasn’t changed. I’m open to every viable path, and we might need to pursue more than one,” Horvath said in a statement. “Before considering the ballot, we must exhaust every option before us.”

State of play

— A POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE: Come November, California voters will partake in a special election to potentially waive the state’s independent redistricting process and approve new partisan congressional maps that favor Democrats. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s high-stakes fight to counter President Trump’s scramble for GOP control is already sending shockwaves around the state.

—HILDA’S PLANS: The proposed maps would create a new congressional district in southeast L.A. County. Supervisor Hilda Solis has yet to publicly announce her candidacy, but she’s made her intention to run for the redrawn 38th District clear within the close-knit world of California politics.

—THE RICK OF IT ALL: Former L.A. mayoral candidate Rick Caruso was initially quiet about Newsom’s redistricting proposal. But after the Legislature sent the measure to the ballot Thursday, Caruso made his support clear, telling us that “California has to push back” against the Texas redistricting scheme. He plans to financially support the ballot measure, he said. One topic he remained vague on was whether he’ll run for mayor or governor in 2026, saying he was still seriously considering both options.

—AUTHOR, AUTHOR: Brentwood resident and former Vice President Kamala Harris announced a 15-city book tour for her upcoming election memoir “107 Days.” The lineup includes a September event at the Wiltern theater in partnership with Book Soup.

—FIRE JUSTICE: Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson was at the Stentorians office Friday morning to show his support for a package of state bills focused on incarcerated firefighters. He appeared alongside Assemblymembers Sade Elhawary, Celeste Rodriguez and Josh Lowenthal and Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas.

— END IN SIGHT?: Councilmember Tim McOsker’s motion to “strategically and competently” work to wind down the mayor’s declaration of emergency on homelessness narrowly failed Wednesday. The motion called for the legislative body to come back in 60 days, with reports from city offices, to advise on an implementation plan to end the declaration of emergency. McOsker’s goal was to terminate the state of emergency, which has been in effect for more than two years, as soon as possible. His motion failed to pass in a 7-7 vote. The council instead continued to support the mayor’s declaration of emergency and will take up the issue again in 90 days.

—”SLUSH FUND” QUESTIONS: An election technology firm allegedly overbilled Los Angeles County for voting machines used during the 2020 election and funneled the extra cash into a “slush fund” for bribing government officials, federal prosecutors say in a criminal case against three company executives. Prosecutors do not indicate who benefited from the alleged pot of Los Angeles County taxpayer money.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? Staff from the mayor’s signature homelessness program visited the council district of Hugo Soto-Martínez, moving an estimated 23 people indoors, according to the mayor’s office. Her Shine LA initiative, which aims to clean up city streets and sidewalks, was postponed to September because of the extreme heat.
• On the docket for next week: The City Council will vote Wednesday on whether to approve the mayor’s appointment of Domenika Lynch to be the new general manager of El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historical Monument, which includes Olvera Street. She would be the first Latina head of the department.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Noah Goldberg, with assists from Julia Wick, Seema Mehta and David Zahniser, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Days after the Trump administration’s mass immigration raids came to Los Angeles, City Councilmember Ysabel Jurado started looking for money to help the city’s undocumented residents.

In a June 10 motion, she asked City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo to detail options for finding at least $1 million for RepresentLA, which provides legal services for undocumented Angelenos facing deportation.

A week later, an official from Szabo’s office said they were “unable to identify eligible funding sources” for the $1 million, which would come on top of $1 million the city has already allocated to RepresentLA.

This summer in L.A., an immigration crisis is colliding with a budget crisis, leaving some councilmembers frustrated that the city cannot do more, as federal agents whisk thousands of immigrants away to detention centers and potential deportation.

The city has been active in court, joining an ACLU lawsuit that temporarily blocked federal agents from using racial profiling to carry out indiscriminate immigration arrests. Mayor Karen Bass also announced a program to provide immigrants with gift cards, funded by private philanthropy, when many were afraid to go to work.

But coming up with another $1 million for immigrant legal defense, after city officials closed a nearly $1-billion deficit through cuts and slated layoffs, has proved a slog.

“Why is it that we can’t find the money for this?” asked Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez during a Civil Rights, Equity, Immigration, Aging and Disability Committee meeting on Aug. 1. “It appears that level of urgency is not being transmitted through this report, because when we’re in other situations, we find the money.”

Jurado piggybacked off her colleague.

“This is an immigration legal crisis,” she said, adding that she felt “disappointment, frustration and, frankly, anger with the outcome here that we can’t find a single dollar to support immigrant communities and this legal defense fund.”

“I find it really hard to believe that the CAO couldn’t find any money for it,” she said in an interview.

RepresentLA, which is a public-private partnership with the county, the city, the California Community Foundation and the Weingart Foundation, has seen a surge in demand for legal services since the immigration raids began in June, said Jorge-Mario Cabrera, a spokesperson for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, or CHIRLA, which manages RepresentLA.

“The need is higher than the needs being met,” Cabrera said.

The city has contributed funding for RepresentLA since its inception in 2021 — initially $2 million each fiscal year before dropping to $1 million in 2024-2025 and $1 million this year out of a total budget of $6.5 million, with the other $5.5 million coming from L.A. County.

RepresentLA, which has served nearly 10,000 people, provides free legal representation for undocumented immigrants facing removal proceedings, as well as other services such as help with asylum applications. Some attorneys are on staff, while others are outside counsel.

In April, Bass said in her State of the City speech that the city would “protect every Angeleno, no matter where you are from, no matter when you arrived in L.A … because we know how much immigrants contribute to our city in so many ways. We will always stand strong with you.”

But behind the scenes, the city’s financial struggles put even the initial $1 million for RepresentLA in jeopardy, with the mayor proposing to slash it to zero for this fiscal year.

“Getting the initial $1 million back was quite a battle,” said Angelica Salas, CHIRLA’s executive director. “It had been zeroed out. We were able to get just the money enough to continue the program for those who are currently in the program.”

The City Council managed to claw back the $1 million during budget negotiations by slowing down hiring at the LAPD, as well as “ending duplicative spending,” said Naomi Villagomez-Roochnik, a spokesperson for Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who sits on the budget committee. (The mayor and Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson have since said they are looking for money to reverse the hiring slowdown.)

“It’s a crumb when you compare it to the rest of the city budget,” Hernandez said.

RepresentLA has 23 attorneys working on deportation hearings, and Salas said each represents about 35 clients at any given time. An additional $1 million “would allow us to expand our capacity for the new people — the thousands of people who have now been picked up in this new sweep,” she said.

At the committee hearing earlier this month, Councilmember Monica Rodriguez said the City Council should find savings in other areas to help pay for important programs like RepresentLA.

“Next time the city attorney comes asking us for outside counsel money, you could say ‘No’ and redirect those resources. … When the mayor comes for Inside Safe, for additional discretionary money that she is unaccountable for, you could say, ‘No, we’re taking $1 million and putting it for RepresentLA,’” she said. “Let’s effing go.”

The committee called on the city administrative officer’s staff to research options for funding RepresentLA, including grants or reallocating money from elsewhere.

Szabo confirmed to The Times that things will be different at the next committee meeting.

“Our next report will provide options to fund RepresentLA at the level requested,” he said in a text message.

State of play

BALLOT ROYALE: Labor unions and business groups have been locked in a heated battle of ballot measures for the last three months, after the City Council hiked the minimum wage for hotel and airport workers. Each side is trying to get measures on the ballot that would have far-reaching effects, including one that would put the minimum wage increase to a citywide vote. Unite Here Local 11, which represents hotel and restaurant workers, has proposed four ballot measures that, according to critics, would wreak havoc on the city’s economy. Business leaders, in turn, have filed a ballot petition to repeal the city’s $800-million business tax — a move denounced by city officials, who say it would gut funding for police and other essential services.

— SAGE ADVICE: The Jurado staffer who was arrested during an anti-ICE demonstration in June gave a heads-up to her boss that she planned to take part, according to text messages obtained by The Times through a public records request.

“Going to the protest at [City Hall] fyi,” Luz Aguilar wrote to Chief of Staff Lauren Hodgins.

Hodgins responded with words of caution.

“To reiterate what we spoke about a few mins ago, if you choose to take part in any community action, please ensure that you approach the event with peace and care for those around you and stay safe,” Hodgins wrote. “This is not a city-sanctioned activity and you are participating on your own accord so want to ensure your safety along with the safety of those around you.”

Aguilar did not text back. She was later arrested at the demonstration and ultimately charged with resisting arrest after allegedly assaulting a police officer.

— BACK TO COURT: Prosecutors filed two new corruption charges against City Councilmember Curren Price this week. The charges were connected to two votes he cast on funding for the city housing authority and the L.A. County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, both of which were paying Price’s wife, Del Richardson. Price’s attorney called the new charges “nothing more than an attempt to pile on to a weak case.”

Sources told The Times this week that prosecutors tried to get Richardson to testify in front of a grand jury as part of Price’s case. She did not ultimately do so.

— IT’S FUN TO STAY AT THE YMCA: Bass, L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath and City Councilmember Traci Park were all in the Palisades Thursday morning at a ceremony where Horvath pledged $10 million from her discretionary funds toward rebuilding the Palisades-Malibu YMCA.

— GIFT ECONOMY: Our public records request for all the gifts Bass received in the last year and a half came back, with the list largely composed of ceremonial gift exchanges with her foreign counterparts (chopsticks and a teacup from the mayor of Sejong, South Korea, estimated cost $32; a scarf and a hat from Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, estimated cost $45).

There were a few interesting tidbits: Bass received flowers (~$72) from race and gender scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw, who coined the term intersectionality. There were also fancy Dodgers tickets and food (~$590, but marked as “paid down”) from her longtime lawyers at Kaufman Legal Group, along with flights and travel for two speaking engagements.

— NOT RULING IT OUT: When Bass appeared on the podcast “Lovett or Leave It,” host Jon Lovett gave her a “crazy pitch”: What if the city of Los Angeles broke off from the county, forming its own city-county? Bass said it “wasn’t that crazy” and asked (jokingly) whether Lovett would be taking on the messy ballot initiative … before reverting back to her standard line on the need for intergovernmental cooperation. Bass also told Lovett that the city is still looking at ways to carve out an exemption to Measure ULA taxes for Palisades fire survivors selling their lots. And, she said, the city is in the process of hiring its long-promised film liaison “as we speak.”

— HOT SEAT: Gov. Gavin Newsom and Democratic lawmakers launched a special election campaign on Thursday, urging California voters to approve new congressional districts to shrink the state’s Republican delegation, as Texas Republicans fight to redraw their own maps to favor the GOP. If the plan moves forward through the many hoops ahead, another district could be created in southeast Los Angeles County, which would undoubtedly kickstart frantic maneuvering ahead of 2026. (L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis’ name is already getting thrown around as a potential candidate, though her office didn’t respond to a half-dozen queries.)

— DON’T ASK, DON’T TELL: City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto came out swinging against SB 79, state Sen. Scott Wiener’s latest housing density bill, back in May. Now, both proponents and opponents are clamoring to know whether Bass will take a position on the controversial bill. The Times has been asking too, but so far the mayor and her team have not responded to questions.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature homelessness program did not carry out any new operations this week. Her Shine LA initiative, which aims to clean up city streets and sidewalks, will be back Aug. 21.
• On the docket for next week: The Charter Reform Commission will meet at City Hall twice — yes, twice — to discuss planning and infrastructure on Monday and “government structure” on Friday.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

It was billed as a bargain-basement deal: L.A. County would buy the Gas Company Tower for $200 million — a third of what the downtown skyscraper cost before the pandemic sent office prices plummeting.

Nine months after the sale closed, some of the supervisors say they have sticker shock.

The sore point: a looming $230-million contract for “voluntary seismic upgrades” to the newly purchased tower, soon to become the county’s new headquarters.

“I never heard that it would double the cost of the purchase,” said Supervisor Janice Hahn, who cast a ‘hell no’ vote against buying the building. “I’m holding out hope that smarter minds will prevail, and we can stop any more investment in this building.”

On Tuesday, Supervisors Hilda Solis and Lindsey Horvath will introduce a motion to “immediately suspend” all seismic work.

“Given that we are in the budget constraints that we are in, I was surprised to know that that work was still being contemplated,” said Horvath.

The county’s financial future has never looked so grim. Federal cuts will force the county to slash health services and potentially shutter a hospital, Chief Executive Officer Fesia Davenport warned the board this week. The county soon will start making payments for its historically large $4-billion sex abuse settlement. Newly negotiated raises for county employees could cost the county $2 billion.

Before the purchase, the supervisors were given ballpark figures as to just how much it would cost to bring the Gas Company Tower into tiptop shape vs. rehabbing the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration, the county’s current headquarters, which is widely viewed by county employees as a death trap during the next major earthquake.

To earthquake-proof the hall — by far the riskiest of the two buildings — it could cost $700 million, according to estimates provided to the board last fall. To do the same for the newer Gas Company Tower, the county Chief Executive Office estimated it could potentially cost about $400 million. (As of now, the county is planning to spend less than that with a bid amount of $234.5 million.)

The Gas Company Tower came out looking the better deal by about a billion dollars, according to the Chief Executive Office, once it took into account other costs needed to upgrade the Hall of Administration — including more than a billion dollars in deferred maintenance and improvements.

Hahn’s not swayed.

“I think the bureaucrats had a plan and they made their numbers fit to sell this ill-conceived project,” she continued, adding she believed similar doubt was starting to creep in among her colleagues.

“I’ve heard some of them have some buyer’s remorse,” she said.

Horvath says she doesn’t regret buying the building — but she is skeptical that the county needs to pour millions more into the tower.

“I still maintain that the purchase of the building was the right thing to do,” she said. “If retrofitting is not needed, then I want to understand why we would [retrofit] at a time such as this, when we are making a very clear case about the difficult financial position we’re in.”

The tower is one of many L.A. skyscrapers that incorporates a “steel moment frame” as part of its structure. In the 1994 Northridge earthquake, buildings with the frame did not collapse, but some were badly damaged.

Lennie LaGuire, a spokesperson for the Chief Executive Office, previously told The Times that the tower is already safe and the upgrades are “proactive.”

“The County is choosing to perform this work proactively with an eye to the future, to ensure that the building performs optimally in the decades ahead,” LaGuire said.

During brutal labor negotiations over the last year, the purchase of the skyscraper became a touchy subject. Labor condemned it as an unnecessary splurge. The county insisted it was an obvious money saver.

The hard feelings haven’t gone away, with some unions saying they were kept in the dark about the tower’s true cost.

“The priority should be those facilities the public relies upon for emergencies and daily needs, like sheriff’s stations, fire stations, medical facilities, etc.” said Richard Pippin, president of the sheriff‘s deputies union. “Look, we get it — with the near doubling of the Board of Supervisors and an elected County Executive Officer, everyone wants an office with a better view, but is that what’s best for the public we serve?”

The motion Tuesday also requests a report on where the money to finance the retrofit is coming from and which departments will be moving into the tower.

“The purpose of this acquisition was to realize substantial savings for the County of Los Angeles by consolidating operations and avoiding leased spaces,” the motion states. “However, there has been little to no transparency into what progress, if any, the County has made in occupying spaces in the Gas Company Tower after eight months of ownership.”

According to the Chief Executive Office, some employees have started to move into the building, but the entire move is expected to take three years.

State of play

— OLYMPIC JITTERS: Councilmember Imelda Padilla, a member of the Ad Hoc Committee on the 2028 Olympics and Paralympic Games, called President Trump’s announcement that he would head a federal Olympic task force a “real curveball” for the city and raised concerns about what a mercurial president would mean for the Olympics. “We are a little nervous to see what they’re going to ask for,” Padilla said during the Los Angeles Current Affairs Forum luncheon on Thursday referring to the Trump administration’s involvement in the Olympics. She also called Trump’s assertion that Bass was not very competent “completely false.”

—TUNNEL TROUBLE: The city spent $25,800, using 10 contracted workers, to paint over graffiti in the 2nd Street Tunnel — only for taggers to immediately paint the walls again within 24 hours. “It’s infuriating that these selfish vandals are wasting tax dollars aimed at improving the city for all Angelenos,” said Steve King, president of the Board of Public Works.

— SILVER LININGS: L.A. County supervisors say they’re open to the idea of a receiver taking control of the beleaguered juvenile halls. But for it to happen, a majority on the board says the receiver will need to take on union agreements and civil service rules, which they say keep problem employees on the payroll.

—PLEA TO THE FEDS: A prominent law firm suing L.A. County over childhood sexual abuse is asking for a federal investigation into how so many children were harmed while in county custody. In a letter addressed to U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli, attorney John Manly wrote that he wanted to see the U.S. attorney’s office conduct an “immediate investigation” into any federal crimes committed by staff within the county’s Probation Department.

—COOLING OFF: L.A. County will soon require landlords in unincorporated areas to provide a way for tenants to keep their rental units 82 degrees or below. The supervisors say the law is necessary to combat heat-related deaths fueled by climate change.

—A HIGH-PRICED HALF-MONTH: A law firm representing the city of Los Angeles in a high-profile homelessness case submitted a $1.8-million invoice for two weeks of work in May. The costs comes as the city faces significant financial burdens from rising legal payouts.

— VENUE VOTE: The hotel workers union turned in a ballot proposal to require that voters approve of “event centers” for the 2028 Olympics, including sports facilities and concert halls. Former City Councilmember Paul Krekorian, who heads Mayor Karen Bass’ Office of Special Events, said the measure “would make vital projects essential for our city and these Games potentially impossible to complete.”

—TEMPORARY LEAVE: As of next week, Deputy Mayor Randall Winston — who also serves as a judge advocate in the U.S. Army National Guard Reserve — will be on a leave of absence from the Mayor’s office for military training. Winston was originally supposed to go on leave in January but deferred to help support wildfire response and recovery efforts. Andrea Greene, Executive Officer of the Office of Infrastructure, will be filling his role until he returns in mid-December, according to the Mayor’s office.

QUICK HITS

• On the docket for next week: The county supervisors are asking the sheriff’s department to report on their use-of-force policies as they relate to journalists covering the ongoing ICE raids.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Julia Wick, with an assist from David Zahniser, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Several millennia ago during the Trojan War, an army of Greeks built a massive wooden horse, feigned departure and left it as a “gift” outside the walled city of Troy.

The Trojans brought the offering — filled, unbeknownst to them, with Greek soldiers — into their fortified city and unwittingly wrought their own downfall. At least that’s how the legend goes.

So if an attack disguised as a gift is a Trojan horse, what do you call a gift disguised as an attack?

One could argue that the attempted recall of Mayor Karen Bass inadvertently fits the bill.

Back in early March, Silicon Valley philanthropist and former Robert F. Kennedy Jr. running mate Nicole Shanahan launched an effort to recall Bass. At the time, Bass was still on her back foot — an incumbent, first-term mayor who’d become a national target for her initial response to the Palisades fire.

It’s notoriously difficult to gather enough signatures to trigger a recall. But Shanahan’s extremely deep pockets (her ex-husband co-founded Google) made anything possible. With the mayor already wounded and Angelenos feeling angry and frustrated, a well-funded recall effort could have been the spark that torched Bass’ reelection chances.

That did not come to pass.

Proponents didn’t even finish the paperwork necessary to begin gathering signatures, then tweeted in June that a recall would “no longer be our vehicle for change” and that they would instead focus on holding elected officials accountable at the ballot box in 2026. Their spokesperson has not responded to several emails from The Times.

But the short-lived recall effort had one effect its proponents likely did not anticipate. During a tenuous moment for Bass, they may have unintentionally handed her an extremely useful tool: the ability to form an opposition committee unencumbered by limits on the size of the donations she collects.

The threat from Shanahan’s group allowed Bass to form her own anti-recall campaign committee — separate from her general reelection account, which cannot collect more than $1,800 from each donor. Now, she could raise more money from her existing supporters, in far larger amounts.

Flash forward to this week, when the latest tranche of campaign finance numbers were released, revealing how much was raised and spent from the beginning of the year through the end of June. While Bass’ official reelection campaign took in an anemic $179,589, her anti-recall coffers hoovered up more than four times that amount.

The nearly $750,000 collected by the anti-recall campaign included two major donations at the end of March that we previously reported on: $250,000 from the Bass-affiliated Sea Change PAC and $200,000 from former assembly speaker and Actum managing partner Fabian Núñez’s leftover campaign cash.

Along with Núñez and Sea Change, the largest donors were philanthropists Jon Croel and William Resnick ($25,000 each), businessman Baron Farwell ($25,000) and former City Councilmember Cindy Miscikowski ($15,000). Several others gave $10,000 a piece, including pomegranate billionaire and power donor Lynda Resnick.

It’s far easier to rally donations when you’re dealing with an impending threat. (“Save the mayor from a right-wing recall!” is much catchier than asking for reelection dollars when a serious challenger has yet to jump into the race.) And it’s infinitely faster to stockpile cash when you aren’t limited to $1,800 increments.

“After the fires and what had happened, anything was possible, and we had to mobilize, and that’s what the mayor did,” said Bass campaign strategist Doug Herman. “But the people of the city didn’t want to have a recall in the midst of what they thought were more serious problems.”

Shanahan declined to comment.

When the recall effort officially times out on Aug. 4, the Bass camp will no longer be able to raise unlimited sums to fight it (with a few exceptions, such as expenses related to winding down the committee or settling debt). But the anti-recall committee will still have quite the extra arsenal to fire off in her favor.

Sometimes your loudest enemies are really friends in disguise.

State of play

—WHITHER CARUSO? Brentwood resident and former Vice President Kamala Harris announced this week that she would not be running for governor, intensifying questions about whether former mayoral candidate Rick Caruso might jump into the gubernatorial race … or potentially challenge Bass again for mayor. Through a spokesperson, Caruso declined to comment.

— RACE FOR THE 8TH FLOOR: City Attorney candidate Marissa Roy outraised incumbent Hydee Feldstein Soto during the latest fundraising period, delivering a major warning shot about the seriousness of her campaign. For now, Feldstein Soto still has more cash on hand than Roy, who is challenging her from the left.

— COASTAL CASH: In the race for a Westside council district, public interest lawyer Faizah Malik raised a hefty $127,360, but her stash pales in comparison to the $343,020 that incumbent Councilmember Traci Park brought in during the most recent filing period. That’s far more than any other city candidate running in the June 2026 election.

— AHEAD OF THE PACK: Council staffer Jose Ugarte, who’s hoping to succeed his boss, termed out Councilmember Curren Price, in a crowded South L.A. race, raised a whopping $211,206, far outpacing his rivals.

— VIEW FROM THE VALLEY: During this filing cycle, Tim Gaspar and Barri Worth Girvan both brought in real money in the race to succeed outgoing Councilmember Bob Blumenfield in the West Valley. Girvan outraised Gaspar during the past half-year, but Gaspar entered the race earlier and still has substantially more cash on hand.

— WHERE’S MONICA? One incumbent who didn’t report any fundraising is Valley Councilmember Monica Rodriguez. When reached Friday, Rodriguez said she is still planning to run for reelection and was in the process of changing treasurers. She did not answer when asked whether she was also considering a potential mayoral bid, as has been rumored.

— WHAT ABOUT KENNETH? City Controller Kenneth Mejia does not have any campaign finance numbers listed because he qualified his reelection committee after the June 30 fundraising deadline. He’ll be required to share fundraising numbers for the next filing period.

— LOWER LAYOFFS: The number of employee layoffs planned for the 2025-26 fiscal year continued to decline this week, falling to 394, according to a report released Friday by City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo. Bass’ budget had proposed 1,600 earlier this year. Szabo attributed much of the decrease to the transfer of employees to vacant positions that are not targeted for layoff.

— TOKENS OF APPRECIATION: According to her disclosure forms, Bass’ reelection committee spent more than $1,100 on gifts “of appreciation,” including flowers sent to Mayer Brown lawyers Edgar Khalatian, Dario Frommer and Phil Recht; Fabian Núñez; lawyer Byron McLain; longtime supporters Wendy and Barry Meyer; author Gil Robertson; former Amazon exec Latasha Gillespie; L.A. Labor Fed head honcho Yvonne Wheeler; lobbyist Arnie Berghoff; Faye Geyen; and LA Women’s Collective co-founder Hannah Linkenhoker. The most expensive bouquet ($163.17, from Ode à la Rose) went to Lynda Resnick.

— PIZZA INTEL: Bass has not, to my knowledge, publicly shared the names of her reelection finance committee. But her forms list a $198.37 charge at Triple Beam Pizza for food for a “finance committee meeting” with Cathy Unger, Victoria Moran, Ron Stone, Kellie Hawkins, Todd Hawkins, Cookie Parker, Stephanie Graves, Leslie Gilbert-Lurie, George Pla, Wendy Greuel, Byron McLain, Chris Pak, Travis Kiyota, Areva Martin and Kevin Pickett. Bass’ consultant did not immediately respond when asked if that list constituted her finance committee, and if anyone was missing.

— FAMILY-FRIENDLY PROGRAMMING? Speakers at Los Angeles City Council meetings will be banned from using the N-word and the C-word, the council decided Wednesday. But my colleague Noah Goldberg reports that the council’s decision to ban the words could be challenged in court, with some legal scholars saying it could violate speakers’ 1st Amendment free speech rights to curse out their elected officials.

— ZINE O’ THE TIMES: City Councilmember Bob Blumenfield finally named his pick for the city’s Charter Reform Commission: Dennis Zine, who served on the council for 12 years, representing the same West Valley district as Blumenfield. Zine spent more than three decades as an officer with the LAPD while also serving on the board of the Police Protective League, the union that represents rank-and-file officers, and should not be confused with progressive former Santa Monica mayor Denny Zane.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature homelessness program went to an encampment next to the 405 Freeway in Van Nuys, moving an estimated 30 people indoors. The operation drew protests from activists who said the mayor was destroying the belongings of homeless people and forcing them into “jail like conditions.” Bass, who was at the encampment, lashed out at the activists, telling reporters: “How dare they sleep in a comfortable bed at night, come here and advocate for people to stay in these kind of conditions. We’re not going to stand for it.”
• On the docket for next week: The City Council’s personnel committee holds a special meeting Wednesday on the plan for laying off hundreds of city workers.
• A political-ish poem to start your Saturday morning: “The book burnings” by Bertolt Brecht, translated from the German by Tom Kuhn and David Constantine.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Here you thought charter reform would be boring.

A 13-member citizens commission is just getting started on the painstaking, generally unsexy work of poring through the Los Angeles City Charter, the city’s governing document, and coming up with strategies for improving it. Yet already, the commission has had a leadership battle, heard allegations of shady dealings and fielded questions about whether it’s been set up to fail.

But first, let’s back up.

Mayor Karen Bass, City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson and former Council President Paul Krekorian chose a collection of volunteers to serve on the Charter Reform Commission, which is charged with exploring big and small changes to the City Charter.

The commission is part of a much larger push for reform sparked by the city’s 2022 audio leak scandal and a string of corruption cases involving L.A. officials. The list of potential policy challenges the commission faces is significant.

Good government types want the new commission to endorse ranked-choice voting, with Angelenos selecting their elected officials by ranking candidates in numerical order. Advocacy groups want to see a much larger City Council. Some at City Hall want clarity on what to do with elected officials who are accused of wrongdoing but have not been convicted.

“You are not one of those commissions that shows up every few years to fix a few things here or there,” said Raphael Sonenshein, who served nearly 30 years ago as executive director of the city’s appointed Charter Reform Commission, while addressing the new commission last week. “You actually have a bigger responsibility than that.”

The real work began on July 16, when the commission took up the question of who should be in charge. Many thought the leadership post would immediately go to Raymond Meza, who had already been serving as the interim chair.

Instead, the panel found itself deadlocked.

Meza is a high-level staffer at Service Employees International Union Local 721, the powerful public employee union that represents thousands of city workers and has been a big-money spender in support of Bass and many other elected city officials.

Meza, who was appointed by Bass earlier this year, picked up five votes. But so did Ted Stein, a real estate developer who has served on an array of city commissions — planning, airport, harbor — but hadn’t been on a volunteer city panel in nearly 15 years. Faced with a stalemate, charter commissioners decided to try again a few days later, when they were joined by two additional members.

By then, some reform advocates were up in arms over Stein, arguing that he was bringing a record of scandal to the commission. They sent the commissioners news articles pointing out that Stein had, among other things, resigned from the airport commission in 2004 amid two grand jury investigations into whether city officials had tied the awarding of airport contracts to campaign contributions.

Stein denied those allegations in 2004, calling them “false, defamatory and unsubstantiated.” Last week, before the second leadership vote, he shot back at his critics, noting that two law enforcement agencies — the U.S. attorney’s office and the L.A. County district attorney’s office — declined to pursue charges against him. The Ethics Commission also did not bring a case over his airport commission activities.

“I was forced to protect my good name by having to hire an attorney and having to spend over $200,000 in legal fees [over] something where I had done nothing wrong,” he told his fellow commissioners. The city reimbursed Stein for the vast majority of those legal costs.

Stein accused Meza of orchestrating some of the outside criticism — which Meza later denied. And Stein spent so much time defending his record that he had little time to say why he should be elected.

Still, the vote was close, with Meza securing seven votes and Stein picking up five.

Meza called the showdown “unfortunate.” L.A. voters, he said, “want to see the baton passed to a new generation of people.” The 40-year-old Montecito Heights resident made clear that he supports an array of City Charter changes.

In an interview, Meza said he’s “definitely in favor” of ranked-choice voting, arguing that it would increase voter turnout. He also supports an increase in the number of City Council members but wouldn’t say how many. And he wants to ensure that vacant positions are filled more quickly at City Hall, calling it an issue that “absolutely needs to be addressed.”

That last item has long been a concern for SEIU Local 721, where Meza works as deputy chief of staff. Nevertheless, Meza said he would, to an extent, set aside the wishes of his union during the commission’s deliberations.

“On the commission, I am an individual resident of the city,” he said.

Stein, for his part, told The Times that he only ran for the leadership post out of concern over the commission’s tight timeline. The commission must submit its proposal to the council next spring — a much more aggressive schedule than the one required of two charter reform commissions nearly 30 years ago.

Getting through so many complex issues in such a brief period calls for an experienced hand, said Stein, who is 76 and lives in Encino.

Stein declined to say where he stands on council expansion and ranked-choice voting. He said he’s already moved on from the leadership vote and is ready to dig into the commission’s work.

Meza, for his part, said he has heard the concerns about the aggressive schedule. But he remains confident the commission will be successful.

“I don’t think we have the best conditions,” he said. “But I do not believe we’ve been set up to fail. I’m very confident the commissioners will do what’s needed to turn in a good product.”

State of play

— STRICTLY BUSINESS: A group of L.A. business leaders launched a ballot proposal to repeal the city’s much-maligned gross receipts tax, saying it would boost the city’s economy and lower prices for Angelenos. The mayor and several other officials immediately panned the idea, saying it would deprive the city’s yearly budget of $800 million, forcing cuts to police, firefighters and other services.

— INCHING FORWARD: Meanwhile, another ballot proposal from the business community — this one backed by airlines and the hotel industry — nudged closer to reality. Interim City Clerk Petty Santos announced that the proposed referendum on the $30-per-hour tourism minimum wage had “proceeded to the next step,” with officials now examining and verifying petition signatures to determine their validity.

— GRIM GPS: The Los Angeles County Fire Department had only one truck stationed west of Lake Avenue in Altadena at a critical moment during the hugely destructive Eaton fire, according to vehicle tracking data analyzed by The Times. By contrast, the agency had dozens of trucks positioned east of Lake. All but one of the deaths attributed to the Eaton fire took place west of Lake.

— CHANGE OF PLANS: On Monday, Bass nominated consultant and Community Coalition board member Mary Lee to serve on the five-member Board of Police Commissioners. Two days later, in a brief email, Lee withdrew from consideration. Reached by The Times, Lee cited “personal reasons” for her decision but did not elaborate. (The mayor’s office had nothing to add.) Lee would have replaced former commissioner Maria “Lou” Calanche, who is running against Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez in the June 2026 election.

— SEMPER GOODBYE: The Pentagon announced Monday that the roughly 700 Marines who have been deployed to the city since early June would be withdrawing, a move cheered by Bass and other local leaders who have criticized the military deployment that followed protests over federal immigration raids. About 2,000 National Guard troops remain in the region.

— HALTING HEALTHCARE: L.A. County’s public health system, which provides care to the region’s neediest residents, could soon face brutal budget cuts. The “Big Beautiful Bill,” enacted by President Trump and the Republican-led Congress, is on track to carve $750 million per year out of the Department of Health Services, which oversees four public hospitals and roughly two dozen clinics. At the Department of Public Health, which is facing its own $200-million cut, top executive Barbara Ferrer said: “I’ve never actually seen this much disdain for public health.”

— HOMELESS HIRE: The commission that oversees the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority selected Gita O’Neill, a career lawyer in the city attorney’s office, to serve as the agency’s interim CEO. O’Neill will replace Va Lecia Adams Kellum, who stepped down Friday after more than two years in her post.

— THE JURY SPEAKS: The city has been ordered by a jury to pay $48.8 million to a man who has been in a coma since he was hit by a sanitation truck while crossing a street in Encino. The verdict comes as the city struggles with escalating legal payouts — and was larger than any single payout by the city in the last two fiscal years, according to data provided by the city attorney’s office.

— LOOKING FOR A LIAISON: Back in May, while signing an executive directive to support local film and TV production, L.A.’s mayor was asked whether she planned to appoint a film liaison as the City Hall point person for productions. “Absolutely,” Bass said during the news conference, adding that she planned to do so within a few days.

That was two months ago. Asked this week about the status of that position, Bass spokesperson Clara Karger touted the executive directive and said the position was “being hired in conjunction with industry leaders.” She did not provide a timeline.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature homelessness program did not carry out any new operations this week. However, her Shine LA initiative, which aims to clean up city streets and sidewalks, is heading out this weekend to Wilmington, Harbor Gateway and a stretch of Crenshaw Boulevard in South L.A.
• On the docket for next week: A bunch of stuff! The City Council returns from its summer recess, holding its first meeting in nearly a month. The Charter Reform Commission heads to the Baldwin Hills library to study planning and infrastructure. Meanwhile, county supervisors are scheduled to take up a proposal to bar law enforcement officers from concealing their identities in the county’s unincorporated areas, including East L.A., Lennox and Altadena.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Rebecca Ellis, with an assist from Julia Wick and Noah Goldberg, giving you the latest on city and county government.

The ‘five little queens’ of L.A. County agree: accidentally wiping out a ballot measure is not a good look.

It’s a “bureaucratic disaster,” Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said this week of the revelation that voters had wiped out the promise of hundreds of millions toward services that keep people out of jail. That snafu happened when voters approved her completely unrelated ballot measure in November to change the county’s form of government.

It’s clear, the supervisors say, someone messed up badly. But who?

The bureaucratic whodunit has confounded county observers — even those who once were creatures of the county themselves.

“I just can’t figure it out,” said Zev Yaroslavsky, a former longtime county supervisor. “The charter amendment just disappeared. I just don’t know how that happened, mechanically.”

The mistake, it seems, began with the county’s executive office, which supports the five politicians with the less glamorous, administrative parts of the job — preparing meeting agendas and guiding the board through marathon Tuesday meetings.

One of the lesser-known job requirements: updating the county charter — think of it like the county’s constitution — when voters make changes at the ballot box. To do that, the executive office is supposed to submit the change to Municode, the online vendor hosting the county’s charter, when the measure passes.

That didn’t happen.

In 2020, voters approved Measure J, enshrining the promise of hundreds of millions toward services that keep people out of jail in the charter. Only the language was never actually added to the official charter document.

Executive Officer Edward Yen, who was sworn into the top job last year, told his bosses Tuesday that the office was cleaning up its act.

“This failure of this magnitude is the reason why we’re doing what we’re doing,” he said at the Tuesday board meeting, noting he’d found his office’s policies “limited and lacking” when he came on the job.

Celia Zavala, the former executive officer who retired in January 2024 after more than three decades with the county, couldn’t be reached for comment.

The executive office called its role “purely ministerial” when it came to charter amendments and said it was working closely with the lawyers to make sure future changes were “accurately and promptly reflected in the charter.”

It was sloppy governance, but — until recently — it didn’t really matter. Voters approved the measure, so it was, legally speaking, part of the county’s governing document, even if you couldn’t open up the charter and see it.

But when a majority of county supervisors decided they wanted to revamp the county government last year, the outdated document became a real problem.

County counsel had their marching orders: They were to create a ballot measure, known as Measure G, that would overhaul the county government, expanding the five-person board of elected supervisors to nine and bringing on a new elected executive, who would act almost as a mayor of the county.

That’s how it works, says Yaroslavsky. A supervisor has the vision. The lawyers create a ballot measure that makes it a reality.

“They put it into the secret language of legalese that none of us understand. And it wasn’t like we took a magnifying glass to it,” said Yaroslavsky, who sponsored a ballot measure in 2002 to raise money for the county’s trauma care network. “I don’t think I had any lawyers on my staff at the time — and certainly not legislative experts. So, I mean, you have to rely on your lawyers.”

To change the county government, county lawyers wrote a ballot measure that would repeal most of a section of the charter — called Article III — in 2028. That section details the powers of the board — and, most consequentially, includes the requirement from Measure J that the board funnel hundreds of millions toward anti-incarceration services.

County lawyers rewrote that chunk of the charter with the new changes the board wanted to make to the county’s form of government — but left out the anti-incarceration funding.

So when voters approved Measure G, they unwittingly repealed Measure J.

The county counsel, led by Dawyn Harrison, said in a statement last week that the fault lies with a “prior Executive Officer administration.” The charter wasn’t updated, so they were left in the dark about what they needed to include in the new version.

But some say the county lawyers — who drafted both ballot measures and therefore were presumably familiar with that part of charter— share some of the responsibility.

“It is an inexcusable administrative failing of the County’s Executive Office and Counsel,” Supervisor Holly Mitchell said last week.

“It’s just amazing that you wouldn’t recall that you had Measure J,” said John Fasana, the former Duarte City Council member who first spotted the mistake.

County counsel said in a statement that it was unrealistic. They were going off of what was posted on the online charter, which they said they’re expected to treat “as the governing law.”

“The idea that county attorneys should have ‘just known’ a provision was missing assumes we memorize every law ever passed,” county counsel said in a statement. “That’s not how the law works, and it couldn’t function if we did.”

Derek Hsieh, head of the sheriff‘s deputy union that opposed both ballot measures, says the buck stops at the top.

“The responsibility for this is with Los Angeles County supervisors. They are in charge, they take responsibility,” said Hsieh, underscoring one didn’t need to have had a law degree to figure this out.

“And by the way, John Fasana’s not a lawyer,” he said.

State of play

— MEASURE J(K): County supervisors unanimously voted Tuesday to ask their lawyers to find a way to bring back Measure J. The county says it’s looking at multiple options to try to get the measure permanently back in the charter including a change in state law, a court judgment or a ballot measure for 2026.

— A HELPING HAND: County officials say a cash fund for families financially reeling from federal immigration raids will be stood up within a month. It’s not clear yet who will be eligible or how much a family could expect to collect.

— HOMELESSNESS HOPE: For the second straight year, the city and county saw declines in the number of homeless people. The number of people experiencing homelessness in the county dropped 4% in 2025, including a 10% decrease in people living on the street, according to the county’s annual point-in-time homeless count.

— TRUMP BASH: A day after the Pentagon ordered the withdrawal of half the National Guard troops deployed in L.A., Gov. Gavin Newsom held a press conference in Downey to criticize the president for wasting hundreds of millions of dollars to appear “tough” by punishing immigrants.

— PALISADES PERSPECTIVE: Mayor Karen Bass’ political image was badly bruised in the wake of the fires, but she has compensated amid a string of historically good headlines in recent days. However, six months after the fires, she still faces some harsh critics in the Palisades, where the devastation is still palpable.

— TRAGEDY WHILE TRAINING: Three deputies were killed on Friday in an explosion at the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department’s Biscailuz Training Center in East L.A. The agency has a history of dangerous incidents at its training facilities, with at least four fires at its mobile shooting ranges in the last 12 years.

— ICE IN JAIL: The sheriff’s department has resumed transferring jail inmates to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for the first time in years. Eight inmates were released to ICE in May and a dozen more in June. Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said he has “no choice” in the matter. He said the department must follow federal judicial warrants seeking the transfer of inmates in its county jails.

— COSTLY CROSSWALK: A jury decided this week that the city must pay nearly $50 million to a man who has been in a coma since he was hit by a sanitation truck while crossing a street in Encino. The verdict comes as the city continues to struggle with escalating legal liability payouts.

— MOUNTING LIABILITY: The county’s no stranger to big payouts either. The supervisors approved a $14-million settlement this week to Alexander Torres, who spent more than 20 years in prison for a murder that he did not commit.

QUICK HITS

• On the docket for next week: The L.A. City Charter Reform Commission will be meeting today at 11 a.m. at Cal State Northridge.
• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s office conducted a citywide response effort this week, bringing more than 65 Angelenos inside from Echo Park, Hollywood, South L.A., Baldwin Hills, Canoga Park, Reseda, North Hills, Westlake and the Miracle Mile (Council Districts 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12 and 13).

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Rick Cole has forgotten more about municipal government than most of us will ever know.

The 72-year-old former mayor (Pasadena), city manager (Ventura, Azusa, Santa Monica) and deputy mayor (Los Angeles) returned for a third stint at Los Angeles City Hall in 2022, bringing a depth of experience to political neophyte and then-newly elected City Controller Kenneth Mejia’s office as Mejia’s chief deputy.

After two and a half years in City Hall East, Cole announced last month that he would be leaving his post to focus on the Pasadena City Council, which he joined again last year.

Cole knew that holding down “a more-than-full-time role in LA and a more-than-part-time role in Pasadena” would be difficult to juggle, he wrote in a LinkedIn post, and ultimately decided he couldn’t do both jobs justice.

In a goodbye presentation to the L.A. City Council, he sounded the alarm, saying he has never been more worried about the city.

We sat down with Cole to discuss that speech and his fears. Here’s some of our conversation, very lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

Tell me about the speech you gave at council. What motivated it?

I’ve never been more alarmed about the future of Los Angeles. I delineated the existential challenges facing the city, which have been decades in the making. Politics needs to be looking out at the future and not just reacting to the crises of the day. And Los Angeles needs bold, systemic reform to meet the moment.

Why are you so alarmed about the future of Los Angeles?

It’s a converging set of crises. You have a homelessness emergency, an affordable housing crisis, a billion-dollar structural financial challenge that’s resulted in the loss of thousands of key city jobs. You had a firestorm that destroyed an entire neighborhood. And you have the federal government at war with the people in the government of Los Angeles.

And underneath that, you have an existential challenge to Hollywood, which is unfolding. And you have crumbling infrastructure.

And you have people feeling that government can’t really fix any of these things, that the money we spend gets wasted, fair or unfair. That’s a challenge.

Do you think the government is wasting taxpayer money?

Every institution has some level of waste. The problem with Los Angeles government and the public sector in California is an aversion to innovation.

We’ve fallen behind the private sector in adapting to the new world of advancing technology and changing demographics. That’s fixable, and that’s what I was advocating for.

What would it look like to fix these problems? Who’s responsible, and who is currently dropping the ball?

The lack of responsibility is built into the City Charter.

Tell me more about what you mean by that.

The people who originally wrote the charter a hundred years ago intentionally designed the system to diffuse authority, which therefore diffused accountability. So it’s really difficult to know who is in charge of any given thing.

A clear example is that the department heads have 16 bosses. They report to the mayor, but in each of the council districts, the council members think that the department heads report to them. That they … have to make the council member happy with what’s going on in their district, whether it’s trimming trees on a particular street or fixing a sidewalk in front of a constituent’s home, the general managers [of city departments] are subject to extreme and constant political pressure.

That distracts them from fixing the system so that we’re doing a better job, so that there are fewer resident complaints, so that a constituent wouldn’t have to go to their council member to get their street fixed. The street would get fixed every 10 years.

But if you are have 16 bosses and and a continually shifting set of priorities, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to put in place systemic solutions.

And in terms of who do you blame: Do you blame the general manager? Do you blame the mayor? Do you blame your council member? Do you blame the lack of resources that the city has to allocate?

The answer is yes.

What needs to change?

What I advocated is designing the city to work in the 21st century, which means a chief operating officer who works for the mayor to make sure the city runs effectively across 44 departments. We don’t have such a person now.

It means a chief financial officer. The responsibilities of a chief financial officer are [currently] divided between four different offices in the city, so it’s difficult, again, to point to one person who’s in charge of keeping the city fiscally sound.

The charter calls for a one-year budget, but we could do a two-year budget and simply update it once a year and be consistent with the City Charter. But then we would have a much broader view of the city’s financial future, and we wouldn’t waste so much time on a budget process that takes 11 of the 12 months and produces very little change.

State of play

— SAFER CITY: L.A. is on pace for its lowest homicide total in nearly 60 years as killings plummet, according to an LAPD tally. The falling murder rate mirrors a national trend in other big cities. As my colleague Libor Jany reports, it also paints a decidedly different picture than the Gotham City image offered by President Trump and other senior U.S. officials as justification for the deployment of military troops in L.A. in recent weeks.

—MORE RAIDS FALLOUT: Mayor Karen Bass announced a plan Friday to provide direct cash assistance to people who have been affected by the Trump administration’s sweeping immigration raids. The money will come from philanthropic partners, not city coffers, and the cash cards will be distributed by immigrant rights groups.

—MOTION TO INTERVENE: The city and county of Los Angeles are among the local governments seeking to join a lawsuit calling on the Trump administration to stop “unlawful detentions” during the ongoing immigration sweeps. The lawsuit was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, Public Counsel and immigrant rights groups last week.

—IN MEMORIAM: Longtime former executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs Jaime Regalado died last month at age 80. Born in Boyle Heights, Regalado served in the U.S. Navy and was the founding editor of California Politics & Policy and the California Policy Issues Annual. He led the Pat Brown Institute at Cal State L.A. from 1991 to 2011.

—“SOMEONE GOOFED”: When L.A. County Supervisors Lindsey Horvath and Janice Hahn co-wrote Measure G, a sprawling overhaul of county government that voters passed last November, they didn’t realize they would also be repealing Measure J, a landmark criminal justice measure that voters had passed four years earlier. Thanks to an administrative screw-up for the ages, that’s exactly what happened. The relevant changes won’t go into effect until 2028, so county leaders have some time to undo their oops.

—DISASTER AVERTED: A potentially tragic situation was averted Wednesday night, after all 31 workers in a partially collapsed Los Angeles County sanitation tunnel were able to make their way to safety. Work on the tunnel has been halted, and the county sanitation district board is looking into what caused the collapse.

—POSTCARD FROM SANTA MONICA: In the long shadow of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller‘s hard-line anti-immigration policies, local and national observers alike are paying renewed attention to Miller’s upbringing in the famously liberal enclave once dubbed “the People’s Republic of Santa Monica.” Join me for a deep dive into Miller’s time at Santa Monica High School and learn why some of his former classmates think he’s getting his revenge on Southern California.

QUICK HITS

• On the docket for next week: The city’s charter reform commission will meet Wednesday afternoon. The City Council remains on recess.
• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s program to combat homelessness was in South Los Angeles this week, according to a tweet from Bass’ office.
• A political poem to pair with your morning coffee: “I Am Waiting” by Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Noah Goldberg with an assist from David Zahniser, giving you the latest on city and county government.

A few Los Angeles city councilmembers got in some final zingers before packing their bags for summer recess.

It was the final council session before the three-week pause, and members were working their way through a thick agenda Tuesday. After weeks in which the main focus has been President Trump’s immigration crackdown in the city, it didn’t appear there would be fireworks.

Then, Councilmember Traci Park rolled her eyes at Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez while he was speaking. And Councilmember Monica Rodriguez had some sharp words for both of them.

Let’s backtrack and figure out how we got there.

In May, the council passed an ordinance to raise the minimum wage for hotel and airport workers to $30 per hour — higher than the city’s minimum wage — with Park, Rodriguez and Councilmember John Lee voting against it.

Soto-Martínez, a former organizer with the hotel and restaurant union Unite Here Local 11, which pushed for the minimum wage hike, led the charge at City Hall.

Park said she voted against the ordinance because she thought that it didn’t take into account economic realities and that it would result in hotel and airport workers losing their jobs. Park’s opponent in a bitterly contested general election for her Westside council seat in 2022 was a Unite Here-backed candidate, Erin Darling.

After the minimum wage hike passed, a business coalition called the L.A. Alliance for Tourism, Jobs and Progress began a campaign to overturn it by gathering signatures to place it on the June 2026 ballot, which would at least delay its implementation.

Things quickly got ugly. Unite Here’s lawyer alleged in a letter to the L.A. County district attorney and the city attorney that petition circulators for the business coalition misrepresented their campaign to voters and even assaulted activists on multiple occasions.

Meanwhile, a petition circulator alleged that she was assaulted outside a Food 4 Less in Inglewood by an SEIU-USWW executive board member while gathering signatures. The woman filed a police report, and a judge granted her request for a temporary restraining order against the board member.

Enter Soto-Martínez and Park.

Soto-Martínez quickly drafted a motion asking for the LAPD to investigate the petition circulators for fraud and other misconduct alleged in the Unite Here letter.

When Soto-Martínez introduced his motion at the City Council’s Economic Development and Jobs Committee last month, Park spoke up, saying it was hypocritical for Unite Here to complain about misleading campaigns when it engaged in the same tactics “on a regular basis.”

Park quoted from a text message campaign that she said dozens of her constituents had brought to her attention.

“A new complaint alleges paid signature gatherers are using misdirection and misconduct to collect these signatures. Don’t sign the petition. Email Traci Park to tell her to stop this misleading effort to lower the minimum wage,” read a text message from Citizens in Support of the LA Olympic Wage, a campaign backed by Unite Here in favor of the hotel and airport minimum wage.

Park said the text made it sound as if she were involved in the campaign to repeal the ordinance.

“I have nothing to do with it. No one ever consulted me about it. No one ever asked my opinion about it,” she said at the committee meeting.

When the committee approved Soto-Martínez’s motion on June 17, she voted “no,” saying any investigation should scrutinize both sides of the wage campaign. The motion reached the full council on Tuesday.

Park quoted from the text campaign again and introduced an amendment asking for the LAPD to investigate both sides of the petition fight — those aligned with the L.A. Alliance for Tourism and those aligned with Unite Here.

“We know that engaging in misleading tactics are not unique to one group or one organization,” she said. “I know this because I have personally been targeted by misleading smear campaigns by the very group now complaining about this behavior.”

Soto-Martínez fired back at his colleague.

“There have been plenty of things said about me that have been misleading and I didn’t agree with, but I didn’t bring it into this chamber,” he said.

Soto-Martínez also said he wanted to draw a distinction between the text message campaign about Park and the alleged physical assaults against Unite Here campaigners.

Still, in the end, he said he supported Park’s amendment.

Park could be seen in a video recording of the council meeting rolling her eyes as Soto-Martínez finished his speech.

In a statement, Unite Here co-President Kurt Petersen called Park’s comments at the council meeting “unbelievably narcissistic.”

“Working people plea for her help after they were allegedly assaulted while they campaigned to raise wages. Instead of focusing on helping the victims, Councilmember Park complains about being criticized for her vote against the minimum wage, and equates criticism of her to the alleged political violence,” Petersen said. “This kind of greedy self involvement in the face of injustice is a hallmark of the billionaire allies of Councilmember Traci Park, and it’s why working people don’t trust her.”

Park responded in a statement, “Kurt Petersen is killing jobs and tanking our local economy. Iconic restaurants are closing, airport workers are being replaced by kiosks, hotels are pulling out, and working families are losing, not winning. His divisive and reckless tactics are speeding up automation and driving opportunity out of Los Angeles.”

Councilmember Rodriguez chastised both Park and Soto-Martínez.

“I think this idea that’s trying to assign blame to one side or another is kind of futile, given the demands of what we need LAPD to be focused on, but I think performative politics is the name of the game these days,” Rodriguez said. “Everyone needs to grow the hell up.”

State of play

— SANCTUARY SUIT: The Department of Justice filed suit against the city of Los Angeles on Monday over its sanctuary ordinance, calling the ordinance illegal and saying that it discriminates against Immigration and Customs Enforcement. L.A.’s refusal to cooperate with federal immigration authorities has resulted in “lawlessness, rioting, looting, and vandalism,” according to the lawsuit. Mayor Karen Bass called the lawsuit part of an “all out assault on Los Angeles” by President Trump. Immigrant rights groups filed their own lawsuit against the Trump administration Wednesday, seeking to block the administration’s “ongoing pattern and practice of flouting the Constitution and federal law” during immigration raids in the L.A. area.

— HOMELESSNESS DROP: Homelessness declined by 15% overall in three areas of Los Angeles in 2024, according to a new Rand study. The biggest drop came in Hollywood, where the report found that the number of homeless people decreased 49% from 2023. The number fell 22% in Venice and went up 9% in Skid Row, according to the report. The Rand study linked the Hollywood decrease to a series of Inside Safe operations in 2024.

— SEE YA, CEQA: As part of the state budget, the California State Legislature passed Assembly Bill 130 and Senate Bill 131 Monday, which exempts most urban housing projects from the California Environmental Quality Act. The act, known as CEQA, has often mired construction projects in years of litigation. Gov. Gavin Newsom muscled the new rules through the Legislature despite concerns from progressive lawmakers and environmental interest groups.

— MANSION SPEND: The L.A. City Council approved a plan Tuesday to spend almost $425 million collected from the city’s “mansion” tax on property sales over $5 million. Backers of the controversial tax — which has been criticized by the real estate industry for limiting property sales and reducing property tax revenue — say the fund is producing crucial dollars for affordable housing and homelessness prevention programs.

— FROZEN FUNDS: The Trump administration moved to withhold $811 million from California that would have helped students who are learning English or are from migrant families. “The [Education] Department remains committed to ensuring taxpayer resources are spent in accordance with the President’s priorities and the Department’s statutory responsibilities,” the administration said in a letter to states on Monday.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature homelessness program returned to locations of past operations in Echo Park, Watts and South L.A. this week, according to the mayor’s office.
• On the docket for next week: The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors will vote to appoint Sarah Mahin as the first executive director for the county’s new Department of Homeless Services and Housing.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s Noah Goldberg, giving you the latest on city and county government.

Zohran Mamdani’s resounding victory in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary has turned the heads of progressive elected officials in Los Angeles.

Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez called it the “biggest victory for a socialist candidate probably in America.”

Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez said Angelenos should take note.

“What it shows is that we can win. We can win in major cities,” she said.

Councilmember Ysabel Jurado was bursting with excitement about the results from a city 3,000 miles away.

“Having a DSA-backed mayor is freaking amazing,” she said about the prospect of Mamdani, who was backed by the Democratic Socialists of America, winning the general election in November.

While Mamdani’s primary upset over former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo injected new excitement into the left flank of the Los Angeles political scene — one DSA member called it a “we’re so back moment” — it also highlighted vastly different political terrains in the two coastal cities, starting with executive leadership.

Mamdani is a 33-year-old democratic socialist who was elected to the New York state assembly in 2020. He ran in the Democratic mayoral primary on a far-left agenda, promising to freeze the rent in rent-stabilized apartments and to make city buses free.

New York’s current mayor, Eric Adams, ran as a Democrat in 2021 but will be an independent candidate in the general election, after Trump’s Department of Justice dropped bribery charges against him. In line with his offer to assist in enforcing federal immigration laws if the charges were dropped, Adams has since attempted to allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents into the city jails (a judge blocked that plan after the City Council sued).

Southern California, on the other hand, has emerged as the epicenter of the president’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants, and Mayor Karen Bass has been an outspoken critic of the president’s immigration agenda.

Trump’s ramping up of immigration enforcement and subsequent deployment of the California National Guard and U.S. Marines to Los Angeles has prompted the city’s progressive and moderate Democratic politicians to band together and set aside their differences.

Councilmembers on the left flank cited the different political realities in the two cities when speaking about the 2026 Los Angeles mayoral election, with the field of candidates still taking shape.

“We don’t have a candidate on the left … as a progressive. We have Mayor Karen Bass, who is running again,” Hernandez said. “She’s moving how she needs to move and has been doing a good job at least in handling this crisis that we’re in right now.”

Hernandez said she is focused on winning her own reelection bid in a crowded field.

Soto-Martínez said the city is “under siege” by the federal government.

“We are trying to show unity against the federal takeover of our city, and so that’s how I feel about it right now, and that might change a year from now, but that’s how I feel,” he said. “I support the mayor and her reelect, and I think her roots from community organizing is something we need right now.”

No progressive candidate has emerged to run against Bass. Before the immigration raids, Bass’ performance in the wake of January’s devastating wildfires led to speculation that she would be challenged from the right again by businessman Rick Caruso, whom she beat handily in 2022. Caruso is also weighing a bid for governor.

Lefty Angelenos shouldn’t hold their breath for a DSA candidate. While the process is member-driven, DSA-LA does not plan at the moment to run anyone for mayor, said Marc Krause, a co-chair of DSA-LA.

Krause said the group’s focus is legislative change, starting with representation on the City Council.

“I think for DSA-LA, our big goal and recent strategy is to try to win a majority on the L.A. City Council,” he said.

DSA-LA’s Mamdani moment came when Hernandez and Soto-Martínez won in 2022, joining Nithya Raman, who had DSA support in her 2020 election.

“It proved to us that what we were aiming to do had some viability to it,” Krause said.

Jurado, also backed by DSA-LA, joined the bloc in 2024.

Those four have helped push the council further to the left in recent years, from passing a $30 minimum wage for tourism industry workers to voting for a budget that sought to slow down police hiring — though those hires may return.

Krause cited a stronger rent stabilization ordinance, higher pay for workers in the city and improved transit infrastructure as some of DSA-LA’s top legislative goals.

To secure those wins, Krause hopes to elect eight DSA-backed city councilmembers or to build a coalition with other elected officials who agree with the policies DSA-LA champions.

And Krause said the movement is growing. The night Mamdani won the primary, DSA-LA gained 50 new members — without even trying.

“We’ll likely be doing more intentional recruitment,” Krause said.

State of play

— INNOCENT IMMIGRANTS: Most of the undocumented immigrants arrested between June 1 and June 10 by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the Los Angeles region had no criminal convictions, according to a Times analysis. The review of data from the Deportation Data Project, a repository of enforcement data at UC Berkeley Law, found that 69% of those arrested had no criminal convictions and 58% had never been charged with a crime.

— RECEIVERSHIP HAS SAILED: A federal judge decided not to put L.A.’s homelessness programs into receivership Tuesday, though he found that the city failed to adhere to the terms of a legal settlement focused on handling the humanitarian crisis on the streets.

— TRUMP SUIT: The city took steps to sue the Trump administration to stop immigration agents from making unconstitutional stops or arrests. The seven councilmembers who signed the letter asking City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto to prioritize “immediate legal action” against the administration argued that the litigation is necessary to prevent racial profiling and unlawful detention of Angelenos.

—UNION DOOZY: L.A. County’s agreement with its biggest labor union will cost more than $2 billion over three years, according to the county chief executive office. The deal with SEIU 721, which represents 55,000 county workers, includes a $5,000 bonus in the first year. Union members still need to ratify the agreement.

—CALIFORNIA VS. TRUMP: The Trump administration may soon be forced to turn over documents related to the activities of the military in Southern California, a federal judge said Tuesday. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals had previously allowed Trump to maintain control over the California National Guard.

—SCHOOLS BUDGET: The Los Angeles Board of Education approved an $18.8-billion budget that allows the district to avoid layoffs this year, in part by reducing proposed contributions to a trust fund for retiree health benefits.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature homelessness program went to Marmion Way and North Avenue 57 in Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez’s district, according to the mayor’s office.
• On the docket for next week: The City Council goes on summer recess beginning Wednesday and will be OOO until July 29.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Claudia Aragon was headed home after dropping her puppy off at obedience school when the first text came in early on Friday, June 6.

“Ice showed up at the Home Depot in cypress park. Want to make sure we can help people,” an immigrant service provider texted her. “this is awful claudia.”

Aragon, who has directed Mayor Karen Bass’ Office of Immigrant Affairs since March 2023, had been sick and was planning to stay home that day.

But she lives only a few miles from the Cypress Park site and decided to drive over.

She arrived outside the Home Depot in the aftermath of the raid — an environment she described as akin to “calm after the storm” in the wake of a natural disaster.

“Everyone’s kind of trying to find their bearings and looking around like, ‘What happened?’ Some of the food vendors that were there were sort of putting things back,” Aragon said.

There would be little calm for Aragon over the next days and weeks.

Within an hour or so of getting home that Friday morning, Aragon’s phone rang again, with someone telling her that federal authorities were at a sprawling fast-fashion warehouse in the Garment District.

Far from being isolated incidents, the Cypress Park Home Depot raid and the arrests at Ambiance Apparel were initial blasts in what would be much broader upheaval, as the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement teams descended on Los Angeles and a military deployment soon followed.

Through it all, Aragon’s phone kept buzzing, as she connected with activists and a host of immigrant service providers.

The next few hours were a surreal and overwhelming frenzy, as Aragon, immigrant advocacy groups and the city all tried to piece together what was happening with little communication from the federal government.

Aragon, who worked in Bass’ congressional office before joining the mayor’s office, has known and collaborated with many of her community counterparts for years.

Those relationships were battle-tested early in Aragon’s city tenure, as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott began sending buses of migrants to Los Angeles in 2023. Aragon was responsible for coordinating the response, as the city, faith and nonprofit partners helped situate the new arrivals.

A day or two after Donald Trump was elected to a second term in the White House, Aragon also sat down with the mayor’s senior staff to strategize on how the city could prepare for potential immigrant raids, since Trump had made no secret of his intentions during the campaign.

The city’s immigrant affairs office is currently a lean two-person team, with Aragon and a language access coordinator. The department was first created under Mayor James Hahn and then resurrected by then-Mayor Eric Garcetti.

Aragon herself is “a very proud immigrant,” having come to the United States from El Salvador when she was 7.

“To be here with Mayor Bass, having the opportunity to elevate the immigrant community through policy, through funding to provide support for providers who champion the community — my community, for families that are like mine — is amazing and an honor,” Aragon said.

It can also be painful at this particular moment in history, when the promise of the immigrant American dream that made her life possible now seems in existential jeopardy and so many are living in fear.

“People can’t even go down the street without being detained … I can’t even look at them and tell them they’ll be okay,” Aragon said.

State of play

— THE CHAOS CONTINUES: Federal immigration raids continued across L.A. County this week, reaching into Hollywood, Pico Rivera and other locations. In San Fernando, L.A. Councilmember Monica Rodriguez and San Fernando Vice Mayor Mary Solorio went on Instagram Thursday to spread the word about residents being swept up from the areas around a Home Depot in San Fernando and a Costco in Pacoima, in hopes of alerting their families.

“We only have first names of some of the individuals,” Solorio said. “Those individuals are Omar, Elmer, Antonio, Saul and Ramiro.” Rodriguez read out contact information for immigrant defense groups, saying: “We need to protect one another in these very scary times.”

In Hollywood, L.A. Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez voiced his fury over a raid in his district at the Home Depot on Sunset Boulevard.

“Despicable doesn’t even begin to describe what this is,” he told The Times. “You hear about this happening in military dictatorships and totalitarian governments. To happen here in the second-largest city in America is — I don’t have words, just outrage.”

— ‘PROFOUND HARM’: Several people were also detained at a bus stop near a Winchell’s Donut House in Pasadena, evoking angry responses from County Supervisor Janice Hahn and U.S. Rep. Judy Chu. Hahn, who chairs Metro’s transit board, worried that residents will be too afraid to go to work, attend church and, now, hop on public transit. “The fear they are spreading is doing profound harm in our communities,” she said. Metro officials underscored those concerns, saying the transit system has seen a 10% to 15% drop in bus and rail ridership since immigration enforcement activities began.

— BEHIND THE MASK: County Supervisor Kathryn Barger voiced fears this week that some of the masked men pulling over Angelenos may not be immigration agents but rather “bad players” impersonating federal law enforcement. “I tell you this story because we don’t know if they were ICE agents or not,” she said at Tuesday’s board meeting. Hahn wasn’t convinced, replying: “Make no mistake about it: It isn’t people impersonating ICE. It is ICE.”

— DODGER MANIA: Yet another part of the city caught in the uproar was Dodger Stadium. Raul Claros, a community organizer now running for an Eastside seat on the City Council, held a press conference Wednesday to demand that the team do more to help families devastated by the raids. “The largest economic engine in this area is silent!” he told ABC7 and other news outlets. “Wake up! Do better!”

The Dodgers later signaled the organization was willing to help. Before the team made its announcement, federal law enforcement agents were spotted outside the stadium, generating new protests. “People are out here because they don’t want to see their families torn apart,” Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez said in an interview with NBC. The team, in a statement on X, said it had denied entry to those agents. (Dodgers referred to them as ICE, federal officials said they were from U.S. Customs and Border Protection.)

— DOWNTOWN SETTLES DOWN: Confrontations between law enforcement agencies and anti-ICE protesters tapered off this week, prompting Mayor Karen Bass to scale back, and then repeal, her curfew order for downtown, Chinatown and the Arts District. But those showdowns have caused legal and financial shock wages.

— RISING PRICE TAG: For example: City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo reported Friday that the costs of the protests to the city had jumped to more than $32 million, including $29.5 million in costs to the LAPD. The City Council voted 12-3 on Wednesday to loan the LAPD $5 million from the city’s reserve fund to cover the associated police overtime. Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, who represents downtown, voted no, as did two of her colleagues: Hernandez and Soto-Martínez.

— A NEW GIG: Former Mayor Eric Garcetti (who, until recently, was serving as U.S. ambassador to India) has been named Ambassador for Global Climate Diplomacy on behalf of C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group.

— HEADING TO COURT: Free speech advocates have begun filing lawsuits to stop what they call the “continuing abuse” of journalists covering protests in L.A. One federal lawsuit, which targets the city, described instances where journalists have been tear-gassed, detained without cause and shot with less-lethal police rounds.

— THROUGH THE ROOF: The overall cost of legal payouts reached a new peak for City Hall this year, driven in large part by lawsuits over policing and “dangerous conditions,” such as cracked or damaged streets and sidewalks.

— TOURISM TURMOIL: The battle between tourism workers and a coalition of airline and hotel groups intensified this week, with the hotel employees’ union launching a pair of new ballot measures. Unite Here Local 11, which recently won approval of a $30 minimum wage hike for its members, proposed an ordinance to require voter approval for any hotel project that adds 80 or more rooms. Union co-president Kurt Petersen portrayed the measure as a response to an ongoing effort by the L.A. Alliance for Tourism, Jobs and Progress, a business group, to repeal the $30 wage.

— THAT’S NOT ALL: Unite Here also unveiled a ballot proposal to hike the minimum wage for employees in non-tourism industries. Under city law, hotel employees currently receive a minimum wage of $20.32 per hour, compared to $17.28 for most non-tourism workers. The union’s new proposal would bring every worker in L.A. up to their level, jumping first to $22.50 and eventually reaching $30 in 2028.

— ALL ABOARD: Officials with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority plan to lease 2,700 buses to get people around the city for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The agency needs $2 billion to make that happen — and is hoping to secure the funding from the federal government.

— COLE FOR THE SUMMER: Chief Deputy Controller Rick Cole is stepping down on July 11 from his job with City Controller Kenneth Mejia. In his announcement on LinkedIn, Cole called Mejia an “inspiring young leader” who “blazed a new path for transparency and accountability.” He also acknowleged the demands he’s faced since winning a seat on the Pasadena City Council, which he called a “more-than-part-time role.” “Kenneth has been incredibly flexible and supportive but I recognize that I couldn’t do justice to both jobs indefinitely,” he wrote.

MAKING THE ROUNDS

In the wake of the protests and weeklong curfew, L.A.’s mayor has been offering support to businesses in Little Tokyo, the Civic Center and other areas hard hit in downtown by vandalism, graffiti and theft. Bass spent about half an hour on Wednesday visiting restaurants on 1st Street, whose windows were covered in plywood.

Bass dropped into Far Bar, Kaminari Gyoza Bar and other spots, chatting up the proprietors and posing for photos with customers. Afterward, she made an appeal to Trump to withdraw the U.S. Marines, saying things were safe and stable.

“In light of the fact that L.A. is peaceful, there are no protests, there isn’t any sign of vandalism or violence, I would call on the administration to please remove the troops,” she said.

Bass was quickly interrupted from Clemente Franco, an Echo Park resident who said he was frustrated with the state of the city — dirty streets, broken sidewalks, streetlights that are out because of copper wire theft.

“A year and a half with no lights,” he told deputy mayor Vahid Khorsand, who attempted to form a buffer between Franco and Bass. “A year and a half the lights have been off. They took the wires. The whole street is black.”

Khorsand asked Franco to provide him a list of problem locations.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to tackle homelessness did not launch any new outreach operations this week, according to her team.
• On the docket for next week: The council’s transportation committee is set to meet Wednesday to take up a proposal to regulate public space around L.A.’s “ghost kitchens,” which have generated complaints about unsafe traffic behavior and other neighborhood woes.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Julia Wick, giving you the latest on city and county government.

L.A.’s Little Tokyo neighborhood was a mess on Monday. Windows were shattered in multiple locations. Graffiti seemed like it was everywhere. State Assemblymember Mark Gonzalez (D-Los Angeles) had had enough.

Gonzalez, who took office in December, had already voiced outrage over the immigration raids being conducted in his downtown district. But this time, he took aim at the people he called “anti-ICE rioters,” portraying them as narcissists and urging them to stay far away from the demonstrations happening downtown.

“Causing chaos, damaging neighborhoods, and live-streaming for likes helps no one,” he said in a lengthy press release. “Our elders, small businesses, and public spaces deserve better.”

Gonzalez did not stop there. He chided demonstrators for spray-painting historic landmarks and pointing fireworks at police, telling them that “terrorizing residents is not protest.”

“If you’re out here chasing clout while our neighbors are scared and storefronts are boarded up — you’re not helping, you’re harming,” said Gonzalez, a former chair of the Los Angeles County Democratic Party. “You’re playing right into Trump’s hands and undermining the very movement you claim to support.”

Politicians in L.A. have been reacting all week to the reports of violence, theft and vandalism that accompanied a week of anti-ICE protests. But each has had a somewhat different way of naming the perpetrators — and summing up their actions.

Los Angeles City Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, whose district also includes much of downtown, was more muted in her description of the people who created mayhem this week, referring to them as “agitators” and “opportunists.”

“Look, for the most part, this has been a peaceful protest,” she said in an interview. “But there are definitely some other folks that join that are not here to support immigrants and peacefulness, but are taking this as an opportunity to do something else. And I definitely condemn that.”

Jurado has spent the last few days highlighting her efforts to secure small business loans for struggling downtown businesses, especially those that were vandalized or had merchandise stolen. She is also pushing for city leaders to find another $1 million to pay for the legal defense of immigrants who have been detained or face deportation.

At the same time, the events of the past week have put Jurado in an awkward spot. Luz Aguilar, her economic development staffer, was arrested last weekend on suspicion of assaulting a police officer at an anti-ICE protest.

Normally, an aide like Aguilar might have been tasked with helping some of the downtown businesses whose windows were smashed or wares were stolen. Instead, Jurado faced questions about Aguilar while appearing with Mayor Karen Bass at the city’s Emergency Operations Center.

The LAPD has repeatedly declined to provide specifics on the allegations against Aguilar, whose father is Chief Deputy Controller Rick Cole. The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union representing rank-and-file officers, said in an email to its members that Aguilar has been accused of throwing a frozen water bottle at officers.

Neither Cole nor Jurado’s staff would confirm or refute that assertion. Jurado, in an interview, also declined to say whether she sees her staffer as one of the agitators.

“She is on unpaid leave, and we’ll see what happens,” she said.

The search for the right words has not been limited to downtown politicians.

Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson offered a lengthy soliloquy, saying police in recent days had encountered “looters coming out of stores with merchandise in their hands” who are using the ongoing protests as cover.

“Someone at midnight running around looting, even though there was a protest earlier, that person’s not a protester,” Harris-Dawson told his colleagues Tuesday. “That person’s a looter. That person’s a criminal.”

The same terms apply after Dodgers victories, Harris-Dawson said, when someone in a street celebration decides to set things on fire. “We don’t say Dodger fans burned a building. We say criminals burned a building,” he said.

Bass declared a local state of emergency in the wake of the downtown chaos, citing the violence against police, the vandalism and the “looting of businesses.” The declaration, issued Tuesday, simply refers to the perpetrators as criminals.

The mayor sounded genuinely frustrated, telling The Times on Thursday that she was “horrified” by the graffiti that covered the Japanese American National Museum, which highlights the struggle of immigrants, and other buildings in Little Tokyo.

“Anybody that is committing vandalism or violence does not give a crap about immigrants,” she told another news outlet.

Gonzalez, for his part, said he produced his anti-rioter screed after hearing from senior citizens in Little Tokyo who were terrified to leave their homes and walk into the melee on the street.

“They were literally throwing fireworks at cops’ faces at San Pedro and 3rd,” he said.

Other downtown residents sounded unfazed, telling The Times that the disruptions were “kind of the usual.” In recent years, major sports victories have been just as likely to end with illegal fireworks, graffiti and burning or vandalized vehicles downtown — even when the games aren’t played there.

Jurado said she is searching for “creative solutions” to prevent such crimes in the future, such as promoting the fact that downtown businesses are in “full support of the protests.”

“There were Little Tokyo businesses that weren’t graffitied on because they had a sign on the window that was pro-actively ‘Know your Rights,’ or against ICE,” she said. “So they didn’t get graffitied on. At least that’s from my anecdotal evidence.”

“So I think if we put that at the forefront, we can help educate our community members to keep our neighborhoods safe and beautiful,” she said.

State of play

— CITY IN CRISIS: The crisis sparked by the immigration sweeps reverberated throughout the week, with Bass urging President Trump to end the raids, ordering a curfew for downtown and Chinatown and speaking out against the tackling of U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla by federal agents. By the time the week ended, City Hall and surrounding government buildings were being guarded by scores of law enforcement officers from around the state — Hermosa Beach Police, San Fernando Police, Riverside County Sheriff, Santa Barbara County Sheriff, just to name a few. Amid the heavy police presence, Friday’s city council meeting was canceled.

— TAKING OFF THE GLOVES: For most of her time at City Hall, Bass has avoided public confrontations with other elected officials, including President Trump. But with ICE fanning out across L.A. and her city engulfed in protest, those days are over. As she navigates the crisis, Bass has also gained the opportunity for a crucial reset after the Palisades fire.

— CHAFED AT THE CHIEF: Earlier in the week, members of the City Council grilled LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell over his agency’s handling of anti-ICE protests. Harris-Dawson bristled at the idea that the LAPD would refer to federal immigration authorities as “law enforcement partners.” “If we know somebody is coming here to do warrant-less abductions of the residents of this city, those are not our partners,” he said. “I don’t care what badge they have on or whose orders they’re under. They’re not our partners.”

— PADILLA PUSHBACK: City Councilmember Imelda Padilla, in a separate line of questioning, asked if the LAPD could warn city officials when it hears from federal law enforcement that immigration raids are coming. McDonnell said such actions would amount to obstruction of justice. “That would be completely inappropriate and illegal,” he said.

— A ‘MIX OF EMOTIONS’: McDonnell has been offering support to LAPD officers who may have mixed feelings about the ongoing federal crackdown. In one message, he acknowledged that some in the majority-Latino department have been “wrestling with the personal impact” of the immigration sweeps. “You may be wearing the uniform and fulfilling your duty, but inside, you’re asked to hold a complex mix of emotions,” the chief wrote.

— WHAT HAPPENS IN VEGAS: Los Angeles City Councilmember John Lee broke his silence on the pivotal 2017 Las Vegas trip that later resulted in the criminal conviction of his onetime boss, Councilmember Mitchell Englander. Lee took the virtual witness stand last week in his own Ethics Commission case, repeatedly denying allegations that he accepted gifts in Vegas — food, drink, travel — in violation of city laws. At one point in his Zoom testimony, Lee said he stuffed $300 into the pocket of businessmen Andy Wang, a key witness in the proceedings, in an attempt to cover his share of the expenses at a pricey nightclub.

— RAPID RESPONDERS: Faced with an onslaught of ICE raids locally and threats from politicians nationally, L.A.’s immigrant rights groups are in the fight of their lives. Those groups have been participating in the Los Angeles Rapid Response Network, a coalition of 300 volunteers and 23 organizations formed last year to respond to ICE enforcement.

— COUNTING THE BEDS: We told you last week that City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo was the city’s star witness in its court battle with the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights, which is seeking to place the city’s homelessness programs in receivership. On Wednesday, Szabo filed a declaration in federal court that pushes back on assertions that the city may have massively double counted the homeless beds it included under a pair of legal settlements. Szabo said city officials identified 12 instances of double counting in an agreement requiring 12,915 beds, and would appropriately correct the record.

— DEAL FOR MORE COPS? It seems like a lifetime ago, but last weekend Bass announced that she had struck a deal with Harris-Dawson, the council president, to find the money to restore her plan for hiring 480 police officers next year. Bass said Harris-Dawson has committed to identify the funding for those hires within three months. Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who sits on the budget committee, said he is open to finding the money but was not part of any promise to do so within 90 days.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature initiative to combat homelessness did not launch operations in any new locations this week. However, the council did go behind closed doors to confer with its lawyers on the legal battle with the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights.
• On the docket for next week: The City Council is set to take up the mayor’s latest declaration of a local emergency, this one in response to “violence against first responders, vandalism of public and private property, looting of businesses, and failure to follow” LAPD dispersal orders.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with an assist from Noah Goldberg and Laura Nelson, giving you the latest on city and county government.

If Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass manages to hold on to her power to oversee the city’s homelessness programs, she may well have one person to thank: City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo.

Szabo, a fixture in the administrations of the past three mayors, was effectively the city’s star witness in its legal battle against the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights, the nonprofit group that sued the city in 2020 over its handling of the homelessness crisis.

During a seven-day hearing that concluded Wednesday, the alliance pressed U.S. Dist. Judge David O. Carter to take authority over homeless services away from Bass and the City Council and give it to a to-be-determined third party overseen by the court.

On four of those seven days, Szabo sat in the witness chair, defending the city’s decisions and occasionally offering cutting remarks about the city’s critics. Above all, he insisted the city would meet its obligation to provide 12,915 additional homeless beds by June 2027, as required under a settlement agreement with the alliance.

Szabo, who reports to both Bass and the council, is well known within City Hall for his work preparing the city budget, negotiating with city unions and providing policy recommendations on homelessness and other issues. During his time in Carter’s courtroom, he was also a human shield, taking the brunt of the hostile questions and helping to ensure that Bass and others would not be called to testify.

Throughout the proceedings, the city’s lawyers lodged hundreds of objections to the alliance’s questions, sometimes before they had been fully asked. Carter cautioned them that the rapid-fire interruptions could make things difficult for inexperienced witnesses.

He also made clear that the group did not include Szabo.

“Mr. Szabo,” the judge said, “certainly is used to the stress.”

The alliance had placed not just Bass but also Councilmembers Monica Rodriguez and Traci Park on its witness list, saying all three had made public statements criticizing the response system. Bass herself called the system “broken” during her State of the City address in April, a fact highlighted by Matthew Umhofer, an attorney for the alliance.

Those statements, Umhofer said, only reinforce the alliance’s argument that the city’s homelessness programs are beyond repair and must be placed into receivership.

“The city is not fixing that broken system,” he said during closing arguments. “It’s simply doubling down on that broken system.”

Bass spokesperson Zach Seidl, asked to explain the mayor’s use of the word “broken,” said she was referring to a number of obstacles, including “an urge from many to return to the old way of doing things that allowed homelessness to explode.”

“But change is happening,” he said. “Under the Mayor’s leadership, we are moving forward.”

The city’s newly hired legal team from Gibson Dunn, the law firm that persuaded the Supreme Court to uphold laws barring homeless encampments on public property, sought to amplify that message. They also claimed the mayor and council members were shielded by the “apex doctrine,” which bars high-level, or apex, government officials from testifying except in extraordinary circumstances.

The city’s lawyers offered up just two witnesses of their own: Szabo and Etsemaye Agonafer, Bass’ deputy mayor for homelessness programs, saying they were the most familiar with the issues. The alliance initially sought 15.

Agonafer testified for about four hours, highlighting progress made by the mayor’s Inside Safe program, which moves people out of encampments and into hotels and motels.

Umhofer ultimately withdrew his subpoenas targeting Bass and the others, saying he didn’t want to incur additional delays. But he called Bass cowardly for failing to show up. By then, he said, his team had enough evidence to show that the city’s elected officials should no longer control homeless programs.

“We have quite literally put the homelessness response system in Los Angeles on trial,” said Elizabeth Mitchell, another alliance attorney, on the final day of proceedings.

The alliance used much of the questioning to highlight problems at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, also known as LAHSA. That agency, overseen by a board of appointees from the city and county, has been criticized repeatedly in audits dating back to 2001 — documents highlighted by the alliance during the proceedings.

Szabo acknowledged that LAHSA has faced issues with data collection. But he insisted that the city is closely tracking the beds required under its settlement with the alliance. “We have taken steps to ensure that the data we are reporting is accurate,” he told the court.

Carter, who has yet to rule in the case, did not sound as confident in the city’s attention to detail. On Wednesday, he demanded that the city turn over records regarding its compliance with another agreement in the case — this one known as the “roadmap.” The roadmap agreement, which expires June 30, required the city to produce 6,700 beds.

In his order, Carter raised questions about whether city officials had double counted “time-limited subsidies” — money used to help homeless people move into apartments and pay their rent — by applying them both to the roadmap requirements and to the obligations within the alliance settlement agreement.

Szabo said city officials are collecting the records for the judge.

Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, whose district includes Hollywood, voiced confidence in Szabo. He also praised Bass for taking on the issue of homelessness, pointing out that LAHSA reported that the city had made progress last year.

“We’re doing things that are showing results,” said Soto-Martínez, whose office has participated in 23 Inside Safe encampment operations. “Is it perfect? No. But we’re working through it.”

State of play

— ICE RAID OUTRAGE: L.A.’s elected officials voiced their anger on Friday over a series of federal immigration sweeps in Westlake, Cypress Park and other parts of the city. L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis said the individuals detained were “hardworking Angelenos who contribute to our local economy and labor force every day.”

Bass issued her own statement, saying: “We will not stand for this.”

“As Mayor of a proud city of immigrants, who contribute to our city in so many ways, I am deeply angered by what has taken place,” she said. “These tactics sow terror in our communities and disrupt basic principles of safety in our city.”

— WELCOME, AECOM: Nearly five months after a firestorm laid waste to a wide swath of Pacific Palisades, Bass announced that the city has hired the global infrastructure firm AECOM to develop a plan for rebuilding the area and reconstructing utilities and other infrastructure. The firm will work alongside both the city and Hagerty Consulting, which Bass tapped as a recovery contractor in February, according to the mayor’s office.

— SWITCHING HORSES? Businessman and gubernatorial candidate Stephen J. Cloobeck offered praise for L.A.’s mayor last year, commending her for her work addressing homelessness. He even said he had donated $1 million to LA4LA, an initiative promoted by Bass during her 2024 State of the City address, an event he attended. But last weekend, while making the rounds at the California Democratic Convention, he told The Times he wasn’t so keen on Bass’ leadership. “I would support Rick Caruso in a heartbeat over Mayor Karen Bass, and that’s a quote,” he said.

— MISSED MESSAGES: Bass has come under heavy scrutiny for deleting text messages she sent during the January firestorms. But she wasn’t the only one. L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who represents the area devastated by the Eaton fire, has an iPhone that “auto deletes” messages every 30 days, her spokesperson said.

— ENGINE TROUBLE: Earlier this year, then-Fire Chief Kristin Crowley cited disabled engines, and a lack of mechanics, as one reason why fire officials did not dispatch more personnel to Pacific Palisades before the Jan. 7 fire. But a Times analysis found that many of the broken engines highlighted by department officials had been out of service for many months or even years — and not necessarily for a lack of mechanics. What’s more, the LAFD had dozens of other engines that could have been staffed and deployed in advance of the fire.

— SAYONARA, CEQA: State lawmakers are on the verge of overhauling the California Environmental Quality Act, which has been used for decades to fight real estate development and public works projects in L.A. and elsewhere. One proposal would wipe away the law for most urban housing developments.

— PADRINOS PAYOUT: L.A. County has agreed to pay nearly $2.7 million to a teenager whose violent beating at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall launched a sprawling criminal investigation into so-called “gladiator fights” inside the troubled facility. Video of the December 2023 beating, captured on CCTV, showed Jose Rivas Barillas, then 16, being pummeled by six juveniles as probation officers stood idly by.

— EVADING EVICTION: A 70-year-old homeless man who illegally moved into a state-owned house in the path of the now-canceled 710 Freeway extension is fighting his eviction. Benito Flores, who seized a vacant residence in El Sereno several years ago, recently holed up in a tree house he built in the backyard — and so far has warded off attempts by sheriff’s deputies to lock him out.

— AIRPORT AHEAD: The long-awaited LAX/Metro transit center at Aviation Boulevard and 96th Street finally opened on Friday, bringing commuters tantalizingly close to Los Angeles International Airport. For now, free shuttle buses will run every 10 minutes along the 2.5-mile route between the transit center and LAX.

— BREAKING BARRIERS: The first transgender captain in the Los Angeles Fire Department died last month at age 80. Michele Kaemmerer joined the LAFD in 1969, retiring in 2003. She transitioned in 1991 and later led Engine 63 in Marina del Rey. In a 1999 interview with PBS, Kaemmerer said that some firefighters who knew her before she transitioned refused to work with her. Despite those hardships, she “always had a good attitude,” said her widow, Janis Walworth.

QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s signature program to combat homelessness did not launch any operations at new locations this week.
• On the docket for next week: The city’s newly formed Charter Reform Commission holds its first meeting on Tuesday, discussing the process that will be used to select its remaining members.

Stay in touch

That’s it for this week! Send your questions, comments and gossip to [email protected]. Did a friend forward you this email? Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Saturday morning.