Same five LA County supervisors, same morning: they voted unanimously to create a new ethics commission, then turned around and voted three-to-two to let landlords gouge fire survivors starting May 29. Same board, very different math. This is Los Angeles Politics and Urbanism Daily — I’m Hope, Matt’s here, and today the Board of Supervisors managed to touch basically everything we’ve been tracking: oversight, housing money, rent protection, and the Wilshire corridor finally moving. Barger, Hahn, and Holly Mitchell — that’s your three votes to end the rent gouging ban. And Mitchell’s name was on the $255 million affordable housing award announcement yesterday. I want to sit with that before we even get to the ribbon-cutting. We’ll get to all of it — the ethics commission, the housing dollars, the Westlake project that just got smaller, the rent ban expiring, and yes, the D Line actually running on Wilshire. Stay with us. From LAist:
Citing a desire to prevent corruption within county government, the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday established Los Angeles County’s first ethics commission. The backstory: In 2024, voters approved Measure G, which called for the creation of an Ethics Commission and Office of Ethics Compliance.
The Board of Supervisors voted five-nothing Tuesday to create LA County’s first ethics commission. Measure G passed in 2024, voters asked for it, and now Lindsey Horvath’s motion is telling county departments to build the thing by the end of the year, with a charter amendment headed to November’s ballot. Same five supervisors, same Tuesday — they passed the ethics commission five-zero, then let the rent gouging ban die three-to-two. Barger, Hahn, and Holly Mitchell voted for the watchdog, then turned around and told fire-displaced renters to figure it out. Worth naming this: the seven-member commission has two seats filled through a Registrar-administered application process. That’s at least structurally different from the usual supervisor-appointment pipeline. Whether it survives once the charter amendment gets to November voters is the next test. Measure G was voters responding to corruption bleeding through county politics. Fine. But if the same board that just created the ethics watchdog is also deciding who four of those seven members are, I want to know what Hahn’s appointee looks like on a day when Hahn just voted against protecting renters. From 2 Urban Girls:
Today, the Los Angeles County Affordable Housing Solutions Agency (LACAHSA) highlighted how Measure A funding is advancing affordable housing production, homelessness prevention, and housing stability efforts across Los Angeles County through more than $255 million in coordinated investments supporting over 1,500 housing units and stabilization initiatives.
LACAHSA is back in the headlines — $255 million out the door, 1,530 units projected, 3,157 residents housed if the numbers hold. 2 Urban Girls had the event coverage out of Long Beach, where Linc Housing hosted the announcement. Holly Mitchell’s name is on this press release. Same Holly Mitchell who voted to let the rent gouging ban die on May 29 — and that was a 3-2 vote she was part of, against extending protections for fire-displaced renters. You don’t get to cut ribbons on affordable housing Monday and vote against keeping people in their homes Tuesday. To be fair, those are different instruments — LACAHSA is Measure A funding, the rent gouging ban is a Board of Supervisors extension vote. But Matt’s right that it’s the same five supervisors making both calls in the same week, and the 3-2 split is the part that has to be said out loud: Barger, Hahn, and Mitchell against the extension. And we flagged this May 19: the per-unit subsidy math was already over $166,000 before land, labor, or permits. Today’s Westlake modification story — Relevant Group scaling back a project to get it through approvals — tells you exactly where that money goes. Not into units. Into friction. From Adrian Brooks at Memesita:
Relevant Group, the firm currently reshaping the Westlake neighborhood, has officially pulled back on its ambitious plans for 1316 Linwood Avenue. While the reduction in scale might look like a retreat on paper, it’s actually a strategic pivot that highlights the evolving reality of Los Angeles’ housing crisis. The firm, working alongside affordable housing specialist Holos Communities, has filed a new application for a five-story, 106-unit complex.
Relevant Group filed a new application at 1316 Linwood — 106 units, five stories. They started at 150 units and eight stories. That’s 44 units that don’t get built because the approval process made the bigger project unfeasible. Those aren’t amenities they cut. Those are homes. And Linwood Avenue sits one neighborhood east of the new Wilshire/La Cienega station. The D Line is literally running now, so the transit case for density at that exact location has never been stronger — and the project is getting smaller. We talked about El Sereno last week as a one-off — transit-adjacent affordable project reshaped by friction. Now Westlake. This is a pattern. And we’ve been quoting $166,000 per unit in subsidy before land or labor — imagine what that number looks like when you spread overhead across 106 units instead of 150. Here's LAist:
Landlords in Los Angeles County will soon be allowed to raise rents by more than 10% from their baseline before the January 2025 fires. A vote by the county’s Board of Supervisors that could have extended a ban on post-fire price gouging for another month failed on Tuesday. Supervisors Lindsey Horvath and Hilda Solis voted in favor, but Supervisors Kathryn Barger, Janice Hahn and Holly Mitchell abstained. As a result, the long-standing countywide prohibition on rent gouging will expire May 29.
The Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday on extending the post-fire rent gouging ban, and it died 3-2, with Barger, Hahn, and Holly Mitchell abstaining. It expires May 29. Two-thirds of fire survivors are still in temporary housing, per Supervisor Horvath’s motion. Holly Mitchell. The same name on the $255 million affordable housing award yesterday is one of the three who just let fire-displaced renters get hung out to dry. That’s not a footnote — that’s the whole story of this board. And here’s the mobility read: renters priced out of the neighborhoods they evacuated from don’t rebuild local — they commute two extra hours, or they leave the region. The ethics commission passed 5-0 the same day this failed 3-2. Same five supervisors, same Tuesday, completely different levels of political courage. Here's Deborah Cooper at BriefGlance:
Opening to the public on May 8, 2026, this first segment extends the D Line from its previous terminus at Wilshire/Western in Koreatown, pushing westward with three new state-of-the-art stations at Wilshire/La Brea, Wilshire/Fairfax, and Wilshire/La Cienega. For the first time, heavy rail transit now serves the Miracle Mile and enters the city of Beverly Hills, offering a traffic-free alternative for tens of thousands of Angelenos.
Section 1 of the D Line is officially open — Wilshire/La Brea, Wilshire/Fairfax, Wilshire/La Cienega, all live as of May 8. That’s 3.9 miles of new tunnel from Koreatown to the edge of Beverly Hills, and it means heavy rail is now running under the Miracle Mile for the first time. We’ve been talking about the busboy-in-Koreatown test since May 15 — whether this line actually moves working people, not just people going to LACMA. The ribbon’s been cut, the trains are running. So who’s on them? And here’s the timing wrinkle: Relevant Group just filed a modification to scale back their Westlake affordable project — one neighborhood east of Wilshire/La Cienega. New transit access lands, and the adjacent density play gets smaller. That’s a strange signal. If they’re cutting units to survive the approval process, that’s your per-unit subsidy cost story right there — the infrastructure finally showed up, and the permitting friction is still eating the project alive. If you follow City Hall, you’ll want the statewide picture too. Check out California Governor's Race, with daily 2026 race coverage on candidates, polling, debates, fundraising, and policy for voters who want more than horse-race takes. Find it wherever you listen to podcasts.
You’ll find links to every story we touched on today in the show notes, so if one caught your ear, you can follow it there and read more.
That’s Los Angeles Politics and Urbanism Daily for this Wednesday. This is a Lantern Podcast.