David Zahniser

You can’t blame most of Los Angeles ?for assuming that hazing in the Fire Department — spiked spaghetti, feces in inappropriate places, private parts lathered up with shaving cream — is the only thing occupying the minds of our politicians at City Hall. Certainly, nothing dominated the news like the......

IF YOU’VE HAD REPAIR WORK done at your home, you know the trepidation of watching a work crew rip open the walls. Who knows what you’ll find? Long-ignored problems, failing systems, even massive rot. The same holds true at City Hall, at least when it comes to employee lawsuits. Most......

IS IT POSSIBLE TO LEAVE skid marks when abandoning a political office? That’s the first question for Richard Alarcón, a longtime pol from the northeast San Fernando Valley who is so eager to take advantage of a measure weakening term limits in Los Angeles that he’s thrown himself into a......

THE FOLKS PUSHING PROPOSITION R, the measure that rolled back term limits in Los Angeles, pulled off an especially crafty one-two punch. First they cruised to victory on Tuesday, overcoming some of the worst political buzz to dominate City Hall since the waning days of former Mayor James Hahn. Then......

NEIGHBORHOOD ACTIVIST JOE BARRETT sounded a little gloomy this week as he discussed the ultrahot political battle being waged in his Sunland-Tujunga neighborhood — a bitterly contested plan for a new Home Depot on Foothill Boulevard. Barrett, who works in the film business, has spent two years fighting the home-improvement......

From the moment he marched in front of the television cameras, the new superintendent of the L.A. Unified School District proved himself to be a bit of a show pony, someone whose charisma and vigorous public-speaking style easily rivals Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s. He has the mayor’s energy. He has his......

LAST WEEK, THREE YEARS AFTER he launched his “pay to play” investigation of former Mayor James Hahn, District Attorney Steve Cooley finally answered the question that had been nagging the public for so long: How big a tip should you give for a hand job at the Bonaventure Hotel? Former......