TRACI PARK IS BOUGHT BY

Natalie Taylor’s husband, Steven Taylor, is a Brentwood real estate investor and landlord indicted on multiple counts of bank fraud, money laundering, and identity theft for allegedly using fake bank statements and forged documents to obtain millions in loans to fund Los Angeles property deals. Prosecutors say he used the money to buy and flip buildings across Silver Lake, Los Feliz, Del Rey, and Cheviot Hills, including a property he secretly resold to a homeless housing developer for $27 million using public funds. Through his company Taylor Equities, he built a portfolio of “value-add” multifamily properties, a euphemism for evicting tenants and converting rent-stabilized housing into luxury units.

The Cohanzad family are among Los Angeles’s most notorious landlord-developers, operating under the Wiseman Residential and Wiseman Management brands. Their business model centers on buying rent-stabilized (RSO) buildings, forcing out long-term tenants through Ellis Act evictions, and redeveloping them into luxury market-rate units or short-term Airbnb rentals. Across the Westside and Hollywood, the family has been accused by tenants and advocates of aggressive displacement tactics and exploiting housing loopholes to maximize profits. Long featured on tenant organizers’ lists of “worst landlords,” the Cohanzads continue to use their real estate wealth to influence city politics—backing candidates who protect developer interests while profiting from the destruction of affordable housing in Los Angeles.

Charles and Karen Rosin are longtime Venice residents and directors of the Coalition for Safe Coastal Development, a nonprofit created to fight the Venice Dell Community housing project. Their group presents itself as protecting the coast from overdevelopment and flood risk but functions primarily as an opposition campaign against the city’s plans for affordable housing on the Venice parking lots. The Rosins have led public comment drives, organized lawsuits, and promoted messaging that reframes a housing development for low-income and formerly unhoused residents as a threat to “coastal safety.”

Seth Lichtenstein and his wife, Hollye Levin, are Venice residents active in local anti-housing politics. Seth, an intellectual property lawyer, serves as president of the Coalition for Safe Coastal Development, a NIMBY group created solely to block the Venice Dell supportive housing project for unhoused Angelenos. While he has positioned himself as a civic-minded “concerned neighbor,” the group’s efforts center on stopping affordable and supportive housing near the beach. Lichtenstein, a donor to The Lincoln Project, and Levin are part of the well-connected Westside homeowner class that cloaks opposition to housing for the unhoused in language of “public safety” and “coastal preservation.”

Reon Roski, daughter of billionaire developer Ed Roski Jr., is heir to one of the largest real estate empires in the United States. Her father, president of Majestic Realty, controls more than 83 million square feet of commercial property nationwide and holds ownership stakes in the Los Angeles Kings, Lakers, and the Silverton Casino in Las Vegas. As CEO of Majestic Realty and a major political donor, Reon represents the next generation of entrenched real estate power in Los Angeles. She sits on elite boards at USC, Exposition Park, and the California Science Center, moving comfortably within the city’s corporate and political establishment. Her family’s vast fortune and development interests have shaped L.A.’s skyline for decades—and their continued influence ensures that luxury construction and profit remain the city’s top priorities over affordability or equity.

Peter Nott, a Venice landlord who owns roughly twenty apartment buildings, has built his wealth on gentrification while publicly railing against the unhoused. In interviews, Nott has described homeless Angelenos as “drug addicts” and “criminals,” called for encampments to be cleared and relocated to “official campgrounds out of town,” and praised Traci Park for being “stricter” than her predecessor. He opposes shelters and affordable housing in Venice, falsely linking them to crime and “filth,” and has accused former officials of “pandering to the homeless.” Nott’s rhetoric—echoing far-right talking points about displacement and policing—reveals the worldview of a property owner profiting from the housing crisis while lobbying to remove poor and unhoused residents from his neighborhood.

Christopher Chee, managing partner of Redcar Properties and a former Blackstone Group real estate executive, is a classic example of Wall Street money shaping Los Angeles politics. After more than a decade at Blackstone, a firm notorious for mass home purchases and rent hikes that fueled the national housing crisis, Chee co-founded Redcar Properties, which has rapidly expanded its portfolio of high-end developments across L.A. While presenting himself as a civic-minded investor, Chee’s political giving tells another story: he’s donated $6,600 to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and regularly backs Republicans.

Marianne Maciborski is closely tied to (and likely the funding vehicle for) developer Leeor Maciborski of ROM Investments and ROM Residential, a company that manages roughly 1,500 apartments across Los Angeles. Maciborski was fined $17,000 by the L.A. City Ethics Commission in 2017 for using straw donors to funnel money into Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell’s campaign and was later at the center of an LA Times exposé for exploiting tenants during the pandemic. His firm, ROM Residential, sent renters “repayment plans” demanding they turn over federal stimulus checks and charity relief funds within five days, a move City Hall called exploitative and likely illegal.

Daughter of developer lobbyist Chris Modrzejewski, whose clients were tied to the Huizar corruption probe. Skyler donated the maximum to Traci Park while working in real-estate development, including for Shangri-La Industries, now under federal investigation.

Son of developer lobbyist Chris Modrzejewski, named in the Huizar corruption probe for his influence at City Hall. Jack also maxed out to Traci Park, reinforcing the family’s pipeline of real-estate money into politics.

Devon Rosenheim is married to the head of Rosenheim & Associates, one of Los Angeles’s most powerful land-use lobbying firms. The company represents major developers and real-estate investors seeking zoning changes, entitlements, and lucrative project approvals across the city, the kind of influence that shapes who gets to build, and who gets pushed out.

Deborah Poulter is married to Dale Goldsmith, the managing partner of Armbruster Goldsmith & Delvac, one of the most influential land-use law firms in Los Angeles. Goldsmith’s clients include some of the largest corporate developers and project owners in the region, from Fox Studios and Trammell Crow to Apple and Onni. Their firm specializes in securing entitlements and approvals for massive developments that reshape entire neighborhoods. 

President and CEO of Harridge Development Group, the firm behind the takeover of the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, a historic center of the Black community in South L.A. Local activists say the sale bypassed a Black-led community bidder and sparked fears of gentrification and displacement. The planned redevelopment allocates just 10 % of the new housing as affordable, while 90 % remains market-rate, threatening to push out long-term Black residents in the name of “modernization.”

Andrew Abdul-Wahab is the CEO of Shangri-La Industries, a real-estate and development firm now at the center of federal corruption investigations. Records show he has donated thousands of dollars to candidates across Los Angeles County, including to those with influence over housing, homelessness funding, and land-use regulation. His generous giving raises serious questions about access, influence and pay-to-play in a city still grappling with displacement and scandal.

Christian Wrede, a prominent Traci Park donor and co-founder of Fight Back Venice, has played a central role in blocking affordable housing on the Westside. Wrede’s group spearheaded the opposition to the Venice Dell Community project, a supportive housing development aimed at helping unhoused Angelenos. Under Wrede’s leadership, Fight Back Venice circulated inflammatory mailers, spread fear about crime and public safety, and weaponized lawsuits to delay or derail the project. He used exclusionary and anti-poor tactics, including appeals to “neighborhood character,” property values, and tourism.

Co-founder of the SUGARFISH restaurant group and head of real estate and expansion for the Sushi Nozawa team, Cameron Broumand also runs Broumand Development with his father and brother. He specializes in buying, managing and flipping high-value Westside Los Angeles properties and commercial portfolio assets.

Jordan Kaplan is the CEO of Douglas Emmett, one of the largest corporate landlords on the Westside. His company owns Barrington Plaza, where two major fires killed one resident and injured others. Instead of adding fire sprinklers, Douglas Emmett pursued a plan to empty the building by evicting hundreds of rent-controlled households for “fire safety renovations,” one of the largest mass displacements in recent city history. Kaplan’s company has a long-standing business model of targeting rent-stabilized buildings in some of the most expensive neighborhoods in Los Angeles, clearing out longtime tenants, and repositioning properties to increase profits. His political activity reflects the priorities of corporate landlords determined to reshape the city on their terms — not those of the renters who call it home.

The Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles is a powerful landlord lobbying organization that fights tooth and nail against renter protections across the region. Backed by deep-pocketed real-estate owners, AAGLA pours money into campaigns and pressure efforts aimed at blocking rent control, eviction safeguards, and affordable-housing reforms. Their business model depends on keeping tenants vulnerable and landlords in charge — and they use their political muscle every day to make sure that’s exactly how Los Angeles works.

Curtis Sanchez works at Afriat Consulting Group, one of Los Angeles’s most powerful land-use lobbying and political influence firms. Afriat represents major developers seeking zoning changes and fast-tracked approvals across the city. Sanchez’s campaign contributions raise questions about whether they are part of the firm’s strategy to buy access for its real-estate clients in City Hall.

Noel Hyun Minor is CEO of The Brooklyn Companies, a real-estate investment and development firm. She previously worked as a land-use attorney and registered lobbyist at DLA Piper. Minor currently sits on the Los Angeles Convention & Tourism Development Board and the City’s Zoning Advisory Committee. Her career spans the full cycle of influence in Los Angeles — law, lobbying, development, and policymaking — placing her squarely in the power structure that shapes what gets built and who gets pushed out.

Denise Modrzejewski has long served as the political fundraising arm of a powerful development-lobbying operation run by her husband, veteran City Hall lobbyist Chris Modrzejewski. When Los Angeles banned campaign donations from registered lobbyists in 2006, Chris stopped contributing—and Denise started. Since then, she’s poured tens of thousands of dollars into city campaigns, effectively continuing the family’s influence operation by proxy. The Modrzejewskis’ network, which has surfaced in connection with the Huizar corruption probe and the Shangri-La development controversy, epitomizes how developers and their lobbyists skirt the spirit of L.A.’s ethics laws while keeping their access intact.

Wife of registered lobbyist Arnie Berghoff, the “dean of LA lobbyists”, runs a consulting and public affairs firm with deep ties to city officials and is pals with the notorious lobbying firm of Englander, Knabe and Allen. Arnie started out in the trash and medical waste business, moving from there to pimping for the oil and gas industry before starting his own lobbying firm. Arnie lobbies on behalf of a rogue gallery of clients including landlords, developers, Airbnb, Uber, trash haulers, billboard companies, infrastructure contractors and tech concerns.

Wife of John R. Howland, partner at the powerhouse lobbying firm Arnie Berghoff & Associates, the same firm that evolved from trash and medical-waste beginnings into a front for developers, landlords, Airbnb, Uber, billboard operators, infrastructure contractors, and tech interests. Through her marriage, Kirsten stands at the heart of a lobbying machine deeply embedded in City Hall influence networks and big-business access.

Ingrid Flintoft funnels tens of thousands into City Hall campaigns. Married to lobbyist Thomas Flintoft at the powerful Kindel Gagan public-affairs firm, she serves as a convenient donor conduit when her husband’s influence network wants to push money into council races, even far outside their district.

A strategic communications and public-affairs firm that openly specializes in “complex” and “controversial” issues, Klink Campaigns works behind the scenes to advance the agendas of powerful clients in heavily regulated industries like real estate, energy and healthcare. With lobbying activity on record and a business model built on shaping public policy outcomes, their contributions raise questions about who is buying influence and whose interests are being prioritized at City Hall.

This powerful real-estate industry political-action committee bankrolls both major parties, acting as a dominant donor to the California Democratic Party and a top donor to the California Republican Party. Their dual-party influence ensures property and development interests have sway no matter which way the political winds blow.

A Venice Beach real-estate investor who bought a historic rent-stabilized apartment building and converted it into a boutique hotel now known as the Venice V. Local advocates say he cleared out long-term tenants and eliminated some of the last affordable beachfront homes for students, retirees, and working-class residents. Lambert has faced a long list of complaints for illegal hotel conversions, unpermitted construction, and short-term rental violations. His pattern of buying rent-controlled housing and turning it into hotel-style accommodations has contributed to the ongoing displacement and gentrification crisis in Venice.

A longtime real-estate power player who spent decades at CBRE as Executive Vice President and Managing Director before founding Bay Hill Partners in 2000. Booth has poured tens of thousands of dollars into high-profile Los Angeles campaigns, including $25,000 through the “Committee to Elect Traci Park to Fix Homelessness” and another $25,000 supporting Bob Hertzberg for County Supervisor.

Hudson Pacific Properties is a major Los Angeles-based REIT that owns and develops some of the most expensive studio, tech and office land in the city, including in Hollywood and the Westside. The company has faced multiple controversies: a 2017 settlement in which it scaled back a high-rise project in Hollywood after being sued for out-of-scale zoning and traffic impacts in a rent-/residents-dense neighborhood. It’s also grappling with deep financial problems—credit-rating firms downgraded its debt amid weak occupancy and asset valuations, raising questions about its long-term stability and the viability of its developments.

IBEW Locals are powerful building-trades unions in Los Angeles that play a major role in shaping development and infrastructure decisions. Although unions are often seen as progressive, These locals frequently align with pro-business, pro-development politics that can lean conservative. Their political involvement prioritizes construction jobs for their members, even when that means opposing environmental reforms, safe-streets improvements or community protections that limit development.

The California Apartment Association is a landlord lobbying group that wields tremendous power throughout the state by shaping policy in Sacramento and killing local tenant protections at the municipal level. They take in massive sums from Big Real Estate and then carries out the industry’s dirty work through four political action committees. The CAA’s influence on California state and local politicians has been enormous.

A Beverly Hills real-estate investor living in a multimillion-dollar home, Brad Conroy treats political giving like another business move. He routed $10,000 into local politics through the so-called Blue Wave Democratic Club, a committee that has backed conservative-leaning candidates despite its name. For Conroy, it is all about maintaining a City Hall that protects real-estate profits, not renters or working families.