Priorities
Priorities for Los Angeles
What Brian Rosenstein is working toward as a Los Angeles City Planning Commissioner — a pragmatic, pro-housing agenda grounded in decades of owning and operating housing.
Brian Rosenstein was appointed to the Los Angeles City Planning Commission by Mayor Karen Bass and confirmed unanimously by the City Council. He approaches the role from both sides of the table — as a long-term real estate operator who has spent his career building, owning, and managing housing, and as a land-use decision-maker responsible for how the city grows.
That experience shapes a straightforward conviction: Los Angeles cannot solve its affordability crisis without building more homes, and it can do that while protecting the neighborhoods that make the city worth living in. The priorities below reflect the positions Brian has argued for on the dais and in his writing.
“I believe a pro-housing and pro-affordable housing approach to planning is important to meet the current and long-term needs of our City while at the same time being business friendly to help strengthen our City’s economic base.”
— Brian Rosenstein
01Build more homes — and build them faster
Los Angeles will not solve its affordability and homelessness crisis without adding housing at the scale the emergency demands. Brian advocates for a planning process that treats new homes as part of the solution rather than something to slow down — and for approvals that move at the speed the housing shortage requires.
Related reading: Solving California’s Housing Crisis · The Future of Urban Planning in Los Angeles
02Fix the permitting pathway
Too many good projects stall in a process that is slow, unpredictable, and expensive. Brian supports permit-pathway reform — clearer rules, faster timelines, and fewer discretionary bottlenecks — so that building housing is workable for everyone from small property owners to nonprofit affordable-housing developers.
Related reading: What Is a City Planning Commission?
03Zone for real housing demand
Rezoning plans should reflect the city Los Angeles actually is and the demand its residents actually face. Brian supports updating zoning and making smart use of state tools — like density bonuses and AB 2097 — to add homes near transit, jobs, and the services people use every day.
Related reading: How AB 2097 & Density Bonus Are Reshaping LA
04Add homes without losing what makes neighborhoods special
Growth and neighborhood character are not opposites. Brian believes Los Angeles can welcome new housing while protecting the historic buildings, tree-lined streets, and community fabric that make its neighborhoods worth living in — the kind of preservation work he supported during his service in Beverly Hills.
Related reading: Solving California’s Housing Crisis Without Losing What Makes Our Neighborhoods Special
05A more accountable City Hall
Good planning depends on good governance. Brian supports the Los Angeles charter-reform recommendations aimed at making city government more transparent, more accountable, and more responsive to the residents it serves.
Related reading: LA Charter Reform: Why These Governance Recommendations Deserve Our Support
06Invest in community and the most vulnerable
Public service and philanthropy are two sides of the same commitment. Through the Wilbur May Foundation, Brian helps direct more than $3 million in annual giving to Angelenos in crisis, and he led his family’s lead gift for the Anita May Rosenstein Campus at the Los Angeles LGBT Center.
Related reading: Building Community Through Housing · Philanthropy in Healthcare