Saturday Summary: City Clowncil And More!
1. Rubber Stamp.The City Council -- or "Clowncil," as one of you has dubbed it -- voted 15-0 to support Mayor Villaraigosa's LAUSD takeover plan. Query whether the rank-and-file teachers will remember that in March 2007, when half the Clowncil gets its report card from voters. Clowincilman Huizar said, of the LAUSD, "it's a disastrous system now and has been for decades" -- and he should know, since he was one of the people running it before taking his present office.
And talk about coming to class unprepared! School board President Marlene Canter tried to sway the Council to vote "no" as follows: "I don't have any notes; I don't have any speech. I'm going to talk to you from my heart." Great plan, Marlene! Then she really let Villaraigosa have it: according to the L.A. Times, she praised the mayor for having a passion for the issues of schools. Talk about mud-slinging!
Anyway, as long as she's talking from the heart, and he's got passion, we're bound to have sound public policies, aren't we?
Here's Clowncilman Perry's incisive analysis: "I think it's a plan with very lofty goals and there's a long road ahead, and with goodwill we may be able to get there." Yeah, that's what we were missing: "lofty goals." As long as you've got heart, passion, and lofty goals, who needs reasoned analysis based on empirical evidence? After all, the only thing at stake is the future of 730,000 children every single year. What could go wrong?!
2. LAX Boondoggle Not Dead.
City Clowncilman Rosendahl is talking about extending the subway all the way to the airport. Keep your eye on this one. It's the perfect prextext to spend a few more hundred million on special trains, visitor centers, etc. for the nine people who take the subway to the airport each day. Taxpayer boondoggles with $11.5 billion at stake are just too appealing for all the potential recipients to walk away from.
3. Diploma Still Means Something -- For Now
Remember the case of the kids who failed the exit exam, but want a diploma anyway? You know, the exam that's pegged at the eighth- and tenth-grade achievement levels for math and English? Well, the Court of Appeals ruled that the Alameda Superior Court erred in issuing that PRELMINARY injunction.
Keep in mind, however, the word "preliminary." Once the trial court conducts a full-blown trial on the matter -- or hears a summary judgment motion -- the court can still issue a PERMANENT injunction requiring schools to issue diplomas regardless of whether children pass the exit exam. So neither the case nor the story is over. My prediction: the courts -- either the trial court or the court of appeal -- will uphold the exam requirement, noting that students who fail still have a remedy of getting adult education till they pass.
4. Trash Talk.
CBS Channel 2 reports that yesterday the City Clowncil -- sorry, I just love that term -- approved a 5-year contract to haul some, but not all of our waste, somewhere other than Sunshine Canyon: "Waste Management, the operator of the El Sobrante Landfill in Corona, agreed to take 600 tons of the city's daily waste stream for $4.3 million annually beginning Dec. 30, according to a Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation report." The other 3000 tons of daily trash will keep going to Sunshine Canyon.
Another great public policy brought to you by passion, lofty goals -- and not a lick of common sense. Let me do the eighth-grade math for those of you who failed the exit exam: that's $21.5 million for NOTHING, for no tangible public benefit whatsoever. Someone fire up the karaoke machine, and let's sing "Feelings" together. . . .
Posted by Walter Moore @ 8/12/2006 08:15:00 AM
35 Comments:
I love the photo and the post. Shocking these "Clowncil" members don't have any guts. I'm going to e-mail everyone to hit this site. They bitch behind Antonio's back on LAUSD then loose their spine and vote yes. Not one NO. This is showing the voters we have a bunch of spineless assholes who are too afraid to speak up and go against Antonio. WE need to vote them OUT.
Talk about oonflict of interest Matt Szabo was just with Wendy Groupie and now he's moving over to Antonio. These are great names people posted.
Mayor Villaraibozo
Cuntroller Laura Chick-n-shit
Councildunce Parks and Weiss-ass.
Clown-cil" -- that is GREAT!
That's right up there with "Polloraigosa" and "Photoraigosa"!
Good work!
Thank you.
You posted this before I added the trash item. You may want to go back and read that, if you want to make your blood boil a little longer.
I'm really appalled at Councilman Huizar's comment to the LA Times (see below). This is a guy who stood by as the District continued to failed, did nothing about it and was able to get elected to Council only because he ran against the MOST depised human in local politics (Nick Pacheco).
Here is El Mero Menso's quote:
Councilman Jose Huizar said the vote to support the bill should not have been surprising, given the politics and substantive issues involved.
"I decided to go for the bill for two reasons. First, the new structure will be much better; it's a disastrous system now and has been for decades (editor notes Huizar did nothing to change the broken system"). Two, next time I vote for mayor, I will consider his accountability for the performance of the LAUSD."
Incredible hubris.
The vote shows that AV traded support for his half-baked plan for the coucnil's term limit measure.
The Times keeps referring to MAV as a "popular" mayor. I'd like to see if they still use this adjective once residents and voters have time to digest his support of more bonds and higher taxes, support of term limit extensions for highly paid/ ineffective city council members, the ever worsening traffic, the continuing gang violence and racial and ethnic tensions in schools, and the developer corruption scandals that will unbdoubtedly surface, etc. But at least he will be able to say he "did something" about LA's terrible schools before he moves on and spreads his popularity in his next office (gasp). I don't know if anyone can fix these huge problems, but it certainly ain't him.
Glad to see the highly paid LAUSD Superintendent standing up for the District. Oh, wait, that's right. He's away on vacation in Colorado. It's for the kids.
Come on, understand, there's no viable opposition in LA. One hand washes the other. Imagine a political atmosophere like Washington's, where every announcement would be met by a counter-announcement. "It's a deal!" they'd shout. "MAV's LAUSD takeover for term limit reform!" And it would get covered and given credibility by the media. This isn't politics. It's taking candy from a baby.
What does it take to wake up the sleeping giant bloc of voters in LA?
Where is the outrage over the criminal activities of the "occupiers" of our city clowncils and legislature in Sacramento?
I get more info on what is really happening in this city on this blog than almost anywhere. I Only watch the local news with the MUTE button on. I will not listen to one word out of the mouths of these crooked "politicians". The first half of the news is all about the murders committed by the Mexicans and the rest of the news is all about the failing schools and crumbling infrastructure.
Unless you have a 'seeing eye dog', all you need to do is open your eyes and look around you! What more evidence is needed to understand that the crooks in city hall and Sacramento have to go!!!!!
Get out there and become a neighborhood activist. We have the power...use it!!!!!!!! Stop being so PC.
Get rid of the scumbags!
Moore. Do you have friends or do you work ever? Shit, man, you have literally nothing positive to say except for such far-right horseshit that even if I agreed with would never fly in Los Angeles. Solve some stuff--have some pride about your city and get the Green Line to LAX. Go Rosendahl!
Mayor Sam, can we get some balance on this site? I like Moore's presence to show one perspective, but get a smart progressive back, too!
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
You -- and several other people -- seem to think I spend hours and hours writing for this blog every day. I don't. It's more like 20 minutes.
Thanks to a a big brain, good training, and years of experience sifting through vast amounts of data to explain things, I can convert info into articles quickly. Then I go live my life. Today, for example, I replaced a bilge pump and determined my big brain better hire a marine electrician, or my big boat will turn into a submarine the hard way.
As for the negative tone, do YOU see anything good going on in local government? Anything whatsoever? If so, do tell. The only thing good I've noticed recently is State Senator Escutia's educational proposal, and I wrote about that on this blog. So, Number 1, don't blame the messenger, and Number 2, I do write about the positive.
As for my writing supposedly being right-wing, huh? Do you seriously think intelligent liberals supporting the redistribution of wealth from the poor to the rich? Do you think they support raw power grabs, not based on logic or evidence? I don't.
The problems with City Hall have nothing to do with ideology. Rather, they stem from a lack of integrity and principles. L.A.'s City Hall is the 21st Century version of Tammany Hall.
I think liberals, conservatives and moderates all agree that integrity is important. We don't have that at City Hall. Any reasonable person, regardless of ideology, believes policy should be based on rational, throughful analysis based on actual facts -- not just knee-jerk, slapped-together "compromises" based on "passion" and "heart."
As for having pride in my city, I'd love to have more, but the politicians in office are an ongoing embarrassment. Tell me you're proud when you see the Mayor using every occurrence in the world to run in front of the cameras.
You want to make the city a source of pride? Let's start with making it safe for children to walk to and from school, shall we? Let's start with refusing to accept as "routine" hundreds of murders each year. Then let's stop giving taxpayers' hard-earned money to billionaire developers. Then let's eliminate the business tax, so good companies will want to come to, rather than flee, L.A. Hey, here's something else that would make me proud: stop killing tens of thousands of perfectly adoptable pets each year.
Extending a subway line by two miles? Not so great when it comes to generating civic pride.
Hey Walter, I have lived in L.A. for 30 years and I don't recall you leading one progressive issue on behalf of the people of Los Angeles. All you do is throw shit at people who do try to make possitive change! Fuck You!
Very impressive reasoning.
Tell me, what's your favorite coloring book?
You can tell the negative posts are from either the Clowncil member themselves or their peons. Yup there's going to be a revolution because people are really tired of these idiots. If the NC's lead the charge I already know tons of people from all over ready to be behind them. Someone needs to create a great looking t-shirt that sends the message to get rid of city clowncil members for all of us to start wearing. We have til Novem to get the message out.
3:53 and 5:41,
Yeah! That's what I was thinking. We need more positivity here. If you see the Clowncil's actions as being negative, you spread negativity and diminish positivity. If we have more negativity than positivity, how will anything ever get done??
A great t-shirt would be the picture of the Clowns you have posted, then at the bottom something like "GET RID OF THE CLOWNCIL MEMBERS NOW. VOTE NO ON ....
dailynews.com SLOUCHING TOWARD DEMOCRACY LA'S FUTURE DEPENDS ON EMPOWERING AND FUNDING NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCILS
WITH all that the Los Angeles City Council has done recently to squelch public participation in the political process, it's heartening that it's considering a proposal to let neighborhood councils have more power in City Hall.
Well, now that we've heard from Mr. Moore, let's see if we can think of some things City Hall is doing beyond his usual litany of ill-informed, presumptuous, and selective diatribe.
1. They're re-doing the LAX Master Plan that drew four different lawsuits and, for the first time EVER in any LAX planning process, the most impacted communities are actually directly involved in the process from the git-go.
2. Contrary to the head-up-their-ass animal idiots (known in the biz as "humane-iacs") Walter Moore sucks up to because they were the ONLY group to endorse him during last year's primary), the Animal Services department IS making progress. This calendar year they'll adopt out more animals than ever in one year and kill fewer. And for the first time ever, all their statistics (good and bad) are available for all to see on their website. 10's of thousands of adoptable animals being killed? Has Moore ever been in one of L.A.'s shelters to say hello to all the pit bulls even pit bull lovers don't want, or maybe find somewhere else to put 10,000 of them? We didn't think so.
3. On education, say what you will about Villaraigosa's plan (we don't like it), but at least City Hall is finally talking about the schools. Ask any expert on urban issues in the world and he or she will tell you if you can't fix public schools, you won't be able to solve your city's other livability problems. If Moore or anybody else doesn't like the way Villaraigosa's going at it, come up with something else. But don't just sit there and try to use criticism of the school proposal as the basis for your next clown-run for mayor or council.
4. The Planning Department actually has someone running it who knows how to plan, is willing to try (unlike the last guy), and likes to go out and talk to neighborhood leaders about the subject and the problems.
The same for the Transportation Department.
6. They've let Zuma Dogg ("Thank you, Mr. Dogg") turn Council meetings into guerilla theater. What the hell else do you want (or need), Mike Hunt?!
Regarding alledged giveaways to developers, Mr. Moore, who tells us he's an attorney, should know that the underlying problem is property rights and the constitutional inability of local government to stop an owner from doing a project unless it pays him or her for the property (which, to hear Moore gripe about the trash deal ad nauseum, is worse than paying them to DO something). These rights are upheld over and over again by Republican-appointed judges all the way up to the Supreme Court (where they even said the government could condemn private property so it could be used by private developers to make money).
What? You say Mr. Moore's a Republican and he would never admit that his party's money-worshipping ideology is part of the fundamental problem if he could find, however speciously, someone else to blame? Tsk, tsk...
6.
So Walter doesn't spend all his time writing this B.S.? It shows.
Glad to know about his big brain and big boat. Is his brain as big as his bilge pump? It seems to have a similar capacity for pumping out excrement.
Actually, I don't think Walter is a Republican anymore; I think he said he's a "decline to state" but he can elaborate. And in terms of "money worshipping," c'mon, it's like the GOP are the only greedy capitalists in the game.
Anyway, good article in the Daily News by Kerry Cavanaugh about how "little-known officeholder accounts are allowing Los Angeles leaders to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars each year in private contributions from lobbyists, real estate developers, unions and other special interests...Council President Eric Garcetti, an outspoken supporter of clean campaigns, downplayed potential political sway of contributors to the accounts. 'The limits are low enough with donations in Los Angeles that I feel comfortable that they don't exert undue influence' said Garcetti,who has raised $72,000 and $62,000, respectively, during the past two fiscal years".. that hekped to "cover expenses on sister-city trips to Armenia and Lebanon.." Ummmm
And the clowns play on..
^
"It's NOT like the GOP" are the only money worshipers..
I love the t-shirt idea!
And an animated video, based on the song "Where are the clowns? There ought to be clowns?"
What should the slogan be?
"Send the City Clowncil Back to the Circus?"
I also think you're right that the negative comments on the blog are from staffers. Attention staffers: get back to work! Help constituents!
LOL re the signs at what a great job the city is doing.
1. Lawsuits re LAX resulted in a "settlement" that is pouring another $250 million to "community activists" -- which you omitted to mention, because you probably haven't even read the settlement -- while LAWA "reconsiders" its plans. Hoo rah! That's truly an accomplishment!
2. Tens of thousands of animals killed a year. Yeah, that's humane! As for having a plan to stop the killing, yes, I had one, and it was in my platform, at my website, and quite detailed. But why should you trouble yourself knowing the actual facts, after all?
3. On education: great reasoning! It's better to "do something" regardless of whether it makes things better or worse, because it shows you CARE. Change for the sake of change is good enough for you, not for me. I advocate smaller class size. How about that?
4. "The planning department is run by someone who knows how to plan." Gosh, that's TERRIFIC! What an innovative and bold move! You really set high standards for yourself and the City, huh? Well, here's a plan for you: stop increasing the density of the city; you're making traffic and the quality of life worse and worse -- for everyone but the rich developers who contribute to your boss's campaign!
5. You jump from "4" to "5." We'll chalk that up to "typos happen."
6. Zuma Dogg gives you pride in our city? We'll chalk that up to an attempt at humor.
Sorry, Skippy, but your attempt to show what a great job City Hall is doing is not convincing. Tell you what: start your own blogging site -- they're free -- and call it "Mayor Sunshine," and then you and your fellow staffers can show everyone what a terrific idea you're doing for the City.
You can post article after article about how you're creating "affordable housing," and how you have these great ideas for "rational growth" -- and all the other euphemisms and lies used to steal from workers and give to the special interests that own your boss. Go for it! I'm sure it'll get a great following in no time.
P.S., Skippy, if you doubt I'm a lawyer, look me up on the State Bar member search website. You obviously are not a lawyer, or you would realize that merely the same enforcing zoning laws that have been around since 1910 or so -- laws designed to preserve our low-rise skyline -- does not in any way trigger the takings clause of the Fifth Amendment, as applied to the States through the Fourteenth.
So you can forget about fooling people into thinking that we "have to" let developers cram denser housing into our neighborhoods to avoid lawsuits.
Rather, you and your bought-and-paid-for bosses are CHANGING the laws, and granting VARIANCES to the special interests that write big enough checks, so they get greater rights than the rest of us, specifically, the right to build denser housing.
You may therefore want to lay off legal opinions until you pass the bar exam. As Mayor Villaraigosa can tell you, it's not quite as simple as you may believe.
P.P.S. -- Okay, one more, and then I'm REALLY going to the beach: I am NOT a Republican, and I do not trust either the Republican or the Democratic parties. I'm an independent, and I believe the parties have, for the most part, been co-opted by special interests, to the detriment of the rank-and-file members of both parties.
Walter Moore, get a job.
I've never read so many negative posts about Walter. That tells me one thing. That the CLOWNCIL MEMBERS read this blog and are pissed Walter is exposing their bullshit to over 1,000 people and more who read this site everyday including reporters. They are trying to kill the messenger but it aint going to happen. Thank you Walter for exposing the frauds who are sitting on those seats we pay for.
Well, it is interesting that all of these other people who have run the school board for about 100 years have made well thought out decisions, that must be why our system is such a mess. Time for new ideas, well thought out or not, at this point anything is better than what we have! I am not a fan of the Mayors, however, why not give this a chance, nothing else seems to be working, Mr. Romer! The truth is there did not seem anyone interested in taking on this school board challenge, because no one came to the table. So all of that criticizing, means nothing if all it is talk! All you big talkers do is Talk! Talk! Talk!
I beleive Walter questions and answers his own blogs.
Walter, you are an Independent what?
Walter, you are an Independent what?
Of course we don't think you spend hours waiting for someone to answer your blogs, as you just finished blogging, afterwards you go to the beach!
If this is such a great plan, the mayor is soooooo popular, and the public is sooooooo supportive for any kind of reform, why can't they put it to a vote? What are they afraid of? All the major groups stand "strongly" in favor of it. What's the big deal? Why can't ADV put it to a vote?
....of the people, I should say. Not legislators trying to find a job in a couple of years.
When you say, "They've (City Hall) let him turn Council meetings into guerilla theater":
Although I'd like City Hall to take a hit because of my actions, I must mention...It's the forefathers of our country who signed a doucment called "The Constitution" (and included an amendment, the first amendment -- I'm sure you like "amendments).
So, you can blame them. I'm more than glad to take time out of my busy day, to help educate one of my less informed consituents.
Thank you Mr. Dogg. It's Hollywood for fuck's sake. We need theatrical City Council. It is theatrical now. They are all ACTING like they're working for our best interests. The truth is their minds have been made up for weeks by the lobbyists who are against their constituents, regardless of the issue or the district.
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