LOS ANGELES

EDITOR’S PICK--More than 30 boxes from former Los Angeles City Councilmember Tom LaBonge’s office, marked for destruction, have been recovered by the Los Angeles City Attorney’s office, according to a city attorney spokesperson. However, it is believed more than another 150 boxes may either be unaccounted for or destroyed. 

According to Rob Wilcox, a spokesperson for City Attorney Mike Feuer, 35 boxes pertaining to Council District 4 (CD4) have been in the City Attorney’s possession “for several months” since it was discovered the boxes were at Piper Technical Center, a city facility, east of downtown, that houses varies city offices, including its records management and elections divisions. 

It is not clear who alerted the City Attorney’s office that boxes from CD4 were at the facility. 

According to Wilcox, representatives from the City’s Attorneys office were seeking legal documents relative to a least one lawsuit, a land use issue in Los Feliz, when “management” learned documents related to that litigation and other CD4 documents were at Piper. Wilcox said, the City Attorney’s office then had the Los Angeles Dept. of General Services transport the 35 boxes to the City Attorney’s office. 

According to Wilcox, it is not known how long the boxes were at Piper facility. Additionally, Wilcox said he was still seeking information about who alerted the City Attorney’s office of the boxes.

Additionally, Michael Miller, a former city attorney who lives in Los Feliz, said in an interview today, that another 100 or more boxes may have already been destroyed. (Read the rest.) 

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GOVERNMENT FOR THE PEOPLE--Those of us who happened to have been scouring the cluttered bulletin board in the corridor near the John Ferraro Chambers at City Hall this week, may have been surprised to come across, wedged behind a FilmLA permit, a document entitled, “Notice Of Intention To Amend The Conflict of Interests Code of The City of Los Angeles Ethics Commission.”  

ENERGY POLITICS--News came earlier this week that the horrific natural gas leak spewing methane at Porter Ranch, just outside Los Angeles, will be capped and contained by the end of February.  Of course, it’s a promise that has come far too late. 

TRANSPORTATION POLITICS--While any reasonable person will acknowledge the need for transportation/infrastructure (T/I) funding, too many of us are acting blind, deaf and dumb (especially the "dumb" part) about our hideous state/federal funding reality: by treating T/I funding as an afterthought, we've forced and ignored the reality of high gas prices as a necessary means of funding something that should be part of the general fund. 

AT LENGTH--Recently, I attended the 24th Annual Empowerment Congress Summit at USC sponsored by Los Angeles County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas of the Second District.

DEEGAN ON LA--Tearing up your tickets may be a pipe dream for some, but it became reality for over 200 people with homelessness and other issues a few days ago when the City Attorney hosted another in a series of Homeless Citation Clinics, administered through their innovative program called HEART (Homeless Engagement and Response Team). 

ART POLITICS-While South LA does have its share of incredible murals, it doesn’t have much in the way of public art, as a general rule.

This is beginning to change. Councilmember Joe Buscaino recently celebrated the installation of several new sculptures along 103rd St. recently. In the 8th district, Community Coalition’s Power Fest and artivist events regularly feature live painting and art-making around community justice themes. In the 10th district, Leimert Park Village stakeholders turned the plaza at 43rd Place into a work of art grounded in African principles and symbols and cemented its role as ground zero for creative expression of all forms. And in the historic 9th district, Councilmember Curren Price hosted a meeting recently as part of an effort to put together a strategic art plan for the area. 

Sadly, South LA’s art scene lost one of its more unusual staples as 2015 came to a close. The Tenth Wonder of the World, located at the corner of 62nd and Budlong, is no more.

I first stumbled across the marvelous hodgepodge of sculptures and structures a few years ago. Dianne and Lew Harris — brother and sister, curators and residents in the home — were sitting outside as they usually did, and invited me to check out the space.

I didn’t make it very far into the yard. Since 1981, the pair had been scavenging enormous chunks of carved glass, transforming metal tubes and fans into tall turrets and telescopes, and planting propellers like flowers all over the yard. There was no room to move. And there was more scrap metal and glass behind the house, they told me. They were just trying to figure out what to turn it into and where to put it.

Tenth Wonder of the World or not, it was the kind of thing I imagined neighbors in a better-off community would condemn for bringing down their property values. But the Harrises’ neighbors seemed quite happy to have them there. The Harrises regularly sat outside and talked with their neighbors. Kids on the street saw their yard as a sort of Disneyland and liked to stop by and gawk at the ever-changing inventory of crazy objects. Hoping to inspire kids to see beauty and opportunity in the ordinary, the Harrises often had candy pieces to hand out to those that visited and were always kind, friendly, and welcoming.

But last year, Lew fell ill and was in and out of the hospital, according to a neighbor. Given the pair’s limited income, they quickly fell behind on bills and found themselves having to move out in the fall. A relative who agreed to take them in came down from Bakersfield to help them close up the place. The neighbor, who also helped them move, was a little shocked at the condition of the interior — it was like something out of an episode of Hoarders, he said, with stacks of magazines and newspapers blocking all but a few paths through the home.

Given the unhealthy condition the Harris’ home appeared to be in, the move may — in the long run — be a good thing for 76-year-old Lew.

Still, it was sad to see that the owner of the property wasted no time in gutting the place, removing any last remnants of the “art” collection that had been so carefully curated over the years, and building a generic dwelling in its place. The only thing that remained of the Harrises was a set of hand-painted signs tacked high onto a telephone pole reading, “What’s up, discipline? Try patience.”

(Sahra Sulaiman writes for LA Streets Blog … where this piece was first posted.)

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OSCAR POLITICS--While I understand the concern about the lack of diversity in nominations for excellence in the acting craft, as a black man I believe that, by trying to focus on the Oscars themselves, that concern is misplaced.

LATINO PERSPECTIVE--According to a new report by Pew Research Center, the Latino electorate is bigger and better educated than ever before. Many of these voters are here in the Los Angeles. 

PUBLISHING POLITICS--The infamous Playboy Mansion came up for sale earlier this month asking $200 million, and with the provision that Hugh Hefner be allowed to continue living there until his death.  

It's one of the craziest real estate stories of all time in a city known for its crazy real estate stories, and thank god and Larry Flynt, it just got a million times crazier: Flynt, the founder of Hustler and the Rabelaisian pornographer of the people to Hef's aspirational smut peddler, supposedly wants to buy the Playboy Mansion, kick Hef out, and turn the place into the Hustler Mansion. STONE COLD.

Is it a stunt? Who cares? It's a GREAT stunt. Of course, Flynt told TMZ last week that he wasn't interested: "I like my own toys and I don't want his dirty sheets," but Harry Mohney, the head of the company that runs the Hustler Stores, claims that was before the two talked and decided that the Mansion "is an excellent place for The Hustler Club and Hustler Mansion," reports the New York Daily News.

Mohney claims that Hustler wants to "move their own staff into the 29-room estate and host 'at least' three parties per week for VIP guests. He also says those gatherings would out-Hef the parties Hefner has been throwing there for 45 years."

And, to add insult to injury, Mohney says "We are not going to offer half" of the $200-million asking price. That might be a problem, since one of the real estate agents involved says the land alone (five acres on one of Los Angeles's most coveted blocks, plus a rare private zoo permit) is worth $100 million.

But the biggest problem is that Mohney says "Hefner could not live in the mansion" (and, incidentally that "Hef's old pal - accused serial rapist Bill Cosby - will never step foot on the estate again if Hustler moves in," as the NYDN puts it). Playboy is firm on that matter, though: "a condition of any potential sale is that Mr. Hefner have the right to continue living at the Playboy Mansion." Maybe he'll really enjoy those Hustler parties.

(Adrian Glick Kudler is the Editor of Curbed LA … where this piece was first posted.) Photo by Jim Bartsch

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PERSPECTIVE--The Ratepayer Advocate is supposed to be in the vanguard of DWP reform efforts. Fred Pickel (photo) can’t even find the rear. To make matters worse, a proposal for substantial reforms is coming from an unlikely source – Felipe Fuentes, a councilmember whose motive to eschew reelection is the subject of speculation. 

ANIMAL WATCH-Although dog poop was not mentioned as a possible offender in his post, “A Disgusting Day to Breathe-in-L.A.,” in February 2015, EarthJustice Attorney Adrian Martinez warned that large areas of central Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley, and southern LA communities are breathing levels of particulate pollution that the SCAQMD classifies as “unhealthy,” after years of fighting for clean air. 

LAPD INSIDER--On January 20 the Los Angeles Police Protective League (LAPPL) held a news conference where the Unions president Craig Lally and members of the Board of Directors denounced Chief's Beck current deployment of police officers within all of the police divisions throughout the city of Los Angeles. 

GELFAND’S WORLD--The Long Beach Opera is opening its new season with a hit -- Leonard Bernstein's Candide. It's kind of a Broadway musical and an operetta all wrapped up into one. It has a series of hummable Broadway-type melodies alongside music that is reminiscent of earlier European opera and light operetta. As stage director David Schweizer explained, Bernstein was doing homage to numerous styles and traditions. This approach is risky, because it can fail or succeed spectacularly. Candide is still perfo rmed because it manages to walk the line artfully, through everything from south American dance music to a Mozartean-sounding soprano aria. 

What LBO does with the written text and the score is what makes it different as a company. In short, LBO is the opera company that dares to be and do differently. 

Robin Buck and Suzan Hanson continue their careers as company stalwarts. Todd Strange plays the title character Candide, bringing a most engaging voice. His love interest Cunegonde is played by Jamie Chamberlin, who manages her role ably. Additional cast members include Roberto Perlas Gomez, Danielle Marcelle Bond, Arnold Livingston Geis, and Zeffin Quin Hollis. They get to play numerous roles and perform in ensemble numbers. Bond is fetching as she plays the character Paquette, the whore with a heart of bronze, if not quite of gold. 

LBO stages the first half of Candide as if it were a rehearsal. Robin Buck is both the director and one of the main characters. As the show begins, he chooses who will play what (to the obvious distress of the losers) and then appoints the remainder to other roles. Bringing the stage director into a show as a role is nothing new of course, as Our Town and later plays demonstrate. And interpreting an opera a little off kilter from the text is nothing new to the modern audience. There is a whole tradition of this in modern European productions. 

But you've got to get it right. There are lots of ways to get it wrong, and some of those other productions have shown this to their own embarrassment. So it's always a joy to see an artistic group twist things just enough to make them different, to do a little mind bending, and in so doing to bring out new elements of the script. 

This approach works well most of the time for Candide. For instance, in an early routine, the crew and idle cast members, in keeping with the presentation as a working rehearsal, watch from the back as two performers do a love song. This creates a certain emotional distance, since we are reminded that at some level, this is not quite reality. But it is at least an honest attempt to create one. 

This distancing is gradually removed. It is replaced by full company numbers, and this allows the powerful emotions of the later numbers to come out more strongly. 

The final number, Make Our Garden Grow, is lyrical and triumphant. An immediately preceding number, What's The Use, is strongly rhythmic and comedic, while remaining, to use the modern term, an intentional downer. 

That's my report, and you can stop here if you like. But if you are interested in the 18th century philosophical struggle that led to the book Candide upon which the opera is based, stay with me. 

First, I'd like to introduce you to an author who writes a fascinating blog about medieval and Renaissance thought.  Ada Palmer is now at the University of Chicago, and the blog post I'm linking here is about the development of skepticism as an intellectual movement. That's where Candide comes in, because Palmer writes about the philosopher and author Voltaire, and how his response to great suffering such as the Seven Years War and the Lisbon Earthquake brought him to write a poem in protest, and that poem was read all over Europe. 

You have to go quite a ways down that blog post to get to Voltaire, but allow me to summarize the argument made by Leibniz that caused skeptics such as Montaigne and Voltaire to rebel. Borrowing from Palmer's blog, the Leibniz argument: 

• God is Omnipotent, Omniscient and Omnbenevolent.  (Given.)  “Grrrr,” quoth Socrates.
• Given that God is Omniscient, He knows what the best of all possible worlds is.
• Given that God is Omnipotent, He can create the best of all possible worlds.
• Given that God is Omnibenevolent, He wants to create the best of all possible worlds.
• Any world such a God would make must logically be the best of all possible worlds

This is the best of all possible worlds. 

The experiences of life, including catastrophes such as the war and the earthquake, would naturally lead to skepticism (at least of some sort) in moderns, but it took a long journey through medieval theocracy to get there. Voltaire seems to have been the one who made the Leibniz formulation into more of a joke than a believable doctrine. 

Voltaire wrote Candide and published it under a pseudonym in the mid-1700s. It is variously described as a semi-pornographic, satirical adventure story, or as a deep satire intended to demolish a once-popular theological argument set forth by the philosopher Leibniz. 

A Broadway musical linked to a 1759 novella, itself based around a medieval philosophical argument? It seems strange, but Voltaire's story involves deeply human questions, the most central being, why is there such misery and suffering in what is supposed to be God's creation? 

Leibniz's argument is sometimes described as optimism. The philosophical idea is only a little oversimplified by the phrase "All's for the best in this best of all possible worlds." Everything has a purpose, and even suffering and evil are really part of a perfect creation. 

One precipitating factor for Voltaire's intense reaction to optimism was the event we refer to as the Lisbon earthquake. It was actually an offshore quake that killed tens of thousands and created a massive fire. In addition, the resulting tsunami did its own damage. It was The Big One we anticipate, but more so, and without modern technology to prevent massive loss of life. 

In short, the Lisbon quake was the sort of event that provoked theological doubt in an era that was ready for it. 

Candide, both as eighteenth century novella and as modern musical theater, begins with a naive young man named Candide who is raised and educated in the philosophy of optimism described above. Voltaire creates a character named Dr Pangloss who teaches this philosophy to Candide and his fellow students. This is the best of all possible worlds, and anything you can think of that seems bad or wrong is actually to the good. The characters in Bernstein's Candide sing the line that all's for the best in the best of possible worlds, and Dr Pangloss illustrates the argument with examples both illogical and comedic. 

At the beginning of the story, Candide, Pangloss, and various love interests live together in a castle in an edenic lifestyle of wealth and power. Maybe there's something to this philosophy after all. But things rapidly turn sour for the young Candide, as he is banished from the castle to live a life of wandering, privation, and sorrow. Over the years, he finds his lost love Cunegonde, loses her again, finds her again, and so on. He gains wealth, only to lose most of it. His childish belief that all's for the best is continually being challenged, but he lacks the intellectual tools, and even the words, to find an alternative line of thought. 

Eventually Candide and his friends reject both optimism and its mirror opposite (you might call it pessimism) and agree to settle down to a simple life and "make our garden grow." 

The LBO season starts with Leonard Bernstein's musical Candide, and goes on to Fallujah, a story of an American Marine recovering in a veterans' hospital. LBO then goes on to Poulenc's La Voix Humaine, the story of a woman trying to converse over the telephone with the lover who is marrying someone else the very next day. The company finishes the first half of 2016 with something called The News, which is described as a Video-Opera that parodies a society addicted to the 24 hour news cycle. 

Candide will play again next weekend, Jan 30 at the Long Beach Opera. 

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

-cw

POLITICS--Attorney Patricia K. Oliver alleges that SoCalGas is “deliberately advancing a deceptive AQMD order that would immunize the gas company from liability for its massive negligence at Aliso Canyon, which is sickening thousands of Porter Ranch residents” in a letter she sent to the South Coast Air Quality Management District last week. 

BACK TALK--We are writing to respond to and clarify some of the issues raised in your article "Tom LaBonge Leaves the Cupboard Bare … Records on $600,000 Missing" posted on January 19, 2016 on City Watch.  

First, it should be stated that LaBonge's funding proposal of $50,000 for the urban design study for the benefit of the Miracle Mile community at large and its museums did go through a formal and publicly recorded vote. Per Council File No. 15-0741-S1, dated June 17, 2015, all ten Council members present voted "yes." (Five were absent.)

Second, LACMA is not the sole beneficiary of the $50,000 grant in question. The proposed funding was allocated for a project to benefit the community of the Miracle Mile and its five museums (LACMA, La Brea Tar Pits and Museum, Petersen Automotive Museum, Craft & Folk Art Museum, and the future Academy Museum of Motion Pictures) to define and promote the Miracle Mile as a distinct and cohesive cultural destination. As a matter of accounting, LACMA was named the recipient of the funds in the name of all the museums and was in charge of paying the consultant using the grant funds. However, the benefits of the funding were to be equal among the five institutions and the City's 4th District community at large.

Finally, the scope of the project is greater than "a way-finding project involving signage along Museum Row."  The project's deliverable was a wide-ranging creative document detailing many factors that impact Museum Mile as a destination. This includes a variety of current and future concerns: consistent naming of the district; accounting of existing parking and proposed alternate models; available sidewalks and crosswalks before, during, and after Metro construction; possible collaborative public programming, and, finally, way-finding.  We believe the project will benefit the entire Miracle Mile community and are working with Councilman Ryu and his office to provide whatever information and documentation that he may need to support the project.

We kindly request that you publish this letter to address the factual inaccuracies and negative implications included in the article on CityWatch. Please reach out with any further questions or clarification about the far-reaching community benefits of this project.

(Miranda Carroll is Director of Communications at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.)

CityWatch

Vol 14 Issue 7

Pub: Jan 22, 2017

PLATKIN ON PLANNING--There is no shortage of heat when it comes to planning debates in Los Angeles, but not much light, especially when attention turns to the proposed Neighborhood Protect Initiative.  For example, an instant opposition group, that does not appear to have even read the initiative, is already mislabeling it the Housing Moratorium Initiative.   

So, borrowing a term from Hizzoner, Eric Garcetti, lets return to some (city planning) basics.  Maybe it is possible to shed some light on these heated planning debates through three simple questions and answers: 

What do we mean by planning?  In California there is not much grey when it comes to planning.  Every city is legally required to prepare and adopt a General Plan.  State law not only specifies that this General Plan must be timely and internally consistent, but it also must include the following elements:  Land Use (Called community plans in Los Angeles), Circulation and Transportation (Called Mobility Element in LA), Housing, Noise, Conservation, Open Space, and Safety.  

In addition most cities, including LA, have an optional Air Quality element.  Furthermore, LA has another element that ties everything together, the General Plan Framework Element.  It also has a new Health element, and many ancient elements, such as Infrastructure, that were prepared a half century ago, but never subsequently updated or rescinded. 

In LA nearly all of these General Plan elements are out-of-date. They are also internally inconsistent, with different base years, horizon years, and presumably even contradictory goals, policies, and implementation programs.  To say the least, they urgently need to be updated.  It is not just a question of following state law. Current, carefully monitored plans are necessary for LA to avoid the chaos resulting from roller coaster market forces determining the city’s fate. 

In addition to the General Plan element, most California cities must prepare an annual monitoring report on its General Plan that is submitted to Sacramento for review.  In LA, which is a charter city, this requirement is built into the legally adopted General Plan Framework Element and its related Environmental Impact Report.  Despite these legal obligations and related lawsuits, City Hall has ignored this monitoring requirement for the past 20 years.  It never created a mandated monitoring program, and it has never drafted a full monitoring report, just a few partial reports.  

This, then, is what constitutes planning in California.  Issues related to zoning, which occupy most of the time and energy of the LA Department of City Planning, are nothing more than a partial implementation mechanism for the city’s Land Use Element.  The 3,000 building permits per year that the Department of Building and Safety shunts off to City Planning for special review are, therefore, only a tiny part of what constitutes real city planning.    

It is, therefore, unfortunate that in Los Angeles, a city that desperately needs good planning, city planning has been reduced to zoning technicalities.  Most city planners, even those with graduate degrees and professional certifications, wile away their days as zoning technicians, processing the building permits that Building and Safety sends over to them.  In effect, their job is to legalize otherwise illegal projects. 

What do we mean by density?  In Los Angeles most references to density take their lead from the primary focus of the city’s planning department: reviewing and almost always approving land use exemptions for large and tall buildings that are otherwise illegal.  This is why in LA there is often agreement by proponents of these discretionary permits, as well as their critics, that density is nothing more than large buildings.  

But, this is only a small part of what really constitutes density.  Many cities that have dense buildings, like New York City, also have high-density public infrastructure and public services necessary for those dense commercial and residential buildings to function.  This includes high-density mass transit, as well as wide, well maintained, tree covered sidewalks that support a high-density pedestrian traffic.  It also means high-density libraries, neighborhood parks, and schools for the high-density population.  In it entirety, this is what should be called good density.  It also accounts for New York City’s low per capita carbon footprint.  In its case, a high density built environment actually works. 

But, in LA what already exists or is proposed for such neighborhoods as Hollywood, Koreatown, Downtown LA, and even Warner Center, is bad density.  It consists of high-density buildings that are permitted through discretionary approvals decades before essential supporting high-density infrastructure and services appear.  LA’s current planning approach is to therefore put the cart many, many years before the horse.  If it were to plan correctly, the General Plan’s mandatory and optional elements would first be brought up to date.  At the same time the city’s public infrastructure and public services need to be upgraded through careful planning and monitoring prior to the approval of new high-density buildings.  If this were done in the correct order, then LA could end up with good density, rather than the bad density that is already blighting much of the city and getting worse as the current real estate bubble swells. 

What do we mean by growth and development?  In L.A. these are euphemisms for real estate speculation.  When officials and pundits talk about growth and talk about development, they mean privately financed real estate projects, usually commercial skyscrapers, apartment complexes, or a mix of the two. 

But, this focus on real estate speculation is an inaccurate definition of growth and development.  Growth also refers to the full gamut of the planning issues addressed in a city’s General Plan, and development also includes all of the public facilities that are necessary for a large modern city like LA, that intend to become a high-density world city.  

Growth also includes the expansion of schools, colleges, universities, galleries, theaters, and museums.  Development should incorporate the roll out of the alternative transportation modes addressed, in part, by LA’s new Mobility Element:  high speed interurban rail, commuter rail, heavy rail (subways), light rail (trolleys), express busses, local buses, shuttles, motorcycles and bicycles, and finally walking.  In short, all of these infrastructure and service categories, whether public, non-profit, or private, are the sum of what should be factored into any analysis and description of growth and development.   

The Unifying Principle:  If there is a unifying principle that will turn all of this heat into light, it can be found in every General Plan.  These plans cover 100 percent of a city’s land area.  They address far more than the privately owned lots that are the subject of building permits and discretionary planning actions. 

Depending on the neighborhood, these private owned lots only comprise 20 to 40 percent of a city’s land area.  The remainder is streets, parkways, sidewalks, driveways, parking areas, public buildings, parks and beaches, power lines and related easements, and different forms of open space.  

Since this is a majority of a city’s total area, and this is fully addressed through the planning process, it only makes sense that these areas need to be fully considered when talking about planning, density, and growth and development.  It also means that these discussions should be linked to each city’s budgeting process and reflected in the work programs of each city department.

(Dick Platkin is a former LA City Planner who writes on local planning issues for City Watch.  He welcomes questions, comments, and corrections at [email protected]. ) 

-cw

CityWatch

Vol 14 Issue 7

Pub: Jan 22, 2016

EDUCATION POLITICS-Sixty-two years after Brown vs. Board of Education supposedly made integration the law of the land, why is it we still have de facto segregation and an objectively inferior public school system in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and beyond? 

The best explanation is the least cited reason: People who are not themselves subjected to inferior segregated public education are loathe to comprehend how impossible attaining a good education is in a district like LAUSD that has sanctions in place for any teacher who tries to buck its clearly inferior system. 

The corporate media, bent on supporting the privatization of public education for profit, continues to censor information regarding the abysmal state of affairs in the vast majority of LAUSD and charter schools. 

Parents without children in these schools have no personal knowledge or any way of knowing how deplorable public school conditions are since their predominantly white children are safely ensconced in comparatively high functioning private or parochial schools. 

These students are being taught critical thinking skills in all subjects through a rigorous curriculum that rarely, if ever, exists at the super-majority-minority-poor-segregated LAUSD schools -- not to mention in many other districts like it throughout the country. 

Those outside the failing LAUSD system are effectively limited to what actions they might be willing to take to change things, mainly due to their media-nurtured ignorance as to what is really going on. 

Add to this the pernicious, unchallenged racial stereotypes that foster low expectations for minority students -- with no expectation that better is even possible – and you are left with the disingenuous rhetoric that “every child should be a lifelong learner who is going to college,” even if they can't read, write, or do basic math. 

So, if 94% of the white population is able to avoid integrated public education by escaping to private, parochial, and certain majority-white charter schools, then it’s no wonder they continue to rationalize their choices, often by falsely believing that the same quality of education might be available in our degraded public schools. 

Another reason inferior segregated public education still exists in 2015 is that no regulatory agency seems willing or capable of taking action against clearly segregated, failing public schools that are in violation of the law. A conspiracy of silence continues to block any objective media coverage of the neglect that remains a closely guarded secret in plain sight. 

Again, this dearth of knowledge has everything to do with the corporate ownership of both the commercial and public media – entities that continue to censor any news that contradicts their corporate masters' move to privatize the $2 trillion a year public education "business for profit.” 

All this negativity tends to create low self-image and low expectations for all involved in segregated public education. Some good teachers still try to get their students to accomplish just one thing that they had formerly been taught was impossible within the “no-expectation” public and charter schools. Good teachers persist in doing this with the knowledge that, once their students master just one thing they didn't think they could do, they might have an epiphany – they might just come to believe they are capable of learning everything. 

Ironically, teachers who go this extra mile are too often targets for removal at LAUSD where, in the vast majority of charters, positive rhetoric takes the place of substantive critical thinking skills. One substitute teacher, who is in high demand at predominantly white charters, related to me how she was censured at a mostly Latino charter when she tried to teach critical thinking skills to her Latino students. She was punished for trying to develop the notion that ideas are interrelated; she was punished for not teaching rote fill in the blanks, the norm at that particular school and others like it. 

Since she knew from prior teaching assignments in predominantly Latino schools in Greater Los Angeles that the students were painfully aware of Presidential candidate Donald Trump's defamatory statements against Latinos, she pointed out that Trump in no way supported any of his allegations with facts. She went on to point out that what was conspicuously missing from all of his diatribes against Latinos and Muslims were any facts to support his inflammatory statements. 

Immediately, her students were able to see not only the weakness of Trump's attacks, but also their own deficiencies in the assignment they had been working on, where they had been asked but did not make a connection between the story’s thesis and the ideas that supported the thesis. 

A passing Vice Principal happened to overhear this teachable moment and consequently requested that this teacher not return to this school in the future.

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

-cw

CityWatch

Vol 14 Issue 7

Pub: Jan 22, 2016

POLITICS--To my knowledge, the only times I've ever experienced magic is when I met my wife for the first time, and when my two kids were born.  But I guess that love-at-first-sight isn't the only magic that abounds in the City of the Angels.  After all, we've got gobs of magic money coming out of Downtown--police settlements, utility settlements, and lots of resources to give developers when we were told that we were running out of water, and that our infrastructure was going to Hades in a handbasket. 

The only problem with all this magic, unfortunately, is that the average middle class Angeleno (for those of us who still exist) has to work with bank accounts that adhere strictly with the confines of math and science. 

In other words, when we have no money to spend, we can't.  And, unless we take a risk with our credit cards, we don't. 

So when the police do something horrible and send innocent men to prison for decades, their need to be compensated (and is money really sufficient compensation?) raises the other question of how Angelenos are supposed to pay for it...because it's not the corrupt police officers who will pay for it, but rather you and me. 

Ditto for the victims of the Porter Ranch gas leak.  They ARE victims, but will the SoCal Gas officials who should have prevented this pay the inevitable legal costs?  Nope, you and me again. 

So maybe we can add public sector/utility malfeasance to the list of problems we'll need to raise the torches and pitchforks about this fall. 

And I am sure that, as with overdevelopment, City Hall corruption/collusion with developers, lobbyists, special interests, etc., we'll be told to just suck it up and take it.  Never mind the fact that our police, utility and other dollars are going to this damage control instead of where our money is supposed to go. 

And I am also sure that Council President Herb Wesson (you know, the guy who redistricts at whim, makes overdevelopment deals at whim, tells former Mayor Riordan to shove off and not even let him speak in front of the City Council, and considers Mark Ridley Thomas' county supervisorial district as his manifest destiny), will shrug his bossy, regal shoulders and tell us that this is all just life in the Big City.  And not just the Big City, but "his" City. 

And I am also equally sure that former Council President and current Mayor Eric Garcetti, who is by far more of a compassionate man that the current king occupying his former position, will fail to acknowledge the rape and pillage of Angelenos' wallets...and perhaps arrange for even more overdevelopment and LADWP revenue transfers to pay for the LAPD and other outrages. 

So along comes the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative, currently backed by former Mayor Riordan, and as reported in CityWatchLA we will have an interesting ride to this November's ballot. 

Because it appears that we WILL have to bring a ballot measure, and perhaps several others, to both challenge the City Council/Downtown oligarchy and demand their royal heralds and political appointees obey the law, and to respect the laws of financial responsibility when the magic money trees stop producing sufficient revenue to reverse the damage of City "leadership". 

And among those ballot measures may have to be either a revisitation of who the City Attorney represents (he is NOT legally obliged to represent ordinary Angelenos, believe it or not, but rather he is the attorney who ultimately MUST represent Downtown City leadership), or to add a City Ombudsman answerable ONLY to Neighborhood Councils. 

Because the magic sooner or later ends, leaving only the stark reality of a City on the edge of financial unsustainability and the cold, hard means we will have live within should we choose to address our financial, infrastructural, and governance problems.

(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 does regular commentary on the Mark Isler Radio Show on AM 870, and 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

CityWatch

Vol 14 Issue 7

Pub: Jan 22, 2016

MY TURN-There was an amazing reaction to my article "Felipe Fuentes: the Long farewell."  It’s always gratifying to know that people read what you have to say, even if they don’t agree with your point-of-view. 

What was surprising, though, was that in all the comments on Facebook and on this site, exactly zero support was shown for Councilmember Fuentes (District 7.) Not one comment came in justifying or praising his work, and I heard from multiple people from each of the neighborhoods in his District.  Frankly, I was almost hoping for some disagreement to balance out the conversation! 

Many comments were in the same vein, expressing the hope that people would now take local elections very seriously and play an active part in selecting future candidates to run for CD7. Several people said they looked forward to fresh winds blowing in the Northeast Valley. 

Several readers called out the entire LA City Council for sticking together and always supporting each other in opposition to their stakeholders. Some even accused certain councilmembers of criminal actions, citing the relevant penal code infractions. 

Contrary to many of the comments I received, I do not believe all of our City Council elected representatives are crooks, but they do have their own agendas and that plays into their actions.  What I find objectionable, however, is the tendency they have to close their eyes to malfeasance on the part of their colleagues. When CM Fuentes evicted long-standing tenants from the Sunland Tujunga City Hall, Council President Herb Wesson said he could not get involved -- a little disingenuous since, not too long ago, he did not take kindly to CM Bernard Parks, using the power of his office to diminish Parks’ influence. 

Maybe it’s the nature of the system in which each Councilmember seems to be the "Mayor" of his or her own district. When I read the City Council agenda's and reports, some of the items are enough to make your eyes glaze over. A link on the Council website allows you to check if and when your representative shows up for Council meetings. I understand that most of the real work is done in the various committees and unless it involves budget matters or something really controversial, staff does most of the investigation. It’s similar to what goes on in both our State and Federal government day-to-day operations. 

One important question initiated by this entire drama is, “What is it that actually makes a ‘good’ councilmember?” Some people imbue their representatives with special powers and are excited to have a picture taken with them, to be recognized or be called by first name. After a while, these elected officials begin believing their own press.  

Elected officials get used to being placed on a pedestal; they forget why they were elected in the first place. Almost all of our city councilmembers have been accused of kowtowing to one benefactor or another – influential people and businesses involved in everything from real estate developments to neon signs to technological updates. This is all part of City business.  

And for each issue there will always be those who believe decisions were made as a result of campaign contributions … or even the lack of campaign contributions. In the end, you can't please every constituent, but you do have an obligation to consider every point-of-view. 

There are many unanswered questions related to the current state of affairs in Council District 7. One compliment I received from a community leader was that he thought I had managed to tie the problems of CD7 to the awakening of people in the Northeast Valley – to folks who now realize that they truly have a stake in who governs them. 

Maybe this will cause some in other Districts in Los Angeles to look at their own councilmembers with more scrutiny…to analyze what he or she is actually doing for the District other than continually passing out certificates of appreciation and posting pictures on Facebook and their respective websites extolling their presence at certain events. 

If you have a great councilmember in your district, let me know. And if you have someone who is not accessible, whose agenda differs from the majority of stakeholders in the district – someone who doesn’t wholeheartedly support the community -- then, let me know that too! 

As always, comments are welcome!

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

-cw

CityWatch

Vol 14 Issue 7

Pub: Jan 22, 2016

NEW GEOGRAPHY--Among urban historians, Southern California has often had a poor reputation, perennially seen as “anti-cities” or “19 suburbs in search of a metropolis.” The great urban thinker Jane Jacobs wrote off our region as “a vast blind-eyed reservation.”

The Pavlovian response from many local planners, developers and politicians is to respond to this criticism by trying to repeal our own geography. Los Angeles’ leaders, for example, see themselves as creating the new sunbelt role model, built around huge investments Downtown and in an expensive, albeit underused, subway and light-rail network.

Yet the notion of turning Southern California into a dense, New York hybrid makes very little sense. Nor has it done much for the regional economy, certainly in Los Angeles. The City of Angels thrived during its period of development into a multipolar region; in the 21st century, as Downtown has gained a few thousand hipsters, the rest of the city has lagged economically while population and job grow th – including in tech – has been more robust in the surrounding counties of Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino.

Building off Strength

Southern California, even before the advent of the freeways, developed along the lines of an “archipelago of villages.” Even Downtown Los Angeles, the one legitimate urban core in the region, lost its central relevance by the 1930s and, despite all its self-promotion, employs close to the smallest share – well short of 3 percent – of the regional workforce of any large region in the country.

In contrast, the two fastest-growing areas in Southern California – the Inland Empire and Orange County – are arguably the largest regions in the country without a real downtown. Rather than a negation of urbanity, as some suggest, these areas are nurturing an expansive archipelago of smaller hubs, each serving distinct geographies, populations, tastes and purposes, and constitute the building blocks for Southern California’s urban future.

The advantages of such districts are obvious. They allow people to live as most prefer, in single-family homes, lower-density townhouses or apartments, while having easy access to a walking environment. In many cases, most notably Irvine, there is employment nearby, leading to very short commutes on average. This multipolarity is essentially baked into the Southern California cake; it cannot be transformed without massive economic disruption, and enormous expenditures on transit have so far done little to reduce gridlock or spur broad economic growth.

The Urban Archipelago

Urban theorists are correct that people, particularly the young, like walkable, often unscripted, urban areas. But that is very different from saying that they want to live in or near high-density for most of their lives. Indeed, as economist Jed Kolko has shown, people’s propensity for living in high-density locales diminishes markedly once they enter their 30s. This milestone looms within a few years for most millennials.

So when we think about urban strategy in places like the Inland Empire or Orange County, we have to see it as fulfilling two different missions: dense areas that serve as magnets for young people or childless couples, but also as places that the vast majority of people – who wish to live in suburban-style homes – can visit and enjoy. As urban hipsters grow up, these nodes continue to allow easy access to trendy food, live music or boutique shopping.

This trend can be seen in the Inland Empire, which has been roundly castigated as the “most sprawling region” in the country. The lively remake of downtown Riverside, or in some new projects being developed in places like Rancho Cucamonga, suggest there is an emerging market for this kind of low-intensity urbanization in the area.

The tendency is more evolved in Orange County, which is far more dense and where land costs are higher. In fact, O.C. is becoming a hothouse for experimentation in a basically suburban setting, including developments on former farmland, such as the Irvine Spectrum, as well as vintage downtowns such as in Orange, Fullerton, Laguna Beach and Santa Ana. Some of the more recent signature manifestations of urbanism Orange style include:

• Anaheim’s old Sunkist House and the surrounding area evolved into the “Packing District,” where young and old alike try fusion cuisine, socialize and listen to live music. Awarded Commercial Project of the Year at the Golden Nugget Awards, the renovated building and its lineup of gourmet shops, along with the new surrounding housing units and Center Street Promenade, provide a cultural hub within a larger suburban fabric.

• The emergence of Costa Mesa as one of the best midsize cities for food in the nation, with out-of-state icons such as Halal Guys and Raising Caine’s finding their way in the fray. The OC Mix is a group of stores in an industrial complex offering artisanal shops, restaurants and space for working and lounging around. The LAB, one of the early purveyors in the Costa Mesa creative scene, with its anti-mall concept, has become a breeding ground and role model for Orange County “hipness.”

• Huntington Beach’s new Pacific City complex pays obeisance to the area’s laid-back beach culture, providing foosball tables, movie screens and space to simply hang out. Besides a few anchor tenants, mostly local merchants, chefs and bartenders will call it home, and the complex plans to incubate restaurateurs at its food hall. Similar to the recently built Residences at Bella Terra, Pacific City could attract new apartment dwellers seeking urban life with a coastal escape just next door.

Toward an Urban Pluralism

Many of these developments have created among some Southern Californians a sense that a way of life is being undermined. A megadevelopment at Beach Boulevard and Edinger Avenue in Huntington Beach has been scaled down from 4,500 new housing units to 2,100, largely due to vigilant complaining and locals’ desire to maintain their “Mayberry by the Sea.”

Some Tea Party and right-wing activists see densification as a grand plot by advocates of world government, but it is less a matter of conspiracy than of conflicting interests and ideologies.

But activists, as well as NIMBYs, have a point. The current planning regime run from Sacramento would like to constrain suburban lifestyles as much as possible. State policy, notes veteran area developer Randall Lewis, is forcing developers to create projects so dense – up to 20 units per acre – that they barely satisfy the privacy needs or preferences of the middle-class families the region needs to attract and retain. “We would want to have the free market work, and developers pick what they can sell,” Lewis said.

In fact, the state’s densification strategy, notes Rancho Cucamonga City Manager John Gillison, has intensified opposition to new production of multifamily units from residents fearful that their lifestyles are being targeted. “It’s made it a lot tougher to push density,” he notes.

A far more logical approach would be to embrace what the urban historian Robert Fishman once described as “urban pluralism,” fostering the development of housing irrespective of type, largely following market forces.

As part of this approach, cities need to assure residents that their single-family neighborhoods can remain intact, while allowing for “infill development” in underused or abandoned areas, including former warehouses, deserted shopping areas or factories. Some projects, such as in Costa Mesa and Anaheim, where there is already a dense infrastructure, might be more ambitious, while other locales, like Old Town Orange, Tustin or Laguna Beach, may seek to retain more to keep a mid-density, small-town feeling.

“What works in Santa Monica does not work so well in Ontario,” notes developer Lewis.

The prospects are excellent for building on our multipolar pattern. The growth of telecommuting – already used by more workers than transit across the whole region – allows for people to cluster in their chosen communities including, if they choose, in close-in urban enclaves close to private co-working spaces such as Costa Mesa’s Crashlabs.

Thirty years ago, transit users accounted for five times the workforce share as stay-at-home workers. This has totally reversed. The growth of ride-booking services, like Uber, and the expected advent of autonomous vehicles also suggest that car-dependence, the scourge of revelers in suburbia, can be reduced.

Technology and a fair understanding of our past provide the preconditions for Southern California’s resurgence as an urban trendsetter. Given that most of America more resembles Southern California than New York or San Francisco, we are well-positioned to shape a bold 21st century urban future.

(Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and Roger Hobbs Distinguished Fellow in Urban Studies at Chapman University, and a member of the editorial board of the Orange County Register. He is also executive director of the Houston-based Center for Opportunity Urbanism. His newest book, The New Class Conflict is now available at Amazon and Telos Press.  He lives in Orange County, CA.

Charlie Stephens is a researcher and MBA candidate at Chapman University’s Argyros School of Business and Economics and founder of substrand.com.) 

-cw

CityWatch

Vol 14 Issue 7

Pub: Jan 22, 2016