CITYWATCH TODAY—The MTA has agreed to pay nearly $300 million more to the contractor of the 405 Freeway widening project. That makes the total cost of the project, according to the Times, about 55% higher than the original budget. Metro said that caving in was cheaper than the cost to continue the court fight. Of course it would have been cheaper if Metro hadn’t screwed up in the first place. They went into the project with inadequate info and changed the plan a number of times after the contractors began work on it. Are these really people you trust with your money?
Government is full of pretenders. People who are skilled at getting elected to office and then pretend they are knowledgeable on finance, management, communication, the law, etc. Miguel Santana was no pretender. He knows what he was talking about. He is the City Administrative Officer and he’s moving on to a new challenge.
Over the past few years, CAO Santana has managed your money. Jack Humphreville writes about the impact he has had at City Hall and what a loss he will be to you. Too many of the people handling your money … making decisions on how to raise and spend it … are seriously short on financial expertise. He was not among them. Give Jack’s piece a read. See what you think. In Today’s CityWatch.
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Mansionization, granny flats, community plans, pay to plan, greedy developers. Few things get LA’s blood boiling like City Planning issues. CityWatch offers a bunch of angles on Planning this posting … including a piece on how LA’s Planning Process got into this mess.
That and more. Today’s CityWatch. Thanks for coming. Let us know what you think.
Ken Draper-Editor, CityWatch
