LA WATCHDOG--The 2019 Assessment Roll for the 790,556 properties in the City of Los Angeles rose to a record $653 billion, an increase of $42 billion, or 6.8%, from 2018. 

THOMSON REUTERS FOUNDATION SPEAKS-Fears are mounting across the United States over a proposal by President Donald Trump’s administration that would force tens of thousands of families to choose between splitting up or being homeless together. 

PLATKIN ON PLANNING-The Los Angeles City Charter, Sections 554-558,and the State of California’s planning laws require all cities and counties to have a General Plan.

EASTSIDER--Clearly, Metro’s plan for a NoHo to Pasadena BRT project has torn the community of Eagle Rock apart.  So where do we go from here? 

ALPERN AT LARGE--For those of us who remember when Mayor Riordan established Neighborhood Councils in the year 2000 (approximately), and for those of us who remember when they sprouted up all over the City, and for those of us who thought that our opinions meant something...it's very hard to see THIS evil nonsense:

RANTZ & RAVEZ-Mayor Eric Garcetti is the 42nd mayor of the City of Los Angeles. He is an educated, respected and very nice man with an annual city salary of $248,141, in addition to having a city-provided residence, a city car and driver, and an LAPD security detail for his every move around Los Angeles and the world.

GUEST COMMENTARY--In a new grim grotesquerie, sales of bulletproof backpacks are up as much as 300% as parents frantic to keep their children alive prepare to send them to this year's killing fields - once called going back to school - after our latest slaughter in El Paso and Dayton.

PERSPECTIVE--How can racism be a threat to the public health of an all-white small town?

PROGRESS--Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) lights a candle during a vigil for the victims of the recent mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, in Grand Army Plaza on August 5th, 2019, in Brooklyn.

ENERGY POLICY-The California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC) plans to make all homes and businesses use electricity only means electricity will need to take up the duties that natural gas has been performing, and provide continuously uninterruptable power as California is on a path toward 100% renewables and “zero-carbon” sources in electricity by 2045. 

WORLD WATCH-Climate change is real and is visible for all to see. The scientific evidence is overwhelming, and denying that climate change is already upon us, especially as the president and his party does, flies in the face of the indisputably dire consequences that will be inflicted on all humanity.

CHATMATES-As we move toward Election 2020 (in about 444 days), much has been made about this current president. 

D.C. DISPATCH-On July 24, 2019, I arrived at the Rayburn House Office building at 7:30 a.m. to witness what I was hoping to be a monumental day in American history -- the day we would get clarity on whether the President of the United States was fraudulently elected with the assistance of the Russian government.

ONE MAN’S OPINION-Duh. What’s prodromal? As we all recall from our high school Greek class, prodrome is derived from the Greek word prodromos, meaning "running before." (Yeah, like I took Greek in high school.)

MY TURN-What has become endemic to large dysfunctional organizations like the non-profit Cedars Sinai Medical Center, is that they don't have enough staff to accomplish even their most basic functions.