Rep. Richardson another arrogant and wasteful officeholder

"Rep. Richardson's flight of fancy - The Long Beach Democrat requests two emergency services helicopters to give her and 19 staffers an aerial tour of Southern California." By Steve Lopez, March 14, 2010 - L.A. TIMES.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lopez14-2010mar14,0,3158504,print.column

You can read this to see the waste that goes on at the federal level, too. There is a woeful lack of oversight on these things. This woman, Laura Richardson, is a complete nut. See the story for the several foreclosures she's had. One of them was rescinded after she used her influence as a congresswoman to undo a sale according to a report in the past. Last year, neighbors complained of a house she owned and let overgrow with weeds. Some said rats were seen there, but not anyone to maintain the house. Finally it became tended to after the story was a topic of several talk shows.

Now she asked for and received the use of County Fire Dept. and City helicopters for a "tour" that was nothing more that a free trip for her staff. We see that the woman has no regard for tax dollars but more seriously, she was ignoring the fact that she would take out helicopters out of service from their regular duty. And what was the purpose? A sighseeing tour for her staff of 20- and that was totally bad. Maybe crazy is a better word for her personally need to throw her weight around to get her way in spite of the fact that all the reasons that were told to her were rejected - the tour must go on.

She is another one of the examples that exist to show absolute arrogance that some people either bring to the office or develop soon after arriving at their jobs.

Read the story to form your own conclusions. I just think that Steve Lopez was too gentle with this nonsense that went on. The City of L.A. contributed the service of one helicopter, too, and that was not reimbursed, but even if it was, it's paying with OTHER TAX DOLLARS anyway.

Pigs feeding at the public trough again, but if this woman had any sense at all, she would not have come up with this stupid waste of money, and if she was a bit less stupid, she'd have taken the cues that were given to her by the local representatives who ultimately gave in to the demands. They were probably afraid of repercussions if they refused her- and this kind of person is very likely one to complain, too.

Daylight Saving Time begins- are you still running on yesterday's time?

Today is the first day of Daylight Saving Time for 2010- coming earlier again in the year than it had been for years, thanks to a change in the law a while back.

If you didn't check all your clocks that don't automatically change, you will need to move the time setting one hour AHEAD to be synched with everyone, time-wise. Remember that this is "Saving," and not "Savings" in the title of this twice-yearly operation, a common mistake that you can correct people about to annoy them.

Enjoy the extra hour of daylight at the end of the day, but many will be getting up in the morning and heading out in the dark again for a while.

LAPD begins training officers on bike laws

The LAPD is moving along with the plan to train officers on the bike laws. You might have thought that it was just drivers and bike riders that were not aware of the law in this area, but many police officers are just as poorly educated here, too. The story is over at the LAist blog "LAPD Takes First Steps to Train Officers on Bicycle Laws," By Zach Behrens in News on March 11, 2010 5:45 PM. http://laist.com/2010/03/11/lapd_takes_steps_to_train_officers.php

This all came about from a City Council Transportation Committee meeting several weeks ago. The problems bike riders encountered were presented to the Committee and the LAPD Chief by a group of riders, the L.A. County Bicycle Coalition, relating their views and experiences. A bike rider was hit by a motorist downtown while on his way to work at City Hall and left in the street seriously injured and nothing if any serious reaction by the police happened, even after the woman appeared at a police station later to tell of her action. This was the catalyst for bike riders to protest law enforcement practices that were either wrong or not being followed by police in all areas and not just the LAPD.

According to the agreement from the Chief, education of officers would be included with their other training in the police academy. Officers now on the job will be given training to update them to create a uniform and correct knowledge and application of the laws in this area. This means that enforcement of existing laws would be followed and it's a situation that cuts both ways as far as bike riders and motorists are involved.

More details from the meeting of March 11, 2010, with the LAPD Task Force and an LAPD Commander and sargeant are reported by the L.A. County Bicycle Coalition, at http://lacbc.wordpress.com/2010/03/11/lapd-task-force-meeting-update-%E2%80%93-internal-code-enforcement-and-education-released/

Running stop signs and red lights will be worth a ticket for bike riders just as it is for motorists, for one example. I think the size of the fine for a red light ticket is up around $500 now, and possibly several times that figure with all the penalty assessments added in. Did you know that a $20 ticket for "using a cell phone hand-held while driving" is totalling between $120 and $145 when all the fees have been tacked on at court? So it is with all the other moving violations. I've read comments from law enforcement offiers that finding violations of that law is like shooting fish in a barrel, and could issue ticket all the time. Of course, that did not mean that there's much "enforcement" done, only that it's possible. And from seeing so many on their phones while driving, it's a law ignored by many who may think they only risk $20.

Read the LAist entry and check the ORDER issued to the officers to see some curent laws that will be getting some use for all sides:
http://lacbc.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/paysingermemo.pdf

There is law that requires a driver not to just open the driver's side door carelessly- often the reason for bike riders to crash or react quickly to avoid injury. It also can get a door knocked off by a passing vehicle. In each case the driver has the duty to use caution and a violation there means you lose in traffic or civil court when the excuse, "it was an accident" is used. You actually are required to check first to be sure it is safe before opening that door.

Well, there's a lot that many drivers don't know about, period. I may make a list of what I commonly see that demonstrates that but someday, not now. So, for Cars & Bikes, this will at least make everyone follow a few laws equally and with enforcement done properly to get some safer conditions to exist for all concerned.

County Supervisors as wasteful with tax money as L.A. City Council

The story in the L.A. Times bears out the fact that wasting taxpayer dollars is not a practice confined to the politicians at City Hall but also done, maybe even bettered by the Board of Supervisors for the County of Los Angeles. Each Supervisor gets $3.4 million dollars (taxpayer dollars) each year to use freely as they decide, for a $22 million total. This kind of money source that allows for accessibilty without any oversight is commonly referred to as a "slush fund."

"L.A. County supervisors spend millions on pet projects - From chauffeurs to charities to parties, the five-member board hands out money from its discretionary accounts with little oversight." By Garrett Therolf, March 10, 2010 5:40 p.m. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-discretion11-2010mar11,0,4253145,full.story

There is more that I want to get to on this story but there is so much happening with the money-dealing and mishandling all around in local and state politics and governmental agencies that compete for time to point these out. Read the story for some eye-opening views to have you informed on what kind of life-styles and attitudes the Board of Supervisors maintain at your expense.

Mark Ridley-Thomas, the elected replacement for Yvonne Braithwaite Burke as Supervisor, was the one who planned on using $700,000.00 to remodel his office a few months ago. A littel price for an office that only he thought needed immediate and major improvement. Guess what? The other four supervisors unanimously approved that. There was so much flak that the Board was getting from the public on this that they had to retract that approval. (There was a suggestion made to Ridley-Thomas that he do the remodelling in smaller chunks so as not to draw attention to the expenditure. Such sneaky devils, these politicians.)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I got this email reply about the Ridley-Thomas waste on January 4, 2010 from Supervisor Gloria Molina, a form letter (notice there's no salutation), but nevertheless a part of the Supervisor's "damage control" effort:

Thank you for your correspondence. I have received numerous letters, e-mails,
and phone calls from individuals expressing your same sentiment and I want you
to know that, for the most part, I agree with it. The funds allocated for the
office remodeling project you are unhappy about could pay for a great many
services, from health care and foster care to law enforcement and
transportation.

As you may or may not be aware, the expenditure came from Sup. Mark Ridley-Thomas' discretionary account, which means he may spend these funds at his discretion however he thinks is best for his district. However, Sup. Ridley-Thomas has since reconsidered his decision -- and, at the Tues., Dec. 22nd meeting of the Board of Supervisors, he moved to refer the item back to his office for reconsideration. In layman's terms, this means that the remodeling project has been rescinded for the time being, though Sup. Ridley-Thomas may resubmit office remodeling plans -- most likely at a much smaller sum -- in the future. All four other supervisors supported today's action -- including me.

For the record: As for myself and the discretionary money entrusted to me for the residents of the First District, I have always applied stringent standards when it comes to spending it. I have never approved such a large sum for office remodeling or any expense like it. First Supervisorial District discretionary monies go toward an array of projects and organizations -- but always with a public purpose.

Thank you again for your letter. Please feel free to contact me again regarding this or any other County-related matter.

Sincerely,

GLORIA MOLINA
Supervisor, First District
-----------------------------------------------------

Well, some of the spending that goes on does not appear to be in the "public's" interest, but more as a demonstration of vanity. Ridley-Thomas is one such case. According to the story, the supervisor spent $25,000.00 to have his name placed in a "Who's Who in Black Los Angeles," a very clear demonstration of the self-indulgence so many politicians engage in with public funds.

Read the story and let's see what you think about it all.

And as for the Molina reply, I guess SHE thought a Cultural Museum for Latinos, though important among the ideals one may hold, should be the recipient of $7 million of public funds. I see it differently. In these times we have seen health services shutting down and trauma centers and the like being reduced for lack of funds. A funding for a museum especially one of a separate ethnicity, may not be seen as the best choice by the general public for pouring in a huge amount of tax dollars. This was something that should not have been done with taxpayer money at all, especially since it's not been approved by any of the public or part of it.

Instead, what's worth doing as far as culture should be worth some fundraising efforts for private donations to show support for the idea. This is not the plasc for a supervisor who applies dollars collected, and collected as REQUIRED by law, with no choice in how the dollars are spent. Cultural things should be personal above all and not something that the government has to promote for a single ethnic group. Most culture in this country is promoted and sustained by the members of the group. They see the value to it, and it's their choice.

Molina is into her own agenda and I have mentioned before that getting votes is worth it at all costs- to the public, of course. That's part of the idea that I also mentioned before- a politicians first priority is keeping his or her office and working on getting re-elected or elected to another office when termed out.

Well, that's enough to think about for now along with what the story shows. Zev says the claim of $200,000.00 being spent on the web site, Twitter and Face book is "absurd." There's a guy in charge of that who is being paid very well.

Sappell, a former Times editor who heads the effort and other special projects,
earns a salary of $142,000, plus benefits.

He recently got a 5.5% raise.

Meanwhile, department heads' salaries are frozen.

Merlin Olson, ex-Ram, broadcaster and actor has died.

If you remember the old version of the Rams NFL team when they were in Los Angeles, you might have some memories of the Rams particular players back from the 60s and on, and one star was Merlin Olsen. Olsen was diagnosed with cancer, mesothelioma, in 2009 and died at City of Hope in Duarte on Thursday at the age of 69. “Hall of Fame football star, broadcaster and actor Merlin Olsen dies at 69.” By Keith Thursby, March 11, 2010 9:56 a.m. L.A. Times.
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-merlin-olsen12-2010mar12,0,4391015.story

Merlin Olsen was also a broadcaster doing sports on television for NBC, and he was a co-star to Michael Landon in “Little House on the Prairie,” and later starred in “Father Murphy.”

Olsen played with the L.A. Rams during their time in Los Angeles, and was part of the very effective “Fearsome Foursome” defensive line along with teammates Deacon Jones, Rosey Grier and Lamar Lundy.

There’s a long entry with many more details of his life- see Merlin Olsen at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merlin_Olsen

Willie Davis, the "3-dog" Dodger centerfielder dies.

Willie Davis has died at age 69. A friend found him dead at his home in Burbank. It's hard to believe he was 69. I remember that Vin Scully called him the "3 Dog" because it referred to something like a racing greyhound. And I remember that he was a Roosevelt alumnus from hearing about that from students from Roosevelt who also worked after school at the post office at Terminal Annex with me and a lot of other high school student workers back in my senior year.

Davis was just fast and he was on the Dodgers beginning in the 60's, replacing Duke Snider in centerfield. It was a time when there was good pitching with Drysdale, Koufax, and Podres among the names that quickly come to me as starters back when you had a lot of 20-game winners with lots of completed games. The bullpen was really good then, too.

The base running show in baseball seemed to belong to the Dodgers with shortstop Maury Wills being the pioneer in modern base stealing. Davis was able to steal bases and could advance on batted balls very effectively, getting more bases out of a play than some players in the same situation.

When Maury Wills got on base as the regular lead off hitter, there was always a chant of "Go,Go, Go" when he was on a base stealing binge. Wills got on base and no matter how many moves a pitcher had and how many times he had Wills diving back to the bag to avoid a pick off, Wills could still get that stolen base. And then this repeated to move over to third many times, too. I'm sure all that experience of playing with Wills helped Willie Davis get his own base-stealing skills improved quickly. Later base runners broke Wills' record that was 50 stolen bases, as I recall. Lou Brock was probably the next record holder, and then later a lot more. Wills made it an art.

But Willie Davis just had pure speed and it seemed could get to any ball in the field in a few strides and on the bases, he could get around just about as fast. He could hit, too. Another thing about him was his deep, deep voice that was instantly recognizable when he was on pre-game or post-game shows. The Dodgers back then were like the movie stars of old, a lot of glamour and ability to perform. These days I just can't get used to the idea of being a fan of millionaires with a roster that constantly changes. It's progress that reflects other changes in life where you can't expect to have the same job all your life and a few career changes during that time is the prediction.

"Dodgers' Davis, who hit in 31 straight, dies - Center fielder batted .279 with 2,561 hits in his 16-year career." By Bailey Stephens, MLB.com
http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20100309&content_id=8729952&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

I sure hate to hear about the passing of the people that gave us some real shows as athletes and others in the music field with the same ability to give us some good entertainment and memories. Well, Sandy Koufax is still around and so is Maury Wills. And don't forget Vin Scully, the announcer that's been modelled after by so many and has created a lot of descriptive phrases that have become regularly used by others. The "Towering Fly Balls" and a fielder "on his horse" to get to a ball, were examples of such color that's gifted the L.A. Dodgers audiences over the years. Many of the Dodgers of the 60s have passed on, but a few still are around and have a lot of stories they could tell us.

[For the Willie Davis wikipedia listing with some impressive stats, summaries and details, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willie_Davis_(baseball) ]

Farts and a city council meeting; Do you remember the "Make Me Laugh" t.v. show?

There used to be a television show in the 70's that I remember called "Make Me Laugh" and if I am correct, Jay Leno appeared on it a lot as a young comic. It challenged the contestant to resist a comic's performance in a a set time of 30 seconds or a minute. And like the title tips you off, if you didn't laugh, you would win some prizes.

When I was teaching, and it was in high school, not jr. high, there were some things that could easily make us laugh in a classroom setting. I was usually able to hold out the best, but it was only because I was so used to a lot of the silliness that happens in a school setting. Nothing like jr. high humor in an adult setting to be a real ice breaker as shown in this video of a city council meeting - and it's not L.A. where you have a lot of windbags there in competition to give us all kinds of their gaseous offerings, but that's a different story. (From Dec. 2008; 1 min: 15 secs).


O.K., now you saw all that and the laughs that it prompted. And I can't really be sure what it is about these sounds that caused the reactions it did, but again, jr. high humor can be so basic and reach so many people to elicit a response.

The video clip below gives us an answer on the source but not on the reason for the humor being what it is. It seems that there's an iPhone app called "iFart." A "Today Show" segment presents this in a more academic setting to show us more about that. (1 min: 24 secs). I'm sorry but that just seems to take out a large part of the humor that you have happening with any live event generating the same audio inspiration.



And that's the break from some of the antics at City Hall that, unfortunately, although clownish, gives us more of the tragedy side than the comedy side of the arts.

More Deception in City Council Chambers- "Yes" votes whether present or not, Times' report shows.

This story clears up a lot of suspicions on what really goes on in and behind Council Chambers. The fact is that the Council members rarely remain in their seats during the entire meeting, and usually can be found with their attention turned to conversations they are having with others at or around their seats. Sometimes they are missing and whenever that absence is remarked upon by a constituent from the podium, Eric Garcetti is quick to reply that they do have their audio outside of the chambers to keep CMs apprised of the comments. Now we see the bigger picture on that situation.

"Automatic 'yes' votes allow time for back-room dealing at City Hall - Thanks to voting software, City Council members can hold meetings, give interviews, even grab a smoke while deciding the day's issues."
By David Zahniser and Maeve Reston, L.A. Times, March 8, 2010 5:37 p.m.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-backroom9-2010mar09,0,194476,full.story

You have to wonder why this charade is tolerated when you have this body so full of itself that they constructed their own "rules of decorum" for speakers in the Council meetings last year, with the penalty of banishment from speaking again at the podium for a specified number of days. This was a thinly veiled action that was mainly directed at Zuma Dogg who has continually pointed out their shortcomings and has been often indelicate in making these comments. However, the free speech issues are at issue and he's presented a case in federal court to challenge the practices.

Jan Perry, presiding over the Council meeting a couple of weeks ago. She's often needing cues from assistants with the procedures during the meetings, but had no trouble cutting Zuma Dogg's time short quickly one day because his voice was "too loud." Perry cut off his microphone, telling him, "You're done," as he did not comply with her complaint. Then she had him banned from 30 meetings- "meetings," not "days"- for a profanity uttered after he was cut off. I have heard others with louder presentations over the last few months that have not received any such "warning" and see that this enforcement of these "decorum" rules is all subjectively applied when they get irritated with a speaker, and usually but not always, it's Zuma Dogg. CM Perry that day was totally off in her count of "minutes remaining" for public comment, and on another day during a special meeting, she was calling for "general public comment" when there is no "public comment" allowed if it's a "special meeting"- and theh she reached the end of a short agenda, almost caught by surprise judging from her reaction to that news.

Well, on the behind-the-scenes level of Council chicanery, you now have an "auto pilot" permanently set on the electronic voting mechanism to produce a "Yes" vote for any phantom council member. Reading the story shows just how detached the CMs have become from their expected job of being attentive to what's going on AND to STAY there while this is all going on. I usually see Alarcon and Cardenas as the ones who appear above the rules by their comments and the way they handle discussions and questioning of department personnel. A lot of arrogance with not too much purpose other than trying to look like they know what they are doing. Really, they are aware that they are on t.v. and they play all this up for the cameras so the uninitiated can believe these guys are sharp, which they are not, at least not sharp enough to have good solutions.

The real potential for procedural disaster would be to be with too few CMs present to constitute a quorum, thus no action of legal effect could be conducted by the Council. If quorum is lost and a vote is taken, that result should be void- but with the very loose application of everything they should be doing, who is going to make that deterimination? There is not "traffic cop" in the council chambers to keep track of these things. We see in the story that "listening" would be a few steps above what's really happening, since audio is not present in many of the examples for any comprehension by a CM of what's transpiring before a vote. They are often not even aware that a vote is happening when they leave if the are conducting a backroom meeting.

One other item that is mentioned gives us an example of another imbalance of access to these CMs who are supposed to represent us. The meetings and conversations are often with "lobbyists" as noted in calendars of the CMs. Consider WHO is getting the most attention by CMs during or outside the meetings: A "lobbyist" who is paid by a client is the agent with the job of getting the client's desired outcome agreed to by a CM. Like the pharmacy reps that visit the doctors offices to get their brand of medicines prescribed. What about the private citizen, the regular man or woman who wants to have Council members hear and fairly evaluate their 2-minute comment - sometimes only 1-minute is allowed if there are very many seeking to speak?

Let's see now. A lobbyist in the office of a CM to make their pitch on something for their clients that is a one-on-one encounter of a conversational style vs. the public commenter at the podium who gets no feedback or direct exchange with any CMS, while the CMs go about the regular business? They may or may not be listening at all. Who's the one that you would expect gets their point or points across for the CMs to consider?

And to close on this topic for now, what about the NEW members of the Council, Paul Koretz and Paul Krekorian who had to learn about this system and DID NOT REVEAL it or challenge it? It seems that when you come into the Council you are with 'em or again' 'em, so the compliance with theses secrets seems to be more important to them both, than to bring it out for the public's knowledge and reaction to this practice. But they did NOT say anything of the sort and were not the ones responsible for exposing the practice. Good job for David Zahniser and Maeve Reston, L.A. Times reporters. Koretz and Krekorian get some demerits for lack of action that should have been taken on their parts.

It comes down to the CMs guilty of more failings that a CM should be handling properly. Other cities noted in the story do not allow a vote to count for their members who have left the floor. So in L.A. we only give lip service to things that the City Council considers not to be too important- like voting on motions. And that just doesn't sit well with me, at least. Next March we will be voting for all the even numbered districts' CMs. A lot of changes should be made and the more you examine with city council, the more reasons you see for change.

More Raises approved Friday for DWP, but Council unanimously sees this as a "good deal."

"Pay increase for DWP managers gets OK -
EXPENSE: Retroactive boost is expected to cost agency $5.5 million.
By Rick Orlov, Staff Writer, L.A. Daily News, Updated: 03/05/2010 10:34:17 PM PST
http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_14523162

This is an example of the direction the city is going, one big downward random spiral that ends with a big thud upon impact with the ground at the bottom of it's travel. You have city employee layoffs announced in the thousands- and the next several years are as bleak on the deficit side of things, but you have the DWP being your biggest regular bill next to housing and transportation, normally, if you happen to live in the city.

But Jack Humphreville, an activist and a member of the DWP Oversight Committee, questioned the decision.

"The council is approving a lump sum payment to the highest-paid city workers at the same time the DWP is shortchanging the cash-starved city with its transfer," Humphreville said, referring to a $147 million revenue transfer approved this week.

"At the same time, the IBEW is forcing the DWP to forgo competitive bidding on solar projects that will end up costing ratepayers even more."

The DWP is pretty much in the hands of the IBEW who have made this agency their own. If you heard the 8 a.m. special panel discussion in City Hall last week about the budget, hosted by CM Jose Huizar, you heard a lot of ideas on how we can get better representation, in the varied theories and observations that the panelists presented.

If you heard the ending, the last panelist, Ron Kaye, stated observations and drew some conclusions that were more along realistic lines than purely theoretical. Kaye's view, although very accurate, was somthing of a welcome surprise with it's bluntness, noting that the IBEW's leverage is the ability to shut down the city if it doesn't get it's way.

How did things get that way? Probably in the same way that we have see the arrival of the current budget disaster- the Council Members and Mayor applied the "Why Not?" test to all requests and proposals presented from the union, the IBEW local, and really, as with most things, they did not think of the long term or even many short term consequences and risks that were created by their decisions. The union, for their end of things in discussions and negottiations, kept leading the way for all kinds of things to come to the union's side, but the Council and Mayor followed that lead until we reached the end of the road now and it's turned out to be a cliff with a big drop.

It didn't happen overnight and other administrations may be sharing the blame, but when you get closer to the fire, you should have to noticee the heat. But before that unavoidable sensation, there were some warning signgs and maybe even see some smoke and flames before then, visible from some distance. Those signs were not heeded, and avoidance and remedial actions never really happened as the downhill slide to come was just made steeper while all the money being handled in the real estate market was too good to be true- and we saw that ended with a the falling dominoes effect reaching far and wide.

So now, the City "leaders" have no ability to deal on an equal footing with the unions and especially the IBEW. The results? Now we get these insane deals that happen as we have heard Council members discuss layoffs of police, brown out reductions in ambulance service in fire stations and some 4,000 layoffs that CM Alarcon was vehement in his correction of CAO Santana's term, and insisted that this should be calle "reductions in 4,000 positions." Call it what you want, there's still a big problem with the money to spread around and it's getting worse by the day. But at least the DWP is going to stay strong and comfy as they plan how to get out the next round of rate hikes for a list of things that will bring in more cash. And there's more information on that to come.

Karen Bass looks to seat in Congress while up to old habits in State Assembly

Karen Bass was the former speaker in the state assembly, moving out last Friday as John Perez, Antonio Villaraigosa's cousin, takes the position over last Monday. She is going out, leaving the Assembly soon because she has reached the end according to term limits, so, just like a lot of career politicians feel they must do, they have another office in their sights. She has found the congressional seat being vacated by the retiring Diane Watson as her new perch.

"L.A. Mayor Villaraigosa endorses former Assembly Speaker Karen Bass for Congress," March 3, 2010 2:51 pm Phil Willon at L.A. City Hall, L.A. Times blog http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/california-politics/2010/03/la-mayor-endorses-former-assembly-speaker-karen-bass-for-congress.html

With Antonio endorsing her, you should know she's bad news. Antonio is proof that quality and successful mangement are not needed to win elections. Neither is good character but that's not viewed by very many to matter anyway as you check Tony's track record.

There's a second story that falls into line with the Karen Bass style of politicss

"Bass promotes, gives raises to 20 staffers on final day as Assembly speaker," By Jim Sanders, in the Sacramento Bee, Published: Friday, Mar. 5, 2010
http://www.sacbee.com/2010/03/05/2584343/bass-promotes-20-staffers-boosts.html The ever-rationalizing Bass defended the raises with the idea that workers deserve rasies for a good job. Well, that may be so, but didn't she hear that people are being furloughed and there's been a policy of no raises, a pay freeze, in the state legislature. The Senate has followed that but Bass' own creation of execptions, as mentioned in the story, causes one to wonder if there are any other "exceptions" being created in the assembly.

"We definitely succeeded in tightening our belt," she said. "This year I also very frugally tried to measure out moderate pay increases for some Assembly employees who were taking on new responsibilities, and I specifically eliminated other positions that more than covered the cost of those modest increases.

"This allows the Assembly to retain staff and, at the same time, it reflects and respects the tough times we are in," Bass said

Bass, if you remember back to last year, was quickly backtracking on a slew of raises she gave then when the state's financial condition was about as bad as it is now. She probably would not have backed down then if she was not outed in the news and in the blogosphere. But now she's leaving for good and this is her gift at taxpayers' expense, while others in the Assembly honor the no-rasies policy. And she is a follower of the idea that whatever ails you (or the state) will be fixed with by finding lots more tax dollars to spend on it. Using some responsible spending practices could have some application somewhere along the way but that would put a crimp in their style and cut down on the rewards to friends, all affecting the ability to get votes.

Karen Bass, I noticed during the tax hike talks of last year, began to adjust her vocabulary to surgically remove that wicked word, "taxes." Bass replaced it with the less threatening sound of "revenues" as she spoke of the areas where the state was coming up short. So suddenly, everyone of the spending critics can relax- no new taxes. Not quite.

Make no mistake, Bass is a true politician and moving forward to run for another elected position so she can remain on the public payroll. The raises she issued for 20 persons, part of the Democratic caucus staff, may not have been for top salaried persons and maybe the staffers could use the money, duh, but who couldn't? EVERYONE is stuck with no money to spare in the state government- HOW can she say she's entitled to make up her own exceptions? It's really the failure to make the effort, to be consistent between actions and behavior, and really, just to demonstrate that they really care. Hence, the conclusion is that we have lots of liars in office.

The answer to "How could she do that?" is that she did this last Friday, the last day that she was in power as the Assembly Speaker, so she needed no other approval. "What the hell?" she must have thought, "Who is gong to stop me now? I'm leaving anyway and they'll get over it." And so she did it. As I said, What do you expect when you have Tony V. lavishing her with his praises? They are friends of long standing, and so he easily endorses her candidacy for Congress. The "birds of a feather flock together" effect. Not a song title here, but a simple and true observation- Tony even cites his long-term friendship with Bass in the story. Villaraigosa's style of management has put L.A. into the fast lane to bankruptcy while this realization must have come as something of a surprise to him, the news being passed along to him undoubtedly by an aide, one of the dozens he's hired, all essential I suppose, since the boss is hardly ever in town, and when he made a pit stop at City Hall between junkets. When he is here, he's still out to lunch - or a photo opp. Truly, Villaraigosa will go down as the worst mayor of L.A.

Last night it was the Pre Oscars Party at the city mansion, Getty House, hosted by the Mayor, who just can't get enough of all that mingling with celebrities, especially movie stars. And you know there's a good helping of the City Council members there, too, following on his coat tails. All this pretense that it's to get more businees from the motion picture industry. Well if that's the case, it's not the stars to pander to, but the producers and decison makers who for years have decided that "L.A. is NOT the place to be" when it comes to making movies. The City's "business unfriendly" practices have created an environment that has chased out dozens of business each year- a conservative estimate.

When businesses leave L.A. sometimes they move to neighboring cities with less onerous conditions to deal with, sometimes they move out of state and sometimes they just quit. In every case, they take jobs with them. Trying to squeeze every last dollar of every last person or business in L.A. is what it's all coming to and it's probably only to be remedied in a bankruptcy court. Karen Bass can represent the area of Los Angeles in Washington, after the next election and think back how she helped her friends do all this for L.A. as she collects her check, gets a staff, benefits, and enjoys a condition that most in L.A. could not even imagine for themselves.

Well, read all the story items and see for yourself that Karen Bass has managed to achieve a degree of arrogance in office that any transgressions committed by her don't even get as much as a flinch from her when she's confronted with questions. It's all about the culture of "entitlement" that many in politics have wallowed in for so long that they have no notion of decorum or as the legal profession likes to term it with judges, "the appearance of impropriety." All that means that it just looks bad, it doesn't have to actually BE bad. In Bass' case, as wtih others "on duty" in Sacramento, she IS doing bad- not yet illegal, but it doesn't have to be to hurt the process or the public.

Glassell Park NC sponsors Community Forum on Budget Crisis- More

IT'S TOMORROW: Glassell Park NC Sponsors a Budget Crisis Community Forum

Councilmember and Chair of the Budget and Finance Committee, Bernard Parks will be present to update the community on the City of Los Angeles most recent budget developments.

On Saturday, March 6, 2010-
The Glassell Park Neighborhood Council is sponsoring a free Community Forum on the City's Budget Crisis.

9:00 to 10:30 AM
The forum is scheduled from 9:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. at the Community Center, 3750 North Verdugo Road, Los Angeles, CA 90065. [It's at Verdugo Road at Eagle Rock Bl.- entrance is at the back using the driveway- easily missed as it's a part of "storage center" structure.]

Refreshments will be provided. Please see flyer for more information.
=========================================================================

additional information on the rest of schedule:

AT 10:30AM - The meeting transitions to the Los Angeles Neighborhood Council Coalition meeting until 1:00PM

AT 1 PM- Then the DWP Committee (of the LANCC) will meet until 2PM

Bobby Espinosa, "El Chicano" Keyboardist, dies at 60.

"Bobby Espinosa dies at 60; keyboardist for 1970s Latin soul band El Chicano -El Chicano's sound blended funk, jazz, rock and R&B. The East L.A. group had top-40 hits in the '70s with 'Viva Tirado' and 'Tell Her She's Lovely.'
March 01, 2010By Claire Noland, Times staff writer, Randy Lewis contributed to this report. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/mar/01/local/la-me-bobby-espinosa2-2010mar02

From NPR's blog, there's an obituary, "Requiem For A Latin Pioneer: Bobby Espinosa," by Felix Contreras, http://www.npr.org/blogs/ablogsupreme/2010/03/requiem_for_bobby_espinosa.html that includes their big recording "Viva Tirado," written by bandleader Gerald Wilson, a big band favorite and a big name in music. I heard that song played by The Gerald Wilson Big Band at a jazz concert in MacArthur Park as a Playboy Jazz Festival pre-event to promote jazz. It was before that park became a haven for crime- and Wilson introduced the song, as I remember it, "This was done by some Mexican boys who became famous with it, but I wrote it," I do think he was just a little annoyed about how that worked out. That same concert included Poncho Sanchez and my neighbor down the street played trombone with that band but I only found that out from seeing my neighbor's kid hanging around. Sure enough, he was up there later with Poncho Sanchez and the rest of the band.

The YouTube videos in that blog posting have some good sound with the second song, "Cubano Chant," really providing a good demonstration of Espinosa's talent on the keyboards at such a young age, and at this time he was no more than 20 years old- (I know because we have the same year of birth, 4 months difference, and at the time this album came out in January 1970 I was just a junior in college with another year to go ) and I played that album whenever I got a chance. I still have it. There were not too many recordings of any local flavor at that time and that was O.K. since this band was very good.

In a review from the L.A. TImes from almost two years ago, there is a pretty informative review on the band before it was to perform at the Greek Theater in the annual "Latin Legends Live" event with El Chicano, War and Tierra on the bill.
"El Chicano recaptures magic," MUSIC REVIEW-May 27, 2008 Agustin Gurza, Times Staff Writer http://articles.latimes.com/2008/may/27/entertainment/et-chicano27 You could tell Gurza is a fan and fills in a little more history of this and the other bands. I really don't know if Tierra was a "spinoff" off El Chicano as a different writer, not Gurza, described the chronology. I haven't seen the either of the Salas Brothers for a long time to see if that matches their recollection. I do see Bobby Navarrete from the original "Tierra" group (all these Lincoln alumni are found everywhere) a little more frequently and might ask him. He was the one who told his brother of the passing of Bobby Espinosa and I found out that way at a family event on Monday. Bobby Espinosa's health was declining but he was still performing with the band until recently, I was told.


I am adding an item about Ersi Arvizu, the female singer that was on that "Viva Tirado" album singing "Sabor a Mi" so memorably. From the L.A. Times, "CULTURE MIX -
"Finding her voz again - Ry Cooder coaxes El Chicano's Ersi Arvizu back from a long break." May 03, 2008 Agustin Gurza, Times Staff Writer
[correction: Ersi Arvizu's outstanding vocal performance of "Sabor A Mi" was on their next album, "Revolucion," where you can find a whole new set of songs, with an enjoyable treatment of the Archies' "Sugar, Sugar." r.g.]
http://articles.latimes.com/2008/may/03/entertainment/et-culture3 This was also written by Gurza at the same time period and there's a lot here, including comment by Bobby Espinosa that bears out the quality of all. There's mention in one of these articles about how there is just not a lot of the Eastside bands around now. I don't think that's any mystery. That's something that I think has to do with rap music which is to me something that omits the part where you have musicians in the group. But that's my opinion and if it were the popular one, you sure wouldn't have a lot of wealthy rappers. But the old school groups were something to relish in those days.

Like a lot of things with local Latinos, we always have some contact with people who worked with or are related to others of celebrity status. And so it was with Ersi Arvizu that one relation, a very nice woman and friend, worked with me and my wife for years, along with about another hundred people including the future L.A. Mayor, and the future husband of Spvr. Molina ( small world for L.A. Latinos), and this friend passed away many years ago at a very young age. It's interesting to me how music can trigger a lot of recollections and feelings of all sorts in most people, especially as you get older and have new experiences.

Actually, El Chicano was less of the legacy brand of music from the Eastside and more of a new style band, emerging as a commercially successful entity onto the pop scene as the 7o's began. It was a very good sound and one very good guitarist I came to know about 13 years ago, had a band that played "Tell Her She's Lovely" incredibly faithful to the originally produced El Chicano version. His band played songs in their original forms, that was their special talent, and they in the band all had good voices, too, but it goes to show how some songs were so well liked by so many.

I never knew the band members in El Chicano personally but I did see them play on occassion and I always enjoyed their songs and their sound, a big part of which was created by Bobby Espinosa. El Chicano came out at a time when, politically and socially, things were changing for a minority that had long been in the background of society and the boldness of the name chosen for this band brought out a new kind of prideful feeling just as the younger Mexican Americans were becoming attached to that identity. I am not sure exactly what impact this band had as far as movements go, but it was definitely significant even if it cannot be reduced to some tangible concept at this moment. And that's why I choose to recognize Espinosa and the band in this small way as he has left them and us, but like all musicians, the recordings they left will keep their memory constantly with us.
================================================
Ed. Note:
[Since the posting yesterday, I found a web site that's grown a bit since the last time I checked it, I guess a longer time ago than I thought. If anyone would like to explore more of the music of the Eastside and the people that made it, Mark Guerrero's web site has a tremendous amount of information with bio pages on El Chicano and Ersi Arvizu. Mark is also a musician with roots in the Eastside and the son of Lalo Guerrero, another Latin Legend in his own right. http://markguerrero.net/ ]

A Dog Video To Enlighten and Inspire

Time for a break from examining all the sub-par work that we are getting out of the highest paid city council in the Country, rivaled only by the state legislature.

I found this video on a blog from a KFI640 producer, Michelle Kube, (credit where credit is due) that carried the title "Get A Tissue." I was ready to see something gruesome that might be from an animal version of the "SAW" movie series, but it was a very impressive video to watch.

Real Life "Stand and Deliver" Garfield Teacher battling cancer.

Former Garfield High teacher Jaime Escalante has cancer and his family has depleted their available funds. This is what the L.A. Times story Monday reported. If that name does not ring a bell for you, you might recognize the title of the 1988 movie, "Stand and Deliver," starring James Edward Olmos as the teacher of the calculus class at Garfield, Jaime Escalante. The news of the condition of Jaime Escalante was shared by James Edward Olmos on his web site.

There are several websites that reflect the circumstances in their own way. The L.A. Times brings us the news, in the "L.A. Now" news blog
"Legendary East L.A. teacher Jaime Escalante battles cancer." March 1, 2010 7:50 pm, by Robert J. Lopez http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/03/jaime-escalante-cancer.html
One of the things that Escalante was able to show was that good teaching methods can allow students to learn and apply what they learned to demonstrate proficency when many before had no real expectations for achievement. That "lowering of the bar" is a reaction that still goes on now to settle for mediocrity where a much higher capacity for learning by students lies untapped.

Escalante was able to see his students learn and excel as the movie portrays very clearly. From what I gather from the stories, at 79 years old, and from what experience I have accumulated over the years with cancer, his comfort is one goal and continued treatements may be effective depending on the advancement stage of the cancer.

I think that Escalante has really been an under-appreciated individual and I don't know why there was not much that LAUSD appeared to gain institutionally from Escalante's teaching to be able to duplicate his successes in a district wide setting. This is something that I see as an LAUSD weakness. When they see that something is working in any area of academics or skill, there is no real ability to capture what makes that happen. There is no real ability that is described in other industry actions as "reverse-engineering" done on any specific level that I have seen or heard about, but instead, it's more experiments as a favored approach to solutions. The experiments are selected by the school board and that sends more money down the pipeline to pay for consultants and vendors used with new programs without any assurances of success.

Jaime Escalante was a contemporary teaching star, with story that was so different, actually it was incredible, that it was made into a movie. This was a success that I believe made Escalante the most famous teacher in the district. I think every one of my students, mostly 9th and 10th graders, in my few years of teaching had seen that movie somewhere earlier in their school careers and knew the story well. The real successes in teaching students don't seem to be spreading anywhere and maybe it is something that needs more attention instead of always going for new theories, something akin to grasping at straws by the District, as if that's the only choice.

On another blog, "The Democratic Underground," http://www.democraticunderground.com/ , it take the reported news from "Source: USAToday" for a Mar 02, 2010 story, "Cast raises money for real 'Stand and Deliver' math teacher's fight with cancer." http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x7826671

At another local blog, "Losanjealous.com" http://www.losanjealous.com
they carry the story as "Friends of Jaime”–Jaime Escalante Cancer Fight Donation Fund," by Losanjealous - Tuesday March 02nd 2010 http://www.losanjealous.com/2010/03/02/friends-of-jaime-jaime-escalante-cancer-fight-donation-fund with a letter by James Edward Olmos reproduced that asks for help in a very passionate reflection of Escalante's impact on students and on ideas of education.

There is a .PDF form: http://www.edwardjamesolmos.com/PDF/JAIME-ESCALANTE-DONATION.pdf for making contributions by credit card to the main fund site in Pasadena obtained from the home page of James Edward Olmos.

Today, March 2nd, in Music History

From the web site, http://www.laradio.com/, for L.A. Radio People, in the REWIND section, there's the bit of music history that I saw that I caught my attention and a few other things for March 2nd I picked out to note here.

On March 2, 1999, Dusty Springfield died of cancer. She was always one of my favorite singers- The Look of Love, Wishin' and Hopin', I Only Want To Be With You, and Son of a Preacher Man from the "Dusty in Mephis" album. That was released on March 1st of 1969 and was considered to be one of the all time great albums.

I liked Dusty Springfield's recording of "The Look of Love" that I associate somehow with the last year of high school, 1967. It's one song that for me just takes me back to a different time every time I hear it and it always gets my attention like that whenever I hear it. The other song that has that same effect for me, but is more upbeat and minus all the melancholy, while still putting me back into that same period of time is The Fifth Dimension's "Up, Up and Away." I liked all those other songs on that album, too, and I know I played it a lot. Just great sounding voices all around for Dusty and for The Fifth Dimension.

I've read that Dusty Springfield just came on the scene too early and could have been a more successful artist had she arrived later when women were able to do more in the way of managing themselves in the music business. She was one considered one of those blue-eyed soul singers and the Memphis session for Atlantic Records did much to support that opinion.

March 2, 1974- Stevie Wonder's "Innervisions" won a Grammy for Best Album of the year. I remember that time since I bought that album and three others of the 5 nominees, Paul Simon's "There Goes Rhymin' Simon" album with "Kodachrome," Bette Midler's "The Divine Miss M," and Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly." I bought these before the Grammy nominations were made and this was back was when there was so much music that really sounded like music, and most with stories to them.

One other very interesting fact from that L.A Radio column today was, "1964 - Beatles begin filming their first movie, A Hard Day's Night, budgeted at $500,000." That year was the beginning of the "British Invasion" and it seeme that no one could get enough of the Beatles. I wish that I had the time to listen to all the music I managed to accumulate, but there's always a lot that work like time machines to bring back memories, but that's all from so long ago that I think I avoid playing some on purpose so as not to think about how much time has passed. ============================================================

Here's a few other March 2nd events in Music History that I found on my own:

Born: Karen Carpenter – March 2, 1950- and she died so young so needlessly. She died on February 4, 1983 of anorexia nervosa.

Number One on March 2: 1963 Four Seasons: Walk Like a Man US #45
In 1963, the Four Seasons became the first group to have 3 consecutive #1’s in the US when “Walk Like A Man” started a three week run at the top.

Born today in 1938 , Lawrence Payton, vocals, The Four Tops. Payton died on June 20, 1997.

There's a lot of artists that I like to listen to that now have on their biographies, right next to the date of birth, their date of death. Time just seems to pass so quickly.

Mayor wants your money for DWP again- Beware.

"L.A. Mayor Villaraigosa considers a carbon surcharge for DWP customers - The extra revenue would be used to move the utility from coal to wind, solar and geothermal sources of energy. The mayor wants 20% of the agency's power to come from renewables by December." By David Zahniser, L.A. Times, February 28, 2010. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dwp-rates1-2010mar01,0,4539226.story Again, the Mayor is creating the result as he pleases to punish L.A. residents for his own sins.

Unless the DWP secures the extra revenue, Villaraigosa will not meet his goal of having 20% of the utility's electricity come from renewable sources by Dec. 31, said former Deputy Mayor Sean Clegg, a political consultant who worked on a voter survey dealing with the issue.

"Without a carbon surcharge . . . the DWP is going to start going backwards on the renewable portfolio," he said.

Clegg said the mayor had not settled on the size of a proposed surcharge, which could be higher or lower than the $2.50 proposal included in a voter survey commissioned by the mayor. That poll, commissioned by Villaraigosa's Committee for Government Excellence and Accountability, concluded that 64% of respondents would support a $2.50 surcharge.

The results were obtained, in part, to influence the city's "opinion makers" -- including the City Council, which will probably vote on a new DWP surcharge in coming weeks.

This is, to put it mildly, more crap from the Mayor's office- and I say his "office" since I don't completely believe he does much work on his own, but has all this staff he's hired doing work that Villaraigosa himself might do if he ever decided to stick around L.A. for other than photo opps and parties. It is another plan to perform that surgery that separates money from the person, and trying to do it at a $2.50 a month clip, so as to be "painless." Don't believe that this rate is where it will end.

The other part of this story is that the "survey" that is used as a basis for forming the conclusion that their a majority in support of that charge is the survey is FROM A SMALL SAMPLE. They like to tell you all about the statistics but don't tell you about the data source so you can see how the responses were elicited. Shaping the results of a poll is one possibilty when you don't see how the questions were asked. Without more of the numbers upon which they make these claims, I can't believe anyone wants more taxes, and that's what it is, a tax and not a fee.

There is something novel that I saw from the story- Council member Jan Perry making a statement that actually is a reaonable assessment of the situation and makes some sense, a true rarity, and here it is:

Councilwoman Jan Perry said it would be "hard to explain" why the city is scaling back on services, including road repairs and libraries, while asking DWP customers to absorb more expensive bills.

"I think this is a tough time to ask people about any increase, unless you've made a very strong case to show that you have reduced operating costs as much as possible," she said.

And she might have gathered this little bit of pure wisdom from the City Council's action in December 2009, again with DWP, approving the contract that gave raises when Jan Perry herself mentioned last week in a heated exchange with Krekorian about the need for 4,000 layoffs being discussed in December 2008, a year before the approval of the DWP contracts. From the December 11, 2009 L.A. Times story:

Council members agreed to give a 3.25% increase this year and four consecutive
raises ranging from 2% to 4%, depending on inflation.

The agreement was negotiated in a year that police will receive no raises and other civilian workers are experiencing pay cuts between December and June.

The agreement drew fire from Jack Humphreville, a DWP critic who said it was unfair for the utility’s employees to get raises when others civilian workers face such sacrifices.

It was all a sweetheart deal that the council approved unanimously- as they approve most things in unison with each other. That was something that challenged simple logic and generated more spin to cover the outcome as not being total lunacy, but as far as I could figure it out, it was absolutely irreconcilable with any notions of rational and prudent behavior on the part of the City Council. Perry probably was trying to avoid a repeat performance after that December bending over for the IBEW union that represents the DWP workers.

Representatives of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 18, which represents 8,648 DWP employees, have argued that the DWP already helps the city budget by providing more than $200 million each year to the general fund, which pays for police, firefighters and other services. Meanwhile, Council President Eric Garcetti said that city civilian employees would see a raise of nearly 6% in 2011.

All these quotes were from the story in the L.A. Times at http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/12/la-council-unanimously-approves-raise-for-dwp-employees.html?cid=6a00d8341c630a53ef01287648a0c9970c

You have something shown in this story that is up front as something very important and you have to question this just a little bit. Its the Union's acknowledgement of a passing over to the city general fund of a sum of $200 million dollars yearly. And Garcetti has the shortsightedness in budget terms to state the city workers' raise of almost 6% in 2011 ( do you think that's still happening?). $200 million a year? And this goes to the city like some Godfather coming in to collect his cut? The idea to me seems that the DWP should have any of the excess money over the expenses either refunded to customers or, (and importantly, neglected) re-invested into the infrastructure to replace or perform maintenance on worn or failing equipment. We see bursting water mains regularly now and a firefighter was killed in an explosion just over a year ago when an electrical vault exploded. That death was attributed to faulty equipment within the DWP's responsibility.

It's an agency run just like a slumlord who takes out money from the tenants and does not put any back to maintain the premises, his lawful obligation to do. And the money collected appears to be "profit" based on the neglect of the duties to provide proper facilities for the tenant's payment of rent. It's like that with the DWP but the City Council only looked into it when problems are put in their faces. DWP should not have all this "money to spare" that it has. Maybe that's something to consider before they try these plans to raise their rates.

One more thing- these surveys really are bogus operations. They put things online to placate critics so as to create a feeling of "making a difference" when you take the survey. Except that everything is slanted to get your answers to fit in neat pigeon-holes that the survey-takers use to support their claims of approval by the public. That's what is happening here when they say approvals are shown. Not everyone even knows about the surveys and then others see online solicitations by the mayor and have no interest in aiding their attempt to validate a survey crafted to show a pre-planned result.

They don't use actual numbers, just "percentages"- do we have all 4 million residents or maybe just 4000 persons in the city participating? I have to look upon this with a lot of doubt and suspicion since distortion and misrepresentation have been used very freely in Los Angeles politics.

So when I see Jan Perry's statement on the current surcharge matter, I have to be surprised from seeing a recognition by her of the problem and more significantly, that she actually learned something from her nonsensical vote last December for these DWP raises.

Mayor's Hands Off LAPD message; Budget Chart Visualization of City Expenses.

"Villaraigosa Wants You to Play Budget, Just Don't Touch the LAPD" By Zach Behrens in "News" on February 16, 2010. LAist Blog.
http://laist.com/2010/02/16/villaraigosas_budget_challenge_leav.php

Here's another example to show you that the Mayor's digging in his heels to resist cuts for the LAPD. This is from February 16th, a couple of weeks ago, and the story should be no surprise since the Mayor has never accepted the fact that keeping the current level of officers is very expensive.

The real bit of enlightenment here is the small but informative chart that shows the key parts of the city budget categories. It shows howthe General and Special funds differ in dollar and employee sizes as parts of the entire city government. You can see the relative sizes to help see the sizes of what we are dealing with as the budget crisis becomes more of a critical care item with each passing day.

The city council is really at about full panic level, ready to sell off anything not nailed down- and that would be a mistake by getting some money for immediate use, but still having additional deficits for the next fiscal years to face.

City Council members have voiced ideas to raise money that include just about anything short of setting up a lemonade stand or having a bake sale. Some ideas stateby by council members: setting up a gift shop in City Hall (Hahn), selling DWP water as a commercial product (Alarcon), using the LAPD Academy to train for other agencies and individuals as Rio Hondo does, setting up a fee-based training for security guard firearms training, and a few other things that get into the city competing with the private sector.

They are becoming more desperate and it's all to make a call for more taxes for all of us to bail them out under the threat of losing vital services. And it was not OUR fault for all this, was it? But you don't get any real acceptance of blame, just a lot of dancing around the issues as Eric Garcetti continues to tell city employees "We are Family," something that solves nothing other than to keep the employees on their jobs for the sake of keeping them on their jobs, and not based on functions fulfilled by any certain types of employees.

DWP as the answer to city council's budget woes- and the reason for yours.

Have you noticed in news reporting on the city's budget manipulations that it's the DWP that is the place to be? That is where they have openings to absorb city employees from jobs paid for by the General fund where money is really all gone, to this, called a "proprietary" agency with its own budget, where they make their own rules and where a lot of money is collected.

Well , more rate hikes are coming but first here's a posting from today in RonKaye.LA a blog that gives you a pretty good chronology of what's happening in city hall-
http://ronkayela.com/ - "DWP: Desperate, Wasteful, Politicized -- Milking the Cash Cow for Every Cent You Got." By Ron Kaye on March 1, 2010 7:06 AM.

This item gives you the picture of how the city has used DWP to shake you down for more money to bail themselves out for their bad management deals.


Another article on the same blog is from a few days ago, also on the DWP and rate hikes coming: "Somebody Has Got to Pay for This DWP Outrage" By Ron Kaye on February 27, 2010 9:05 AM
http://ronkayela.com/2010/02/somebody-has-got-to-pay-for-th.html


and

"Here Come's the Bill: DWP Wants Massive Power Rate Hikes"
By Ron Kaye on February 26, 2010
http://ronkayela.com/2010/02/here-comes-bill-dwp-wants-mass.html





Each one of these blog postings shows you what you might have already suspected and it gives you a very good example of why you just cannot trust the Council and the mayor. You come in not second nor even third in terms of importance, but much lower. THEY have to come first, you know, of course they do. And then their campaign contributors and so on need to be tended to. So, unless you are passing over large sums of cash donations to their campaigns, you really don't matter to them.



Read more in the past postings from this blog of Ron Kaye and you will get a realistic view of what a bunch of time wasters they are, trying to please everybody (that counts, to them) and always thinking about what effect this will have on their political future.



That answer should be simple enough- this should be their last elected position. Koretz and Kracorian have a bit of excuse as they are new additions from last year's elections, but they may fall into place sooner or later. Right now they still have room to prove themselves. The rest are pretty much political animals and deserve no such benefit of any doubt.

L.A. Times Gives Revealing View of Mayor's Cousin, Assembly Speaker-elect, John Perez- A True Politician

And what do you know? There's a story in the L.A. Times today about Mayor Villaraigosa's cousin, John Perez, who was elected to the state assembly with a lot of help from Antonio and his associates. Perez is being sworn in as the Assembly Speaker on Monday and although he's often viewed as the defender of the downtrodden and neglected members of society, the Times' story shows that Perez is definitely not being neglected by those with big campaign donation money to send his way.

And why would you think campaign money is donated to a politician? Could it be like "forget-me-nots" that keep the donor in the mind of the politician when it comes time to make decision? Working for special interests keeps that money flowing so denial of any "quid pro quo" or "something in exchange for something else" just pushes the limits of credibility. What do they take us for? Fools? Quite possibly. With the rise in taxes in California, you can add that saying, "A fool and his money are soon parted." So, "Yes" they do take us for fools. Electing and re-electing them may be signs of that categorization.

"California Assembly Speaker-elect Pérez has ties to deep pockets - The legislator, who has cultivated an image as a crusader for the marginalized and powerless, has also advocated for the powerful."
By Patrick McGreevy and Jack Dolan, L.A. Times, February 28, 2010. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-perez28-2010feb28,0,2336364,full.story Tony has undoubtedly shared tips and trained John in the art of accumulating campaign donations, and it involves a lot of cozying up to those with access to large amounts of cash.

Before his election to the Assembly, while a member of the Los Angeles redevelopment commission, Pérez voted to give millions in government subsidies to a giant real estate firm that contributed heavily to his union's political fund.

Pérez, 40, a cousin of L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa -- a former Assembly speaker himself -- responded philosophically when asked about his involvement with powerful patrons.

That response is representative of another political skill developed by politicians and constantly improved on by practice- the art of spin. What you say in response to challenges is affected by HOW you say it. It all depends on how you give your interpretation to a set of facts. The truth is that the other characteristic often found in politicians seems to co-exist with all else in the make up of an elected offiicial, and it's that proclivity for shading the truth that most people call "lying."

Deception, mischaracterization, omission of facts, failures to disclose and a whole array of other terms for not giving the true picture will all apply to the political scene. I see that regularly in the City Council affairs as they conduct business, sometimes subtley done and sometimes shown by a contradictory statement that itself exposes an earlier position of the same speaker. But read the story and see that John Perez is only a rookie in terms of years in the Assembly, but not by his political experience. He can play to both sides of an issue and come out ahead and he's spent years before the Assembly election to use the same paths and directions that his cousin, the celebrated Antonio Villaraigosa, has tested and developed to advance himself along in politics. Would you call that the "Villaraigosa Way?"

My obervation here is that we are getting another politician in the mold of the Mayor, and we have seen that all the political victories of the individual do not equate with running things well and producing a benefit for the public. Instead, I see that we are in for more economic mistakes to be made by legislators, with the taxpayers being used to foot the bill. Taxpayers become again involutary enablers of the overspending, overextending authority of state government. That government ignores individuals rights, practices its costly experiments in social engineering as a nanny state, while making it expensive for businesses, including small businesses, to remain operating as many more regulatory measures are produced that continue to force business closures or chase businesses out of California, taking their jobs with them.

Read about John's background and see how money is the lubricant of the political machinery that operates for benefit of those that maintain the machine. The only one who I see making out very well in all this economic calamity over all the years is John Perez. He is not the only one able to manipulate the power he's accumulated to generate even more power, but the fact is clear that challengers to office holders generally don't do well at all without the funding to wage expensive campaigns. That result is shown by most victories from the city level to the national level. A change in campaign funding laws might balance the playing field or at least allow others onto it.

A change to PART TIME LEGISLATURE could force legislators to focus on the priorties of the state first and not pay them to stay in Sacramento the entire year to run their personal business of power brokering and cavorting with the special interests that include the monied businesses and unions alike. Cutting down the unneeded time in Sacramento will get them in and out of the city more quickly to force completion of real work ahead of non-essential activity. They would not have time to play footsies with the campaign funders the rest of their time year-round and they would have less time to plot out ways to satisfy demands of these sources of campaign funds while they concoct needless and expensive laws along the way. Politicians would have less time to brainstorm more ways to exploit their offices as they do now, and it would reduce prostituting themselves as has become more widely revealed regularly in newspaper reports about politicians as we continue with day to day life.

Mayor Tony to Host Pre-Oscar Party Thursday- What Budget Crisis?

From the L.A. Weekly's City News, "What Budget Mess? Mayor V. To Host Pre-Oscar Party," by Dennis Romero, Friday, Feb. 26 2010 @ 12:14PM
http://blogs.laweekly.com/ladaily/city-news/mayor-host-oscar-party/

The Mayor always aims to please- unfortunately it has very little to do with making the city better for the people. The paragraph below, from that story, captures the incongruity of the situation that continues to be the trademark of the Villaraigosa administration.

Now comes word that Mayor V., ever the man with his priorities straight (witness December's trek to Europe or this month's cameo on All My Children), will be hosting a pre-Oscar party at the city-funded mayor's residence Thursday night. Because, when the city's on it's last dime and you can't find a cop when you need one, what it really needs is a red-carpet event celebrating the ultra-rich of Hollywood.

Only one year into his second 4-year term as mayor of Los Angeles and Tony V. has not lost one bit of his penchant for showing his lack of concern for the regular people of Los Angeles. Tony's actions continue to contradict what the situation calls for. I suppose we should all be used to that by now. Tony simply cannot resist the opportunity to mix it up with monied interests and the Hollywood (or wherever they are making movies these days) celebrities. It's like his entire being is all about validating his self-image of grandeur. The idea he's apparently following is, "Look at me. I am important and I have to hang around with other important people to prove that to you."

And some people wonder how things can get any worse in management of the city. Stand by for more bad news from all the regular elected sources of ineptitude.