Mayor Bass picks up endorsement while Raman lays out homeless plan

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass Tuesday was endorsed by business leaders for her reelection campaign while her challenger, LA City Councilmember Nithya Raman, laid out her plans to combat homelessness.

Touting Mayor Bass’ effort to reduce street homelessness, business owners in downtown LA supported Bass’ second term.

“I’m happy to see we’re seeing a trajectory right now that makes downtown a much, much better place than it was a few short years ago,” Bass said during an event that announced the endorsement.

Bass also said for the first time, the city is seeing a reduction in street homelessness.

“Now a 40-year system that has been fundamentally broken for all of those years is going to take a while to transform that system, but transformation is underway,” the mayor said.

But Councilmember Raman disagreed: She said the current system has not worked, and a major overhaul is needed to put an end to the city’s homelessness.

“When you look at the list of issues in Los Angeles, where do you rank homelessness? I think housing and  homelessness are our two biggest issues,” Raman said in a news conference.

Raman pledged to eliminate homelessness by investing in what works, tracking every dollar spent while doing more for mental health services.

“I want to build out a single point in the city that is absolutely responsible for making sure every dollar is spent, every dollar is tallied and that data about outcomes is available for decision making within the city and for the public to see where their dollars are going,” Raman said.

A month before the June primary election, the LA mayoral election appears to be wide open. A recent UCLA polled showed Mayor Bass had a lead with 25% of the vote while conservative reality TV personality Spencer Pratt was trailing at second place with 11%. Raman was right behind him at 9%.

Some 40% of voters were undecided, according to the poll.