Power to the People
The latest hit to LA shows how well we handle things compared to other cities. As fouled up in some ways that our city government is, when it comes to the basics - especially handling emergencies - we do very well compared to the rest of the country.First off, the citywide power outage that happened today rarely happens in LA. When we get outages, they are localized and almost always short in duration. Once in a while a bad storm will really mess things up and a small area could be without power for a few days, but that rarely happens. And considering the power was out citywide - it was back up in less than two hours. Fantastic. Had this happened in New York for example, the entire Eastern seaboard would be down for two days.
When the city was devastated by a major earthquake, we were up and running again within days. Sure, many homes and buildings too years to repair, but that was due to other issues. For Christ sake, we had a major section of the 10 Freeway destroyed and it was back up in a little over two months - when the "experts" said it would take five years.
Not to get cocky, we have to keep prepared. Everyone should have an emergency plan and the city should continue to prepare. That's why we have constant drills, meetings, discussions, etc. This incident is just yet another reminder why we have to keep doing that.
But we should be grateful that Los Angeles is ready to deal with most things that can come our way and can deal with it well.
So - if the DWP wants a raise - give it to them. But FIRE the idiot who cut the line (as CNN is reporting) that caused this outage.
Posted by Mayor Sam @ 9/12/2005 02:19:00 PM
5 Comments:
Fire the idiot who cut the line?! He's the main labor negotiator for the DWP union. Think the city council would cave now? Antonio caved a long time ago, now he has to acknowledge labors "increased leverage." The cops get the "blue flu", DWP workers have "blue outs."
Who is this person if you know?lkf
How does a short-term power outage prove we're prepared for a major catastrophe?
Sure, LA withstood a significant earthquake at 4:30 on a holiday morning. And yes, traffic was a problem for several weeks. But that in NO WAY compares to the devastation that hit the south. An entire city is virtually gone.
If we have a major earthquake in California, I sure as hell hope FEMA is better prepared than they were for Hurricane Katrina.
We don't need FEMA and GWB isn't going to help us anyway. We are on our own.
1. Do you work for DWP? If not then why would you advocate for a pay raise? They are already the highest paid entity within the City of LA!
2. The City of LA is in no way prepared to handle a large scale catastrophe of great magnitude! We do not have the emergency personnel to deal with anything of that nature.
3. We have the largest percentage of minorities in the United States. Do you really think the gov't is interested in funding our survival?
*get a clue*
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