Nine mayoral challengers who will appear on the March 7 ballot agreed during a Feb. 15 forum at American Legion Post 43 in Hollywood that city hall needs a shakeup.

The incumbent, Eric Garcetti, to whom much of the night’s ire was directed, declined an invitation to defend his record.

“There’s such a distrust of the process, such a distrust of politicians,” said Mitchell Schwartz, who has worked in various levels of politics and government. “I want to bring that trust back.”

Nine mayoral candidates participated in two forums on Feb. 15.

Schwartz ran then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton’s 1992 New Hampshire campaign, and the 2008 California campaign for former President Barack Obama, who was then a U.S. senator from Illinois.

Like the other candidates, Schwartz said he wants to address the city’s housing crisis. He does not support Measure S, which would impose a ban up to two years for construction that increases development density, and prohibit amendments to the city’s general plan to accommodate specific projects. Schwartz’s housing plan calls for the city’s general plan and community plans to be updated within four years as more housing is added to meet the current demand. Seven other candidates support Measure S.

Distrust of Garcetti’s current administration and the housing crisis reverberated throughout the hour-long forum.

“Somehow Los Angeles has checked out of the political process, and I think that’s because the trust has been broken,” said Paul E. Amori. “We have to figure out how to make the people care again.”

Amori, who supports Measure S, also wants to implement a housing plan capable of keeping up with demand.

Eric Preven, a writer and producer, has been a frequent presence at city council and county board of supervisors’ meetings over the past several years. He said “there’s a lack of an ally for Angelenos down at city hall.” Over the years, with strategic public records requests and observance of local politics, Preven has tried to fill that role from afar. One of his recent accomplishments includes a California Supreme Court victory in ACLU/Preven v. Los Angeles County, which upheld public access to government billing records with private law firms.

Other mayoral candidates who attended were David Hernandez, a community advocate; Diane Harman, a retired Los Angeles Unified School District educator; David Saltsburg, a community activist; Y.J. Draiman, a neighborhood council board member; Dennis Richter, a factory worker; and Frantz Pierre, a community activist.

Richter, a member of the Socialist Workers Party, said he supports Measure S after seeing how residents have been ousted from their longtime homes.

“Addressing this is crucial to the future of Los Angeles,” he said. “We need to be smart about building before we expand our city.”

Hernandez, who ran for the city council’s second district seat in 2015, said he wants to “see to it that the spirit of Measure S is implemented” should voters reject it next month. He also has an infrastructure plan that criticizes the mayor for investing in public transportation and bicycling instead of working to alleviate automobile traffic.

Draiman joined Garcetti and Schwartz in opposition to Measure S.

“If it’s modified then I would support it,” he said. “[But] it’s going to cause major problems for unemployment and housing.”

Another of Draiman’s platforms is a job-creation plan that would prioritize renewable and fossil fuel sources.

Garcetti, whose campaign has raised approximately $3.1 million in monetary contributions, holds a clear fundraising advantage over all the challengers. After Schwartz, who has raised $369,634, no other campaign has collected more than $7,000 in monetary contributions. Five candidates – Harman, Saltsburg, Pierre, Draiman and Richter – do not have any contributions. But some of the lesser-funded candidates agreed that money in local politics has been a corrupting force for issues such as development.

“There’s no Malibu addiction clinic for pay-to-play development,” said Saltsburg, who excoriated Garcetti as “Mr. Do-nothing, Absentee Mayor who’s too good to be here.”

Pierre broke the monotony of grievances about the status quo in Los Angeles by proposing that all of the city’s residents receive a universal basic income as a way to reduce poverty. The idea has slowly gained traction worldwide, including in Canada, where Ontario plans to launch a universal basic income pilot program next month.

Harman, who is running her campaign on her retirement funds and her husband’s disability check from social security, said she wants Los Angeles to be “great again.” Part of her plan is to allow free public transportation for each city resident who has a job.

The forum was hosted by the Hollywood Hills West Neighborhood Council. The candidates attended another forum in Northridge, hosted by the Northridge East Neighborhood Council, later that night.

A spokesman for Garcetti did not return a request for comment about the mayor’s absence from both forums. Yuval Kremer, a math educator and activist, was the only other candidate who didn’t participate. He said the forums conflicted with other campaign-related events, and he had concerns about the fairness of the questioning.