Two years ago, Heather Hutt was appointed to the Los Angeles City Council representing District 10 as a temporary replacement for Mark Ridley-Thomas, who had been removed from the council after being indicted on federal corruption charges. He was named as a permanent replacement in April 2023 after Ridley-Thomas was convicted. He is now running for a full term on the Nov. 5 ballot.
Her challenger is Grace Yoo, a trust and estate attorney with a history of activism in the district on a variety of issues who has served as an LA City Commissioner, neighborhood council member and executive director of the Korean American Coalition of Los Angeles. He lost his bid for this seat in 2020 and is running again to represent District 10, which includes the Koreatown, Mid-City, Baldwin Hills and Leimert Park neighborhoods.
There are things to admire about both of them – their community service, determination, coming to the district. We have no doubt that everyone wants to serve diligently to serve all the different communities in the district.
Of the two, we recommend Hutt to jog. He has earned the respect of other City Council members who find him collaborative and thoughtful about issues during his two years on the council. Prior to his appointment, he served as chief of staff to former Board President Herb Wesson during the months he served as an interim board member for that seat. He won kudos for constituent service from environmental activists and for appearing at many community events which councilors often, understandably, do not have time to attend.
Hutt, who grew up in the district, also has relevant political experience. He is the state director for Sen. Kamala Harris and district director for Isadore Hall III while serving in the state Legislature.
On homelessness, one of the big problems in the district and other cities, he retained the Ridley-Thomas human outreach strategy and has worked to move people out of camps and into temporary and permanent housing. He tells the story of personally trying to convince two women living in a tent near a busy road to move home. When she refused, he asked the outreach worker to return to the woman four days in a row to talk to her and finally persuade her to take the house.
We are heartened by his passion. But they need to be careful when it comes to affordable housing. She said she wholeheartedly supports creating more affordable housing in her district, but she doesn’t seem prepared to fight residents who don’t want her in her neighborhood.
For example, he proposed a motion by Councilor Katy Yaroslavsky to stop the rapid development of affordable housing – which Mayor Karen Bass has championed with Executive Directive 1- in the historic preservation zone to address the concerns of residents. In other districts, he said, he’s willing to talk with neighbors about the opposition they’ll face to affordable housing projects and try to stop them. But there will be times when he will have to support a project even if his neighbors oppose it. The city needs multi-unit affordable housing and won’t get enough if councilors bend to NIMBY pressure. We hope he has enough backbone to face them.
Hutt has other challenges ahead. He spoke enthusiastically about keeping small local businesses in the district’s commercial corridors where rising rents threaten to disappear. But they should come up with a special plan to support or even subsidize the business. He has been an advocate for safer streets and supported Measure HLA, which voters approved in March, which would have required the city to install bicycle, bus and pedestrian improvements on city streets. Hutt, as head of the City Council’s Transportation Committee, must ensure the city fulfills that commitment.
Yoo is smart and capable. Like Hutt, he said he understands how badly LA needs affordable housing. However, he was wrong on some issues and then changed his mind. For example, in 2017, he supported the anti-development, slow-growth Measure S proposal (which lost badly.) He says now he knows it will only exacerbate the housing crisis and he won’t support it now.
Hutt has so far done an honorable job in this position. And we believe they can grow stronger and become better.
