Yaroslavsky, Darling and Sandoval for City Council

Much of the coverage of Los Angeles’ Nov. 8 election has focused on the mayor’s race, but the future of the city rests as much on what voters decide in the Los Angeles City Council races on the ballot. The 15 members of the City Council wield tremendous power in their large districts by directing land-use decisions and setting citywide policy and spending priorities. As the city faces one of the most challenging moments in its history, the choices voters make today will set the city’s course for the next decade or more.

In three of the four council district races on the ballot, the person we endorsed in the June primary won a place on the November ballot. We think these three are the best candidates in their races and urge voters in those districts to support them.

Council District 5: Katy Young Yaroslavsky

We strongly endorse

Katy Young Yaroslavsky to fill the open seat vacated by Councilman

Paul Koretz, who is termed out. Smart and experienced at navigating her way through local government, she will bring to the position not just an expertise on policy but an understanding of the complexity of homelessness and other problems the city faces.

Yaroslavsky, a land-use and environmental attorney and the daughter-in-law of former L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, spent nearly five years in corporate practice before becoming general counsel and director of government affairs at the Climate Action Reserve, an L.A.-based nonprofit. In 2015, she became senior policy advisor on the environment and the arts for then-newly elected L.A. County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl.

Those who have worked with her found Yaroslavsky tireless and adept at handling complex issues and dealing with local governments, businesses and the community. She also has a record of accomplishment that indicates she will be an effective council member.

She spearheaded the creation of L.A. County’s first Office of Sustainability, which helped pass a landmark ban on single-use plastic food ware. And she spent three years working on Measure W, the Safe, Clean Water Program, building a coalition of labor and environmental leaders, property owners and developers to get their input. The result was a parcel tax, approved by voters in 2018, that generates $300 million a year to capture and clean stormwater before it reaches the ocean. Her ability to listen to a range of constituencies, parse the issues wisely, and get the buy-in of different groups will hold her in good stead on the council as it faces numerous challenges.

Homelessness and lack of affordable housing are among the issues she will have to take on in a district that stretches from Bel-Air south to Palms and east to Melrose Avenue and some Mid-City neighborhoods.

Her opponent, Sam Yebri, an attorney and a board member of various community nonprofit groups, doesn’t have the experience that Yaroslavsky does — nor the same outlook on strategies to address homelessness.

Both Yaroslavsky and Yebri believe, rightly, that it’s crucial for the city to provide housing and services, including mental health treatment for homeless individuals. But Yebri has overemphasized utilizing a controversial city ban on encampments. Pushing people from one sidewalk to another does not reduce homelessness. Yaroslavsky knows that the anti-camping ordinance should not be wielded against homeless people. The use of this tactic should be paired with housing and services that effectively meet people’s needs.

Council District 11: Erin Darling

Erin Darling is a civil rights lawyer who has devoted his professional life to representing workers, renters and others fighting for their rights.

He’s our choice for the Council District 11 seat left open when Councilman Mike Bonin decided not to seek reelection. Darling will be a smart, thoughtful and strong steward of a district that stretches from Pacific Palisades to Playa Vista where residents worry about crime, traffic, brush fires and homelessness, among other problems.

Born in Venice and now living there with his wife and young son, he would be one of the most informed advocates on the City Council for renters — who make up the majority of the city and half of Council District 11. And he will push to get more affordable housing in a district that mostly has priced out its workers. He is not against having a police force — contrary to what his detractors say — but he wants to encourage more unarmed responses to calls for service for things such as mental health crises.

Darling won’t ignore the complaints about homeless encampments on sidewalks and in parks. He has opposed the enforcement of the anti-camping ordinance but says he won’t try to undo the nowstanding restriction on encampments outside schools. Darling has rightly said that the only way to significantly reduce homelessness is to provide more shelter and interim housing along with permanent housing. It will fall to Darling to help his constituents understand that necessity while hearing out their concerns and brainstorming with them about ways to build housing

that blends into neighborhoods. We believe he can successfully do that heavy lifting.

On the other hand, we don’t think his opponent, Traci Park, will even try. While the municipal law attorney, who also lives in Venice, comes across as an affable politician who says that shelter and housing for homeless people is essential and believes in adaptive reuse of buildings on the Westside for housing, she has fought against all of that in her district.

She filed a voluminous appeal of the city’s approval of a permit for a 33-room Ramada Inn in Venice to be used as interim housing for several years and later probably as permanent housing. (The city bought it with the help of funds from the state’s Homekey program, which finances the purchase and adaptive reuse of motels and hotels for housing.) Among other things, she argued that it would adversely affect public safety. The president of the city’s Board of Public Works, which heard the appeal, suggested that with the 24-hour security planned the project might help public safety. Ultimately, the board unanimously denied the appeal.

Park is also opposed to a Venice housing project, partially funded through Proposition HHH, that is being built on cityowned parking lots and would create 140 desperately needed units of permanent housing for homeless people. Among other things she told The Times, it’s in a tsunami zone. So are inhabited portions of Venice and Santa Monica.

This district needs someone who is willing and able to tackle the challenges of the city. Darling is that person.

Council District 15: Danielle Sandoval

Of the two candidates running to replace Councilman Joe Buscaino,

Danielle Sandoval, a community activist and entrepreneur from Harbor City, is best positioned to advocate for all Angelenos and deliver real change on pressing issues from housing and homelessness to public safety and pollution.

She is a grass-roots politician who has run an impressive on-the-ground campaign, knocking on doors in communities that have long been ignored in a district that includes Watts, the Harbor Gateway, Harbor City, Wilmington, San Pedro and the Port of Los Angeles. For years, District 15 has been represented by someone from San Pedro, which has had outsized power and influence over its council member’s priorities despite making up less than one-third of the district’s population.

Sandoval would bring a fresh perspective to the council and support policies that are practical, non-dogmatic and would make a difference in people’s lives: housing the homeless, pushing antipoverty efforts and expanding mental health services and youth programs to address the underlying causes of crime without increasing the size of the LAPD. She wants to reduce truck traffic and pollution without automating port operations or cutting good-paying union jobs. She would be the first Latina to represent a district that is nearly twothirds Latino.

She will draw on years of service on the Harbor City and Central San Pedro neighborhood councils, and as a budget advocate for the harbor area, where she has fought to get resources like streetlights, speed bumps and turn signals and to hire more city staff to respond to 311 calls about illegal dumping and other service requests. She also has valuable firsthand experience that will help her tackle city issues with wisdom and empathy, having experienced homelessness, lost a loved one to gun violence and navigated city bureaucracy as a small-business owner.

In the June primary, Sandoval came in second out of four candidates and, despite being vastly outspent, forced her opponent, Tim McOsker, into a runoff. It speaks highly of Sandoval that she went on to win the endorsements of the two other contenders in the race, Anthony Santich and Bryant Odega, who are now urging their supporters to back her in the election.

McOsker is an attorney, former lobbyist and nonprofit executive from San Pedro who has worked at City Hall as chief of staff to former Mayor James Hahn and as chief deputy city attorney. He is aligned with business groups, labor unions and other powerful establishment interests. Sandoval is the better choice because she will bring an outsider’s perspective, focus on the needs of regular people and be a forceful advocate for change. Voters should support her.

See all of our endorsements online at latimes.com/endorsements.