Yaroslavsky on What’s Next for Los Angeles

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, weighed in on big issues facing greater Los Angeles in the aftermath of recent elections. A Los Angeles Times op-ed asked civic leaders for ideas on how to improve local governance. Yaroslavsky, who served for decades as an L.A. city councilman and county supervisor, recommended appointing a homelessness czar empowered to “cut through the thicket of bureaucracies that too often slows or prevents progress.” He wrote, “The unhoused don’t have time to wait for a complete overhaul of this broken system. … The creation of a homelessness czar would be a departure from the norm, but a radical departure is what we need.” Yaroslavsky was also cited in an L.A. Times article about county Measure A, which would empower the Board of Supervisors to fire an elected sheriff who commits a serious infraction. “It really needs to be a slam-dunk kind of transgression,” Yaroslavsky said.

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Yaroslavsky on the Scandal Shaking L.A.

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Zev Yaroslavsky, the longtime city councilman and county supervisor who now directs the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to several media outlets about the scandal shaking L.A. City Hall. The release of a recording that captured racist and disturbing comments by city officials is a sign that the governance system is profoundly broken, Yaroslavsky said. “I don’t think there’s been anything like this in city government since the ’30s and ’40s, the corruption heyday of Los Angeles,” he told Politico. “As much as it was a racist, racial, ethnic disparagement of everyone in town, it was more about power. It was a raw power grab,” he told the New York Times. The prospect that three members of the City Council would be forced to step down has no precedent, “but this whole crisis is without precedent,” he told the Los Angeles Times. Yaroslavsky also spoke to the Los Angeles Daily News, KCRW’s “Press Play” and KPCC’s “Air Talk.”

 

Yaroslavsky on Concern Over Angelenos’ Mental Health

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A Los Angeles Times article on rising concern about Angelenos’ mental health cited the work of Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. In the last few years, residents have endured skyrocketing inflation, extreme heat and drought, an alarming rise in hate crimes and the lingering effects of a devastating global pandemic. This year’s UCLA Quality of Life Index, which measures Los Angeles County residents’ satisfaction with their lives, found the lowest score since the survey was launched in 2016. “What it said to us is that county residents aren’t happy. There is an anxiety level here that is unprecedented in my lifetime,” said Yaroslavsky, director of the survey and a longtime public servant in Los Angeles. He noted that one-quarter of respondents said they go to bed each night worrying they will end up living on the street — all part of a “perfect storm” of mental health stressors afflicting Angelenos today.

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Yaroslavsky Assesses Candidates’ Plans for Tackling Homelessness

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about plans to combat homelessness put forth by Karen Bass and Rick Caruso, who are vying to become L.A.’s next mayor. With Election Day two months away, the candidates have offered details about their ambitious proposals for sheltering the city’s unhoused, including cost estimates and strategies for clearing bureaucratic hurdles. “I don’t think either of those plans will accomplish what they say they are going to accomplish in a year … but I think it’s good to set the goal,” said Yaroslavsky, who served as a city councilman and county supervisor in his decades of public service. Yaroslavsky proposed a single, countywide homelessness executive empowered to budget money and make land-use decisions. “Let the city and the county create a new paradigm, set a new template of political collaboration and cooperation and effectiveness,” he said.

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Yaroslavsky on County Supervisors’ Authority Over Sheriff

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UCLA Luskin faculty member Zev Yaroslavsky spoke to CBS2 News and KPCC’s “AirTalk” about a motion from the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors to seek authority to remove an elected sheriff from office. The proposed change to the county charter, which would require voter approval, comes amid continuing strife between board members and Sheriff Alex Villanueva over funding, hiring, COVID-19 vaccination policies and claims of “deputy gangs” within the agency. “I think the board is right to be frustrated with this sheriff. … But they need to be careful that the remedy does not undermine their high-ground position,” said Yaroslavsky, a longtime public servant who now directs the Luskin School’s Los Angeles Initiative. The timing of the motion may be a “tactical mistake,” he said, as it could divert attention and resources to the supervisors’ action rather than Villanueva’s record as he faces a runoff election in November against former Long Beach Police Chief Robert Luna.

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Yaroslavsky on Takeaways From Tuesday’s Elections

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A New York Times article on key takeaways from this week’s nationwide primary elections turned to Zev Yaroslavsky for his insights on the California races. Yaroslavsky, a longtime public servant who is now on the UCLA Luskin faculty, said voters were more interested in effective government than ideology. “People want solutions,” he said. “They don’t give a damn about left or right. It’s the common-sense problem-solving they seem to be missing. Government is supposed to take care of the basics, and the public believes the government hasn’t been doing that.” Yaroslavsky directs the Luskin School’s Los Angeles Initiative, which produces the annual UCLA Quality of Life Index to measure residents’ satisfaction with life in L.A. County. In its election coverage, the Los Angeles Times cited the index’s findings that Angelenos are deeply disillusioned with the status quo, particularly inflation, public safety and housing.

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Yaroslavsky on Deep Dissatisfaction Among L.A. Voters

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A CNN analysis about the potential for a right-tilting backlash among California voters who are discontented with public disorder cited Zev Yaroslavsky, a longtime public servant who now directs the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. Yaroslavsky said the level of voter frustration is reminiscent of the late 1970s, an era of high inflation and soaring property tax bills that produced California’s Proposition 13 and helped propel Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1980. He cited this year’s UCLA Quality of Life Index, a poll of 1,400 residents that showed deep dissatisfaction with life in L.A. County. The region’s struggle to meet the basic housing needs of its people is “a billboard that says failure,” Yaroslavsky said. “I think homelessness is both a real issue but it’s also a metaphor for everything else that’s gone wrong in society and government’s ability to address something that is so visible and so ubiquitous in the county.”

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Sheriff’s Approval Ratings Point to Risk at the Polls

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A Los Angeles Times story on L.A. Democrats’ failure to agree on a consensus candidate to back in the race for county sheriff cited results from this year’s UCLA Quality of Life Index, produced by the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. The actions, policies and rhetoric of Sheriff Alex Villanueva have alienated local Democratic clubs and progressive advocacy groups, but infighting and indecision kept them from mounting a united campaign against the incumbent, the article said. The Quality of Life Index, directed by Zev Yaroslavsky and published in April, found that 37% of voters had a “very or somewhat favorable” view of Villanueva, 33% have a “very or somewhat unfavorable” view, and 30% have no opinion or are unfamiliar with him. The results suggest that Villanueva could have trouble getting 50% of the vote in the June 7 primary, needed to avoid a runoff. The index, a survey of 1,400 L.A. County residents, includes favorability ratings of local officials.

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Yaroslavsky on Inflation’s Fallout on Local Elections

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, spoke to KPCC’s “AirTalk” about the impact of Southern California’s widening economic gap on upcoming elections. Yaroslavsky cited results of the 2022 UCLA Quality of Life Index, which found a steep drop in residents’ satisfaction with life in L.A. County, largely due to concerns over inflation and public safety. “What stands out is that people are unhappy, they’re anxious, they’re angry, they’re concerned,” Yaroslavsky said. Lower-income households, hard hit by lost wages and rising inflation, have been slower to rebound from the financial shock of the COVID-19 era, the survey showed. “We are the ground zero in this country of the economic divide,” Yaroslavsky said. The Quality of Life Index also showed a decline in approval ratings of many local government officials. “Inflation, I think, is the most pernicious thing economically that we have in our society,” Yaroslavsky said. “That will have a political bite like nothing else.”

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