LOS ANGELES — Many of Los Angeles’s leaders had hoped to spend 2025 preparing the city to host the next summer Olympics and instead found themselves engulfed by a series of unanticipated crises, from devastating wildfires to a destabilizing immigration crackdown. But rather than working together, the city’s leading pressure groups are at each other’s throats in a spiraling grudge match.
After Mayor Karen Bass enacted a new minimum wage that would guarantee tourism workers $30 per hour in time for the 2028 games, airline and hotel companies began working to repeal the law via referendum. A labor union that had lobbied for the wage bill immediately retaliated with four ballot initiatives targeting the travel industry, including to require voter approval for new stadiums and meeting centers. Local chamber of commerce heads then countered with an initiative that would slash the gross-receipts tax paid by city-based companies.
“None of this is good for the city,” said Rick Cole, a former LA deputy mayor who now serves on the city council in neighboring Pasadena. “Not that there aren’t legitimate arguments for and against the Olympic wage, not that there aren’t legitimate arguments for and against the gross-receipts tax — but going to the ballot box represents a divisive, confrontational approach that will divert attention from working on common problems.”…