What should the city do when confronted with homeless individuals who refuse to go into a shelter or temporary housing? 

I know there are misbehaving people who must be dealt with, I am all for that. But when the cops walk into communities they are unfamiliar with, they constantly screw up. In fact, every council district should elect their own cops. It is apparent that cops are prejudiced against the people they are dealing with, as if they caused their own social problems. They did not.  

Long Beach trashes poor people, while relying upon them. The reason they live in these “problem” neighborhoods is that their social problems are unaddressed. Let us address them here and now. Lay them on the table. Let us list them.

How would you address crime in the city?

The cops have misperceptions, prejudice, and violent tools to solve problems of poor people in “problem” neighborhoods. These “problems” were created by a misbehaving legal system, and a system of unfair economic rewards. I am a CPA by trade, but my academic love is economics. I considered the ethics of the system of economic reward in Long Beach.  

The police union is not a respectable union. I do not understand why people in City Hall play games with the police union. Then, as a result, Long Beach poor people end up in Superior Court tagged with fraudulent documents by the cops. By the way, public defenders are not miracle workers. They are burned out by the legal system, as are the other attorneys who work in it. Attorneys are sometimes unfairly blamed for a legal system they are the victims of.  

Long story, bottom to top, the Citizen Police Complaint Commission is a disgrace. That is the opinion of myself and my recently deceased husband, CPCC whistleblower Tomas Gonzales.  Learning what I did about CPCC ripped my head off as a White person thinking about the legal system.

I was hoping that the legal system is one of fair punishment. A system to solve problems. It is not. In fact, the legal system is a threat to democracy, starting with the judges, and the city attorney. I have no reason to be impressed with the city prosecutor. I tend, for good reason, to assume the worst out of Long Beach City Hall. 

The city needs to make room for 26,502 new housing units by 2029. How should the 9th District be a part of that plan?

First, be more reasonable as to housing fees. I need to build a garage apartment for my elderly mom who might end up living with me. My mom cannot stand the thought of living with my stepdaughter because my stepdaughter is noisy. My stepdaughter suffers from severe mental illness. She screams for cigarettes at 3 a.m.  

I checked into permitting a garage apartment. The application permit was more than $5,000. I am a single mom who is dependent on SSI. This entire situation is outrageous. 

What would you do about the high cost of housing in Long Beach? 

My girlfriends are stable people. Not only do we provide housing for ourselves, we provide housing for friends of our kids when their parents are doing drugs, and not paying attention.  When people are dumped on the street, they come to our house before they get a new place.  

We are pillars of stability for the community, but we are financially unrewarded in our property taxes. If you can substantiate that you care for someone on SSI, or someone who has been abandoned by a mom on drugs, or you need assistance with getting a disabled person, you should get a property tax break.

In addition, you ought to be able to call up the district office and get it. I once turned down my friend’s friend, who was a guy who had been run over by a tractor when as a child. He was turned out of his home after a dispute with relatives, when his mom went to the nursing home.  Because I could not get him up my steps, he ended up on the street. I called and emailed the district council office for assistance for this guy. Nobody from the council office responded to my pleas for help.  

You can also tie Long Beach wages mathematically to rent. Call it what you want. I call it fair. And apply the laws of taxation to financially benefit and penalize certain behavior, such as real estate speculation, which hurts the community of ordinary people trying to enjoy life here, without constant commercial intrusion and harassment.  

The Queen Mary? Junk. Dump it as quickly and cheaply as possible, then put that money in well-planned housing, not just housing that makes real estate developers happy. 

There’s been a historical lack of investment in open space and recreational opportunities in your district. How would you secure more resources for open space?

Recreational opportunities are a great topic, having sat at home for three solid years doing nothing but staring at paint. Please give recreation time and places for old stoners who drink coffee and who do not drink liquor or smoke cigarettes. We like healthy munchies.  

And get rid of these heart attacks known as burger joints. Give us healthy food with friendly city rules for our restaurants. The bureaucracy in this place is stifling creativity.

Do you believe the city is doing enough to alleviate climate change and the effect it’s having on the city? If not, what additional actions should be taken?

The city is in denial about climate change—aka, the Belmont pool. Hey, the beach is going underground with all that public money you want to dump in it.

We must talk about the fact that the beach is receding. And stop investing in an area going underground.

Every building roof top must go solar. Slap the solar roofs on first, ask questions later. Get going—the forests are burning. My mom is sitting in her bathtub in Natchez, Mississippi covered by pillows sitting out tornados that keep buzzing by while we fool around getting solar roofs. 

Drag out some socially minded economists and accountants, like myself. I am not the only one. Google us. There is some pollution going on here. Before the polluters can split without paying the bill, we need to monetize the damage, and get them to pay it. Stop waiting for these corporations to be nice. It is only money and PR to them. 

What should the city do when confronted with homeless individuals who refuse to go into a shelter or temporary housing? 

We need to respond from a place of compassion. There are a variety of reasons why someone may refuse housing assistance including the length of time without housing (recent versus long term), mental health needs, disability, safety concerns, presence of children and availability of permanent housing. We need to have housing options and support services that address these barriers to acceptance and prevent unhoused people from cycling back into homelessness. This is a long term issue and thus requires long term solutions. I believe that:

• We need to build additional transitional housing with a clear path to permanent housing. We have seen short-term success through the city of Long Beach’s and county of Los Angeles’ Project HomeKey, which converts motels into housing options with supportive services attached.
• We need to provide resources to our local health department for community mental health services. This would help to both prevent homelessness and provide assistance to those experiencing homelessness due to un- or under-treated mental health conditions.
• Ensure our housing options can accommodate members of our disability community and can keep families intact. It is not acceptable to have housing options that are not considered accessible or require families to separate.
• Target recently unhoused individuals and families that would more quickly accept assistance. Have the housing and wrap-around services available to quickly move people into permanent housing, provide employment and other support services. 

How would you address crime in the city?

Our public safety personnel are often asked to do work they are not sufficiently trained to handle, with fewer resources than they need to do the work well. We must increase the resources we allocate to assist our communities with mental health issues. As we continue to assess our public safety continuum, we must reframe the discussion away from simply addressing crime as a singular issue to a broader focus on crime reduction, intervention, and prevention. 

To do so, we must think more broadly about the influences and circumstances people are contending with and relevant factors like age, economic circumstances, and where people are born, live, learn, work, play and worship. Approaching improved public safety from a public health and social dynamic perspective can provide a more holistic approach to public safety and how we deal with crime and criminal behavior and how we address complex issues like domestic violence, mental health and family conflict. 

The city needs to make room for 26,502 new housing units by 2029. How should the 9th District be a part of that plan?

The Uptown Planning Land Use and Neighborhood Strategy has implemented a series of zoning changes along our corridors that allows for additional mixed-used and residential housing. There is already a development breaking ground this year that will add an additional 84 housing units. 

The 9th district has a number of nuisance motels that no longer serve the use they were originally designed for. We need to work with Development Services and Economic Develop to create a series of incentives for owner/operators to transition those properties into housing.

We need expanded first time home buyer assistance programs. North Long Beach is one of the last affordable places in the city to buy a home. We need to create a pathway to homeownership and wealth building among our residents to shift people out of the rental housing and thus take the pressure off of our rental housing market. 

What would you do about the high cost of housing in Long Beach? 

Unfortunately, much of this is a regional and state-wide issue around the affordability of California and Southern California in particular. As it pertains to the rental market, the state has passed rental stabilization measures to address increases in annual rent and reduce displacement. Locally, we have an Inclusionary Housing Ordinance that requires affordable housing to be included in new development projects in Midtown and Downtown and provides a series of incentives to developers for other parts of the city. 

It will take some time before the city is able to assess the impact of this ordinance and whether modifications to the ordinance are needed. As a councilmember, I will ask for regular updates on the city’s affordable housing production. I will also push for the city to determine a consistent local source of funding for affordable housing production. 

There’s been a historical lack of investment in open space and recreational opportunities in your district. How would you secure more resources for open space?

Currently, there are less than 50 acres of programmable park space in our district. The 51,483 residents in District 9, many with young children who need safe spaces to play, deserve better park and open space resources. As your Councilmember, I will build on the work I have already done developing the North Long Beach Open Space Master Plan, which provides a  framework for the Citywide Parks Strategic plan. 

As the most park-deficient area in Long Beach, District 9 needs a strong advocate on the City Council to ensure we are able to expand opportunities for new parks and open spaces in the 9th District. The newly adopted Parks, Recreation and Marine Strategic Plan lays out a clear path to prioritize previously ignored communities like North Long Beach. With these two strategic plans, we can continue identifying funding to make our open space priorities a reality.

Do you believe the city is doing enough to alleviate climate change and the effect it’s having on the city? If not, what additional actions should be taken?

I believe the city is on the right track when it comes to addressing climate change and its impact on our communities, but we are still a long way from any satisfactory measures. The City of Long Beach is developing its first-ever Climate Action and Adaptation Plan (CAAP). The Plan is currently available for public viewing on the city’s website. It includes a number of activities designed to incentivize climate-resilient buildings and communities, minimize our carbon footprint and protect our natural ecosystems. Specifically, I would be focused on issues surrounding air quality, truck pollution and re-activating the Los Angeles River.