Los Angeles' 3rd Council District is in the southwestern corner of the San Fernando Valley and includes Woodland Hills, Tarzana, Canoga Park, Winnetka and Reseda. The hills south of Ventura Boulevard and the Ventura Freeway include iconic ranch-style single family homes, which in the flatter areas to the north are joined by multifamily housing and commercial strips on major streets.
Rocket engines were formerly built on Canoga Park land that once was envisioned as the new downtown of the West Valley, but the parcel remains empty pending environmental clean-up.
Adjacent land is slated to become Rams Village, a training facility for the NFL team and a new shopping complex to replace the Woodland Hills Promenade, currently being demolished.
The council seat opens up this year as incumbent Bob Blumenfield nears the end of his third and final term. Voters here historically have sent centrist (for Los Angeles) Democrats and Republicans to represent them on the nonpartisan City Council.
What’s at stake in this race
Los Angeles voters will choose who will be their chief steward of city services in each of eight odd-numbered council districts (look up your district here) for the next four years and will determine the ideological makeup and effectiveness of the 15-member City Council.
Challenges include federal immigration enforcement, homelessness, the city’s readiness for the 2027 Super Bowl and the 2028 Summer Olympics and continuing city budget shortfalls.
What does a City Council member do?
Council members have three distinct roles:
- Each member curates their district by identifying local problems and opportunities and working with more than 40 city departments to steer needed services to residents and businesses. They may work to bring in non-city resources in the form of county, state, federal or philanthropic grants. They serve as intermediaries between their constituents and City Hall. Members play a vital role in shaping development in their districts.
- As part of the full-time, 15-member council, they set citywide policy, adopt ordinances, commission studies and provide a counterweight and oversight to the mayor and city departments and bureaus. They adopt an annual city budget ($14 billion in 2025-26) based on a proposal provided by the mayor, divvying up money among the Los Angeles Police Department, homeless services, libraries, parks, sidewalk repair and tree-trimming, among other services. They approve or reject the mayor’s appointments to city commissions and to lead most city departments. They focus on areas such as policing and public safety by leading or serving as members of council committees.
- Council members often work outside their formal roles through appointment to other governmental boards such as Metro and the Metropolitan Water District and by providing leadership in their communities through assisting charities, schools and civic institutions.
Fast facts about the City Council
- Each City Council member represents about 260,000 Angelenos.
- Annual salary is $244,727.
- A term lasts four years. Members may serve a maximum of three terms.
- City elections are non-partisan.
- Voters may have a chance to enlarge the council from the current 15 members to 25 members under a charter reform proposal that supporters say will provide better representation. (As a point of comparison, several other major cities have far larger councils. New York has a 51-member City Council. Chicago has a 50-member council.) It’s up to the current council whether to put the question on the Nov. 3 ballot.
What it takes to win
Candidates who win more than 50% of the vote June 2 will be sworn into office in December. If no candidate wins more than 50%, a runoff between the top two vote-getters will be held Nov. 3.
The candidates in City Council District 3
Christopher Robert "C.R." Celona, tech entrepreneur/dad
Christopher Robert “C.R.” Celona calls himself a tech entrepreneur, media executive, influencer teacher, storyteller and “Tik Tok philosopher.” He grew up in Connecticut, where he was a volunteer firefighter and where he cared for his father before moving to Los Angeles five years ago.
His focus is on the entertainment industry, which he said must be healthy for the city to be able to afford to deal with problems like homelessness.
“If I can get entertainment back in, we can fundamentally have this city working,” he said.
He criticizes the current leadership in the district for leaving behind the parts of the district that are in most need, including Winnetka and Canoga Park.
Celona said he would add more fire stations and repave streets.
“I bring a pragmatic and innovative approach to every single enterprise and business I’ve ever touched,” he said.
More voter resources:
Tim Gaspar, Valley businessman/parent
Tim Gaspar grew up in Woodland Hills and Canoga Park and became an entrepreneur in high school and attended Pierce College before graduating from Cal State Northridge. He trained to become an insurance broker and built Gaspar Insurance Services. He recently sold the business.
He said he is running for the City Council because he is concerned about the direction of the city, and he cited insufficient investment in youth services, calls to defund the police and the election of George Gascón as district attorney in 2020 (Gascón was defeated in 2024). Were he on the council now, he would not have voted to approve the city budget because it did not allocate enough money to law enforcement.
He said he would have voted against some tenant protections and opposes rent control because it “creates slumlords” and “drives prices up.”
“The city needs somebody who comes from the outside,” with business experience, he said.
Gaspar calls himself “the most moderate of the candidates” and “a Democrat through and through” who opposes ICE raids and wants to support immigrants “working their tail off to make life better.”
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Barri Worth Girvan, Valley community advocate
Barri Worth Girvan’s interest in government began when she was a UC San Diego student spending an academic quarter in Washington, D.C., interning for Rep. Brad Sherman. After earning a master’s degree, she worked in the field office for Assemblymember Lloyd Levine, was West Valley area director for Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and later was district director for state Senate Majority Leader Bob Hertzberg. Most recently, she was community affairs director for county Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, a job in which she focused on fire recovery and constituent services. She also was government affairs and community engagement director for the Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles.
“I am accustomed to connecting with constituents,” she said, adding that she would use the relationships she has built in city, county and state offices to better serve residents and businesses in the district.
She said she would seek deeper involvement from the county departments of Public Health and Mental Health to move homeless people from encampments to shelter and permanent housing.
“We have an obligation to restore people’s faith in government, even if it’s not my jurisdiction,” she said.
She said she would make use of Sec. 41.18 to remove homeless encampments in sensitive areas, and streamline the permitting process to speed housing construction, in part to ensure the city does not lose control of development to the state.
She called ICE raids “unconscionable” and said she would work to protect communities from ripping apart families.
More voter resources:
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The incumbent faces a primary challenge from his upstairs neighbor, as well as two others, in District 13, which includes Echo Park, Atwater Village and much of Hollywood.
Four candidates are trying to unseat the incumbent in L.A. City Council District 1, which includes the neighborhoods of Highland Park and Westlake, among others.
