Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti says he plans to put a stop to private meetings between planning commissioners and real estate developers or other outside parties — part of a bigger attempt to fend off a hotly contested ballot measure, it was reported today.
In a letter this week, Garcetti wrote that he plans to issue an executive directive prohibiting such ex parte communications with planning commissioners in order to “ensure that all dialogue with private stakeholders is on the record,” the Los Angeles Times reported.
Critics have grown vocal about private meetings between real estate developers and planning commissioners appointed by Garcetti, arguing that such talks have skewed city planning decisions in favor of development interests.
Backers of the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative, a ballot measure that aims to crack down on “mega-developments,” have urged Garcetti to prohibit private meeting between real estate developers and city decision makers.
Last month, the group suggested it might stop pursuing its ballot measure if Garcetti swiftly agreed to halt such meetings and make other changes. Since then, however, the group has turned in signatures to put its plan on the ballot next March, according to The Times.
Garcetti made his pledge in a letter this week to AIDS Healthcare Foundation President Michael Weinstein, whose group has championed the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative, according to the newspaper. The mayor said he would seek to bar ex parte meetings with members of the City Planning Commission and the area planning commissions that vet development plans in different parts of the city.
