LOS ANGELES

ALPERN AT LARGE--You would think that the only person willing to turn California into a sewer sump is a chump.

CLIMATE POLITICS-Throughout the world, mega droughts are hitting hard with a ferocity not seen in decades and in some cases not seen in centuries.

AT LENGTH-California Gov. Gavin Newsom just announced a bold initiative to add some $1.4 billion to the budget to address the homeless crisis on the local level. He has called for an all-hands-on-deck approach from state agencies.

ONE MAN’S OPINION-From its outset, mankind has been plagued by bad governance.

ALPERN AT LARGE-No matter how indisputably hated, no matter how universally despised, and no matter how ubiquitously decried and defeated, Senate Bill 50 (SB 50) is again being pushed  by our own "woke" anti-environmental actor, State Senator Scott Wiener, (photo above) after multiple outcries from cities, counties, and grassroots activists. 

VOICES-La Brea Willoughby Coalition continues its fight to protect the quality of life, as well as the character and scale of the La Brea-Willoughby neighborhood in Hollywood by focusing on clarifying and enforcing all zoning laws. 

SOUTH OF THE 10-The Los Angeles County Office of Education has denied a controversial charter school renewal to remain open. 

GUEST COMMENTARY--Predictive powers don’t do much when the future is already here.

EASTSIDER-At their January 2, 2020 Executive Committee meeting, the HHPNC Board continued to roll over the troops. Their agenda itself may or may not have been submitted into DONE’s ENS system in a timely manner, and at the meeting itself there were only two copied handouts of the agenda.

THE REAL ESTATE BILL THAT WON’T GO AWAY--Senate Bill 50 by State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) was shelved last May in the Senate Appropriations Committee.

IN THE US, WAR PAYS--The prospect of war with Iran is terrifying.

PLANNING WATCH-If you rely on the corporate media, like the Los Angeles Times, for your take on the housing crisis, you have repeatedly heard that the cure is to “build more housing” through across-the-board zone changes.

ONE MAN’S OPINION-The following is quoted from the U.S. Constitution, Art 1, Sec 2: “The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.”  

GUEST WORDS--Mother Teresa’s Gift of Love House was located in a beautiful Victorian home in a quiet residential neighborhood of San Francisco. These kinds of Victorian homes are called Painted Ladies. 

CLIMATE POLITICS-There’s a problem with America’s favorite statistic: GDP. It avoids pretty much everything that’s actually, truly, really good for society, including the importance of robust ecology. Still, it’s the biggest measure of what’s happening with the economy and used around the world, even though horribly flawed. 

@THE GUSS REPORT-Most telling about local political reporting in the last few weeks of 2019 was when Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti – whose disastrous 19-year tenure on City Council and as Mayor mercifully winds down – assembled LA’s dutiful media to announce (ta-da!) that he is waiving all past-due library fees. 

ATTACKING ANONYMOUS OWNERSHIP-America’s cities are being bought up, bit by bit, by anonymous shell companies using piles of cash.

ALPERN AT LARGE-No one should be blamed for being concerned about killing Qassem Soleimani, the terrorist kingpin who killed had Syrian, Iraqi, Yemeni, Lebanese, and American blood on his hands, because now we're wondering where this will all end up.

VIEW FROM HERE--One of the reasons I stopped identifying as a Christian is that pacifism is too demanding. Personal questions concerning justified warfare, what to do about extremely violent criminals, and protecting two young children, became impossible to rationalize considering Jesus' teachings about absolute nonviolence.

GELFAND’S WORLD--On New Year’s Day, instead of watching the Rose Bowl I watched a sunset. It wasn’t entirely intentional at the time.

Planning Watch:  As detailed by Samuel Stein in The Real Estate State, the world is awash with massive capital investments in urban real estate.