Commentary: Abandoned properties, fire hazards. Are L.A. mayor candidates part of the fix, or the problem?

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Set us as preferred Labor Day is behind us, election day is less than two months away, and the question before Los Angeles voters is this:Can anyone run this city?Two fires at abandoned properties, one in Studio City and the other on the eastern edge of Larchmont, offer windows into City Hall dysfunction as Mayor Karen Bass defends her job against a challenge by City Councilmember Nithya Raman.Let’s start on Babcock Avenue, just south of Moorpark Street, where, for roughly five years, neighbors of a vacant house begged City Hall for attention to what had been a dumping ground, a fire hazard and a homeless hangout.To no avail.When they received any response at all, they got the runaround.Resident Jon Manzanares told me he has supported Bass and Raman in the past.But in a spring 2025 email to City Hall, he said both “should be ashamed and resign in disgrace.”Well, they didn’t.

And following an Aug.26 fire at the Babcock property, which damaged the rear of an adjacent home, Bass and Raman went after each other for not having addressed all those pleas for help.“Nithya Raman wants to lead the whole city,” said a Bass campaign social media post, but after six years in office “she can’t even get a single lot cleaned up in her own district.”Raman shot back, saying she had alerted the mayor’s office about the nuisance property 10 months earlier.“I cannot call her about the 200-plus issues that we’re dealing with that are at this level of risk,” Raman snapped.The finger-pointing doesn’t inspire confidence, does it?At least, said Manzanares, a retired lawyer, L.A.

found out what it takes to get a response from the two mayoral candidates.“The news crews showed up” to cover the fire, Manzanares told me, “and it finally got some attention because of the election.”But festering eyesores are everywhere, as...