L.A. County Supervisor Ridley-Thomas asks for $707,000.00 to remodel his office- And it's approved.

Mark Ridley-Thomas is certainly not anyone to take the "cheap" route, even if it's the taxpayer dollars getting burned up. He is the newest member of the County Board of Supervisors and make a big splash in this entirely wasteful and shameless expense as some sort of testamenta and validation of his own self-worth. Channel 7 yesterday has a feature on this. "$707K approved for Ridley-Thomas renovations," Tuesday, December 1, 2009. http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/local/los_angeles&id=7148171

$707,000.00 for "remodelling" the office comes out to about two times what the mean value of a house in L.A. costs. Tiger Williams may be doing the Kobe thing and buying his wife a "house on a ring" but this is two houses, and paid with tax dollars, too.


Channel 4 NBC television has a news item by Jonathan Lloyd on this as well- it still comes out bad for Ridley-Thomas. Still "Oink, Oink" for the supervisor.
http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/politics/County-Considers-Supervisors-700000-Office-Renovation-78250317.html (Dec. 2, 2009).

I always suspected it but now I am sure that this guy is just all about himself- and using the SEIU and other unions interests to get to where he convinces himself of his importance. Maybe the Mayor and the others in the State Asssembly members were bad role models in taking the frugal path in expenditure in funds more seriously. Fabian Nunez and pal, Gil Cedillo, have each been in the news about their choices and amounts (large) of expenditures, usually tied in to travel.

I heard a caller last night on talk radio say he works at the L.A. Co.-USC Med. Center in the basement of an old building. He said he's in the service employees union and supported Ridley-Thomas, but they have a carpet in the workplace that for years they have been trying to get replaced or removed because it triggers allergies in numerous poeple and is a hazard in that regard. They have been unsuccessful and can't even get it out just to leave the bare concrete floor there. That's a very symbolic view where people in public office tend to forget the little people who get them into office and have less interest in what the little people have to deal with in their lives, especially when there are problems in the workplace that is county affiliated.

When you talk about "pigs feeding at the public trough" this situation is what reinforces that picture and I won't call it a "stereotype" picture, it's just what there.

The more surprising thing is that the other 4 supervisors approved the expenditure- and none of them has ever had such an expense accumulated for their own office remodels. What happened here? (or does Mark Ridley-Thomas have some deal for them in store that makes it worthwhile? If so, I can't imaging what it could be to have them allow this.)

City Coucil to consider Med-Marijuana ordinance next week- Today Ed Reyes and the High Speed Rail Route.

The Medical Marijuana issue was to be heard today and is being put over another week to examine the terms of the proposed ordinance.

Ed Reyes wants to get into details. Item 11 asks for another EIR on the route for the High Speed Rail project other than Union Station. (Ed wants the HS Rail to move the route elsewhere but takes forever to get to his real point.)

The Agenda Item 22 also involves placement of the station.

CM Rosendahl in his own unique style says that this was waived out of his Transportation committee as a "no brainer" (an oh-so-appropriate phrase for lots of city council activities) and paraphrasing, "We all agree that we all want High Speed Rail." I disagree.

The California High Speed Rail is supposed to get you to where? The closest destination in the earliest time will be Lancaster. Is there a big demand now for that?

The whole idea to me seems simply and plainly a great sounding idea that really is too costly and not useful when you consider the benefits and burdens (especially the tremendous financial one.).

Frankly, I am surprised in one respect, at CM Reyes' resistance to moving this along. He usually can't push things like this fast enough when you say the magic words, "it will bring jobs to L.A."

The real reason is that the main proposal puts the route too close to the L.A. River and his pet project at making the area useable.

I don't know how many of his concerns have merit, but he wants the alternatives to be chosen. Reyes says there's to be 4 trains in and 4 trains out that will make noise and the rest of the things that go with transit, all presented to support his position, but perfection is rarely achievable. It sounds to me like something to add to slow down this project for a complete re-routing, making an enormously expensive project even more a hideous expenditure of public money. I think the better view would be to decide if the range of changes is financially feasible, and not conisdering only the preference that it keep a distance with its noise and hazards.

I think that this High Speed Rail is another political animal that wastes lots of money that is even more shameful in times of our poor economy. But that's not ever an essential element of any public office holder to consider, other than as a false front to disguise their own agenda.

LaBonge is backing the concern of Reyes also, citing past choices and outcomes like the Green Line rail never reaching the Airport- blaming an earlier roster of Council persons. That result was due to the city planning with special interests - I believe that case involved the taxi companies- to keep the end AWAY from the airport and not go TO it as other cities provide. It is not a mistake, it was done on purpose and a political result. What isn't a result of politics nowadays.

Again, there is a thing called a plane to get you to San Francisco for a cost that the high speed rail planned will likely only reach when it is subsidized. The route that the project takes through California is the real reason to make this boondoogle get off the ground.

The ballot measure probably sounded good when voters read it- "Yeah, a high speed train? Great. I vote 'Yes' on this." The bond and tax increase probably did not dominate their thoughts at that moment. We don't need this and the idea that people will get out of their cars to take this train instead of driving is false because, (a.) it will not go where they need it to go to any regular frequency, (b.) what transportation needs will be met at the destination is not clearly shown, and (c.) people will only get out of their cars when they NEED to, as in traveling by plane, and leaving behind cars for public transportation is more opposed relative to how nice a car they have.

Comparing California to Europe is an unfair one. European countries are small and distances are not the same for one thing. One more thing, the governments tax their people to heavily subsidize their rail projects. And don't forget that driving in Europe is not universally a part of life. They don't all have cars AND the gas is and has always been even MORE expensive than it has ever been in L.A.

What arguments they use in City Hall are really a lot of inaccuracies and half-truths to prop up their own positions that don't have too much relevance in connection with what is best for the city. In other words, they still do what they want and make it look like its something else, masking a lot of the true picture so the projects slide by the public to get to the desired conclusion. They hook up their arguments to other considerations that sometimes are inconsistent with their positions the same people originally taken but don't mention they were on the other side of the fence, so to speak, earlier. "Whatever works" to convince you to agree is the rule here.

If you happen to oppose anything in these situations then you most often are villified and considered an obstructionist or some other label with negative connotations.

==========================================================
text of the 12-02-09 WED- agenda selections:

"ITEM NO. (11)

09-0252
AD HOC RIVER COMMITTEE REPORT relative to California High Speed Rail alignment and station options for the City of Los Angeles.

Recommendations for Council action:

1. DIRECT the Department of City Planning (Planning), and other City departments as appropriate, to continue working with the California High Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) as a participating agency.

2. DIRECT Planning to continue working with City departments to explore the possibility of a Union Station East/Vignes Station.

3. DIRECT Planning to continue working with other City departments to provide a formal comment letter to the CHSRA on the recently released Draft Alternatives Analysis reports.

4. DIRECT Planning to work with the Department of Transportation to explore hiring a consultant to assist with the preparation of comments on project alternatives and the development of feasible mitigation options.

5. DIRECT Planning to provide a list of communities impacted by this project.

Fiscal Impact Statement: None submitted by Planning. Neither the City Administrative Officer nor the Chief Legislative Analyst has completed a financial analysis of this report.

Community Impact Statement: None submitted.

(Transportation Committee waived consideration of the above matter)

------------------------------------------------------------

[ALSO TO BE CONSIDERED together with Item 11]

ITEM 22
ITEM NO. (22) - Motion Required

09-0002-S179
COMMUNICATION FROM CHAIR, INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS COMMITTEE and RESOLUTION relative to requesting the California High Speed Rail Authority to consider multiple sites for a downtown Los Angeles high speed rail station.

Recommendation for Council action, pursuant to Resolution (Reyes - Perry - Huizar), SUBJECT TO THE CONCURRENCE OF THE MAYOR:

ADOPT the accompanying RESOLUTION to REQUEST the California High Speed Rail Authority to include in its study on possible locations for a downtown Los Angeles rail station more than one potential site and include an examination of potential sites that are in the proximity of Vignes Street and East Patsaouras Plaza, between Union Station and the former westbank option.

Fiscal Impact Statement: None submitted by the Chief Legislative Analyst. The City Administrative Officer has not completed a financial analysis of this report.

Community Impact Statement: None submitted."

---------------------------------------------------------------

Both item passed unanimously with a "friendly amendment"

L.A. Weekly has a good "all-about" story on City and MMDs; The City Council Medical Marijuana Ordinance draft due today.

Last week, the L.A. Weekly put out a really detailed story on the long path taken for the city to get to a long-awaited ordinance on Medical Marijuana Dispensaries. If you want to see what's really happened in the course of events in how City Council members dropped the ball in so many ways, read this story and you may be surprised. All that dubious "leadership" that the CMs reflexively mention ( especially during those Friday awards days) in congratulating each other really seems to be completely absent when checking how the MMD problem developed.

THE L.A. WEEKLY'S WORK ON "THE REST OF THE STORY"-
The L.A. Weekly's story: "L.A.'s Medical-Weed Wars
How the potheads outwitted Antonio Villaraigosa and the L.A. City Council,"
By PATRICK RANGE MCDONALD AND CHRISTINE PELISEK. (Published on November 23, 2009 at 11:49pm) is a story about this one topic, Medical Marijuana, and what happened over the years that brought us to nearly 1,000 hardship exemptions filed as more "Medical Marijuana Dispensaries" have opened up in the city. See http://www.laweekly.com/2009-11-26/news/l-a-39-s-medical-weed-wars/

Ed Reyes of CD-1 (that includes Lincoln Heights and Highland Park) was not quite the mover and shaker on this matter that some people might believe he is. As Chair of the PLUM, "Planning and Land Use Management" committee, he was responsible for the committee assigned to make decisions on the very ambiguous "hardship exemptions" for applications to conduct these business. CM Reyes did nothing on these from the end of Summer 2007 when the "moratorium" ordinance and its hardship exemption were enacted, until Spring of this year when community pressure to address the increasing numbers of MMDs that were popping up in the city. CM Jose Huizar's move was to end the "hardship exemption" this year, prompting hundreds more applications to be filed before any change became effective. There's always something that sounded good on paper but didn't quite work out in application.

Well, read the story and see the others involved over the roles that they played over the years. There's a lot that you'd expect should have been done that didn't happen, but that often happens with the way the City Council works. The big public comment day a couple of weeks ago had CM Dennis Zine appearing frustrated with the snail's pace progress that was being made and urged the PLUM Committee to adopt the West Hollywood law as a model and then make adjustments to it later. (Now why didn't that come up BEFORE by anyone? TOO logical? Well, "better late than never" applies here.)


CITY COUNCIL TO HAVE A DRAFT ORDINANCE ON MEDICAL MARIJUANA TODAY.

Council President Eric Garcetti announced today that there would be a draft ordinance online for review later this afternoon. The ordinance that was to be drafted to the specifications that the Council agreed upon in the rounds of hearings will be ready to view by going to the city's website. It will be coming up for more discussion

Tomorrow's AGENDA item no. 8, Council File: 08-0923 will bring up the matter again . This will go on for a while but you need to remember that the City Attorney Carmen Trutanich and the District Attorney Steve Cooley had been saying for some time that the state law, "The Compassionate Use Act," does not allow "sales" to be part of the operations. The Council really did all it could to ignore that advice for a long time and then Jerry Brown, the Attorney General for California, said "sales" are not permittied. SO the council apparently started to believe that part and plan in that feature. But not all were happy, and really, if they could allow sales legally and collect taxes, they would as any money source gets their attention these days.

Check the city's web site or just make a google search later for the draft ordinance. And there's more to come. No matter what you hear from these council members praising each other at even the slightest incremental advance on this issue, no one is a "hero" or real "leader" in this area. (I think it's simply politics at a base level where their constant praise of each other will gradually imprint on the members of the public who are either uninformed or easily impressed.) They should have figured this out earlier, like 2007 and they really needed to shut down the businesses around that time, too, when there were few. Doing nothing just encouraged all the others to open in the City. No heroes here in this batch of CMs.

City's sale of "surplus property" -$1 each for 2 Kawasaki 1000 Police Motorcycles?

Some curious things in the City of Los Angeles Council Agenda for the meeting tomorrow, Tuesday, 12-1-09- some real bargains but not for taxpayers of Los Angeles.

When you think of how much penny-pinching is going on with the city leaders trying to balanace the budget you see some really odd situations.

This is a sale of "surplus property" for $1.00 each for 2 Kawasaki 1000 police motorcycles. It goes to the San Fernando Police Dept. but I am supposing that these are worth SOMETHING MORE than a dollar each.

OK, it's to a neighbor city but is this what we want to see when the city is approaching a $500 million budget shortfall.

Here is the item as it appears on the 10-30-09 agenda:
"ITEM NO. (10)

09-2209

BUDGET AND FINANCE COMMITTEE REPORT relative to the sale of surplus motorcycles at below market value to the San Fernando Police Department.

Recommendations for Council action, pursuant to Motion (Garcetti - Zine):

1. AUTHORIZE the sale of two Kawasaki 1000 police motorcycles to the San
Fernando Police Department (SFPD) for the below market price of $1.00 each, in
accordance with Los Angeles Administrative Code Section 22.547.

2. REQUEST the City Attorney to expedite preparation of the appropriate documents to effectuate the sale and transfer of the above identified surplus equipment at below market value to the SFPD.

3. INSTRUCT the City Clerk to inform SFPD [Robert R. Ordelheide, Chief of
Police, 910 First Street, San Fernando, CA 91340 (818) 898-1267] that the
surplus equipment must be claimed within 60 days from the date of Council
approval of the request at which time they will revert to the City's surplus
equipment pool for disposal by the Department of General Services.

Fiscal Impact Statement: The Chief Legislative Analyst reports that the sale of two Kawasaki 1000 police motorcycles at below market value is consistent with the City's Financial Policies as the SFPD is a police department of a neighboring city, whose border is contiguous with the City of Los Angeles. This below market sale will increase the General Fund by $2.00.

Community Impact Statement: None submitted."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am sure that there must be some logical explanation for this that's somehow not very apparent. But for now, I need to see it to believe that the city can afford it and not just making an outright gift when there is no more money to make gifts.

Here's the motion that was made by Eric Garcetti, that ever so generous Council President, seconded by Dennis Zine, former LAPD officer, http://clkrep.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2009/09-2209_mot_9-4-09.pdf

And it really still looks like a gift. This just is one little part of a lot of odd things that the city does through the actions of its Mayor and Council Members that mounts up. Somebody has to tell them that they should really cut out the gift-giving when you are talking about laying off lots of employees and cutting services.

So far the city has its libraries still open regular hours, for example, but that's one area that is in danger of being cut back, and cut back a lot. There's always been a huge disconnect with that idea as the city CMs still really act as it things are NOT as bleak as they really are. They came back last month from break in Council meetings for several days of a meeting of cities in San Antonio, Texas. It's part of mixing business with pleasure, I'd say, but even more interesting is that they learned from others how to use PR, public relations, better and other ideas on management.

You might expect the Council Members to be doing the same things as before but making it sound very nice as they start using the tips on the PR end of things. They just really use up too much money without a real need. Some call it "waste."

And the Mayor? He went to Guadalajara for a Book Fair that's costing a few million dollars (federal funding for this, I believe is their justification for the huge expense. This is also to honor the mayor- and of course, that's all right down his alley, so how could anyone expect him to give a second thought to saying "No" to leaving the city again as usual. Some things just don't improve.

State Senator Carol Liu to speak at Eagle Rock NC meeting Tuesday at 7pm.

The Tuesday, December 1st edition of the regular monthly meeting of the Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council has State Senator, Carol Liu, 21st District, (photo, right) as the special guest slated to provide the public with some insight into what's going on in Sacramento. District 21 web site -http://dist21.casen.govoffice.com/

The ERNC meetings are held at The Eagle Rock Center for the Arts, on Colorado Blvd., one block east of Eagle Rock Blvd. Additional parking at Bank of America's lot on Colorado Blvd.

The December meeting will be the Holiday meeting for the year adn there will be refreshments provided. As another note, this will be the third consecutive month for the ERNC to be hosting the presentation of an elected official as a guest speaker. Anthony Portantino, Assemblymember for the 44th Assembly District (the Assembly District's successor to Carol Liu), spoke at the November meeting, and in October, Wendy Greuel, City Controller, made a presentation about the state of city finances and what her office is doing during the current financial calamity.

The time scheduled is already noticed to be brief by the Senator's aide, but this will still be a relatively rare opportunity to hear first-hand from another official that the people elected to represent the local area.

UC Regents kick up the fees 32% for Undergrads- what next?

The U.C. Regents met at UCLA to make the decision to increase the charge for attending the 10 campuses of the University of California system by 32% or about $2,500 a year more, making the cost (without food, housing or books) come to about $10,000.

There were protests of this and many said that they were probably not going to be able to handle the increase. The thing that most that I heard on news clips talk about was the burden it puts on them and their inability to meet it. They did not really have all of the picture in at that time. There is going to be increased financial aid and what the University does is sort of give you credit for the expenses that would otherwise be payable when the term starts.

Instead, they hold off and then make you pay when you leave school by graduation or dropping out. And there's a large percentage of students that have financial aid in the form of grants that are simply "gifts" and don't get repaid like a loan. Those can change too. The ceilings for financial aid maximums for certain sums of aid is being raised to include more families.

BUT WHY THE INCREASE?

It's simple enough of a reason. There is not enough money coming from the state to cover the bills and the student payments will have to substitute for the difference. 32% is huge for a single bump up, and I don't know if this is one of those things to be made high enough so that another hike will not be needed so quickly the next time.

The State of California is on the verge of bankruptcy, only there's no bankruptcy relief for a State. There's cuts and more cuts but not enough to make the budget work out. The taxl boost of last Spring was a deception and they are, as often said, "kicking the can down the road," so that later it still has to come up again.

So the UC system charges more and then it's only for the undergrads. The professional schools, the grad students, all will have some big changes in their bill to after this part is finished. It looks like the plan is for the professional schools to pay higher fees eventually to help subsidize the undergrad program.

WHAT'S HAPPENING IN SACRAMENTO THAT GOT THINGS THIS WAY?

That is what some should be asking instead of just believing that sitting in is going to be an equivalent of printing money.

The people in Sacramento were elected to represent the people but when they got there, the people they worked for somehow transformed from the people in their district to union representatives and lobbyists for assorted industry and financial entities.

You saw many begin to handle THAT business to the detriment of the home town people. What happened, and this is largely to do with the Democrats who were and are the majority party, was that spending and spending and then more spending happened. More program and more payments to this project and that.

The good times came and brought revenues (that's the word that replaced "taxes" in Assembly Speaker Karen Bass' vocabulary) as the dot-com boom arrived and then as the real estate market heated up. Unions got what they wanted from legislators and public employee unions were replacing many as the influence on lawmakers. Raises in pay, more holidays, paid of course, and better and better pensions were happeining.


Well, it went downhill fast and the revenues dried up with economy downturn and there were all these programs created in years past that craved more money to stay alive. There were pensions modified over the years so that you have people makng lots while retired and these pensions are like salaries but here, the "retiree" is not doing any work for you. (And sometimes they actually get another government job and get that pay AND the pension- but that's another story in itself).

What students and maybe their parents might think of now is that it is very important to watch these people that get elected and that what they do and what they set up and promote in Sacramento does sometimes have a delayed effect on you and like the UC students, it is a profound effect. But you know, when government spends, no one really thinks about the money someday NOT being there. Many young people have friends (or may be that "friend") who spends and buys them drinks and is a fun-loving person that they like to have around.

But sometimes they may wonder where's this money coming from? Is it ok to spend so much for other people? Oh, well, let's enjoy it all since he (or she) would not do it if things were not covered. And that's the thought given to it for a moment and then you forget about it.

In government, these people spend, sometimes on nothing worthy of the tax dollars committed by their choices, and then for a moment, people wonder, "Is this idea actually making any sense?" But like most thing for the casual observer of government, that thought gets replaced by some new problem or issue and it's gone- for now.

Here, all that happy time of spending and raking in the revenue changed and the bills come due without the income to back it.

Still, government (the representatives are govenment) does not curtail it's ways, still spending like nothing is changed and things get worse.

Did you know about the bad times that California government is in? Is it news or is it a new situation? I think we have seen things going downhill for a while, but the State has been hiring an average of 42 people a day for years. All this is the wake of furloughs and lay offs. (By the way, some unions managed to get an agreement of no layoffs or even furloughs from the state- that's some pretty big power for a public employee union to have).

So now it's come to the point where the UC system undergrad students have the bill coming to them. And financial aid boost or not, this still causes class elimination and reduced services- all as the eventual consequence of an out-of-control spending proclivity that our lawmakers possessed. I repeat, you have to watch them and NOT let these people spend OP (other people's) money without accountability.

IF they were made responsible and not living lives so very privileged by the very fact of holding the public office, maybe the cuts to education would have been lighter or not at all.

It's like that for all the consequences, but no one connect the relationship of PUTTING PEOPLE IN OFFICE (voting for them) and HOW LIVES WILL BE AFFECTED.

Looking back to Fabian Nunez, termed-out Assembly Speaker who had travels to other countries, drank fine wines and made purchases of things that he could because of CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTONS and other people paying his bills, you see that this life-style does not make a person suddenly trim down the spending when it's time for handling taxpayer paid money.

Not at all, that spending Jones, the living high on the hog and feeding at the public trough is just too damaging and costly for voters to ignore. Nunez is not the only one who has travelled that path and is not the last one but we need to monitor all of them since "they are victims of their own greed" and can't be held accountable. Nor will they be held accountable with everyone turning away as this conduct goes on.

UC students may have a better insight into how these politicians made laws and programs that wound up damaging the common person who may never have associated politics with ordinary life. There is a connection and some of it is very direct and other times it is not direct or immediate, but it's there. Not voting, and especially not voting with at least a little knowledge, can be harmful to your own health.

I will talk about how bond measures have come to affect us another time, but that's another way we suffer now and maybe, maybe get some benefit later, much later, all because of what we think we will get for no cost but to make a mark on a ballot.

Coming on Tuesday's Council Meeting-MMDs and Parking in San Pedro

This came in today from the City Clerk's office:

Los Angeles City Council, Supplemental Agenda Tuesday, November 24, 2009 John Ferraro Council Chamber, Room 340, City Hall - 10 am

ITEM NO. (41) -
Motion Required
08-3237-S1
http://clkrep.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2008/08-3237-s1_mot_11-6-09.pdf
CD 15

CONTINUED CONSIDERATION OF MOTION (HAHN - LABONGE) relative to free holiday parking program for shopping districts located in Council District 15.

Recommendation for Council action:

INSTRUCT the Los Angeles Department of Transportation to take the necessary steps to implement a 2009 free holiday parking program from Monday, December 14, 2009 through Friday, January 1, 2010 in the San Pedro parking meter zone (No. 518), the City's parking lots in San Pedro (Lots Nos. 641, 647, 648, and 735) and the
Wilmington parking meter zone (No. 534).

Community Impact Statement: None submitted.

(Transportation Committee waived consideration of the above matter)

(Continued from Council meeting of November 20, 2009)"

====================================================
This is Janice Hahn's district, CD-15 and it makes sense to have some parking handy if you want customers to come by. The "problem" is only a problem because of the holiday season gift from the Council to the city from one year ago. That was the tripling and quadrupling of the parking meter rates and extension of hours past the usual 6 p.m. PLUS ending lots of free Sunday parking. So the usual 25-cents per hour rate jumped to a dollar an hour. Parking was already $1/hour in the downtown area, going up to $3 and $4 per hour.

They now have PAYMENT CENTERS that are computer credit card terminals set on posts along the streets WITH NO parking meters, only numbered SPACES that you match to your payment, all to make the money flow more quickly from you to the city. Try to skimp and you may get a parking ticket for your frugality.

Back to the Motion- it's to give shoppers a break here so they can shop and not be an obstacle for shoppers in deciding whether to visit the area so that merchants can have a better chance for customers to come by this holiday season..

Criticism (Of course), is that this would be entirely unnecessary IF the Council did not try to gouge the public with the huge rate change for parking meters. This was certainly no "motorist-friendly" action to begin with and Council discussions mentioned raising parking fees to discourage driving and make people use public transportation. Well, that's never going to happen in the near future. People with the BMWs and Lexuses among others will not be parking their cars to ride the bus or light rail voluntarily. Pubic transportation ridership will remain the realm primarily of those without another form of transportation available or a matter of immediate economic situations.

But IF this parking holiday passes, and why not, the other CMs should try to do something for their CD residents. And 'Why not?'"

MEDICAL MARIJUANA:

There is too much to include in this post but it's going to be something to see if the City Council relents in their pursuit of an ordinance that allows money for a "medical marijuana" product to be exchanged between strangers, something commonly know as a "sale." Whatever they call it, unless it does not resemble a "purchase" it is not going to work- so they have to make it complicated, I expect and that's something they do very regularly with city business.

The state law makes "sales" under the Compassionate Use Act, i.e., Prop. 215, but then dollar signs started to fill the eyes of CMs as the thought of collecting more sales tax here could help them out a little in the budget. They see ways around this detail and proponents of better access to marijuana were for anything that did not restrict the current wide open city handling of dispensing marijuana.

The City Attorney, Carmen Trutanich and District Attorney, Steve Cooley both have expressed their opinion that any "sales" would constitute a violation of state law in this area. (Federal law already makes marijuana an illegal substance and they just hold off prosecution in states where such "medical marijuana" legal provisions are in effect.) DA Cooley has said that he will prosecute any sales of marijuana since they are not permitted under the state law.

The STATE OF CALIFORNA's Attorney General Jerry Brown said, as reported in the news today, that sales of marijuana are not permitted under state law and can be prosecuted. A sort of 60s style commune organized for raising marijuana and distributing it to members of the commune is what the law envisions as a permissible set-up, and not a 7-11 open at all hours for anyone to show their "doctor's recommendation," pay some cash as if buying a pack of Marlboros, and then head on to another Medical Marijuana Dispensary for more of the herb.

The MMDs are raking in money now and there's no system in place to limit or even know the amounts of marijuana that any "qualified patient" or "Care givers" have obtained at any other MMD. The establishment of the MMD and how it can operate is currently the area that is not clear. But SALES that make them profitable businesses is not supposed to happen- it's almost like only the "expenses" can reimbused. And you know that's not what the operators have in mind in putting these things together, most done after the prohibition was made to stop new shops from opening. Just a small detail that all forget as they tell the CMs, "They have done everything legally and should be allowed to continue." Everything except opening without legal permission- but that's a technicality that all ignore.

The Council held off a vote on Wednesday and several "amendments" to the proposed ordinance were made, requiring another round of public comment there. A lot of proponents of "legalization" of the Medical Marijuana Dispensaries appear to be more interested in just getting the weed as recreational users more than alleviating physical symptoms due to "serious medical conditions" that the statute contemplated as a basis for its passage.

I expect the matter to continue past Tuesday and for some CMs to be a little more reflective on the situation that has the number of MMD applications reach almost a thousand. Too many shops opened up AFTER the "moratorium" on new facilities was enacted in 2007. No one from the city side of things acted to shut them down or to make a ruling on the applications.

"APPLICATIONS" for a "hardship exemptions" was taken by about all applicants to mean, "Start up your business." Most common meanings of "application" would have you expect that somebody FIRST has to make a decision to ALLOW YOU to start business.

In Los Angeles, the City Council acts in its own convoluted fashion and the APPLICATIONS were untouched until around MARCH 2009 when this came back into the public light.

So what you see now is what happened when no agency or department took any action to enforce anything to shut down non-compliant businesses from operating. Stand by for Tuesday's meeting.

Tomorrow, Saturday, Alumni Meeting at LHS

MEETING:
There's an Alumni Association meeting tomorrow.

Time: 9:30 a.m.
Location: The Student Cafeteria in the 500 Building

Attendance at the meetings is open to all persons interested in the mission of the organization, especially alumni.

See the Alumni tab in the Lincoln High website link in the sidebar for more details on events, the mission, bylaws and other items that you may find informative.

MAIN LOBBY DISPLAY CASE
The Alumni Association has the use of one of the main display cases in the Administration building (the "100 building") that is both for students and adult vistors to see. The display usually has a lot of photographs with some views of the past among them, and the job of changing the content is performed as there are volunteers and material to present.

The City Council and City Attorney's Office on a Rocky Road to an MMD Ordinance.

The City Council members in a joint meeting of the Public Safety and the Planning and Land Use Committees on Monday held a hearing that was memorable, to say the least. (Right: file photo- Ed Reyes, Council Member for CD-1 and Chair of the "Planning and Land Use Management['PLUM']" committee.)

On the city political view, the hearing on Monday was really a battle between the Council members and the Deputy City Attorneys office. The CMs seemed peeved since there was that "threat" of jailing Jan Perry if the AEG signs were allowed to be erected, according to CM Jan Perry's account of a conversation with CA Trutanich. The CMs also appear to be pulling rank in trying to put the City Attorney's office "in it's place" as an "advisor" and that it's the Council that has the final word. The CMs are dopes.

PUBLIC COMMENT supporters were using threats of litigation (probably heard somewhere that LA CITY Council is preoccupied with avoidance of litigation in much of their decision-making.

The idea for many who spoke in public comment was to use this issue as a foot-in-the-door to on the way to simply legalizing marijuana, more so than achieving the limited use that Prop. 215 allows.

The angle that there could be tax dollars realized by allowing the MMDs to operate, apparently with little restriction.

That "sales" language that leads to TAXING possibilities has some of the CMs absolutely drooling at the thought of getting some more revenue in. The City Attorney's office deputies said that the STATE LAW does not allow "sales" and the brilliant CMs tried an assortment of approaches clearly attempting to circumvent that interpretation.


The opponents of the proposed ordinance were made up of persons appearing to focus on the need for access to marijuana as patients with a medical need, and those persons who seemed to have more of a recreational usage and freer access to obtaining marijuana as their motivation. References were made to marijuana as a "medicine" very often, and many from both of these groups pushed the “compassion” aspect.

There was little acknowledgement from either the objectors and supporters of the fact that MMDs were opening without any compliance that a more conventional business venture would have to follow. The Building and Safety Department is pretty much a neutered city department but should have issued something like a certificate of occupancy in connection with a city business license to operate.

I don't think that the MMDs forming after the City’s Interim Control Ordinance, aka, “the moratorium” on opening more MMDs, had given any thought to following the law, using the ambiguous “hardship exemption” to justify their application. This was only AN APPLICATION, and not permission to open up shop, but that detail didn’t stop anyone.

Clearly, they moved along to open up and conduct business in the face of the then-existing "moratorium" on any additional MMDs. The loosely framed "hardship exemption" APPLICATIONS were treated as PERMISSION TO BEGIN BUSINESS and "following the law" was certainly not a component of the process. Neither the spirit or letter of the law was followed- the MMDs popped up like their product: weeds.

The committee members, most vocal among them, Reyes and Cardenas, appeared to square off with the Dep. City Attorneys appearing there in the special joint committee meeting. More than once, the CMs reminded the City Attorneys that they were only there to advise the Council and that it was the Council that would follow or reject the advisements. Someone among the Council members mentioned that the Council in the past has sought out their own counsel apart from the CA's office where there was disagreement in the past. That was during the “Rocky Delgadillo, City Attorney” period.

I don't know why the Council members wish to act with these chips on their shoulders. Maybe I am the only one noticing that nuance.

It was particularly noticeable when "sales" was the word that the CA advised NOT be used in the language since the STATE LAW does not allow "sales," under the interpretation of their office. The CMs were pretty stubborn and appeared not to grasp the idea that using "sales" invites a challenge to the validity of any ordinance, as "sales" under the state law were a prohibited action. Putting “sales” as a term into the language of the ordinance would be inconsistent with the language of the state statute.

Nevertheless, some of the CMs were looking at ways to circumvent that aspect. It comes down to the CMs, in their constant quest to collect revenue by hook or crook, setting the stage here with some ripe ground for levying taxes on sales.

CM Cardenas appeared to be annoyed at the cautions that the CA was giving and finally said, "If we use 'sales' are we going to be sued?" Cardenas asked that in his usual challenging style of his that he employs when conducting questioning of persons in Council meetings. This time that tone was used in the questioning of the City Attorney and you again gather that there's some hostile attitudinal issues involved.

But the City Attorney, in an effort to explain their insistence on NOT using the word, “sale,” explained that the ordinance COULD state that a transaction for money did not constitute a sale so that it was "not a sale" under the city’s ordinance, BUT the facts could constitute a crime and subject persons relying on the ordinance to be prosecuted by the attorney general.

The CA’s actual reply was, "No, but someone relying on the ordinance and believing they are in compliance could still be prosecuted if the Attorney General decided that they violated the state law."

It was pretty obvious that many CMs want money to come to the city and see this as an opportunity to squeeze some money out for the city. The "fees" aspect was described and you could see by the questioning of the CAs that the CMs were headed to recouping money by imposing fees as distinguished from taxes. “Fees” however are not allowed to be imposed without limit and some showing of a relation to actual expense of a service has to be established rather than simply having an arbitrary value assigned. And you could already tell that's what the CMs had in mind- if they couldn't have a “Sales Tax” since there is not “sale” occurring, they could set a high "fee" to make this bring in some big bucks. Well, they can't do that, at least not legally.

That sound bite of Sen. McCain came to mind: "You can call it a banana if you want" when a choice of wording was brought up as he campaigned for President, meaning in the bare bones analysis, that the underlying facts will show what something is, regardless of the label you want apply. Another phrase used during that campaign was similarly brought to mind; "It's like putting lipstick on a pig." And that's pretty stark in demonstrating that you still have a pig after all is said and done.

There was a lot of this nitpicking on words and the CMs seemed to be like children at a candy story who wanted to do what they wanted to do, and any type of suggestions by their parents was treated as meddling. Here, the CMs did not want the CA to meddle.

The other problems that I saw were more of a land use nature. The 500 foot radius, and the1,000 foot radius sorts of things were complicating all of the job at hand in arriving at an ordinance to vote upon.

My view here is to make an ordinance that handles “how” to dispense the substance (and avoid calling it "medicine" as was happening there), and just work that out. Then, separately, as to zoning and the details like the distances from schools and so on, leave that task to the Planning and Land Use committee or the Council as a whole.

Keeping the physical facilities and related subject matter SEPARATE would do much to ease the task of finishing the ordinance- they could add some language like, "The facility shall be in compliance with the requirements specified in the city's Planning and Land Use directives and subsequent ordinance” Mixing both areas, the legal scheme of distribution with the physical location and facility, just make it out to be the city version of the Rubic's Cube. The task just never ends as more adjustments are added.

Just to close now, and there was so much more that comes out in listening to hearings instead of only reading about the actions in the newspaper- Zine was saying towards the end of the hearing, to paraphrase, "Let's use W. Hollywood as a model go ahead to get an ordinance- we have wasted to many years already."

The lawsuits were among the topics mentioned- or threatened- during Public Comment. The passage of the ordinance would result in "costly litigation" according to some opponents speaking at the hearing. Dennis Zine stated later, paraphrased here, "We are going to get sued anyway so let's pass an ordinance and go from there."

I was wondering months ago why they didn't adopt the approach taken by any of a number of other cities where the situation has been managed without so much commotion. The West Hollywood ordinance may have a flaw in that is uses "sales" in the language and the City Attorney remarked on that but the CMs still seem to try to pull rank on their legal counsel more than listen to the REASON for the advisement.

Zine got lots of applause, but his thought process in saying we should be getting an ordinance out now and then amending as needed was not earth-shaking in any way since even I thought of that before as the City constantly re-invents the wheel in it's plodding along with city business.


====================
MAJOR POINT OF THE STATE LAW:
COLLECTIVES are what everybody did not want to deal with- and COLLECTIVES ARE what the state law allows.

In a COLLECTIVE, there's not an outright payment for the product, but a shared endeavor to raise the weed from planting to harvesting and using. So this is not conducive to any current models of the MMDs in L.A. and was glossed over by those in favor of trading money for weed as has been done so far.

"PROFIT" AND "for Profit" were terms bounced around but they miss the point. Non-Profits do this all the time, getting some "employees" wealthy and then not showing a book "profit." If you check a lot of the non-profits you will see that there’s some good salaries getting paid out to the managers- and that is what it’s all about for many non-profits getting money from the city. Non-profit groups can be very profitable.

Using “out-of-pocket expenses” and “actual expense” “with documentation” would be better choices to try to screen out a lot of padding that goes on. But the CMs were not on that track anyway.

ANOTHER MAJOR POINT
”CAREGIVER” and “PATIENT” or “QUALIFIED PATIENT” are separate categories of persons that can be authorized under the law to obtain the marijuana. A “CAREGIVER” is somebody who very literally gives continuing care to the patient. A Medical Marijuana Dispensary is not giving a patient such personal and continued care and is not considered under state law to be a "CAREGIVER."

The "PATIENT" is one who becomes qualified under the terms of the statute and thereby can obtain and use the marijuana.

If you may recall, the "compassionate use" that underlies the passage of Prop. 215 envisioned the circumstances where many people had HIV and were dying from AIDS as well as persons afflicted with cancer. THIS is how the CAREGIVER fits in as often times the patient is disabled and cannot personally go get any marijuana, so the caregiver is allowed to do it. (The CAREGIVER is effectively the proxy or agent for the Patient).

THE LEGAL EFFECT ignored by City Council-
Because money for a product in the "sales" framework of operation clearly doesn't match this state law's picture of compliance, all this profiteering by MMDs is actually in violation of the state law and the City cannot make it legal by “proclaiming” in the words of a statute that it is legal. The State law is still the ruling this area, and under Federal law, marijuana is still illegal all by itself, compassionate use or not, with some deference given to states passing laws such as California’s “Compassionate Use” statute passed by voters as Proposition 215.

The CMs in their actions Monday, apparently trying to show their version of "leadership" here, continue to fumble along and air their arrogant attitudes with the City Attorney's office regardless of how appropriate the interpretations appear to be.

CONCLUSION
The City Council committee members don't get to the point, ignore legal advice, have their eyes full of visions of tax dollars coming in and totally are incapable of doing a competent job of making a clear law to end this MMD explosion in the city.

They don't learn anything and need to get a pay cut and move to part time so that they stop spending so much time showboating but instead get down to business and stop all the back-stabbing and back-slapping that has become an addiction to the current crop of CMs (and Mayor).

In the end, the city dropped the ball and is now trying to find it to continue the game. And they are really bad at this game.

And, this is my opinion, of course.

Another High School for LAUSD, starting at $66.5 Million in Huntington Park. .

From the Tuesday LAUSD Board of Education agenda, there's a simple listing under "D. Open Session Items" that seemed pretty bland until I got to the price tag, $66.5 Million. It's O.K., that's just an authorization and like most things in LAUSD, this is subject to change. This price tag will probably look like a bargain after the work has begun and more changes are made to boost the price to something more noteworthy.

At least you won't see this match the Beaudry High School, aka Roybal Learning Center. It was going to be named "The Belmont Learning Center" http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-belmont10-2008aug10,0,1095667.story "New name, new life for Belmont school."

Here's the agenda item:

BOARD OF EDUCATION OF THE CITY OF LOS ANGELES
Governing Board of the Los Angeles Unified School District
SPECIAL MEETING ORDER OF BUSINESS
333 South Beaudry Avenue, Board Room
10:00 a.m., Tuesday, November 17, 2009

D. Open Session Items
1. Board of Education Report No. 127
- 09/10 - Postponed from 11-10-09 Regular Board
Meeting.
Facilities Services Division
(Authorization for Staff to Enter into a Development Agreement for the Delivery of South Region High School No. 7) Recommends authorization for staff to enter into an agreement with McCarthy Building Companies, Inc. for approximately $66.5 million for the delivery of a 1,620 students high school to be located at 6361 Cottage Street in the City of Huntington Park, and adopts the plans and specifications for the school
pursuant to the requirements of Education Code Section 17406.

So, am I being to critical on this project? I don't think so and I just look back to the other projects that support this idea. Back to Belmont/ Roybal (and for a time, "Vista Hermosa"):

"$400M High School Opens 10 Years Behind Schedule," from the CBS-KCAL television story of Oct 18, 2008. http://cbs2.com/local/Roybal.Learning.Center.2.843826.html
This is the most expensive school in the United States, built over an earthquake fault line (like most of L.A.) and over an oil field (Do you remember when there were oil wells there on that slope before the land was graded?).

Over at the old Board of Education headquarters on Grand Ave., you have the recently opened High School #9, the Arts High School, coming in at a price tag of $232 Million, at least that was the figure from the story last year in the L.A. Weekly- the L.A. Times story this year has some updated information on cost and how they choose students, but that's for another blog day.

"Art School or LAUSD Folly?" in the L.A. WEEKLY on September 03, 2008, http://www.laweekly.com/2008-09-04/news/art-school-or-lausd-folly/ gives you a sample of the things that run up costs and delay completions of schools. This school is very close to Roybal and its the second most expensive school in the U.S. to build. Only in L.A.

By the time the schools are done, the original population that the building plan was based upon has changed by more students leaving the neighborhood entirely as there's more "gentrification" happening in L.A., pricing out people, or the students head to charter schools or Catholic or other private schools. And don't forget that there's lots dropping out so that a 9th grade class has a high casualty rate by the time a 12th grade graduation day arrives.

I read a while back that the plan for construction will complete 2 schools a month until 2011 when the project is done.

And for those of you in the Cypress Park, Glassell Park area, High School #13 (if I remember the numbering correctly) is quickly taking shape. That property in the old train yard off San Fernando Road next to the Fed Ex facility only cost LAUSD $50 million two years after a firm bought it for $30 million undee the noses of the LAUSD Board 2 years earlier after the LAUSD did not move quickly enough to get its act together. Mayor Villaraigosa's friend and campaign contributor was part of this deal. A $20 million profit in 2 years? But then that firm filed for bankruptcy as the real estate market dried up. It was reputed to be the biggest single owner of downtown real estate.

Well, we will see how long it takes and how much it costs for this school- and there's also a chance that they are building this school for it to be taken over by a charter school. Somehow that doesn't sound right that LAUSD should be building schools that it realistically has a chance of not operating. Again, as memory serves me, the number may be up to 250 sites. Well, that's LAUSD.

LHS Homecoming Friday at 6 p.m.- v. Eagle Rock H.S.

Lincoln High's last game is the Friday, November 6, 2009, the Homecoming Game - (and, yes, it's at home, and at night- and for you who have been out of touch with things at the campus, we've had lights since about October 2001, give or take a year. There's not much parking, as usual, but there are lights.)

Varsity game vs. Eagle Rock, at 6 PM, the JV at 3 PM, and the Homecoming Dance to follow at 8 PM.

A Parade This Sunday on Eagle Rock Blvd.: It's the 4th Annual Northeast Veterans Day Parade

Northeast Los Angeles Veterans Day Parade
Date: November 8, 2009

Time: 1:00 p.m . Starting Point:
LAFD Fire Station 55
York Boulevard and Eagle Rock Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90041

The route proceeds North on Eagle Rock Blvd. to

end, one block South of Colorado Blvd.

Ending Point: City Parking Lot:
Merton & Chickasaw (1 block S. of Colorado Blvd.)
Los Angeles, CA 90041

Among the entrants will be Lincoln High and Franklin High- Eagle Rock High appears to be continuing with their own technical difficulties and is not making an appearance.

4th Annual Northeast Los Angeles Veterans Day Parade covering the Northeast Los Angeles area which is comprised of Eagle Rock, Glassell Park, Mount Washington, Cypress Park & Highland Park.

Phone: 323 258-0776
Fax: 323 255-6387

Contact Name: Ruby de Vera
Position/Title: Event Chairperson

L.A. City Council- support for LAUSD mandatory uniform policy- Both the resolution and an LAUSD policy are way overdue.

There was something that came on the agenda for Wednesday's Council meeting that appeared to be worthwhile, but the only question to me was, "Why did this take so long to happen?" The Council came to agree on a resolution- and that's all it can do since the City Council has no jurisdiction over the LAUSD schools- and made this resolution, a purely advisory item, to support the LAUSD mandatory school uniform policy when it brings it up.

The motion was co-sponsored by Jose Huizar, Council member for CD-14 and former LAUSD Board President before he arrived at City Council. If you don't remember, it was after Mayor Villaraigosa left CD-14 for the higher calling to the Mayor's office that CM Huizar moved up in office and pay.

The only wonder I have is why Jose did not make a substantial effort WHILE serving as LAUSD's Board President for this. But again that rule of thumb applies, especially so with government, "better late than never."

===================================================
As appearing on the agenda today:

"ITEM NO. (20)
09-0366
EDUCATION AND NEIGHBORHOODS COMMITTEE REPORT and RESOLUTION relative to support for any plan by the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) to implement a mandatory district-wide school uniform policy.

Recommendation for Council action, as initiated by Resolution (Huizar - Hahn - LaBonge), SUBJECT TO THE CONCURRENCE OF THE MAYOR:

ADOPT the accompanying RESOLUTION to include in the City’s 2009-10 State Legislative Program SUPPORT for any plan by the LAUSD Board or Superintendent to implement a mandatory district-wide school uniform policy, IF AMENDED to delete the phrase “including in the City’s 2009-10 State Legislative Program.”

Fiscal Impact Statement: None submitted by the Chief Legislative Analyst. The City Administrative Officer has not completed a financial analysis of this report.

Community Impact Statement: None submitted.

(Rules and Government Committee waived consideration of the above matter)"

==================================================

The current policy of LAUSD is to allow each school to decide for itself whether it will have uniforms.

A parent spoke in Spanish through an interpreter to the Council about the positive experience that the policy brings and her remarks were very relevant, perceptive and supported the ideas that I have long agreed with. The benefits of a mandatory school uniform policy far outweigh the disadvantages that may exist from adopting the school uniforms policy.

A big feature she included was that there was some deterrent effect with gang involvement Also mentioned was that the students appeared to do better overall in school after the uniforms were adopted. Discipline is improved and you can identify which are the school's students inside and outside of school by the uniforms. It helps school security. The expense of the fashion race is bypassed and a better attitude is formed by students.

The Markham Middle School experience in city was cited by an official who also spoke. I believe he may have been a school police representative. The beneficial outcomes that arise from adoption of the school uniforms policy were related by him

Council Member Cardenas said he would vote for the motion, but that he requested also that there be documentation of the benefits that resulted that were attributable to the wearing of school uniforms, rather than making the assumptions that the beneficial changes described will actually happen and that they will happen as a result of school uniforms being adopted by a school.

This was something interesting and unexpected to hear from a CM. Usually it is THEY, the CMs that make far-reaching assumptions and predictions, citing no authority or factual basis for the conclusions that they present in proposing the assortment of motions that they continue to generate.

In that same process there is little opportunity to challenge the conclusions that the CMs state in their presentations, especially right before a vote that ends up in the usual fashion, a “unanimous” vote of all CMs present, apparently reflecting little of any contrary public comment made by members of the public to whatever degree that it appears compelling, immediately preceding the vote. The “done deal” effect in operation again.

But here, CM Cardenas seemed to be hedging his bet and on the face of it, I don’t see any ill wind blowing from that Northernly direction. Am I suspicious or doubting? Over time and through observation, I have just come to see that all that happens is not usually a result of only what is presented in city council meetings and there’s often more happening to be seen later.

For now, this is all that can be done by the City Council- they have their own greedy hands full now with trying to fix the city budget with a mounting deficit. The ball is in the LAUSD’s court- to use another sports metaphor that I follow with one more below.

The LAUSD’s action on uniforms would be something more than a pure “Hail Mary” pass to try to improve the performance of a generally failing school district. There is much present to address the concerns of the opponents of such a policy and we can get to that later, if and when LAUSD get things moving.

As I have said before, the District moves too slowly on things, too much attributed to putting politics ahead of function usually. It’s the students that get churned out of the District's schools year after year in June graduations, or earlier by dropping out, that are shortchanged. THEY suffer and WE all will suffer, too as a result of the consequences of an under-educated youth.

===========================================
When I was last at Lincoln already four years ago, there was no leadership in handling dress code violations, to the extent that the existing dress code was known. Teachers were not encouraged to do anything about that. In fact, there was more of an environment to ignore even obvious violations that mostly arose with the female students, lest you be accused of some misdeed yourself as a teacher.

And so it was at LHS, from the top down. Only one teacher, who I admired for actively and successfully addressing the problems as they arose, able to act on this. (It was something that motivated me as a teacher to not ignore students throwing trash on the ground, especially when they were standing right next to a trash can, as I walked from one classroom to another. Those things CAN be handled successfully for all concerned with some postitive attitudes.)

Here, a mandatory uniform policy would essentially bypass that entire situation and maybe help to right the ship. If concerns are that "expense" is an issue, there are many solutions for that as the need arises.

For now, let's see how long LAUSD takes to try to save it's programs and schools with a practice that's been followed in most if not all Charter Schools and the Catholic and other private schools for years. The prospect of a Charter School taking over some or all of the facilities at Lincoln is real- 5 consecutive years of PI status, "PI-5," but the process moves so slowly, maybe some effective changes can be made to ward off those proposals when made.

City Controller Wendy Greuel, tonight's guest speaker at ERNC meeting.

City Controller Wendy Greuel will be visiting the Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council meeting as a guest speaker tonight. The ERNC meetings are from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. The last word received from Yvette Rojas of the City Controller's office was a confirmation of the visit. There will be a short presentation with a Q&A to follow before getting to the agenda items.

You might ask, "And where is this meeting supposed to take place?" The ERNC meets at "The Eagle Rock Center for the Arts," 2225 Colorado Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90041, one block west of Eagle Rock Blvd. http://www.eaglerockcouncil.org/

Side Note: By the meeting time, Mayor Villaraigosa will have announced his selection for the next LAPD Police Chief. (News update: The expected Chief will be Charlie Beck, Chief of Detectives- official announcement to be made at 11 a.m.)

Tony Cardenas thinks the City needs to make "lactation rooms" in City buildings/Offices.

Here's something that caught my attention in the news on the radio this afternoon. Tony Cardenas in a sound bite says, that when he speaks with women, and I don't know if this is an ice breaker at a party or something that's part of official communication: "every time I bring up the idea of a lactation room they think it's a great idea."

This just seems so much a low priority thing that affects such a small part of the population that it doesn't support taking attention from other things that are looming for the Council as city business with an urgency.

This was also mentioned in Mayor Sam's blog in the Comments posted that I did not notice Friday:
http://mayorsam.blogspot.com/2009/10/los-angeles-politics-hotsheet-for_30.html

By Anonymous:

More pages from the "nanny" state . . . (although what this has to do with
either "information technology" or "government affairs" is tough to figure. . .

Information Technology and Government Affairs Committee Tuesday,
November 3, 2009, Room 1010, City Hall - 2:00 pm

Members:
Councilmember Tony Cardenas, Chair
Councilmember Jan Perry

FILE
NO. SUBJECT (2)
09-1950
Motion (Cardenas – Perry) relative to the
feasibility of creating lactation rooms for mothers with newborns in City
facilities with 250 or more occupants, and related actions. (Arts, Parks, Health
and Aging Committee approved motion on October 13, 2009)
October 30, 2009
11:23 AM

The 2pm meeting's Agenda is here: http://ens.lacity.org/clk/committeeagend/clkcommitteeagend2463332_11032009.pdf

Of course it's useful to lactating women but in terms of absolute numbers, how many women are in that condition AND are city employees AND can't manage otherwise without the City creating physical space for this purpose? Tony Cardenas says that maybe they can get Gerber or some other baby product manufacturer to pay for the cost. Oh, really? We have a poor economy and companies have been cutting back all around for nearly a year, and "donations" from corporate sponsors have been dwindling for standard charities and public service organizations. There is very little to motivate a busines, especially without a trade-off in return, to pay for such a thing .

I would guess it's either city-paid or it doesn't happen and if it's city-paid, it should come with a chunk of salary from the Council members that approve it.

Student cheating a life long-skill? Richmond Gang Rape a sign of Moral Decay?

A couple of things in the news this week have a connection to each other although only indirectly.

Students and Dishonesty.

First, "Seeds of adult dishonesty are sown in youth, study finds," by Carla Rivera, October 29, 2009. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dishonest29-2009oct29,0,25349.story

The story in the L.A. TIMES on Friday seems to establish a couple of things that some have already thought were happening generally. Namely, that standards of honesty and doing right don't rate as highly with youunger people than older ones and that the students that cheat in high school are more likely to do so in later life. The study was done by the Josephson Institute, an organinzation that works on ethical issues training and information.

The story in the TIMES does go into the possible reasons for more teen cheating and dishonesty. That discussion of reasons makes sense but still does not justify the behavior, it only explains its possible causes.

If the results of the study are accurate, there's a lot less that's good to expect of our future leaders and future politicians (as if the politician types needed new reasons for dishonesty). The story goes on to show that an ethics program in Downey Unified School District was begun four years ago and suspensions and expulsions are down and attendance is up.

The Second Story- Gang Rape Outside Homecoming Dance.

In the news this week there was the other story about the Richmond, California gang rape of a 15-year old student (Ed. note: corrected from earlier "16-year old" reference.) outside the school's homecoming dance. A group of males acosted her as she left the dance early to get picked up outside by her father. The men took her around the location an alley and raped her for 2-1/2 hours, witnessed by at least 20 persons with no one calling 911 for the police or trying to stop it. some people were said to have recorded the scene on cell phone videos.

The girl's assault was being talked about inside the dance and another woman called police to report it. Some reports say they were still in progress when police arrived. The question in most people's mind is "Why" no one called the police at all, even if they did not want to be seen doing it at the scene?

Another question is "Why would anyone record the video and not call police?" Did they consider this crime to be some form of entertainment?

This loosely ties in with the idea in the "dishonesty" treand among young people. A lot of disinterest in the welfare or caring about fellow human beings could result in this kind of inaction. The Kitty Genovese murder in NY was the clasic example of such failures to help. In that case, decades ago, the woman was assaulted and her screams were heard by a large number of people, but no one called police. The conduct at Richmond, a high crime area as described by many, shows that we haven't had any consistent instilling of values in young people.

Most in high school, adults that is, when it comes to teaching right from wrong and seeing a value in doing good, simply say, "That's the parents job." You'd be surprised how young people see violence and crime as an acceptable kind of behavior. There was a very large proportion of students that had no idea of common courtesies such as "Please, Thank You, or You're Welcome." (There's enough adults. too, with this pattern, so you can see that's why it was not learned or reinforced. I had to say, to respond, for each instance that another teacher shrugged it off, "Well, SOMEBODY has to show them and they can't do that in my class."

It was a pretty novel concept to many but progress was made slowly but surely. It's just that not enough attention is given to see the voids in the makeup of young people, maybe with all the pressures of teaching to the standards and the tests, there's no time to teach as much about fitting in with other human beings.

Yet, simply explaining with some examples and asking a question, "How would you like to be treated in the situation?" often begins to turn on some lights and begins to put it together for students. No one wants to be treated badly and to further demonstrate things, you could ask, "What if this were your friend, your mother, your sister, your baby sister or brother?" or some less numerous combination presented to not go overboard in the exercise.

And now this rape situation seems that it should be intolerable to ignore and not call police, but that's what happened. Maybe the kinds of questions and discussions I had with students never were presented to these young crime witnesses.

That's why the gang rape story, a horrific and brutal example of human behavior, could be explained to some extent, but it would never be justified. Those perpetrators, some adult and some teens, look like they are facing the most serious penalties for the felonies and the youth offenders are said to be charged as adults.

So there are the two stories that do have a connection of sorts, something that calls for causes to be addressed since neither should be an acceptable level of behavior.

The quietly launched LAUSD Duffy-Cortines summer deal that bumped out permanent subs

On 10-29-09:

"Senority system in LAUSD keeps good teachers out,"
By Larry Sand, Updated: 10/29/2009 04:42:33 PM PDT

The writer is a former teacher. He sides with the union's deal to give priority for substitute teaching calls to go to the laid off teachers over the existing body of substitute teachers, many of whom have been subs for years.

This is a story that has generated a few comments. Some of these favoring the laid off teachers and some favoring the subs, especially noting that most of the subs have the greater seniority. You can see that at http://www.dailynews.com/opinions/ci_13669698

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Earlier stories as the Substitute Teachers came to realize their dangerous reality:

Sept. 22, 2009

"Veteran substitute teachers protest loss of work," L.A. TIMES- "L.A. NOW" section online http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/09/veteran-subs-protest-loss-of-work-and-endangers-health-benefits.html From the story:

Under the agreement, 1,800 full-time teachers who were laid off this summer are given preference for open substitute jobs. In L.A. Unified there are roughly 2,200 openings for substitute teachers every day.

Subs must work one day a month to keep their health benefits and must total
100 days worked in a school year to earn benefits for the next year. In his
statement, Duffy pledged to help the veteran subs recover the work hours they
needed.

The deal was criticized as a secret one because this part of the agreement was not given much or any publicity. The Times' writer says they had to go find this out.
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October 15, 2009

"L.A. schools chief stands by controversial deal to use laid-off teachers as subs," [Updated] October 15, 2009 11:47 am, L.A. TIMES' "L.A. NOW" -

The Los Angeles schools superintendent says he opposes revoking an agreement that has imperiled health benefits for more than 1,000 veteran substitute teachers while costing hundreds of them regular work.

In an interview, Supt. Ramon C. Cortines said he stands by a deal that was designed to help recently laid-off full-time teachers by giving them preference for available substitute jobs over veteran subs with more seniority.

I think that Cortines is just tired of dealing with the same work and especially, he's not interested in helping AJ Duffy, the union president, to look good to his members- and then create more power for Duffy. The idea of dealing with the union to save jobs was a task in itself and this detail is more Duffy's problem than that of Cortines.
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October 22, 2009

"Veteran L.A. substitute teachers losing work -
L.A. Unified Supt. Ramon Cortines stands by a one-year deal made with the teachers union to give assignment preferences to laid-off instructors, including those with less seniority" By Howard Blume, October 22, 2009.

The arrangement to bypass teacher seniority only came to light when the district provided a copy of the agreement to The Times. The deal then created a firestorm within United Teachers Los Angeles, especially when veteran substitutes noticed that they were getting little or no work. Many subs rely on their district employment as primary income. They also get health benefits when they work at least 100 days a year and at least one day a month.

Because of the ongoing state budget crisis, the Los Angeles Unified School District on July 1 laid off about 2,000 full-time teachers who had not yet earned tenure. About 1,800 of them then signed up for sub work. On average, the district employs about 2,200 substitutes a day.

You can see from the numbers that after assigning the substitute assignment calls to the laid-off teachers, there's not much left for anyone else. It doesn't do much for the regular subs, who were effectively doomed by the Duffy-Cortines arranged agreement. Cortines say it is designed to keep teachers around until the economy improves and they can come back to LAUSD.

He did not mention that there is a steady decrease in enrollment in LAUSD schools over the last decade, at the same time a school building surge is continuing, now producing about a new school per month.

As an aside, consider that (1.) many of these new schools will ultimately become managed by charter schools and (2.) you have lots of school in the fifth year of PI (Performance Improvement) status.

After 3 consecutive years of PI status, the state can take over the school. Right now, taking over schools is sort of "on the back burner" for the State, preoccupied with some other problems, so any changes will be slow to come, but meanwhile, 2 or 3 more years worth of students will be churned out of the LAUSD, either by graduation or dropping out, educated NOT to their fullest potential.
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Here's an abstract of a doctoral work: "National Implications: An Analysis of E-Mentoring Induction Year Programs for Novice Alternatively
Certified Teachers" that considers the importance of mentoring on novice teachers, a category of teachers that leaves the profession at high rates (30% and up) within the first five years of teaching. It considers the impact of mentoring and e-mentoring to reduce the attrition rate. Pay rate, to the surprise of lots of people, is not among the leading reason for leaving teaching.
http://www.nationalforum.com/Electronic%20Journal%20Volumes/Anthony,%20Taiwanna%20D.%20An%20analysis%20of%20E-Mentoring.pdf

The object of the study is what to do about keeping and making good teachers by mentoring approaches that will support them and make them better teachers who, in turn will produce better educated students.


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From the Article of June 8, 2005:

The issue of The Total View newletter from Success Performance Solutions that advises on hiring at topic 1. Fifty Percent of New Teachers Leave in 5 Years. on http://www.super-solutions.com/teachershortages.asp

According to a National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) survey of 8,400 public and private school teachers, the main reasons for high teacher turnover and attrition rates are with inadequate administrative support (38 percent) and workplace conditions (32 percent).

Teacher recruitment and other supply-side solutions may not only fail to solve the problem, but could also make it worse if recruitment strategies involve lowering teacher standards, or if the effect of increasing teacher supply is to deflate salaries or erode working conditions.

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2008

Here is an article "Why Are New Teachers Leaving- The Case for Beginning-Teacher Induction and Mentoring? -that talks about what's needed to help new teachers become successful, namely the mentoring of new teachers and how the structure should be to establish such support on a systemic basis. This is a very detailed plan that is described showing the entire plan and what should be done and what is the purpose of the actions.

http://www.icfi.com/docs/beginning-teachers.pdf

DWP is going to be collecting more from you, but why?

Here is more from a Tuesday entry on Ron Kaye's blog http://www.ronkayela.com/ that you can examine to see that the DWP collects and has been collecting for years, loads of money. "DWP Calling: Your Money or Your Life (Or Why We Need to Know Where Our Money Goes)," By Ron Kaye on October 27, 2009. http://ronkayela.com/2009/10/dwp-calling-your-money-or-your.html


You might have sensed that part about collecting loads of money from you, but did you ever wonder WHERE it went? All that money was collected as a public utility only have it passed along to the "General Fund" of the city to use as it pleases. Instead, they could have been using it to improve service and maintain facilities and infrastructure.

The DWP collected so much money that the City Council had simply used it as a regular supplier of cash, not really doing much for the utility's customers of water and electricity. Remember, too, that this is a monopoly, the only game in town, and you really have no choice when it comes to sellers of water and electricity. It's all DWP and only DWP when it comes to getting electricity or water.

Check the numbers and see the added note at the beginnig of the October 27 blog posting that reflects the City Council meeting's outcome. The DWP requested approval for bonds for applying to DWP improvement on Tuesday, October 28, 2009. Bonds are the way that money is obtained. Actually it is borrowed to pay for things such as government projects. They are very expensive and the amount used comes from selling them to investors who will get paid back, usually from more taxes imposed upon the publie. The High Speed Rail to San Francisco sounded cool and I
am sure many voted to approve the project because of that, but it won't be ready for many years, while the costs to cover the bond repayment begins to mount fairly promptly.

That approval by the City Council, often colorfully referred to by many critics as the "City Clowncil," is mentioned in the linked posting and repeated below:

Editor's Note: The City Council, after a lengthy debate about Google
vs. Microsoft email products, unanimously approved both the water and power bond plans of DWP without debate, setting the stage for further rate increases. Google email won unanimous approval to be City Hall's email.

The DWP has a history of actions that cause most reasonable people from wondering, "Who's in charge here, anyway?" This ranges from the breast feeding classes for employees paid for at the work site by the DWP when the health insurance already provides this benefit, to the payments for an outside Public Relations company when an in-house ability already exists and when there is no other competing utility because DWP is a monopoly. All these came at hefty prices and the PR problem was corrected finally but it shows that they need serious watching.

By the way, David Nahai, ex-GM, resigned earlier this month and is getting paid as a "consultant" to answer emails and phone calls "during business hours" at just under $150,000 for the time left this year. Nahai was solidly behind the breast feeding expenditure. That was back when Nahai and the IBEW (union) were more in agreement than when Nahai left. Ron Kaye's blog gives a lot more of the details for dozens of the city politicians' activities that are not what they should be doing for the public and the voters.

Another resignation from L.A. City Pension Board, LHS alum Moctesuma Esparza

"Another member of L.A. pension board resigns," by David Zahniser, Oct. 28, 2009 . http://www.latimes.com/news/custom/topofthetimes/national/la-me-pension28-2009oct28,0,5787968.story The news here involves an alum from the Lincoln High Cl. of 1967, producer Moctezuma Esparza, who was appointed by Mayor Villaraigosa to the "Los Angeles City Employees' Retirement System," aka "LACERS." Esparza's position was a volunteer position. This makes him the seventh of the Villaraigosa appointees to resign in the last six months according to the Times' story.

The story explains some of the reasons for departures, and while there is no actual violation of anything now. Esparza has some business interest that could be considered within the newly changed law that prevents a person from holding a commission appointment while having dealings that may conflict with the public's interests.

The city's retirement system has lost a huge amount of money over investments in the downturn of the economy. This is something that is being investigated to determine whether any dealings happened to benefit individuals making the investment selections. The City is responsible to make up losses to the pension fund, something that doesn't happen with most private pension investments. The city's budget woes were made significantly more serious by these losses, with many investments made in projects of unusually large size and carrying significant risk. Losses were suffered when those went belly up or were otherwise devalued in the real estate market's plunge.

The various reasons for resignations of the other members are stated in the story. It appears to be a good choice on Esparza's part to leave in order to be clear as not having any question of conflicts of interest raised from potential personal benefits that could arise as a commissioner on the pension board. It's a problem he doesn't need to be involved with. Esparza is known for producing many notable movies, among them, Selena, Gettsburg, The Milagro Beanfield War, and Walkout.

Council plans to ban more outdoor smoking

"L.A. officials express support for smoking ban in outdoor dining areas,"
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/10/a-los-angeles-city-council-committee-voiced-support-for-a-ban-on-smoking-in-the-citys-outdoor-dining-areas-tuesday-but-or.html Something that the L.A. City Council does to pass time instead of deal with real issues of budget, crime or traffic, not to mention soaking the public for as much as they can in as many ways as they are able to invent- parking meters, trash fees, traffic tickets raised, telephone tax created, fee waivers as special events to unqualified events, and on and on.

The one of the originally published versions of this story in the L.A. Times had incorrectly stated that a ban would extend to a 40-mile radius from a taco truck

The actual application of the proposed city ordinance is "40-foot radius of mobile food trucks and refreshment kiosks." Note: "mobile food trucks" appears to be the current descriptive title for the more common term, "taco trucks.' And historical note: Does anyone remember the label, "Catering Trucks?" Those were trucks that had a route to stop by businesses daily for breaks and lunch but the food was already preapared instead of a carrying cook and kitchen on board. At that time the franchise fast food places were not found everywhere like today, and McDonald's was still establishing its place on the horizon. Now you find McD's, Burger King, Wendy's, Taco Bell, and many other franchises in a short drive, or even walk, from whereever you work, go to school or live.

Well, first, a while back, the city wanted to limit where taco trucks could park for any length of time before they had to move on. The courts struck that law down, so now the city goes the other way, and constructs a zone that appears to be more accommodating of their operations and including them within conventional eating establishments. Right about here, I think it's a good place to remind you that City Council is known neither for its consistency or proper prioritization of any issues.

The comments on the L.A. Times blog responded to the story's initial typo banning smoking within a "40-mile radus" instead of 40-foot radius from a taco, or, "mobile food truck" or "food kiosk.'

Some samples of comments from the version, "L.A. council to consider banning smoking in outdoor dining areas," October 26, 2009, at http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/10/la-council-to-consider-banning-smoking-in-outdoor-dining-areas.html,


That's a tough new law. I don't think you can ever be 40 miles from a taco truck in California.
Posted by: Omond October 26, 2009 at 06:52 PM

What? Within 40 miles of a mobile food truck? That has to be a typo. If it were county wide that'd mean if there's a truck in San Gabriel I couldn't smoke in Pasadena.
Posted by: Matt Reed October 26, 2009 at 06:55 PM

How will I know if I'm within 40 miles of a mobile food truck?
Posted by: Kevin October 26, 2009 at 07:12 PM

How will I know if I'm within 40 miles of a mobile food truck?
Posted by: Kevin October 26, 2009 at 07:12 PM



The City Council will spend hours in a hearing on ONE agenda item and still bungle the outcome. To offset this time imbalance, many times they will then pass agenda items in other important areas very quickly with unanimous votes after little or no discussion. (Where there is public comment on an "agenda item," within seconds of the last speaker, they call for the vote and you get in ALMOST EVERY CASE, a UNANIMOUS vote that makes you think what the speakers said mattered not a bit. I think it's the case and you'd have been paid more attention speaking a foreign language instead of English. (That's because you would have an interpreter there, and everything you say will come out twice.)

There are lots of blogs around that chronicle these things so I won't go on any longer with my own list. www.ronkayela.com is one place each day to find so many examples of a malfunctioning city government that you really have to wonder, "Who elects these people anyway?" ANSWER: usually a "majority" of a 12% to 18% turnout- barely 1/5 at most, of the registered voters. . In other words, a different outcome could result with way less than 1/4 to 1/3 of the REST of the registered voters choosing differently.

Dance Contracts for High School students

There's a story in the news this week about the use of "contracts" for high school students. This contract happens to be directed to dancing. Aside from the dress codes that never seem to be handled well in LAUSD, as far as I have seen, there is the dress and behavior at school dances.

The L.A. Times story on the topic carries the headline, "Schools putting the moves on hold," By Carla Rivera, October 26, 2009 . http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dances26-2009oct26,0,1724549.story

Downey and Aliso Niguel High are using "dance contracts" to address the problem of explicit teen dancing. The story covers a lot of the experiences in student behavior and this is an attempt to address the matters. Read this for some enlightenment on current student culture if you haven't seen what's happening yourself.

I think it's about time for this to happen. LAUSD should take notice.