Measure S – restricting development all over Los Angeles, especially in South Central where residents are frantic — is the most confounding, intriguing line on Tuesday’s countywide election ballot.

The partisan skies are heavy with clouds.

• The business community and its high-profile backers say they need more elbow room with where they can go and when.
• Middle-class residents, especially south of Downtown and in Koreatown, are worried they will be routed by developers creating high rises for high prices that they never will be able to afford.

Where is the leader of Los Angeles, Mayor Garcetti?

Both sides have claimed his backing.

It is not as if Mr. Garcetti has planted his feet and taken a loud stand.

He may be in a straddle mode.

In a written response last September (http://www.voteyesons.org/read_mayor_eric_garcetti_agree_letter_praising_reforms_measure_s)

to the chief backer of Measure S, Michael Weinstein, CEO of the Aids Healthcare Foundation, the mayor said he agreed with four major reforms within Measure S. Mr. Weinstein is a heavyweight, having funded about 99 percent of the S campaign.

Whether the winds or the mayor have shifted in the past six months, Mr. Garcetti has declined to act in one crucial area that he said unequivocally he endorsed:

In September that he would stop city Planning Commissioners from meeting in private with real estate developers and others in the field for two reasons:

• Negative optics.
• Potential and perhaps already established coziness.

Five days out from the election, Mr. Garcetti has not banned such secretive meetings.

The Measure S team is strongly upset about his reluctance.

Mr. Garcetti said he is planning to impose the ban, but it takes a long time because the process is complex.

If this has not demystified the notion of saying yes or no on Measure S, you probably are with the majority of Tuesday’s voters.