MEMO TO THE MAYOR-Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti is no longer a new mayor, but continues to navigate his way amidst an economic, political and legal turn of events that keep posing obstacles to the LA financial and cultural renaissance that he clearly desires. It's fair game to criticize the past and present decisions of our mayor, but it's important to fight for a better future.
1) First, a vote of thanks for the Olympics effort is long overdue. While a bit hushed at this moment, Mayor Garcetti and his team deserve credit for fighting hard (very, very hard) for the 2024 LA Olympics that should have been.
There are many who believe that the decision of the U.S. Olympics Committee to choose Boston over LA and other cities was an emotional one (to show that Boston had gotten over its terrorist Marathon nightmare), and it's not hard to conclude that the USOC made a mistake. LA would have had a profitable Olympics in 2024; maybe not so for Boston.
2) LAX reconfiguration, including the long-sought Metro Rail/Airport connection, is one that has vexed both former Mayors Hahn and Villaraigosa, but appears on its way to becoming reality in the years to come.
Mayor Garcetti is no small part of this success, and having a right hand man like Mike Bonin as CD11 Councilmember is a big help. There have been both clashes and cooperation with outgoing LA World Airports CEO Gina Marie Lindsey, but she's leaving on a very high and hopeful note ...
... while the choice of her successor is needed to see Lindsey's and Garcetti's and Bonin's efforts through. Particularly an airport that modernizes without expanding to the north and threatening incoming/outgoing/peripheral car traffic on Sepulveda and Lincoln Blvds.
3) Police unions and other unions need to work for the Mayor and for his taxpaying constituents, not the other way around. Concerns over public sector unions is NOT the same as opposing unions altogether--organizing workers can be a good thing, pushing around and intimidating the taxpayers is something else altogether.
For those of us getting the flyers in the mail about crime is going up, and how police need more funding (even if we can't afford it) or it will go up, the question of whether it's an issue of supporting the police (which we all do) or whether it's looking like "protection money" (which we all fear) now must be confronted.
Ditto with the DWP, which insists on more funding but also insists on less oversight, including the nonprofit slush funds that are the epitomy of the despised and seemingly corrupt Brian D'Arcy era of a DWP union gone amok.
Taxpayers--including those in private sector unions--increasingly are aware of the blatant and unsustainable intimidation/tax grab that an increasingly UN-civil service is demanding of an electorate who voted in Garcetti as someone who could come through the very real demands of basic City services. Garcetti has his work cut out for him.
4) Nothing will kill the proposed "Measure R-2" to expand transportation funding like bad Planning--particularly the overdeveloping, anti-homeowner crazies left over from the Villaraigosa Era who are screwing up potential Planning improvements on Pico and other major commercial corridors.
Appropriate densification for seniors, students and workforce affordable housing, as well as for commercial development, can be a great thing. Building 4-5 story corridors where there are now only 1-2 stories is something else altogether.
It should be remembered that the Expo Line is limited in capacity for new riders--it shares tracks with the Blue Line Downtown, and can therefore only carry up to 90,000 riders or so.
The Expo Line is NOT the Wilshire Subway, CANNOT carry hundreds of thousands of new riders, and therefore cannot be a vehicle to turn the Westside into another Downtown (even if we wanted that, which we don't).
There are three main "Downtown" regions ripe for megadensification--Downtown proper, the Wilshire Corridor and the Century Corridor (that last region doesn't get enough press, but it will once LAX is reconfigured). Transforming the inherently suburban Westside into another Downtown can never make any sense.
To conclude and summarize, Eric Garcetti must choose content and not conflation.
Conflating the failed Olympics effort with the Mayor's past and ongoing efforts to boost the city is wrong.
Conflating LAX redevelopment with inappropriate LAX overdevelopment is wrong.
Conflating the need to have public sector unions work with the Mayor and with the taxpayers, and accept compromise, with a disrespect for the public sector altogether is wrong.
Conflating elegant densification with overdensification, and conflating bad Planning with good Planning, is wrong.
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The Mayor's feet should always be held to the fire--he's earned past and present criticisms aplenty. But Garcetti does appear to be trying to do right by the taxpayers, and although there's a difference between lip service and credible achievement, his actions do show he deserves our support.
Garcetti's battles will be quiet but very real, and usually with compromise and good feelings preferred over harsh confrontation. But they're also OUR battles, and we deserve a Mayor who'll fight for us as much as an electorate willing to fight for itself, to boot.
(Ken Alpern is a Westside Village Zone Director and Board member of the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC), previously co-chaired its Planning and Outreach Committees, and currently is Co-Chair of its MVCC Transportation/Infrastructure Committee. He is co-chair of the CD11Transportation Advisory Committee and chairs the nonprofit Transit Coalition, and can be reached at [email protected]This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. He also does regular commentary on the MarkIsler Radio Show on AM 870, and co-chairs the grassroots Friends of the Green Line at www.fogl.us. The views expressed in this article are solely those of Mr. Alpern.)
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 13 Issue 13
Pub: Feb 13, 2015
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CityWatch Los Angeles
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