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THE BOTTOM LINE - Los Angeles City Hall has officially lost its mind.
In a stunning 14-0 vote, the LA City Council advanced new restrictions on police traffic stops based on one breathtakingly absurd idea: that cops enforcing traffic laws are somehow a bigger threat to public safety than the criminals terrorizing the streets.
Not the drunk drivers.
Not the gang members carrying illegal guns.
Not the reckless speeders turning intersections into death traps.
The police.
Only in Los Angeles could politicians look at rising crime, collapsing public trust, and growing street chaos and decide the city’s biggest problem is still “over-policing.”
Read the motion carefully and the message becomes unmistakable: Los Angeles is now governed by politicians who begin every public safety debate with suspicion toward law enforcement.
Their underlying assumption appears to be that officers are simply waiting to abuse motorists unless City Hall imposes yet another layer of restrictions on police activity.
Leading this effort is City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who has spent years pushing to remove traffic enforcement responsibilities from armed police officers. On his official city website, Harris-Dawson argues that traffic stops have been used “to fish for potential criminal suspects” and claims “it is unnecessary to have armed law enforcement stopping people for vehicle code violations.”
That is not serious public safety policy.
That is an ideological attack on policing disguised as reform.
Even Harris-Dawson admitted the council’s latest action is merely a “down payment,” signaling this is only phase one of a broader campaign to weaken traditional law enforcement authority on Los Angeles streets.
And the most radical parts of the proposal were softened only after city leaders ran into questions any reasonable person would have asked from the beginning:
What exactly is an unarmed civilian traffic officer supposed to do when a driver refuses to comply?
Ask politely?
What happens when the driver turns out to be drunk, armed, wanted, or violent?
What happens when a supposedly “routine” traffic stop suddenly becomes a life-threatening encounter?
Because traffic stops are not customer-service interactions.
They are among the most dangerous and unpredictable encounters in policing.
Yet many of the politicians running Los Angeles discuss policing as though it were an academic theory seminar rather than real-world law enforcement.
Meanwhile, in the real world, traffic stops routinely lead police to illegal firearms, outstanding warrants, impaired drivers, gang activity, drug trafficking, and violent criminals.
LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell has repeatedly defended traffic enforcement as a critical public safety tool. The Los Angeles Police Protective League warned that weakening enforcement could turn city streets into a “demolition derby.”
That warning may sound dramatic.
Then again, so is the idea of replacing trained police officers with civilian traffic monitors in a city already struggling with crime, chaos, and collapsing public confidence.
And let’s be honest: this was not some fringe activist proposal introduced by one isolated councilmember.
Fourteen members of the Los Angeles City Council voted for it.
Nobody voted no.
Nobody stood up and called the policy reckless.
Nobody defended proactive policing.
Nobody asked whether ordinary families might prefer stronger enforcement against dangerous drivers over another City Hall social experiment.
Councilwoman Traci Park did not vote, leaving her as one of the few figures at City Hall not attached to the measure.
And mayoral candidate Nithya Raman supported the motion as well, reinforcing her already well-established anti-police reputation among critics.
That matters.
Because this mindset is no longer confined to activists shouting slogans through megaphones at protests.
It now dominates decision making inside Los Angeles City Hall.
Mayor Karen Bass has remained largely silent while the city inches closer toward treating routine policing itself as inherently suspect.
Not reckless driving.
Not armed criminals.
Not lawlessness.
Routine policing.
Los Angeles voters should pay very close attention to what just happened.
Fourteen members of the City Council looked at dangerous streets, reckless driving, rising disorder, and collapsing confidence in government — and decided the greater threat was the LAPD conducting traffic stops.
Nobody voted no.
Nobody stood up for stronger enforcement.
Nobody defended proactive policing.
Because in today’s Los Angeles, ideology matters more than public safety and criminals are no longer the people City Hall seems most interested in stopping.
(Mihran Kalaydjian is a seasoned public affairs and government relations professional with more than twenty years of experience in legislative affairs, public policy, community relations, and strategic communications. A respected civic leader and education advocate, he has spearheaded numerous academic and community initiatives, shaping dialogue and driving reform in local and regional political forums. His career reflects a steadfast commitment to transparency, accountability, and public service across Los Angeles and beyond.)
