LOS ANGELES

EDUCATION POLITICS-Not at the moment. All of the recent years for which final (“actual”) budget data are published show every single annual budget has finished in the black. While the entirety of the LAUSD budget includes various capital and internal funds, for the purposes of tracking the actual operating budget, the General Fund revenues and expenditures are of most importance.

Recent school board candidate’s statements casting shade on LAUSD’s current solvency are just wrong. But what about the future? Is the District simply swirling that bankruptcy toilet, circling inevitably toward the abyss? Even if currently flush, how well can past financial performance predict the future? 

The District’s Chief Financial Officer (who just resigned after 10 years of constitutional, if not justifiable, worry), publishes a projected budget for one and two years beyond the current operating year. That current operating year’s budget is finalized in June prior to the start of the upcoming schoolyear. And there’s a big accounting midyear to check up on things. 

So this means there are four forecasts for any given year -- snapshots of how budget forecasts stack up against the facts of what actually come to pass: (i) at mid-year, (ii) right before the start of a new fiscal/school year, (iii) one year out from that year and (iv) two years out from that year. 

Each one of these sets of guesses is expected to have different tendencies. They will vary by how far in the future the forecast projects, by what sorts of monies are considered, revenue or expenditure. And each can be assessed for accuracy, what direction these forecasts trend for any given point, etc.

The forecasts are key in assessing whether the “sky is falling” – the origin of the claim that LAUSD is sinking financially, whether it’s accurate, what has been and what should be done about it. 

Revenue projections, especially with increasing time in the future (by two years out,) have been conservative, or favorable to the bottom line; less has been anticipated and planned for coming in, than wound up coming in when all was said and done. That’s responsible and it makes for good planning. The relatively small percentages of unfavorable, negative variance for the upcoming year’s final budgets was always offset by underspending. Every successive year has maintained a positive carryover. 

It is in the expenditures that the district has carefully offset the volatility of state and federal monies so vulnerable to political caprice. LAUSD has consistently, favorably, underspent its budget in every year. What is clear is that the pessimistic, Henny-Penny terror of projecting a future so influenced by vagaries, is hedged through persistent projections of underfunding and overspending…which don’t then come to pass in reality. 

That’s OK, sort of. Life happens.

But what isn’t OK is insisting that forecasts – particularly the sort that are inherently conservative – are blueprints of tomorrow’s future. Because that’s the partisan agenda furthered by the voice of corporate Democrats and school privatizers in the guise of “Charter Reform.” 

That voice is prophesied by LA School Report and The 74 (“partners” of: Broad, CA Community, DeVos, Gates, Gen Next, Karsh, Simon, Triad and Walton Foundations; Bloomberg Philanthropies, Carnegie Corp., Fisher Fund, Park Ave Charitable Trust, Sackler and Strauch,) and by the California Charter School Association-sponsored school board candidates Gonez (LAUSD6) and Melvoin (LAUSD4). And it’s asserted religiously, without ever cross-checking how past projections compare with future reality once it actually comes to pass. 

The data actually show two things: First, careful projections and husbandry of its funds has actually served LAUSD well fiscally. Despite tumultuous financial circumstances in our city, state and at the federal level, LAUSD has managed to keep a laudably steady keel. Its administrators have done themselves proud. 

Secondly, however, this fiscal responsibility in the face of predictive doom-saying has come at the expense of the District’s very own Commons. LAUSD’s students and staff cinch their belts every year on cue to defend the institution from the fallout of the partisan fake outrage at the risk of deficit. LAUSD has balanced the books every year despite tumultuous swings in funding, because the institution extracts an enormous carryover buffer from every year’s operations. 

During each of the five years in question, LAUSD’s carryover has been on average 12.5% of that year’s eventual actual revenue intake. In three of these five years, the carryover was never broached because revenues wound up larger than expenditures. In the two years when the carryover was tapped, 9% was used in 2011-12 and 17% was used in 2012-13. 

But that translates to hundreds of millions of dollars due for our students and teachers, money that, year after year, is never realized. Far from overspending our way to insolvency, there’s an important case to be made that LAUSD underspends each year. 

For example, for want of less than $2.5 million in 2012, then-Superintendent Deasy summarily cut all Title I funds to schools of middling diversity overnight, causing enormous financial hardship to schools of poverty percentage between 40%-49% (the burden was partially mitigated through a one year “hold-harmless” fund that has since been discontinued.) Twenty-three of these high-functioning schools weathered the unforeseen shortfall via privatization, converting their schools to “fiscally dependent” charters. 

And yet $687 million remained that year to rollover into the following year’s budget. That amounts to 12% of 2012-13’s eventual $5.7 billion revenue. That carryover could address so many worthy needs; it could lower LAUSD’s vital teacher:student ratio, for example – certainly more effectively than eventually came to pass.  There is no shortage of important needs to address, but one of these should be the size of the accounting cushion itself, because every dollar spent politically mollifying appearances, is a dollar not spend substantively at the school-site. 

It’s not clear what amount of carryover is optimal for a large government agency, or even whether there is any.  Certainly every budget is a political document and collateral choices are forced by the way it is designed. But those choices are also implied in the way the budget is interpreted. 

LAUSD isn’t going broke and the institution should have the courage to stand up to those who would wish to paint it so in order to further the narrative of “churn and disaster” that only leaves us poorer than when we started. Our public funds are to be spent on us the public, by us the public. And while we could use more of these funds, what we have is precious.

(Sara Roos is a politically active resident of Mar Vista, a biostatistician, the parent of two teenaged LAUSD students and a CityWatch contributor, who blogs at redqueeninla.com) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

BELL VIEW-In 2009, I got involved in my first unsuccessful attempt to put an independent voice on the LA City Council. I didn’t run. A guy I’d met on the East Hollywood Neighborhood Council – a Harvard lawyer, a treasurer for two neighborhood councils, a community activist, and an all-around good guy – decided to challenge the incumbent councilmember. 

We lost in a landslide. At the election night get together in a small booth in a Thai Restaurant in East Hollywood, someone said “you just can’t beat the machine.” 

I thought – “machine?” I grew up in Chicago, where the Democratic Party built by the first Mayor Daley created a machine like no other. Daley would start the election with a million votes in his pocket. That’s a machine. In that 2009 LA City Council election, the incumbent won with a little more than 8,000 votes.

After that, I was snake bit. Eight thousand votes! This is doable, I thought. So, two years later, I worked my heart out for another candidate against an incumbent in another district.

Yeah – we lost. 

In that race, two supremely-qualified candidates went up against an incumbent that could barely put two words together. Between the two candidates, we couldn’t force a runoff.

This year, I supported an old friend of mine from my neighborhood council days who decided to make a run for it. The truth is: I liked three candidates in that race. On Election Day, I stood outside a polling place (beyond the 100-foot barrier) and passed out fliers for my friend. The cordiality of the voters heading in to vote that day really surprised me. I know how it is: I never want to talk to strangers on the street about anything. But the voters I met – with a few exceptions – were overwhelmingly polite, and a large proportion of them actually stopped to talk with me.

The conversation usually went something like this: I would talk about my friend, what he’d done for the community, and why I thought he would make a great City Councilmember. If I sensed I’d gotten through to them, I’d hand them a flier and they would be on their way. But, if I didn’t feel like I’d closed the deal on my friend, I had one last pitch. 

“You know,” I’d say as they were walking away from me, “there’s only one woman on the LA City Council.” Invariably, they would turn around. “That’s right,” I’d say, “one woman. And there are two women running today. I like them both, but I like one better than the other, and here’s why.”

I can’t tell you how many people I turned that day. I just don’t know. But, among the small percentage of Angelenos who actually go to the polling place on Election Day to cast their votes – the issue of women in government is on their minds.

That’s why Tuesday’s special congressional election in the 34th district is so disappointing. I don’t live in the district, so I couldn’t vote. But of the 300,000 registered voters who do, less than 30,000 of them bothered to vote at all. Of the 24 candidates, 12 of them were women. In the end, the two top fundraisers – both men – made it into the runoff. 

Without commenting on the merits of the two contenders, it’s a shame that in a year when the country elected a misogynist president; when we have a vice president who will not sit down with another woman outside the presence of his wife; when the fate of women’s healthcare is decided by a roomful of men – that barely 10% of the electorate could even bother to vote in an election that presented a dozen opportunities to put a woman in the U.S. Congress.

Seven hundred and fifty thousand people marched in the streets of Los Angeles for The Women’s March following the presidential election. Where did everyone go?

(David Bell is a writer, attorney, former president of the East Hollywood Neighborhood Council and writes for CityWatch.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

MY TURN-How about a change of topic today? I don't know about you, but the constant stream of nefarious political accusations is giving me heart burn ... literally. 

Looking back over the last few Presidents and their visions, I keep coming back to John F. Kennedy and the famous line from his Inaugural Address: "Don't ask what your country can do for you...ask what you can do for your country.” 

What if we bring it down to, "What can you do for your City?" Fortunately, there are Angelenos who are doing their part to improve living conditions here. But just as it is not enough to just feed and house your children, it is not enough to say, "I pay my taxes, so let the government make sure I have a good life.” 

We both -- private citizens and businesses large and small -- have a moral responsibility to participate in this effort. Usually we spotlight individuals or not-for-profit organizations that are engaged in making Los Angeles a more livable city. Recently, though, I came across a for profit company in South Los Angeles that is engaged in literally helping to "clean up" its community. 

Errol Segal, the Senior Recycling Consultant for Active Recycling and his program, is a good example of what companies can do to help the communities from which they benefit. He’s LA’s ‘Trashsamaritan’. 

He told me, "My business has been in South Los Angeles for over 40 years. We are a Trash and Recycling Center on Slauson Avenue. We have tried to be a good community partner and over the years have given away free Christmas trees, gasoline and other items to those in need within our community. 

"I reside in the San Fernando Valley and one day as I was leaving for work, I noticed a couch, a mattress and table along the street near my home. My first thought was that they were dumped illegally or had been put out for Bulky Item Pick-up day. These items were gone within three days. 

"As I drove to work along Slauson Ave, I began to notice the amount of illegally dumped items on the streets and in the alleyways. If caught it could result in a substantial fine, which wouldn't solve the root problem. I asked myself, what could I do to address the issue in South Los Angeles? 

"About one week later, I read an article in the LA Times about illegally dumped trash in the Black and Latino Neighborhoods of South LA. It was an investigative report that said bulky items and illegally dumped trash took weeks to be picked up... if they were picked up at all. It was very critical of the services being provided to the communities in South LA. In comparison it took three days in the more affluent parts of LA." 

Twenty-three months ago, Active Recycling started its Clean Up LA Campaign, allowing people to bring in trash for free rather than dump it on the street illegally or being forced to pay a fee to a recycling center. The community has responded and so far this company has processed over three million pounds of trash. (Photo above: Resident Charletta Butler poses with community trash that has been brought to Segal’s Active Recycling.) 

Since the study by the LA Times was done more than two years ago, some changes have taken place. The Mayor introduced a new program which will go into effect this summer to revamp and improve trash recycling throughout the City of Los Angeles. 

According to Enrique C. Zaldivar, P.E. Director of LA Sanitation, Zero Waste LA is a new public private partnership. It establishes an exclusive, zone-based franchise system that will offer regulated and customer friendly waste and recycling services to all commercial and industrial businesses, institutions and large multi-family buildings. 

He said, "Zero Waste LA” 

will be transformative for residents, customers, and businesses who have long sought to participate in and have more access to the City’s sustainability efforts. It will move the City closer to achieving zero waste through innovative waste reduction, reuse, recycling, and recovery programs. Through coordination, collaboration, and communication, I am confident that we will meet the partnership’s goals: 

• Reduce city landfill disposal by 1,000,000 tons per year by 2025. 

• Set transparent and predictable waste and recycling service rates. 

• Offer accountability and quality customer services. 

• Enforce compliance with environmental mandates. 

• Reduce greenhouse gas and air pollution emissions. 

• Decrease food waste and increase food rescue and donations. 

"In April 2014, the Mayor and City Council approved the ordinance establishing the new franchise system and delineated 11 zones. The franchisees for each of these specific areas were subsequently selected to partner with the City through an open and competitive bidding process that included extensive evaluation and negotiations over a two year period." 

LA Sanitation will continue to provide solid waste and recycling services to single family homes and small multi-family residences, and specific waste streams such as construction and demolition, medical, hazardous, and radioactive waste will continue to be serviced by permitted private waste haulers. 

Errol Segal will still be helping his community as all costs for the Free Trash Dumping project are being shouldered by Active Recycling; single and small multi-family residences are not covered under the new initiative. 

I know the topic of trash isn't exciting, but when we manage it efficiently it helps improve our quality of life. Come to think of it, maybe we could find a way to alleviate some of the political "Trash Talk" under a new initiative! 

As always...comments welcome.

(Denyse Selesnick is a CityWatch columnist. She is a former publisher/journalist/international event organizer. Denyse can be reached at: [email protected]) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

MEMO TO LAUSD--My grade school summer vacations seemed to last forever, pairing well with the Beach Boys’ Endless Summer double album I wore out on the record changer. During those hot and humid Northern Virginia summers, I headed each weekday to the summer camp held in my elementary school’s nearly-abandoned cafeteria. It was a low-key affair -- ping pong and table hockey on the cafeteria lunch tables, kickball and football on the playground, key chains and macramé in arts and crafts -- while mix tapes with Gerry Rafferty’s “Baker Street” in heavy rotation played over the school’s PA system. 

And in what must have been one of the greatest bargains of the 1970s, camp tuition was $20 for the entire summer. 

Today, such an easy-going camp would be trashed on Yelp! despite its unbeatable price, for failing to deliver any quasi-academic or super-creative purpose. Imagine my camp competing with today’s Computer Camp, Robotics Camp, Animation camp, and (my personal favorite) New York Film Academy Camp, which is in, of all places, Burbank. 

Kids’ summer camps in Los Angeles enter parents’ collective consciousness around January 15, just after the three-week-long Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) winter break, which was the dream of the teachers’ union (which also negotiated an entire week off for Thanksgiving) and the owners of, yes, winter camps. The most popular summer camps are said to fill up by mid-February, so the camp arms race begins before one even has a chance to plan a basic family vacation. 

Our daughter, now eight, is already enrolled in four camps (with a fifth still possible) so that we, her two professional working parents, can earn a living and thus afford said camps. We’re signed up for a week-long, overnight, all-girls sleepaway camp at Griffith Park, an arts camp at a synagogue three blocks away, a swimming/all-around recreation camp at Valley College, and Beach Camp, which, for our fair-skinned daughter, requires bulk purchases of SPF 50 sunscreen.  

There’s also the matter that plenty of LAUSD families simply can’t afford private summer camp at all, since absolutely none of them can be found at the bargain, 1970s price of $20. Half of all LAUSD families qualify for free lunch programs, meaning their household income is just over or below the federal poverty line. Some summer camps offer scholarships on a very limited basis, but that just means families in need must compete for these coveted slots and complete additional administrative paperwork. 

Mind you, this is on top of the dizzying registration process that often involves websites crashing after anxious parents overwhelm the system immediately after the online enrollment period opens. 

For lower-income families, the availability of formal and informal municipal resources -- public swimming pools, kids’ day camps at city parks, and air-conditioned public libraries -- is critical. For tens of thousands of Los Angeles-area kids, poverty doesn’t take a summer vacation. 

The LAUSD academic calendar also plays a role in making summer a tough sprint for families. The long winter break is offset by making the summer break short, just over two months long, with school ending June 9 and starting up again August 15. So while the fabled and possibly archaic family summer vacation is possible for those with means, it’s the hottest, priciest, and most crowded time of year for travelling. 

It’s taken our family three years of practice to finally figure out how to make this unconventional school schedule work for us. We did this by giving up on a conventional week of summer vacation; we might get a long weekend or two if we’re lucky. Instead, we opt for vacation during the tail end of winter break, after the holidays, when most other school districts are back in session and airfares and hotel prices drop significantly. 

But our coping strategy is under fire. The LAUSD Board, in their infinite wisdom, has considered changing the academic calendar as the solution to several of their administrative woes. You see, other school districts start at a far more conventional time: after Labor Day. Not only do some board members observe other school districts with a jealous eye, but they are also under the impression that a later start will result in lower air conditioning usage and, hence, lower energy costs district-wide. This past fall, it looked like a move towards a more traditional start, one week later in 2017 and an additional week later in 2018, was going to pass. 

In December, however, forces far greater than Computer Camp took hold, shocking the school board into reversing their position -- and reverting (for now) to the calendar with the two-month summer break and the three-week winter break. Why? For two big reasons. First, the teacher’s union likes the status quo. Second, changing to a calendar with a shorter winter break would result in more student absences, since a considerable number of parents would still yank their kids out of school for a few days for holiday-time visits to relatives and winter vacation destinations. These additional absences would result in LAUSD losing some of its funding from the State of California, which allocates resources based on average daily attendance. 

But the scheduling issue remains white-hot. The board’s decision on the calendar was so divisive that the board President abstained -- yes, abstained -- when the academic calendar issue came before them. So while the calendar is set for the school year beginning this coming August, the board has yet to decide on the calendars for the 2018-19 school year and beyond. 

I wonder if this lack of leadership, leading to unnecessary uncertainty for parents, would even matter if we had the informal, cheap, carefree, drop-in nature of the summer camp I remember. But I recognize that in our current era of instant access and gratification, kids like our daughter might not know what to do with the unstructured fun I had when I was a kid. None of today’s summer camp options offer any time for being lazy or hazy -- there’s only a short break before your next camp activity starts at 10:10 a.m. 

What memories will she have? What sport will she remember playing that didn’t come with rules or equipment? And with her day’s activities lined up on a scheduling grid, will she even have the time to reflect on her summer music soundtrack?  

As for me, Gerry Rafferty’s sax solo will always remind me of those slow and easy summers, with the click-clack of a table hockey puck adding some percussion. Just don’t tell the Beach Boys.

(David Gershwin is a Los Angeles-based public affairs consultant, Zócalo Public Square board member, and teaching fellow at UCLA Anderson School of Management.) Primary Editor: Joe Mathews. Secondary Editor: Sara Catania. Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

GELFAND’S WORLD--I have a scar running through my right eyebrow, and it symbolizes why I don't give a damn whether the NFL comes back to Los Angeles or not. I intend this column to be a polite response to the piece by Daniel Guss in which he faults the elected leadership of Los Angeles for losing the Raiders to Las Vegas. 

The unstated implication in that column is that it is a great achievement to get a professional football team for your city. And the further unstated assumption is that it makes a difference whether that football team is located within your city limits or just outside of them. Otherwise, the writer would presumably be jumping with joy over the return of two professional football teams to the L.A. adjacent city of Inglewood. There may be a further unstated assumption with regard to the relative merits of the Raiders vs. the Rams and/or Chargers, but I'm unable to identify whether that specific view exists. 

I disagree with the basic assumption. I don't think that having one professional football team (among so many others, all over the country) compares in any way with being the foremost town for movie making, being the nation's prime seaport, or being a world capitol of theoretical physics. Furthermore, my view is that the city of Los Angeles won this round with the NFL, just as it has won numerous rounds previously. 

Winning vs losing depends on what you are trying to achieve, and whether or not you achieved it. 

The payoff from watching sports, I would suggest, comes from our ability to identify with the athlete and the team. For one magical Saturday afternoon, we get to be the guy carrying the ball against Notre Dame, or the base runner on first against the Giants. I can still remember Craig Fertig throwing the winning touchdown pass against a previously undefeated Notre Dame team, and who can forget Gibson's home run? 

Magic moments, yes. We all get to be David battling Goliath for a few seconds. But there is a difference between fandom and city governance, because there is a difference between identifying with the team vs really being on the team or owning the team. One is make believe. The other isn't. 

There is also a difference between college sports and professional sports. I would argue that our ability to identify with the local college comes a lot easier than our ability to identify with the professional sports team that has just announced that it is leaving town. UCLA isn't going to pack up its buildings and move to a different town that makes a better offer. It's always going to be UCLA in terms of film studies, chemistry, and ancient history. 

So back to that scar and how it relates to the comments by Mr Guss about Las Vegas winning the battle for the Oakland etc Raiders. When I started college, one of my classmates mentioned that I might be interested in something called Rugby (technically it's Rugby Football) because that's what my college had, and it was something like American football. That last statement turned out to be only partly right. Rugby is something like American football if you leave in the tackling and leave out the blocking. Oh, and you also leave out the helmet and the pads, although being an American, I used a mouth guard. 

So over the years, Rugby was my game. After 17 years of playing rugby, first at the intercollegiate level and then at the club level, I no longer feel any urge to identify with professional football players. I just don't need to have a professional team at hand to provide me with self esteem. It's true that the pros are at a completely different level as athletes and hitters, but it also became true that I no longer had to prove something to myself along the lines of athletics and physicality. I had knocked heads with the Big Ten and with Cal, had been knocked cold a few times, and somehow avoided the big knee injury. I enjoyed sports a lot in my day, but at this point, having another team win for me (and for the strength of my ego) has lessened. 

And then there is that scar through the eyebrow. Why it is germane in this discussion is that it was inflicted on me by one of my teammates in a practice, and it was this same teammate who went on to become a famous professor who studied the impact of professional sports on local economies. Along with other careful observers, he found that adding a professional football stadium (and team) to the local economy may not do a lot of harm, money-wise, but it doesn't do much good, either. All those ticket sales? That money is taken away from other expenditures. People with enough discretionary income to go to professional football games could spend the same amount of money in lots of other ways. People who live in cities lacking a pro football team find ways to entertain themselves. Local boosters seeking a team always promote the economic benefits in terms of hotel occupancy and local sales taxes, but in the net, the results have been unimpressive over a large number of decades and over a lot of teams. 

In bidding on the services of a professional football team, we are trying to buy two things -- the entertainment value of the sporting events, and the emotional value of having the team to identify with. In the case of professional sports, that identification is at best a stretch, because the team is only committed to you as long as the money doesn't run out. Some leagues fold and some teams leave Baltimore in the middle of the night and drive to Indianapolis. How can we view Los Angeles as anything but a way station for NFL teams? 

It's up to the sports fan to decide whether the price of a pair of tickets and a couple of beers is worth the hefty price. That's a personal decision for you to make. But things get beyond the personal when a sports team wants the tax payers to subsidize the construction. Half a billion or a billion dollars is a substantial amount of money, even for a big city like Los Angeles. Whether the mayor should chase after a professional sports team by chasing after the City Council to invest tax dollars is a collective decision that belongs to the voters as a group. 

The history of the past several decades is that Los Angeles tax payers don't want to cover the costs of a new stadium just to service billionaire owners. We've got a couple of perfectly good fields if the intent is to watch a football game. The stadium boxes would only be there to serve the interests of the few. Our elected officials have held the line against such public expenditures. 

This is not to say that a lot of our elected City Council members didn't want to bring back the Rams (or some team, any team). They begged and pleaded, negotiated, got down on their hands and knees, and then begged some more. The one thing they wouldn't do was to shovel public dollars into a new billion-dollar stadium designed to service the wealthy. 

Even the die-hard fans who still were carrying a torch for the old L.A. Rams admitted that for the NFL, the function of Los Angeles was to be a threat to other cities. If those Minneapolis (et al) tax payers didn't come up with the big bucks, their teams -- the Vikings, Ravens, Rams, or Raiders -- would move to Los Angeles. The extortion racket worked pretty well. You had St Louis and San Diego begging like jilted lovers for One More Try. We'll try to find maybe three hundred million, and get some local billionaire to pony up another half billion. 

During the long winter of no professional football, Los Angeles mayors have been asked how much money they will support for the construction of that new stadium. Eric Garcetti was succinct: "Zero." Other L.A. mayors were equally straightforward. "Bring us back a team," they would say, "But don't expect the taxpayers to cover your team's costs." By refusing to get rolled by the NFL owners, the mayors and City Council of Los Angeles have won their end of the battle. The city didn't get a team, but the taxpayers didn't get fleeced, either. I think we can take pride in the fact that we have a greater sense of self worth than the cities which caved. Extortion victims like Minneapolis can't say the same thing. 

Every city which is in the running for a sports franchise has the same choice. It's a question of funding the existence of a sports team that we (as individuals) can learn to love, or saving our money. It's a balance between spending real money and expecting the taxpayers as a whole to engage in mass psychological identification vs. spending the money on something else. 

Like I was saying, the scar tells me that I don't have a need to identify with some other set of athletes anymore. Sure I will root for the U.S. soccer team in the World Cup and for the Dodgers if they ever get out of the first round of the playoffs. But I don't need to. If it happens it will be fun, and if it doesn't, so be it. 

Interestingly, I was chatting with a former professional athlete a few weeks ago. When I asked him whether he felt any need to identify with professional sports teams, he responded No. He only watches college football. It was obvious that he had proved himself to himself and didn't feel the same way that a frustrated adolescent fan would feel. 

I have to give Mr Guss credit for one observation. I think that there is at least a possibility that Las Vegas will break the odds and actually develop some financial gain from bringing in a professional football team. This would of course depend on Las Vegas merchandising football tickets to the tourist trade. Football would be one more entertainment option along with magic, lounge singers, and burlesque. It probably wouldn't add any money to city government revenues, but it would go well in the usual Vegas advertising blitzes. The point for Vegas is to bring in elbows to pull the slots and finger tips to add chips to the roulette tables. The taxpayers of Nevada can cover a little bit of football as part of that giant advertising machine that is the Vegas strip. 

But things are different here in greater Los Angeles. However you slice it, the existence of the Rams in Inglewood is unlikely to affect the local economy very much, one way or the other. The economists who have studied this question over multiple decades and dozens of cities have made this clear, and that includes the one who split my eyebrow with his forehead. If there is to be any contribution to the local economy, it will be to the region as a whole. A few tens of thousands of people who travel to Los Angeles will stay in hotels all over the area, not just in Inglewood. Yes, a Super Bowl is a big deal nowadays (the first one wasn't so big, even if it was held right here in L.A.), but LAX moves seventy million people a year, with or without a Roman Numeraled football game. 

And notice something else. New York nominally hosts a couple of pro football teams, but they play in a place called East Rutherford, New Jersey. That distancing doesn't seem to have depressed the price of tickets to Hamilton. San Francisco nominally hosts a pro football team, but it plays forty miles down the coast. This doesn't seem to have made the city any less desirable to Silicon Valley millionaires or to tourists. 

One interesting point raised by The Economist: Pro football teams not only cost the locals a lot of money, they result in increased crime. 

Just Breaking 

The next one to fall is Devin Nunes, who will step down from chairing the House investigation of Trump's Russian ties. At what point will the elected politicians start to realize that there is real danger in becoming associated with Trump's criminality?

(Bob Gelfand writes on science, culture, and politics for CityWatch. He can be reached at [email protected]) 

-cw

THAT CEREMONIAL SPIRIT-In the Olympic spirit, the LA County Board of Supervisors and LA City Council have been vying to see which highly-compensated municipal body can more thoroughly cram its meetings full of vacuous ceremonial presentations. 

Vegas has all but written off the County -- for which tomorrow’s meeting is do or die. The City’s final “at bat” was Friday, when it shattered its own world record set on June 26, 2015.  If you subtract from the City’s past two Friday meetings the collective four hours of ceremonial commendations which took place, you are left with barely an hour’s worth of public business being done -- though that depends to some extent on whether you include as public business Councilmember Blumenfield speaking Farsi and/or Controller Galperin texting incessantly during the Nowruz celebration (Persian New Year.)  

Regardless, as he stated proudly at the second meeting, the Mayor hopes we can “incorporate a gender lens through everything we do now.” 

Meanwhile, those who would write off the County in this race should know that its agenda for tomorrow bristles with thirteen presentations plus a televised pet adoption appeal. To be sure, most of those commendation recipients -- ArtsforLA, Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 13 President, LA County Occupational Therapists -- won’t burn up much time, but one of the honorees -- SafetyBeltSafe U.S.A. (to be honored for their great work in reducing the number of children who suffer from tragic injuries in car collisions) -- could turn out to be a real doozy, if they bring some kids downtown. 

Moreover, if all else fails, Supervisor Ridley-Thomas can go thermonuclear with an “adjournment for the fallen,” which entails each Supervisor lecturing in remembrance of someone recently deceased. Not even half of a typical Janice Hahn encomium could tip the balance in favor of the County. 

In other words, this race is far from a sealed deal; and the fat lady, though slated for one-hour performances at both the City and County next week, has yet to sing.

(Eric Preven and Joshua Preven are public advocates for better transparency in local government. Eric is a Studio City based writer-producer and Joshua is a teacher.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

ANIMAL WATCH-On March 15, after adopting a dog named “Emmet” from the Clinton Humane Society, Kris and Ashley Greene took their new pet to the home of Tyler and Holly Harrison, where the dog bit the Harrison’s 15-month-old son, Lucas, in the face, leaving massive facial wounds, the Clinton Herald reported.

With the increasing number of reports of aggressive dog attacks in Los Angeles and nationwide, there may be some important lessons to be learned. 

Although the dog in Clinton, Iowa, had been listed as a "Boxer-Labrador-mix," it was determined to be a Pit Bull  that had been transported from a Louisiana shelter. 

The dog was subsequently declared a dangerous dog by Clinton authorities, and Ashley Greene was cited for owning a dangerous dog. She pleaded not guilty on March 28, according to the Herald. 

The photos of the horrific disfigurement of this beautiful child are chilling. Lucas’ injuries are described and photos shown before and after surgery on the family’s GoFundMe page: 

He was airlifted to the University of Iowa Childrens' Hospital where he had a 6- hour surgery involving at least 3 surgeons. A large part of his gum/bone including permanent teeth were ripped out, most of his nose cartilage was destroyed, and he will have lifelong damage. He will not have any upper front teeth, will need dental reconstruction to hopefully support false teeth when he is an adult, and have more facial surgeries in the future. 

Colleen Lynn of Dogsbite.org did a thorough investigation of the background of the Pit Bull, Emmet, and describes the mechanisms by which dogs with a propensity for aggression are transported nationwide for adoption to an unsuspecting public. 

She writes, "Animals of IPAC advertised Emmet as a 'great dog with a great temperament.'" 

“Three weeks before the attack, a pit bull-mix named Emmet, was on death row at the New Iberia Parish Animal Shelter in Louisiana. On February 22, after social media rallied to "save Emmet," by raising over $300, the dog was "approved for transport."  (Read more)  

HUMANE SOCIETY SUED 

On Thursday, March 29, 2017, the Herald announced that a civil lawsuit against the Clinton Humane Society and the owners of the dog that attacked Lucas had been filed on Tuesday by Attorney John Frey, on behalf of the parents of Lucas Harrison. 

The following items are excerpted and summarized from the Herald report: 

The petition alleges one count against Kris and Ashley Greene for dog owners’ strict liability, and two counts against the Clinton Humane Society for product liability, negligence and breach of express warranty.” 

It states the “foreseeable risks of harm” posed by the dog could have been reduced or avoided by the provision of reasonable instructions or warnings.

Among these instructions should have been the precautions for bringing the dog into a home “where another dog, an infant and small children are present.”  

The petition asserts that the Greenes should have been warned that the Humane Society’s ability to determine whether a dog is child friendly is extremely limited, rather than “expressly warranting” that the dog was “child friendly.” 

The new owners should have been warned that the dog had been moved from a shelter in Louisiana to Clinton Humane Society after being impounded for over five months and was scheduled for euthanasia.  

The Greenes should have been warned that the dog in question could be a pit bull mix, even though it was allegedly advertised by the Clinton Humane Society as a Boxer-mix. 

The petition states "the omission of the instructions or warnings renders the dog not reasonably safe." 

The petition lists one count against the Greenes for strictly liability for all damages done by their dog, citing Iowa code section 351.28. 

WHY THIS LAWSUIT IS IMPORTANT 

Traditionally those who rehome unwanted pets -- mainly animal shelters and humane society -- have been held harmless from prosecution and/or liability for the future misconduct of the animal. Courts have taken a Caveat emptor approach, meaning, "let the buyer beware."

Findlaw advises this means "sold as is,” and the buyer assumes the risk that a product may fail to meet expectations or may have defects. However, implicit in this concept is the presumption that buyers will be able to inspect or otherwise ensure the integrity of the product before they decide to complete the transaction. 

Of course, with a shelter animal that is almost impossible. There is no way, based upon looking through the bars of a cage or kennel or taking a pet into an introduction area, that health or temperament can be accurately assessed.

Although some dogs adapt to a new home immediately, it can take several weeks, or longer, before a new pet has "settled in" and relaxes enough to express its true character and personality and/or begins to show territorial dominance. Therefore, in the past, shelters have been cautious about absolute, positive statements and have made notes on all observed behavior by employees visible on posted kennel cards or otherwise easily available, so that potential adopters could make a more-informed decision. 

But, the “No Kill” movement has changed that. The industry-wide competition to have the highest “live-save” rate and specific pressure from leading humane groups to not interfere with the right to breed and own combat Pit Bulls (“No BSL”), has resulted in withholding negative behavioral information and sometimes making misleading statements to get these animals adopted and so they don't inflate the shelter’s euthanasia rate.

To further this effort, Pit Bulls are commonly misidentified as Boxer-mix or listed as American Staffordshire Terriers, and referred to as “Nanny Dogs” that are “great with kids.” San Francisco SPCA tried calling them “St. Francis Terriers” and New York introduced “New Yorkies” -- a program which reportedly lasted three days. 

At first, “no kill” applied to humane societies, many of which are “limited entry” and have the option to only accept adoptable dogs. This gave them a heads up on receiving donations, because no one wants to support a "kill shelter." 

But the pressure to be "no kill" then shifted to the “open-admission” tax-funded municipal shelters, which must accept all strays and animals in need, regardless of temperament or condition. This has forced governmental agencies -- which have direct responsibility to protect the public -- into keeping alive animals that have serious aggression or behavior concerns and applying any remotely plausible description to them, except “dogs bred to kill each other.” 

Of course, not every Pit Bull unpredictably attacks and some can be loyal, loving pets; but the genetics and recent history of this breed requires an acceptance that, increasingly, the desire for winning fighting dogs has led to producing Pit Bulls that may react with unpredictable violence to almost any stimulation that "challenges" them.

This often includes pets, children, or even the hand that feeds them. On March 30, the NY Post reports, Man Fatally Mauled by his Dog during Interview with Film Crew. The article describes that this was not the first attack by this Pit Bull on his owner, but a neighbor said that Mario Perivoitos, 41, “loved the dog more than himself.” The Pit Bull was also described as generally quiet and never seen to be vicious. 

Thus, shelters are packed with Pit Bulls whose true natures begin to show usually between eight months to two years and often become such a problem or potential liability that they are just dumped in the streets or relinquished; in either case, these animals proliferate in animal shelters nationwide. 

The Michael Vick case created two new industries -- (1) “rescues” that thrive on donations for saving the “misunderstood" underdogs and which “pull” known aggressive dogs from shelters to save them; and (2) transport businesses that charge per animal to move these often-unadoptable animals to a shelter in another city or state. Thousands of dangerous animals that have already shown vicious or anti-social behavior are packed into trucks or airplanes and shipped to known or unknown destinations, rather than being humanely euthanized. 

This deceptive shell game allows shelters, humane societies and the rescuers bragging rights to a higher “live-save” rate (after all, the animals left alive) and the historical “caveat emptor” and governmental-immunity laws have allowed them to avoid responsibility for damages to a future adopter or harm to animals or humans. 

This could soon change, based on a lawsuit filed after the tragic event that occurred on March 15.

(Note: The above does not include the many responsible "rescues" nationwide who carefully screen both the animals and every potential adoptive home.) 

HOW "PRODUCT LIABILITY" IS ASSESSED 

I asked a local attorney who works for a government agency to explain “Product Liability" and also asked, if it is granted in the lawsuit filed on behalf of a 15-week-old Iowa boy, could all agencies or parties involved in impounding/rescuing or transporting homeless animals potentially find themselves liable for any future damages caused by these animals?

Here is his informal response: 

“Strict product liability "applies to everyone in the “stream of commerce." Everyone along the stream is jointly and severally liable for any resulting harm. Manufacturer, wholesaler and retailer -- in this case, each shelter that made the animal available for adoption, transported it or had any part in placing it in the stream of commerce -- could be liable even if it was unknown to any of those parities that there was a defect in the product or the product posed a hazard.  That is the nature of strict liability. 

“Additionally, any party who had knowledge of the propensity of a defect but did not warn or disclose that knowledge could also face liability for negligence. Liability for negligence may apply to anyone of those who moved the animal through the steam of commerce.   

“Anybody who  has knowledge of a potential defect or danger has a duty to warn or inform consumers (adopters) and failure to do so is breach of that duty, resulting in liability for harm that results from that omission.” 

For those seriously interested, the following comment is presented by Animal Law:

EVERY DOG CAN HAVE ITS DAY: EXTENDING LIABILITY BEYOND THE SELLER BY DEFINING PETS AS “PRODUCTS” UNDER PRODUCTS LIABILITY THEORY  

ARE ATTACKS BY SHELTER DOGS INCREASING? 

In a July 11, 2015 article, Pit bull from Asheville Humane Society kills six-year-old, Merritt Clifton of Animals 24-7, describes the tragic death of John Phillip Strother, 6, in NC, brutally killed by a Pit Bull adopted three weeks earlier. 

He describes the Asheville Humane Society as, "An adoption program promotion partner of both the Best Friends Animal Society and the American SPCA, both of which have long fought legislation meant to stop pit bull proliferation." 

He also provides some valuable statistics to that date, citing that Joshua Strother was, "...the 38th fatality involving U.S. shelter dogs from 2010 to present, in attacks involving 30 pit bulls, seven bull mastiffs, two Rottweilers, a Lab who may have been part pit bull, and a husky." 

"By contrast, there were no fatalities involving shelter dogs from 1858 through 1987. Two fatalities occurred, both involving wolf hybrids, in 1988 and 1989." 

He noted that, ". . .there were only 32 disfiguring maulings by shelter dogs from 1858 through 2009, 19 of them involving pit bulls." 

"From 2010 to present [July 11, 2015], there have been at least 138 disfiguring maulings by shelter dogs, 99 of them involving pit bulls. Nineteen shelter dogs have killed or disfigured people thus far in 2015, all of them pit bulls." 

On August 6, 2015, Buncombe County officials completed its review of the screening and transferring procedures by the Asheville Humane Society (AHS). Among other revisions, both parties "agreed to enhance current standards."

One of the revisions was, "Assuring that all adoption agencies provide complete information gathered on the adoptive animal through the sheltering process to all adoptive owners."

(Phyllis M. Daugherty is a former City of LA employee and a contributor to CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

My April Fool’s column, Garcetti Says No to Higher Office, was based on the reasonable speculation that Mayor Eric Garcetti was not going to run for Governor or Senator in 2018. 

If Garcetti entered the race for Governor, he would risk a career-ending loss in a primary brawl with three well-funded candidates, Lt. Governor Gavin Newson, State Treasurer John Chiang, and former LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.  And he is certainly not going to mess with Senator Dianne Feinstein, one of the State’s most popular and respected politicians. 

As for Garcetti’s side deals with Newsom, Chiang, and Feinstein, they were inspired by my love for April Fool’s Day, especially when it comes to poking fun at the political establishment and their self-serving side deals.  

But I should have continued the ruse by developing a scenario so preposterous that anybody in their right mind, including members of the media, would know that there was no way it could be true.  

If I wrote that Mayor Garcetti was going to focus on balancing the budget, eliminating the Structural Deficit (where personnel costs increase faster than revenues), developing a comprehensive plan for the repair and maintenance of our streets, reforming the City’s two underfunded pension plans, and establishing an Office of Transparency and Accountability to oversee the City’s precarious finances, everybody would know that our fiscally irresponsible Elected Elite and the leaders of the public sector unions would never allow this to occur. 

But this is exactly what needs to happen if LA is to be a world class city.  Otherwise, the next generations of Angelenos will be paying for today’s sins.  And that is not a joking matter. 

(Jack Humphreville writes LA Watchdog for CityWatch. He is the President of the DWP Advocacy Committee and is the Budget and DWP representative for the Greater Wilshire Neighborhood Council.  He is a Neighborhood Council Budget Advocate.  Jack is affiliated with Recycler Classifieds -- www.recycler.com.  He can be reached at:  [email protected].)

-cw 

THIS IS WHAT I KNOW-Last December, I first covered the social media-motivated attack on a West Hills teen. Jordan Peisner was on an after-school Wendy’s run when he was jumped by another teen he had never met while the attacker’s friend snapped images on her smartphone. The attack left Jordan with a fractured skull, a blot clot in his brain and ruptured eardrum. In a flash, Jordan’s and his family’s lives were changed forever. 

Jordan’s father Ed Peisner says his son is slowly recovering. “As for the hematoma, as of the last MRI, it was 19mm but we will have another this month to check the size. Hopefully, it has shrunk. His hearing loss is permanent and that is very hard to accept.” 

What happened to the alleged assailants? 

The girl arrested and charged with conspiracy to incite a violent act was moved to LA Teen Court, says Peisner, “because the probation department felt there wasn’t enough evidence to make her charge stick so a jury of her peers -- 14- and 15-year olds -- found her not guilty. We didn’t have a voice in the matter at all. We weren’t even allowed to be there.” 

The arraignment for the teen who physically attacked Jordan will be held on April 7, shares Peisner, “but from what the D.A. told me last week at the pre-plea arraignment, he will most likely receive probation for a certain amount of time. So, my son has permanent physical damages and emotional issues while the assailant gets to pick up trash.” 

The girl who filmed the attack to post on social media wasn’t arrested, says Peisner, because “that isn’t a crime.” 

An Interview with Rep. Matt Dababneh and Sen. Henry Stern: 

Rep. Matt Dababneh (D-Encino) has introduced a bill to change that. Assembly Bill 1542 would criminalize the act of conspiring with an attacker to take video of a crime and would also add a year to the court’s sentence for a criminal felony when the attacker conspires to have that assault recorded. 

I sat down with Dababneh and Sen. Henry Stern (D-SD 27) to talk about the assembly bill, how Jordan’s attack inspired the proposed law, and the importance of addressing social media-motivated attacks. 

BCK: What were your first thoughts when hearing about Jordan Peisner’s attack? 

Dababneh: When I saw the video on Facebook, it was heartbreaking. I was sick to my stomach. This could have been a neighbor or my nephew, one of my interns. I got the sense that this was mostly younger teenagers with a desire or need to be infamous, how many “likes” they have on their profiles. They’re willing to create violence to leave their mark. 

Stern: I was outraged when this all occurred and earlier than that, this ugly knockout club trend on the web. The internet can be used as a tool for incredible good and change but also the basest tendencies and ugliness. This is an evolution of that. 

BCK: What inspired you to introduce this bill? 

Dababneh: Right away, during Jordan’s recovery, Ed took the opportunity to be an advocate. I admire that.  Instead of what could have turned into vengeance, he has been tireless. 

Stern: As the resident millennial in the senate, I feel it’s my duty to stop the abuse of these kind of tools. I think young people say more social media is better -- don’t put any impediment to its use for filming for the purpose of social media. I disagree that it’s universally good. Watching Jordan go through this and getting to know him and Ed a bit, I think they are onto something, the way the community has stood up to bullying. We all think we have bright ideas in the Capitol but the ideas really come from the community. 

BCK: Can you explain the significance of the bill? 

Dababneh: We wanted this bill to be narrow and specific. Social Media is paramount to the issue and the bigger reality. We want to make sure our streets are safe against attacks, rapes of co-eds, attacks on transgenders. We want to send a strong message that the attacker will face legal consequences. When an accomplice helped plan and was a motivator, that’s no different from being the getaway driver. 

Stern: The perpetrator (who filmed Jordan’s attack) is not currently in violation of any law. That is inexcusable and needs to be remedied. We’ve narrowly tailored the bill to exclude Good Samaritan acts but to focus on those conspiring to do acts of violence with their phones. Technology has been evolving faster than our mores and laws. We’re playing catch-up. That’s the job of government. 

BCK: What are some concerns with getting the bill passed and how have you addressed those concerns? 

Dababneh: I’ve worked with law enforcement and education leaders, the ACLU so that free speech is addressed. 

Stern: I’m trying to be Matt’s lawyer in the Senate when it gets down to legal questions. I hope to be able to be a good second man. We want bystanders and citizen activists to use camera phone for recording protests or whatever incidents they see that need to be reported to the police. The computer is a powerful tool for good. I care about civil liberties and the First Amendment -- that we not chill any of those freedoms but address premeditated and actual acts of violence. 

BCK: What’s the next step for the bill? 

Dababneh: The Bill will first go through the committee and the Assembly before going before the state Senate, hopefully by the spring. If passed, we hope the bill will be on the Governor’s desk by late spring. 

Stern: Matt is doing the heavy lifting. I don’t believe there is any major fiscal impact but we have got to get it through the Assembly and through the Senate to the Governor’s desk. 

BCK: Is there a plan to raise awareness of Jordan’s Law? 

Dababneh: We’ve been working through the media, through Op-Ed pages, as well as introducing at town hall meetings. Jordan’s attack is well-known. Educators and parents will hopefully teach accountability and responsibility. 

BCK: Any other thoughts on Jordan’s Law? 

Dababneh: We want to send a very strong message. If you think about engaging in an action like this, think twice. Think of the consequences. Life is filled with choices. In ten seconds, a young life was compromised. Consequently, for many years, Jordan faces challenges. He’s resilient but he has a blood clot, hearing loss. This has been disruptive to Jordan’s parents and his family, his friends. We are committed to this position so that anyone considering these attacks is aware of the consequences. 

Stern: Matt’s done a great job at holding off opposition and is working closely with the ACLU and other folks who care about issues. This is about showing Jordan that he is not alone and this is not just a West Hills or San Fernando Valley issue but about building a campaign on this. There are victims of these crimes all over the state. It’s a universal issue. I applaud Dababneh for having real focus. It was his idea to work with Ed and Jordan. I hope to be a good lawyer and to help him. We’ve been leaning on Cool to be Kind clubs and young people are leading here, as well as parents. Kids on the El Camino campus, at Cleveland and Reseda, there’s a ripple out from El Camino to high schools all over the Valley. Kids are talking about this. It will be interesting to see if we can translate chatter into political progress.

(Beth Cone Kramer is a Los Angeles writer and a columnist for CityWatch.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

NEW GEOGRAPHY-- To some progressives, California’s huge endorsement for the losing side for president reflects our state’s moral superiority. Some even embrace the notion that California should secede so that we don’t have to associate with the “deplorables” who tilted less enlightened places to President-elect Donald Trump. One can imagine our political leaders even inviting President Barack Obama, who reportedly now plans to move to our state, to serve as the California Republic’s first chief executive.

As a standalone country, California could accelerate its ongoing emergence as what could be called “the Republic of Climate.” This would be true in two ways. Dominated by climate concerns, California’s political leaders will produce policies that discourage blue-collar growth and keep energy and housing prices high. This is ideal for the state’s wealthier, mostly white, coastal ruling classes. Yet, at the same time, the California gentry can enjoy what, for the most part, remains a temperate climate. Due to our open borders policies, they can also enjoy an inexhaustible supply of cheap service workers.

Of course, most Californians, particularly in the interior, will not do so well. They will continue to experience a climate of declining social mobility due to rising costs, and businesses, particularly those employing blue-collar and middle-income workers, will continue to flee to more hospitable, if less idyllic, climes.

California in the Trump era

Barring a rush to independence, Californians now must adapt to a new regime in Washington that does not owe anything to the state, much less its policy agenda. Under the new regime, our high tax rates and ever-intensifying regulatory regime will become even more distinct from national norms.

President Obama saw California’s regulatory program, particularly its obsession with climate change, as a role model leading the rest of the nation — and even the world. Trump’s victory turns this amicable situation on its head. California now must compete with other states, which can only salivate at the growing gap in costs.

At the same time, foreign competitors, such as the Chinese, courted by Gov. Jerry Brown and others to follow its climate agenda, will be more than happy to take energy-dependent business off our hands. They will make gestures to impress what Vladimir Lenin labeled “useful idiots” in our ruling circles, but will continue to add coal-fired plants to power their job-sapping export industries.

Our housing crisis could get worse

For a generation, California housing prices have been escalating, particularly along the coast, at rates two to three times faster, relative to income, than its rivals. Regulatory policies aimed at reducing the single-family units that most Americans prefer will continue to drive people, notably younger families, to what liberals dismiss as “Trumpland.”

Before the election, developers in Texas and elsewhere fretted that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Housing and Urban Development would impose a California-style regulatory regime across the country. They recognized that if prices were driven higher in Dallas, fewer would opt to live in a physically less attractive, and less temperate, place.

Now the gap between Trumpland and California will likely grow even more. New “zero emissions” housing policies alone are likely to boost the cost of new construction by tens of thousands of dollars.

California’s alternate reality

Already the most unequal state in terms of incomes, education levels and standards of living, according to a Social Science Research Council report, California seems destined to become even more so. Our ultrahigh taxes do not seem to be driving the really rich away. Like the rising population of the dependent poor, the rich likely will always be with us.

Billionaires, of course, can afford to choose the most attractive places on the planet in which to live. Our state now has more billionaires, notes Forbes, than all other countries, excluding the rest of the United States and China. Nearly half of the 16 counties with the highest percentages of people earning over $190,000 annually are in the Golden State.

Our emerging Republic of Climate, of course, is not so amenable to those who live outside the upper reaches. Elite firms in the tech, entertainment or media industries may keep their headquarters and key operations here, but when companies like Apple employ middle-wage earners, they tend to do it in Texas, not Tulare.

For most inhabiting the Climate Republic, the future could well be low-end jobs. People from around the nation and the world, who could not afford to live here full-time, increasingly come to California as tourists so they can live like Mediterranean grandees for a week or two. In this sense, California, once the heartland of the American dream, increasingly will resemble Hawaii, a state largely dependent on serving the luxury lifestyles of retirees and out-of-state visitors.

For the state’s middle class, of course, working at a hotel or feeding tourists generally does not pay enough to rent, much less buy, a decent place to live. They will continue to leave, as they have for 22 of the past 25 years.

Whether as a new or a virtual republic, California seems destined to remain a paradise for the wealthy and well-established, while offering increasingly little for those who aspire to the American dream. Many, particularly in the younger generation, may be forced to sacrifice a perfect climate and glorious topography for the chance of a decent standard of living.

(Joel Kotkin is the editor of New Geography … where this piece was most recently posted … and is R.C. Hobbs Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University in Orange and executive director of the Houston-based Center for Opportunity Urbanism. Wendell Cox is principal of Demographia, a St. Louis-based public policy firm, and was appointed to three terms on the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission.)

-cw

GUEST WORDS--A belated 98th birthday to California’s Lawrence Ferlinghetti, indefatigable poet, bookseller, anti-Fascist, First Amendment activist, environmentalist, publisher, painter, creator of community, patron saint of the Beat artists, Poet Laureate of San Francisco, living monument to the arts, "old-ass anarchist" and dazzlingly prescient speaker of truth whose City Lights bookstore has served as a beacon of enlightenment, creativity and resistance since the 1950s.

Ferlinghetti inspired the 2009 documentary "A Rebirth of Wonder," he titled his 2013 collection of poems "Time of Useful Consciousness" for the vital moment a pilot is aware of coming disaster and can still act, and he is working on a stream-of-consciousness memoir he likes to call "Portrait of the Artist As An Old Red."

In a riff on Gahlil Kibran's "Pity the Nation," Ferlinghetti wrote his own searing version ten years ago; it could be today. Likewise prophetically, he began his 2007 prose book, "Poetry as Insurgent Art," with, "I am signaling you through the flames." They continue to rise. May he, too.

Pity the Nation

“Pity the nation whose people are sheep,
and whose shepherds mislead them.
Pity the nation whose leaders are liars, whose sages are silenced,
and whose bigots haunt the airwaves.
Pity the nation that raises not its voice,
except to praise conquerors and acclaim the bully as hero
and aims to rule the world with force and by torture.
Pity the nation that knows no other language but its own
and no other culture but its own.
Pity the nation whose breath is money
and sleeps the sleep of the too well fed.
Pity the nation — oh, pity the people who allow their rights to erode
and their freedoms to be washed away.
My country, tears of thee, sweet land of liberty.”

― Lawrence Ferlinghetti

(Abby Zimet has edited CD's Further column since 2008. A longtime, award-winning journalist, she moved to the Maine woods in the early 70s, where she spent a dozen years building a house, thinning the carrots, hauling too much water, experiencing true if ragged community, and writing. This perspective was posted originally at Common Dreams.) 

-cw

EDUCATION POLITICS-A recent 60 Minutes program reported on how the H1B visa is being used to get rid of an older, more expensive professional American work force in favor of imported workers whose best "skill" is that they will work for a fraction of the salary and benefits. 

The link between this phenomenon and higher profits at any cost should not be missed merely because it is not reported by the mainstream corporate-owned media that is not so coincidentally behind this phenomenon designed to increase corporate profit at any cost. Even foundation-dependent NPR is loathe to go against the interests of its equally compromised corporate owned and controlled foundation supporters, who believe that NPR will never "bite the hand that feeds them." 

This financial reality within the media is emblematic of how much worse things will be in the American workplace and economy for older, more expensive high seniority employees now that we have a Trump administration that is hell-bent on reinstituting a 19th century government-free laissez faire work environment that supports corporate profit and the elimination of hard earned seniority and vested salary rights above all other legal rights and considerations. 

The rights of expensive high seniority employees were already under assault under the Obama administration when regulatory agencies like the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) were defunded to the point of being unable to stop blatant age, gender, and racial discrimination in the marketplace. But that was just the tip of the iceberg. 

Even more sinister is what amounts to the complete elimination of the hard-earned ability of unions to stand against this well-planned assault on American workers across the employment spectrum. As I have already pointed out in many articles about the privatization of public education, unions like American Federation of Teachers (AFT) under Randi Weingarten or United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) under Alex Caputo-Pearl and company were put into office by the very players in management that are so intent on eliminating any vested rights teachers might have. 

Just one example of how this is accomplished can be seen at UTLA in its position when called upon to defend expensive high-seniority teachers that are disproportionately targeted and removed from their careers using completely fabricated "evidence." Once the school district has fired the teacher, they are no longer considered to be a member of the union so the union has no obligation to legally defend that person -- even though the LAUSD/UTLA Collective Bargaining Agreement clearly gives the union this right. 

Doesn't allowing management in any unionized industry the ability and power to determine union membership completely undermine the fundamental power and purpose of a union? According to UTLA and other ersatz unions like it around the country, you can be a good dues paying member of the union for years, but once the employer removes you, there go your union rights. 

What exacerbates this irrational phenomenon is that employees are being targeted and removed by management with no respect for their basic rights to presumptions of innocence and due process of law. 

To put it bluntly, unions like UTLA and others around the country now represent management and their own administrative interests -- not the interests and hard fought legal rights of their rank and file. 

Putting aside the blatant illegality and inequity of this collusion between union leadership and corporate management, one might also ask what avoidable economic catastrophes might occur if the institutional memory offered by older workers continues to be eradicated. 

If the laissez-faire policies of the Trump administration make 2017 the functional equivalent of 1928 (on the eve of the Great Depression of 1929) by eliminating a seasoned older work force, who will be left to keep this country from going over a cliff? 

While racial and ethnic discrimination are often in the news, do you think the majority of people in this country are aware that in the aggregate, age discrimination could be the most dominant and pernicious form of discrimination in our society?

(Leonard Isenberg is a Los Angeles observer and a contributor to CityWatch. He was a second generation teacher at LAUSD and blogs at perdaily.com. Leonard can be reached at [email protected]) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

@THE GUSS REPORT-Kudos to Las Vegas, with a population of about 600,000. It is the little city that could, and did, land what the City of Los Angeles could not: an NFL franchise – in fact, one with a phenomenal brand – and what is going to be the baddest domed stadium in the world when it opens in a few years.

Then there are the tens of thousands of jobs and a bazillion tax dollars from the concerts, conventions and Super Bowls it will host. Wonders, it shall also do, for the occupancy rate of its hotels, its infrastructure, home property values and the needs of its neediest. 

Vegas, baby ... Vegas. 

Why can’t we get government leadership like that? 

Vegas landed the Raiders because it was ready to deal. It wasn’t a fluke. The NFL thrives on money and television, yet Vegas is just the 42^nd largest TV market in the U.S., while Los Angeles is second only to New York. They won because of leadership. The City of Los Angeles lost its NFL chances because of a lack of it. 

That theory holds true because a far smaller and poorer LA County city, Inglewood, with an estimated population of just 120,000, landed not one, but two, NFL franchises and what is going to be an insanely cool multi-billion dollar stadium and shopping and hotel complex that will host Super Bowl LV in 2021 and countless events in the decades to come. 

Oh, the tax revenue that will bring…to Inglewood. 

The Rams, Chargers and now the Raiders have something else in common: they all at one time or other played in the City of Los Angeles, left it, and are coming back to cities nearby but which are not named the City of Los Angeles. 

For years, the past and present 18 elected officials of the City of Los Angeles gassed-on about landing an NFL team and a world-class stadium in which it would play. It could be a refurbished Coliseum, Dodger Stadium or the never-to-be-built Farmer’s Field in downtown.

They, the political set, thought they would be our conquering heroes and land a pile of tax revenue that would save us from their profligate spending, bloated pension burdens and launch them all to higher office. 

But as we found out after the Rams, Chargers and Raiders chose other nearby cities in which to land, the City of LA only has great weather, and not the leadership to make a great deal. 

Another reason why Las Vegas landed the Raiders, as well as recently getting a National Hockey League team, is because it and Atlantic City no longer have pariah status with professional sports leagues as the exclusive homes of gambling in the United States. As the New York Times recently pointed out, “according to the American Gaming Association, 19 N.F.L. stadiums are less than 20 miles from a casino, and daily fantasy companies allow fans to bet on a lineup of players of their design using a computer or smartphone.” 

In other words, as times changed and circumstances evolved, the leaders in Las Vegas and in Inglewood were ready to deal. They did, and won. 

Meanwhile, City of Los Angeles officials continue their pursuit of sparkly things that LA does not need, like million dollar condo developments, luxury hotels and the 2024 Olympics, with few buying Mayor Eric Garcetti’s line that since Peter Ueberroth made the 1984 LA Olympics profitable, it is inevitable that he, Garcetti, who can’t house the homeless, ease the traffic or honor a budget (presently $250,000,000 under water) can do the same. 

Garcetti has held the reins of power in City Hall as either City Council president or Mayor since 2006 but is still seeking his first big “get.” 

In 2024, the LA Coliseum will be 101 years old, the Rose Bowl will be 102 and the Staples Center will be one of the older of the “newer” American arenas at 25. They, and lesser known venues in the area, will never suffice for an Olympics. 

The recently re-elected Garcetti should stop reaching for the glittery things in his field of vision, be they sporting events or higher office, and start governing to the benefit of the hoi polloi who live and work here now and in the coming years. When there are new and exciting things to go for, he and his successors should study the winning formulas of the little cities that could … and did.

(Daniel Guss, MBA, is a member of the Los Angeles Press Club, and has contributed to CityWatch, KFI AM-640, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Los Angeles Magazine, Movieline Magazine, Emmy Magazine, Los Angeles Business Journal and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter @TheGussReport. His opinions are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

Tags: Daniel Guss, The Guss Report, NFL teams, Raiders, Las Vegas, Ingelwood, Eric Garcetti

VIEW FROM INSIDE--A recent Los Angeles Times story explored the recent drop in arrest rates, both in Los Angeles and across the state, stating it was "unclear" why arrest rates have dropped as crime has risen. While we can't speak for other agencies, we can inform the public about some reasons for the arrest rate decline in jurisdictions patrolled by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. 

One key factor is the lack of unobligated patrol time due to short staffing in our patrol functions. As detailed in a National Institute of Justice report, "Preventing Crime: What Works, What Doesn't, What's Promising" proactive policing, where deputies interact with the public and investigate suspicious activity and persons, produces arrests and deters crime.  However, instead of engaging in those functions, deputies now spend time racing from call to call, leaving little time for proactive patrol.  

In addition, short staffing of the Department leads to patrol deputies being forced to work multiple overtime shifts in a week, which often lengthens a shift to 16 hours.  Additionally, deputies are being ordered to work on regularly scheduled days off. The fatigue factor of long shifts and the realization that an arrest towards the end of a shift will lead to multiple hours in paperwork and additional hours in processing if a booking takes place, combined with compression of work weeks, is certainly a discouragement to making an arrest. In addition, making an arrest often requires backup, the availability of which many times is in question due to short staffing. 

It is not, however, just a lack of resources which have led to a drop in arrest rates. While the article implies a decrease in conjunction with a rising crime rate means crimes are not being solved and suspects identified, that is overstated. Since arrests are most often discretionary acts, a deputy may simply write a report documenting the crime, leaving it to prosecutors to file charges and send a notification letter to the defendant with an appearance date for arraignment. An arrest simply jump starts this process. This then raises the question: Why would a deputy forego an arrest and instead only write a report?  Simple.  Making an arrest presents an opportunity for second guessing by the Department, politicians, and the public. 

The Department has instituted a culture that emphasizes discipline not praise for hard working patrol deputies, with a singular focus on looking for the "bad" in every arrest or public contact. The default response of line supervisors and higher-ups is to second guess deputies and look for "bad tactics" or outcomes, instead of supporting proactive deputies, or praising them as examples to be followed. Since discretion allows a deputy to solve a crime and document it with a report, the understandable human behavior is to avoid making an arrest if that will simply invite second guessing and undue scrutiny. 

Then, of course, there is the politics of law enforcement; that is, politicians. The lack of support for deputies doesn't just exist within the Department but is amplified by politicians eager to grab the limelight and slam rank-and-file law enforcement whenever an incident does not end in textbook fashion. Former NYPD Commissioner and LAPD Police Chief Bill Bratton once observed, "Police work is not always pretty. In my years in law enforcement, I've learned not to make a judgment until I have all the facts."  Sadly, that is not the case with many politicians. Far beyond just a lack of support, the willingness of elected and self-appointed experts to rush to the cameras and pass judgment on rank-and-file law enforcement officers for incidents where they scarcely know the details--and what "details" they often know later prove to be false--certainly causes pause in engaging in arrests or proactive law enforcement.  

Further, whether it is simply a vocal minority receiving outsized attention on their views of law enforcement, or in fact a larger segment of society, it is unquestionable that as a whole there is less civility towards law enforcement by the general public. Society has become impatient, rude, judgmental and sanctimonious towards law enforcement, and it should be no wonder why deputies are hesitant to engage in actions such as arrest which leads to second guessing. 

A recent survey in a leading law enforcement publication found the major decrease in proactive policing across the nation was in large part because of  "significant correlations between leadership, media, community relations, and training to their individual effects upon decreased proactivity." As mentioned above, the decrease in arrests and a rising crime rate does not mean that crimes are not being solved and suspects identified.  However, if one wants to start searching for the reasons for a decrease in arrests while there has been an increase in crime, the responses of nearly 500 officers and deputies in this survey and the issues detailed in this blog provide a solid starting point.

(The Association for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs (ALADS) is the collective bargaining agent representing more than 7,900 deputy sheriffs and district attorney investigators working in Los Angeles County.)

-cw  

TRANSIT WATCH--Everyone loves a good April Fools story, and the Expo Line to Catalina Island "Chunnel" was as cute a ditty as any.  For years, those of us interested in transit joked about the westward expansion of Expo to Catalina (or even Hawaii!). But there are some truly interesting developments: 

1) It's not as sexy to talk about "the center" or "the hub" as it is to talk about expanded train service to far-flung regions of the county, but it's that center/hub that makes train/transit riding make sense. We've got a Downtown Light Rail Connector to bring our light rails from all over the county together, but what about Metrolink and Amtrak?  And, for that matter, high-speed rail? 

Many reading this either support, oppose, or are ambivalent about high-speed rail.  I admit to being in the "ambivalent" camp because the taxpayers are owed an apology for those who lied their tails off about the original CA High-Speed Rail (CAHSR) Initiative, but one of the good things about that initiative is that it helps to pay for the Union Station Run-Through Tracks. 

As with the Downtown Light Rail Connector, the Union Station Run-Through Tracks won't catch the eye of many taxpayers, but it's about as important as any project one can think of at Union Station. 

The stub-end tracks will be added to create loop tracks to decrease delays and increase station capacity, and both enhance Metrolink and Amtrak usage as well as establish compatibility of high-speed rail trains for the future.  No more backing in, pulling out for trains picking up passengers at Union Station...just a fix for a problem that decades-overdue for a correction. 

2) Busways often lead to rail lines, and the link of the San Fernando Valley and San Gabriel Valley has been anticipated for years to decades. 

We've got a Red Line to North Hollywood, an Orange Line that needs conversion from a Busway to a rail line, and a Gold Line station at Pasadena that needs to be opened to points west as well as points east. 

The dedicated Busway between Pasadena and North Hollywood therefore bodes well for regional connectivity, and particularly for those in the Burbank/Glendale region who feel forgotten by Metro. 

A street-focused, and a freeway-focused, pair of alternatives will be considered by Metro, and it's hoped that the busway will be a hit. 

After all, once the Gold Line Construction Authority finishes its work with the Foothill Gold Line, it's not hard to wonder if it shouldn't focus its efforts on a new light rail line/initiative from Pasadena all the way to Warner Center. 

3) Meanwhile, bus ridership is down while the Gold and Expo Lines have gone up in ridership...which isn't so bad a thing.

The bus companies have done a great job trying to work with Metro Rail projects, but as Uber and Lyft have gone up in popularity, those who can take more efficient, speedy, and high-capacity trains will certain eschew buses and use a combination of rail/car or rail/bicycle to get where they want to go on their own, individual schedules. 

And individual scheduling and commuting is what drove the popularity of the automobile.  Still does. 

4) Finally, that portion of "Downtown", that eastern/southeastern region, is getting the love that former supervisor Gloria Molina could have only dreamed of.  The concept of a heavy rail Red Line extended south beneath Vermont Avenue all the way to 125th Street in West Athens is raising a few eyebrows. 

Want to enhance the economic activity, the housing/construction, and the neighborhood development of south and east LA?  Build more infrastructure and access to that region! 

While we're at it, the proposed Vermont Subway project needs more attention ... 

... and the Harbor Subdivision Right Of Way from Inglewood to the Blue Line to Union Station would provide the direct LAX-to-Union Station line that commuters will be screaming for once the LAX/Metro Rail connection is finished 2022-24.  Please...no bike/pedestrian walk way needs to preclude a fully-modern and high-capacity rail line. 

With the passage of Measure M, and a willingness of developers and city/county leaders to demand that developer money get siphoned for these major infrastructure projects, the forgotten and disconnected regions of the county (I haven't included the South Bay and Southeast/Gateway Cities, have I?) need no longer have to wait decades for "their turn". 

Seriously.  No foolin'!

(Kenneth S. Alpern, M.D. is a dermatologist who has served in clinics in Los Angeles, Orange, and Riverside Counties. He is also 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 CD11 Transportation 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 Dr. Alpern.)

-cw 

GUEST COMMENTARY--The LA Times editorial board is as edgy as a scruffy blogger these days: 

It was no secret during the campaign that Donald Trump was a narcissist and a demagogue who used fear and dishonesty to appeal to the worst in American voters. The Times called him unprepared and unsuited for the job he was seeking, and said his election would be a “catastrophe.” 

Still, nothing prepared us for the magnitude of this train wreck. Like millions of other Americans, we clung to a slim hope that the new president would turn out to be all noise and bluster, or that the people around him in the White House would act as a check on his worst instincts, or that he would be sobered and transformed by the awesome responsibilities of office.

Instead, seventy-some days in — and with about 1,400 to go before his term is completed — it is increasingly clear that those hopes were misplaced.

In a matter of weeks, President Trump has taken dozens of real-life steps that, if they are not reversed, will rip families apart, foul rivers and pollute the air, intensify the calamitous effects of climate change and profoundly weaken the system of American public education for all.

His attempt to de-insure millions of people who had finally received healthcare coverage and, along the way, enact a massive transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich has been put on hold for the moment. But he is proceeding with his efforts to defang the government’s regulatory agencies and bloat the Pentagon’s budget even as he supposedly retreats from the global stage.

These are immensely dangerous developments which threaten to weaken this country’s moral standing in the world, imperil the planet and reverse years of slow but steady gains by marginalized or impoverished Americans. But, chilling as they are, these radically wrongheaded policy choices are not, in fact, the most frightening aspect of the Trump presidency.

What is most worrisome about Trump is Trump himself. He is a man so unpredictable, so reckless, so petulant, so full of blind self-regard, so untethered to reality that it is impossible to know where his presidency will lead or how much damage he will do to our nation. His obsession with his own fame, wealth and success, his determination to vanquish enemies real and imagined, his craving for adulation — these traits were, of course, at the very heart of his scorched-earth outsider campaign; indeed, some of them helped get him elected. But in a real presidency in which he wields unimaginable power, they are nothing short of disastrous.

Although his policies are, for the most part, variations on classic Republican positions (many of which would have been undertaken by a President Ted Cruz or a President Marco Rubio), they become far more dangerous in the hands of this imprudent and erratic man. Many Republicans, for instance, support tighter border security and a tougher response to illegal immigration, but Trump’s cockamamie border wall, his impracticable campaign promise to deport all 11 million people living in the country illegally and his blithe disregard for the effect of such proposals on the U.S. relationship with Mexico turn a very bad policy into an appalling one.

In the days ahead, The Times editorial board will look more closely at the new president, with a special attention to three troubling traits: 

1) Trump’s shocking lack of respect for those fundamental rules and institutions on which our government is based. Since Jan. 20, he has repeatedly disparaged and challenged those entities that have threatened his agenda, stoking public distrust of essential institutions in a way that undermines faith in American democracy. He has questioned the qualifications of judges and the integrity of their decisions, rather than acknowledging that even the president must submit to the rule of law. He has clashed with his own intelligence agencies, demeaned government workers and questioned the credibility of the electoral system and the Federal Reserve. He has lashed out at journalists, declaring them “enemies of the people,” rather than defending the importance of a critical, independent free press. His contempt for the rule of law and the norms of government are palpable.

2) His utter lack of regard for truth. Whether it is the easily disprovable boasts about the size of his inauguration crowd or his unsubstantiated assertion that Barack Obama bugged Trump Tower, the new president regularly muddies the waters of fact and fiction. It’s difficult to know whether he actually can’t distinguish the real from the unreal — or whether he intentionally conflates the two to befuddle voters, deflect criticism and undermine the very idea of objective truth. Whatever the explanation, he is encouraging Americans to reject facts, to disrespect science, documents, nonpartisanship and the mainstream media — and instead to simply take positions on the basis of ideology and preconceived notions. This is a recipe for a divided country in which differences grow deeper and rational compromise becomes impossible.

3) His scary willingness to repeat alt-right conspiracy theories, racist memes and crackpot, out-of-the-mainstream ideas. Again, it is not clear whether he believes them or merely uses them. But to cling to disproven “alternative” facts; to retweet racists; to make unverifiable or false statements about rigged elections and fraudulent voters; to buy into discredited conspiracy theories first floated on fringe websites and in supermarket tabloids — these are all of a piece with the Barack Obama birther claptrap that Trump was peddling years ago and which brought him to political prominence. It is deeply alarming that a president would lend the credibility of his office to ideas that have been rightly rejected by politicians from both major political parties.

Where will this end? Will Trump moderate his crazier campaign positions as time passes? Or will he provoke confrontation with Iran, North Korea or China, or disobey a judge’s order or order a soldier to violate the Constitution? Or, alternately, will the system itself — the Constitution, the courts, the permanent bureaucracy, the Congress, the Democrats, the marchers in the streets — protect us from him as he alienates more and more allies at home and abroad, steps on his own message and creates chaos at the expense of his ability to accomplish his goals? Already, Trump’s job approval rating has been hovering in the mid-30s, according to Gallup, a shockingly low level of support for a new president. And that was before his former national security advisor, Michael Flynn, offered to cooperate last week with congressional investigators looking into the connection between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.  

On Inauguration Day, we wrote on this page that it was not yet time to declare a state of “wholesale panic” or to call for blanket “non-cooperation” with the Trump administration. Despite plenty of dispiriting signals, that is still our view. The role of the rational opposition is to stand up for the rule of law, the electoral process, the peaceful transfer of power and the role of institutions; we should not underestimate the resiliency of a system in which laws are greater than individuals and voters are as powerful as presidents. This nation survived Andrew Jackson and Richard Nixon. It survived slavery. It survived devastating wars. Most likely, it will survive again.

But if it is to do so, those who oppose the new president’s reckless and heartless agenda must make their voices heard. Protesters must raise their banners. Voters must turn out for elections. Members of Congress — including and especially Republicans — must find the political courage to stand up to Trump. Courts must safeguard the Constitution. State legislators must pass laws to protect their citizens and their policies from federal meddling. All of us who are in the business of holding leaders accountable must redouble our efforts to defend the truth from his cynical assaults.

The United States is not a perfect country, and it has a great distance to go before it fully achieves its goals of liberty and equality. But preserving what works and defending the rules and values on which democracy depends are a shared responsibility. Everybody has a role to play in this drama.

Yeah. What they said.

(Heather Parton blogs under the pseudonym Digby at the blog site she created: Hullabaloo and also writes for ourfuture.org) 

-cw

@THE GUSS REPORT-The City of Los Angeles has a history of losing anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuit against public participation) lawsuits when it has illegally tried to silence critics with threats of unjust criminal charges and physical intimidation. It appears that it may be hit with another anti-SLAPP suit in the coming days for its actions last week, and it could cost the taxpayers millions of dollars in civil damages and LA City Attorney Mike Feuer a headache with the California Bar Association. 

Outside a Canoga Park town hall meeting last Thursday where speakers included Feuer and California State Assemblyman Matt Dababneh, a pack of nearly 20 LAPD and California Highway Patrol officers descended upon the parking lot and allegedly drew and aimed high-powered semi-automatic guns at a man sitting in his vehicle talking calmly on his phone.

(Note: I was on the other end of that phone call, interviewing the man for what was supposed to be today’s article, and heard the encounter from its first moment.) 

Law enforcement’s guns were allegedly trained on Wayne Spindler, the controversial attorney embroiled in a year-long, two-way legal battle with the City of Los Angeles. He was at the meeting a half hour earlier complaining about difficulty registering guns on a state website which is not presently functional. 

After ordering Spindler from his parked vehicle, law enforcement officers instructed him to lie on the pavement where he was cuffed, patted down, and had his vehicle searched while he was interrogated. 

Then Spindler was let go. 

“They eventually admitted it was a false alarm,” Spindler told me by phone after the incident, “but they didn’t apologize. This was an unprovoked threat against my life that I had better drop my civil rights lawsuits against the city … or else.” 

The story started 24 hours earlier when Feuer’s primary spokesman, Mike Wilcox, planted a story in the LA Times that reporter Emily Alpert Reyes apparently failed to confirm with the court website. 

Reyes’ article entitled, LA City Hall Critic Faces Charge of Possessing an Assault Weapon, says, “Spindler was charged with a misdemeanor and is scheduled to be arraigned in April, Wilcox said.”

Note the words: “was charged” and “is scheduled,” both untrue according to the LA courts website at the time of the article’s publishing. This is a snapshot from its website taken on Sunday morning, showing no such charge in the system five days after Reyes’ article was published. If the case isn’t in the system, it has not been filed, a court employee confirmed for me. 

Wilcox made the same claim in written form to other members of the media, which was eventually shared and wound up on the websites of KTLA, LA Daily News, City News Service and others who didn’t check its accuracy against the court website. 

I reached out multiple times to no avail to Wilcox, who has been incommunicado with me since last year when I exposed Deputy City Attorney Hugo Rossitter as running two side businesses in conflict with his city employment, and for his failure to pay business taxes to the cities of Los Angeles and Beverly Hills. I also got no response from Feuer’s executive assistant or his chief of staff.

I then emailed Reyes to determine whether Wilcox tipped her off on a case that was not on the court website and that the defendant knew nothing about, and what is the Times’ policy for verifying what anyone, including a government official, claims? 

Reyes refused to answer, deferring my inquiry (at the direction of her editors Shelby Grad and Steve Clow) to Hillary Manning, the Times’ Communications Director, who repeatedly deflected.

“We do not have a comment on this, as it relates to the details of our newsgathering,” Manning wrote.

When advised that Reyes’ story was factually wrong, Manning asked what about it was incorrect and I told her that my position, too, then, is to not disclose the details of my newsgathering, but that they may wish to confirm its accuracy, which was also suggested to Reyes.

Neither the Times nor Reyes apparently did that though. Her article remains published in its original form on the Times’ website in direct conflict with the LA court website, five days after it was published.

This turmoil all started nearly a year ago when Spindler submitted an LA City Council speaker card with racially antagonistic words and imagery to City Council president Herb Wesson, who is black, and who felt Spindler’s content was threatening. While the city obtained a temporary restraining order (TRO) against Spindler, which he is appealing, the California Bar Association refused to take action against him, citing his content as free speech and that it did not constitute a threat. 

The TRO against Spindler required him to turn in all firearms he owned, which he did in May 2016. His AK-47 was unregistered but, he says, it was grandfathered because it was purchased prior to the 1991 law requiring registration. “As an officer of the court, even though the gun was legally not in the state’s registry, I turned it in for voluntary destruction along with my other guns because that is what I was ordered to do.”

Spindler provided me with a dated copy of the receipt for the gun’s purchase which, he says, was provided to the LAPD when he turned it in. The date of purchase was January 25, 1989, long before the 1991 law. (I cropped the receipt to not expose Spindler’s personal information on it.) 

That raises the question, if possession of the gun is a misdemeanor, as Feuer now claims, why was Spindler not arrested on the spot and charged with a crime when he turned it in in May 2016?

What has transpired between then and now, since the possession was not illegal? 

The answer is Spindler’s civil lawsuits against the city, and his appeal of the TRO, that’s what. 

And why would anyone be charged with a misdemeanor when the state recently launched a program allowing people to register guns without repercussions for not doing so earlier? 

In our phone interview right before the LAPD and CHP surrounded his vehicle with guns drawn, Spindler told me, “If they’re going to try to prosecute me for that, which I am confident I will win, they had better be prepared to charge everyone else in LA in the same predicament.”

At a recent settlement meeting with attorneys representing the city, Spindler says they encouraged him to hold off serving the city with his second civil suit (against Wesson,) allegedly and ominously telling him they “would see what we can do about this.” 

Spindler claims that Feuer’s office planted the fake LA Times story on Wednesday and ‘threatened his life’ on Thursday to induce a quid pro quo to drop his civil lawsuits and his TRO appeal in exchange for their dropping what he says is a baseless misdemeanor charge. 

He adds that Feuer violated the State Bar’s Ethics Rule 5-100, which states that a prosecutor can’t threaten criminal charges in order to get an advantage in a civil lawsuit; Rule 5-110, that they can’t threaten charges that don’t stand up to probable cause standards; and 5-120, that Wilcox’s extrajudicial statements to the media were done to bias a potential jury pool. 

Spindler says he will sue to get the recorded 911 call, if one was actually made, and phone records of everyone who accompanied Feuer and Dababneh to the town hall to establish what threat they claim he posed, and whether, if they felt he did pose a threat, the meeting hall doors were locked and the building evacuated from the other side.

That is what you would do … if you feel someone posed a threat requiring such a heavy-handed law enforcement response.

(Daniel Guss, MBA, is a member of the Los Angeles Press Club, and has contributed to CityWatch, KFI AM-640, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Los Angeles Magazine, Movieline Magazine, Emmy Magazine, Los Angeles Business Journal and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter @TheGussReport. His opinions are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

GELFAND’S WORLD--Everyone remembers how Romeo and Juliet ends. But suppose that by the final scene you know Juliet well enough to really care so that you are deeply bothered by her death. That's what the Elysium Conservatory Theatre is trying to accomplish in its new production of Romeo and Juliet. To a considerable extent, they succeed. Director Aaron Ganz and leading lady Ria Gaudioso have developed a Juliet who is a lot more than the traditional rendering of a sweet but rather passive girl who falls (note the verb) in love with her Romeo. The ECT takes another tack. 

This Juliet is young and, as we know, subject to a stifling family system. But when she sees Romeo, she knows what she wants. She explains to Romeo that he is to take her seriously or not at all. 

This stronger version of Juliet is present -- has always been present -- in Shakespeare's lines, particularly in the famous balcony scene. It's merely a matter of diction and intonation whether Juliet is personified as the more medieval lady or the vigorous spirit of a more modern age. The personality of the character is communicated through how the lines are spoken, and this Juliet speaks to Romeo as one equal to another. She understands that he will officially be her lord and master when they are wed, but there is a strong tone of emotional equality on her part. 

It's not uncommon for theatre companies to try to be novel by staging an old play in a modern setting, say Peleus et Melisande on the Malibu beachfront. Audiences don't generally care much, one way or the other, as long as the director doesn't mess with the music or the words. But ECT goes the other way 'round, staging Romeo and Juliet in traditional costume and devoid of extraneous settings, but letting the characters explore more modern themes even as they go through the old sturm und drang. 

It's a matter of how the lines are spoken. To the more modern Juliet, the following is less dreamy-eyed singsong than serious warning and serious offer: 

If that thy bent of love be honorable,

Thy purpose marriage, send me word to-morrow,

By one that I'll procure to come to thee,

Where and what time thou wilt perform the rite;

And all my fortunes at thy foot I'll lay,

And follow thee -- my Lord -- throughout the World -- 

"I mean it," she is saying. "If you don't mean it, don't come back." 

Romeo is played athletically and engagingly by Gerard Alvarez, who hails from Gloucestershire in England and studied in Bristol and London. Interestingly, he alone among the cast members speaks with any kind of noticeable British accent. After a while, the audience fails to notice. 

This performance carries on an ECT tradition of mixing operatic and balletic elements with the more traditional spoken theatre. The cast functions as characters and chorus alternatively. Melissa Ortiz does Shakespeare's narrative recitations and, in addition, musical numbers which support the dramatic intention, although these modern songs are not present in the original Shakespearean text. As to her performance, If writers still used the term dulcet tones, that's the description I would use. 

Another point: As director Ganz explained, there are a couple of characters who are usually left dangling in typical productions. You might say that they are present merely to be disliked and to provide plot points. Tybalt usually functions mainly to be killed by Romeo, thereby causing Romeo to be exiled by the authorities. Paris usually functions merely as the parentally chosen suitor that Juliet abhors, and as such is the instrumentality by which Juliet is rejected by her own parents. 

This production gives Paris (played by Christopher Lyons) a little scene of his own. In the moment of Juliet's agony -- when she has to deal with the fact that her secret husband Romeo has been exiled from Verona -- Paris is brought in to woo her. The ECT production gives Paris a musical number at this point. He breaks into "Wise men say, only fools rush in" but not as Elvis, just as a man in love, singing a song. Paris goes on with, "But I can't help, falling in love with you" and so on. The actress playing Juliet has to play the part of a young girl who is repulsed, but is trying to camouflage her true feelings. This scene, for all its oddity, actually works as intended. It is a different, deeper Juliet who emerges -- Paris finishes his number with a flourish, and Juliet is left to be talked into the subplot that leads accidentally to Romeo's death and her own suicide. 

Charlotte Spangler ably stays in character as Juliet's nurse, being at times a devoted nag and at other times the personification of sorrow, all in all a compelling performance. Neyssan Falahi is originally French-Swiss, and has the sort of tall, muscular looks that should be worth tv parts, combined with the ability to put on a swaggering air. As Mercutio, he gets one of the best known lines in the history of theatre, "A plague on both your houses," as he realizes that he is dying from a sword wound after one of the senseless street battles that the Montagues and Capulets love to start. This being Shakespeare, that curse becomes prophecy, as audiences have learned for the past four hundred years. 

Newcomers include Rob Miller as Friar Laurence, Giulia Blandino as Gregory, and Christina Gardner as Lady Capulet. ECT has rewritten the Tybalt character as female, played with aggression and speed of foot by Kate Slinger. She seems to get a kick out of playing the role, but transposing a Shakespearean swordsman who picks street fights into a female role seems to conflict with the theme of patriarchy as it ensnares Juliet. Other newcomers include Francesca Gomez, Will August, Justin Powell, Brian Raetz, and Tim Roberts as Sampson, Montague, Capulet, Benvolio, and Peter respectively. 

This production is the opening of ECT's new playhouse on South Palos Verdes Street in San Pedro. As you might expect for such a new theatre, there are some growing pains. The new playing surface is a cavernous rectangular space that still sports unadorned concrete floors and extended walls. As such, it suffers from a bit of reverberation that at some points obscured the dialog. I suspect that something as simple as positioning a few sound-absorbent flats during performances will get things under control. 

At the same time, having a big room allows for big room performances. When Juliet's father bellowed his anger, you could feel it in a way that wouldn't have been possible in the previous space. ECT continues to carry on the immersive theater approach (as it did before) to some extent. 

The new space seems less appropriate to that approach, and for whatever reason, there was less direct interaction with the audience compared to previous productions. At one point, however, cast members pulled audience members from their seats to join in a dance number. There's always something unexpected with this group.

(Bob Gelfand writes on science, culture, and politics for CityWatch. He can be reached at [email protected]) 

-cw

WHERE’S THE LOGIC-Back in 2015, people started telling Mayor Eric Garcetti that toxic vehicle emissions where harmful to people and especially for children, but he rejected the idea repeatedly. Instead, he insisted that the best place for bike lanes in LA was in major thoroughfares; thus, his Mobility Plan 2035 called for Bike Lanes. 

In Eric Garcetti’s defense, only recently did anyone realize that auto emissions where harmful to children’s health. In 1961, the State of California required cars to have positive crankcase ventilation systems.  

In 1966, California did legislate to control auto emissions, but Garcetti, who was born in 1971, was not even a fetus yet, so I guess we can forgive him for not knowing about LA’s poor air quality then. In 1967, California created the California Air Resources Board, but we cannot expect Garcetti to know about this agency -- it was formed four years before his birth. By 1975, cars that ran on leaded fuels were no longer allowed to be manufactured for California, but Garcetti was only 4 years old at that time, so we cannot blame him for not knowing about this fact as well. 

After Garcetti’s most wonderful and compassionate Mobility Plan 2035 was released in 2015, he was still unaware that auto emissions were harmful. So he pressed forward with bike lines in heavily trafficked thoroughfares like Westwood Boulevard and Reseda Boulevard. 

Bike lanes have allegedly been removed from segments of Sunset and Hollywood Boulevards that pass through Hollywood, but not due to any concern that we are giving our children cancer. Rather it’s because the streets were already way too narrow and the intersections were rated F for Fail. Ironically, CD 13 councilmember O’Farrell thought bike lanes in heavily trafficked streets were are a great idea, so he voted “Yes.” Yes, for lung cancer. 

Due to the city’s love affair with giving children and other bike riders cancer by placing bike lanes in LA’s most congested boulevards and avenues, Garcetti’s Mobile Plan 2035 I and II both provide for toxic bike lanes. 

On September 20, 2015, Garcetti, along with the other cancer lovers at City Hall, was sued for concealing the health studies from the EIR for MP 2035 -- research that showed that placing bike lanes in heavily congested areas was adverse to people’s health. Bike riders, as everyone other than Eric knows, are exercising. As they peddle they breathe more deeply and when they come to upward inclines, they peddle even harder and inhale more deeply. At this point trucks, especially diesel trucks, emit more toxins.  

Since September 10, 2016, two community groups, HELP and CCLA, having been fighting in court for the city to take the time to study the health impacts of toxic air emissions in bike lanes. Garcetti has stood firm: no studies. While we know that City government has many sane people who do not think that children should be exposed to heavy concentration of toxic fumes, the orders have come down from the top. No studies that show that toxic auto emissions have adverse health impacts will be allowed! 

This absolute denial, even in face of on-going litigation and the attempt of others in the city to get the bike lanes moved, is business-as-usual for City Hall. The first modest step would be to study the situation, but even that is verboten. Because the rest of the world is not as regressive as Los Angeles, we have the data and almost everyone else is trying to move bike lanes away from vehicle traffic. 

Then out of left field, we have the most curious resolution at City Council. On March 22, 2017, Councilmembers Huizar and Koretz presented a motion that the City needs to study the adverse health impacts of housing constructed next to freeways. The motion says: 

“This revelation is consistent with long-standing concerns of people who live near traffic pollution zones suffering from higher rates of asthma, heart attacks, strokes, lung cancer and pre-term births. The California Air Resources Board provides guidance in its 2005 Air Quality and Land Use Handbook that recommends against "siting new sensitive land uses within 500 feet" of a freeway and certain high-traffic roadways.”  

Wow, is our City Council up-to-date! It has a report from 2005! What’s next? “Lindbergh Baby Kidnapped!” 

Garcetti was not only alive in 2005, but he had already been elected CD 13 Councilmember by the time the California Air Resources Board issued its Air Quality and Land Use Handbook. While we may forgive little Eric for not knowing about the adverse health impacts of vehicle emissions which were published before he was born, what are we to make of his not knowing about them in 2005 or later in 2015 when he issued his Mobility Plan 2035 [MP 2035] which featured bike lanes where the toxins were most lethal? One person has allegedly said that it is unfair to expect Garcetti to read anything that is not attached to a check from a real estate developer. 

It seems that if placing an apartment house or school within 500 feet of a freeway or a heavily trafficked street is a health hazard, then placing a bike lane on Reseda Boulevard, Venice Boulevard, etc. would be a dangerous land use. But not to Mayor Garcetti. He still thinks that our kids should peddle their hardest right there next to the diesel trucks. 

What does Garcetti have to say -- in 2017 – about housing within 500 feet of a freeway or high traffic roadways? 

According to David Zahniser’s LA Times article on March 24, 2017, “L.A. Officials Push for New Steps to Address Health Risks from Homebuilding near Freeways,” Garcetti said, “We should look at both zoning requirements and technology to ensure that people who live in housing always live healthy,” Garcetti said. “I grew up next to two freeways during leaded gasoline days. My family’s experienced cancer. We had a cancer cluster on our street, so I’m very personally sensitive to this. So absolutely. Whether it’s through spacing, or through technology and ventilation, we should be looking at ways of protecting Angelenos.” 

Really? Garcetti is “personally sensitive”? Cue the crocodile tears. Is it his personal sensitivity to cancer deaths that makes him such a vigorous supporter of children peddling the hardest where the air pollution is the greatest? Garcetti knows that he won’t be politically liable 20 to 30 years from now when today’s kids are dying prematurely of lung cancer. So there will be no political blow back on him. 

The multitude of studies from around the world establishing the extreme health hazard to cyclists and especially to children have been presented to Garcetti, but he closes his eyes. Hyperlinks for many of these studies were listed for Garcetti in the petition that HELP and CCLA filed with the Court. It would have been easy for Garcetti to click and learn about the “brand new, never before known” fact that auto emissions have adverse health impacts on children. Maybe Garcetti was too busy counting his loot from the Sea Breeze project ($60,000) and from Rick Caruso ($125,000) to be bothered to look at the data.

Expect three things to happen: 

1) The apartments will continue to be constructed contiguous to freeways. 

2) Kids’ bike lanes will remain in major thoroughfares. 

3) Garcetti will continue to express his personal sensitivity.

(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney and a CityWatch contributor. 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.

'As the Impeach Donald Trump Now campaign’s website documents in detail,' writes Norman Solomon, 'Trump's personal riches are entangled with countless policy options for his administration. That precedent must be resisted and defeated.' (Image: Common Dreams / CC BY 3.0)

The Massachusetts city of Cambridge will be weighing in Monday on whether the city should call for an impeachment investigation into President Donald Trump.

If the resolution passes, Cambridge would become the first city in Massachusetts and the fifth in the nation to call for Trump’s removal. Town and city councils have no actual legal authority to call for an impeachment, but they can send a powerful message.

The proposed order calls on the U.S. House to back a resolution directing the Judiciary Committee to investigate whether there are grounds to impeach Trump.

The resolution states, "That the City Council call upon the United States House of Representatives to support a resolution authorizing and directing the House Committee on the Judiciary to investigate whether sufficient grounds exist for the impeachment of Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, including but not limited to the violations of the Foreign Emoluments Clause and the Domestic Emoluments Clause of the United States Constitution."

It continues, "On January 11, 2017, nine days before his inauguration, Donald J. Trump announced a plan that would, if carried out, remove him from day-to-day operations of his businesses, but not eliminate any of the ongoing flow of emoluments from foreign governments, state governments, or the United States government; and on January 20, 2017, Donald J. Trump took the oath of office and became President of the United States."

The resolution further argues, "From the moment he took office, President Trump was in violation of the Foreign Emoluments Clause and the Domestic Emoluments Clause of the United States Constitution."

Last Tuesday, Berkeley (photo left) became the third California city to call for Trump's impeachment. The Bekeleyside reported:  

“Every day there’s a new ethical problem that warrants impeachment,” said Mayor Jesse Arreguín, who co-sponsored the resolution, with Councilwoman Sophie Hahn, calling for the federal investigation into Trump. Council members Ben Bartlett and Cheryl Davila asked to be added as co-sponsors during Tuesday night’s meeting.“Every day there’s a new ethical problem that warrants impeachment,” said Mayor Jesse Arreguín, who co-sponsored the resolution, with Councilwoman Sophie Hahn, calling for the federal investigation into Trump. Council members Ben Bartlett and Cheryl Davila asked to be added as co-sponsors during Tuesday night’s meeting.

The mayor’s office cited concerns about how the president has undermined freedom of the press, and had “conspicuous connections with Russian officials,” as some of the reasons the House of Representatives should launch an investigation into the possible impeachment of the president.

The resolution was approved unanimously.

On February 21, Richmond, California became the first US city to pass a resolution calling for Trump's impeachment. And on Tuesday, March 7, the nearby City of Alameda unanimously passed a similar resolution.

Also on March 7,  the small Vermont town of Charlotte passed an advisory resolution calling on Congress to look into whether sufficient grounds exist to pursue an impeachment of President Donald Trump. “It's the first time I ever made a motion,” said Susan Ohanian, a retired teacher who introduced the advisory resolution at the Town Meeting Day gathering in Charlotte.

Here is the text of the Charlotte, VT resolution:

Town Meeting offers an opportunity for Vermonters to bring the Emoluments Clause in the Constitution to the attention of members of the House of Representatives, urging them to investigate whether sufficient grounds exist for the impeachment of Donald J. Trump because of his violations of the Foreign and Domestic Emoluments Clauses of the US Constitution.  Here is a shortened version of the resolution prepared by the legal counsel at Free Speech For People and passed unanimously by the City Council in Richmond, California.

WHEREAS, The Foreign Emoluments Clause of the United States Constitution provides that “no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under [the United States] shall, without the Consent of Congress, accept any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or Foreign State,”

WHEREAS, The Domestic Emoluments Clause of the United States Constitution provides that, besides the fixed salary for his four-year term, the President “shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument from the United States, or any of them,”

WHEREAS, Donald J. Trump, the President of the United States, owns various business interests by means of which he receives emoluments from foreign governments, states in the United States, and the United States itself, in violation of the Foreign and the Domestic Emoluments Clauses of the United States Constitution,

NOW, THEREFORE, THE TOWN OF CHARLOTTE RESOLVES to call upon the United States House of Representatives to authorize and direct the House Committee on the Judiciary to investigate whether sufficient grounds exist for the impeachment of Donald J. Trump for the violations listed herein, and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that a copy of this resolution be transmitted officially by the Town Clerk to the Member of the United States House of Representatives that represents the Town of Charlotte, namely, the Honorable Peter Welch.

 (This report by the staff at Common Dreams  … where this piece was first posted.)

-cw

LEANING RIGHT--It’s always impossible to repeal laws that require Ann to pay for greedy people, because the greedy run out on the streets wailing that the Republicans are murdering them.

Obamacare is uniquely awful because the free stuff isn’t paid for through income taxes: It’s paid for through MY health insurance premiums. This is unfortunate because I wanted to buy health insurance.

Perhaps you’re not aware — SINCE YOU EXEMPTED YOURSELVES FROM OBAMACARE, CONGRESS — but buying or selling health insurance is illegal in America.

Right now, there’s no free market because insurance is insanely regulated not only by Obamacare, but also by the most corrupt organizations in America: state insurance commissions. (I’m talking to you, New York!)

Federal and state laws make it illegal to sell health insurance that doesn’t cover a laughable array of supposedly vital services based on bureaucrats’ medical opinions of which providers have the best lobbyists.

As a result, it’s illegal to sell health insurance that covers any of the medical problems I’d like to insure against. Why can’t the GOP keep Obamacare for the greedy — but make it legal for Ann to buy health insurance?

This is how it works today:

ME: I’m perfectly healthy, but I’d like to buy health insurance for heart disease, broken bones, cancer, and everything else that a normal person would ever need, but no more.

INSURANCE COMPANY: That will be $700 a month, the deductible is $35,000, no decent hospital will take it, and you have to pay for doctor’s visits yourself. But your plan covers shrinks, infertility treatments, sex change operations, autism spectrum disorder treatment,drug rehab and 67 other things you will never need.

INSURANCE COMPANY UNDER ANN’S PLAN: That will be $50 a month, the deductible is $1,000, you can see any doctor you’d like, and you have full coverage for any important medical problems you could conceivably have in a million years.

Mine is a two-step plan (and you don’t have to do the second step, so it’s really a one-step plan).

STEP 1: Congress doesn’t repeal Obamacare! Instead, Congress passes a law, pursuant to its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce, that says: “In America, it shall be legal to sell health insurance on the free market. This law supersedes all other laws, taxes, mandates, coverage requirements, regulations or prohibitions, state or federal.”

The end. Love, Ann.

There will be no whining single mothers storming Congress with their pre-printed placards. People who want to stay on Obamacare can. No one is taking away anything. They can still have health insurance with free pony rides. It just won’t be paid for with Ann’s premiums anymore, because Ann will now be allowed to buy health insurance on the free market.

Americans will be free to choose among a variety of health insurance plans offered by willing sellers, competing with one another to provide the best plans at the lowest price. A nationwide market in health insurance will drive down costs and improve access — just like everything else we buy here in America!

Within a year, most Americans will be buying health insurance on the free market (and half of the rest will be illegal aliens). We’ll have TV ads with cute little geckos hawking amazing plans and young couples bragging about their broad coverage and great prices from this or that insurance company.

The Obamacare plans will still have the “essential benefits” (free pony rides) that are so important to NPR’s Mara Liasson, but the free market plans will have whatever plans consumers agree to buy and insurance companies agree to sell — again, just like every other product we buy here in America.

Some free market plans will offer all the “essential benefits” mandated by Obamacare, but the difference will be: Instead of forcing me to pay a premium that covers Mara Liasson’s special needs, she’ll have to pay for that coverage herself.

I won’t be compelled to buy health insurance that covers everyone else’s gambling addiction, drug rehab, pregnancies, marital counseling, social workers, contact lenses and rotten kids — simply to have insurance for what doctors call “serious medical problems.”

Then, we’ll see how many people really need free health care.

Until the welfare program is decoupled from the insurance market, nothing will work.Otherwise, it’s like forcing grocery stores to pay for everyone to have a house. A carton of milk would suddenly cost $10,000.

That’s what Obamacare did to health insurance. Paul Ryan’s solution was to cut taxes on businesses — and make the milk watery. But he still wouldn’t allow milk to be sold on the free market.

Democrats will be in the position of blocking American companies from selling a product that people want to buy. How will they explain that to voters?

Perhaps Democrats will come out and admit that they need to fund health insurance for the poor by forcing middle-class Americans to pay for it through their insurance premiums — because otherwise, they’d have to raise taxes, and they want to keep their Wall Street buddies’ income taxes low.

Good luck with that!

STEP 2: Next year, Congress formulates a better way of delivering health care to the welfare cases, which will be much easier since there will be a LOT fewer of them.

No actual money-making business is going to survive by taking the welfare cases — the ones that will cover illegal aliens and Mara Liasson’s talk therapy — so the greedy will get government plans.

But by then, only a minority of Americans will be on the “free” plans. (Incidentally, this will be a huge money-saver — if anyone cares about the federal budget.) Eighty percent of Americans will already have good health plans sold to them by insurance companies competing for their business.

With cheap plans available, a lot of the greedy will go ahead and buy a free market plan. Who wants to stand in line at the DMV to see a doctor when your neighbors have great health care plans for $50 a month?

We will have separated the truly unfortunate from the loudmouthed bullies who simply enjoy forcing other people to pay for their shrinks and aromatherapy.

And if the Democrats vote against a sane method of delivering health care to the welfare cases, who cares? We have lots of wasteful government programs — take it out of Lockheed Martin’s contract. But at least the government won’t be depriving the rest of us of a crucial product just because we are middle class and the Democrats hate us.

There’s your health care bill, GOP!

(Ann Coulter is an American conservative social and political commentator, writer, syndicated columnist, and lawyer. She frequently appears on television, radio, and as a speaker at public and private events.)

-cw