Richard Taite lives in an $8.7M house in the Palisades and spent $75,000 on the Traci Park campaign. He circumvented spending limits by funneling the cash through a political action committee called “Citizens to end the homeless crisis in CD11.” A former addict, Taite leveraged his personal addiction struggle into a profitable rehab empire. He’s cashing in on the opioid epidemic by luring wealthy clientele to his luxury rehab center, Cliffside Malibu. A lawsuit filed in 2018 alleges that Taite engaged in false advertising and underhanded practices in a cutthroat race to fill his beachside facility with clients. According to an advocate for reform in the addiction industry, Taite’s tactics have “essentially kept people from getting real life-saving treatment.”