Accomplishments

From the first day of his administration, Mayor Villaraigosa began laying the foundation for fundamental change on the big issues facing our city. Even in tough economic times, Mayor Villaraigosa has kept his promise to hire a 1,000 police officers and is on pace to meet that goal by 2010. He created LA's first comprehensive anti-gang strategy. As a result, crime is at its lowest level in 50 years. Gang-related homicides dropped 26.5 percent in 2007, and the homicide clearance rate rose by 24.5 percent. Never satisfied, Villaraigosa plans to expand anti-gang enforcement and prevention efforts for at-risk kids in his second term.

Mayor Villaraigosa has made fixing traffic a top priority. He banned road construction during rush hour, synchronized traffic signals on our city's busiest streets and deployed gridlock tiger teams. He led the fight for passage of the county's largest investment in public transit in a generation, Measure R. Angelenos overwhelming approved this $40 billion strategic roadmap to expand subway and light rail service, modernize freeways, and synchronize traffic signals countywide.

Using his ability to build broad coalitions, Mayor Villaraigosa has taken concrete steps towards improving education for all the children of Los Angeles. He led the passage of the biggest school construction program in LA history – by putting in place a plan to expand small neighborhood schools, green schools campuses and provide three hundred fifty million dollars to open new charter schools.

Mayor Villaraigosa has led the effort to change the school district using the ballot box to build a majority on the school board and creating his Partnership for LA Schools. Through his partnership schools, he has taken over Los Angeles' lowest-performing schools and put in place a system of accountability and community involvement. Teams are now working hard to improve test scores and slow down drop out rates.

To cut smog and global warming, Villaraigosa quadrupled LA's use of renewable energy and has plans to reduce the city carbon emissions by 35 percent. Within two years 20 percent of our power will come from wind, solar and renewable resources. He has made Los Angeles a center of the new Green Economy, breaking down the barrier between sustainability and development while creating a framework that will provide thousands of Angelenos with green, good, high-paying jobs.