Sharona Nazarian: Beverly Hills Person of the Year

Sharona Nazarian is the Beverly Hills Person of the Year for 2025–2026, not only for who she is and what she has accomplished but also for what, hopefully, she will accomplish as our new Mayor.

My purpose now is to pay tribute to Sharona, report on her priorities expressed during her installation on April 1, and offer my suggestions to supplement those priorities.

Sharona has an impressive background and has come a long way from her “Valley Girl” days at Birmingham High School in Van Nuys. She is a thirty-year Beverly Hills resident and mother of three accomplished sons. Her husband Danny was a classmate of mine at the Citizens Police Academy and always did much better than I did at the role-playing scenarios.

I did not know Sharona well until I watched with admiration as she led, as President, the Rotary Club of Beverly Hills with great enthusiasm and grace through the darkest days of COVID. It was truly a tour de force.

Before being elected to the City Council three years ago, Sharona had an impressive record of public service serving on both the Beverly Hills Human Relations and Public Works Commissions. She led the creation of the City’s Civility Statement and the Sustainability Ordinance and served as a Los Angeles County Commissioner for Alcohol and Other Drugs.

At the outset of her installation speech she highlighted the importance of her family, including her sons Noah, Aaron, and Jonah and her father Jacob Rashti. She explained that she had come to this country as a result of religious persecution and pointed out that she was the first Iranian-American woman to serve as Mayor of Beverly Hills.

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Mayor Nazarian’s Priorities and Initiatives

It has become customary for incoming Beverly Hills mayors to announce their initiatives and priorities during their installation address. Mayor Nazarian’s priorities and initiatives are unusually ambitious. They include the following:

• Vision for Beverly Hills: “Unity and community” through a responsive and innovative government using “technology as a force multiplier.”

• Public Safety: A facility called AI Blue Scribe to “eliminate bureaucracy, streamline report writing and get officers back on the streets”; a public safety kiosk at the La Cienega Metro station; and BHPD Live Link providing “real time updates on calls for service.”

• An arrangement with District Attorney Hochman allowing Beverly Hills to prosecute misdemeanors committed in the City, with the goal that “Beverly Hills will never be the target of unwarranted attacks again.”

• Fire Safety: A system called Beverly Hills Fire Watch leveraging cameras and other tools to detect early signs of fire, plus a BHFD Wellness Network, Just in Case, the Nurse Practitioner program and a “holistic approach to support the unhoused.”

• Fiscal responsibility: a “zero-based approach to capital improvement spending.”

She also announced her very active approach to her new role, including:

• Spotlight with Sharona starting April 23

• Straight Talk with Sharona starting May 8

• Moments of Unity, Moments of Inspiration, Sharona’s Innovation Circle, and Sundays Socials with Sharona

Whew! Just listing these exhausts me!

In all, it was an uplifting and optimistic speech. Sharona can be spellbinding and this was Sharona at her best. It was very well received.

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Suggestions & Friendly Caution

Most of these initiatives are promising; some are imaginative. But all have financial consequences, some of which are substantial.

Taking on the job of prosecuting misdemeanors will require setting up an office of the City Prosecutor — and that will be expensive. Although the description of the public safety kiosk at the La Cienega Metro station was not specific, it will likely involve additional costs. And the context of the financial condition of the City cannot and should not be overlooked.

Given that condition, a top priority should be how to bring the City’s expenditures in line with anticipated revenues. I am planning to write about the subject of the City’s expenditures in more detail and depth in the future. For now, I will summarize the situation and urge that Mayor Nazarian give expense reduction the highest priority along with public safety.

Mayor Nazarian’s reference to fiscally responsible decision-making, eliminating redundancies, and a zero-based approach to capital improvement spending are steps in the right direction.

A guiding principle will be, as it has always been, to “maintain a balance where ongoing expenditures are funded by ongoing revenues.”

The current adopted budget, which included projections for the next several years, was adopted in approximately late spring of 2024. These projections showed a break-even balance of revenues and expenses through 2025–26 but a shortfall of more than $40M for the three fiscal years from 2026–29. I understand that these projections for the current and the future years now appear very optimistic. The shortfalls will be greater than anticipated when those projections were made. This is not sustainable and our reserves, while apparently substantial, are not appropriately used to compensate for operating deficits.

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The Needed Deep Dive

Two years ago, then Mayor Gold recognized that sizeable deficits were realistically projected. Accordingly, he formed a “Blue Ribbon” committee under the direction of City Treasurer Howard Fisher to look at whether there are new potential sources of revenues and/or potential reductions of expenditures to bring our revenues and expenses into balance.

This committee concluded that there was no reasonable prospect for material additional revenues. The job was not completed because there has been NO exhaustive look at what our city spends and why. What is needed is a comprehensive examination of the expenditures.

For example, “zero-based budgeting” (looking directly at everything that a city department does and asking whether it is truly necessary and/or could be done for less) should apply to all existing operations, not just new capital expenditures. We should look at all existing programs, evaluate them, and where appropriate, sunset them. We have done a bit of nibbling around the edges with the somewhat questionable and controversial combination of a few Commissions, but far more is needed.

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Mayor Nazarian: Congratulations!

You are off to a very good start. I hope that you will consider my friendly suggestion.

To be continued.