Comments
ERIC PREVEN’S NOTEBOOK - Smart Speaker: Thank you. Supervisor Barger, appreciate all of the good work. But unfortunately, we can't hear Mr. Yen as he reads at 100 miles an hour all of his recusals. I have asked him to provide a written copy of the recusals. It's interesting, all of the Horvath/Michael Weinstein recusals, there's $19 million worth of sole source contracts, many of which are being floated over to AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which is a terrific operation. I had no idea that they had 2,800 employees, only 1,000 of which are in Los Angeles. Yet we are funding the bejesus out of them. And they're doing God's work, so that's helpful. The conflict of interest waiver that Harris Dawson just approved at City Hall for Covington & Burling—you should not be cavorting with him about litigation on LAHSA when the City and the County have big issues regarding LAHSA. To refresh your memory that is the firm that provided the great International White Wash Report and buried it under Fesia Davenport's $630,000 annual chaching!
The grift above is not an accident...
Round 'em up:
Below is the recusal information that was read out at the Tuesday, February 4, 2025 Board meeting.
There were no recusals found for Supervisor Hilda Solis in this meeting.
Supervisor Kathryn Barger recused from Item 19 due to a $500+ contribution from Al Senella. Supervisor Holly J. Mitchell also recused from Item 19 due to a $500+ contribution from Jonathan Thompson. The item approves Justice Support Services Master Agreements with vendors through 2035, with five one-year extension options. Funding comes from government, nonprofit, and private sources.
Supervisor Lindsey Horvath recused from Item 21 due to a $500+ contribution from Jim Mangia. The item approves 17 contracts for HIV medical services, including outpatient care and patient support, totaling $48.3 million in federal and state funds. Contracts run from March 1, 2025, to February 29, 2028 .
Supervisor Lindsey Horvath recused from Item 22 due to a $500+ contribution from Michael Weinstein of AIDS Healthcare Foundation. The item approves a $12.2 million contract with AIDS Healthcare Foundation for HIV medical services. The contract is 100% federally and state-funded and runs from March 1, 2025, to February 29, 2028 .
Supervisor Kathryn Barger recused from Item 23 due to $500+ contributions from Alicia Mardini and Al Senella. The item approves a contract for services related to healthcare and social services, with funding allocated through multiple sources .
Supervisor Kathryn Barger recused from Item 26 due to a $500+ contribution from Al Senella. The item approves a $523,014 contract with Tarzana Treatment Centers, Inc. for transportation services for Ryan White Program clients, funded entirely by federal sources .
Supervisor Kathryn Barger recused from Item 28 due to $500+ contributions from Alicia Mardini and Al Senella. The item approves additional contract funding for health-related services, primarily through federal and state sources .
Supervisor Lindsey Horvath recused from Item 30 due to a $500+ contribution from Michael Weinstein. The item extends an AIDS Healthcare Foundation contract through February 28, 2026, for a total of $350,646, fully funded by the Ryan White Program .
Supervisor Lindsey Horvath recused from Item 51-D due to a $500+ contribution from Michael Weinstein. The item approves a $159,228 contract with AIDS Healthcare Foundation for transportation services for Ryan White Program clients, fully funded by federal sources
Barger 4 items
Horvath 4 items
Mitchell 1 item.
Solis 0 items
Hahn 0 items*
Smart Speaker: Thank you very much. Thank you, Supervisors, for addressing this, and Dr. Ferrer, for working hard to keep us safe and informed, and thoroughly inspected. I don't think that we should do that—I think it's important to shine light on the way men and women are treated in the trafficking racket, but not go into a regressive searching through all of the massage parlors in town. That feels like backward thinking and doesn't work. In terms of data, which everyone loves, these big mega events cause a great deal of exploitation. People looking to have a big party with party things available for trafficking. I think we need to rejigger this effort and try to, you know, find a way to help the human, as opposed to widening the net. It's like—
The County Board meeting had 335 watching, while the City Council only had 205... (excellent!)
PRA Request & Travel Statistics
"This was the PRA request for all of Mayor Karen Bass's Out of Town letters to Councilmember Harris-Dawson or with a copy to his office during the period June 1, 2024, through January 21, 2025."
During this time frame, Mayor Karen Bass was out of town on the following dates, requiring Marqueece Harris-Dawson to serve as Acting Mayor:
- July 21 – July 29, 2024 → 9 days
- August 6 – August 12, 2024 → 7 days
- September 28 – October 2, 2024 → 5 days
- October 18, 19, and 21, 2024 → 3 days
- January 4 – January 8, 2025 → 5 days
Total days as Acting Mayor (June 1, 2024 – January 21, 2025): 29 days
Visible at the podium, civil rights leader Holly J. Mitchell stands beside City strongman Marqueece Harris-Dawson, who reduces others to the size of Blumenfield’s nose.
Meanwhile, Harris-Dawson has been dropping every other Friday, effectively trimming back open meetings from 12 to 10 per month—presumably to work for the constituents or fundraise.
If Mayor Bass maintains this 30-day travel pace every six months, by the time her four-year term is complete, Harris-Dawson will have served as Acting Mayor for approximately 240 days—nearly eight months of unelected leadership. [This was written before the sneaky Special Meeting you will hear more about…]
**Special** Measure G
Next Wednesday, the LA County Board of Supervisors will hold its own Special Meeting, where seven departments—Fire, Consumer and Business Affairs, Aging and Disabilities, Animal Care and Control, Medical Examiner, Arts and Culture, and Human Resources—will be lumped into a single item. One comment period for seven agencies? Will they allow more than one minute per speaker, or will this be yet another exercise in performative governance, where input is reduced to background noise?
This all comes as Measure G—better dubbed "Get Them Out of Here"
The Usual Customers:
County department heads want each department opened to public comment, not a weird Kafkaesque mishmash.
As of December 2, 2024, Los Angeles County has 40 department heads, with a combined annual salary totaling $14,515,000.
How many items should be on a county budget agenda? Forty, right? cc - Bob "One City, One Item" Blumenfield who cut his eye-teeth under the direct supervision of Paul Krekorian, whose salary will be coming soon cc - David Michaelson.
Here are the top ten highest-paid county department heads:
- Fesia Davenport – Chief Executive Office: $630,813
- Dr. Christina Ghaly – Health Services: $590,710
- Dr. Barbara Ferrer – Public Health: $581,949
- Dr. Lisa H. Wong – Mental Health: $568,622
- Anthony Marrone – Fire: $500,865
- Dr. Odey Ukpo – Chief Medical Examiner: $498,221
- Dawyn Harrison – County Counsel: $489,194
- Ricardo Garcia – Public Defender: $466,489
- Mark Pestrella – Public Works: $461,675
- Dean C. Logan – Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk: $448,179
And the ten lowest-paid county department heads:
- James Zenner – Military and Veterans Affairs: $209,998
- Lori Bettison-Varga – Museum of Natural History: $256,236
- Jeffrey Prang – Assessor: $266,915
- David J. Carroll – Youth Development: $262,561
- Kelly LoBianco – Economic Opportunity: $273,810
- Kristin Sakoda – Arts and Culture: $294,284
- Rafael Carbajal – Consumer and Business Affairs: $298,667
- Michael J. Govan – Museum of Art: $303,199
- Kurt Floren – Agricultural Commissioner/Director of Weights & Measures: $309,634
- Elizabeth B. Ginsberg – Treasurer and Tax Collector: $309,750
(Eric Preven is a Studio City-based TV writer-producer, award-winning journalist, and longtime community activist who won two landmark open government cases in California.)
