There are 4 million people in the City of Los Angeles, yet we must rely on just fifteen people to represent us. 15! Many of our problems result from the simple fact that our City Council is not capable of truly representing our diverse population. The number of districts must be increased to more accurately represent local communities. 

Neighborhood Councils must be empowered to take a more active role in representing the people on a grassroots level, while serving as the supervisors of city policy. We cannot rely on promises to "consult" with communities - we need our communities to be represented.

A council that does not center the voices of labor and racial minorities will only deepen the inequalities in LA.  Elected representatives of labor and racial minorities need to serve in each district.  

Our current system of separation of powers was designed to maintain the status quo on behalf of the wealthy.  A People's council will share executive powers with the agencies they direct. This means amending the current charter so that the elected representatives can actually follow through on their legislation.  

City leaders need to remember that they serve the people first and foremost. The luxury salaries paid to city officials are among the highest in the nation. I propose amending the city charter to permanently tie compensation for elected city leaders to the city's median income level. Our leaders cannot represent the needs of average, everyday working Angelenos while living in luxury on the people's dime.

We must also take measures to improve civics and fmore participation in the democratic process. The Democrat-Republican duopoly has worked hard over the years to exclude meaningful opposition from the ballot. Steps must be taken to protect the people's right to vote and run for office. We need to bring back civics education to our schools, and turn our public libraries into centers of civic education, serving as a direct link between the masses and the political process. This won't topple our corrupt system overnight, but it will help us build the organization we need to fight back. 

Addressing climate change and the threats it poses to the air we breathe, the water we drink, and our community’s natural resources is a top priority for me. I took on the nuclear industry and prevailed as a first year attorney representing three Native American Indian Tribes when the nuclear industry proposed to dump radioactive waste into unlined vats over a pristine aquifer that led directly into the Colorado River, a major water source for Southern California.

In September 2021, the City Council approved a new goal for LA to achieve 100% clean energy by 2035, a critical goal to drastically cut the carbon pollution that causes climate change. But setting a goal is only the first step. We must aggressively deploy solar energy projects that deliver clean, renewable power to our homes and businesses — all while putting Angelenos to work in good-paying, green union jobs installing and maintaining these projects.

I’ve taken this on at LAUSD, where over thirty schools are undertaking a solar pilot project to help the district reach its clean energy goal. We can and must do more across the City to combat the existential threat of climate change.

I also ensured that 200 air quality monitors were distributed throughout the City so that every citizen within Los Aneles can monitor their air quality in real time.

Our coastline is a treasure that we must preserve for generations to come. In order to do that, we’ve got to make sure the Santa Monica Bay is clean, not polluted by storm water, trash, and microplastics. As your councilmember, I’ll hold Hyperion Plant accountable for abiding by environmental regulations and promptly notifying the public when it encounters problems.

People experiencing homelessness are suffering and need a place to stay, and it is unsafe, unhealthy and disadvantageous for neighborhoods to be surrounded by encampments. I care about our families, communities, and our fellow human beings. We need to act swiftly to deal with this crisis by demanding that we declare this crisis the emergency that it is. We need a plan with dates, deliverables and deadlines. And, we need to focus on preventing homelessness.

We have a humanitarian crisis in L.A. Unhoused individuals are living in dangerous, unhealthy, and inhumane settings. I’ve worked on this firsthand at LAUSD as we worked with communities and schools with homeless encampments to make sure students have safe passages to get to schools every day.

The problem is made worse by some of our current representatives in City Hall who have polarized this debate to the point they’ve become unable to take the necessary actions to solve this crisis.

Here’s my view: Many people experiencing homelessness are suffering and need a place to stay and it is unsafe, unhealthy and disadvantageous for neighborhoods to be surrounded by encampments. I care about our families, communities, and our fellow human beings — and we need to act swiftly to deal with this crisis.

In the short term, we must deal with encampments now. We can all agree that our kids should be able to get to and from school and access public parks and beaches without needing the cross unhealthy and unsafe encampments. We need to enforce the local ordinance for banning camping at our schools and parks. We need to create and support localized plans and organizations within each community, like the Pacific Palisades Homeless Task Force and the Friends of Venice Beach Boardwalk, so each community can establish programs that work best for their areas and have buy-in from residents. We must also tackle mental health and addiction issues with coordinated plans between the city, county, and federal governments — including law enforcement — so resources are used efficiently and effectively.

Eliminating homelessness in the long term will require a laser focus on getting the unhoused into permanent housing — that means building more units now. Building public facilities requires experience and determination to cut red tape — that’s what I’ve done managing LAUSD’s 10,000 properties and being part of the campaign to pass Measure RR to provide $7 billion for school facilities.  

We need to prevent homelessness by allocating resources and providing opportunities to learn employable skills. We have resources from the federal and state government to address our housing shortage. Since voters passed Measure HHH in 2017, the city generates hundreds of millions of dollars a year to build housing, but too many projects are stuck in City Hall’s bureaucratic approvals process. We must get that money out the door ASAP and cut regulatory hurdles delaying the construction of much-needed housing. We need to incentivize builders to finish projects early like we did with the 10 freeway after the Northridge earthquake.

Let’s take action: Here are my six key solutions – many of which will be done concurrently. The most critical component to any plan is insisting on deadlines, dates, deliverables, and transparency. We have significant resources. Los Angeles needs a leader to oversee that these monies are spent with urgency, accountability and efficiently. That is me. I have a proven record.

1. First, On day one, I will demand we treat this homelessness crisis as the emergency that it is so that we will cut through the bureaucracy and eliminate a mountain of unproductive regulation for urgent action.
   
   We did some amazing things at the school district during the pandemic because it was an emergency by building teams and acting together:

• 83% of our LAUSD kids live in poverty, so we ramped up our food service to serve 140 million meals to students and their families.

• We provided COVID testing for 100,000 students and faculty a day.

• We transitioned to a laptop or tablet for every student overnight.
  
  

1. We will clear encampments and keep them from returning.

• It is unacceptable for encampments to line our streets, let alone our schools, parks and beaches.

• I will enforce the “No camping” signage in communities to make it clear that encampments are not permitted. 

• Let’s get people help before they are so traumatized they cannot easily recover. Those experiencing homelessness go to temporary shelters. All people will be given a menu of choices, but staying in an encampment is not an option.

• We will bring solutions that tackle the many aspects of homelessness, which includes the chronically homeless, mentally ill, situational homelessness, and subsets of the population that can be helped with quicker and easier interventions than permanent supportive housing.

• We’ll partner with community organizations to assist and get buy-in on how best to clear encampments.

• People from other states and areas are coming because we allow encampments – we must disincentivize folks from coming.

1. We will provide temporary shelters with wrap-around services. 

• The city is obligated to provide shelter not homes – and we need to do both

• Picture safe temporary shelters with services offered, including mental health, medical treatment, social workers, career skills, and dedicated security. 

• We will increase the number of temporary shelters. We have the land. We will replicate other innovative models that have proven track records to address all levels of needs for our unhoused population. 

• We will provide housing vouchers for those willing to enter rehabilitation and job training.
  
  

1. We will prevent more people from becoming homeless. For every 207 people we get out of homelessness, 227 more become homeless each day. By failing to bring our own agencies together, the city is inadvertently adding to the problem, not solving the problem. For example:

• More elderly are falling into homelessness because frail room and board facilities are condemned rather than fixed. I have consulted with Cedars Marina CMO. We can fix this.

• Existing facilities for the severely mentally ill are dwindling and we need more treatment options for this ever-growing population. The county and city must collaborate to rectify this problem. I’m going to build bridges across the bureaucratic divides, just as I have done.

• Studies confirm, having career skills will get folks out of poverty. Let’s help people going through these programs by coordinating adult education, providing free daycare and connecting with mass transportation.

• People need connection, a place and a purpose. Studies confirm, having career skills will get folks out of poverty. We have great examples, around the world and locally. 

• Record number of working people are becoming homeless. These are people we can help transition out of homelessness.

1. We will expedite the building process for housing.

1. Los Angeles needs thousands of units for low to moderate income residents, and it’s not happening or certainly not at an acceptable pace.  

• I reached out to experts to understand the problem and there is a lot of low hanging fruit to act upon:

• Simplify the finance model for housing projects with clearly designated expedited timelines eliminating the bureaucratic hurdles. Monitor timelines, outcomes, and deliverables with transparency and accountability.

• Improve Los Angeles Building and Safety permitting process to be timely, consistent, and predictable.

• Pay city vendors quickly – waiting to be paid for 6 months is unacceptable. 

• Build a community relations team to lead housing efforts and identify best locations. 

• I support addressing the housing crisis by building homes as fast as possible, and at fair cost, while making the city beautiful and livable.

• We have the money and we are not short on ideas.  We need leadership to work together. That is what I do.

1. We will build a powerful triad: health care, social workers and law enforcement.  

• We will train and deploy more social workers, have more health services available, and more law enforcement on the street. 

• I want to see those trained in public safety to deal with those individuals and allow them to focus where they are the real experts. Our police officers need to be able to focus on crime.

• We will make sure that social issues are dealt with by those trained in social work and know-how and where to direct people for the services – mental health and treatments as well as healthcare they need. 

• Having the right level of social workers and law enforcement as part of our team is critical. 

• Currently, 80% of our law enforcement resources are going to treat frequent flyers. We cannot get ahead using our dollars and talent in that way.

Our strategy for mental health and addiction must be coordinated, consistent, and comprehensive. It is critical that we work with the County to ensure that the unhoused are not living in dangerous encampments. Let’s double down on what works:

1.       Increase successful shelters with an umbrella of services and community models like The Village in Long Beach, Urban Mission and Community Outreach at Hollywood First Presbyterian Church, Union Rescue Mission through-out LA City –These shelters are open 24/7 and open to everyone ready for help. Here, people are listened to and offered a menu of options which demonstrates needed compassion and respect.  

2.       Develop residential facilities for 12 to 24 month stays with different, specialized tracks of treatment – this allows people some choice as to where they need the most help not a top-down generic recipe for all people.  It’s at these facilities that people get help and learn to make healthy life choices such as how to maintain an apartment, pay bills, interact with others, and get connected to jobs.

3.       Develop more Board and Care facilities with better amenities. The concept of Board and Care is solid so let’s make the investment to bring them up to a current standard of care. Board and Care facilities are for people who after an initial 24 months can go if they cannot make it on their own – for whatever reason.

I will bring clarity to our mental health strategy by working with the mental health providers, law enforcement, firefighters, and LA County to make it happen. We have to treat this homelessness crisis as the dire emergency it is - many people are dying on the streets each day in encampments.

I have a proven track record navigating a large bureaucracy and motivating people to work together. We can do this!