On L.A.’s Eastside, a new City Council member eyes a lobbyist to run her office

Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the Record — our City Hall newsletter. It’s David Zahniser, with a little help from Dakota Smith and Doug Smith, giving you the latest on the comings and goings of L.A. city and county government.

While tenant rights attorney Ysabel Jurado was running for a seat on the Los Angeles City Council, she uttered a frequent refrain: Voters in her Eastside district are sick of career politicians.

That message gave the distinct impression that Jurado, who ousted City Councilmember Kevin de León in the Nov. 5 election, was looking to offer a departure from the usual City Hall politics.

Now, Jurado is poised to make a potentially counterintuitive move by hiring Lauren Hodgins, a longtime City Hall lobbyist, as her chief of staff.

Hodgins, who until recently went by the last name Delgado, worked from 2016 until May 2024 as a lobbyist with the Santa Maria Group, representing educational institutions, hotel projects and real estate developers — especially those who build or renovate affordable housing. As chief of staff, she would oversee dozens of employees at City Hall and at four satellite offices, in a district stretching from downtown to Eagle Rock and El Sereno.

Jurado’s campaign spokesperson, Naomi Villagomez Roochnik, repeatedly declined to answer questions about Hodgins’ lobbying work — or even confirm that she is being hired. However, three City Hall officials told The Times that Hodgins was introduced as Jurado’s new chief of staff at a recent luncheon in Mayor Karen Bass’ office.

A fourth official, De León spokesperson Pete Brown, said Hodgins was introduced as Jurado’s incoming chief of staff during a Nov. 27 conference call with multiple offices.

At City Hall, it’s not unusual for council aides to leave their positions and become lobbyists. It’s much less typical, but not unheard of, for a councilmember to bring a lobbyist onto their staff. Councilmember Curren Price, for example, hired lobbyist Rob Katherman to work as an economic development aide for several years.

Lisa Gritzner, a veteran City Hall lobbyist who worked as a chief of staff to former Councilmember Cindy Miscikowski, said a new council member can benefit from someone from the industry on their staff. Lobbyists have a wide range of policy expertise, with clients in both the nonprofit and business communities — “voices that often get drowned out at City Hall,” she said.

For a new council member, “the learning curve is steep, no matter what,” Gritzner said. “So there is value in having a wider array of experiences among your staff.”

Santa Maria Group is named after Hodgins’ uncle, longtime lobbyist James Santa Maria, according to an interview she gave in 2020 to VoyageLA.

While she was with the firm, Hodgins made a specialty of helping developers seek tax-exempt financing for affordable housing projects. She was registered to lobby not just planning, housing and building officials, but sometimes also L.A. city agencies such as Los Angeles World Airports, the Department of Water and Power and the Department of Transportation.

According to city disclosure reports, Hodgins has represented real estate entities such as the Related Cos., NASH-Holland Koreatown Investors and R Cap Ave 34, which sought approval for a 468-unit residential project in Lincoln Heights.

The notion that Jurado would hire a lobbyist was troubling to Lincoln Heights resident Michael Henry Hayden, who fought the Avenue 34 project, now under construction. Hayden, who supported Jurado’s council bid, said he already sees “a revolving door between private interests and government in general.”

“The way I see it, these government offices serve as a check and balance against the abuses that private interests readily take,” said Hayden, who heads the Lincoln Heights Coalition, a community group. “When you have somebody working both sides, it makes you question where their loyalties lie.”

Jurado, while running for office, also touted her decision not to accept campaign donations from corporations, chambers of commerce, law enforcement unions, real estate developers and other interests. Santa Maria Group, like many L.A. lobbying firms, raised money for political candidates both in and outside City Hall, collecting nearly $60,000 for an array of City Hall politicians — including, oddly enough, De León.

City disclosures show that, between 2016 and 2021, Santa Maria Group raised $3,200 for Councilmember John Lee, $8,400 for Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson and nearly $12,000 for De León’s council campaign and office holder committees.

The firm also brought in $2,400 apiece for former Councilmembers Gil Cedillo and Nury Martinez, who are now out of office. And it raised $10,000 for Richelle Huizar in 2018, weeks before she ended her council campaign following an FBI raid of the home she shared with her husband, then-Councilmember Jose Huizar.

Hodgins left Santa Maria Group in May, becoming a high-level staffer on Jurado’s campaign. She received nearly $23,000 between June and October, according to ethics filings. In recent weeks, she’s been working to build Jurado’s team, soliciting resumes from potential hires.

Jurado takes office on Monday.

State of play

— LET THE GAMES BEGIN: Mayor Karen Bass tapped City Councilmember Paul Krekorian, who leaves office on Sunday, to be executive director of the Office of Major Events. He will oversee the city’s handling of the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games and other large sporting events.

— BUMPY LANDING: Nine months after rejecting a lease for a helicopter company at Van Nuys Airport, council members reversed course and signed off on the agreement. The 11-2 vote was a defeat for Councilmember Imelda Padilla, who had waged an aggressive campaign against the lease, both in public and behind closed doors. However, other city officials voiced fears about the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funds.

— WAREHOUSE FIGHT: Two Eastside elected officials are pushing for the city to block the approval of a warehouse planned near an elementary school in Lincoln Heights, saying it would produce truck traffic and dangerous diesel emissions. City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez and school board member Rocio Rivas warned the 62,000-square-foot facility would pose a serious health threat.

— HALFWAY THERE: Bass began celebrating a major milestone in her time at City Hall this week, holding a series of events marking the halfway point in her four-year term. Although she technically won’t reach the two-year mark until Thursday, this week’s events highlighted her push to improve city services and create ‘green’ jobs.

— STEPPING DOWN: The head of the Department of Animal Services has resigned from her post, nearly four months after going on paid leave. Staycee Dains, who earned about $272,000 annually as the agency’s general manager, left her position on Nov. 30, at a time when the city’s animal shelters are experiencing staff shortages, major overcrowding and rising euthanasia rates.

— STEPPING DOWN (PART 2): L.A. County’s chief probation officer, Guillermo Viera Rosa, plans to retire at the end of the year. His departure would cap a 20-month stint during which he failed to reform the troubled agency, whose juvenile halls face the threat of closure under mounting scrutiny from oversight agencies.

— ALL IN THE FAMILY: The brother of former City Councilmember Jose Huizar was sentenced Friday to community service and ordered to pay a $4,250 fine, according to MyNewsLA. Salvador Huizar pleaded guilty to a felony count of making false statements to FBI agents who were investigating his brother.

— POLICE PAYOUT: A jury has awarded $3 million to an ex-LAPD sergeant who alleged the department’s SWAT unit was gripped by a “mafia” culture.

— INNER CITY BLUES: Former City Atty. Mike Feuer, who left office in 2022, has joined Inner City Law Center as a part-time senior policy advisor, a spokesperson for the group said. Staffers at the nonprofit told LA Taco they are very unhappy with the hire.

— RUNNING AGAIN: Los Angeles City Councilmembers Katy Yaroslavsky and Traci Park have filed paperwork to run for a second four-year term in the June 2026 election. Park and Yaroslavsky represent different parts of the Westside. Meanwhile, Tim Gaspar, founder of Gaspar Insurance, announced he is running for the San Fernando Valley seat being vacated by Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who faces term limits in 2026.

Could L.A. crack down on bad meeting behavior?

It’s well known that Los Angeles City Council meetings can be extraordinarily unruly, with audience members shouting, hurling slurs and, at times, getting into fights.

Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, speaking Thursday to the Los Angeles Current Affairs Forum, said he’s preparing to confront the problem.

L.A., with its graffiti, illegal dumping and other urban ills, is already viewed by many as a “lawless place,” Harris-Dawson told the lunchtime audience. Chaos at council meetings only adds to that perception, he said.

“You could go to a country where you don’t speak the language and run a first-grade class, and it would be more orderly than an L.A. council meeting,” he said. “So we’ve got to take it very, very seriously.”

Harris-Dawson, who became president in September, said he wants the city to go to court to seek permission to crack down on bad behavior at meetings, which is having a “chilling effect” on civic participation at City Hall.

Improving those meetings, he said, would help L.A. move out of its “Gotham City” phase.

“If you go into the place where they’re making the laws, and you see that nonsense” from audience members, “you’re going to go, ‘Oh, no wonder it’s lawless here. Because these people can’t even conduct a meeting,’” he said.

On Friday, Harris-Dawson had a number of audience members ejected from the room. One was arrested on suspicion of battery on a police officer and disturbing the public’s business, LAPD Sgt. Dennis Clark said.

Clark did not immediately identify the protester. He said one officer was injured while using physical force to subdue the protester.

(NOT SO) QUICK HITS

• Where is Inside Safe? The mayor’s program to combat homelessness went to the area surrounding Sunset Boulevard and Ivar Avenue in Hollywood, a neighborhood represented by Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez.

• On the docket for next week: The City Council’s newest class takes office! That means the arrival of Jurado and Adrin Nazarian, who are replacing De León and Krekorian, respectively. Five others who won reelection will start new four-year terms: Imelda Padilla, Nithya Raman, Heather Hutt, John Lee and Harris-Dawson.