District 1 Newsletter, September 28, 2026

Happy first full week of fall, Redondo,

Put a few thousand mayors, councilmembers, and city staff in one Anaheim convention center, and what do you get? My week, as it turns out. The League of California Cities Annual Conference filled last week with sessions on e-bike safety, artificial intelligence, coastal erosion, and ethics law, plus one Friday vote where Redondo Beach helped nudge statewide housing policy in the right direction. Consider this edition my unpacked suitcase: what I learned, what I argued for, and what I am bringing home to District 1.

Before the conference notes, a thank you: to everyone who joined Tuesday night’s District 1 Zoom meeting, I appreciate you spending one of the first evenings of autumn on city business. If you missed it, you can view it on YouTube, and my inbox is always open. And two calendar flags before you scroll: free compost arrives this Saturday, and new bus schedules take effect a week from today.

🚲 Public Safety: E-Bikes at a Crossroads

🔹 The session I attended for you, and for every parent. One of my biggest conference takeaways came from E-Bikes at a Crossroads: What California Cities Can Do Now, a session on the state’s rapidly evolving e-bike laws, enforcement challenges, and the growing pressure for statewide regulation. Every issue on the panel’s list is one we see at home: young riders, excessive speeds, wheelies in traffic, sidewalk riding, and packs of riders creating dangerous situations for themselves, drivers, and pedestrians.

→ 🎯 My take: Education and enforcement matter, but cities also need better tools from Sacramento. I believe the State should seriously consider age restrictions, registration, and some form of license plate or identification requirement for e-bikes, and I raise this directly with candidates seeking my endorsement for State Assembly and State Senate. E-bikes are a valuable transportation option, and they are not going away. Our laws just need to catch up with the technology.

🔹 A small-world bonus. The panel featured a Carlsbad police lieutenant, a Sonoma State professor, and Chula Vista Councilmember Michael Inzunza, who turns out to be the neighbor of a good friend of mine. We connected after the session and kept the conversation going. Conferences are useful like that.
👉 Read my e-bike safety post (Instagram)

🏛️ Housing: Redondo’s Voice in a Statewide Push for Local Control

🔹 A resolution with our fingerprints on it. As a member of the League’s Housing, Community, and Economic Development Policy Committee, I helped review a resolution from the City of Murrieta addressing the steady erosion of local authority over housing, zoning, and land use. When it reached the Resolutions Committee, I spoke up to restore Murrieta’s stronger original language, which called for exploring a state constitutional amendment, along with legislative, policy, and ballot-based strategies, to restore meaningful local authority. The motion did not prevail, and the committee advanced a revised version instead.

🔹 The bigger effort succeeded anyway. On Friday, delegates from cities across California overwhelmingly approved the revised resolution at the General Assembly, making it official Cal Cities policy. It calls for a statewide working group to explore ways to strengthen cities’ authority over local housing, zoning, and land-use decisions.

→ 💡 What this means: California cities now have a unified platform to push for a better balance between the State’s role in setting housing goals and protecting civil rights, fair housing, safety, and the environment, and each community’s ability to decide how those goals are implemented based on local conditions.

→ 🎯 My take: This is not about stopping housing. It is about who decides how it fits into our neighborhoods. I would have preferred the stronger original language, but I was proud to have Redondo Beach in that room, on the record, moving the conversation forward.
👉 Read my full recap (Instagram)
👉 How Cal Cities resolutions become policy

🌊 Environment: Coastal Notes From the Conference Floor

🔹 Fifty years of the Coastal Commission, and a room full of coastal cities. The Coastal Cities Group Annual Business Meeting closed out one conference day with discussions of coastal erosion, land use, and the California Coastal Commission, which marked fifty years the very same week. If you read last week’s edition on the County’s sand replenishment and living shoreline plans for our beach, you know why I took a seat near the front: every coastal city in that room is wrestling with the same shoreline math we are.

🔹 A keynote about where we will all live in 2050. Urbanist Greg Lindsay’s keynote combined climate science, demographics, and artificial intelligence to map which regions will be most resilient in a warming world. His framing stuck with me: climate change is not only a story of mounting catastrophes, but also of opportunity for communities that prepare. Dunes, sand, and storm-ready infrastructure are exactly that kind of preparation.

🔹 Free compost this Saturday, October 3. Athens Services hosts a compost giveaway at Wilderness Park, 1102 Camino Real, from 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM. Bring proof of residency and sturdy containers, and arrive early, because supplies may not last. Your fall garden does not know about coastal policy, but it does know about compost.
👉 Read the compost giveaway details

🤖 Technology: AI Lessons Worth Bringing Home

🔹 Cities are not waiting on the future. The Artificial Intelligence Strategies and Case Studies session showed how cities are already putting AI to work: predictive maintenance, smart dispatching, asset management, and synthesizing public input, plus collaborative efforts like the San José GovAI Coalition, where cities solve these puzzles together instead of separately.

→ ⚡ Why this matters: I chair the South Bay Cities Council of Governments AI Working Group, where we are asking these same questions for cities across the South Bay. Leveraging technology to improve city services is one of my core priorities, and I have been working with new technology since my ARPANET days, so believe me when I say the tools change, but the questions do not: does it solve a real problem, are the safeguards in place, and do people remain accountable for the decisions government makes?

🔹 The best souvenir is a working example. Seeing what other cities have already tried, and what has flopped, saves us time and money. I am bringing several of these ideas back to our South Bay conversations this fall.
👉 View my AI post (Instagram)

🍎 From PTA Boards to Council Chambers

🔹 A reunion years in the making. One of the best parts of gathering local leaders from across the state is bumping into old friends. I caught up with Dianna MacDonald, now a Santa Rosa City Councilmember, who I served alongside for years in California State PTA, including her two years as State PTA President while I served as her Vice President for Communications. Two PTA volunteers, decades of advocating for California’s kids and families, and now two councilmembers at opposite ends of the state. You never know where showing up for your community will take you, and that is rather the point.
👉 See my reunion post (Instagram)

🗳️ Good Government Homework, and a Clearly Labeled Personal Note

🔹 Ethics training is not optional, and that is a good thing. The conference opened with the AB 1234 ethics course. State law requires local officials to complete two hours of ethics training at least once every two years, and newly elected officials must complete it within their first year. I also sat through a timely session on campaign season and city hall, covering the Political Reform Act, the Brown Act, and the strict rules against using public resources for campaign activity. Transparency is a value you practice, not just praise, and refreshers like these keep the lines bright.

🔹 Also in the notebook: keynote speaker Stephanie Chung on using brain science to lead multigenerational, fast-changing teams. City halls qualify.

🔹 Now, wearing my personal hat, clearly labeled as such: I am supporting Ben Allen for California Insurance Commissioner, and I am joining South Bay leaders at an event in Palos Verdes Estates this Sunday, October 4, from 3:00 to 5:00 PM. Ben is running to strengthen consumer protections and help keep coverage available and affordable for California families, which is a kitchen-table issue in every coastal zip code.
👉 RSVP for the October 4 event

📅 Coming Up

🔹 New bus schedules start Monday, October 5. The Beach Cities Transit adjustments to Lines 102 and 109 that I covered on September 14 now have an official effective date. The changes affect the southern stops between the Redondo Beach Pier and Palos Verdes Boulevard at Via Valencia, squarely in District 1, so check your route before your Monday commute.
👉 Read the BCT rider updates

🔹 City Council returns Tuesday, October 6, at 6:00 PM. I will preview the agenda here as soon as it posts.

🔹 Hispanic Heritage Month continues through October 15. A fitting time to celebrate the neighbors whose culture, history, and contributions make Redondo Beach stronger.
👉 View the meeting calendar

🥕 Weekly Markets

Farmers’ Market by the Pier (Veterans Park), Thursdays, 8am to 1pm. 309 Esplanade.
👉 Read more

Riviera Village Farmers Market, Sundays, 8:30am to 1pm. Triangle Lot, 1801 S. Elena Ave.
👉 Read more

North Redondo Beach Farmers Market, Wednesdays, 2pm to 7pm. Green Lane at Artesia.
👉 Read more

📱 Access Redondo

Do you have a problem or need to report an issue to the city? Use the Access Redondo App. After two days of AI sessions about smart dispatching and predictive maintenance, I came home more convinced than ever that good technology starts with the humble service request. One report in the app sends your issue to the right department the first time, and every report becomes data that helps the City fix problems where they cluster.
👉 Download the Access Redondo App

🏘️ Redondo Roundup

A statewide housing vote with Redondo’s voice in it, a case for smarter e-bike rules, AI lessons headed for the South Bay, an old PTA friend on a faraway dais, and compost waiting for your garden this Saturday. My ask this week is a fun one: hit reply and tell me one city service you think technology could genuinely improve. I am collecting ideas for the South Bay AI conversation, and the best ones usually start at a kitchen table, not a conference.

Questions, ideas, or corrections: hit reply. I read every message. Welcome to fall, Redondo.