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Monday, February 19, 2007

Monday Open Thread: Sunland-Tujunga's Home Depot Again...

The L.A. Times has an article on the Home Depot thing. I can't bring myself to read it -- we'll chalk it up to the late hour, the dog beach video, and all the writing -- but you go right ahead.

And here's another article in the L.A. Times about Measure L.

If Mayor Sam weren't fishing, I know he'd want me to say to you, in a gentle, supporting, avuncular fashion (that's your word for the day, by the way), "Blog away, dum-dum's." You're so smart, you explain what's happening and why it matters to the rest of us, would you? I gotta go help a friend buy or lease a car.

26 Comments:

Blogger Unknown said:

Now don't be silly, Wally, the story is not going to bite you!
And no, we are not going away, no matter how tired you get of hearing about us...

February 19, 2007 1:34 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Amendment L has received relatively scant public attention. Huizar scratched plans for a campaign to promote it after an unexpected challenger caused him to mount his own reelection effort.

February 19, 2007 3:29 AM  

Blogger Zuma Dogg said:

HERE'S A COMMENT FROM ANOTHER THREAD I COPIED AND PASTED IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:

Zuma is right. The idea that someone with no educational experience should be setting educational policy for 700,000 is asinine.

The Superintendent's job is an administrative job. The school board is a policy making entity. To turn over the reigns of power to a neophyte like Galatzan would roll back educational reform a decade or more.

Not only is she ignorant of current reform, she has no idea of what has been tried already. At her kickoff she said she first became aware of the problems by reading a newspaper article on the dropout rate at Birmingham.

That was a year and a half ago. She said she suddenly woke up to the problems.

Geez lady, while you were asleep on the issues, we've been searching for answers for 30 years. Some of the solutions are working well, others have failed miserably.

Under her stewardship will we have to try all the old failed ways again because someone packages them up and sells her on how shiny they are?

This is a job that requires experience. It requires Institutional Memory. Galatzan has none.

February 19, 2007 4:11 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

"Business as usual" has not worked at LAUSD, and everyone knows it. We are graduating functional illiterates at an increasing rate. Why in the world would we want to continue the status quo?

It is time to do something to change our ways, and reelecting the fools that got us here is not the answer.

February 19, 2007 4:34 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Open thread:
LA Times endorses
Tony Cardenas, Monica Rodriguez, Jose Huizar

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-endorsements19feb19,0,4414187.story?coll=la-opinion-leftrail

Making L.A. their own
Our choices, and a few thoughts, on next month's City Council election

February 19, 2007 7:41 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

I really like Rick Orlov because he reports the facts and isn't a kiss butt like other reporters.

Villaraigosa is taking council President Eric Garcetti and Councilwoman Wendy Greuel with him to Sacramento on Tuesday to lobby for more transportation funds.
(HERE ARE THE 2 BIGGEST KISS BUTTS TO AV ON CLOWNCIL. GREUSOME THEY SAY HAS A GROUPIE CRUSH ON AV.)

Of course, as a result, the City Council won't be able to meet to do city business because it won't have enough members for a quorum.
(MUST BE NICE NOT HAVE TO WORK)

Take City Councilman Herb Wesson, who held a pair of fundraisers last week that added $80,000 to his campaign fund - even though he is being opposed by only two write-in candidates who failed to qualify for the ballot. One of those fundraisers had a host committee of some two dozen lobbyists and attorneys who do frequent business before the City Council. (DIDN'T AV SAY HE WAS GOING TO CLEAN UP CITY HALL OF LOBBYISTS AND SPECIAL INTERESTS? SOMEONE TELL METRO SEXUAL WESSON)

...council ramrod through some $95 million in tax breaks for the $2.05 billion Grand Avenue project, hoping it will serve as a further catalyst to a growing downtown. But it also suffered what it sees as a major setback with the council's adoption of a living-wage ordinance for hotels adjacent to Los Angeles International Airport - complete with no guarantees it will be quarantined to that area.....Toebben said he and other business leaders do not even plan to voice a protest when the issue comes up for final approval this week....Instead, business leaders are just planning to go to court to challenge the measure and the council's action.
(GREAT...HOPE ALL THIS LAME ASS CRAP CLOWNCIL IS PASSING GETS STUCK IN COURTS WITH LAWSUITS. IDIOTS HAVE NO BRAINS AND WILL COST TAXPAYERS IN SETTLING)

February 19, 2007 8:50 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

I just read the LA Times articles. Me can not wait for MS to get back and have fun with the Tujunga dum dums. I bet Joe B must be pissed at the LA Times. They didn't interview him seems as if more people in Tujunga than he will admit want the home deport.

Dumb Joe dumb. Better go back to being a failed screenwriter.

Mayor Sam come back time for more delectable troublemaking!

February 19, 2007 9:23 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Rebuttal to Measure L

VOTE “NO” ON CHARTER AMENDMENT L

This measure is just one more attempt by Mayor Villaraigosa to take over the LAUSD Board of Education. Putting aside the question of constitutionality (the measure combines more than one unrelated issue on the same ballot initiative; term limits and campaign finance reform) this initiative is wrong on so many levels.

Let’s begin with campaign finance reform which, according to the text, will “encourage a broader participation in the political process by placing limits on the amount any individual can contribute" in any one election. Campaign reform of this type, while it sounds good, will actually do the opposite. By setting contribution limits at $1,000 per individual, an unknown candidate running a grassroots campaign will have to get 150 people to contribute $1,000 to compete with the likes of Mayor Villaraigosa and his developer friends. These interested parties have already contributed over $150,000 to his Partnership for Better Schools–a committee the Mayor formed to raise money for LAUSD candidates in three separate Districts. Anyone who has ever worked on a grassroots campaign knows that you have to raise money to raise money. If you have the endorsement of people with access to deep pockets who know all the clever ways to traverse the system, this type of reform is irrelevant.

Secondly, if you manage to get through the first 17 pages of legal jargon in your Voter Information Pamphlet, you'll find the breakdown of a compensation committee that is due to form on April 7, 2007. The need for a committee of this sort is baffling enough without trying to figure out how the darn thing is supposed to work. These are elected officials that earn $24,000 a year being of service to their community. This measure makes them look like corrupt politicians in dire need of oversight and accountability.

Thirdly, this reform will do nothing to prevent the formation of a committee like Partnership for Better Schools. After trudging through a morass of sections and subsections, there is a clause on page 16 that stipulates that as long as the advertisements don't say that it is paid for by the candidate, anyone can endorse or oppose anyone they want as long as they clearly specify such on all campaign ads and literature. Remember all those 527's people were so upset about during the 2004 election, well here we to again.

Finally, on the issue of constitutionality, many of the same people behind Measure L were also behind Measure R on the November 2006 ballot. That proposition was ruled unconstitutional by a Superior Court Judge and allowed to stay on the ballot by an appellate court.

Mayor Villaraigosa’s initial attempt to take over the LAUSD school board was ruled unconstitutional by Judge Dzintra Janavs in January. He has stated publicly that he is determined to take the matter all the way to the Supreme Court.

Measure R—the proposition that combined term limits and ethics reform—passed by the voters in November, is due to go before the same judge in April. Like Measure L, it too combined more than one unrelated issue on the same ballot initiative. Doing so violates the state constitution and the LA City Charter. Don’t let another measure pass that ends up in the courts! Remember it is your money they’re spending; they don’t care what it takes to further their agenda or how long.

Donna C.
votesmart.wordpress.com

February 19, 2007 9:49 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Wawawawa that is all you hear from the dinosaurs in Sunland Tujunga. I hate progress, too many homes, too many people, not enough horses. The world progresses even if you don't like it.

My only complaint is with Wendy. She smart intelligent she know that things will change in this area even if some of the old time residents don't like it. Why is she paying attention to these group of dinosaurs? She can get elected without them. Do the right thing plan for future growth in this area. It is inevitable, it will happen. When I moved here 4 years ago I once went to a N.C. meeting at expressed this sentiment. I was just about killed by this group of inbred nimbys who live here. They hate free speech if you don't agree with them.
But I am thinking about my kids and where will they live in the future. We have to redevelop land to accomodate them. These inbreds can't see farther than today.

February 19, 2007 9:57 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Only one thing you gotta know about about the Home Depot issue.

NIMBY, NIMBY, NIMBY.

They'll use the store somewhere else, hire the workers somewhere else, but "NOT in my back yard."

And the silly business about driving "mom and pops" out of business is just that, silly, and also hypcritical.

Wanna know how much? Just ask yourself how many of the protesters would be upset if a BIG BOX "Whole Foods" market was coming into the area to "destroy" the liveliehood of "mom and pop" corner stores and smaller independent markets.

Answer? None. Period.

February 19, 2007 11:09 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

The only question I would like responded to regarding Home Depot in Sunland is whether or not they are following the rules and regulations set up for safe building.

If they are attempting to go around the laws which every other business has to follow, then they must either conform or move on.

If your only response is to hurl insults and character slurs, then you are not in a real position to defend your position.

Why not just call us Racist? That seems to be the slur de jour for those with no facts to back up their position.

February 19, 2007 11:21 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Whole Foods a Big Box? Now that's funny!
Home Depot has numerous forklifts
to move and load large items. Home Depot gets 18 to 20 semi truck deliveries per day! Why? Because they sell in bulk and wholesale to industrial and contractor customers.

Whole Foods sells groceries to people with shopping carts.

February 19, 2007 11:59 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

I heard Skelton and Hacopian are on the Home Depot payroll as consultants, is that true?

February 19, 2007 1:18 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

1:18

I guess that is one way to buy off AV's support.

Nothing would surprise me with those guys.

February 19, 2007 1:22 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

11:09 am,
Rick Taylor of Dakota Communications, Home Depot's PR firm!
Is that you? Just gotta put in your 2 cents of drivel, don't ya?

February 19, 2007 1:32 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Thanks to MS and the LA Times looks like the silent majority of Sunland-Tujunga is finally speaking up against the wing nuts.

February 19, 2007 2:43 PM  

Blogger Unknown said:

2:43
A woman that just moved here, a 19 year old looking for a job, and a guy in Shadow Hills.
That's a Silent Majority?
Please.
The story read like a promo for Home Depot and criminal developer Robert Hall. The kid that wrote the story spent so much time up here interviewing so many people that I can only assume an over zealous editor has hacked his story into
an unrecognizable version of what he originally wrote.

February 19, 2007 3:32 PM  

Blogger Unknown said:

11:09 said:
And the silly business about driving "mom and pops" out of business is just that, silly, and also hypcritical.

yea you are right, just watch this video from today's KCAL 9 site:

http://www.cbs2.com/video/?id=34131@kcbs.dayport.com

February 19, 2007 6:00 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Joe B, you are way too kind.

This is one more absolute proof that the corporations have bought off the world. Home Depot spends thousands of dollars advertising in the LA Times.

This reporter supposedly was asked by Wendy Greuel to come to do an article about the old fashioned lights that are coming to the Olde Towne on Commerce Avenue where we are in the process of restoring the old commercial district. Instead they used it to do a propaganda article for Home Depot - their very monied corporate advertiser.

We have summer jobs and we have paint. We do not need or want Home Depot on that site and that is almost all of us, so who were the shills they quoted in the paper? Are they real people, part of that 3 or 4%, or were they set up by Home Depot or the Times or both?

And the photographer took hundreds of pictures of the No to Home Depot Demonstrators, and out of hundreds of pictures of dozens of people they chose to display one picture of a guy with an NRA shirt on.

NHDC has never ever belied the day laborer issue, but somehow that was mentioned as reasons for opposing HD twice in this article. As a member of the NO2HOMEDEPOT campaign I can assure you that is an out and out lie.

This so-called comprehensive article was one of the most biased pieces of drivel I have ever read. I plan on cancelling a many-year-long subscription to the LA Times tomorrow. I urge you to do the same. Without honest media and news reporting, there can be no honest government.

What a hatchet job

February 19, 2007 6:18 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Yep, I'll be cancelling my subscription to the Times, too. If that is what they call reporting, then I don't care to read their paper. It looks like Home Depot must have either threatened or paid the editor or the reporter, or both.
I'll buy a paper from the other guys.

February 19, 2007 8:33 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Great Idea!
Boycott the LA Times!
I'm up for it!

February 19, 2007 10:25 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

The LA Times is pathetic. As has been documented, their coverage of the black Long Beach hate-crime thugs was beyond ridiculous. Cancel your subscription, and if you HAVE to read one of their (usually sloppy and biased) articles, go online.

February 19, 2007 10:44 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

MS and LA Times exposed the Sunland Tujunga nut cases. now they're crying

February 19, 2007 11:27 PM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

Sunland-Tujunga = Venice without the ocean. The nut jobs walk up and down Sunland Blvd. all day long. Makes for great entertainment without the drive to the Westside.

Home Depot will be built there. Just like Walmart in Porter Ranch. And the same people fighting it will shop there, just like the folks in Porter Ranch with Walmart.

February 20, 2007 12:24 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

I hope they pay you Home Depot shills plenty of money. You have nothing else left - no soul, no integrity, no decency, no respect, no life.

February 20, 2007 1:54 AM  

Anonymous Anonymous said:

How many times can you call us nut jobs or some other childish word. You are plain and simple. And your writing on behalf of the HD sounds like it's coming from a ten year old. Grow up, understand the situation, and see with eyes that know something, instead of wearing blinders and lashing out without a reasonable amount of thinking. Just childish.

February 24, 2007 8:01 AM  

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