Jim Newton

The transportation future of this region rests, in no small measure, with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. And that body's board is about to change. In part, that is because Los Angeles will be getting a new mayor. That mayor will sit on the...

Despite bitter attacks in recent weeks, the two candidates for mayor of Los Angeles grudgingly conceded in a debate Sunday night that their rival was (mostly) honest and not so different on many of the plans they have for leading the city. That didn't...

Despite bitter attacks in recent weeks, the two candidates for mayor of Los Angeles grudgingly conceded in a debate Sunday night that their rival was (mostly) honest and not so different on many of the plans they have for leading the city forward....

The two candidates for mayor of Los Angeles have another shot at engaging voters in a debate tonight at 5:30 that will be streamed live on latimes.com and broadcast on KTLA-TV (Channel 5). City Councilman Eric Garcetti and City Controller Wendy Greuel ...

It's fun for mayoral candidates to imagine eliminating potholes or building new trains to link the Valley to the Westside. It's not hard to support a spiffed-up LAX (really, what's hard to believe is that it's taken this long) or legions of new police...

We have, when you think about it, always been an argumentative culture and society, even before we became a country. And we’ve been arguing ever since, for better or worse, and with varying degrees of skill. The nature of argument was part of the...

The complaint I hear most often about this race for mayor of Los Angeles is that the candidates, Controller Wendy Greuel and Councilman Eric Garcetti, spend too much time talking in generalities without providing details about what they'd do. But when...

WATCH: Garcetti video interview | Greuel video interview In advance of the May 21 runoff election, we collected questions from voters for the mayoral candidates to answer. The questions covered a range of topics: neighborhood revitalization, small...

Over the past few weeks, the race for mayor of Los Angeles has been less a contest of ideas and leadership than it's been an endorsement roulette, with Controller Wendy Greuel and Councilman Eric Garcetti trotting out their latest pledges of support as...

Imagine if Los Angeles, with a population that is roughly half Latino, had just one or even no Latinos in elected office. There would be protests and political recriminations in every election cycle. There would be lawsuits and threats of lawsuits. The...

Over the last couple of weeks, I've spent considerable time with the leading candidates for mayor, asking them about their approach to governance, watching them campaign and trying to get a feel for what distinguishes each from the others. Specifically,...

City Councilman Dennis Zine has never struck me as a controller type. He's garrulous, outgoing, street-smart — the remnants of his first career as a Los Angeles police officer and union representative. He was a forceful personality at the Police...