‘Realistic’ foot dragging
Dear ER:
“It faulted the city for failing to identify locations for a sufficient number of “realistic” new housing units to satisfy the city’s RHNA allotment” (“AES ruling against Redondo may open door to Builder’s Remedy developments statewide” Oct. 16, 2025). Amen to this. Foot dragging against any development has created a city of dead retail zones like the Galleria, Artesia Blvd, and a host of vacancies along Sepulveda Boulevard. Rents are skyrocketing, people can’t afford to rent due to the constrained apartment supply…yet commercial properties sit vacant. The solution is clear: rezone for housing element overlays and encourage density in under used commercial only spaces like the Galleria. Bring foot traffic, walkability, and modern urban planning to Redondo. New construction brings badly needed tax revenues and commercial activity to help subsidize all those Prop 13 capped tax bases
Weir
ERnews comment
San Pedro ‘utopia’
Dear ER:
San Pedro probably has added 50% more housing units to the town in recent years (“AES ruling against Redondo may open door to Builder’s Remedy developments statewide” Oct. 16, 2025). We have so many giant new condo developments throughout this area that it has gotten ridiculous. It has not led to a decrease in prices, and in fact has led to an increase in prices.
The solutions put out by politicians are failures. All they’ve done for San Pedro is make it more dense, add more traffic, and made driving, bicycling and walking a miserable experience, and much more dangerous for everyone. Emergency vehicles can’t get in and out, but it’s the utopia Newsom and his cronies want. The only way to fix this is to stop voting for people like Newsom and the current legislature.
Richard Wagoner
San Pedro
Suspected
Dear ER:
Last week’s Easy Reader News letter to the editor “Should’a known” (Oct. 16, 2025) and reporter Garth Meyer’s article (“AES ruling against Redondo may open door to Builder’s Remedy developments statewide” Oct. 16, 2025) revealed what many already suspected: Redondo Beach’s long-questioned Housing Element has now been judicially exposed for what it is — a plan more theoretical than real. Once again, following the Rumsfeld framework, there are known knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns. Known Knowns: The Facts Everyone Pretends Not to Know: The appellate court didn’t need to “decertify” Redondo Beach’s Housing Element to expose its flaws. It found the plan noncompliant with state law, citing overlay zones that promised housing only on paper. Known Unknowns: The Art of Saying Nothing with Confidence: After the ruling, staff told the Planning Commission that the court “did not make a specific ruling on the Housing Element,” that the City’s position is it “remains certified,” and that commissioners were advised not to discuss the decision while the City “evaluates next steps.” In the aftermath of the appellate court hearing, transparency becomes choreography — and choreography isn’t governance. Unknown Unknowns — The Fallout Still Unfolding: How many Builder’s Remedy projects will now re-emerge? How many cities will take Redondo’s path — mistaking certification for compliance and litigation for leadership? Redondo Beach didn’t just fail to plan — it planned to fail, then certified the wreckage.
Pat Healy
Redondo Beach
Own it
Dear ER:
Redondo Beach Mayor Jim Light and the late, former Mayor Bill Brand own this (“AES ruling against Redondo may open door to Builder’s Remedy developments statewide,” ER October 16, 2025). As usual, Light points his lying finger at others. What’s so ironic about this whole mess, is that it’s the liberal Democrat politicians in Sacramento whom Light, Brand and their supporters vote for in every election are forcing this Marxist garbage down their throats.
Gart Williams
ERNews comment
Unintended fiscal consequences
Dear ER:
While I appreciate Assemblymember Muratsuchi’s recent visit with him, we did not talk about how housing mandates impact the character of a city (“SB legislators talk A.I, e-bikes, housing,” ER October 16, 2025). Of private land under Redondo’s jurisdiction, 85% is zoned for housing. Only 15% is zoned for commercial and industrial use. We average $7.60 more city revenue per square foot for commercial than for residential. And if you apply the cost of city services, housing becomes a net loss.
Each nine-year RHNA (Regional Housing Needs Assessment) cycle erodes our commercial space to increase housing. That means our revenue base is eroding with each cycle. But it is actually exacerbated beyond that. Online sales tax is distributed based on brick and mortar commercial space. So as we convert commercial into residential we lose online sales tax as well. And to add fuel to the fire, the other mandates beyond RHNA incentivize commercial property owners to sit on their property until they get a developer who wants to build housing. We’ve already seen one property owner pull a project in process for commercial development and resubmit as high density housing.
Redondo has already spent over $2.6M on our housing element and on housing mandate related lawsuits, and we allocated millions more in our last budget. With a $3.5 million General Fund deficit, these housing mandates threaten cities with abundant housing into fiscal insolvency.
Redondo is ranked in the top 5% in housing density across the state. We have 85% of our land dedicated to housing already, most of it multi family housing. About half our units are rental. And 11% of our housing is below the 80% market rate Federal standard. We are the only Beach City with a Housing Authority and Section 8 voucher program. We are subsidizing housing for about 500 residents including veterans. We are the only Beach City with pallet shelters and permanent supportive housing.
How bad would it look if a city like Redondo — a model of housing density, diversity and homeless programs — would slip into insolvency, directly driven by the impacts of the state housing mandates?
Meanwhile the cities and Counties of the legislators leading this glut of mandates create loopholes to save their own wealthy constituents. This is just wrong.
Jim Light
Mayor
Redondo Beach
Go electric
Dear ER:
Railroad traffic along the North Redondo Beach right of way is one or two trains a day. With the proposed Metro C Line project, two more tracks will be laid down, destroying large heritage trees, removing green space, and destroying a tiny neighborhood. This is not a compromise for the over 1,100 families who are adjacent to this project. And yes, these are families who likely depend on mass transit, and are simply asking for the project to be moved over three blocks to Hawthorne Boulevard, rather than cut through their disadvantaged neighborhood. The electric buses have always been in the mix, but Metro likely ignored them because they aren’t as flashy. Now, many environmental groups are criticizing Metro for not increasing their electric buses. These buses would keep Metro from spending our tax money on expensive rail projects, and secure clean mass transit, without decimating neighborhoods. Have some compassion
Erica Cambridge
ERNews comment
Locals impact, worldwide
Dear ER:
I am so glad Easy Reader featured a former local attorney (“Law Nerd: former Deputy DA livestreams pop culture trials,” ER October 9, 2025). Emily D Baker grew up in Manhattan Beach, attended Mira Costa HS, UMass and Southwest Law School. It is great to hear of the locals who have made an impact worldwide, as some have and some continue to do.
Charles Didinger
Hermosa Beach
EDB priority
Dear ER:
I love watching (and listening to) EDB! If I’m tuned into another legal livestream and realize EDB is on, I immediately hit pause like, “Sorry, other lawyer person, priorities!” Her analysis is sharp, her reactions are gold, and that perfect mix of real talk and humor? Unmatched. Law Nerds unite!
WA Wong
Deflection
Dear ER:
On Saturday, I attended Redondo Beach District 3 Councilwoman Paige Kaluderovic’s virtual community meeting. A 30-plus year resident raised a long-standing concern about excessive noise and safety along Prospect Avenue and its impact on the quality of life for hundreds of residents. Rather than address the issue directly, Kaluderovic deflected responsibility, suggesting that I, a Public Works and Sustainability Commissioner, should have handled it.
While I understand Councilwoman Kaluderovic is relatively new to her role, it’s important to clarify that City Commissions are advisory bodies. They do not set or enforce policy. According to the City Charter, decisions on commission recommendations require a majority vote from the City Council to move forward.
Shifting blame to a single commissioner for an issue squarely within the Council’s jurisdiction is both inappropriate and misleading, especially when the Councilwoman herself has not responded to repeated resident complaints. As an elected official, she has both the authority and the resources to act. During her campaign, she assured residents she would address this very issue — a promise that, to date, remains unfulfilled.
Her unwillingness to lead on this issue is the reason noise violations along Prospect and Paulina avenues persist. We urge her to stop deflecting and start problem-solving for the Beryl heights residents.
Candace Allen Nafissi, MPA
Public Works Commissioner
Redondo Beach
“Unintended Fiscal Consequences” — by Mayor Jim Light
This letter is a textbook defense memo disguised as public outreach:
• It restates selective statistics (housing density, Section 8 participation) to establish moral credit.
• It constructs a fiscal martyrdom narrative (“the State is bankrupting cities like ours”).
• It equates density with fiscal insolvency while ignoring the costs of serial litigation and noncompliance.
What’s most important is his strategic omission:
Light never acknowledges the court’s reasoning — that the City fabricated capacity through nonviable overlay zones.
He reframes the issue as an external imposition rather than a judicial finding of deception.
Effect: A sophisticated gaslight — conceding burden but denying fault.
Pat Healy seems averse to the facts of the situation. Our city has more diversity in housing than the average city in Southern California. And it is a fact that we are already in the top 5% of density of all cities in the state. And yes, only 15% of our private land is zoned and built out as commercial property. City planning 101 is not rocket science. Good city planning balances the costs of residential development with the net positive revenues from commercial and industrial development. Eroding our commercial zoning erodes our General Fund revenues. The overlays are not “non-viable”. We have already approved the increase in housing on the Galleria Site. And we have another high density project on commercial property going through the approval processes that is totally reliant on the Housing Element and the overlays. The overlays are working. Simple facts.
The legislators specifically set up HCD to interpret the housing mandates and to certify and enforce Housing Elements to ensure they comply with housing mandates. The overlay is not something fabricated by Redondo’s consultants, staff, Commissioners or elected officials. They were direct guidance from HCD. Overlays over commercial property were used by dozens of cities under the guidance and ultimately certification by HCD – not just Redondo. As much as Mr. Healy seems to want, there was no malfeasance by anyone in the City.
And yes, the housing mandates are an external imposition. Not sure how Mr. Healy can make any claim to the contrary.
If a city cannot rely on the very organization set up by the legislature to interpret and apply the housing mandates, where else should a city turn?
If the court believes overlays do not comply with the legislation, should the court ruling not address HCD rather than the City? In the end HCD will have to certify whatever changes we make to the Housing Element. That is the way it is set up by our legislators.
If you look at our neighbors like Manhattan, Hermosa, El Segundo and even Torrance, they all invested and are benefiting from revenue producing projects done when costs and interest rates were low. It was literally front-page news that Redondo was fiercely against growth. I do think what started out with good intentions is not benefiting Redondo today.
Jim, you are 100% correct we are more densely populated versus other cities, but doesn’t Redondo have a lot more open space to build the much-needed affordable housing? There are plenty of dated buildings, like the Galleria, and open space, like AES and even BCHD Prospect building, that the state could argue would be ideal for affordable housing. Plus, some of this land is owned by those angry at Redondo for being so difficult to work with. How much longer can Redondo fight against the growing need for affordable housing and win? The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Instead of lamenting the past, what is the plan going forward? As I said in response to Bob Pinlzer’s article, blaming others for one’s poor decisions is pathetic and weak. If you are an elected official or on a commission, own your mistakes and make constructive suggestions or risk being irrelevant. Redondo residents are voting for cooperative, constructive candidates like Paige and Brad versus those who relentlessly criticize, whine and blame. Redondo has to balance the needs of those clinging to the 1990s versus the needs of the next generation who wants affordable housing like many of us had decades ago.
On Government: When Dialogue Becomes Defense
Public discourse is supposed to illuminate policy, not obscure it. Yet in Redondo Beach, the debate over state housing mandates has become less about compliance and more about calibration — who controls the narrative, and how much daylight separates rhetoric from record.
Last week’s Easy Reader “Letters to the Editor” section (October 21, 2025) offered a rare glimpse into that tension. Mayor Jim Light’s letter, “Unintended Fiscal Consequences,” presented an argument that, at first glance, reads like a fiscal policy memo. It’s dense with numbers, citations, and references to housing density, diversity, and Section 8 participation. The letter’s surface tone is civic, even cautionary — warning that state housing mandates may push cities like Redondo toward financial insolvency.
But beneath the fiscal veneer lies a rhetorical sleight of hand — one that has become increasingly familiar in California’s housing discourse.
Selective Metrics, Broader Meaning
Mayor Light’s argument relies on a series of selective facts: that 85% of Redondo’s private land is zoned residential, that only 15% remains commercial or industrial, and that commercial space yields $7.60 more per square foot than residential. Each figure is accurate in isolation. Taken together, however, they construct a narrative of victimhood — the city as a responsible steward punished by Sacramento’s one-size-fits-all mandates.
What’s missing is context.
Nowhere does the mayor acknowledge that Redondo’s own Housing Element was found noncompliant by the California Court of Appeal — not because of the state’s overreach, but because of the city’s own actions: fabricating housing capacity through overlay zones that didn’t legally allow housing.
By omitting the judicial finding, Light redefines accountability as adversity. The State becomes the aggressor; the City, the martyr.
A Digital Public Square
When I posted a brief analysis in response — noting that Light’s letter reframed legal noncompliance as fiscal victimhood — the exchange evolved into something larger than a comment thread. The mayor replied publicly, defending his position with the assertion that Redondo merely followed guidance from the state’s Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), and that if overlays were faulty, the court should have directed its criticism at HCD rather than the City.
That argument, while rhetorically sharp, misunderstands the hierarchy of accountability.
Cities don’t answer to consultants or agencies; they answer to law. HCD can guide, but it cannot legalize a zoning fiction. The court ruled on what the City enacted, not what the Department advised.
The digital exchange thus became a microcosm of our civic dilemma: when an elected official defends a policy narrative online, the forum blurs — part outreach, part rebuttal, part public relations. The difference between explanation and justification dissolves.
The Broader Principle
The “On Government” takeaway isn’t about who’s right in a comment thread. It’s about how cities communicate when they’re wrong — or more precisely, when they’ve been told they’re wrong by a court of law.
The health of local democracy depends not just on compliance, but on candor. When an official conflates criticism with attack, or substitutes narrative for responsibility, the result is an erosion of trust that no budget number can quantify.
Housing policy is complicated. Transparency is not. If Redondo Beach wants to preserve its credibility — as well as its coastline — it must relearn the art of plain governance: admitting mistakes, correcting course, and letting the record, not rhetoric, do the heavy lifting.
⸻
Commission Nafissi’s point on Councilmember Kaluderovic’s lack of understanding of the role of citizen commissioners is likely one reason that City staff failed the GPAC as seen in former Councilmember Pinzler’s column. If the Mayor and Council don’t accept responsibility and try to pawn it off on commissioners, then why wouldn’t Staff also shirk responsibility?
Is something VERY WRONG with respect to ACCOUNTABILITY with the current Mayor and Council?
No, staff absolutely did not let down Redondo Beach! I think Redondo staff and current Council majority is doing a great job in a difficult environment.
On November 14, 2022, there was a LA Times cover story titled “Crude emails reveal nasty side of a California beach city’s crusade to halt growth.” Todd Lowenstein stated on NBC news “Honestly, we’re already full…If you’re going to pick a place to have low to medium-income housing, are you going to put it next to the ocean, or are you going to put it inland?”
Mr. Pinzler’s article fails to mention Todd Lowenstein, Zein Obaji and Nils Nehrenheim approved the housing plan while both Christian Horvath and Laura Emdee told City Council about this risk and voted against it. Christian and Laura both opposed the plan’s high-density zoning increases in North Redondo, as did many residents who were ignored. Laura express concern that concentrating housing near transit centers and freeways would lead to a worse Regional Housing Needs Assessment. Wasn’t it suggested by Laura and many residents to distribute the required housing more equitably across the city? In response it seems Laura was a victim of the “crude emails” highlighted in the LA Times, while City Council tried, and epically failed, to get Christian off City Council.
Everybody makes mistakes and hindsight is always 20/20; that is understandable. Blaming staff and current council members for poor decisions made by commissioners and past Council members is pathetic and weak. Commissioners own your mistakes and make constructive suggestions or risk being irrelevant. Redondo residents are voting for cooperative, constructive candidates like Paige, Brad and even Jim versus those who relentlessly criticize, whine and blame others.