Late for School Hotsheet for Wednesday
If you've been reading the ongoing soap opera known as MayorSam for a while, you know that I wondered how long it would take before the wizards at the fishwrap of record took an otherwise fine City Hall reporter and started to make him sound trite. Here's Zahniser on the Home Depot Kerfluffle:
The Times has had about five articles on the dispute to date---why does it seem to Zee-man like they're dog-paddling to catch up on this controversy? The only answer I can come up with is editing.
Still, Zee-Man is Zee-Man, and here's one bit of tantalizing info right here:
Really? Over what? And should we care? Isn't that kind of like Sherry Bebitch Jeffe calling?
The permitting process. City lobbyists. Home Depot. A-lert the media.
While the Mayor (Sam) hops from point A to point B as the Mayor Yorty did all those years ago (is Michael aware that Yorty was the City's first Mayor to take heat for travelling too much, and even was out of town at the start of the Watts riots?), the Daily News breaks the following: "Traffic keeps us closer to home." Well, it tries to. Yesterday I took the 2 along Sunset from Vermont to Sweetzer and ultimately to Book Soup, where 86-year-old Elaine Dundy did a delightfully namedroppy reading of her celebrated 49-year-old Parisian novel The Dud Avocado. My ride was one of those two-wheelchair, jam-packed rides that drive you crazy. I don't know how anyone on the Westside does it anymore. The westbound 2 at 4 p.m. may be the slowest damn bus in LA.
She spoke of Hemingway, Peter Finch, Gore Vidal, her husband Kenneth Tynan, etc., but one thing Ms. Dundy didn't talk much of: LA. Funny, especially since she is such a location-centric novelist. She's lived here a while now, and the most memorable quote she issued forth: "It's all location, in a funny way." She was talking about the way she writes books: she wants to be somewhere, so she writes a book set there. But she has been in LA a while---maybe a little local remembrance would be a great frame for a great career?
The ineffable Kevin Thomas moderated. Including Lisa and I, there were only about fifteen of us there for this damn fine bookchat session. I presume the rest of you were stuck in traffic.
Oh, look at this: Jim Hahn Still Mayor? OK, so the hampsters at LAist, who don't like to touch City politics much, found something at the City website. "Important issues!" they say. I suppose. Now go find an actual live body to criticize---hint: there are sixteen of them in City Hall, no lines, no waiting.
Forget the talk about traffic, zoning and even day laborers. At Los Angeles City Hall, the fight over a new Home Depot may boil down to a single question: How many lobbyists will it take to open one hardware store in the San Fernando Valley?
Home Depot's push to expand into Sunland-Tujunga might seem like the most local of controversies, one pitting a retail chain against angry neighbors worried about blight and congested streets.
But over the course of two years, the issues surrounding the proposed Home Depot on Foothill Boulevard have expanded to include race, the nation's immigration reform bill and, not surprisingly, Home Depot's ambitious plans for Southern California.
The Times has had about five articles on the dispute to date---why does it seem to Zee-man like they're dog-paddling to catch up on this controversy? The only answer I can come up with is editing.
Still, Zee-Man is Zee-Man, and here's one bit of tantalizing info right here:
And Councilman Richard Alarcon received a call from lobbyist Fernando Guerra, who has two clients in Alarcon's San Fernando Valley district.
Really? Over what? And should we care? Isn't that kind of like Sherry Bebitch Jeffe calling?
The permitting process. City lobbyists. Home Depot. A-lert the media.
° ° ° ° °
While the Mayor (Sam) hops from point A to point B as the Mayor Yorty did all those years ago (is Michael aware that Yorty was the City's first Mayor to take heat for travelling too much, and even was out of town at the start of the Watts riots?), the Daily News breaks the following: "Traffic keeps us closer to home." Well, it tries to. Yesterday I took the 2 along Sunset from Vermont to Sweetzer and ultimately to Book Soup, where 86-year-old Elaine Dundy did a delightfully namedroppy reading of her celebrated 49-year-old Parisian novel The Dud Avocado. My ride was one of those two-wheelchair, jam-packed rides that drive you crazy. I don't know how anyone on the Westside does it anymore. The westbound 2 at 4 p.m. may be the slowest damn bus in LA.
° ° ° ° °
She spoke of Hemingway, Peter Finch, Gore Vidal, her husband Kenneth Tynan, etc., but one thing Ms. Dundy didn't talk much of: LA. Funny, especially since she is such a location-centric novelist. She's lived here a while now, and the most memorable quote she issued forth: "It's all location, in a funny way." She was talking about the way she writes books: she wants to be somewhere, so she writes a book set there. But she has been in LA a while---maybe a little local remembrance would be a great frame for a great career?
The ineffable Kevin Thomas moderated. Including Lisa and I, there were only about fifteen of us there for this damn fine bookchat session. I presume the rest of you were stuck in traffic.
° ° ° ° °
Oh, look at this: Jim Hahn Still Mayor? OK, so the hampsters at LAist, who don't like to touch City politics much, found something at the City website. "Important issues!" they say. I suppose. Now go find an actual live body to criticize---hint: there are sixteen of them in City Hall, no lines, no waiting.
Posted by Joseph F. Mailander @ 8/15/2007 07:49:00 AM
53 Comments:
When Fernando Guerra calls a City Councilman to lobby him, it isn't like Sherry Bebitch Jeffe calling.
Guerra is an academic of sorts, but he is also a registered lobby. The problem is created when the media calls him to ask him opinion of some issue (usually relating to Latino politics) and portrays him as an independent pundit. Zanhiser, in one of his previous lives (LA Weekly?) did a piece on this. It's a complete conflict of interest.
ineffable \in-EF-uh-buhl\, adjective:
1. Incapable of being expressed in words; unspeakable; unutterable; indescribable.
2. Not to be uttered; taboo.
Dumbass.
"Hampster"?
Is that the same thing as a "hamster"?
Dumbass.
This is where the city govt wonks(affectionately speaking) working that beat really do open the eyes of just the average joe citizen like myself who have gotten into this Home Depot mess. Sure, it's not news about lobbyists at city hall. That's a given. But the reporting of potential conflicts of interest is vitally relevant. Having a connection does not necessarily make for a conflict of interest, but it is essential that everyone is up front with it to the public so you can see the context in which their decisions are made. Maybe this is old news around the city hall water cooler, but for the average joe who has to take off of their real job to attend these hearings, it would be nice to know what you are up against. The deck is already stacked against community members, it takes reporters and bloggers to help level the playing field where conflict disclosures fail to materialize.
Sorry that your event when bad, you should hired a professional next time Alicia Corona. Well at least you still got your Mentor and his family supporting you. By the way how did you manage to the loan from them help you out. Did start repaying the loan back to them yet? If I were you, I should be careful the they don't investigate them? Now you don't want to out them in hot water. But of course, your friend make the payment for you if you can. I guess you still the little whore of Lincoln height.
10:23 am
WHAT EVENT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!!
AND WHAT LOAN AND WHAT FAMILY?
9:46
Fernando Guerra and academic of sorts??? Name one academic quality of this sellout! Guerra has sold out timae and again to the highest bidder, in most cases the highest bidder is the most corrupt Latino politician. This is the guy who was going to take Alatorre's campaign money to write his biography "Getting It Done" - but the FPPC had a different idea on how campaign donation laws are interpreted.
Guerra uses his Ivy League flunky- David Ayon - to get his "objective" perspective out to the public - remember those flawed polls durin gthe mayor's race. And it helps that Ayon is Monica Lozano's live in boyfriend, unhindered access to the Latino masses.
Guerra has done more than any other academic to keep Latinos in their subservient status. And like Antonio, all for personal gain.
When Fernando Guerra calls a City Councilman to lobby him, it isn't like Sherry Bebitch Jeffe calling.
Trust me, it is. Merely.
The problem is created when the media calls him to ask him opinion of some issue (usually relating to Latino politics) and portrays him as an independent pundit. Zanhiser, in one of his previous lives (LA Weekly?) did a piece on this. It's a complete conflict of interest.
Yes, we know all about that. What's everyone's problem with Fernando Guerra, other than that he's lobbying while Latino? I even heard Barry Sanders host KCRW's The Politics of Culture once. Is that a conflict too?
And why didn't Zahniser say what Guerra was lobbying for? He talked to Alarcon---he has two clients---BFD. Uh, most lobbyists have clients. Let's see more, if there's an actual problem.
Mailander,
Guerra is a lobbyist who tries to spin his views as objective perspectives through the mainstream media. This doesn't strike you as a problem, then you and Fernando are cut from the same cloth.
Alatorre, Alarcon, Villar and other corrupt Latino politicians turn to Guerra as their academic validation. There are plenty of other Latino professors out there that wouldn't dare touch any of these guys - this is called integrity, something Guerra is sorely lacking.
There is nothing wrong with him being a lobbyist, he's obviusly made a fortune. But if he wants to continue being a lobbyist he should give up being a professor. Can you imagine how many young minds he has polluted at LMU.
Alatorre, Alarcon, Villar and other corrupt Latino politicians turn to Guerra as their academic validation.
You know what? I tend to suspect that you are right about that. But it's just a suspicion of mine, as it appears to be with others. So...
So why doesn't someone write it, write out the evidence, and get these people to respond to it? Why instead do they just try to whiffle it, always burying it in cautious and condescending subtext? If there is evidence of conflicts and ersatz academic validation---as there is in, say, the Indian Gaming biz---et's see real evidence, knockdown pitches, not these stupid and inconsequential wiffle-balls that slime without building any case at all.
10:01- learn to punctuate before you cast stones.
"And why didn't Zahniser say what Guerra was lobbying for? He talked to Alarcon---he has two clients---BFD. Uh, most lobbyists have clients. Let's see more, if there's an actual problem."
Let me connect the dots for you. The whole story was about Home Depot, and they are one of Guerra's clients.
Guerra & Assoc
Jan 01, 2007
Delaware North Companies Travel Hospitality Services
Golden Boy Partners
Home Depot
Las Lomas Land Company, LLC
Microsoft Corp
Panda Restaurant Group
Providence Holy Cross Medical Center
That's a serious list of clients. My educated guess is that he might be grossing $250K annually on $5K-a-month retainers. Journalists like Larry Mantle of KPCC, who frequently uses the guy as an analyst, should cross him off their pundit lists. He's got more conflicts than you can count.
BTW, Kerman Maddox plays the same game.
Sorry, Sherry, only real minorities can get away with it. Although you had a good thing going when your husband was consulting and you were "analyzing."
Damn, taxpayers are getting raped more than ever with these cocksuckers and their "political analysis.
I wish I could get away from doing something like that.
I'm a little worried that Zahnister is writing for the LA Times now because the Beaner-aigosa excuse me Villaraigosa media lobby would be out in full force to try and supress and sugar coat obivous conflicts of interest.
BREAKING NEWS... IT'S A DUCK!
Greuel goes long and scores a touchdown.
Despite the best efforts of Tony Cardenas the Los Angeles City Council rules proposed Home Depot Sunland-Tujunga IS A PROJECT. Abby Diamond, Joe Barrett, Jim Alger, Wendy Greuel, and the residents of Sunland-Tujunga handed amazing victory over an UNPRECEDENTED number of lobbyists who invaded city hall over the past few days.
Wendy Greuel "It's a duck."
THANK YOU JO0E BARETT for leading us to victory!
THANK YOU JIM ALGER for all of your political advise that has allowed us to win this battle. Home Depot did exactly what you predicted and flooded City Hall with lobbyists but we were able to beat them. THIS IS AMAZING!
THANK YOU WENDY for standing by us!
Congrats, S-T, so far, so good!
10:48 a.m.
Don't play stupid, the loan that you asked your Mentor/printer famuly to pulled for you to help you with your place? Now do you have a recollection whore Alicia & Teresa. I guess you are playing your little poor Alicia part, I don;t have the money to reply huh!
alicia how did you manage to keep a secret from the family. Oh well I guess now you have deal with it huh!
Congrats to Sunland Tujunga
Tony Cardenas - Home Depot is playing the game of asking forgiveness rather than gaining permission. They and their lawyers know what an appeal process is. Home Depot is not going to take it's bright orange soccer ball and go home just because you make them stop playing the game with their hands. A mere 1% of Home Depot's gross revenue comes from LA currently. To grow they have to breach the city walls, and they don't care how many casualties there are. Don't sell the city short Mr. Cardenas. I don't know which Home Depot lobbyist hit you with a 2x4 but there are plenty of other businesses which would like to get a piece of real estate here, pay similar taxes and are willing to follow the rules.
Who's Lisa?
To old people, L A was a small village where the names on the signs meant something. I knew a famous lady whose name I won't mention, but having tea with her was a stream of, "And that reminds me of when we had dinner with the Cursons...or Dohenys."
I think the idea of old Mayor hauntings is a good one: even dead ones like Bradley, Yorty could pop up in the background in photo ops.
I thought Jim Alger was for Home Depot or at least didn't someone post that awhile back? Fernando Guerra is a joke and I am shocked the dumb media always goes to get a quote from him about Latinos. Remember Guerra from LMU did all those stacked polls saying how great Antonio was and against Hahn. No one believes anything out of his mouth and he's another corrupt Latino.
Reggie the alligator escaped his compound but couldn't make it outside the Zoo. The rumor is that Janice Hahn helped her little PR machine on his caper. There is no City Council meeting on Thursday, so expect her to hold a news conference in order to drain what may be one last bit of publicity from this story.
Reggie makes a run for it
Daily News
Article Last Updated: 08/15/2007 12:21:08 PM PDT
Apparently Reggie doesn't like his new home.
The alligator who recently debuted his own habitat exhibit at the Los Angeles Zoo made a break for it this morning by climbing over a wall and hightailing it to the zoo's loading dock.
Zoo staff members noticed Reggie was AWOL and immediately searched the grounds. They found him by the loading dock just before the facility opened at 10 a.m.
While they held him in the zoo's quarantine area, staffers inspected his habitat and discovered he escaped by climbing a side wall.
"Corrective modifications will be made immediately," according to a zoo statement.
Reggie - who was fished out of Lake Machado in Harbor City earlier this year and brought to the zoo among much pomp and circumstance - was expected to be returned to the exhibit by noon, under the watchful eye of zookeepers.
And to add to the absurdity, the zoo just before noon sent an advisory to the media asking the news helicopters hovering overhead to move back because they were scaring the animals.
Only in L.A.
I remember Guerra's lectures from back in the day. He's a racist, angry guy. If you're not Latino/a you owe everyone an apology.
No dummy. Jim Alger is involved with Do-It Center. He wants to be that is. Really he wants YOUR money to go to Do-It Center in exchange for a donation to Joe Barrett.
Wannabe liberal politicians like Jim Alger have found they get union favors and nimby love by opposing big box. There is no down side in it.
To Sunland Tujunga LA is a village for white people where buildings go no more than one story and stores are just big enough to turn around in.
They just haven't realized that died about say 1971 maybe?
10:23am & 1:16pm
IT IS TIME TO TAKE YOUR MEDS STUPIDO!
YOU KNOW NOTTING ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT AND I MEAN NOTTING!
4:28 - Don't know anyone at Do-It Center and have never shopped there. Your half-assed argument makes no sense.
What I want is the communities voice to be head, as it has been. The City Council has rebuffed the onslought of lobbyists and I don't care why... they just did.
The community clearly won today, and won big.
Next Prediction for Home Depot:
VILLARAIGOSA VETO
Not enough votes to overturn it in the end.
Reyes, Alarcon, Cardenas, Huizar, Bernie Parks and Janice Hahn vote NO
Wendy says
I TRIED! but you know these damn Latino politicians!
heard even :)
Hey HIGBY!
Do you have some kind of alert for JIM ALGER to know when he's being blogged about? GET A LIFE Alger you are on here fast.
EVERYONE is going to know about your You Tube video plan to run NC money through DO-IT as part of your scheme with JOE. We know why you're doing it.
HEY JIM are there pictures of you at a meeting with DO-IT officials? OUTSIDE DO-IT?
There could be!
HIGBY...
astroturfing for DO-IT
and his buddy ALGER
How much are they getting paid?
WE KNOW...
DO IT DO IT
$$$
JOE B
JIM A
CD12 is NEXT
2:57 - Not a bad idea! Perhaps the image of Norris Poulson could suddenly pop up in the background...
Weekly is a hit-and-miss paper, might find a good story by a person sincere and committed to a topic (WitnessLA's Celeste Fremon writing on LAUSD, for example), or the other extreme, zume writing on LAUSD, for example. Their readers are more anti-establishment, so they can get away with it. LAT readers just don't like the edgy- bordering on insulting coverage that's common in "alternative" news. DZ is just reacting to the market/ readership.
(Funny, DZ = quality; ZD = poop. Quality-wise, dad iz.)
Who's Norris Poulson?
10:01: A Hampster is what you put dirty laundry in. Too bad zuma doesn't own one, or a place to put the hampster in. But his whole mind belongs in one. Yikes, that takeover of Van Nuys today by the whole gang! Any normal person wandering in there would feel out of place. Odd, some guy who says he's from Van Nuys was in downtown City hall instead.
5:28 - Don't you know your Los Angeles history? Norris Poulson succeeded Fletcher Bowron as Mayor of Los Angeles, and preceeded none other than Sam Yorty!
Norris Poulson was the mayor who took Nikita Khrushchev to task for his (Khrushchev's) comment, "We will bury you." by responding, "You shall not bury us and we shall not bury you. We tell you in the friendliest terms possible we are planning no funerals, yours or our own."
And each lobbyist was hired to try to "pick off" at least one council member, to sway them from voting in favor of residents who were actually involved in the process....
Zahniser was making a point about all of the hired guns and the BIG $$$$$$ being spent by Home Depot to try to counter actual local community opposition.
Very interesting article. As usual, good job by Zahniser.
James Hahn may not officially be the mayor, however, he still must have strong connections because his law firm received over a million dollar contract to defend DWP in the Lucille Estes v. DWP lawsuit, which will probably turn into a class action because of the thousands of phone calls being illegally monitored I'm sure his law firm will milk it for all its worth like the PR firm did because no one at DWP cares. DWP lawyers are too incapable & lazy to do any kind of professional legal work which is why so much is spend for outside attorneys. DWP lawyers are basically for "display only"
As I recall the conspiracy was to spend NC money to buy community disaster prepardness supplies from the DO It Center and they would donate (kick back) a portion of the money the the Neighborhood Council Congress. Alger was, until recently, the vice chair of the Congress and hey he needed a slush fund! What is the problem?
Alger's on here all day talking shit. Gotta love it.
Alger's latest crusade is to stop the expansion of Holy Cross hospital. The Mission Hills NC, where Holy Cross is located, supports the expansion as do the cops and many others but busy body Alger claims that Holy Cross must complete an EIR. He actually said, if they refuse to do an EIR they must be hiding something.
Of course Tony Cardenas sided with the lobbyists in favor of the project. No surprise there!
Anon 7:17 P.M.:
Jimmy Hahn is not practicing law; he is trying to raise money for a firm that does financings; it is not a law firm.
What firm do you think is "his firm"??
David Zahniser is the best reporter at City Hall, far and away. When he was at the Breeze, he was the best; when he was at the Weekly, he was the best; and now that he is at the Times he is still the best.
James K Hahn is listed as the Defendant's attorney on the lawsuit of Lucille Estes v. DWP
BC364522.. you can check it out on the Los Angeles Superior Court website
maybe it should have listed Rockard Delgadillo as the City Attorney not James Hahn
on BC364522
Jim opposing a Catholic hospital? Someone tell Mailander
Re: Holy Cross, nothing wrong with a community asking for an EIR....
Re: Cardenas, LAT editorial comment today "Dog ate my..." excuses are often used by staff for variety of things -- they need to get it together over there....
Re: Alger, y'know, Zuma's balls are busted daily on this blog -- mostly for good reasons -- but when a community activist actually delivers....wtf?
Well I thought that Dave's article was a nice reminder of how city government actually works.
All credit to S.T. for slowing these guys down. Maybe you will get a bit of token mitigation when the EIR is done. But, for every "victory" like this one, the system gets its way 99 times.
Someone said this morning, "Activisim is the process of losing."
Remember "The Credibility Gap", back in the days of Mayor Sam I? They called him "Travelin' Sam", and said that "Los Angeles is the only city with its own foreign policy."
"Around your corner and up your city Hall, the Just Plain Sam Show". Kinda sounds like this blog!
jack off,
RE: Holy Cross, nothing wrong with the community asking for an EIR...
The Neighborhood Council where Holy Cross is located supports the project. The impacted community has made their decision. Alger needs to but out.
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