The Brief

The Los Angeles Department of Transportation has a new general manager.

Laura Rubio-Cornejo, who previously served as Pasadena's transportation director, will oversee 52 transportation services and projects, including the Vision Zero initiative that aims to reduce traffic related deaths.

Susanne Whatley, who hosts LAist 89.3's a.m. news show Morning Edition, spoke with Rubio-Cornejo about what's ahead for transportation in Los Angeles. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Top priorities

LAist: Talk about your top priorities as L.A.'s new transportation general manager.

Rubio-Cornejo: My top priority would be ensuring that our streets are safe for all Angelenos, but particularly for the most vulnerable amongst us. Ensuring that whether you're a child, you're an elderly person, that you can walk out your front door and that is safe, and that is inviting.

LAist: And that's quite a challenge for a city that was pretty much constructed, at least in modern times, on the automobile. Back in 2015 is when the city approved Vision Zero, and it was called a commitment to eliminate traffic deaths by the year 2025. And yet we're seeing the numbers actually increased since then. It's up, my understanding is, nearly 70% percent in this past year compared to when Vision Zero was adopted. Talk about what's behind this increase and how you plan to make L.A. streets safer.

RC: The trend is one that we're seeing not just in Los Angeles, not just statewide, but nationwide. And it's a very disturbing trend that despite efforts to make our streets safer, despite ongoing infrastructure that LADOT and the City of Los Angeles has been implementing, we continue to see an increase in fatalities, particularly amongst pedestrians. But what we know is that where there is safe street infrastructure — it is effective. And so this isn't a time to scale back. This isn't a time to throw our hands up and say this isn't working. We know it is working. And so we need to continue to address safe streets.

We need to continue to implement safe street infrastructure and we need to do that one street at a time, one community at a time.

What it will take to make streets safer

LAist: What specific steps do make a difference in making the streets safer?

RC: When we have streets that acknowledge that they're intended to be for all modes. We have a very good example with Avalon Boulevard, where we were able to reallocate road space and make that a multimodal street. We saw a reduction in speeds there. We saw pedestrian amenities be more inviting for that mode. And so that's just one example. Bicycle infrastructure isn't just about allocating road space for the bicyclist. It's about also traffic calming. It's about providing some additional protections for the pedestrian. And really, when we plan our streets, when we design them, in consideration that the streets really are intended to be shared. By all modes, that really makes the greatest impact.

Where does Vision Zero stand?

Map of L.A.'s High-Injury Network (HIN). Just 6% of city streets account for 70% of deaths and severe injuries for people walking.

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Courtesy City of L.A.

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LAist: On the city's Vision Zero website, the most recent progress report was from about six years ago in 2017, just a couple years into the program. When do you anticipate another update for the public on where things are with the Vision Zero goal?

RC: We just provided an update to our city council this last summer. We do anticipate a more comprehensive update report coming out of the city's CAO office in a couple of months, if not sooner. And so that will really be a full view of the program, its effectiveness, and some recommendations on how to proceed.

How to get involved

LAist: If people in L.A. want to get involved in supporting Vision Zero, how can they do that?

RC: They can participate, be active participants when we do have meetings. They can coordinate with our community engagement team here with LADOT. They can work directly with their council offices. I would say the best way is when we do have a project and we have a community meeting, attend speak out, share with us what your concerns are, your preferences. That's what we're there to gather. Making sure that whatever infrastructure we move forward with, really reflects the priorities of that community.

What's next for transportation is L.A.?

LAist: Moving ahead, what have been the biggest changes involving transportation in Los Angeles in recent years, and are there any major projects that you'd like to highlight for our listeners?

RC: You know, we've had the ability to implement over 20 miles of bus only lanes. We're really excited about our Safe Routes to School programs where we're advancing safety at the nearby schools. Those are just two of the ways that we're really working on advancing safety at a more local level.

LAist: Governor Newsom just signed hundreds of bills into law over the past month or so after the end of the legislative session. And I'm wondering if there are any new laws Angeleno's in particular should keep in mind when it comes to driving or street safety or just transportation in general.

RC: One in particular that the City of Los Angeles really participated in advancing to the governor's desk is AB645 sponsored by Assemblymember Friedman that allows for us to be able to detect speeding and enforcement of speeding. And so that's one that we'll be working really closely over the next several years with our fellow departments on implementing and reporting back out to the state on its effectiveness.

LAist: Is that the speed camera law?

RC: It is. And I think what's really important about that law is it allows us to enforce speeds in a way that's consistent, in a way that is accountable. So really looking forward to having that implemented.

LAist: And that encompasses city of Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Glendale, where Laura Friedman is from, in addition to three cities up north. How long is this going to be a pilot program and what method is going to be used to evaluate whether that works or not?

RC: I believe we have to report back a couple of years into the program being in effect. Five years or so is my understanding. There are a couple of metrics we have to report back on to the state, and so we'll be making sure that we're tracking that in house and reporting out to the state as well as to our fellow cities, working with our other cities that are part of that legislation to ensure that the application is consistent across the board.

LAist: Anything else that you'd like to add?

RC: I would just like to reinforce the department's commitment to safe streets. It is really important that individuals at Angelenos, whether you're a resident, you're visiting, that you feel safe walking down our streets, that you be mindful as you're driving that we are sharing the same road space. There's a strong commitment here to make sure that the streets really do reflect that they are intended to be for people.

Inglewood city officials are launching an audit of their financial relationship with SoFi Stadium and claiming the stadium could owe years of ticket taxes, one month after a judge voided the 2015 contract that brought the stadium to Inglewood. 

The Inglewood City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to commission the audit. Mayor James Butts said the move is a necessary next step after the court ruling, which threw the terms of the financial relationship between the city and Hollywood Park stadium development into question. 

Millions of dollars are at stake for both the city and the stadium businesses. City officials say that the ruling means a cap that limited the amount of admissions tax that Inglewood could collect no longer applies. They also plan to investigate the authenticity of $376 million worth of infrastructure bills Hollywood Park claims the city owes. The findings of the audit could also factor into discussions of how the city will address its current $30.8 million deficit.

The City Council motion — put forward by Butts and co-sponsored by Councilmember Dionne Faulk — requires the city attorney to retain an accounting firm to conduct the audit and report back to the public on its findings within 30 days. It set aside $325,000 from the city’s General Fund to pay for the audit. You can read the city’s full explanation of the audit here.

Butts, who was at the city’s helm a decade ago when developer Stan Kroenke brought his Hollywood Park pitch to Inglewood, said city officials built what they thought was a partnership with their stadium counterparts.

But that partnership has crumbled. Since last summer, the city and stadiums have been slugging it out in a complex series of court cases over the stadium’s contract and Inglewood’s network of video billboards. The conflict has spilled over into the Nov. 3 election via ballot measures that would change the city’s commercial advertising and ticket tax rules. 

The audit approved by the City Council on Tuesday will dig into the entire financial relationship between the stadium and city since 2015, unpacking what is owed and what was received from taxes on everything from tickets to parking. City officials plan to continue auditing the taxes on a quarterly basis into the future.

Still, it’s not guaranteed the city would be able to force the stadium development to pay any debt the audit does claim. Hollywood Park could still appeal the court ruling that voided its contract with Inglewood, while Butts said the city wants to negotiate a new contract to replace it. 

A Hollywood Park spokesperson said the stadium development has lived up to its financial obligations, including paying all of its taxes.

“This is yet another thinly veiled attempt to distract from scrutiny surrounding the City’s own fiscal mismanagement and the questionable actions of its Mayor,” the spokesperson wrote in a statement.

Some locals at Tuesday’s meeting said during public comments they were baffled why the city hadn’t set up an audit process earlier.

“We have needed an audit from day one. We can’t sit here and claim we didn’t know or have an inkling what we were doing with Hollywood Park,” Diane Sambrano said. 

Exterior of Sofi Stadium in Inglewood

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Gary Coronado

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The LA Local

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Speaking during the meeting, Butts said the audit was triggered because of the void left by the development agreement and because major events including the 2027 Super Bowl and 2028 Olympics are about to hit Inglewood.

The mayor first claimed the development agreement was illegal in a letter written directly to Stan Kroenke last year, saying the city’s lawyers made the determination while researching billboard litigation.

Millions in tax revenue at stake

After the judge ruled in agreement with the city, Butts told The LA Local that city officials were still researching the specific implications of the court’s ruling. In Tuesday’s council motion, city staff highlighted what they say is one major change they’ve discovered: There’s no longer a limit on how much admissions tax the city can collect.  

Inglewood collects a 10% tax on tickets sold at SoFi Stadium, but the 2015 initiative that brought the stadium to the city put a cap on that revenue, starting at $15 million a year and increasing annually with inflation. 

The admissions tax cap also happens to be the subject of the current ballot Measure AT. WOW Media, the billboard operator allied with the city in its dispute with the stadium, is funding a campaign in favor of the initiative.

Admissions tax has been a sizable revenue stream for the city — bringing in an average $20 million a year since SoFi Stadium opened — but city officials have said it could be significantly bigger. A city analysis of Measure AT estimated that getting rid of the cap could bring in as much as an extra $50 million in future years. The city did not estimate how much admissions tax revenue it has missed out on while the development agreement was in effect.

The Inglewood audit seeks to clarify basic questions about how taxes are assessed on ticket sales and whether those taxes are actually forwarded to the city. Officials say it will provide transparency about ticket sales, pricing and fees, which have been heavily scrutinized in recent years across the state. 

Gray gets support on proposal for future billboard revenue audit

Councilmember Gloria Gray attempted to amend the audit motion Tuesday, asking the city manager to also audit the revenue the city gets from billboard fees.

“I believe the same standard of financial transparency should apply to every city agreement,” Gray said.

Though her motion didn’t receive a second, Councilmember Eloy Morales said he’d support putting a billboard revenue audit on the council’s agenda in the future. 

“I think we all support all those audits,” Morales said. 

Gray’s move was a rarity for a council that seldom debates motions during public meetings and almost always votes unanimously. The councilmember is currently running for mayor against Butts.

Inglewood pulls in as much as $8 million a year from billboards, according to budget records. Much of that comes from a series of deals the city cut with WOW Media, allowing the billboard company to construct and operate the billboards on public medians and sidewalks. In return, WOW gives the city a cut of ad revenue along with other concessions.

The post Inglewood is investigating if SoFi Stadium owes years’ worth of ticket taxes appeared first on LA Local.

Netflix plans to lay off about 6% of its workforce, amounting to nearly 1,000 positions, as the streaming giant makes wider “organizational changes.”

Co-CEOs Greg Peters and Ted Sarandos announced the job cuts in a memo to employees Wednesday. They said the company’s product, tech, legal and human resources teams would be the most impacted.

“Decisions like these are never easy, and we don’t take them lightly,” Peters and Sarandos wrote in the memo, which was obtained by The Associated Press. They maintained business was strong — but that Netflix needed to be “disciplined about where we prioritize our people and resources” as it invests in future growth and “high impact areas to improve our service.”

Beyond the memo from its chief executives, Netflix declined to comment further about Wednesday’s cuts.

Between membership signups and price increases, Netflix’s profit has grown this year. In its second financial quarter, the company earned $3.4 billion and racked up revenue of $12.56 billion — up 9% and 13%, respectively, from the same period last year.

Still, Netflix’s forecast for the third quarter fell below Wall Street’s expectations. The company plans to report those earnings next week.

Competition in the streaming space is growing more crowded overall. Netflix continues to be a dominant player (accounting for 19% of the market per the latest data from streaming guide JustWatch), but rivals like Amazon’s Prime Video and Disney+ are close behind.

HBO Max and Paramount+ are also now under the same roof — Skydance — after Paramount’s $81 billion buyout of Warner Bros. Discovery closed last week. The new Hollywood giant plans to unify its streaming products “into a single service over time.” Netflix initially inked a deal to buy Warner’s studio and streaming business late last year, but walked away from that offer back in February.

At the end of 2025, per regulatory filings, Netflix had about 16,000 full-time employees worldwide. The layoffs announced Wednesday mark the biggest round of cuts the California-based company has rolled out in years.

The Wall Street Journal first reported Wednesday’s news of the layoffs.