The Proverbial Middle Finger
Both the Daily News and LA Times ran stories this morning chronicling the Sunshine Canyon debacle.Daily News:
In a last-minute bid to win support for the city's Sunshine Canyon Landfill deal, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa promised on Thursday to carry out sweeping long-term changes in trash policy that would sharply reduce the need for dumps in urban areas over time.LA Times:Villaraigosa, in a letter to North Valley Coalition President Wayde Hunter late Thursday, said he remains committed to end Los Angeles' use of urban landfills but believes the lack of alternatives and potential for soaring costs for trash service has forced the city's hand to extend the contract with the Granada Hills dump for five more years.
Hunter dismissed the mayor's arguments, saying the city has another year to find other solutions to the trash problem.
"I think it's a cop-out," he said.
On Thursday afternoon, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa weighed in with a letter to the North Valley Coalition — a group opposed to the landfill — that was also distributed to the council. The mayor acknowledged that he had been against the contract renewal but said the city had no choice. "I am urging the members of the Los Angeles City Council not to put our residents in a situation where we either have no place to take our trash in 11 months, or could be held hostage by waste management companies that could charge us a gate rate that is nearly double the rate we currently pay at Sunshine Canyon," Villaraigosa wrote. "I am urging them to make the tough choice." Even if the council cancels the Sunshine Canyon contract, the dump will remain open. It has other clients in the area, and much of the city's trash would probably be hauled there anyway, at least for the near future. But instead of paying the $24-a-ton rate in the contract, the city could pay as much as $41 a ton.The Outcome: It was one vote short for extension handing Villaraigosa his first Council defeat. The culprit? Someone's sister who resides in the Harbor Area. Councilwoman Hahn was thought to be a "yes" vote, but with a sly smile on her face and a look of payback, voted NO. The 8th vote was no more. This one's gonna sting!
What's next? Does it come back Tuesday for reconsideration? Can he buy her vote back? Stay tuned...
Posted by Anonymous @ 8/05/2005 02:00:00 PM
63 Comments:
Smith did a good job on this one. I can't wait to see the alt-energy solutions that come out of this!
What was the vote breakdown? How did council members vote?
Yeah, yeah "first council defeat"
The HornyMoon is over, dude.
You can't produce, ADV -- you can't deliver, and you can't keep weaseling out of the reality of big city life. Except for the heartbeat, you're already as "dead" a mayor as the tongue waggers that started this blog.
How many $$$ did we get in transit funds, per L.A. City resident, after your GREAT ambastardorial trip to D.C.?? $60...
(can I get mine in gas vouchers, please, ADV?)
And KERN COUNTY got 1,000 smackers apiece?? Where the HELL is there to GO, or build ROADS to in Kern County, anyway?
And you and your buddies were laughing at Hahn a couple months for losing the stem cell plant to Emeryville (really the whole Bay Area)? You just got BAKED by Bakerfield, SHAFTED by Shafter, and REAMED by Ridgecrest!
Bend over and get used to being on the receiving end, little Tony.
Update for Antonio:
"Accomplishments" is not the sound you make when you sneeze, under-achiever.
This issue isn't dead. It's going to come back up again for a vote on Tues.
anon 3:14-- hilarious!
any "alt energies" are already being developed and have no real bearing on filling Sunshine Canyon.
I agree that Councilman Smith did a good job bringing those receipts and putting those SAN officials in a poor light.
And if I hear Mary Edwards cry one more time, I'll rip my ears out.
This is no North Valley Victory by any stretch. I bet it passes Tuesday, though.
There were were few people absent and the eighth vote is a-coming.
But, August 5th was last day for Council action; can a vote for reconsideration of the motion on next Tuesday be nuc pro tunc and fulfill the deadline date?
We need a real lawyer for this one.
NAH, Chief Faker, the bloggers are upset because Mayor SAM still let's you post your drivel here after you spent three months this year dropping unadulterated numbnuts bullshit on the blog about having PROOF Antonio actually DID something for the two years he was on-deck to be mayor (aggregate Salary = $300,000), and started 80+ neighborhood watches in a district with less than 20 real communities.
YEAH, keep giving back the pennies from bad Fla. donations (for show), ADV. I've bite your poison apple again when you admit you stole your paychecks for two full years pretending to give a politician's ass about CD14.
nuc pro tunc?
You got it all wrong -- this was all for SHOW?
ADV did this with Elephant Hills open space in El Sereno. Pretended he could "fix" - but just propped up a quid pro flim flam.
COVER ME, guys... I'll PRETEND I'm on the "people's" side, and then YOU outvote me. Then I go back and smile and say "I tried" (I'm just too fucking impotent do actually DO anything I say I'll do).
"Wait a second,
Aren't the bloggers upset because Antonio says things that doesn't upset people?
Yet here was today taking a strong position on Sunshine upsetting folks in Granada Hills (cough cough, supported Hahn)
It will easily come up for reconsideration, no worries. I think we can see that the Hahn family has no shame, they started this mess (sunshine) when lil jimmy was City Attorney, Mayor and his lil sister continues the lies, cries and spilled milk game."
Chief Parker, Blow it out of your ass!
Oh when Lil Jimmy was City Attorney, Who was mayor then? Riordan? Bradley?
Payback is a bitch.
AV stopped the Salex Tax measure for More Police.
Janice Hahn stopped Sunshine Canyon.
This will be VERY, VERY interesting.
OK, here's the vote:
Noes: Hahn, Padilla, Perry and Smith.
Yes: Cardenas, LaBonge, Parks, Reyes, Rosendahl, Weiss, Zine.
Absent: Garcetti and Greuel.
A motion for reconsideration has to be made by "winning side".
Zine has excused absence Tuesday.
Look for re-negotiation and Antonio to save the day (as usual).
Eleven months is a long, long time.
Where is Kevin Roderick when you need him?
Yes, Mr. Villaraigosa I vote to receive my $60 in transit funds in the form of gas vouchers to use at a Unocal.
Transit bill cheats SoCal
When it comes to Southern California's transportation needs, the answer has to be, "Not by a long shot,' despite the region's piece of the $286.4 billion funding pie delivered this week by Congress.
The region will receive about $188 million with the lion's share, $167.4 million, going to build grade separations at rail crossings as part of the Alameda Corridor East project and to provide $19.79 million for planning and design of the eastward extension of the Gold Line light-rail project.
But much of what would have gone to ease heavily congested freeways and roads in Southern California, and create alternative transportation projects, went north instead to Kern County at the behest of Rep. Bill Thomas, chair of the House Ways and Means Committee.
Guess it's a question of seniority, not need, nor national interest, because ACE success will benefit the nation. Much of the product moved out of the ports are intended not for local consumption, but bound for factories, farms and consumers far beyond California. It is by far the most vital transportation issue for the state and topped Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's priority list.
No doubt Kern County and Bakersfield in particular could use some highway renovation and traffic mitigation, but the needs pale in comparison to Southern California and particularly Los Angeles County.
Constituents in Thomas' district that includes most of Kern County will receive the benefit of a little over $1,000 per capita with the congressman's $722 million coup.
Compare that with Los Angeles County with 10 million people. L.A. County's share pencils out to about $60 per person. Seems Congress members who represent those 10 million folks were asleep at the wheel.
Laborthug,
What are you talking about? Antonio is king in negotiating, he can get anything done, pronto.
When pressed on the fact that Kern County got more money per capita than Los Angeles - $1,000 per resident compared to about $60 in Los Angeles County - the congresswoman said that kind of disparity is to be expected sometimes.
But she also noted that Rep. Bill Thomas, the Bakersfield Republican who chairs the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, proved an ally, making the $286 billion bill the largest transportation and public works appropriation in the nation's history.
"It was Chairman Thomas who we went to, to see if we could find funding to help to prop this bill up so the president could sign it," Millender-McDonald said. "When you negotiate bills, those are some of the negotiating factors that come with it."
http://www.rednova.com/news/technology/197970/officials
Watch the tape... Smith and Padilla were stunned. The whole room didn't respond for 30 seconds.
Smith didn't do shit... He will work busily behind the scenes to help his favorite campaign donors BFI.
Kind of funny, Smith just became a victim of his own grandstanding. He eithr gets exposed on Tuesday or he has to put up... this ought to be good.
Guess Smiths' chief of staff Englander (nephew of BFI lobbyist Harvey Englander) is burning up the phone lines to BFI trying to secure the funds for the next election which are on the verge of being withdrawn.
Smith really got his ass into a corner here.
Politics 101:
The Golden Rule: He who has the gold, makes the rules.
For politics, it is the votes that make the gold. The Republicans run the Congress, both Houses.
California has many very powerful Republican Congressmen. But only one has any part of LA County, and that is Buck McKeon from Antelope Valley. He got plenty up there.
The California resources go to the powerful chairmen, Thomas, Drier, and most of all, the Chair of the Appropriations Committee himself, the 10,000 pound gorilla, Jerry Lewis, of San Bernardino.
Solution: Elect some Republican Congressmen from LA or a Republican U.S. Senator or two and see what happens.
Right now, the Democrats are on the road to permanent minority status due to the leadership (not) of How Weird Dean.
Keep voting Democratic in Federal elections, and keep sucking air.
It isn't just Harvey Englander that is sweating bullets. It is Arnie Berghoff as well.
Promises, promises, promises...
Great Post! It is about time an anon posted reality.
Where was the Northridge West Neighborhood Council who told anyone who would listen they would be there in force to stop this?
Antonio is in enough trouble starting out of the gate. He has DWP to deal with, MTA, LAUSD that his lapboy Jose has made a mess of, hasn't done shit about getting more cops even though Hertzberg has said the city has more revenue 14% then ever before.
The Northridge West NC was the ONLY NC to file a Community Impact Statement. Jim Alger worked councilmembers and attended the hearing today.
That's where they were.
What does Alger have to do with the Northridge West NC?
How did Alger "work the councilmembers?"
The transportation funds being diverted to Kern County has to do with our Republican California governor AH-nold, who's about to get his ass handed to him in November. He's doing all he can to round the right-wing vote otherwise he's back in Hollywood.
AV was in office for less than a month when this allocation was dispersed. Who was in mayor's office before that? Oh yeah, the empty suit, aka Jimmy Hahn.
Alger is President of the Northridge West NC and has been burning the phone lines to city hall for the last 2 weeks. Did it make a difference? Who knows.
The North Valley Coalition deserves the win, give Alger the assist.
Sadly, dirty Rockard (follow the BFI $) has figured out a way to get this reconsidered. We need to start working and getting some Councilmembers to reconsider and we
need a show of force next week.
We have data that shows that the dump will cost hundreds of millions
to clean up. It is less expensive to recycle the waste stream.
If anyone can get us appointments with any of the Yes voters where we can lobby and convince them to Vote NO, I would appreciate knowing this immediately.
Los Angeles Business Journal: Friday, August 5, 2005
Delgadillo Digs Up Sunshine Landfill Extension
By HOWARD FINE
Staff Writer
Call it the controversy that just won’t go away.
Two hours after the Los Angeles City Council failed to extend a five-year contract Friday with Browning Ferris Industries to dispose city trash in the Sunshine Canyon Landfill, L.A. City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo issued a ruling that put the matter back on the Council’s agenda for next week.
Citing an obscure provision in the city’s charter that requires a majority vote for the ultimate resolution of any matter before the council, Delgadillo ruled that the 7-4 vote did not meet that threshold and the council must reconsider the contract extension at its next meeting.
Delgadillo’s ruling is crucial because two councilmembers were absent from Friday’s vote: Eric Garcetti and Wendy Greuel.
Although Greuel has publicly declared her opposition to extending the contract, Garcetti has not taken a position on it.
If he votes in favor of the five-year extension and all other votes remain unchanged, that would be the eighth vote needed to pass the extension. The 7-4 vote fell one vote short because it did not represent a majority of the full 15-member council.
The ruling surprised several councilmembers who left council chambers believing the contract extension issue was closed. BFI, which operates the landfill, had said that Friday was the deadline for extending the contract.
The council’s vote fell short when council President Alex Padilla and councilmembers Janice Hahn, Jan Perry and Greig Smith voted against the extension. It also was a blow to new Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who on Thursday came out in favor of the extension.
Villaraigosa issued a statement late Friday requesting the council pass the extension next week. “I urged the City Council to reconsider the impact of increasing the cost of the disposing our waste and raising residents’ trash fees,” stated the release.
The initial vote was a victory for San Fernando Valley residents who have strongly opposed the facility, but it would not close the landfill which has other customers, including Los Angeles County. And it would not even necessarily halt city trucks from dumping trash there, since they could do so at higher market rates.
However, should the contract end June 30, 2006. the city would need to find a reliable, less costly alternative for most of the 3,600 tons per day the city deposits there. Padilla had said he would convene an ad-hoc council committee to study alternative trash disposal strategies.
The Sunshine Canyon landfill has generated controversy for decades as nearby residents have objected to trash trucks going by their neighborhoods and the environmental impacts of the landfill. It was a key issue in the debate surrounding San Fernando Valley failed secession attempt three years ago.
Alger was burning the phone lines for the last 2 weeks...really? I don't think "city hall" takes him seriously anyways. And I am not saying that in his defense. I don't know what kind of lobbying he could do?
I think it is safe to say most people in City Hall take Alger quite seriously, if they don't it is at their own peril.
The guy has proven repeatedly he can organize people, and has consistantly exceeded expectations on Spring St, including the recent public smackdown of Grieg Smith.
His roladex contains the cell and home numbers of many councilmembers, including my boss. Did he have anything to do with the Sunshine vote? Probably very little, but I know he spoke to several council members over the past few weeks. The Alger critics really don't know why they criticize him, they just do.
Now if I can have a peacefull day with my daughter, I'll see you guys later.
Any councilmember that would give Alger their home phone # is a bigger dumbass than he is. Ego maniac? Yes. Expectation exceeder? Not so much.
Has anyone thought about what the folks in the West Valley think about he possibility of the City using Calabasas Landfill or whether Greuel and Cardenas want the trash coming to Bradley?
I thought Palmdale threatened to sue over this issue just two months ago. Something about needing an EIR, IIRC.
Calabasas and Bradley will bring on the same opposition from neighbors and the city as has Sunshine. Plus they probably can't handle the amount of tonnage per day as Sunshine can
anon 10:39: Egomaniac? Just proved you don't know him.
Janice Hahn sure gave the proverbial middle finger to the Mayor!
Janice thinks she is so clever to cause this to be a problem; my prediction is that our Mayor gets into it with BFI and gets them to:
1) Agree to fund a study for alternative treatment methods and costing for treatment facilities; and
2) Modify the terms to make it terminable after two or three years on a yearly basis; and
3) Lower the cost a little for window dressing.
In the end, Janice will have acomplished exactly the opposite of what she clearly intended - she will have strenghtened Antono's hand rather than weakened it.
Her dumb brother, who never should have been anything, let alone Mayor, lost, and she needs to get over it and be an adult.
Antonio continues to appoint adults to these Commissions, and Janice would do well to absent herself from the confirmation process.
All she does is confirm that she is nearly as dumb as her brother.
Oh, Kenny, you must be rolling around in your grave these days. I'll come visit you soon. Being back in LA is getting tiresome; these guys are such AMATEURS.
AS WELL SHE SHOULD HAVE!
Smith and AV have been running around saying this was all Hahns fault as if they weren't around.
When Smith and AV stop accepting BFI money, then they may get some credibility on the issue.
Word is Smith is working HARD to get this turned around so if that happens Tuesday, you know who to blame.
He sure can put on a show though can't he?
Alger, can you be a dumb as you sound? This is Jim Hahn dumb.
This is not a debate about the pro's or con's of dumps; the BFI dump is leagally licensed, so if we don't dump there, someone else will. The dump will close when it is 1) full, or 2) when we buy it.
Go raise the money to buy it and then start the debate, you dummy.
Meanwhile, find the 17 Million that yuou are taking from the Police dDpartment to fund the cops we need.
Life is so simple when you are a wannabe. Thank goodness we aren't dumb enough to elect you to anything.
Antonio continues to appoint adults to these Commissions...
Yeah, he continues to appoint people who endorsed him and who he owes favors to like Maxine Waters by appointing her husband, like Cynthia Ruiz, godmother to one of his kids who was on his campaign etc. etc.
This was a slap in the fact to Antonio and a defeat. That is was the papers are saying. Now watch him urge with threats the council members to change their votes next week. Let's see who's weak.
Janice is out to vindicate the family brand name, like GW did in 2000. She'd like nothing better than to set up a run against AV in '09. If Pachueco gets back on the Council, he'll do everything he can to help.
Anon 3:44
OBVIOUSLY you can't read.
If LA stops sending their trash to Sunshine, WHERE ARE THEY GOING TO GET IT FROM??? They can't get it from other cities, cause they have contracts and can't get it from outide the county cause there permits don't allow it.
GOD BLESS YOU ALGER for doing SOMETHING.
These idiots who hide behind their anonymous names have no balls at all.
All they want to do is say "your taking money from cops" or "the trash will pile up on the streets" fear, fear, fear, fear... thats all these idiots have is fear.
Maybe we'll raise trash fees and stop subsidizing it? OR MAYBE as Smith pointed out yesterday WE CAN GET AN EVEN CHEAPER RATE!!!
DO NOT COWARD TO FEAR!!!! Jim, you have my vote 100% We need more people like you!
3:44 Moron...
If we don't dump there someone else will?
How about if I don't kill you something else will??? You idiot.
Maybe someone else will dump there, maybe the dump will be forced closed when it loses $43 million a year in revenue.
Saying if we don't do it someone else will just shows how morally bankrupt you are.
Attacking a man for trying to make a diffence while hiding behind your anonymity shows your a coward.
The fact that your dead wrong shows you a horses ass.
Hey Alger... your a pilot? Who would have thunk?
"Thank goodness we aren't dumb enough to elect you to anything."
Hey schmuck.., he ALREADY IS ELECTED TO SOMETHING.
Like him or not, at least he is trying to help. What are you doing besides hurling stones from a distance?
Let's stop the campaigning here and focus on sunshine canyon. I can care less what Jim Alger thinks or what his detractors of defenders think of him. Sorry Jim, but this debate shouldn't be about you or the the Granada Hills folks; it should be about the issue.
Frankly I don't care who lobbied who for what. Go pat yourself on the back.
If BFI can't renew the contract next Tues with the City of LA contract they lose out big time. Question is can the City find options by next summer when the contract completely expires? Will neighborhood council's be in the Council Chamber fighting with the Council on what to do like start charging homeowners for trash disposal or find a new city and community to dump on?
Also, won't the city's trash from apartments, condos and businesses continue to be dumped at Sunshine (the city and county landfills)?
I meant a REAL office, you know, like Assemblyman or something.
Neighborhood Councils suck.
It is irresponsible to not make provision for the waste of LA.
The deal should have been renegotiated to have some shorter option periods, so that if alternate technology or sites presented themselves, LA could withdraw.
This will take the sjill of AV to step in and make a better deal for LA.
Jimmy Hahn never had the balls to try to do anything like that. Too hard from his bunker.
This deal will get done a different way and Alger will be holding his Pyrric Victory bag.
This is the NFL now.
You can't take the politics out of this. Janice was definitely campaigning -- at the city's expense. She saw an opportunity and took the first shot of '09.
Janice was not campaigning. She's experienced with big companies polluting her district and not being able to explain it to her constituents because they can't physically see it.
She understands the concerns of the residents. She believes that Wendy was correct in saying that we used to be fearful of recycling too.
It doesn't matter what staffers and political gadabouts on this blog think. Janice knows that not renewing that contract is ultimately, the best thing for the city.
the whole north valley supported hahn? ann ziliak was at antonio's valley office almost every day. if she was lobbying last week, she didn't come to our office.
Just watch; this deal will be renegotiated and Janice and Alger can go cry in their beer with her brother, who will last about a month in the sea of sharks in which he is trying to swim.
Antonio will save the day and the city money while making a deal that will start the recycle/treatment of trash appropriately.
It is a deal who's time has come. Who better to shape it and take all the credit?
At least he doesn't hide in the bunker behind McOsker, who hides behind Doane Liu, who hides behind whichever bureaucrat is handy. Gotta give the man credit where credit is due.
With dumb moves like this, Janice will follow her brother into political oblivion. Her Harbor area constituents are the ones who will suffer from the political opportunism she displayed this week.
What the hell?
Tell me this isn't the same "Jimmy Blackman" that was AV's chief of staff in CD14 -- the one who couldn't get a SINGLE project up and running in 2 fucking years.
I thought AV said he was going to appoint QUALIFIED people who knew something ABOUT the board's oversight matters to head up things in the NEW Los Angeles. . .
COUNCIL: 8-12-2005
CD 2 Communication from the Mayor relative to the appointment of Mr. Jimmy Blackman to the Board of Fire and Police Pension Commissioners for the term ending June 30, 2005 to fill the vacancy created by Mr. Sim Farar whose term expired on June 30,
2005, and for an additional five-year term beginning July 1, 2005 and ending June 30, 2010.
Ethics Commission Review: Pending
Isn't Blackman one of AV's Deputy Mayors? Can he be appointed to a commission board? Talk about favors. AV once again proves he's full of bullshit when he said throughout campaign he wouldn't appoint special interests, friends, family, people who endorsed him. Jimmy is a moron. Did nothing for CD14 as chief of staff. He's the laughing stock of CD14
Janice Hahn is a strong role model for women. She is loved citywide. She's tougher in council then all those wimpy men she sits next to. What a bunch of losers!!@ Jance speaks her mind and is smart unlike some of those idiot men and the stupid things they ask and say in council. They are an embarrassement to this city like Lameboy Padilla, Zine, Weiss who are at the top of the list. Janice should run and teach these weak men a lesson
Thanks for clearing that up
If the Mayor could really get these concessions as metioned above, then Janice got exactly what she wanted.
1) Agree to fund a study for alternative treatment methods and costing for treatment facilities; and
2) Modify the terms to make it terminable after two or three years on a yearly basis; and
3) Lower the cost a little for window dressing.
In the end, Janice will have acomplished exactly what she clearly intended.
Janice is not her brother. She is her own person and the election is now behind her. She knows what residents near Sunshine live through since she has similar businesses in her district.
WAY TO GO JANICE HAHN!!! You made people finally pay attention and forced the Mayor to get involved and negotiate. In the end, you acomplished EXACTLY what you clearly intended to do.
I dont think she is dumb at all. On the contrary, I think she is very bright. She single-handly got the negotiations started!
The sad part here is that a vote was legitimately completed and once again the power players have found a loophole (probably one they created) to vote again. Now that BFI has another opportunity they will push those no votes to vote yes.
If this works for BFI then anyone that had a project approved or disapproved by the same number of council members; they can bring back the item for another vote.
Way to go Ms Hahn, make AV and his cronies accountable.
Way to go, Ms. Hahn; make yourself totally irrelevant for the future.
Woah, Alex voted no?
Wow, I didn't know "Alex Padilla 4.0 Version" was already out. Is this the "pro-environment" patch that was not included in the 3.5 version? I need to upgrade, where can I purchase it??????
AV DOES NOT = ENVIRONMENTALIST
labor thug, you have some fans in Los Angeles, your posts are good.
For the person who asked who Joe Ramallo is, he worked for Alex Penelas in Florida, Remember "Floridagate and Villariagosa?" Well, he has been working for AV and is his right hand person, confidant, and money launderer.
What a bunch of Pussies!!!
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