If you’ve been reading these pages, then you know the final K Line vote is tomorrow. West Hollywood has one more chance to weigh in and the City wants residents to show up and speak up.
The full Metro Board of Directors meets Thursday, March 26 at 10 a.m. at Metro Headquarters in DTLA to vote on the K Line Northern Extension Locally Preferred Alternative. Metro’s Planning and Programming Committee took up the item March 18 but punted it to the full Board without a recommendation.
Is WeHo about to get railed?
Committee chair Ara Najarian said he wanted the full Board to handle it and wanted to make sure Mayor Karen Bass could weigh in. Bass said Tuesday she will vote yes to advance the K Line but —plans to introduce a motion alongside that vote, one that would effectively delay the project. Clear and important distinction, she did not say she supported the San Vicente-Fairfax route specifically.
That’s the part that has some WeHo residents and transit advocates nervous.
Streets for All reported Tuesday that Bass may have gotten both Najarian and Inglewood Mayor James Butts on board for her amendment. If Bass, her two non-recused appointees, Butts, and Najarian vote together, that’s five votes. The staff recommendation dies. Bass’s amendment wouldn’t actually select a Mid-City alignment, meaning LA County couldn’t spin up its EIFD portion, effectively killing the financing plan that makes early construction possible.
All Politics Is Personal
Former West Hollywood City Councilmember Steve Martin, commenting on WEHOonline, thinks the Bass-Horvath history is worth watching. “Maybe it’s payback time,” Martin wrote. “Horvath was hardly subtle in her attempts to undermine Bass in connection with the Palisades Fire. Everything in politics has consequences.” Martin suggested Bass could frame a vote against San Vicente-Fairfax around equity — arguing the route benefits the “privileged” folks of West Hollywood at the expense of underserved communities elsewhere in the region.
Bass is running for re-election in June. West Hollywood doesn’t deliver her votes. Lafayette Square does. Those residents showed up at her office and got private meetings. West Hollywood got a shuttle bus. Bass is caught between a constituency she needs and a transit project that benefits a city that doesn’t vote for her. That’s not nothing.
Who Pays?
Even if the train leaves the station tomorrow, the funding question doesn’t. The City attempted to address it directly in recent days. Senior Planner David Fenn told the Los Angeles Times that West Hollywood would not pay “anything like $4 billion” and that the City is not considering a sales tax increase. The City told WEHOonline on March 19 that the EIFD has not been formed, no timeline has been set, and no partner agency has formally committed. The 25% funding threshold, the City said, has not been defined and may not apply to the full project cost. Regional partners would share the obligation.
UCLA transit researcher Jacob Wasserman told the Times the K Line extension would “change people’s mental model of the city.” Author Ethan Elkind, who wrote “Railtown: The Fight for the Los Angeles Metro Rail and the Future of the City,” called it “a missing link in the system, through a fairly densely populated part of the city.” Whether it transforms LA, Elkind said, depends on what gets built around the stations.
Free shuttle from West Hollywood Park
If you’d like to be a part of history, shuttles leave West Hollywood Park at 8:15 a.m. and return around 2:30 p.m. Coffee, light refreshments, and materials supporting the San Vicente-Fairfax route on board. Space is limited. Reserve at weho.org/metro.
Metro Headquarters is at One Gateway Plaza, 3rd Floor, downtown Los Angeles.
How to participate remotely
Watch online at boardagendas.metro.net.
Call in at 888-978-8818. English access code 5647249#. Spanish 7292892#. Press #2 when Item 7 comes up.
Email boardclerk@metro.net or voicemail (213) 418-3093. Written comments must be submitted by 5 p.m. Wednesday, March 25.
In-person attendees register in the lobby upon arrival.
Related Coverage
K Line Vote West Hollywood: Is the Metro Board Decision Already Off the Rails?
Four Billion with a B: West Hollywood Residents Want Answers on the K Line Funding Gap
All Aboard: The Biggest Transit Vote in West Hollywood History Is Days Away
“Now Is the Time.” West Hollywood Rallies for Metro K Line San Vicente-Fairfax Route
Metro Approved the Biggest Subway in LA History Thursday. West Hollywood K Line Still Waiting
I do not support Karen Bass, that said, I am hopeful she inadvertently saves West Hollywood from its own city council and crooked developers and puts the K-Line through Lafayette Square. Our city does not need to become another Universal Citywalk nor another skyscraper haven which the three stop K-Line option would allow. No. Nope. Not here.
I’ve been a West Hollywood resident for a long time and I implore you to CALL AND EMAIL METRO EXPRESSING YOUR OPPOSITION TO K LINE EXTENSION COMING TO WEHO The lobbying by West Hollywood Council for 3 stations in the city (San Vicente option) is not motivated by transportation needs but by WeHo’s City Council’s alliance with developers. Under legislation SB79, the designation of subway stations will trigger large-scale luxury apartments across WeHo right now, decades before any subway line is actually built, with no guarantees of affordable housing. WEST HOLLYWOOD RESIDENTS ARE OPPOSED TO THE 3 STOPS LOBBIED BY WEST… Read more »