Check your mailboxes Los Angeles voters, election season is officially kicking into high gear.
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season → check → gear
Los Angeles County has begun mailing ballots ahead of the Nov. 3 general election, launching the final month of a packed election featuring contests for LA mayor, California governor and Congress, along with a sprawling collection of local and statewide measures.
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County → begin → measures
The county is offering more than 400 ballot drop boxes, while vote centers begin opening Oct. 24.
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centers → offer → boxes
Voters who haven’t registered and want a ballot mailed to them have until Oct. 19.
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Sign → register → California
The ballots are landing as California remains at the center of a heated fight over election security.
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California → land → security
Critics, including First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, have raised concerns about the state’s vote-by-mail system, ballot handling and the ability to verify that ballots are being cast by eligible voters, while state officials and voting advocates have defended the Golden State’s safeguards.
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officials → include → safeguards
The debate is likely to intensify as millions of ballots go out ahead of next month’s election, putting renewed focus on how the state verifies, processes and counts the votes once they’re returned.
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they → intensify → votes
Among the headline contests is the Los Angeles mayoral race, where incumbent Mayor Karen Bass faces City Council member Nithya Raman.
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Bass → face → Raman
That contentious matchup between the two Democrats involves candidates with dramatically different political coalitions.
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matchup → involve → coalitions
But the mayor’s office is far from the only consequential choice facing Angelenos.
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office → face → Angelenos
City voters will also confront eight local ballot measures, ranging from taxes and wildfire recovery to sweeping changes in how City Hall operates.
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Hall → confront → changes
Here are five measures involving significant fiscal, governmental or land-use changes:
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measures → involve → changes
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The citizen-sponsored measure would slap a new 0.5% sales tax on purchases in Los Angeles to pump approximately $345 million annually into the Los Angeles Fire Department.
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measure → download → Department
The money could pay for firefighters and paramedics, fire trucks, ambulances, helicopters, fire stations, emergency communications, brush clearance and wildfire preparedness.
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money → pay → firefighters
It would also establish a Citizens’ Oversight Committee and require audits.
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It → establish → audits
Proposition TE — A Palisades Fire tax break
Voters will decide whether some victims of the devastating January 2025 Palisades Fire should receive an exemption from Proposition ULA (commonly known as the “mansion tax“), the city’s transfer tax on high-dollar real estate deals.
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victims → decide → deals
The exemption would apply to qualifying residential properties damaged or destroyed by the fire and sold by the qualifying owner within five years of the blaze.
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exemption → apply → blaze
City analysts estimate the exemption could reduce ULA revenue used for affordable housing and homelessness-prevention programs by $35 million to $66 million through January 2030.
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exemption → estimate → January
Charter Amendment LA — City Hall shake-up
This proposal could overhaul the machinery of the LA government, including moving the city toward a two-year budget cycle and requiring a capital infrastructure plan.
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proposal → overhaul → plan
It would also give the Director of Public Works greater authority, allow changes to or elimination of the Board of Public Works, loosen restrictions on city business enterprises and mortgaging city-owned property, and change contracting procedures.
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It → give → procedures
Charter Amendment PL — Planning overhaul
The measure would scrap LA’s seven Area Planning Commissions and replace them with a single Neighborhood Appeals Commission.
It would also change how some land-use decisions and appeals are handled and allow the City Council to alter floor-area restrictions by ordinance.
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Council → scrap → ordinance
Charter Amendment EE — Ethics and elections revamp
The wide-ranging proposal would increase maximum penalties for campaign-finance violations, strengthen the independence of the LAPD Inspector General and Fire Department Independent Assessor and impose a five-year restriction on certain Ethics Commission officials seeking city or LAUSD office after leaving their posts
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proposal → range → posts
It would also increase the signatures required for referendum petitions from 10% to 15% of the votes cast in the previous mayoral election and change the City Council’s minimum meeting requirement from three days per week to at least weekly.
And those are only part of the ballot.
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those → increase → ballot
City voters will also weigh measures concerning parks funding, LA’s airport, harbor and water-and-power departments and LAUSD campaign-finance rules, giving Angelenos plenty of homework before Election Day.
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voters → weigh → Day
The Aporia
