LA Podcast - Don’t Spray It’s Over

Alissa, Mike, and Marco say a requiem for the Graffiti Towers. Nithya Raman receives endorsements from some big players, including Kenneth Mejia’s corgis. In the wake of the Lineage environmental disaster, which still reeks, LA’s City Council votes for more environmental disasters. And who will be LA County’s first elected CEO?

Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, on the web at Think Forward, or almost anywhere you get your podcasts.

SHOW NOTES

The Graffiti Towers have been sold and cleaning efforts have begun

Aren’t the Graffiti Towers the Watts Towers of their generation? (Both are being refurbished for the 2028 Olympics)

Keep Honking! I’m admiring the Oceanwide Plaza Graffiti Towers! See them up close with Alissa and the Rent Brigade on a tour next week

Nearby, a new park under the Sixth Street Bridge, also resplendent with graffiti, continues gentrification conversations

LA Material’s Degen Pener reports on families of coyotes living in residential towers in West Hollywood

The Western States Carpenters union endorsed Nithya Raman, reversing their 2022 support for Bass

Raman was also recently endorsed by Kenneth Mejia, who is encouraging the public to add a Nithya sticker to their yard signs

City Council will vote on splitting Housing and Homelessness and Health into two separate committees this week

The Lineage fire still smells and it’s still bad news so Karen Bass wrote an open letter to the Lineage shareholders and supports an order of abatement from AQMD

Councilmember Ysabel Jurado introduced a seven-motion package for Boyle Heights fire recovery. Hilda Solis is in charge of small business recovery

The EPA has asked Lineage for documents to assess Clean Air Act compliance: aka, was there an ammonia leak? Lineage warehouses have had 63 fires over the last ten years, by the way

Hungry for more environmental disasters, Council approved a retrofitting of the Scattergood gas plant

Eric Garcetti has a new job and it is (or isn’t) what you’d expect

Garcetti recently declined Julia Wick’s request for comment as she explored who might throw their hat in the ring for the powerful LA County CEO position in 2028 for LA Material. Mike profiled Long Beach mayor Rex Richardson, another rumored candidate, on What’s Next, LA?, look for it in the upcoming weeks

Support LA Podcast by becoming a paid subscriber at thinkforward.la

This week’s episode was produced by Sophie Bridges

Thanks to our digital producer Bianca Cockrell

The reporting and analysis you hear in the show is put together by our rotating cast of producers and co-hosts every week. All opinions expressed on the show are solely those of co-hosts and may not represent the views of LA Forward.

Alissa Walker writes the newsletter Torched, tracking LA’s megaevent progress. Find her at @awalkerinla on Instagram and @awalkerinla.bsky.social on Bluesky.

Mike Bonin is the executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at Cal State LA, and can be found at @mikebonin on Instagram and @mikebonin.bsky.social on Bluesky

Marco Santana brings over a decade of leadership to the LA homelessness services sector and is a former candidate and active leader within local Democratic party politics. He’s at @Marco4LA on Instagram