At 41, having served as Hollywood's councilman and the area's chief land-use visionary and community policymaker for nearly 12 years of his life, Eric Garcetti wants to become the 42nd mayor of Los Angeles. He is clearly proud of Hollywood's turnaround and its bustling nightlife scene. In fact, Garcetti has publicly said that he wants to replicate Hollywood's style of urban renewal across communities in Los Angeles.
Driving out thousands of Latino working and poor families in favor of affluent residents and high-end restaurants is not part of his pitch.
Ted Soqui
Ted Soqui
Leon Gubler, Hollywood Chamber of Commerce president
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"L.A. is full of bad planning," Garcetti said at a recent mayoral debate in Hollywood with rival candidates Wendy Greuel, Jan Perry and Kevin James. "You look at places where there are four jobs for every one unit of housing, and wonder why they're stuck in traffic. Hollywood has become a template for a new Los Angeles."
Except Hollywood's traffic is immeasurably worse than when Garcetti was elected to represent the area, even though one-twelfth of the population has left. For all their planning, the City Council, Los Angeles Planning Department and Garcetti have brought mass congestion to a residential community that is shrinking, not growing.
Gary Slossberg, a public-interest attorney who represents low-income clients and who ran for City Council against Garcetti in 2009, says, "A lot of his policies don't match what's best for the people in Los Angeles, but a lot of people are getting rich."
Garcetti has raised nearly $3 million for his mayoral bid by promising "bold, new ideas" and calling for the need to create more jobs for working families.
The urban cleansing some see unfolding in Hollywood puts Garcetti in an awkward position with activists like Ziggy Kruse. Kruse became an expert on fighting City Hall when, as a waitress at Hollywood Star Lanes in 2001, she stood up to the Los Angeles Unified School District's eminent-domain plans to destroy the bowling alley where she worked.
Now a well-known whistleblower who tracks the sweetheart deals often granted to developers, Kruse sees Garcetti as a cold figure who is in denial about the high-end development he embraces.
There's palpable resentment among Kruse and other activists toward Garcetti, who was raised in an upper-class household in Encino and whose life has been eased by a bequest of property that provided him thousands of dollars in annual income starting when he was a young man.
Kruse says Garcetti "has gone more times against the community than with the community," backing zoning variances and other exceptions that let developers ignore protective zoning laws, and supporting what Kruse sees as too-generous taxpayer subsidies. "The only time he goes with the community," she says, "is when it's a politically smart move."
Now, Garcetti is wooing Latinos to elect him as mayor, even controversially claiming that he is a Latino candidate. Garcetti is half-Jewish, part Latino and part Italian. His great-grandfather was Italian and immigrated from Europe to Mexico, where Garcetti's paternal grandparents were born and raised. Three great-grandparents on his father's side were Latino. [Editor's note: This paragraph has been corrected. Please see correction at end of story.]
Romero, the groundskeeper at Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church, has found the councilman to be "a nice person to talk to but different when you want to solve a problem."
Such sentiments could pose a problem for Garcetti in the mayoral race. But he still has a deep well of voter support in Hollywood, having been easily re-elected more than once.
Many people welcome the changes Garcetti has pushed through.
"Development has been great for Hollywood," says Laurie Goldman, president of Friends of the Hollywood Central Park, a nonprofit that's pushing an effort to build a park over the 101 Freeway. The neighborhood has improved so much, Goldman says, that she wants to move back to where she once lived, but "it's too expensive. My rent is cheaper in Beverly Hills."
Wehbe, a longtime resident who walked the streets with the Hollywood Sentinels in the early 1990s, is more than happy with Garcetti's policies. Of Hollywood's transformation, he says, "It's day and night. It's amazing. You can walk around at any given time. Back then, you couldn't get out of your house."
Manny Romero chuckles when he hears such talk, repeating an old saying: "El saluda con sombrero ajeno." The church groundskeeper, who faced down violent gang members on Hollywood street corners before Garcetti's time, says the phrase essentially means that "someone else does the job and the person who's the opportunist takes the credit."
Hollywood historian Greg Williams also gives voice to residents who are not pleased with Garcetti's sleek vision. "It's really bad development," says Williams, who was born and raised in the community. "There's no variety. It's the same mixed-use with retail on the bottom floor and condos on top." He's come to see Garcetti as "totally in the developers' pockets. He's not for the preservation of old Hollywood."
Robb, the aide speaking on behalf of the unavailable Garcetti, strongly disputes that notion. "What developers tell us is that community activists have too much of a say" in Garcetti's decision making. Robb says his boss completely supports preserving old Hollywood, while looking to the future. "It's always been about taking what Hollywood offers," Robb says, "and enhancing it."
