LOS ANGELES

SPECIAL PROP 64 REPORT--At the Oct. 18 Central San Pedro Neighborhood Council stakeholder meeting, President Mona Sutton read aloud a statement released by Los Angeles City Council President Herb Wesson, just two weeks earlier. The statement called on the city’s neighborhood councils and citywide committees to discuss the legalization of cannabis. He expressed the hope that this could be a space where community impact statements, white paper suggestions and recommendations could be provided to the Rules, Elections, Intergovernmental Relations, and Neighborhoods Committee -- a committee he chairs. 

For Sutton, this call-out was a welcome change from her experience a couple of months prior when she chatted with Mayor Eric Garcetti during a regional gathering of neighborhood council presidents.

“With a pending vote on cannabis in California, are you going to get out in front of it anytime soon?” Sutton recalled asking. 

She said the mayor looked a little dumbfounded by the question before she followed up with a suggestion. 

“How about [making it so that potential operators pay] $100,000 to open or get permit fees for this and renew it yearly?” 

“We can call it the Sutton tax,” Sutton recalled the mayor facetiously responding. “You can call it whatever you want, but how about we start a fund and use for something really important?” she asked. 

Matt Garland, a local stakeholder at the meeting, agreed with Sutton, except for the part about the $100,000 entry fee. 

Garland, a medical marijuana patient for the past 15 years, said he was excited that there are groups and cities looking at how communities can benefit from the legalization of recreational cannabis.

“There are some potential benefits with legalization, but it depends on how the city regulates it,” he said. “I’m really hoping we can do something in Los Angeles.” 

Garland argues that cities should move towards obtainable small business licenses, seeing legalization as a potential jobs growth engine in low-income communities, if done right. 

“This could be just one more job that people are doing,” Garland said in a later interview with Random Lengths. 

Garland sees this moment as an opportunity to bring above ground the existing black market economy of marijuana. Garland said he spent eight years in Humboldt County in the 1990s. He recalled communities with few job opportunities but they had their own growing project going, providing a lot of people with a little bit of income. 

“We’re talking $20,000 to $30,000 a year for a part-time job,” Garland said. “The result of that was that small businesses prospered because people had money to spend. I know that was 20 years ago. But I do see the potential benefits.” 

But Garland’s views are a little different when it comes to how Los Angeles has been dealing with the illegal cannabis dispensaries opening up everywhere, then shuttering like pop-up restaurants. He agrees with City Attorney Mike Feuer’s aggressive crackdown since he came into office. 

“My concerns for San Pedro are in regards to patient access, family safety and the lack of regulation around medical cannabis,” Garland said. “It has created an unsafe environment for the community.”

He went on to say that Wilmington and parts of San Pedro have been made a dumping ground for illegal pot dispensaries. To a certain extent, Garland’s attitude was similar to that of neighbors of Barton Hill Elementary School who turned out for the Sept. 25 rally opposing a proposed navigation center on Pacific Avenue. 

At the time, rally attendees mocked bureaucratic attempts to sanitize the public perception of homeless storage facilities and weed shops by renaming them “navigations centers” and “medical marijuana dispensaries.” 

The enduring popularity of 2013’s Prop. D, the ballot initiative limiting the number of medical dispensaries to the 135 that opened prior to 2007, is probably the reason why Los Angeles has been so slow to prepare for the possible passage of Prop. 64, along with Feuer’s reelection bid to office in 2017. 

Feuer’s visit to San Pedro on Oct. 13 illustrates this point. It was intended to be a town hall meeting in which he would give a brief introduction, then open the floor for questions from attendees. There were 75 to 100 people present. 

Included in his opening remarks was the fact his office, with the help of the Los Angeles Police Department, has closed more than 800 dispensaries in Los Angeles -- 48 in the Harbor Division alone. Many more are still being investigated in the Los Angeles Harbor. This announcement was received positively, even if most of the attendees were more interested in hearing about Feuer’s enforcement efforts regarding problems related to homelessness. 

When he gave the same intro in Wilmington, the applause was sustained for 30 seconds or more.

“All marijuana-dispensaries in the city are illegal under that ordinance,” Feuer said. “Some can get limited immunity to enforcement by my office if they hit a whole bunch of cylinders. They can’t be too close to each other; they can’t be too close to parks; playgrounds and schools. They can’t have their signs lit up at night…a whole bunch of things they have to do.” 

At this meeting, he reminded attendees that he had no staff and no list of addresses to work from when Prop. D was passed. 

The city attorney also said there may be five or six shops that may be able to satisfy criteria to be immune to prosecution. The number of investigations are declining, he noted, because they are closing the dispensaries as investigations proceed. 

Feuer noted that it was unclear what would happen if Prop. 64 passes. He said it is possible for the city to say, “No, we don’t want medicinal marijuana.” Or, it is possible the city could say recreational marijuana is okay, but medicinal marijuana will be more restricted. 

It was at this meeting that residents learned that there’s another initiative headed towards the March ballot that would create some licenses for marijuana facilities in the city. 

“Another thing has happened,” Feuer answered to a question about the possibility of legalization. “Gov. [Jerry] Brown signed a law about a year ago that created some regulation for medical marijuana in the state and only allows those that are permitted by local jurisdictions to exist.” 

As Feuer noted, none of those that are permitted are legal in the city. 

“If I’m going to guess, there are going to be some significant changes in several areas of this law but in the meantime we are doing what you asked, and that [is] aggressively enforcing the law.” 

But there is a subset of activists, civic leaders and community members who believe the passage of Prop. 64 can economically benefit historically disadvantaged communities in very tangible ways.

Carson is dealing with similar concerns. The community hopes legalization will be an opportunity to expunge the criminal records of youth who where arrested for marijuana possession. In turn, they can then find better jobs. 

On Sept. 24, former Los Angeles City Councilman Robert Farrell, in conjunction with the Carson-Torrance chapter of the NAACP, hosted a town hall meeting on Prop. 64 at the Carson Recreation Center — one of many in recent months focused on the potential impact on communities of color in Los Angeles County. 

The panel included Greg Akili from the nonprofit organization Corporate Accountability International, which is known for its high profile campaigns to protect public health, the environment and democracy from abuse by transnational corporations; Virgil Grant III, co-founder and co-chairman of California Minority Alliance, a nonprofit that aims to prepare disadvantaged communities to economically benefit if marijuana is legalized; and Cat Packer, a campaign coordinator for Californians for Responsible Marijuana Reform. 

Farrell framed the conversation by noting the negative impacts that the war on drugs has had on communities of color. 

“If this passes, we will see a cultural shift,” he said. “The moment is here, but where do we go after?”

He went on to say that passing this proposition has broad ranging impacts on life as we know it and might lead to better business opportunities for blacks and Latinos. 

“Before 1964, only whites owned the liquor stores in Watts,” he said. “After the Watts riots, blacks and Latinos went into businesses, they got liquor licenses and liquor stores.” 

Carson resident Robert Leslie, a retired police officer who worked on a drug task force, said he was very concerned about rising crime rates as a result marijuana legalization for recreational use. 

“As a police officer I saw recreational marijuana use … connected with burglary and assault,” Leslie said. “Many people I arrested were repeat offenders. Then they had to go into reversion programs…. Smoking marijuana also causes cancer. And according to some studies smoking it is worse than tobacco.” 

It wasn’t just retired police officers who still had misgivings regarding marijuana’s legalization. Others also expressed concern, like Tony Wafford. 

“To be honest, I could care less if people out there are smoking weed,” Wafford said. “That’s what I call it, not cannabis or marijuana. It’s weed. But I am still battling with what weed does to people.”

Wafford recounted his son’s experience with a medical marijuana card. 

“He went to a job interview and then he tells me he can’t pee in a cup. I said, ‘Where’s your weed card?’ He said that wouldn’t help. I smoke cigars and drink brandy on Sunday, but I can pee in a cup on Monday. If this proposition passed tomorrow, can people go and do whatever test they have to and get a job?” 

The third expert speaker was Packer. She said when she was in law school she did not think she would get involved with marijuana legalization -- she wanted to stick to civil rights issues. 

“But, I’ve seen bad legalization,” said Packer. “I worked on a legalization campaign in Ohio. Ten investors were spending $2 million each to control all of the state’s cultivation. To try to get more voter support these investors put forward a companion bill that would expunge records, but only after the other initiative passed and the investors got their monopoly. I moved across the country and got involved with Californians for Responsible Marijuana Reform because this is a civil rights issue. Mass incarceration is real. And. it is due to drug arrests, which are primarily related to marijuana. 

“Because money is involved in this, legalization is inevitable, but you have a choice of what type of legalization you want. Proposition 64 is not perfect, but it’s the best initiative so far because it acknowledges the war on drugs and the harm that it has had on the black community.” 

Packer went on to give some key features of the proposition: 

• Having 1 ounce (8 grams) and 6 plants is legal for anyone 21 and up. 

• $10 million of taxes from marijuana sales goes to community reinvestment for communities disproportionately affected by the war on drugs. This can increase every year up to $50 million. 

• 20 percent of tax revenue goes to environmental remediation of harm due to illegal past cultivation. 

• Retroactive penalty reduction for people incarcerated and petitions for expungement for past criminal offenses due to marijuana. 

• Five-year ban on cultivation operations of 22,000 square feet and above to discourage monopolies from developing. 

When Packer began to talk about how the revenue would be used she took a moment to get personal. 

“If it were up to me, some of this money would be going into training cops not to be racist,” Packer said. 

There were grins and scoffs and someone exclaimed, “That’s not going to happen!” 

Nevertheless she encouraged citizens to be aware and provide input to their cities if the proposition passes. 

During the question and answer portion of the forum, attendee concern ran the gamut of where will the taxes go to where they are needed to the potential of increases in crime. 

Associate professor of business law Charles Thomas asked, “Can local governments level their own taxes?” 

“Yes, they can also choose to just allow cultivation,” Packer replied. 

Packer said that her group plans to organize watch parties on election night with people who have marijuana convictions. That way at 12:01 (a.m. Nov. 9) after Proposition 64 passes, the state will have a list of people whose records can be expunged. This bit of information received a rousing round of applause. 

Packer noted a tough road ahead in changing perceptions of marijuana. She looked professional and was well dressed. She told us that she is a recreational user of marijuana. 

Virgil Grant asked the crowd to lobby to change the drug testing issue and to lobby assembly members like Mike Gibson on the issue. 

Akili said that the fight against white supremacy is not over, that some will find ways to keep minorities unemployed (credit tests and appearance like hijabs or tattoos.) 

Prop. 64 does not give a one-size-fits-all solution to cities. It offers flexibility. 

Residents and business owners from Carson to San Pedro have been invited to join the conversation and affect local marijuana policy.

(Terelle Jerricks is Managing Editor of Random Lengths … where this column originated. Christian L. Guzman is Community Reporter for Random Lengths.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

ALPERN AT LARGE--Freedom isn't for sissies.  Life is complicated, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't confront it--particularly in a free society, where our decisions aren't supposed to be made for us.  If America is "the home of the Free and the Brave", then the obligations of freedom are NOT above and beyond us. 

Our California ballot is so very complicated, and with so many taxation and policy questions, it's easy to run away screaming from your ballot box and/or absentee ballot envelope.  But with the understanding that you need not vote for every measure and/or proposition or election race, here are a few considerations: 

1) Taxing a few of us for something we're all supposed to benefit from is neither democratic, courageous, nor moral.  If it's good enough to tax some of us, then tax all of us. 

The argument that the more wealthy should pay more than those less wealthy makes sense, but how to do it in a fair manner will be argued long after we're gone.  If we don't all have some skin in the game, and if the money's not supervised with respect to transparency and quality spending, then why do we need to nail other financially and hurt our economy? 

Joel Fox, former president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, states it well when he decries how California--home of Proposition 13--appears willing to tax itself into oblivion, particularly when it's "someone else" who'll pay the taxes for YOUR pet priorities. 

Of course, many of those who tried to keep California on an even keel have retired and left the state, or have passed away, leaving poorly-educated new generations who think that the warnings of Big Government are all crazy and for paranoid seniors (I guess the worshiping of youth has replaced the respect of elders and the knowledge/wisdom they've collected over their lives). 

And for those of you willing to vote for OTHERS to pay more for what YOU want...well...how brave of you.  How BRAVE of you!!! 

2) VOTE NO on Proposition 55:   Ooooooh, those awful rich people!  Get 'em!  Make 'em pay their fair share!  So I guess that the "big lie" that this tax on those making $263,000 per year would be temporarily taxed is being shown as just that...a lie.  And does that figure carry the same weight and wealth as it does in states with a lower cost of living? 

And if more small business owners, who work 80-100 hours a week for that money, leave the state (along with your job), that'll make you happy?  And is paying over 50% of your income in federal and state income taxes enough to make lower-income Californians satisfied?  And will the money, supposed to go to education, BE ... SPENT ... WELL? 

Is our tax dollars, particularly our education tax dollars, being spent well in California?  Do you really favor the public sector education unions over your own job/employer? 

3) VOTE NO on Proposition 56:   Oooooooh, those awful cigarette smokers!  Get 'em!  Make 'em pay their fair share!  Because there are so MANY smokers left and because that extra money will be spent so ... damn ... well!  Best that we enact laws that require higher healthcare premiums and life insurance premiums for smokers (the latter already exists). 

4) VOTE YES on Propositions 53 and 54:  Transparency is good.  Bonds have to be paid back, and if it's over $2 billion then the taxpayers should vote on it.  Ditto with us all being able to see legislation online for at least 72 hours before Sacramento can vote on it. 

... and in other races where we have to S.O.S. (Save Our State) ... 

5) VOTE NO on Proposition 57:  What...the jump in crime after we passed Proposition 47 wasn't enough for you?  You think that there are just gobs and gobs of innocent sweeties those nefarious prosecutors and judges threw away in jail for funzies, and that their ridiculously-long rap sheet means nothing?  You really want to put yourself and your family at risk...AGAIN? 

6) VOTE NO on Proposition 58:  Latino children have been among the chief beneficiaries by requiring families to specifically request for bilingual/immersion education programs.  Passing this would be a step backwards--if someone is bilingual, then that is an unqualified plus in our world. But if a child doesn't speak and learn English first, then it's a guaranteed restriction on their future. 

7) VOTE NO on Proposition 64:  We already look the other way for those with small amounts of recreational marijuana, and already are OK with medicinal marijuana.  You want more DUI's for those high on pot (which is by far more available in high concentrations today than in the past, and are virtually hallucinogenic at certain doses) like in other states?  There's a difference between tolerating pot, versus telling your kids it's "just fine" or to even watch advertisements go up that virtually encourage teenagers and kids to "go for it" when it's legal (or even earlier).  VOTE NO! 

8) VOTE NO on Proposition 62, and YES on Proposition 66--Mend it, don't end it!  The death penalty exists for a reason, and reasonable reforms and commutations have already been made (and should continue to be made) for the protection of the innocent.  Do NOT reward those who ultimately seek to let those truly guilty of monstrous crimes out of prison, and/or who do NOT truly understand the unforgiveable act of first-degree murder.  Please speak for the rights of the slain--because they cannot speak for themselves!  Victims' lives matter ... right?   

9) Vote YES on Measure M--I am no hypocrite, and no purist. I've already opined that we shouldn't need Measure M, but we damn well do!!! 

With respect to transportation, the public education lobbies have financially crippled the state with respect to proper budgeting.  LA County MUST Save Itself!  And demand matching grants from Sacramento and Washington whenever possible! 

Measure M taxes all of us, and is filled with BOTH freeway and rail projects, as well as operational and sidewalk/road repairs that we all can benefit from.  Chambers of commerce, newspapers throughout the County of LA and among those benefiting the most from transit projects. 

Former County Supervisor Yaroslavsky, who helped kill the subway construction bonanza when the spending was out of control in the 1990's, favors Measure M, and he earned his reputation as a fiscal conservative. 

And I am also a fiscal conservative, recommending a "no" vote on every tax/bond initiative in the city, county, and state...but Measure M is the big exception, and we can fight for more transportation, and better inclusion for the county, the very day after we pass it. 

But we MUST pass Measure M. 

Again, freedom isn't for sissies. We should NOT, even in the la-la land of California, forget that we are part of the Home of the Free and the Brave.  No taxes or stupid Big Government when it's unhelpful.   

But when we tax ourselves, or make policies that affect all of us, let's all do it together--including that taxpayer/voter you see in the mirror every day.

(Ken Alpern is a Westside Village Zone Director and Board member of the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC), previously co-chaired its Planning and Outreach Committees, and currently is Co-Chair of its MVCC Transportation/Infrastructure Committee. He is co-chair of the CD11Transportation Advisory Committee and chairs the nonprofit Transit Coalition, and can be reached at  [email protected]. He also co-chairs the grassroots Friends of the Green Line at www.fogl.us. The views expressed in this article are solely those of Mr. Alpern.)

-cw

MY TURN--I first became acquainted with Assembly Member (notice it is now assembly member NOT Assemblyman) Patty Lopez (D) right after she was elected to the 39th District of the California Legislature. Her opponent, the incumbent Raul Bocanagra (D) was already trying to raise funds for a recall attempt. He and his establishment supporters couldn't believe they had been outvoted by a Mexican born immigrant and a "Woman" at that. (Patty Lopez, above left) 

Now in 2016, Bocanegra is in a runoff with Lopez in a bit of déjà vu. Assembly District 39 encompasses: Agua Dulce, Arleta, Canyon Country, Lake View Terrace, Mission Hills, Newhall, North Hollywood, Northeast Granada Hills, Pacoima, San Fernando, Santa Clarita, Shadow Hills, Sun Valley, Sylmar and Sunland-Tujunga. 

If those areas sound familiar, it’s because they seem to have been traveling under a black cloud of late. They have endured fires, floods, incompetent politicians, forced High Speed Rail routes, homeless encampments, economic blight and probably the locusts will come this winter. 

Full disclosure--- I am not in the 39th District so am unable to vote for either one of the candidates. In the last two years I have become rather familiar with the Northeast San Fernando Valley. As I have stated here several times, the people really care about their neighborhoods and are willing to stand up and fight. I admire their tenacity and willingness to participate in their own future. 

Also in full disclosure I don't agree with everything they want to do ... but then again I don't live there. Its population is an ethnic microcosm of Los Angeles and incorporates the economic scale with a solid middle class. It also has political diversity with both Trump and Clinton signs on the lawns. 

So why do I think she faces a rigged system? The Los Angeles Democratic Central Committee in most instances will endorse the incumbent. This election they chose to endorse Bocanegra. I tried to find out why. I know it’s hard to believe, but no one wanted to go on record. 

I did learn about something called "pay for play" which Trump has accused his opponent of doing. Well, last election instead of talking with his constituents in the last two weeks of the election he was out campaigning and giving funds to his colleagues. The Central Committee is determined by election and surprisingly Bocanegra's friends were elected to represent the area and they voted to endorse him. 

He is very prolific in fund raising and does spread it around; whereas the last election Lopez supporters sold pozole and enchiladas to help her financially. This time he is also raising for more money but interestingly she has the support of both Republicans and Democrats in the area. 

Originally from Michoacán, Mexico, Assemblywoman Patty López came to the U.S. at the age of 12 and was raised in the city of Pacoima. She is a wife, mother of four and grandmother of three.   She started working in the community giving voice to those that previously had none.   Her website Patty Lopez for Assembly talks about her advocacy for education which led to her 2014 victory. She also publishes all literature and news bilingual. 

In my opinion it is because she is at every event in her district.   She knows her communities and fights for them. One recent success was her spear heading efforts, along with other organizations in the community. to open a satellite branch of Mission Hills College in Sunland. They broke ground last month. 

She has hosted dozens of free, informative workshops on housing, education, small businesses, immigration and other key issues. She is staunchly committed to protecting the rights of women, children, seniors and veterans. She has been a champion for the people in countless ways. 

Seven of Assemblywoman Patty López' bills have been signed into law this year alone. Her groundbreaking legislation promises to improve the overall quality of life for California's children, working families, foster youth and college students while also supporting small businesses, giving local residents the power to shape their communities and reforming the criminal justice system. 

She was recognized by fellow legislators and environmentalists at the 2016 Green California

Advocacy Day Reception for her exemplary efforts to safeguard our communities and

the environment. The annual event is hosted by Green California ‒ a network of more than 100

organizations that plan, strategize and work collaboratively to voice their concerns to the State Legislature and regulatory agencies on issues impacting the air, water and other natural resources. 

When Lopez went to Sacramento she was not received with open arms by her fellow democrats. After all, she had beaten their colleague, who thought he would be the next Assembly speaker. Subsequently she has made inroads. The Women's Assembly Caucus has been helpful and she has learned how to get things done. Patty Lopez is not a great orator. She doesn't keep her audiences spell bound. She is not a sophisticated politician. What she does ... better than her predecessor ever did ... is truly represent them. She has her pulse on the community and its needs. 

She has raised less than $100,000 and he has raised close to $500,000. She has received endorsements from a large number of different organizations. She also received the endorsement of the Daily News in the Primary. When you see the list of his doner's you know where his priorities will lie. 

I don't know Raul Bocanegra. I've sent queries to his campaign but no response. It's not hard to understand. He was Chief of Staff for ex LA Council member Felipe Fuentes, when Fuentes was in the Assembly. Fuentes was never forthcoming, so obviously Bocanegra followed in his Boss’s footsteps.   I had to smile at Bocanegra's web site since one of the words used to describe him was "humble." 

The ex assemblyman has some skeletons in his closet.   I found some letters on line from a group of high powered women who wrote the LA Weekly "We are asking that you please make public any sexual harassment complaints made against Raul Bocanegra, including what the investigation found of said complaint and whether or not a financial settlement of any kind was reached. These are taxpayer dollars and voters have a right to know if a State employee's sexual harassment settlement cost the taxpayers money while still allowing him to continue to walk the halls of the State Capitol." 

The LA Weekly asked for a copy of the complaint; received it, but didn't mention the disposition.   Of course the LA Weekly gave Fuentes the "Worst Congressman of the Year." award. Bocanegra as his Chief of Staff should probably share that title. 

We Americans do not encourage excellence in our leaders. In order to run for anything one needs to belong to a group, or political party. In order to get support, a candidate must convince his/ her backers by either compromising or acquiescing to so many people, in spite of good intentions, one has diluted the original reasons for running for political office. Patty Lopez was the exception in 2014. I hope for District 39's sake she is again. 

This is why Hillary Clinton's email server issues don't bother me. We all have flaws. On a scale of one to ten that was a stupid mistake but it didn't hurt the country. If we compare flaws, I'll take Hillary any day compared to her opponent. 

He did say something that I agree with: We should have term limits for all Federal political offices. Three six-year terms for Senators; four two-year terms for House seats. This is the only way we will be able to encourage our best and brightest to be an integral part of the governing process. 

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])

-cw

@THE GUSS REPORT-Dishonest or disconnected: on any given week, you never know where LA Mayor Eric Garcetti is going to land on Planet Policy. Last week, I proved how his administration knowingly falsified thousands of pet adoptions, one of his many and ongoing dishonest humane claims -- with more to come. A week later, it is still the #1 Most Viewed article on CityWatch.

This week, Garcetti’s administration is showing its total disconnect from humane issues, causing a public backlash by giving away animals for free (a dangerous idea at any time) – including black cats and kittens – during Halloween week. This practically begs for their torture, exploitation or abandonment soon thereafter. 

So say former LAAS Commissioners from the administrations of Garcetti’s two predecessors: 

Laura Beth Heisen, an attorney and MBA, is a former LAAS Commissioner appointed by Mayor James Hahn and is chair of the City’s Spay/Neuter Advisory Committee, appointed by City Council president Herb Wesson. She warns, “The number one rule of rescue is: ‘No free animals, especially prior to Halloween!’ For good reason. They wind up being used for abusive, tortuous non-pet purposes like bait for dog fighting, sold for lab experiments or bizarre Halloween rituals.” 

Marie Atake, founder of Forte Animal Rescue in Marina del Rey was an LAAS Commissioner appointed by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. She says, “This type of practice only reminds us that (in politicians’ views) animals are commodities, hence the animals in the pound are treated the same as impounded cars; actually those cars are more valued than sentient animals! To city officials, animals are important only when they make their empty promises to get elected. How many of them ever visit the LA animal impound facilities once they’re in office? I spoke up for the animals, and was threatened by the Mayor’s office to ‘shut up or else,’ and I chose the ‘else’ and resigned from the LAAS Commission. It is a shame that the most important qualification to stay on the LAAS Commission is to not care for animals and just rubber stamp. This campaign is another example that proves their priorities and intentions.” 

Atake’s point shines a glaring light on the comprehensive lack of prior humane experience by virtually all of Garcetti’s current shelter Commissioners: 

Alisa Finsten was appointed last week to the LAAS Commission with zero inquiry by City Council on her qualifications for the role and her knowledge of humane policy. 

Earlier this summer, Garcetti appointed Olivia Garcia to the Commission with the comparatively stellar qualification of “occasionally doing some transportation of animals for a local charity.” 

LAAS Larry Gross possesses extremely deep qualifications…to be on any Garcetti panel related to housing and tenants’ rights issues, but has threadbare prior experience in humane issues. 

Then there’s the bickering duo of Roger Wolfson and president David Zaft who spend more time in meetings on their petty, personal differences than on policy…when Wolfson actually shows up to meetings. 

This seems to be Garcetti’s end-goal: keep misleading the public on humane issues by maintaining a dumbed-down LAAS Commission light on experience and featherweight in courage. Garcetti would need to first show he cares about a problem before taking measures to fix it. To date, he has proven only the opposite.

(Daniel Guss, MBA, is a contributor to CityWatchLA, KFI AM-640 and Huffington Post. 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.

It's Halloween and the fate of the Republic is in our hands. A double whammy, if you dare.

There’s much talk about how little talk there has been about public education in the presidential election. I guess the Russians just aren’t interested enough in American education policy to dump emails on the topic.

One leaked email did have particular relevance to public education though. David Dayen in the New Republic calls it “the most important Wikileaks revelation.”  

A month before the 2008 presidential election, a senior Citicorp executive sent his appointment picks to Obama advisor John Podesta. Those preferences included Arne Duncan as Education Secretary. Duncan, who put the public-education-as-a-competitive-marketplace on steroids. So destructive was Duncan that his legacy is that the decades-in-waiting revamp of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act removes most of the power from the Secretary of Education.

Flash forward to 2016, when some education activists are crying foul that their union leaders might be, well, leading. Randi Weingarten and Lily Eskelson Garcia appear to be having discussions about education with Hillary Clinton. For shame!

While many education advocates are grateful that the frontrunner’s advisors this time around include actual educators, the more militant activists see something nefarious. They could be relieved, though, that leaked emails show that the Clinton campaign recognized Rahm Emanuel as a liability for the civil war he has stoked against Chicago public schools. These are indicators that we might be in for some change of thinking about public education policy if Love Trumps Hate.

You do need WikiLeaks to see that education issues are out in the open in other elections.

Massachusetts is having a hu-u-u-ge public debate about lifting its charter cap, which even LAUSD ex-pat and Boston Supe Tommy Chang opposes. Elected officials in that state, from mayors to Senator Elizabeth Warren, oppose lifting the cap, and the massive out-of-state and decidedly right-wing money backing “Question 2” has raised eyebrows enough to show the charter agenda is about a lot more than charter schools.

In Oakland, the charter group deceptively named Parent Teacher Alliance (the same PAC that ran the disgusting campaign against LA school board veteran Bennett Kayser) gave money to an anti-rent control group. It’s connections like this that show the charter lobby has far bigger interests than putting students first, or in this case, even under a roof.

Salon reprinted a post from Capital and Main about what those billionaires really want out of the charter industry (and a third installment is coming soon). 

Closer to home, local reporters continue to help the CCSA get its point across to the public. KPCC touted the highest priority of the charter lobby: to transfer the power of charter authorization away from those pesky elected school boards. Afterall, it would be a lot easier for the charter lobby to control one appointed state board than to pick candidates in so many messy local elections for school districts up and down the state.

That drew the ire of Curmudgucation, a.k.a. Peter Greene, who had a thing or two to say about Kyle Stokes’ framing of the board as the fox in charge of the henhouse. This notion is lifted right out of the charter lobby's playbook. 

I’m no reporter, but, no, simply asking school board members for reactions to the CCSA's talking points does not count as in depth reporting.

The public deserves a fuller picture of the inherent conflict between the CCSA and LAUSD. The school board is elected by the public to oversee public assets and investments of the school district. The fact that the board is pushing back against the massive giveaway to charter school corporations is a result of voters throwing out the rubberstamping board members of yesteryear. Presenting CCSA's perspective without explaining that its mission is to displace the public school system is misleading at best.

The time is NOW to make it clear that our own elected leaders are the only officials who should authorize schools in our district. Tell your elected officials at every level how important this is. It's the week before a presidential election. Chances are, you'll be hearing plenty from them in the next few days. And the backers of the agenda to have someone else make those decisions are so wealthy, they could easily slap it on the next ballot.

LAUSD does not always make it obvious that we're looking out for our schools either. For example, why is this neighborhood school advertising Great Public Schools Now's takeover of the district as just another parent choice? Is somebody in LAUSD wanting to give away our schools? 

It's confusing enough to find our who's on our side. Take a look at this convoluted web:

Button your hatches! In my neighborhood and all over the west side, the CCSA has paid parent organizers and a group called SpeakUp Parents! infiltrating grassroots school groups, promoting *choice* and trashing the district for being non-responsive to parents. Are they in your neighborhood yet?

Did you see this? PSconnect got mentioned in the Washington Post for fighting on behalf of Los Angeles public schools! 

Please support our public programs. We really want to engage the community in discussion about the issues that matter for the survival of public education in Los Angeles. We've lined up awesome speakers! Can you donate $10 today?

(Karen Wolfe is a public school parent, the Executive Director of PS Connect and an occasional contributor to CityWatch.)

-cw 

SUPRESSING PUBLIC COMMENT-Five months ago on March 8, the LA County Board of Supervisors passed a motion by Michael D. Antonovich to contribute $1 million to ongoing efforts to discover a vaccine for Valley Fever.  

The disease, as the Motion describes, is an infection that is caused by inhaling certain fungal spores found in the soil and dirt.  

When inhaled, the spores “attack the respiratory system” and although many infected individuals exhibit no symptoms or experience mild respiratory illness, according to Antonovich's motion, Valley Fever "can be life-threatening” to the immunocompromised and others who are at higher risk to contract Valley Fever including infants, adults over 60 years old, African Americans and Filipinos, diabetics, and pregnant women. He notes in closing that the incidence of Valley Fever has increased dramatically in recent years, including in the Antelope Valley. 

Last Tuesday, the same five LA County Supervisors who voted in favor of the motion just described passed another motion related to Valley Fever -- approval of the Mira Loma Women’s Detention Center project including an EIR finding that all “significant adverse effects” of that project “had been reduced to an acceptable level.” 

Disturbingly, a fact considered significant by the Board in the March 8th motion -- that Valley Fever can be "life-threatening” to certain vulnerable groups -- was completely absent from the presentation made to the Board regarding potential adverse effects of the project. This is crucial, because the facility will be located in Lancaster, in the Antelope Valley, where the rate of Valley Fever, according to the Board’s own statistics, is 1300% higher than that of the rest of LA County.  

Although Supervisor Solis raised concerns about Valley Fever three separate times during the Board discussion, she never once asked about how inmates who fit one of the vulnerable profiles -- African-American, Filipino, immunosuppressed (including HIV-positive), pregnant, or some combination thereof -- will be kept safe. Most of these inmates just described have the additional vulnerability of coming from outside the region which lowers the chance that they have built up an immunity to the pathogen.  

And it’s an important question, when you consider, for example, that according to the LA County Department of Health, it is appropriate to “warn people at high risk for severe [Valley Fever] not to travel to endemic areas when conditions are most dangerous for exposure.” [Acute Communicable Disease Control 2014 Annual Morbidity Report.] Those conditions include dust storms caused by the kind of high winds endemic to Lancaster. (Watch DPH powerpoint for the Santa Susana Field Lab Community Advisory Group.) 

If it’s appropriate to warn a woman who is African-American or pregnant or both not to even visit Lancaster, how can it be appropriate to incarcerate her there? 

That question would have been posed to the Board prior to their approving the item if Chairman Solis had not shut out the public. Having cleared the room earlier in the day, because of some rowdy protesters opposing the Mira Loma project, the Supervisors recessed into closed session for almost an hour. When they returned, the protesters were gone, leaving about twenty calm individuals wanting to speak on both sides of the prison item. And yet despite numerous calm entreaties for the public to be let back into the meeting, Chairperson Hilda Solis kept the doors shut.  

It’s shameful. It will never stand.

(Eric Preven is a CityWatch contributor and a Studio City based writer-producer and public advocate for better transparency in local government. He was a candidate in the 2015 election for Los Angeles City Council, 2nd District. Joshua Preven is a CityWatch contributor and teacher who lives in Los Angeles.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

On Sunday, October 30, 2016, The LA Times broke its article about the massive money laundering operation at Los Angeles City Council. The thing which makes the money laundering, i.e. illegal campaign contributions aka bribes, effective is the City Council’s unlawful vote trading agreement. Each councilmember agrees to always vote yes for each other councilmember’s project, and as a result of this agreement, projects are unanimously approved over 99.9% of the time. 

This vote trading is not deference – no matter how many superior court judges want to look the other way. Deference does not result in unanimous approval 99.9% of the time. The US Attorney Eileen Decker just put away State Senator Ron Calderon for 42 months saying that it is a crime to buy a vote with cash. It is equally criminal to buy a vote with a return vote, but Attorney Decker conveniently forgets that Penal Code 86 criminalizes Vote Trading in city councils. 

When one looks at the amounts of money which were laundered for LA City Council politicians including Mayor Garcetti, one realizes that the lynchpin of the corruption is the criminal vote trading agreement. No developer will pay hundreds of thousands of dollars without a guarantee that the councilmember can deliver the city council’s approval no matter how many laws his project breaks. 

The thing which makes the money laundering feasible is the guarantee that the councilmember can deliver. The favor can be as simple as needlessly tearing down Marilyn Monroe’s Valley Village home as Councilman Krekorian did or as massive as the Millennium Towers in Hollywood or the Sea Breeze project in the LA Times article. It does not matter. If a councilmember puts it on the city council agenda, it gets unanimous approval. 

Without the guarantee which the Vote Trading Agreement brings, developers could not afford to bribe a majority of the City Council. Those bribery cost would be much more than the money to one councilmember. Imagine how much the final councilmember’s vote to make a majority would cost a developer! Assuming that developer did spread around enough cash to buy a majority, he certainly would not squander more money to always buy every single councilmember! The very fact that we have ten years of unanimous approval proves that we have a vote trading agreement and not occasional deference. 

Under the Vote Trading Agreement, each councilmember knows that he/she can guarantee the passage of any project which he/she places on the city council agenda. Once an item is on the agenda and the council president calls that item, it receives unanimous approval. Councilmembers do not even have to vote since the Council’s vote tabulator votes yes for each councilmember. 

Do not expect the criminal vote trading agreement to disappear.   The courts have ruled that it is beyond the power of the courts to question anything which the City Council does. In considering the unanimous approval of thousands of projects, the court ruled in the SaveValleyVillage #2 case that the city councils’ actions are non-justiciable. That means the courts will turn blind eye and a deaf ear – no one will ever be allowed to have a trial to put on evidence.   The court threw out all such cases as non-justiciable. No matter what state laws the City Council breaks, the Court says that their behavior is beyond the reach of the law. 

Now you know what the criminal vote trading agreement has been in operation for over a decade and billions of dollars of illegal construction projects have been unanimously approved and will continue to be unanimously approved. 

The combination of open and notorious money laundering, i.e. cash bribery, coupled with vote trading, i.e. buying votes by return votes, are a permanent fixtures in Los Angeles. Despite a four year prison term attached to each violation of Penal Code 86, you can rest assured that no L.A. City councilmember will ever be held accountable for violating Penal Code 86.

THIS IS WHAT I KNOW--This past July, I covered the aggressive actions The New Home Company had taken to prevent members of Save Malibu Canyon [[ http://www.savemalibucanyon.com/ ]] from gathering the necessary signatures to place a petition on the November ballot. The petition was viable because the proposal required both a zoning change and a general plan amendment. The 16-acre parcel, which is at Las Virgenes and Agoura Roads, would require hillsides to be altered to stabilize an ancient landslide. 

The petition drive was successful and Measure F appears on the November 8 ballot. Should the “Yes” on Measure F succeed, New Home Company would get the green light to the construction of Canyon Oaks, a development of 71 homes and a three-story hotel. A “No” vote would “send the development company back to the drawing board. 

On the surface, this seems as business as usual for developers but the story has some unusual quirks that give residents pause to take notice. The New Home Company has proposed an alternative project should the measure fail, which would include 205 residential units and 150,000 square feet of commercial space. The campaign to support Measure F focuses on avoiding the alternative higher density plan. Supporters claim the higher density project would increase traffic. 

It’s not unusual for developers to threaten to build a more significant project to get the go-ahead but what’s eye-opening here is that a sitting council member (and the city’s general manager) have been actively lobbying on behalf of the project and in support of Measure F. In fact, Council Member Fred Gaines, has sent at least one e-mail and has appeared on a robocall funded by the New Home Company to support Measure F. 

Fred Gaines, per his law firm website, is “the Founding and Managing Partner of Gaines & Stacey LLP, a San Fernando Valley-based law firm, which specializes in land use, zoning, environmental law, related litigation and political advocacy.” The firm provides counsel to property owners and real estate developers and Mr. Gaines has concentrated his practice “in a variety of areas, including administrative approvals, environmental review of development projects and litigation involving development projects. 

When developer Richard Weintraub proposed the Rondell Oasis hotel project next to the 101 Freeway at Las Virgenes Road last spring, Gaines recused himself from discussions because his law firm had represented the developer on other projects. 

Although the Gaines & Stacey client list does include a roster of developers, he doesn’t appear to represent The New Home Company as a client. However, he appears to be committed to supporting commercial development in the city. According to Calabasas City Planning Commission minutes from a regular meeting (December 2013), then-mayor Gaines announced he had convened a special meeting of sixty real estate brokers to present them with “the last handful of parcels available for commercial development in the city and we told them what we want,” urging them to “bring us a hotel.” That same month, The New Home Company submitted an application for the residential units and a four-story 120-room hotel. (The hotel project was later limited to three stories.) 

Gaines does not stand alone as a vocal proponent of the project. City Manager Tony Coroalles promoted two proposed hotel and residential projects to be located on the city’s west side in The Acorn newspaper last December, stating that “the entire City of Calabasas can use the revenue generated by the bed tax from these properties. We recently lost a significant source of revenue when Spirent moved out of the city and we are taking on a significant new expense with the opening of our new senior center.” 

Although the City’s General Plan would allow up to 180 housing units and 155,000 square feet of development at that site, maximum buildout would need to be approved by city officials. Opponents of the measure cite that geological and biological constraints would limit what could be developed on the property.

The General Plan also states that the city “will not sacrifice the area’s natural environment or its residents’ quality of life in the pursuit of municipal income.” Tax revenue, state opponents to Measure F, is not a reason to approve development. 

In addition, a city council member and city manager should not be actively lobbying for development despite environmental and quality of life issues for residents on the west side of Calabasas.

(Beth Cone Kramer is a Los Angeles writer and a columnist for CityWatch.)

-cw

SPEAKING UP TO POWER-Every two years Anglenos have the unique opportunity to share their views on the future of LA’s energy policy during public comment on the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) 20-year Integrated Resource Plan (IRP). It may sound like the kind of dry process that would attract only the wonkiest of policy wonks, but in fact it is a crucial opportunity to pressure our leaders to chart a bold course towards the health and wellbeing of LA’s communities. 

LADWP says that the IRP focuses exclusively on three “Rs”: Rates, Reliability and Renewables. Given the health and climate change consequences of a 20-year energy plan, it is unacceptable that a public-owned utility does not focus on the human and environmental cost to our communities and future generations. Somehow LADWP understands we need renewables as a matter of costs, but it fails to acknowledge the bigger issue at hand, that they are key to solving our dependence on fossil fuels and the damage they inflict in our communities and our environment. 

After the SoCal Gas blowout near Porter Ranch disrupted thousands of families, Food & Water Watch and our partners pressured City Hall and LADWP to study transitioning Los Angeles to100 percent renewable energy to end the City’s dependence on dirty, fracked gas. We were initially encouraged to learn that LADWP’s IRP intended to study a 100 percent fossil-free scenario. However, the IRP seems like it will only contemplate reaching 65 percent renewable energy by 2035, at best. Worse yet, LADWP is planning to invest heavily in gas-powered plants. 

As Los Angeles moves off of coal by 2025, there are plans to reinvest in a whole new era of LADWP gas power plants. The gas power plants are located throughout Los Angeles County in Sun Valley, Wilmington, El Segundo, and Long Beach and disproportionately impact low income, communities of color. We are at a crossroads. DWP has a choice to reinvest in dirty, polluting gas power plants or move to clean, renewable energy. 

This is an opportunity to inject equity and justice in our energy plans and make smarter, more just choices. The City must clean up communities burdened with pollution from gas plants and infrastructure by decommissioning these facilities and transitioning to 100 percent renewable energy. 

Thanks to efforts by Councilmembers Mike Bonin and Paul Krekorian, Los Angeles has approved a motion to study 100 percent renewable energy for Los Angeles. But the IRP process is where the rubber meets the road. LADWP is making decisions this year about LA’s energy future that falls short of this 100 percent renewable goal. 

Affordable clean energy technology is here and has been for a while. LADWP must transition the city to 100 percent renewables by 2030. No excuses. We don’t need to just reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, we need to end it. Fortunately the technology to make the transition will also generate good, green jobs. 

Even without the pressing environmental and public health needs the case for renewables can be made in terms of hard costs alone. For example, an air-cooled gas generator can cost up to 10 times as much as solar power. Once human health and climate change are factored in, there is absolutely no reason to invest in old, dirty technology. 

It’s time for LADWP to break up with all fossil fuels and embrace renewables to generate power, to become an advocate for electric transportation, for both private cars and public transit. Some electric vehicles even have the technology to power homes in case of outages. More importantly millions of residents who live near freeways will no longer be exposed to tailpipe emissions. 

Additionally, as the devastating drought continues, it is undisputable that renewables have a much lower water footprint than fossil fuels. From extraction to transportation and refinement, fossil fuels cannot compete with renewables when it comes to water savings.  

It’s time for Mayor Eric Garcetti, the City Council and LADWP to take leadership. They can choose to do right by Angelenos or they can choose to keep sacrifice zones where people and the environment will pay a hefty price. Our communities have a huge opportunity to remind them of these obligations during the IRP, October 26 through November 14, whether by showing up at a LADWP meeting, submitting written comment or visiting City Hall. Help lead Los Angeles into a clean energy future. 

NEED TO KNOW--IRP Hearings 

First Hearing: October 26, 6-8pm; DWP Headquarters, 111 N. Hope Street, Los Angeles 90012 

Second Hearing: November 2, 6-8p; Wilmington Senior Citizen Center, 1371 Eubank Avenue, Wilmington, CA 90744 

Third Hearing: November 3, 6-8p; Pacoima Neighborhood City Hall Cultural Room, 13520 Van Nuys Blvd, Pacoima 91331

(Andrea Leon-Grossman is an organizer with Food & Water Watch focusing on a just transition to 100 percent renewable energy for Los Angeles.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

PERSPECTIVE-Last Thursday evening, I had the pleasure of attending a debate between two gentlemen in the race to replace termed-out Fran Pavley in the 27th SD. It was sponsored by the American Association of University Women (San Fernando Valley Branch), NOW and the League of Women Voters. Representatives from four West Valley Neighborhood Councils were there. 

Henry Stern (photo above right), who serves on Pavley’s staff, and Steve Fazio, a long-time small businessman in the San Fernando Valley, faced each other at the Westfield Mall, fielding questions from a panel and the audience. 

The civility was refreshing. 

The 27th is not my district. My reason for being there was to hear where the two opponents stood on California’s misguided and bloated high-speed rail project, particularly Mr. Stern’s view. 

I met with him shortly before the primary. We discussed a number of issues, including HSR. I was impressed by his overall pragmatism, especially when it came to transportation priorities. 

He stated then that he was supportive of commuter rail in general, but the HSR project was poorly conceived and planned. 

I was wondering if he would stick to that position, especially when Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom recently flipped his stance. Perhaps Newsom buckled under pressure from the unions and contractors who stand to benefit from this financial debacle on rails, a project that is absorbing critical cap-and-trade funds. 

If anything, Stern doubled down and recommended that the plan be put before the voters again.

He emphasized that HSR was putting the cart before the horse. What good would it be if we did not first develop intra-city transportation? 

To be fair, Fazio also voiced strong opposition. 

But if we are going to kill HSR, it would die a quicker death if there were more Democrats behind the effort to do so. That’s why candidates such as Stern and Patty Lopez, who is running for re-election in the 39th Assembly District, could further nudge others within their party to stop it before there is too much more money wasted.

+++++

Patty Lopez (photo above left) is engaged in a stalwart campaign, a rematch against party-insider favorite Raul Bocanegra. Despite her solid voting record along party lines, as well as getting several bills important to her constituents passed, the Democratic Party is supporting her opponent. 

It’s all about money. Bocanegra spent lavishly on his colleagues’ campaigns in the 2014 election. He was an ATM for established members of the legislature. You don’t mess around with one of the good old boys, especially when he raises dough. 

Yet, she stands a chance. 

Bocanegra garnered only 44% of the primary vote this time compared to 62% in 2014 – the same year Lopez upset him in the general election. Perhaps money doesn’t buy as many votes these days. A measurable majority of voters did not support him. 

A passage in a San Francisco Chronicle article about Lopez says it all: 

“It’s nice to have an outsider in Sacramento,” said Lea-Ann Tratten, political director for the Consumer Attorneys of California, one of the few interest groups that have donated to Lopez. 

“It’s refreshing. And frankly I think we need more of that. But that’s not how Sacramento works. It’s very much an insider game.”

(Paul Hatfield is a CPA and serves as President of the Valley Village Homeowners Association. He blogs at Village to Village and contributes to CityWatch. The views presented are those of Mr. Hatfield and his alone and do not represent the opinions of Valley Village Homeowners Association or CityWatch. He can be reached at: [email protected].) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

PLATKIN ON PLANNING--Los Angeles may have an aging, out-of-date General Plan, but it, surprisingly, does have a planning process. It might not be the one taught to professional city planners in graduate school, and it might not be the one required by the State of California, as formulated in up-to-date General Plan Guidelines from the Governor’s office of Planning and Research. Nevertheless, it is there, warts and all.  

The real planning process is totally ad hoc, and the best way to understand it is through the metaphor of a football field. At the line of scrimmage – which corresponds to real estate speculation -- are elected officials, for the most part hand picked by one of the teams. On one side of the officials is a team of professional football players, what seasoned observers call the urban growth machine.  On the other side is the junior varsity, which is corresponds to neighborhood and environmental groups. 

As they battle each other to move the line of scrimmage, at City Hall this translates to the permitted size, height, and use of buildings. The professional team usually wins, which means that the elected officials routinely approve their projects. 

Sometimes, though, the scrappy junior varsity pulls off a victory, and it is able to stall or even stop plans, zoning ordinances, and individual projects because they are out-of-scale, out-of-character, or out-of-synch with infrastructure and service systems. With the help of outsiders, such as lawyers, the junior varsity occasionally scores a big win, like AB 283, which puts the planning process back on track for several years.  

But, while the football game is played for control of privately owned land, the stadium itself is wobbly and on the verge of collapse. This means that even when the pros have a winning streak, which is most of the time, the stadium and its surroundings are still in bad shape. Failure, in fact, is only a question of time, as explained below. 

The major steps of this rickety process 

Macro-level Planning: The following is the logical sequence of events, but in Los Angeles many steps are conducted out-of-sequence. For example, the City is now redefining local zoning through re:code LA, prior to any official updates of the General Plan and local Community Plans. In a great sci-fi time-travel plot, City Hall is implementing plans that have not yet been prepared and adopted. 

• The City Council approves the General Plan, including its mandatory and optional elements. The mandatory elements are stipulated by State Law, while, optional elements, such as the General Plan Framework, are initiated by the City Council. 

• The General Plan is then implemented by zoning ordinances, municipal budgets, and Capital Improvement Programs. 

• Public agencies, both municipal and external (LAUSD), engage in their own sectorial planning, budgeting, and work programs in parallel to the General Plan. They each operate in a silo, independent of other City departments and outside agencies, oblivious to the City’s official planning process. 

• While State law has detailed General Plan monitoring report methodologies and requirements, they are ignored by the City of Los Angeles, which does not systematically monitor its General Plan, departmental and agency sectorial plans, and the City’s five year Capital Improvement Program.  

Micro-level push back against planning: In response to top-down macro level planning, at the level of private land use there are many forces pushing in the opposite direction. 

• On a lot-by-lot basis developers apply for parcel-level discretionary actions, such as the spot-zones and spot-General Plan Amendments that the Neighborhood Integrity Ordinance intends to stop. 

• Aggrieved parties, usually neighbors or local civic organizations, appeal these discretionary actions. The adopted discretionary actions then fold in many conditions of approval, most of which are beyond the authority of City Planning and the concern of Building and Safety. 

• Communities push back against over-development through local zoning overlay ordinances, such as Specific Plans and Historical Preservation Overlay Zones. 

• Developers also push back against adopted plans and zones with their own pro-development zoning overlay ordinances, such as Transit Neighborhood Plans.  

• Developers also push back against adopted plans and zones through bootlegged and illegal construction. When residents report these code violations to the Department of Building and Safety, the Department sporadically mails out notices to correct or issues citations. The buck usually stops at this point though since the City Attorney seldom pursues zoning and building code cases. 

One consequence of this convoluted planning process is that the city’s public infrastructure and services -- like the football stadium in our analogy -- are ignored. The Department of City Planning defines their day-to-day planning mission as the efficient processing of developers’ requests for discretionary actions. It is not comprehensive, rigorously monitored planning, but what the executive suite calls the “development process,” and what they publicly define as promoting foreign and domestic investment in quickly approved Los Angeles real estate projects.  

Because this outlook has been regularly shared with Neighborhood Councils and other community groups in recent years, they, too, have gradually accepted this truncated definition of city planning. Rather than holding City Hall’s feet to the fire to make sure that planning includes carefully monitored goals and programs related to air quality, public facilities, parks, streets and sidewalks, mass transit, libraries, climate change, emergency services, and the full spectrum of municipal infrastructure, they too often but unwittingly abet the real estate speculation agenda of the City’s elected officials, especially Mayor Eric Garcetti. 

Luckily, this minimalist approach to municipal governance is now peaking, like it did in the 1980s and 90s, because of public push back. The City not only regularly loses law suits over illegally granted zoning entitlements, but from March 2017 onward, the City’s voters will most likely force City Hall to start planning Los Angeles through the Neighborhood Integrity Ordinance. The era of market forces substituting for the planning process is finally coming to an end, and you can lend a hand to make it happen. 

(Dick Platkin is a former Los Angeles City Planner who reports on local planning issues for CityWatch. Please submit any comments or corrections to [email protected].)

-cw

PLAYING WITH CALPERS (PART 3)--Now that we have examined the who’s who of CalPERS Board and Staff in my previous CityWatch articles, how does the system function? On the one hand, we have Board President Rob Feckner; he chairs the general meeting. This is the guy who fatuously remarked upon Fred Buenstroso’s “retirement,” that “he was talking to us for a while about retiring and seeing about doing something else.” Yeah, like going to jail. 

Rob’s latest (August 3, 2016) has been a couple of videos and a PR piece entitled, “CalPERS is Well-Prepared for Market’s Ups and Downs.” Sure they are. His written commentary was printed in the Sacramento Bee in response to getting hammered in the press over a 1% return for last year, as well as questions about future returns. 

Clearly Mr. Feckner is either living under a rock or he simply functions as a front for the CalPERS staff. I vote for the latter, and that was the reason for my last article on the Executive Staff team structure and the staffing that Ann Stausboll created during her tenure. 

There are serious questions as to whether or not the CIO, Ted Eliopoulos, and his Private Equity staffer, Real Desrochers, are up to the job. My favorite blog, Naked Capitalism, has been calling them out for years. Check out this article from Fortune Magazine. 

Equally, there are substantive questions as to the legal advice given to the Board by their General Counsel, Matthew Jacobs. At a recent Investment Committee meeting, he gave seriously flawed legal advice about limiting public comment and whether or not it has to be allowed for each agenda item. 

The subject matter prompting the bogus advice couldn’t be more important -- dealing with the pitiful rate of return on CalPERS investments, which has formed the core basis of naysayers’ attacks on the pension system. To read about those into details, Naked Capitalism called him out on it in a lengthy and damning piece. 

Next, as I wrote some time ago in CityWatch, the hiring process that CalPERS followed in obtaining outside fiduciary counsel for the Board smelled to high heaven and resulted in the Board hiring a sleazeball Florida lawyer named Robert Klausner. He, by the way, isn’t even licensed in the State of California as an attorney, even though he’s been giving the Board legal advice! 

It was within this context that I raised the question at the end of last week’s article, as to why CEO Ann Stausboll would suddenly retire at age 59 1/2 -- with the caveat that I am not a part of the 1%, so I don’t know what goes on in the minds of CEO’s making $300,000 per year or above. However, unless you are a safety employee, whose pensions are mostly based on a retirement age of 50, few people in CalPERS or any other California public sector pension plan retire at age 59 1/2. The trade-offs between age and benefit amount are simply too high. The “sweet spot” is usually age 62 and the 100% gold standard is age 65. 

Finally, and we won’t know the answer to this question for some time, there is the fact that as her last major act prior to announcing her retirement, Stausboll brokered a real estate deal in New York City; a 51-story office building at 787 Seventh Avenue, to the tune of $1.9 billion. This in a frothy market. 

RIABiz, a financial services advisory industry blog, evaluated her tenure at CalPERS with a big question mark. 

Cracks and Attacks on CalPERS and Defined Benefit Plans in General 

Quite aside from CalPERS’ ability to shoot itself in its collective foot, there are fundamental issues here that go to the core of our society and public service. 

Remember, the cratering of our economy in 2007/08 by the financial services industry was not a one-off. If it were not for our government and the central bank (The Fed) handing out money at 0% like candy corn, and buying up most of their toxic assets, most of the financial services industry would have gone broke. And they are still being propped up by the Fed and our government, which has failed to jail a single one of the crooks that caused this catastrophe. 

Imagine if you and I had access to 0% interest “we don’t care about credit scores” money, and the government would buy up every one of our toxic loans. Wow! Never happen, of course. 

So the same forces that tanked our economy have to look around for targets other than themselves to blame. Otherwise, a lot of us might start asking why our 401-k plans that were for “retirement” suddenly lost half their value and were suddenly declared “not a retirement plan,” – so much so that a lot of people may never get to retire. 

Well, the last places that actually have tangible assets to strip away are the public sector defined benefit pension plans. So once they stopped playing with hedge funds and private equity scam artists, the relentless move to do away with them really began in earnest. 

Of course the end game is not pretty. First, you make these systems subject to ordinary bankruptcy processes. Then you go in, declare them insolvent, strip out the assets, and leave the empty shell and the troops to fend for themselves. After all, bonuses are once a year for the top of the food chain. 

Lest you think I am joking, look at private sector defined benefit plans from the big companies back in the 60s and 70s. Corporate raiders like Carl Icahn would go in with their Mergers and Acquisitions buddies, would use borrowed money to buy the companies, then strip the pension plans to pay for the deal, leaving the carcass to rot. Net result: no mas defined benefit plans in the private sector and no pushback from the U.S. government. 

Fueling the Attacks 

To be fair, public employees and public sector management bear a good chunk of the blame for inviting the demise of one of the last decent pension plans in the U.S. I posit two specific areas which offer free low hanging fruit for those who want to go after CalPERS. 

First, take the case of the “3@50” pension plan for public safety members -- essentially, police and firefighters. The formula provides that at age 50, these employees can retire with a pension based on taking 3% of their highest years’ earnings, and multiplying it by the number of years of service. With the minimum 10 years of vesting required for full benefits, and 50 years of age, that would mean that the officer/firefighter would receive 30% of highest year’s salary. If you were 20 when you hired on and had worked for 30 years at age 50, that percentage would rise to 90% of your highest years’ earnings for life. 

By a couple of other mechanisms, referred to as “pension spiking” and playing with what hours of “work” count towards salary, the dollar amounts for some individuals have reached fairly irrational levels. Take the police officer who suddenly gets “promoted” to Sergeant, or the firefighter who suddenly gets “promoted” to Battalion Chief, each a little more than a year before he or she retires. It all counts in their final compensation number for calculating the retirement amount. 

The articulated premise behind the “3@50” formula was that these are very arduous professions, and employees are just plain physically worn out by age 50. Of course, you could make the same argument for hard physical labor like construction or assembly line plant workers. 

Some individuals who have really gamed the system offer terrific photo opportunities to attack the entire CalPERS system, even though the average pension for the average employee is more like $3000/month at age 65. And, by the way, many of these employees do not receive Social Security benefits at all, for reasons too complicated for this article. 

My second example of low hanging fruit for the naysayers has to do with high level public sector managers. It is not unusual these days for the City Manager of a small city to make something like $300,000 per year or more. And that doesn’t count the brazen crooks like Robert Rizzo, the former City Manager of Bell, now sitting in jail for 12 years in a massive corruption scheme. 

When managers start to get paid like CEOs of large corporations, ordinary folks start wondering what the heck is happening to the concept of “public service,” and they have a point. Add to that a spate of corruption charges against high level public managers, and you once again have wonderful photo ops for those interested in taking the system down. 

The LA Times Series 

I truly believe that the Times series is ideologically based. Take a look at a revealing section of the first article on The Pension Gap:  

“In 2012, Gov. Jerry Brown, a Democrat, persuaded the legislature to raise the retirement age for new employees and reduce their benefits slightly. That will save money decades from now, when those employees retire, but it will not reduce the cost of benefits already locked in for active and retired workers.” (emphasis added) 

Similar loaded comments abound in the other pieces. For example, in the one called A CalPERS Primer, we have the ominous header, “Has anyone tried to dilute labor’s influence?” Gee, guess the answer. 

And finally, at least until further installments, there is a piece about how CalPERS is faring in the court system, with a clear message that the courts have a duty to reverse existing case law and break the promises made to existing beneficiaries. Read between the lines; what they are really talking about is the ability to reduce the cost of benefits already locked in for active and retired workers. This includes, one presumes, the ability for court ordered bankruptcy and the abrogation of all kinds of things. 

What Can Be Done 

Believe it or not, there are a couple of things that can be done to slightly modify the current system and allow these plans to survive on a go forward basis. In the last of my CalPERS article next week, I will provide some details and give my reasoning.

(Tony Butka is an Eastside community activist, who has served on a neighborhood council, has a background in government and is a contributor to CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

THE EPPERHART REPORT--Propositions, initiatives, measures, referenda, annoying – call them what you will, but they have been an integral part of California democracy for more than a hundred years. More than any other state, California relies on its citizens to propose and make law. 

It all started when Hiram Johnson, a progressive Republican, was elected governor in 1910. He crisscrossed the state in an automobile railing against the power of corporations, particularly the Southern Pacific Railroad. Big money determined who would run for office, who would win, and how they would vote once they got to Sacramento. 

Johnson won his election and pushed through a number of reforms reducing the power and influence of corporations in the Golden State. Most notably, in 1911, the people got the right to introduce legislation in the form of ballot initiatives and decide at the polling place whether or not they would become law. 

Even now, 105 years later, Proposition 59, asks voters to urge legislators to support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would overturn the Supreme Court’s decision in the Citizens United case and allow restrictions on campaign contributions and spending. Some things never change. 

Perhaps the greatest impact made by a ballot initiative occurred in 1978 when, by an overwhelming majority, Californians adopted Proposition 13. It rolled back property tax rates and capped annual increases. It also required a two-thirds vote to approve certain tax increases. In the years since, despite ongoing criticism, the impact of Prop. 13 has only been expanded and never reduced. It is known as the “third rail” of California politics. Touch it and you die. 

In 1994, Proposition 187 called for denying government services to undocumented aliens. Despite passage with 60 percent approval, it was never implemented due to a court injunction that stands to this day. What’s notable is not the measure, but the effects of the campaign supporting it. The pro-187 advertising run by the Republicans was viewed by many as racist and is considered to have triggered a mass movement of Hispanic voters to the Democrats. 

In 1998, voters passed a law, Prop. 227, to outlaw bilingual education in public schools. This year, Prop. 58 would repeal most of that ban. If it passes, it will be a clear demonstration of the demographic shift in California’s electorate.

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If adopted, two initiatives may have the most far-reaching consequences. 

The first, Proposition 62, proposes abolishing the death penalty in California. Currently, there are 741 prisoners awaiting execution, more than any other state. There have been 13 executions in California in the last 40 years. The reality is that a death row inmate is more likely to die of old age than lethal injection. (Another measure, Prop. 66, seeks to speed up the appeals process in an effort to ratchet up the number of executions.) 

The second, Proposition 64, would legalize the recreational use of marijuana. It many ways, it merely recognizes what is already a fact of life. But, acknowledging that fact legally and normalizing its use in the same manner as tobacco and alcohol is a big step for government. 

Finally, the state Democratic and Republican parties disagree on just about every measure. However, they both recommend a no vote on Proposition 60, which would require the use of condoms in adult films. In this time of political polarization, it’s good to know there’s something that can unite us.

(Doug Epperhart is a publisher, a long-time neighborhood council activist and former Board of Neighborhood Commissioners commissioner. He is a contributor to CityWatch and can be reached at: [email protected]) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

NEW GEOGRAPHY--The consumer technology boom, largely responsible for a resurgence in California’s economy after the tech wreck of 2001, seems to be coming to an end. The signs are widespread: slowing employment, layoffs from bell-weather social media companies, the almost embarrassing difficulty of finding buyers for Twitter, the absorption of Yahoo by Verizon and the acquisition by Microsoft of LinkedIn.

This is not to minimize the great things which have been accomplished over 15 years of massive investment in these technologies. Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook in 2004, and is now worth some $55 billion, up $15 billion from last year. In 2015, more than 1 billion people globally used Facebook applications every single day. The “app economy” created by Steve Jobs and Apple is equally impressive. What would we have done with our free time if it were not for Farmville, Angry Birds and Pokemon Go?

The tech boom has changed the face of wealth in America. Tech oligarchs, mostly clustered in the Bay Area, which dominates some 40 percent of employment in search and web publishing, now account for one quarter of the wealth of the Forbes 400 richest Americans. This tilting of wealth is not going away, and may shape the business world for a generation.

Concentration and contraction

Overall though, the economic impact of these technologies has been limited. Google’s Alphabet Inc. and Facebook Inc. together employ fewer than 75,000 people, one-third fewer than Microsoft, worth only a fraction its value. Snapchat, the star of Silicon Beach, employs several hundred people, hardly enough to reverse a long-term decline in Southern California tech employment.

More troubling still are changes in the Bay Area tech culture. In its 1980s heyday, Silicon Valley was a Wild West of start-ups, new companies and ideas, and lots of jobs. Today, it resembles increasingly the cozy and fundamentally uncompetitive world of Detroit’s Big Three — Ford, Chrysler and General Motors. The Valley is increasingly dominated by a handful of companies — Google, Facebook and Apple — while conditions for startups, even well-funded ones, have deteriorated markedly.

Despite the hype surrounding the possible IPO for Snapchat, new firms raised $15 billion in venture capital during the third quarter of 2016 — ending in September — down 28.6 percent from $21 billion for the same period one year ago. The third quarter of 2016 marked the fifth straight quarterly decline in completed financings and the lowest number recorded by PitchBook since the fourth quarter of 2010, signaling that investors are writing bigger checks for fewer deals.

Rather than the Wild West, we are seeing consolidation in social media, which depends largely on advertising revenue. Google and Facebook claimed 64 percent of that revenue, according to Pivotal Research. Google scooped up $30 billion and Facebook gathered $8 billion, while other smaller companies have lost market share over the last five years.

As promising start-ups are swallowed up at an alarming rate, the likely scenario, as we have seen in other industries, may be secular stagnation. With less competition and innovation, the track record of oligarchies, particularly regionally incestuous ones, is not a great one, as anyone who deals with new Microsoft or Apple operating systems, can attest. Even Sergei Brin, a co-founder of Google, recently suggested that start-ups would be better off launching somewhere else.

One door closes, another opens

The preponderance of evidence is pointing to the end of the boom era in social media growth. Already, there are clear signs of slowing, with layoffs growing rapidly and more companies looking for space in less expensive, less highly regulated areas.

Yet this shift from social media may prove a long-term benefit both to the national economy and California. The sad truth is that for all the billions earned in stock market value, social media, unlike past tech booms, has done precious little to boost economic productivity. According to the Pew Center for Internet, Science and Tech, 56 percent of workers who use social media platforms for work-related purposes agree that social media distracts from the work they need to do, with 30 percent agreeing strongly.

Rather than thrilling tweens with their first Tweets, technology companies may be shifting to far more important callings. In the Bay Area and elsewhere, firms are delving into promising fields including autonomous vehicles, machine learning, artificial intelligence, financial technology, biomedical research and even space exploration. These endeavors do more than simply keep people entertained and informed about their friends. They may create the basis for longer-lasting growth in the productive economy, not only here in California, but around the nation.

Will California be able to maintain its innovation dominance in this next tech cycle? The Golden State faces the twin headwinds of high housing prices and restrictive regulations. These growing technologies require interfacing with the analog (aka real) world, relying more on 30-something, experienced engineers and data scientists than the millennial hipsters and coders who have fueled social media and casual gaming. California needs to make housing affordable and lessen regulatory burden for business if it plans to lead the next wave.

(Joel Kotkin is the R.C. Hobbs Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University in Orange and executive director of the Houston-based Center for Opportunity Urbanism. Marshall Toplansky is senior advisor to Chapman University in the area of Data & Analytics, as well as an adjunct faculty member at the Argyros School of Business and Economics. This piece appeared most recently at New Geography.) 

-cw

CORRUPTION WATCH-While we know that Lord Acton was correct in 1887 when he said power tends to corrupt and we also acknowledge that corruption tends to destroy, we seldom trace out exactly the relationship between excessive power, corruption, and destruction. We now have a case example with the Urban Blox project in Valley Village, called the Hermitage Project. 

But first, let’s remember that Lord Acton was not the first to complain about the corruption which comes with power. In fact, the Founding Fathers tried to work out this problem, which is how we ended up with a government of checks and balances. A monarchy proved to concentrate too much power into one person’s hands. In the 1770's, everyone was familiar with feudal life and how the aristocracy ruled over its serfs. Each feudal lord had absolute control over his fiefdom so long as he pleased the Prince above him. 

America rejected the feudal form of government so it’s notable that in 2006 it was resurrected by Eric Garcetti in our own City Council with the “Voting Trading Pact.” Under the City’s government, each council district is a fiefdom, subject to the absolute rule of the councilmember. That control is rooted in the pact to never Vote No on any project in another’s district. Thus, each councilmember is guaranteed that, no matter what atrocious behind-the-scenes deal he makes with a developer, the LA City Council will unanimously approve the deal.   

This is why the City Council unanimously approves each agenda item over 99.9% of the time. The power of each CM to be able to guarantee a developer that his project will be unanimously approved by the City Council -- no matter how many laws he violates -- is huge. It also closes all the serfs (formerly known as “constituents”) out of the political process. If a councilmember wants to construct an illegal project that will be very harmful to his own district and to surrounding districts, it will pass unanimously. 

The City does not care that “Vote Trading” is a form of bribery which was criminalized by Penal Code 86. Buying a vote with a return vote is bribery just like buying a vote for cash is bribery. There is, however, no way that these councilmembers will relinquish the power to do whatever they want within their own districts. 

The Urban Blox-Councilmember Krekorian Project in Valley Village 

We see the lawlessness that is visited upon Angelenos in the case of Urban Blox’s Hermitage Project in Valley Village where it wants to demolish rent-controlled cottages in order to construct high-end units. 

Urban Blox dispensed with the need to own the property. With the backing of Councilmember Krekorian, Urban Blox decided that it would simply coerce, deceive, and cajole people into handing over their properties. CityWatch has previously written about this project.    

Basically, Urban Blox wanted to tie together three pieces of property along Hermitage Avenue in Valley Village containing only rent-controlled units. Councilmember Krekorian knew that pretending to care about poor people was only political posturing and demolishing these homes so that a developer could make a few million bucks while savaging what is left of the quaintness of Valley Village was far more important to him. After all, Krekorian’s the one who engineered the destruction of Marilyn Monroe’s Valley Village home so that it could not be moved to a safe location. Naturally, the City Council unanimously approved that demolition since there was nothing in the world more important than building five more high-end condos in the San Fernando Valley. (Yes, that was attempted sarcasm.) 

The Urban Blox Hermitage project is right across the street from where Krekorian had Marilyn’s home needlessly destroyed. 

The problem is that Urban Blox does not own the property where it wants to demolish the rent-controlled cottages. In fact, the developer is suing the property owners to compel them to sell the property. It takes a very corrupt City Hall to pretend that a developer has Site Control when he is suing the property owners to force them to sell to him. 

The City Attorney’s Office has known about this game stopper for months but told the Planning Commission to just ignore it. When a councilmember wants to push a project, he’s got the power to tell City departments what to do. Also, Planning has never checked to see if Ellis Act payments were made to the renters. Planning’s excuse for skipping this step was, “We relied on the professionalism of the housing department.” In other words, as far as Planning knows, none of the Ellis Act payments were made. Why should the developer follow the Ellis Act in a lawless society where no violation will ever deprive the developer of unanimous approval? 

After Urban Blox sued the property owners, it decided to sue another entity with claim to the property. That’s how the public found out that Urban Blox has no enforceable right to the property! This is what happens in a society where anyone can do anything and still get unanimous approval. Urban Blox never had any contract with the property owners to buy the land. But, why should Urban Blox follow basic law when it has a city council which always approves everything anyway, no matter what? 

It turns out that a non-registered LLC purported to buy the property, but non-registered LLCs are forbidden from doing business. A contract with a non-registered LLC is a contract with no one. Since Urban Blox based its rights upon nothing, it has no rights to enforce. 

But wait, it gets worse. Since Urban Blox has no rights to the property, it has no Site Control and there is no basis to have Weddington Street vacated and given to the developer. Assemblywoman Patty Lopez has been questioning the propriety of this entire deal for a few months, but Councilmember Krekorian has been blowing her off. Had Krekorian shown elementary courtesy to the State Assembly, this huge defect would have been brought into the light months ago. Instead of following the law, though, Councilmember Krekorian and Urban Blox chose to press ahead, relying on the fact that unanimous city council approval was guaranteed. So, now it seems that Urban Blox owns only one third of the property. But the rights of other people count for naught. 

People wonder, “How did the top 1% end up owning so much wealth, while the rest of us are struggling to survive?” Corruptionism based on the criminal vote trading system at City Hall is part of the answer. 

If the councilmembers knew that they had to justify their actions in order to get a majority vote on the City Council, then they would not feel secure about trampling the law to death. Would Krekorian have wantonly destroyed Marilyn Monroe’s home if he had known that he would have to justify its destruction in front of the entire city council? Probably not. Would Krekorian be trying to push through the destruction of all these rent-controlled units while pretending to be a friend of the homeless? Probably not.   

The criminal vote trading in the LA City Council gives each councilmember way too much power. It means he or she can evade and break any law and still get everything he or she desires. There is no accountability for the tens of thousands of people who have and are being thrown out of their homes and onto the streets so that millionaire developers can build luxury units. And now, the City Council has the nerve to ask the tax payers to give these same developers $1.2 billion under City Measure HHH to build “affordable housing.” 

Krekorian’s and Urban Blox’s attempt to destroy the homes of poor people in Valley Village is sufficient reason to vote “No” on City Measure HHH this November 8. There is something immoral about demolishing the homes of poor people and then using their homelessness as justification for tax increases that, in turn, will end up giving those same developers billions of dollars.

(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney. He can be reached at: [email protected]. Abrams views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

PROP 57 … RESTORING DISCRETION IN SENTENCING-Just how much discretion should we give to officialdom when sentencing people to prison for crimes? It’s a hard question, and, as I’ve learned firsthand, the answer can change through time. Forty years ago, I was a principal proponent of the determinate sentencing law (DSL), which made felony sentencing more predictable, thus reducing the discretion of judges and parole officials. Today, I’m supporting a state ballot initiative -- Proposition 57 -- to modify that legislation and restore some discretion to sentencing. 

And I’m hardly alone in seeing this issue change across time. The leading backer of that 40-year-old law, and of today’s ballot initiative to change it, is the same person: Gov. Jerry Brown. 

Back in 2003, Brown, by then the mayor of Oakland, testified before a state commission that DSL was an “abysmal failure” for which he shared responsibility. In this regard, I also share responsibility. But I think the governor is being too hard on himself. To his credit, he has stuck with the issue and is leading (and largely funding) this year’s campaign for Prop 57, a ballot initiative to ameliorate some of the problems of the last 40 years. I don’t think we were totally wrong in the 1970s. The context was just different, which a brief history demonstrates. 

The 1970s was a decade of tremendous social unrest, especially in prisons. In 1975, legislative hearings concluded a major cause of prison unrest was the “indeterminate” sentence law (ISL) then in place. The ISL prescribed broad sentences (such as five years to life) and gave enormous discretion to the parole board, operating with few rules or regulations. This board had the power to determine the specific sentence by granting parole, including the ability to release a prisoner before the prescribed “minimum” sentence. A prisoner granted a hearing sat before one of multiple parole board panels. If denied parole, a prisoner waited for the next parole hearing, conducted by a different panel, reflecting the whims of the new panel’s members. As a consequence, a prisoner often received contradictory advice from one panel to the other on how to “earn a release date” (learn a trade, gain insight about behavior, earn a GED, get religion, etc.). This experience was problematic for the prisoner, their families, and planning a future. 

The ISL had another feature: It gave the governor control over prison population. Whenever prisons became overcrowded, the governor would quietly issue a “relax release decisions” directive to the parole board to reduce the number of prisoners. Ronald Reagan, Jerry Brown’s predecessor, once reduced the prison population by over 25 percent virtually overnight. The arbitrariness of this opaque practice resulted in uncertainty and disrespect for a process intended to “rehabilitate,” the stated goal of the ISL. 

In 1975, Brown, then newly elected as governor, decided he wanted to stop using this sleight of hand and change the law rather than kick the can down the road, while addressing any concerns of Republicans and law enforcement. 

I participated in the negotiations with the Governor’s staff and interest groups. The DSL was passed in 1976. Its sentences were based on median time served for crimes under the ISL. It made sentencing predictable and limited discretion. The judge could add or subtract a year based on the circumstances of the crime. The DSL was initially touted as a historic reform and praised by correctional experts. 

What went wrong? By increasing transparency around sentencing, the DSL also added to public awareness of the actual lengths of prison sentences. Soon, outrage flared when a heinous crime was considered too lightly punished, and the legislature responded by prescribing ever-longer sentences. 

The prison guards, who gained power, became organized and advocated for longer sentences and more prison (it was good for their business.) And the voters, in their public request for retribution for crimes, adopted initiative measures to add to sentences -- most notably the prison industry-funded “Three Strikes.” Under that measure, a person convicted of shoplifting a package of cheese as a third strike was given a life sentence. 

Today, the number of prisoners serving Three-Strike sentences rivals the total number of prisoners incarcerated in 1976. Indeed, before DSL, California had nine prisons holding approximately 30,000 prisoners. Those numbers eventually increased to 33 prisons with a population at times exceeding 150,000. 

This rising prison population resulted in growing expenses and significant overcrowding, which in turn led the federal courts to intervene and demand a reduction in the number of prisoners. Even after that reduction, the high costs (around $60,000 per year per person) remain. The 2016-17 California budget appropriates 8.1% to prisons, a greater percentage than the 5.3 combined percentage appropriated for both the University of California and the California State University. 

Our budget-constrained era thus presents a difficult choice: Should the taxpayers maintain the greatest public universities or the biggest and costliest prison system? Voters are beginning to conclude, not just in California but in places like Texas and Georgia, there can be too much punishment, which isn’t cheap. 

Proposition 57 is straightforward. The initiative measure simply allows parole consideration for non-violent offenders who have already served their base sentences. It gives prisoners an incentive to earn an earlier release after serving a substantial portion of their sentences. It’s not radical, and not a complete reversal of DSL. Those not granted parole will continue to have their cumulative DSL sentence as a cap on how long they serve. If the initiative were to pass -- and the parole authority were to adopt effective regulations -- the changes would be a long overdue refinement of DSL. 

Did we get DSL wrong? In some ways, if anything, the DSL worked too well. But the larger lesson of the last 40 years is not about one sentencing law. It’s that it remains very hard to rehabilitate felons, a challenge we need to better address. I’ve learned it’s unrealistic to expect a modification of sentencing law -- whether that law is ISL, or DSL or Prop 57 -- to yield rehabilitation. Getting to effective rehabilitation would require a sea change in how we do corrections. 

But DSL wasn’t a mistake. It responded to the real problems of ISL. And the experience of DSL was necessary to show the need for the reforms of Proposition 57. It also helped to have a governor with enough longevity and experience to recognize DSL’s shortcomings, and the political will to address them. 

We’re now, 40 years later, trying to get to a better place -- where we can have a more realistic discussion of what really happens in prisons, and of how much we are willing to pay and sacrifice for punishment.

(Michael B. Salerno is a law professor and director of the legislation clinic at UC Hastings College of the Law. In 1976, he was principal consultant to the California Senate Select Committee on Penal Institutions, the committee responsible for the DSL legislation. This piece first appeared on Zocalo PublicSquare.org.) Primary Editor: Joe Mathews. Secondary Editor: Sophia Kercher. Photo: Rich Pedroncelli/AP Photo. Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

DEATH PENALTY POLITICS--Of the 17 propositions on this year’s California ballot, few are as divisive as the issue of capital punishment. There are actually two separate initiatives targeting the death penalty: Proposition 62, which would abolish the death penalty and replace it with prison without the possibility of parole; and Proposition 66, which would speed up the process to send condemned murderers to the death chamber.

According to campaign finance disclosures compiled by the California Fair Political Practices Commission, much of the pro-death penalty campaign funding is coming directly from police and prison guard unions. The California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA) alone spent $498,304 on Prop. 62, while the Peace Officers Research Association of California spent $455,000 and the California Association of Highway Patrolmen ponied up $250,000 to keep capital punishment.

One recent advertisement, paid for by California’s largest prison guard union, opens with grainy surveillance footage. It shows a terrified young woman squaring off with an attacker. As the woman struggles, a voice-over narrates: “Charles Ng raped, tortured, and killed women. Murdered their babies. Killed their husbands…” Another ad bankrolled by CCPOA features a few members of law enforcement explaining their support of the death penalty — and why voters should support it, too.

“I’ve seen what the worst among us can do,” says Sergeant Dan Cabral of the California Deputy Sheriffs’ Association in one video. “Killings so brutal, families never recover. That’s why we have the death penalty.”

In 2012, another ballot initiative, Proposition 34, also sought (but failed) to eliminate the death penalty. At that time, however, law enforcement unions donated a tiny fraction of what they have spent on the 2016 ballot. It begs the question: Why are law enforcement officers so intent on keeping the death penalty?

The official arguments provided by California law enforcement groups supporting capital punishment claim that the death penalty provides closure to victims’ families, saves taxpayers millions of dollars and that repealing it would jeopardize public safety. Essentially, union officials say the death penalty process in California is broken, but they want legislators to fix it.

Brian Moriguchi, a lieutenant with the LA County Sheriff’s Department and the president of the Los Angeles County Professional Peace Officers Association, which represents 8,800 members of law enforcement, says the death penalty should be reserved for the “worst of the worst.”

“Most police officers, by a very large margin, support the death penalty,” he says. “We’ve been to those calls where somebody has raped and mutilated a child, and we’ve seen the type of people that do that. They are a threat to the safety of others as long as they are alive. Even locked down in prison, [they are] still a threat.”

Lt. Moriguchi says there is increased support for the death penalty this year, as opposed to 2012, because of an increase in violence targeted against police officers, not just in California, but around the country. (According to FBI data released in October, 41 officers were killed in the line of duty in 2015. Already in 2016, 46 officers have been killed.)

“What has changed since 2012 is that there is a greater attack on police officers today, where people want to kill police officers,” Lt. Moriguchi says. “ We’re passionate about that this year particularly because we see the assaults on police officers increasing. We want to see justice for those police officers, and we want to see those people on death row.”

(The other top three unions behind the campaign did not return requests for comment.)

Some outside of law enforcement, however, believe the motivations to support the death penalty are far more political than practical.

Bill Zimmerman, a longtime California political campaign manager, says the current wave of law enforcement support for the death penalty is a reaction to increased scrutiny over police and prison officials. The unions, he says, are “feeling threatened by this climate of police reform. They see this as a battle in a long war, and it’s a battle they don’t want to lose. If they can win this battle, they see it as something that gives them more clout, or at least the perception that they’re a powerful political force when it comes to legislative matters.”

Zimmerman believes financial support for the death penalty is a reaction to movements like Black Lives Matter, which some police officials say undermine respect for law enforcement.

“Their support for the death penalty fits into a larger context of criminal justice reform going on in California,” Zimmerman says. “The events in Ferguson, Missouri led to a new wave of public demands for reform — of criminal justice and police behavior. We’ve seen an enormous increase in the fundraising capability of law enforcement [unions]. Organizations that used to give $5,000 to $10,000, in this death penalty fight in 2016 are giving $50,000 or $100,000.”

Both sides agree that the death penalty system is outrageously expensive, costing some $150 million per year for the state because of extra litigation costs and a lengthy appeals process. The entire death penalty system is said to have cost taxpayers $5 billion since 1978. However, rather than just get rid of it, law enforcement groups say the death penalty process should be reformed.

“Death row inmates have murdered over 1,000 victims, including 226 children and 43 police officers; 294 victims were raped and/or tortured,” the campaign explains. “It’s time California reformed our death penalty process so it works.”

Prison guard unions particularly support the death penalty, largely because their leaders say that convicted murderers would have nothing to fear (and might target prison guards) if the death penalty were not on the table. “Without the death penalty, what’s to stop the killer who’s serving life without parole, from killing inside the prison? asks CCPOA president Chuck Alexander in the latest advertisement. “It’s our last defense.”

Matt Cherry, executive director of Death Penalty Focus of California, disagrees with that notion, and says that even with the death penalty, a convicted murderer could still harm a guard on death row. More broadly, though, Cherry says there’s no statistical evidence to show that states with the death penalty experience fewer attacks on police officers. (In fact, the murder rate is lower in states without the death penalty.) “That’s one of the arguments that police like to use,” Cherry says. “I personally don’t think it’s convincing.”

Cherry believes police and prison guard unions feel they’re under pressure.

“There is a certain sense amongst police that times are changing, that there’s more criticism of police actions and the union leaders are hunkering down and rallying around the traditional causes that they have supported,” Cherry says.

He adds, “I don’t think that’s universal, though. You see a lot of smart police chiefs who don’t take that opinion.”

He’s right — not all police chiefs support the death penalty. A 2009 report from the Death Penalty Information Center, a nonprofit research group, polled police chiefs around the country about all the different methods that could be used to reduce crime. Their findings: The use of capital punishment ranked dead last, according to the police chiefs.

So what’s the disconnect? Why do union leaders and police officials continue to support the death penalty if many, at least in the privacy of an anonymous poll, agree it’s ineffective and too expensive? According to Dr. George Kain, a current police commissioner in Ridgefield, Connecticut, it’s because police unions have an “arm-in-arm” mentality.

“It’s so polarized,” says Kain, who began his career as a probation officer. “You can’t be on the fence with this if you’re a cop. The political climate now is forcing people to one side or the other. It’s easier to get pushed towards support of the bully mentality: ‘We’re gonna execute more people, and we’re gonna execute them more quickly.’”

In California, that sort of mentality could have extreme consequences. Right now, there are 741 inmates on death row — more than any other state. However, California has only carried out 13 executions since it reinstated the death penalty in 1978. (Its most recent execution was in 2006.)

As of mid-October, opponents of Prop. 62 (which would keep the death penalty legal) have raised about $4.3 million, compared to $8.9 million raised by groups that want to abolish the death penalty. Supporters of Prop. 66 (which would speed up the death penalty process) have raised $4.9 million, compared to the $10 million collected by its opponents. Put simply, groups supporting the death penalty are being outspent by about 2-to-1 by groups that oppose it.

However, the most recent polls are showing a tight race; there is a slight lead for proponents of abolishing the death penalty, but only by a slim margin. Nationally, support for the death penalty is waning. A September 2016 Pew Research poll found that support is currently the lowest in more than four decades.

Regardless of national sentiment, law enforcement leaders within California, such as Sacramento Sheriff Scott Jones, are hoping voters will keep (and reform) capital punishment on November 8. “The public and law enforcement recognize that [capital punishment] makes our communities safer by acting as a deterrent and ensures that the most violent criminals will never be released into our communities again,” Jones, the president of California Peace Officers’ Association, wrote in a recent letter.

But they are facing an increasing amount of opposition, not just from wealthy anti-death penalty advocates — but from crime victims as well.

One of them is Dionne Wilson. Wilson’s husband, Dan Niemi, was a police officer in San Leandro, California who was shot and killed in the line of duty in 2005. Irving Ramirez, 23, was charged and convicted of Niemi’s murder.

At the time of his sentencing, Wilson says, she “begged” the judge for a death penalty sentence. On August 3, 2007, Wilson got her wish. (Ramirez remains alive and on death row.)

But as the years went on, Wilson’s opinion began to change about the death penalty. She no longer supports it — in fact, she’s on a crusade to get the death penalty repealed. Instead of executions, Wilson wants to see legislators use that $150 million go towards victim services, programs to treat mental illness and drug addiction, education and afterschool programs, and other crime reduction initiatives.

“I understand that type of vengeance-based reaction,” she says. “Trust me, I get it. But there seems to be a lack of analysis in that position.”

She adds, “Our criminal justice dollars are misused in this way. It’s frustrating to me. It’s just ‘cop killers deserve to die.’ Well, okay, but is there a better way to hold people accountable than propping up a system that has wasted $5 billion for the past 30 years? I can certainly think of better ways to invest that money.”

(Eric Markowitz has written for the New Yorker, GQ, Newsweek, the Atlantic and other publications. In 2016 he received two awards from the Society of American Business Editors and Writers for his coverage of the United States prison system. This perspective was posted originally at Capital and Main.) 

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PLANET WATCH--Despite living in the Arctic in a time of unprecedented climate change, the bearded seal is doing okay: the International Union for Conservation of Nature lists it as species of least concern, its population size remains fairly robust, and there have been no clear signs of a decline. But climate projections show that by mid-century, the Arctic sea ice the bearded seal depends on for survival will decline by at least 40 percent, meaning odds are high that, if climate change continues apace and models hold true, the bearded seal won’t be okay for long.

And that, according to a landmark decision handed down Monday by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, is enough to warrant listing the species as endangered, even though it’s not endangered right now — a decision that could have implications for future conservation cases around the country.

The Center for Biological Diversity, which first petitioned for the bearded seal to be listed as endangered eight years ago, applauded the court’s decision, noting that it would help protect the species from the threat of climate change.

“This is a huge victory for bearded seals and shows the vital importance of the Endangered Species Act in protecting species threatened by climate change,” Kristen Monsell, an attorney for the Center of Biological Diversity, said in a statement. “This decision will give bearded seals a fighting chance while we work to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions melting their sea-ice habitat and keep dirty fossil fuels in the ground.”

In 2008, citing studies which showed that the bearded seal’s habitat would rapidly decline in the face of climate change, the Center for Biological Diversity asked asked the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to list the bearded seal as as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act. Receding sea ice, the Center argued, would force bearded seals to nurse their pups closer to the shore — exposing them to land-based predators like polar bears — and search for food in deeper, less productive waters.

In 2012, NMFS agreed with the Center for Biological Diversity’s petition, and listed the bearded seal as threatened. Two years later, fossil fuel interests like the Alaska Oil and Gas Association and the American Petroleum Institute, joined by the state of Alaska and several native Alaskan groups, filed a lawsuit disputing the listing. In 2014, a lower court vacated NMFS’ initial listing, stating it was “based upon speculation” and calling it “arbitrary and capricious.”

On Monday, a three-judge panel overturned that decision, concluding that the NMFS acted reasonably, based on “substantial evidence,” when it found that climate change would endanger the bearded seal population in the foreseeable future.

“There is no debate that temperatures will continue to increase over the remainder of the century and that the effects will be particularly acute in the Arctic,” the decision, written by Circuit Judge Richard Paez, read. “The current scientific consensus is that Arctic sea ice will continue to recede through 2100, and NMFS considered the best available research to reach that conclusion.”

But perhaps more importantly, the court found that the NMFS’ definition of “foreseeable future” as 500 to 100 years was not too broad, even if climate models can be volatile that far out.

“The fact that climate projections for 2050 through 2100 may be volatile does not deprive those projections of value in the rulemaking process,” the decision read. “The ESA does not require NMFS to make listing decisions only if underlying research is ironclad and absolute.”

That decision, according to Vermont Law School professor Pat Parenteau, makes this particular finding uncommon.

“‘Reasonably foreseeable,’ we’ve been wondering what that meant, and I guess the answer is that it depends on the species and the circumstance,” Parenteau said. “Pushing it out 50 to 100 years is certainly pushing the envelope on ‘foreseeable.’ I can see where other courts would disagree with that and think it is speculative.”

But it’s not completely without precedent. In 2008, the U.S. Department of the Interior listed the polar bear as threatened because of lessening sea ice due to climate change; it was the first time that a species had been listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act due to climate projections. And in April, a U.S. District Court ruled that the Fish and Wildlife Service must take climate change and project declines in snowpack into account when considering whether or not to list the wolverine as as threatened.

It’s possible that future courts could take this decision into account when making rulings related to the Endangered Species Act, Parenteau said, but that would be up to the discretion of that particular court. Some conservative courts might balk at the idea of interpreting “foreseeable future” to mean such a wide stretch of time, while others might view the 9th Circuit’s decision as well-reasoned precedence.

Parenteau said he expects the decision to be appealed to the Supreme Court, though it’s possible that the court might not choose to hear the case, especially if the vacancy left by Justice Scalia’s death remains unfilled. In that case, the 9th Circuit’s decision would stand.

But even if more species eventually are listed as “threatened” or “endangered” under the ESA, Parenteau warned that such a designation does little to stem the global warming-fueled loss of habitat that threatens those species in the first place.

“All we’re doing is listing them,” he said. “Until we get serious about reducing emissions and stopping fossil fuel infrastructure, it won’t matter. We’re just keeping track of the ones that are going.”

(Natasha Geiling is a reporter at ThinkProgress … where this report originated.)

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CONNECTING CALIFORNIA--Gov. Jerry Brown’s best choice for attorney general – an appointment he must make after Kamala Harris’ election to the U.S. Senate -- is obvious: his wife, Anne Gust Brown. 

Call it nepotism if you want. But Anne Gust Brown is highly qualified. She not only had a distinguished career as a lawyer, but she helped run the attorney general’s office during her husband’s four-year stint there before becoming governor. 

And while there are many other qualified candidates interested in the post, the first lady is the only one who can redefine the job in the way it needs to be redefined. As teammate of the governor.

Among California’s many democratic deficiencies, there’s this: we are fools to have voters elect attorneys general, and all the other statewide executive positions. The reasons for this are many.

First, California is hard enough to govern without dividing up executive power among several elected politicians. The attorney general needs to work with the governor -- and should work for the governor. 

Second, while electing people to a.g. and other offices is supposed to make them independent, the reality is quite the opposite. The attorney general’s race, and other races for statewide executive positions, draw little public or media scrutiny. So the successful candidate isn’t really vetted. Instead, the races really serve as fundraising opportunities for ambitious younger politicians. Much of the money to support them comes from interests and industries that are deeply affected by the decisions of that particular statewide executive. These are pay-to-play elections. 

There’d be more accountability in an appointed a.g. That person wouldn’t be compromised by political donations. And it’d be far easier to remove an appointed a.g. who behaved badly than an elected one. 

Appointing Anne Gust Brown, thus, could be a first step to changing how we choose attorneys general -- and insurance commissioners, controllers, treasurers and state superintendents of public instruction.

(Connecting California Columnist and Editor, Zócalo Public Square, Fellow at the Center for Social Cohesion at Arizona State University and co-author of California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It (UC Press, 2010). This piece first appeared in foxandhoundsdaily.com.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

LA’S NEIGHBORHOODS--Once again, the City Attorney’s office and the Planning Department have played the City Council for fools. This time around, the City’s legal advisors and planning bureaucrats blatantly lied on the Council floor, spinning a fabricated tale that, if the Council would approve Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell’s September 13 motion to open a window for 5 days at the end of September for new second unit applications to be filed under very permissive state “default” standards (rather than the City’s stricter adopted standards), only a handful of new applications would be filed -- probably only about seventeen. 

O’Farrell stated that initially he had drafted his September 13 motion to “grandfather” only a handful of specific “stranded” second unit developers in his district who had been previously turned away by LADBS when they had sought to file their applications. 

These additional grandfathered developers would be added to the hundred or more second unit applicants and permittees who had sought and/or obtained permits under the very permissive state “default” standards that the City had been illegally using since May 2010. In early 2016, the Superior Court had declared that the planning and building departments’ dubious policy of following permissive “default” standards, rather than the City’s own adopted, much stricter standards -- based on the City Attorney’s mistaken legal advice -- was unlawful, and it ordered those departments to stop following those “default” standards. 

O’Farrell explained that, as he was drafting his September 13 motion, the City Attorney’s office persuaded him to expand it so it would open to one and all a 5-day end of September filing window for new applications under the permissive “default” standards. 

Councilmember Paul Koretz vigorously objected, saying that, whenever the Council announces that loose zoning restrictions are about to be tightened up, very substantial increases in permit application filings (seeking to take advantage of those looser restrictions) are very common. Accordingly, the number of new second unit applicants filed during the 5-day window would probably be closer to a hundred, not a mere handful. LA Neighbors in Action also protested that LADBS’s second unit application forms are so simplistic that they present no practical difficulties at all to anyone seeking to take advantage of the 5-day window. 

But Planning Department and City Attorney representatives repeatedly testified on the Council floor that the practical difficulties of filing a second unit application would limit the number of applications to a “very small” number. The 5-day window would be “fair” to the “very small” number of developers who would be in a position to take advantage of it, so it would not be overly disruptive to the surrounding single family residential neighborhoods throughout the City. 

Specifically relying on their advice, Council members Krekorian, Blumenfield and Ryu expressed their support for O’Farrell’s motion, and the Council overwhelmingly approved O’Farrell’s proposed end of September 5-day window. 

Now the results are in. The City Attorney recently reported to the Superior Court that, during the 5-day window, second unit developers filed fully 140 new applications -- almost ten times the City’s planning and legal advisors’ disingenuous projection, and, in one week, more than double the average annual number of second unit applications filed in the past dozen years! 

These are not idle numbers. LADBS must now process and approve “by right” 140 newly filed second unit applications with no discretion to impose any mitigation measures. The proposed second units need merely meet very weak “default” standards allowing construction of oversized 1,200 SF second units -- the size of many primary residences and almost double the 640 SF that the City’s existing standards allow. 

These oversized second units can be squeezed into backyards in single family neighborhoods throughout Los Angeles -- and sometimes into front yards! And, even though the City’s adopted standards would otherwise forbid it, the 140 second unit applications filed during the 5-day end of September “window” can be built in designated “hillside” areas and on “substandard” streets. (Ugly, severely impacting second units of the kind allowed under the default standards during the 5-day window can be seen in the attached photos.) 

Notably, shortly after the Superior Court’s ruling earlier this year, the Planning Department strongly (but inaccurately) urged the Council that it had only one “feasible” option: repealing the City’s adopted strict second unit standards so that the state’s permissive standards would thereafter apply by “default.” This extreme proposal -- which the Department put on a fast-track approval process -- generated a storm of controversy. 

Neighborhood Councils and homeowner associations throughout the City strongly objected, demanding that the City’s adopted protective second unit standards be maintained. Meanwhile, “stranded” developers demanded that their second units be grandfathered, since they had relied on the City’s unlawful second unit policies before the Superior Court declared them illegal. 

Finally, on August 31, the Council approved a compromise motion addressing both side’s principal objectives. On one hand, “stranded” developers and applicants would be “grandfathered” so their proposed second units can be completed -- even if they exceed the adopted standards and negatively impact the surrounding neighborhoods. On the other hand, going forward, the Council would retain the existing adopted protective standards until, based on a transparent process with robust public outreach and study, it decided to change them while customizing them to the City’s diverse neighborhoods. 

Matters appeared heading toward the Council’s approving an ordinance that would implement this compromise, until O’Farrell’s September 13 motion suddenly proposed the new 5-day late September open window allowing second units under the permissive default standards. To that point, the planning and legal bureaucrats had always argued that the proposed grandfathering could be justified, because, despite the negative “spillover” impacts of these oversized, improperly located second units, the financial impacts on the “stranded” developers arguably offset these neighborhood impacts. They emphasized that the stranded developers had “relied to their detriment” on the City’s unlawful second unit policies and practices, and, if they were stopped in mid-process, they might sue the City for substantial financial compensation. 

But for the first time, O’Farrell’s September 13 motion proposed that during this late September 5-day window, second unit developers would not need to establish any “reliance interest” at all and yet would still be allowed to take advantage of the permissive default standards and inflict adverse impacts on their neighbors. Under O’Farrell’s motion, it was sufficient simply to submit an application and pay the required fee. 

Since reliance would not be necessary, the Council members who backed O’Farrell’s motion stressed the Planning Department’s and City Attorney’s representations that only a “very small” number of applications -- about 17 -- could likely be filed during the 5-day window. 

• Council member Krekorian, for example, was particularly fooled. Although he was led to expect only about 17 applications citywide, the recent City Attorney report to the court revealed that fully 23 applications were filed in his district alone. Krekorian will have some serious explaining to do to the 23 neighborhoods that will be disrupted and potentially devastated by oversized, poorly located second units. 
• Similarly, a dozen second units in Council member Blumenfield’s district will now get away with conforming merely to the permissive “default” standards. Not exactly the “very small” number Blumenfield anticipated citywide.
• Some 19 new second units will be built in Council member Englander’s district under the permissive default standards. Did Englander realize that those 19 neighborhoods would be adversely impacted even though none of the developers in question needed to show they ever relied on the City’s prior unlawful conduct? What explanation will Englander give to homeowners who will have to live with new oversized second units peering into their backyards and bedrooms? 

Notably, as with second unit permits issued throughout the past decade and a half, by far the most applications filed during the 5-day window (more than 100 of the 140 applications) will be located in the North and South San Fernando Valley. Twenty-two of the new second units will be sited on lots that City planners concede are “environmentally sensitive.” 

Ironically, the City Attorney’s recent report to the Court related that only five of the new second unit applications filed during the 5-day window are located in O’Farrell’s district. If O’Farrell had ignored the City Attorney’s spurious advice to expand the scope of his motion, those five applicants -- the mere handful that he attested were his specific concern -- could have obtained their second unit applications without baselessly wreaking havoc on some 135 additional single family neighborhoods throughout Los Angeles.   

Instead, O’Farrell allowed himself to get sucker punched by the City Attorney, while the Council again foolishly placed its trust in the Planning Department and City Attorney staffs’ testimony. Will this misplaced confidence just keep on going and going? Will they ever learn? 

(Carlyle Hall is an environmental and land use lawyer in Los Angeles who founded the Center for Law in the Public Interest and litigated the well-known AB 283 litigation, in which the Superior Court ordered the City to rezone about one third of the properties within its territorial boundaries (an area the size of Chicago) to bring them into consistency with its 35 community plans. He also co-founded LA Neighbors in Action, which has recently been litigating with the City over its second dwelling unit policies and practices.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.

ALPERN AT LARGE--There's something to be said for supporting a winning argument, and recognizing losing arguments when you see them.  In theory, we should not NEED Measure M (half-cent sales tax for transportation funding) to be passed. In theory, Sacramento should have kept its priorities of pensions for past employees balanced with funding for current employees and services. 

But Sacramento didn't, and despite the fact that state taxpayers throughout the economic and political spectrum are tapped out, we'll need to save ourselves in the City and County of Los Angeles. 

Which means that all the money that taxpayers are on the hook to pay for an unsustainable pension plan at the City, County and State levels (you can be BOTH pro-government AND recognize unsustainable financial/budget plans!) was, is, and will very much kill our ability to rely on Sacramento to do its job for schools, public safety, transportation, etc. 

So here's the WINNING argument in a nutshell … 

1. The overwhelming success of the Expo Line, with trains every six minutes; 
2. Public/private partnerships funding rail throughout the County; 
3. County transportation measures throughout the state;  

… show that Measure M is both timely and necessary for our county's economic future. 

Yet all the siphoning of state budgeting and other economic resources to public sector workers retiring in their 50's, and being paid for 30 or more years at a level we just CANNOT afford (not all retirees, but too many and without sufficient limit-setting) has led to: 

1) K-12 and community college taxes and bonds that have proven inefficient, and which are proof-positive that enrichment of certain small special interests, and not outcomes, is the ultimate goal of the "cottage industry" of the public education lobbies who (purportedly for the children) are driving this state into the economic ditch. 

2) A City, County and State bureaucracy that is anything but transparent, and which is milking small businesses dry and driving "good jobs" (solid pay and benefits) out of this state. 

3) A City of L.A. and State that has given the cold shoulder (or perhaps a more rude gesture or two) to law enforcement, and is more focused on bending the law, or ignoring the law altogether, rather than valuing law enforcement and those pleading for our society to adhere to laws.   

(For those who still give a rip about laws, and who still value law enforcement recommendations, please review my last CityWatch article) 

So the desire to pay for transportation/traffic measures has been thrown to the beleaguered cities and counties of our state, and woe be unto those of us who dare decry this violation of the budgetary and other rules of law and economics! 

Maybe the pessimists are right, and maybe they're not, when they proclaim that California is inevitably on its way to an economic crash (particularly when the inevitable next stock market downturn occurs and we discover there really are NOT enough rich millionaires to keep bailing us out), but: 

1) If the money is vague and probably will not be spent well, then vote NO. 

2) If we're already spending gobs of money on a given priority, and the past funding has been spent poorly, then vote NO. 

Hence it's clear that County Measure M is the only tax initiative that merits approval because it's transparent and defined, and has as its greatest opposing argument that it doesn't go far enough. 

Meanwhile, the City, County and State needs to perform a long-overdue clean up of their economic houses and spend more efficiently and sustainably rather than vomiting out another slew of tax, bond, or other fiscally-related measures and propositions. 

Vote YES on County Measure M, and vote NO on all other financial measures.

(Ken Alpern is a Westside Village Zone Director and Board member of the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC), previously co-chaired its Planning and Outreach Committees, and currently is Co-Chair of its MVCC Transportation/Infrastructure Committee. He is co-chair of the CD11Transportation Advisory Committee and chairs the nonprofit Transit Coalition, and can be reached at  [email protected]. He also co-chairs the grassroots Friends of the Green Line at www.fogl.us. The views expressed in this article are solely those of Mr. Alpern.)

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Tags: Ken Alpern, election 2016, ballot measures, Measure M