Mitchell Englander

Mitchell Englander (born July 25, 1970) is a member of the Los Angeles City Council, representing District 12 in the San Fernando Valley. Currently the district covers the Northwest Valley communities of Chatsworth, Granada Hills, Northridge, Porter Ranch, Sherwood Forest, West Hills, and parts of Reseda and North Hills. Beginning on July 1, 2012, with new boundaries from redistricting, Englander represents the West, Northwest, north-central, and North San Fernando Valley. He is the only member of the city council who is registered as Republican. He calls himself a fiscal conservative. He came into office July 1, 2011.

Englander was born in 1970 in West Hills in the San Fernando Valley. According to an interview with the Los Angeles Daily News, his parents separated when he was 5 years old, and his mother, Linda, a real-estate agent, "worked two jobs, but lost a home to foreclosure." They lived in Canoga Park with his uncle Michael, whose janitorial firm Englander worked for as a teenager. Englander attended college in Arizona but returned to California without graduating in order to care for his ailing mother, who died of a brain tumor.

In 1994, his uncle Michael, who Englander said was a father figure for him, was shot and killed in a gang-related robbery. Englander became a Los Angeles Police Department reservist in 2005 the same day his uncle was killed, Englander's older sister Natalie suffered an asthma attack and fell into a coma. She was "rushed to an emergency room whose doors were mistakenly locked." She wasn't able to receive medical aid in time and "awoke with brain damage." She lived with the Englander family for a decade before she died.

Campaign

Englander served as chief of staff to City Councilman Greig Smith from 2003 to 2009, in Los Angeles City Council District 12, then in the Northwest San Fernando Valley. In September 2009 Englander launched his campaign to succeed Smith, who had announced retirement upon his term's end.

Noting that Englander was the "consummate City Hall insider," the Los Angeles Times endorsed him as "the best of several good choices." An editorial noted that Englander's "proximity" to Greig Smith had "clearly brought him advantages in fund-raising," with more than $440,000 already raised, "which is 10 times as much as his closest rival (and more than any other candidate for city office this election)." The Times said that Englander had served as Smith's "proxy" and "now claims to have played the leading role in a number of Smith's accomplishments." The L.A. Daily News endorsed him as well, saying that Smith presented "common-sense ideas to reform government, such as cutting general managers' base salaries but awarding bonuses to those who provide excellent service on a tight budget."

Election

• See also: List of 2011 Los Angeles municipal election returns.

Mitch Englander was elected to represent City Council District 12 in the March 8, 2011 primary, receiving 57.74% of the total vote.

CD 12 communities

Englander represents all or part of the communities of:

• North Hills
• Granada Hills
• Northridge
• Porter Ranch
• Chatsworth
• West Hills
• Reseda
• Sherwood Forest

Council activity

• Arizona boycott—On October 21, 2011, Englander called for an end to the city's boycott of Arizona, which had been voted in May 2010 after that state adopted Arizona SB 1070, a law requiring law-enforcement officers to ask for proof of U.S. citizenship from people in vehicles pulled over and suspected to be in the United States illegally. He said he would pay his own way to attend a National League of Cities conference in Phoenix, since the city would not do so.
• Minimum Wage-On May 19, 2015 Englander cast the lone dissenting vote when the Los Angeles City Council voted to raise the minimum wage in the city to fifteen dollars per hour in increments by 2020.

• ^ City of Los Angeles—Council District 12: About the Councilman . accessed 6.21.2012
• David Zahniser, "Aide to L.A. City Councilman Launches Bid for Valley Seat," Los Angeles Times, September 8, 2009
• "Mitch Englander in City Council District 12," Los Angeles Times, February 5, 2011
• "Council District 12 Can Benefit From Mitchell Englander's Experience in City Hall," Los Angeles Daily News, February 10, 2011
• Los Angeles city clerk
• Councilman Wants End to Arizona Boycott, City News Service in myfoxla.com., 2011-10-21, archived from the original on 2012-06-01 
• Times, Los Angeles. "Los Angeles' minimum wage on track to go up to $15 by 2020".