CITYWATCH ACTION POLL--“I think we should be working toward free tuition. That may sound pretty radical, but that was in the original intention of the CSU system, so lower-income students could afford education without having to break the bank with their family, or not even being able to go because they can’t afford it.” ” Cal Poly SLO student Erica Hudson as quoted in the San Luis Obispo Tribune.

Make it free! Make it free!

Fearless prediction. The next big fight in California budgeting is coming, and it will be about a student movement to make public universities free. And it could scramble politics and budgeting in the state.

[sexypolling id="9"]

The San Luis Obispo Tribune offered a detailed story recently about Students for Quality Education, which has chapters at 19 of the 23 CSU campuses, and is ramping up for a big push this fall. They are going to challenge the CSU’s plans for annual increases in tuition tied to inflation – a model that resembles the approach favored by the legislature (and with some departures, by UC).

And they have a great argument. Subsidies to higher education more than pay for themselves; they were the foundation of California’s 20^th century success. And tuition and fees have more doubled in the past decade, leaving many students in debt. The state, even in good times, is more interested in throwing money in a complicated rainy day fund than in investing in public higher education. And there are a lot of young Bernie Sanders supporters who need something to do.

Free tuition is it.

And there are many ways the students, and their sympathizers, could draw blood. One target would be Prop 55: the partial extension of Prop 30. They should point out that the measure doesn’t retain a sales tax increase, and is likely to produce less money than the stopgap Prop 30. The question: why doesn’t the state make tax changes that bring in more billions that go to higher education?

The students would also be wise to draft and start circulating a ballot initiative for 2018. It should be simple: bar UC and CSU from charging any fees or tuition to Californians, perhaps with the caveat that fees can be charged to students from families who make $250,000 or more.

That would precipitate a crisis in Sacramento. How to pay for it? How to budget for it? But that would be healthy. Gov. Brown and Sacramento have dodged fundamental questions about the budget and taxation, instead limiting spending and riding the wave of economic growth. The budget system is still dysfunctional, as will become apparent in the next recession. Or when university students demand what ought to be their birthright.

(Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Zócalo Public Square. This was originally posted at Fox and Hounds.) 

-cw

THE GUSS REPORT-Hugo Rossitter, a veteran Los Angeles Deputy City Attorney, is not to be trusted … or so it would seem if you listen to … Hugo Rossitter. Or, consider his dubious documents and websites. 

A simple inquiry about inconsistencies on a recent affidavit he filed led to bizarre denials from him about two businesses listed on his Linked-In profile – businesses he claims are not and never have been active despite extensive evidence to the contrary. 

The subjects are tied together because, as the phrase goes, falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus, or, if a witness is lying about one thing, he may be lying about everything. 

A few weeks before the 4^th of July holiday, I called Rossitter at his City Hall office to ask about the affidavit he wrote to obtain a temporary restraining order (TRO) on behalf of Herb Wesson, Los Angeles City Council president, against Wayne Spindler, an Encino immigration attorney, who wrote and drew reprehensible and racist content on a speaker card that he submitted to Wesson. 

After validating the affidavit’s authenticity, Rossitter could not explain why he signed it under penalty of perjury on April 27, fifteen days prior to the actual Wesson/Spindler incident on May 11. He similarly lacked explanation on why the Petitioner on related forms is listed as the Office of the City Attorney rather than the City of Los Angeles, since it is a workplace violence matter and Wesson works for the city. (The subsequent use of the boilerplate form, according to another City Attorney staffer, a case where Councilmember Paul Krekorian pro se sought a restraining order against Lee James Jamieson, the Petitioner is correctly listed as the City of Los Angeles). 

Rossitter could also not explain why his document said injunction, which is usually Civil Court, as opposed to TRO, which is usually Family Court, or what injunctive relief he sought, though both are technically injunctions. 

The next questions caused Rossitter to stop speaking altogether. 

Why were Spindler’s criminal and TRO hearings scheduled to take place at the same time in different courthouses? And, given the totality of these inconsistencies, was he engaged in a premeditated SLAPP action against Spindler? 

SLAPP is a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation, a meritless legal entanglement that powerful entities such as governments use to suppress critics by overwhelming their time, freedom and financial resources. 

Instead of denying it, Rossitter referred me to Rob Wilcox, Director of Community Engagement and Outreach for City Attorney Mike Feuer. Wilcox said the date was due to Rossitter’s “sloppy” work.   He could not explain why the Petitioner was listed incorrectly. And he denied that the city ever engages in SLAPPs. 

But Wilcox too stopped talking when told of a 2006 Appeals court ruling against Rossitter and his boss Vivienne Swanigan, both working for then-LA City Attorney Rocky “Crash” Delgadillo, in favor of animal activist group Animal Defense League’s anti-SLAPP motion. More on Swanigan further down. 

Rossitter’s background is curious. Admitted to the California Bar in 1978, he went on inactive status from 1980 to 1995. After a stint with local television station KCAL-9, he joined the City Attorney’s office in 2002, primarily handling workplace violence issues. 

New job notwithstanding, at the same time, Rossitter got a real estate broker’s license and started two legal consulting businesses (See complete screenshots of WVPrevent and Southland Mediation) whose websites have the same mailing address and phone number, which I called twice on the 4^th of July. Rossitter answered both with a business-like, “This is Hugo, how can I help you?” 

I asked Rossitter why his businesses, which are on his Linked-In page, are not listed with the California Secretary of State, City of Beverly Hills or City of Los Angeles Department of Finance. 

“They are not active,” he responded. When asked when they became inactive, he said, “They have never been active.” 

In other words, Rossitter would have you believe that two businesses listed on his Linked-In page as active since 2002 and 2003, with functioning multi-page websites, active fax and phone numbers (that he personally answers), email, street and mailing addresses, biographies and photos of him – and only of him – with claims of successes achieved for clients, his fees for those services ($395 per hour with a four-hour minimum), and what it costs to reschedule ($400 for a full day or $200 for a half day) is all just for show.   

“I just have those websites in case I want to run businesses like them someday,” he implausibly offered after a long pause.   

Told about abundant proof that those businesses are, indeed, functioning, Rossitter replied colorfully when asked whether he pays taxes on revenue from those businesses, takes a home office tax deduction, if he asked for and got permission from the city to have outside earned income, and if he submitted a required Statement of Economic Interest. He again stopped talking when asked whether, if moonlighting as a private attorney, he maintains a client trust account. 

Rossitter’s disclosure documents – some approved by Swanigan – provided to me by the Ethics Commission and begrudgingly by a Feuer deputy show dates crossed out and massive gaps, particularly for his WV Prevent enterprise. Their income level claims are inconsistent with success claims on his websites. And his web pages promise “real time” responses that conflict with city policy on using city time and assets for outside employment.   

And this is why it matters. Rossitter gets a prosecutor’s unspoken benefit of the doubt in court because most judges are former prosecutors. His credibility impacts the freedom, safety and finances of everyone involved in his cases. His dubious work on TROs, history of proven SLAPP activity and denials that neither business was ever functioning are red flags requiring investigation by LA District Attorney Jackie Lacey’s Public Integrity Division and the California Bar Association. 

If it is determined the city violated Spindler’s rights (who has filed a $775,000 claim against the city) and caused him economic harm, the taxpayers may end up paying the piper. It would not be the first time the taxpayers did that for outspoken, sometimes boorish, gadflies, either. Rossitter’s credibility will come into question. 

A closing thought on that TRO: Wesson’s colleague, LA City Councilmember Curren Price, who is African-American, said Spindler should be made an example of. But days later, Price approached Spindler outside of a committee meeting, shook his hand chuckling “PDQ. That is a good one. You got me.” Is that why criminal charges have not been filed, and might not ever be, against Spindler? And what, if anything, did Rossitter have to do with it?

(Daniel Guss, MBA, is a contributor to CityWatchLA, KFI AM-640, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Los Angeles Business Journal, Los Angeles Magazine and others. He blogs on humane issues at http://ericgarcetti.blogspot.com/. The opinions expressed by Daniel Guss are his own and do not necessarily represent the opinions of CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

RATEPAYERS BEWARE-DWP Charter Reform will be on the November 8^th ballot. Voters will do themselves a favor by viewing this initiative with a healthy dose of skepticism. As Shakespeare reminds us, “a rose by any other name….” Just so happens that in this case, the same can be said of reform. 

Some folks will be encouraged by the word “Reform” and operate under the correct notion that something needs to change at DWP. What they may not realize is that “something” is Brian D’Arcy’s power and that the proposed “reform” likely originated with D’Arcy himself. As documented by the LA Weekly, D’Arcy’s union Local 18 has made contributions to Councilman Fuentes’ campaign. Fuentes then introduced the D’Arcy measure under the rubric of reform. (The current rumor is that the reason Fuentes is not running for another City Council term is that D’Arcy has promised him a job). (Photo above: Brian D’Arcy.) 

At this point, some may ask, “What does the DWP boss get from this?” That’s a good question; and here is the answer: The D’Arcy measure allows for Civil Service standards to be bypassed pursuant to a legally binding Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). This means that a DWP union’s MOU, not the Civil Service standards developed over the last 130 years, will determine how DWP employees are hired and fired. This will provide D’Arcy an embarrassment of riches with regard to political power (and the exact opposite of what needs to be done to reform DWP). 

D’Arcy will be able to hand out $200K plus/year jobs (just as he does at JSI/JTI today) as political patronage, and get DWP employees fired that dare challenge him. This type of behavior is a rollback to the 19^th century practice of patronage that inspired the creation of Civil Service in 1883 via the Pendleton Act. According to Tony Wilkinson, Chair of the Neighborhood Council DWP MOU Oversight Committee, in a CityWatch article on July 11, 2016, this will make DWP “totally dependent on labor negotiations with its dominant union (Brian D’Arcy’s Local 18) for a solution to its hiring crisis.” 

What voters need to know is that real DWP reform starts with curtailing, not enhancing, D’Arcy’s power. A real reform measure would limit the percentage of DWP employees that can belong to any one DWP union, abolish the JSI/JTI slush funds, and ensure that DWP employees that challenge D’Arcy (or any union boss) are protected from retribution. The D’Arcy Charter Reform is not reform, it is a union boss power grab. 

The forces supporting this initiative have constructed a Trojan Horse decked out in the livery of reform. Their intent is simple: mine DWP for resources to further their political aspirations. Able to bypass Civil Service, DWP jobs will be handed out as political patronage. Local 18 cash, funded by high salaries fueled by greased rate hikes, will flow into the campaigns of politicians willing to do D’Arcy’s will. What these supporters want is a 21^st Century Tammany Hall, financed by DWP cash, with D’Arcy in the role of Boss Tweed. 

Those sitting on the fence may ask, “Is there anything good in D’Arcy’s DWP Charter Reform initiative?” Well, according to Tony Wilkinson’s July 11, 2016 CityWatch article, this initiative does not free DWP from the political meddling of elected officials and does not include the exemptions needed to resolve DWP’s hiring crisis. Wilkinson’s criticism does not stop there. He further states in his article that: 

“Inserting into the Charter a requirement that DWP implement monthly billing by January 1, 2020, raises the specter of a three-year (2017, 2018, 2019) forced march to a major billing system software change that can’t be halted if it is not ready. Did we learn anything from the last billing system fiasco?” 

Now, why does D’Arcy’s DWP Charter Reform initiative call for monthly billing (as oppose to the current bi-monthly)? The answer is simple: rate hikes will be less apparent to DWP customers, and rate hikes are required to fund Boss D’Arcy’s 21^st Century Tammany Hall. 

In summary, D’Arcy’s DWP Charter Reform is not reform. It is a vehicle for cronyism, corruption, and rate hikes. And those supporting it need to re-visit this issue in-depth. “A rose by any other name…”

(Los Angeles native Schuyler Colfax is an independent writer and former military officer residing in the beautiful San Fernando Valley. He can be reached at [email protected].) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

THIS IS WHAT I KNOW--If you’ve ever taken Las Virgenes Road to the beach, you’ve probably noticed the golden hills of the California landscape. Over the years, development has added apartment and condo communities, and a gated community. More recently, you may have noticed poles indicating a development in the works, as well as signage about a boutique hotel to be built on what was an empty space. 

A drive through just about any Southern California area these days includes some sort of development, new homes or mixed used space. There’s a push and pull to change. Each city and county has General Plans that are supposed to guide the short- and long-term land development and usage. However, when we add large sums of money into the mix, things change. Plans are somehow obscured. 

I’ve been covering grassroots activists groups throughout the city who are focused on maintaining the integrity in their neighborhoods, balancing affordable housing with open space and issues like density, parking, and traffic. I’ve listened to concerned residents detail how their trees were collateral damage during a demolition that weren’t even aware was happening or a soon-to-be designated historical cultural landmark being razed to make room for a McMansion or condos. 

Typically, developers hide behind land-use attorneys or city council people and staff with whom they appear to be cozy. That’s what makes the contention between The New Home Company and a group of Calabasas signature-gatherers especially interesting. 

The New Home Company, says Malibu Canyon Community Association president Mary Hubbard, has been working to prevent members of Save Malibu Canyon from gathering the necessary signatures to overturn Canyon Oaks, a three-story hotel and gated community of 71 homes at Las Virgenes and Agoura Road that was approved by Calabasas City Council in a 3-2 vote last month. The development, which required significant grading, would be built on a 77-acre vacant lot on the Las Virgenes corridor. 

If the petition drive is successful, the 16-acre project could be before Calabasas voters on the November ballot. The group will need the signatures of 10 percent of Calabasas registered voters or 1,500 signatures to get the petition on the November ballot. 

On July 9, deputies from the Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station were notified to intervene in a dispute at the Albertson’s shopping center between petition gatherers and several supporters of the project. Save Malibu Canyon had been granted permission to set up a table outside Albertson’s but six representatives of New Home positioned themselves to block the volunteers from approaching customers. The representatives also handed out fliers promoting the project. The Save Malibu Canyon volunteers said the New Home promoters were calling them names and intimidating shoppers so police were called in. 

The New Home Company has hired advocates to promote the benefits of the project, setting up a website to relay the benefits of the project and also to gather signatures to “decline the petition.” The group also took out a full-page “open letter to the community” to promote their project, which Hubbard says also attempts to discredit anyone in opposition to the project. 

“The most disingenuous thing they’ve done is to present that the only alternative would be maximum buildout for that property,” explains Hubbard. “Nothing could be further from the truth. It doesn’t make sense. We’ve shown up at city council meetings, commission meetings begging for a much smaller development. To present that we’re advocating for a maximum buildout is what has offended us the most.” 

Hubbard adds, “The city council should never have approved this project. Three people voted against what 99 percent of the residents who testified wanted. That’s why a direct democracy is important.”
If the referendum makes it to the ballot, city officials can either rescind their approval or refer the vote to election. Calabasas City Manager Tony Coroalles has said if the Canyon Oaks projects fails, the landowner would bring a larger project of up to 180 residential units and 155,000 square feet of commercial place, permitted in the General Plan. Coroalles adds that a larger project would severely impact traffic and that there is no demand for retail and office space in the western part of Calabasas. 

“From the city’s perspective, this (Canyon Oaks) is absolutely the best project we could hope for on this site… Something will be built,” says the city manager. Hubbard disagrees with the city manager’s assessment. “The only way this could be built to maximum entitlements is if the city council approves. Previous city councils have not approved projects that were too big for the property,” she says. “A Home Depot was proposed and previous council let the developers know this is a wildlife corridor with landslides, a hillside. What we are asking is to scale back the project to either a hotel or homes; not both. Now, the city is spreading misinformation. There is no reason a competent city council would approve of a maximum buildout on that property.” 

“We showed the city council other chains who have done beautifully designed two-story hotels with meandering walkways, nestled into the surroundings so then project doesn’t urbanize the area, which is the gateway to the Santa Monica Mountains. This project is next to a residential area, which the city rezoned to commercial,” she adds. 

Hubbard says the city used an illegal roundabout to get around Measure O, an open-space initiative passed by Calabasas voters. “Measure O requires rezoning is supposed to go to a vote before the people in this case. The city got around this in a convoluted way. In order for houses to be built where there is possibility of a landslide, they had to do extensive grading, over 2 million yards of cut and fill. They scoop out the dirt on hills to fill in the valleys and make it flat. The city presented this as a ‘health and safety issue to rationalize this. We are filing a lawsuit because we think this was illegal.” 

“If people vote against this, the project will be undone completely. They won’t be able to bring this forward for another year and it will send a message to the city council that they cannot ignore the citizens who testified and begged them not to approve, not to change the zoning and the general plans. They ignored us and did it anyway. We don’t think we have a good representative government,” Hubbard says. “A city survey concluded that preservation of open space and the view shed was the highest priority for 80 percent of residents surveyed. We moved here to escape over development. We aren’t asking for money or to build more buildings, whether preschools or senior citizen centers. The city council needs to listen to our priorities. Preservation of the natural environment has always been our priority.” 

Supporter’s opportunity to sign the petition and help get the initiative on the ballot in November have until July 22. The clock is ticking.

(Beth Cone Kramer is a Los Angeles writer and a columnist for CityWatch.)

-cw

DANCE OF DENSITY-We have heard that one reason the Garcetti Administration has been demolishing the homes of poor people is to construct more dense units near Transit Corridors. They call these extra dense projects Transit Oriented Developments (TODs). Some people think that it is wise to cram high density construction near subways and light rail. As the LA Times reported, the City has approved the destruction of over 20,000 rent-controlled units since Garcetti was first elected as councilmember for CD 13 in 2001. 

What is the connection between demolishing thousands of poor people homes and the METRO Lines? 

Rent-controlled properties are older (pre-1978) and almost all of them are less dense than new projects which Garcetti wants constructed in the TODs. Since METRO lines already go where the housing has already existed for decades, there is very little vacant land for the TOD projects. Thus, existing rent-controlled units, i.e. the homes of the elderly, disabled and poor, obstruct Garcetti’s desire to create a Manhattan type density near transit lines. The solution of the Garcetti Administration is to demolish the homes of poor. 

Now, Valley Village has provided us all with proof positive that one purpose of destroying poor people’s homes is to increase new projects with much greater residential density so that bad parking and traffic conditions become so unbearable that people will give up their cars and use the METRO. The group Fix the City has previously alleged that the Garcetti Administration is intentionally making traffic much worse in an effort to coerce people to use the Metro System. 

Let’s be very clear – we are not talking about METRO’s serving the needs of the poor but rather the poor sacrificing their homes to satisfy the desires of METRO. This admission was made last Thursday, July 14, 2016, by a Garcetti appointee on the South Valley Area Planning Commission. Commissioner Dierking explained his voting to destroy rent-controlled apartments on property which the proposed developer did not even own. Here is Commissioner’s justification for destroying the homes of poor people, a quote from the hearing on the Hermitage-Weddington Project on July 14, 2016: 

“…as a METRO Employee this is a block and a half away from the orange line station and I want to see people talking less about parking and cars and more about walking to the bus and I think we need to create trans-oriented development route projects...I'd love to see the 48-unit project… ” 

After a hearing lasting hours, during which many residents provided extensive evidence of the great difficulty they were already having finding places to park, told stories of being attacked at night as they walked blocks to their homes, and complained of increasing traffic congestion, Garcetti’s appointee, who works for METRO, brushed aside all the testimony about parking and congestion as if he just does not want to see it. Instead, Garcetti’s appointee wanted to hear testimony about walking to take the bus. This is because his boss has a vested interest in more people taking the bus. 

In most cities, commissioners are not permitted to vote on issues which will benefit their employers. But, apparently, in Los Angeles the rules governing conflict-of-interest do not apply to Garcetti appointees – even when they admit in public that they have a conflict-of-interest. Thus, we see the decision to ignore the evidence and vote to benefit an employer. 

How far away from any semblance of fairness has the City gone for a commissioner to freely admit that his vote is to benefit his employer after stating he does not even want to hear evidence he does not like. No member of the public present at this hearing testified in favor of the Project. No one at the hearing thought that worse parking and more congestion were laudable goals -- except, it seems, Commissioner Dierking. 

After re-reading Commissioner Dierking’s admission, it’s clear that he not only says what type of testimony he does not want to see presented by the public, but he specifies what the public should be saying. Commissioner Dierking is upset that the public provided no support for Metro’s Let’s All Use the Bus mantra. 

We should note that this proposed destruction of more homes of the poor is right across the street from Marilyn Monroe’s home that was demolished with Garcetti-Krekorian approval three (3) days before the Cultural Heritage Commission hearing on the subject. 

Development does not necessarily mean “progress.” As we have seen in other places in Los Angeles, the term “development” has come to signify the predatory destruction of tens of thousands of homes of the elderly, disabled and poor because their homes are within a few clocks of Transit Oriented Districts. As Commissioner Dierking explained, the Garcetti Administration does not want to see any evidence of the harm which it is causing. Rather, the Garcetti Administration dictates to the public the type of evidence that they should present to support the destruction of their homes. It’s as if Garcetti were following a script out of a George Orwell novel. 

After years of destroying rent-controlled apartments and years of documentation that Los Angeles is slipping into decay due to the Garcetti Administration’s predatory practices, people need to assert themselves in order to save Los Angeles. 

Back in December 2013, famed international lawyer Mickey Kantor convened the prestigious 2020 Commission to address the deteriorating state of the City of Los Angeles. In its December 2013 Report Introduction, the 2020 Commission found: 

“Los Angeles is barely treading water while the rest of the world is moving forward. We risk falling further behind in adapting to the realities of the 21st century and becoming a City in decline. For too many years we have failed to cultivate and build on our human and economic strengths, while evading the hard choices concerning local government and municipal finance presented by this new century.” 

We are approaching the three year mark of this alarming indictment of the way Garcetti runs the City, but each day reveals new evidence of a predatory regime which has become so authoritarian that it dictates to its citizens what type evidence they should give at public hearings.

(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney. He can be reached at: [email protected]. Abrams views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Graphic credit: LA Curbed. Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

DEEGAN ON LA-There’s been no shortage of ideas, proposals, concepts, wishes and dreams for how to provide housing for our city’s homeless population. Maybe even some prayers said in private. Some cost estimates go as high as $2 billion to provide supportive housing. Now, if only someone would agree to pay for it! That someone is looking more and more like the taxpayers, but to get them to vote “yes” on funding will take a lot of strong messaging from a variety of sources. 

Lots of political will is pushing for solutions, at both the city and county levels. But why hasn’t Cardinal José Horacio Gómez, spiritual leader of over four million Catholics in 287 parishes in the Archdiocese, spoken out? And, what about Gary L. Toebben, President and CEO of the LA Area Chamber of Commerce that represents the interests of over 235,000 businesses in LA County, an organization that sponsors more than 25 advocacy events annually? 

The most Toebben has said recently about homelessness in our city, was on January 19, 2016 in the face of impending El Nino rains: “I applaud the City and County for preparing these comprehensive and complimentary plans” (to care for the homeless if it rains heavily.) 

Three weeks later, on February February 9, 2016, he marginally increased his soft voice on homelessness by saying, “I urge you (the County Supervisors) to take the next step in ending our housing and homelessness crisis by adopting the Comprehensive Homeless Strategy before you today.” 

To “applaud” and to “urge”, essentially to be a cheerleader sitting on the sidelines, is a very weak form of advocacy from a business leader representing “member companies who are working to promote the economic vitality and quality of life in the LA region.” 

Do Toebben and the Chamber think that “quality of life” is reserved for the business class and is irrelevant to the homeless whose “quality of life” would be dramatically improved if able to transition into supportive housing? Could one of his 25 annual advocacy programs become one that tackles homelessness? 

As weak as this advocacy from Big Business is, the Church leadership performs even worse on the civic stage. Cardinal Gómez has said nothing about how he may lead the Church into a region-wide solution to homelessness. He’s not even offering to pray for them. This is hard to understand from a spiritual leader that has one of the largest megaphones in this heavily Catholic city. Some loud and strong words from him could activate the huge apparatus of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles into action. Yet he has revealed no voice, no plan for the homeless. 

It’s not just taxpayers that should be carrying the burden of providing for the homeless: corporate Los Angeles and religious Los Angeles must form a coalition with political Los Angeles to start providing some solutions. This includes encouraging their constituencies of businessmen and parishioners to support programs that they, Cardinal Gomez and Chamber President Toebben, create, articulate and lead; they should mobilize their followers with a call to action to help the city and county that are facing an uphill battle to get the voters to approve revenue schemes on the November 8 ballot. 

There will be two ballot measures, one from the city and one from the county. The city measure calls for taxpayers to carry new debt through bond payments; the county wants a vote in favor of a tax on marijuana, but that relies on the approval of the marijuana ballot initiative, California’s Adult Use of Marijuana Act. 

The Los Angeles City Council agreed to place a $1.2 billion bond initiative on the November city ballot to build more housing for the homeless, although there are strings attached: by law, the bond money could be used only for housing construction, not to provide services. 

The County reached a point where it had to choose between a 1/4 cent sales tax or a 10% levy on the gross receipts of businesses that produce or distribute marijuana and related products. It voted for the tax on weed, a risk since it hinges on the California Adult Use of Marijuana Act being approved by voters. Strings include restricting the tax-on-weed revenue to pay for mental health and substance abuse treatment, rental subsidies, emergency housing and other services intended to get and keep people off the streets. Annual revenue from this tax is estimated at $130 million. If voters approve legalization, the marijuana market would be valued at $1.3 billion annually and growing. 

According to LA County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, “The Board chose an uncertain marijuana business tax to fight homelessness, rather than a reliable 1/4 cent sales tax to put on the November ballot. The Board selected an option that would generate the least amount of money and take the longest amount of time to generate funds.” 

On the upside, Fortune Magazine recently reported that Colorado, a state with a fraction of our population, collected $1 billion in marijuana tax revenues last year. In the long run, the 10% tax on marijuana could be a significant money maker for the county. 

Neither the city nor the county measure is pure, and both must fight for attention among some nineteen statewide measures, as well as a handful of local measures, all on the November 8 ballot. Statewide measures include votes relating to adult entertainment, regulation of businesses, campaign finance, the death penalty, education, elections and campaigns, the environment, firearms, government accountability, healthcare, and legalization of marijuana. 

Ridley-Thomas continued, “There is no guarantee that voters in November will pass a measure legalizing the use of marijuana, and there are also many unresolved questions as to the impact on public health and safety on our communities-- particularly those that are most vulnerable.”… “However, I remain committed to securing the funds needed to address the homeless crisis in LA County.” 

The politicos cannot be the only ones speaking out to rally support for their proposals to help the homeless -- especially when the Church and the Chamber have the resources to aggressively join the conversation with loud voices. They have the means to take their place in the civic discourse about homelessness, an issue that concerns everybody in the city. Will they become leaders and join the conversation? Will they bring their followers along, now?

(Tim Deegan is a long-time resident and community leader in the Miracle Mile, who has served as board chair at the Mid City West Community Council and on the board of the Miracle Mile Civic Coalition. Tim can be reached at [email protected].) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.