CORRUPTION WATCH-The word “crime” is one of those terms which we use all the time without taking the time to think about it too deeply. According to Merriam-Webster, crime means: (1) a gross violation of law, (2) a grave offense especially against morality, (3) something reprehensible, foolish, or disgraceful. 

The Los Angeles City Council’s behavior satisfies all definitions of a crime. It operates in violation of Penal Code 86 which forbids vote trading among members of a city council. Its actions are morality offensive especially when it comes to the theft of billions of tax dollars and the destruction of poor people’s homes. Finally, its behavior is reprehensible, foolish and disgraceful. 

Yet, these words fail to convey the great harm which the ‘criminal’ Los Angeles City Council has brought upon us. 

Let’s take a deeper look at how a city council which is a criminal enterprise destroys a great city – one injustice at a time. 

Case in point is one tiny section of Valley Village, a place so small and so out of the way, that the vast majority of Angelenos do not even know that it exists. Zooming in closer, we see a most remarkable intersection at Hermitage and Weddington – or, at least, what is left of it. On the southeast corner once sat a modest home (demolition photo above) where Marilyn Monroe lived during the end of WW II. 

Rather than allowing the modest structure be moved, Mayor Eric Garcetti and Councilman Paul Krekorian wanted the home destroyed. So a couple days before a Cultural Heritage Commission hearing, Marilyn’s home was demolished (just as Garcetti demolished the facade of the Spaghetti Factory in Hollywood in defiance of a court order.)

From a neighborhood standpoint, the properties on the westside of Hermitage across from Marilyn’s home were significant in their own right. Directly opposite from Marilyn’s home was a beautiful Spanish-style apartment and to the north of Weddington was one of Valley Village’s most unique properties. 

Because Valley Village was a mixture of these unique low density places in an area where mega-apartments were encroaching, the Valley Village Specific Plan was enacted in order to preserve the character.  

The fascinating aspect of these Valley Village properties at 5621 to 5303 Hermitage is that they had an extra measure of protection from being destroyed. Weddington Avenue runs ½ block westward between the beautiful Spanish style apartment home at 5621 Hermitage and unique grouping of cottages at 5303 Hermitage. 

With the state owned street separating the two parcels, neither parcel was large enough to attract attention of developers who increasingly want to construct larger projects. In a city run by criminals, however, laws are impotent. Councilmember Krekorian and Mayor Garcetti see nothing wrong with giving the street to the developer so that Urban Box will have an extra-large area on which to construct its project – after destroying all the rent-controlled units and throwing the elderly and disabled on the streets. 

Criminals, however, do not care who owns property. It can be you, it can be me, or it can even be the State of California. When a criminal syndicate operates with the force of law, they take whatever they need. And, everyone else better shut up or else. 

This Is the Evil of Criminality 

In Los Angeles, greed rules and decency is in exile. If a developer wants to destroy your home, no law will stop him. Los Angeles City Council is a criminal enterprise where every unlawful demolition, where every unlawful gift of public property, where every corrupt commission decision always receives unanimous approval. 

We need to be very clear about this: in Los Angeles, the law counts for nothing, for zero, por nada. The criminal vote trading pact requires that each councilmember give unanimous approval without any regard to lies, deception, physical intimidation, vandalism or theft of public funds. There is no crime significant enough for a councilmember to refuse to go along. The criminal regime at City Hall is strict: not even allowing a single protest vote against the destruction of Marilyn Monroe’s home. 

Yet, the District Attorney finds nothing nefarious is afoot when all projects unanimously receive “Yes” votes. The odds of flipping a coin 100 times and getting 100 heads is 1/1.2676506 × 1030. Okay, so you don’t even know how to name that number because it is so large. We are talking about 15 coins being simultaneously flipped and getting all heads. Oh yeah, we’re supposed to believe that number, whatever it may be, is not the product of a vote trading agreement.

The Rise of the Garcetti Goons 

After some goons tried to intimidate an attorney who had come to the property at 5303 Hermitage prior to the August 11, 2016 South Valley Area Planning Commission meeting, the attorney complained to the Commission. He wrote to Councilmember Krekorian and to Mayor Garcetti that the intimidation had to stop. Neither of them bothered to reply. 

Silence in the face of an accusation is an adopted admission. There is a rule of law that says when someone is accused of bad behavior and they say nothing, their silence is a sign that the charge is true. 

Dear Councilmember Krekorian and Mayor Garcetti: 

The intimation and threats in connection with your desire to demolish the rent controlled units at 5303 Hermitage in Valley Village must cease and desist immediately. Brandishing firearms, tampering with the gas lines and having thugs try to intimidate the tenant’s attorney has brought the City’s “war” on poor people’s homes to a new low. As I told the South Valley Area Planning Commission yesterday, this criminal behavior has to stop. Furthermore, no police officer should ever tell a person who has been assaulted with a fire arm that he will arrest her if she calls 911 for protection. We expect this criminal behavior to cease and desist forthwith.-- Richard MacNaughton, Attorney at Law, State Bar 77258.  

When the city council becomes a criminal enterprise, we all live in a lawless society. And when white collar criminality at City Council becomes physical intimidation, it threatens of intolerable violence at the home owner level. 

Let’s remember that this Valley Village instance is not the first situation involving Garcetti, development and criminals. Garcetti’s fundraiser, Juri Ripinsky, spent two years incarcerated in Federal prison at Leavenworth for real estate and bank fraud. Yet, Garcetti got unanimous approval from the City Council for Ripinsky to have the lucrative Paseo Project at the old Sears site in Hollywood. Two years at Leavenworth and he gets a multi-million dollar real estate project! 

Just like the poor people who are desperately trying to save Valley Village, all Angelenos face a criminal enterprise. When criminals with absolute immunity want something, they just take it. And, people wonder why employers and the middle class are leaving Los Angeles.

(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.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

DEEGAN ON LA-What does it take to access the corridors of power in City Hall, establish a by-name relationship with key departments, be recognized on sight by your councilmember and staff, and possibly even share an elevator ride with the Mayor and buttonhole him about your community’s issues? 

It takes two things: knowledge and position. So get yourself elected to your Neighborhood Council and then get yourself trained because one feeds into the other in our citywide NC system of 96 Neighborhood Councils. With over 1,800 board members representing neighborhoods across the city, the NCs are city-chartered grass roots organizations that have been empowered for a decade. They help connect residents to the world of city planning as well as other processes. 

Los Angeles City Charter Section 900 defines the purpose of Neighborhood Councils as: “To promote more citizen participation in government and make government more responsive to local needs.” 

Cindy Cleghorn, Chair of the Neighborhood Council Congress 2016, points out that “about half of Los Angeles’ Neighborhood Council board members were elected to a Neighborhood Council for the first time in the most recent cycle of neighborhood council elections that were completed earlier in the summer, and that brings a new class of board members into the system that will need to learn how to navigate the civic ecosystem.” 

Describing the Congress, Cleghorn says, “The Congress is a once a year opportunity for Neighborhood Councils across the City to come together at City Hall for a day of education and communication for the entire NC System. It is an opportunity to speak one on one with our city's elected officials, department officials and each other. Also, to take advantage of a wealth of specialty workshops created by and for Neighborhood Council leaders. This year’s Congress seeks to advance the Neighborhood Councils’ advisory power needed for the enhancement and/or preservation of our communities.” 

Several hundred “newbies” and NC veterans are expected at City Hall on Saturday, September 24, for the 2016 Congress of Neighborhoods. Presented by the Neighborhood Councils of Los Angeles and the city’s Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (DONE), this year’s theme -- “Neighborhoods First: Your Voice, Our City” -- examines how local focus can create citywide impact. 

The Congress is an all-day free education featuring a range of sessions that will teach participants about their roles and responsibilities as board members, and introduce them to some of the intricacies of working the system, now that they are freshly-minted political and civic insiders. 

Registration at www.NCCongressLA.com went live on August 22. Over 700 Neighborhood Council leaders from across the City are expected to attend the annual event. 

What will they learn? The menu of choices is tantalizing, with over 40 workshops and discussion panels held during four 75-minute sessions. Participants will be able to choose from topics in the areas of:

• Leadership skills
• Planning and land use class series
• Managing your City funds
• Writing & sharing Community Impact Statements
• Homelessness
• Purposeful aging
• Code enforcement
• Outreach, social media and PR 

Ethics training (which is required of all Neighborhood Council members) will also be available. Classroom space fills up fast, so early registration is encouraged. 

Each year, leading City officials like the Mayor, City Councilmembers, the City Controller, and the City Attorney have spoken at the opening and closing sessions of the Congress. Headline speakers are still being confirmed, but so far, City Council President Herb J. Wesson, Jr, and City Councilmembers Paul Krekorian (CD 2), Bob Blumenfield (CD 3), David Ryu (CD4), Paul Koretz (CD 5), and Marqueece Harris-Dawson (CD 8) are scheduled to appear. 

It’s a fact, known through observing the success of many previous Congress events, that participants come away smarter and more informed about their board positions and the role of NCs. Also indisputable, is that their new knowledge directly impacts how much better they are able to work for the communities they serve. For many, attending a Congress is just the beginning of a political curriculum that helps prepare them for service to community and city – and could possibly be a stepping stone in their own political careers. Who would want to miss that? 

The Congress runs from 7:45 am - 4:30 pm, on Saturday September 24, at City Hall. It includes four workshops, breakfast, lunch, and opening and closing sessions. Attendees may come and go as their schedules permit. 

Here's an outline of the day: 

7:45 am – Breakfast 

8:30 am – Welcome 

9:25 am - Session 1 workshops 

10:50 am - Session 2 workshops 

noon – Lunch 

1:20 pm - Session 3 workshops 

2:45 pm - Session 4 workshops 

4:05 pm - Closing session 

Everything is free if you RSVP, including admission to over 40 workshops, exhibit tables, catered meals and parking! Sign up at www.NCCongressLA.com. This is about the only time you’ll ever get a free lunch at City Hall. 

Attend the Congress, and go home empowered!

(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.

ALPERN AT LARGE--With skyrocketing utility rates, costs of health care, and an average rent of approximately $2000 per month, it's obvious the City of the Angels is anything but angelic when creating affordability for the average Joe/Jane middle-class American.  But can we fix this affordably, or will we just continue to encourage those who built LA and California to throw up their hands and move away? 

1) It's obvious from the way our City and state spend money that we've been pandering too long, and with too much budgetary devastation, to present and future governmental services from being efficient and sufficient for taxpayers' needs. 

So whether it's the Republicans, or conservative or moderate Democrats, or liberal Democrats who understand that "Math doesn't lie", we've got to get over our mommy/daddy issues and recognize that a balanced and sustainable budget--with all of its painful sacrifices--is truly necessary if we're going to allow ourselves and future generations a chance to succeed and thrive. 

And if "progressivism" is turning into "socialism", then we better take a hard, HARD look at Venezuela, Greece, or any other paradise-turned-into-purgatory before we walk down that road.  If the middle class is fleeing to other states (like Texas or North Carolina), then we MUST take note. 

So when the issue of state pension reform hits the news cycle, perhaps we can stop ignoring it.  The reality is that cities and counties are not only grappling with their own pension/budget problems, but they also have a devastating lack of state support. 

We MUST have our City and County political heads work with our state leaders, or we'll have a fiscal crisis the likes of which will make Detroit look like a picnic--because there are only so many millionaires and billionaires in California, and because the stock market will NOT be rising forever. 

2) We MUST fund transportation as the economic engine to promote mobility for both fiscal, business, and quality of life purposes.  We finally have a name for "Measure R-2" for more sales taxes to fund transportation...it's called "Measure M".  And we must pass it.

I've been on the fence for this measure for quite awhile, because I've seen past transportation efforts lead to bad planning and developer overreach...but if we look at transportation as "income" and planning as "spending", we have to have more "income" and less (or smarter!) "spending" to fix our L.A./California household. 

Past stupidity and lack of courage/foresight in the San Fernando Valley led to an Orange Line Busway that could have, and should have, been a more cost-effective and economically-beneficial light rail line.  But the Valley's leaders blew off the experts and the transit advocates, and never reversed the Robbins Bill to show cohesive leadership and build it the right way. 

So with the long-awaited Orange Line-Red Line pedestrian tunnel finally completed and a VICA-led effort to convert the Busway to a light rail line, it'll be expensive but LESS expensive if we upgrade our transportation system NOW. 

And we need to let private employers, developers, and businesses know that we mean business when we ask them to pay for our infrastructure.  Universal Studios and the City Walk could have been directly connected to the Red Line Subway, and now everyone's suffering from that.  Ditto for any lost opportunities in North Hollywood. 

Arguably, any "deals" with hotels, developers, etc. should be focused on transportation/infrastructure mitigations.  THEY (the private sector) can and should expedite paying for freeway, road and rail connections and repairs and upgrades, and play a major role towards the conversion of fixing L.A.'s sidewalks from a 30-year window to 7-10 years. 

(AND I AM TALKING TO YOU, MR. MAYOR, WHEN I STATE THAT YOUR RE-ELECTION SHOULD ADDRESS THAT ISSUE IF ANGELENOS ARE TO TAKE YOU SERIOUSLY). 

So we will all need to pay for transportation upgrades, because not only our freeways but our new rail lines (Expo, Foothill Gold) are clogged with commuters, and our subways are busier than ever.  

There's just no question we all need to put our money where our collective mouth is. 

3) We MUST stop whistling past the graveyard, and stop promoting Orwellian nonsense, about affordable housing when we're really just helping the rich get richer, and promoting upscale housing for the wealthy instead of giving the middle class the support and love they deserve. 

We could build 2-3 story affordable, middle-class housing all over the City (and including south of the I-10 freeway) in a matter of 1-2 years without having to build uber-developments that are geared to the "1%" or without having to transform neighborhoods from family-friendly to those that favor the wealthy and build so big and tall that "us little people" will no longer be able to see the sun and sky. 

And if our celebrity/star-obsessed City will pay attention, it's not just the "old, NIMBY cranks" who want the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative--it's also concerned Angelenos Leonardo DiCaprio, Kirsten Dunst, Joaquin Phoenix, Chris Pine, Garrett Hedlund, and Chloe Sevigny...to say nothing of former Mayor Richard Riordan (who founded the Charter Reform that created the Neighborhood Councils) and Skid Row Reverend Alice Callaghan. 

Let's build...but not have get-rich-fast types kick some financial tail at the expense of kicking the tails of the rest of us.  Los Angeles IS moderate, IS compromising, and IS open-minded and caring. Blockbuster building that shreds the character of neighborhoods isn't "progress"...it's wanton destruction, no matter what flowery speech is used to justify it. 

So we can and should focus on TRUE affordability...but we can't wait any longer.  We just can't afford to keep kicking the can down the road, either at the political or the grassroots level. 

These are battles that we just cannot afford to lose, if we want to keep our City and state truly affordable for ourselves and our children.

(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]. He also 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.

CORRUPTION WATCH-Although most of us say we believe in “Thou shall have no other GODS before Me,” the reality is that Angelenos actually worship the weather gods. Yes, we have the weather gods of perpetual sunshine who have to fight off the god of May Gray and the god June Gloom each year, but throughout Los Angeles’ history, the good weather gods have always prevailed. 

So, the weather gods have been a little off their game in the last few years with the drought, but that’s hardly a wrinkle. Besides, drought means no mosquitoes with Zika virus. 

The weather gods, however, not only bring us the wonderful California sun, but more importantly, they bring us a constant influx of new Californians with brains, energy and creativity. The weather gods also deter any reverse migrations back to the Snow and Rust Belts. “It’s a Wonderful Life” with Jimmy Stewart turns out to be a subversive film. It reminded new Californians in the depths of winter just how horrible it would be to move back to Small Town USA. Yep, the last time I saw Jimmy Stewart ready to jump into the freezing river, it was 85 degrees in Hollywood. I had to run outside and stand in the sun, murmuring my little prayer of thanks to the LA weather gods. 

Shocker!! The weather gods are deserting us – or the world has been knocked off its axis. 

Something dire has happened -- people have stopped coming to Los Angeles. Worse yet, the weather gods have opened the exit gates and people are streaming out of the City! 

Look at it this way. Money is streaming out of Los Angeles. Yes, whenever a white collar job moves to Texas, it means that hundreds of thousands of dollars are leaving Los Angeles. Worse yet, Los Angeles has fallen to #60 as a place where professionals and business service workers want to live. We are behind Chicago and New York -- and they don’t even have weather gods! 

Nashville has had its professional and business service worker segment grow by 47% since 2010, while Dallas-Ft.Worth increased by 29%. San Francisco-Redwood City-South San Francisco has grown a remarkable 45% since 2010. 

Here are some rankings: Nashville was #1, San Fran etc. was #2, Dallas was # 5, metro New York ranked #14, Chicago with its wind, chills, snow and summer humidity ranked #43, and Los Angeles was #60 as the place where middle class white collar workers desire to live. 

When one sorts through all the data, what we see is that places with atrocious weather and with over-crowding and high costs of living are doing significantly better than Los Angeles. Places which have sunshine like South Texas are doing wonderfully. 

So that has been the Kryptonite for our weather gods? “Corruptionism.” 

When business leaders look long-term, nothing is a greater deterrent than entrenched Corruptionism. It’s not just that LA’s streets are the worst and that our traffic congestion has become the worst in both America and Europe. The real threat is a City Council which is a criminal enterprise. There’s a difference between LA and a place like Chicago where cronies throw city contracts to their friends and if they get too far out of line, they get prosecuted. 

In Los Angeles, the City Council itself has been the criminal enterprise since 2006 when Garcetti was City Council President. When employers see entrenched criminals receiving the protection of the District Attorney and the courts for a decade, they know that matters will deteriorate. 

It’s no secret that billions of dollars have been diverted to real estate developers at the same time the City has been destroying poor people’s homes. The City is subsidizing the private Grand Avenue Project to the tune of an initial $198 million. Only the terminally naive think that this largesse will be the last of the city’s generosity to the project. And now they want us to approve ballot measures costing over $200 billion and that’s just the start of it. 

We know that the exodus from Los Angeles will accelerate because two important groups of Millennials are leaving: (1) Those who had to postpone starting families because of the bad economy and high student loan payments, (2) Those who are a few years younger, but who also can afford to start families elsewhere. 

Don’t expect new Millennials to take their place. The number of younger Millennials is dropping each year and since LA is now #60, there are 59 other cities where all Millennials of any age believe they can make better lives for themselves.   

Recently, there has been disinformation out there that only the poor are leaving the City. That is a false claim, although smart poor people actually should move. For the state as a whole, according to IRS data, “In 2014, more than two-thirds of the net domestic out-migrants were reported on returns filed by persons aged from 35 to 64. These are the people who are most likely to be in the workforce and be parents.” And we know Los Angeles is doing much worse than the rest of the state, so our middle class is abandoning the City. 

No place can economically survive when the 35 to 64 age group is two thirds of the net domestic out-migrants. That is why employers are moving away from Los Angeles and why Los Angeles’ great residential neighborhoods are now being built in Texas – which has some pretty powerful weather gods of its own. 

Corruptionism is Kryptonite. Employers know that the criminal vote trading at Los Angeles City Council is permanent. Los Angeles’ corruption overlords have become far stronger than our kindly weather gods.

(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.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

CITYWATCH INSIDER REPORT (FIRST OF AN OCCASSIONAL SERIES)--If you ask someone what the small army of lobbyists who frequent LA City Hall actually do, you'll probably get an answer along the lines of, “they try to get the City Council and various commissions and committees to support projects and other things their clients want.” 

This is true. But it leaves a lot to the imagination. For instance, when a lobbyist steps off the elevator on one of the floors at City Hall, where is he or she going? To the mayor's office? To one of the 15 LA City Councilmembers' offices? To the Planning Department? Public Works? 

And even more to the point, who is the lobbyist going to talk to in one of those offices, and what, exactly, will that city official be asked to do? 

Because lobbying firms are required to register with the City Ethics Commission and file quarterly reports that are posted on the commission's website, one might assume that the answers to these questions are just a few mouse clicks away. Unfortunately, that's not the case. 

To illustrate, take the most recent quarterly report of one of five firms registered to lobby on behalf of Clear Channel Outdoor, the multinational corporation that owns some 1,600 billboards in the city. The firm, Ek & Sunkin, reported receiving $75,000 from the corporation to lobby on “issues related to City sign ordinance.” Listed as targets of that lobbying were the mayor's office, the city council offices and the city planning department. That's the extent of the report. 

There are more than a thousand persons working in the mayor's office, the city council offices and the planning department. Who did the lobbyist meet with? The mayor himself or an underling? A city councilmember or one of his or her staff? The director of planning or a deputy? 

And almost every conceivable issue involving billboards would be related in some way to the city sign ordinance. Did the lobbyist want an amendment to the ordinance? A particular vote on the latest version of the ordinance which is pending in City Council committee? Something else? 

Some reports are marginally more informative. For example, when the lobbyist is working for a client with a specific real estate development, the name or address of the project is often listed. But there is typically no detail about who the lobbyist met with, when and where the meeting took place, and what, exactly, was being sought. All these questions are highly pertinent to one of the Ethics Commission's stated purposes: promoting government decisions that are “fair, transparent, and accountable.” 

We'd all like to think that politicians and other city officials are guided in their decisions purely by personal principles and public opinion. But one needn't be a cynic to assume that those officials are also influenced by the blandishments of businesses, labor unions, and others with a strong vested interest in the decisions made inside City Hall. 

Consider the fact that 200 firms employing 442 lobbyists are currently registered with the Ethics Commission, and that those firms were paid $58 million last year to promote the interest of some 1400 clients ranging from corporate behemoths like Exxon Mobil and Comcast to local businesses such as restaurants and taxi companies. 

In addition, those lobbying firms reported raising $996,000 for city election candidates and delivering another $324,000 in contributions from individuals. All legal, even though registered lobbyists are prohibited by law from contributing directly to those candidates. 

It's doubtful that this flood of money spent to influence city officials can be slowed down, but there are ways to shine more light on the connections between that money and the decisions those officials make. In fact, the Ethics Commission is engaged right now in a review of the municipal lobbying ordinance, and soliciting public comment about ways to improve it. 

The commission doesn't have to look far for ideas. In San Francisco, for example, lobbyists are required to report the names of officials they contact, the date and location of that contact, and its purpose—to propose a specific policy, to get support for an ordinance, to provide information about some matter, and so forth. 

That city also maintains a directory of all public officials who have been contacted by a registered lobbyist and a list of all “subject areas” of concern reported by lobbyists. Lobbying firms are also required to report monthly, rather than quarterly as in Los Angeles. 

At its most recent meeting, the Ethics Commission discussed another element of lobbyist regulation that seems to cry out for reform. While the state of California and Los Angeles County define a lobbyist as someone who receives compensation for communicating with a public official to influence legislation, Los Angeles defines a lobbyist as a person who engages in 30 hours or more of compensated lobbying in a 3-month period. 

Which means that a lobbyist spending less than 30 hours in that activity is not required to report, or even register with the Ethics Commission. How many contacts could a person make to influence city officials within that time limit and still keep the public in the dark? 

Of course, none of these possible reforms would impede deep-pocketed interests from sending that small army of lobbyists to City Hall to buttonhole councilmembers, commissioners and others. But at least the public would have a better idea of who was buttonholed and how that contact might have affected a vote or other action. 

To use another billboard-related example, did lobbyists for Clear Channel meet with Councilman Mitchell Englander and/or members of his staff before he put forth a proposal to grant “amnesty” to all of the unpermitted and out-of-compliance billboards in the city? The public surely deserves an answer to the question. 

If you want to weigh in on lobbying reform, the commission welcomes public comment. Send yours to

[email protected]. We can be sure that the lobbyists themselves will look to protect their own interests. But that may not jibe with the greater transparency and accountability the public deserves.

(Dennis Hathaway is the president of the Ban Billboard Blight Coalition and a CityWatch contributor. He can be reached at: [email protected].) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

DROUGHT CONUNDRUM-While fire is always part of nature, many attribute its increased frequency and intensity to climate change. Certainly, that makes sense: longer stretches of warm weather and earlier snowmelt create a fire-friendly scenario. But what does this connection do for us, beyond providing another reason to rue the continued assaults on our climate? For the terms “climate change” and “global warming” elide the dynamics that create the constellation of factors that, collectively, we call climate. However, by zeroing in on the ecology of fire-prone regions, we can find ways to minimize the risk and severity of the fires that threaten homes and wilderness areas—not to mention the lives of firefighters. 

For example, since arid conditions beckon fire, we can ask how healthy environments maintain moisture. Plentiful rain is one obvious answer, but equally important is what happens to rain once it falls. Enter “green water”, or water held in soils. We generally think of freshwater in terms of lakes and rivers, but two-thirds of rainfall becomes green water. When rain falls on living soil that’s rich in organic matter, it stays in the system and sustains plant and microbial life. Rain that falls on soil depleted by tillage or chemicals streams away, as does all the rainwater that strikes concrete or asphalt. Dry, degraded soil (read: dirt) doesn’t absorb water, thirsty though it may be. For every one percent increase in soil organic matter, soil stores 20,000 gallons of water per acre. 

Historically, our western landscapes were kept hydrated in part by beavers. According to Brock Dolman of The WATER Institute’s Bring Back the Beaver Campaign, the winsome rodents act as “water engineers”. By building dams they harvest water and direct its flow, and the moist soil that surrounds the pools yields lush vegetation. Beavers, he says, serve as ecological “shock absorbers” so that land is less susceptible to drought and fire. Beavers are native to much of California, and were numerous prior to the early nineteenth century, when they were mostly wiped out. (Water-wise, California’s “fur rush” was a bigger deal than the Gold Rush.) Nationwide, today beavers number around 10 million, down from an estimated 200 million when Europeans arrived on our shores. 

One ongoing challenge in staving off conflagrations is keeping down potential fuel: the dead trees and dried leaves and grasses standing or laying around, ready to ignite. Australian soil microbiologist Walter Jehne, whose Regenerate Australia program emphasizes reducing fire risk, says nature has two basic strategies for dispensing with combustible material. One is through fire, which tends to perpetuate a fire-prone regime: favoring plants that require fire for germination or that thrive on bare ground. (One such tree is the Eucalyptus, which sprouts and regenerates quickly after fire. Originally from Australia, Eucalyptus, now pervasive in California, have been implicated in deadly fires, notably the 1991 Oakland Tunnel fire that killed 25 people.) 

The other means of managing fuel is recycling the plant matter biologically. This could be by way of animals that eat the plants or, says Jehne, “fungi that can break down litter or fuel into organic matter and reincorporate it into the soil where it is safe from fire.” Either way, plant debris is returned to the soil so that the ground becomes a sponge for rain and dew, thereby creating a fertile environment for plants to thrive, draw down carbon and cycle water. All of which make uncontrolled fires less likely. 

"We can think of climate change as the manifestation of disrupted carbon, water, nutrient and solar cycles." 

We can think of unbridled wildfires as a result of climate change, as well as a contributor to it. Extensive bush and grassfires spark a negative spiral that leads to more greenhouse gas emissions—in Australia, annual CO2 emissions from fire exceeds that of fossil fuels—dry, tinderbox conditions, and bare soil unwelcoming to plants and vulnerable to erosion. When sunlight beams down the ground gets a direct hit, without the cooling effect of water transpiring through plants. The alternative scenario, in which the land holds moisture and would-be fire fuel is processed biologically, encourages what we want: living soil that stores, rather than releases, carbon; plants providing food and shelter for animals, birds and insects; water cycling within the system rather than evaporating or rushing away. 

In other words, climate change isn’t merely a looming specter that’s tied up in physics and the fiat of large corporate and governmental entities. It’s also about what we do with land. Climate dynamics are too complex to be reduced solely to an equation involving CO2. Rather, we can think of climate change as the manifestation of disrupted carbon, water, nutrient and solar cycles. With this approach, we see that wildfires—along with droughts, floods, heat waves and other problems associated with climate change—are not inevitable. 

In my travels reporting on ecological restoration I’ve seen numerous instances of people allying with natural processes that hold water on the land, and seeing multiple benefits including reduced risk and impact of fires. Chris Henggeler, who manages a parcel in Western Australia the size equivalent of New York’s five boroughs, has minimized fire damage by keeping water in springs and creeks longer into the dry season, installing fire breaks, and making use of dew, which he calls integral to the “micro-water cycle”. 

As we look toward future fire seasons, there is indeed much we can do to douse the flames—and curtail the degree of flames need dousing to begin with.

(Judith D. Schwartz is a longtime journalist who lives in Vermont. Her most recent book, Water In Plain Sight: Hope for a Thirsty World, has just been published by St. Martin's Press. Her previous book is, Cows Save the Planet (Chelsea Green Publishing). This perspective was first posted at Common Dreams.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.