LOS ANGELES

POLICY--Across California, many local governments have raised taxes while cutting services. Local officials desperate for union support have made irresponsible deals with public employee unions, creating staggering employee costs. Taxpayer money meant to provide essential services to the least well-off instead goes directly to higher salaries and benefits. 

GELFAND’S WORLD--We are the west coast -- accent on that word coast. What makes California different from Nebraska and Colorado is that we have an ocean. We have sea cliffs, beaches, and kelp beds you can explore underwater. We even have the remains of a shipwreck that you can walk right up to, at the base of a local cliff. Californians take pride in the fact that the beach and the water belong to all of us. But it's not a done deal in all places. 

NEW GEOGRAPHY-California’s economic revival has sparked widespread notions, shared by Jerry Brown and observers elsewhere, that its economy — and policy agenda — should be adopted by the rest of the country. And, to be sure, the Golden State has made a strong recovery in the last five years, but this may prove to be far more vulnerable than its boosters imagine. 

ANIMAL WATCH-At the June 27 meeting of the Los Angeles Animal Services' Commissioners -- all appointees of Mayor Eric Garcetti -- Commissioner Roger Wolfson, a screenwriter, urged the creation of an LAAS poster on how to handle a dog attack, indicating he had already received support of the idea from GM Brenda Barnette and Commission President Larry Gross. 

@THE GUSS REPORT-In a Van Nuys court room on Friday, the illegal gun possession charge hastily filed by LA City Attorney Mike Feuer’s office against City Hall critic Wayne Spindler (photo above) died a death as curious as its life. 

CORRUPTION WATCH-The hubris that comes with holding public office is usually rational. Public officials so seldom are held accountable for their actions that they never think of possible criminal liability for their behavior. The times, they may be changing. 

BOYARSKY’S LA--Immigration court in Los Angeles is in an undistinguished, rectangular office building in the center of downtown. Every weekday, immigrants make their way there to plead before one of the judges for a chance to remain in the United States. 

DEEGAN ON LA-In less stressful times, the relationships between tenants and landlords were ruled by the market economy of supply and demand. Lately, however, affordable housing has entered a state of crisis, as space is needed to squeeze in more people who want to live here or park their money in real estate investment. A third wheel has been attached to the landlord-tenant equation: developers eager to make their profits in a booming upscale housing market is leaving many renters in the dust. 

PEOPLE POWER—(Editor’s Note: This is one a series of profiles and reports celebrating Resistance Heroes … people like you who have stood up to power and won.)

CONNECTING CALIFORNIA--What’s the fastest way to change California?

EYES ON THE PRIZE--At the LA Press Club’s 59th Annual Awards Ceremony on Sunday, at the Biltmore Millennium Hotel, brothers Eric Preven and Joshua Preven took first prize in the category of online political commentary, for their CityWatch article “It’s Time to End LA’s Secret Meetings: What Do City Council Members and LA’s County Supervisors Have to Hide?” More than five hundred journalists and media executives attended the event.

THE COHEN COLUMN--The Senate Republicans were going to quick-fix their massive tax cut for the rich, pretending to be a health care bill, which the independent Congressional Budget Office slammed worse than the House bill. Then they ducked out of town one day early.

PREVEN REPORT-“I am pleased to share that our Parking, Safety and Athletic (PSA) Improvement Plan will have its first public hearing with the City of LA on on Monday July 24, 2017,” writes Harvard-Westlake President Rick B. Commons in a recent email to “friends and families” of the school referring to Harvard-Westlake's proposed 750-space parking garage and accompanying roof-top athletic field and 163-foot pedestrian bridge over Coldwater Canyon Boulevard. 

RANTZ AND RAVEZ-On July 1, 2017, LA Mayor Eric Garcetti and LA City Council members were sworn into office for the next 5 1/2 years. Now that they are officially in position, in power to serve the public, what will they do to improve the quality of life in Los Angeles? What will they do to address transportation gridlock, the high cost of housing, increasing crime and a host of other pressing matters using over $8 billion in taxes? 

RIGGING THE RULES-The public employee unions, especially the teacher union variety, are very jittery over the prospect that the Janus case, if successful in the U.S. Supreme Court next year, could free government workers from paying forced dues to a union as a condition of employment. Enter California’s AB 119, a trailer bill, which was signed into law last week. As R Street Institute’s Steven Greenhut reminds us, a trailer bill is typically intended “for last minute and non-controversial technical fixes to budget matters.” While, AB 119 was certainly last minute, it is anything but non-controversial. 

15 CANDLES-- (Editor’s Note: It has 15 years since Los Angeles certified its first Neighborhood Council … Wilmington Neighborhood Council … in December of 2001. The ’15 Candles’ campaign celebrates the occasion, looks back at the early days and considers the future of LA’s NCs. Bill Christopher Chaired the Board of Neighborhood Commissioners … BONC … beginning in June of 2001 and, working at fever pitch, oversaw the certification of some 60 neighborhood councils in a two year period. Bill takes a look back and considers what he might do differently.)  

CORRUPTION WATCH-Millions of Americans on the Left are being scammed by the call for “Single Payer Health Care.” We have naively allowed ourselves to be so polarized by the endless hogwash from both parties that we will believe anything. The Left is consumed with insane Tweets from a mentally ill President and by the stupendous avarice of the GOP in Congress; a majority of Americans have lost the ability to think. 

EASTSIDER-I rarely write directly about what I do for a living, but as a neutral person with some 25 years experience in California public sector labor relations, I feel compelled to write about the merits of the DWP/IBEW settlement itself, especially after the recent flood of articles casting the contract in unflattering terms. 

TENANT’S RIGHTS--Close to four Million people reside in Los Angeles according to an annual population report by the California Department of Finance dated May 1, 2017 

PERSPECTIVE-Much has been written and discussed about the recently approved contract with DWP’s IBEW Local 18 members...but not enough. 

CONNECTING CALIFORNIA-- Dear America, I suppose I should wish you happy birthday. But I’m just not feeling it.