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WESTSIDE - In what is looking to become the most expensive state legislative race in all of California and possibly the country, progressive advocate Ellen Evans is "all in" as they say in politics as she stated in our interview she will self-fund a large portion to the tune of $150,000 and believes she will spend some $600,000 in media and messaging overall.
A graduate of Brown University, Evans is originally from New York and prides herself on not being a "career politician," but rather "persistent and focused on implementing her progressive values in Sacramento."
"What makes me effective is my approach which is detailed oriented and persistent," offered the neighborhood advocate.
A self-described pit bull, the 60-year-old candidate is a stay-at-home Mom and Vice-President of the Bel Air Beverly Crest Neighborhood Council. She has two children attending college, a son at the Parson's School of Design and a daughter at Northwestern. Married to attorney Laura Brill, the founder of KBK, a prestigious boutique firm here in Los Angeles, she clerked for the late US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
A marathon runner who enjoys biking and hiking, we spoke about her candidacy and her take on solving the issues before the voters. For example, the current approach to homelessness she described as "remarkably ineffective."
Here is the complete Q&A with the candidate:
Housing & Affordability:
Your campaign emphasizes tackling California’s housing crisis. What specific policies would you support to increase housing supply while ensuring affordability for long-term residents in District 24?
Building is hampered by the length of our permitting processes. Even by-right construction can take months and years to get off the ground.
Part of this is due plan check problems. Developers get corrections from plan checkers, make those corrections, only to go back and get new corrections even for elements of the design that didn't change. Some of these corrections are based on regulations that are not in the code and may not even be written anywhere. To solve this problem, the state should require a binding pre-submission meeting where all the regulations are revealed, and that corrections are accompanied by code citation. It's simple but I think it will make a big difference.
Some months of delay are also created by utilities. Instead of planning for increased density and preparing for it, utilities wait for building proposals and then move forward with upgrades. My plan is to create a regulatory environment where the upgrades are considered and made prior to project proposals coming in.
We also used to have redevelopment agencies, which put together underutilized commercial and industrial land for public -private partnerships to develop. They created thousands of affordable units every year. We need a similar structure now.
Finally, the affordable housing financing system in the state is too complicated. There are too many different funding programs, each with its own application process and timeline. I will simplify this so builders can more easily finance their affordable projects.
Public Education Funding:
You’ve called for fully funding public schools. Given California’s budget constraints, where would you prioritize spending increases, and how would you pay for them?
California's budget for education is volatile because it's too dependent on capital gains and high earners. So, we have boom and bust cycles. I will always fight to protect education funding when the budget gets tight.
Community colleges are the most underutilized asset we have. A two-year degree or vocational certificate can get someone into a well-paying career in the skilled trades, healthcare, technical fields, jobs that can't be automated or shipped overseas. We have a serious workforce shortage in exactly these areas. Investing in those pathways is education policy and economic policy at the same time.
That connects to something I'd work on directly: attracting advanced manufacturing to California. We have the workforce potential and the innovation ecosystem. What we've lacked is a serious effort to make California competitive for those jobs, through targeted incentives and workforce pipelines that connect community colleges directly to employers.
A stronger, more diversified economy generates more stable tax revenue. That's how you get a more stable funding stream for education.
Civil Rights & Reproductive Freedom:
As a civil rights advocate, what new legislation would you introduce or support to strengthen protections for marginalized communities, particularly in response to national political shifts?
I've been doing this work since before it was safe to. I was arrested at the White House in 1987 demanding that the Reagan administration respond to AIDS. I know what it means when the federal government decides certain people don't matter.
California has to hold the line right now. That means shielding reproductive healthcare providers from federal interference, making sure our civil rights laws have real enforcement behind them, and being aggressive about protecting immigrants and LGBTQ people from federal overreach.
The forward-looking work matters too. I'd push to prohibit California public entities from sharing surveillance data with federal authorities,and extend that prohibition to private entities operating in California. The next civil rights battles are going to be fought over who has access to data about where you go, who you talk to, and what you do. California should be setting the standard on that. We're not doing enough.
Local vs. State Control:
You’ve worked at the neighborhood level solving community issues. How would you balance local control with statewide mandates when it comes to issues like zoning, homelessness, and policing?
I believe strongly in local control over zoning. There's more to densification and to solving our housing crisis than zoning. Jobs, infrastructure and transportation all need to be considered and revenue needs to be allocated to necessary upgrades. Therefore I oppose state mandates that override local planning without providing the infrastructure funding to support the density.
California's homelessness problem is fundamentally a facilities problem, whether we are talking about mental health treatment or housing. The state should facilities and set standards and require municipalities to accept them, but not without infrastructure planning, not without community input, and not without ensuring the facilities are actually designed.
I support local control of policing within state minimum standards that protect civil rights. On use of force, I've told law enforcement directly that I think the reasonable standard is workable. Communities should direct their police departments. But there have to be enforceable floors on data reporting and officer accountability. California's decertification process for misconduct is the right idea.
Economic Growth & Small Businesses:
You’ve highlighted support for small businesses. What concrete steps would you take in the State Senate to help small businesses compete and survive in high-cost areas like Los Angeles County?
Small businesses are being crushed by the same thing that's killing housing production: delay. I've heard from business owners who waited six months for a permit to open a clothing store. Every month of delay is rent, payroll, and savings walking out the door. Streamlining permitting for small businesses is one of the most concrete things Sacramento can do.
I'd also go after the bad actors who undercut small businesses that play by the rules. Small businesses that do right by their workers and their communities shouldn't be competing on an uneven playing field against businesses that cheat. Enforcement matters and I'd push to strengthen it.
California's litigation environment is another burden small businesses carry that large ones can absorb. I'd push for a right to cure, before you can sue a small business, you notify them of the violation and give them a reasonable period to fix it. Businesses that genuinely harm people should be held accountable. Businesses that made a technical error and would fix it immediately shouldn't be sued before they get the chance.
And I'd work to attract advanced manufacturing and industries that create good local jobs, because a stronger local economy is what keeps small businesses alive in the first place.
Climate & Wildfire Preparedness:
Wildfire prevention is a key part of your platform. What policies do you believe would make the biggest difference in reducing wildfire risk while also addressing climate change?
Our electrical infrastructure is both the path to our clean energy future and, right now, a significant wildfire risk. Hardening and modernizing the grid reduces ignition risk from aging equipment and downed lines. Upgrading capacity serves our all-electric future. These are the same investment. We should be making it urgently.
Home hardening incentives are currently proposed in Sacramento. I will follow through on this.
We have to be honest about evacuation infrastructure. The Palisades fire exposed how dangerously inadequate our evacuation routes are in hillside communities. That's a planning failure we have to fix.
Leadership & Differentiation:
This is a crowded primary field with many Democratic candidates. What distinguishes your leadership style and priorities from your opponents, and why should voters choose you to advance to the general election?
I'm the candidate in this race with a decade of demonstrated outcomes working outside the system. Not structures. Not alliances. Actual results: conditions enforced, programs built, logjams broken.
I didn't wait for a seat at the table. I showed up at hearings nobody else attended, read environmental documents nobody else read, hired lawyers, built coalitions, designed enforcement programs, and got things done in a system that is specifically designed to wear people out.
Making change from the outside in Los Angeles requires a superhuman level of tenacity and attention to detail. That's not a credential you can claim. It's a track record you either have or you don't.
What Sacramento needs right now is not someone who can introduce bills. It needs someone who understands the gap between what a bill says and what it actually delivers, and who will do the unglamorous work of closing that gap. That is what I have been doing for ten years. That is what I will do in Sacramento.
I'm the only woman in this race, and I think that matters. But it's not the argument I lead with. The argument I lead is with my track record.
(Nick Antonicello is a thirty-three-year resident of Venice who is covering the open seat race for California's 24th state senate race. Antonicello served as a legislative aide in both the New Jersey General Assembly and Senate. Have a take or a tip? Contact him via e-mail at [email protected] )
