CM DENNIS ZINE Discusses New Phone Tax Ballot Measure With Doug McIntyre (And It Will Cost At Least $5 Million To Put It On The Ballot!)
***** LAUSD CONCERNED PARENT UPDATE *****
What started out as one comment I posted from an email I received today, turned into a whole big deal with LAUSD parents from the Valley area. They are all telling the same stories. So check the comments section for some of that. And I am preparing a big thread story. But out of the past year and a half of blogging...this has gotten the most response from people based on emails sent to me from different people. (zumadogg@gmail.com)
Thanks to CM Dennis Zine for not being a pussy and calling into Doug McIntyre's radio talk show in the 7am hour. Unfortunately, he was the guy most against this new phone tax that is to be put on the February ballot, but took the PR hit on the issue since he was the only CM to give voters some representation for their new taxations.
Bottom line: Big DZ (CM Zine) was there to tell listeners that they would have a chance to vote on it. (About the best spin you can put on it, however weak an angle it is.) And Doug felt that it was another example of constituents having to fight the government against fraud. (Shouldn't even be on the ballot in the first place...then it's up to the public to fight against it. Which isn't so easy, since they are calling it a "reduction".)
And thanks to Doug for mentioning how projects like Grand Avenue Project aren't helping the homeless crisis, that is expected to not only increase, but spread throughout the entire City, now that you can set up tents and sleep anywhere in the City, as long as you are ten feet away from a doorway. And good for Dennis, who focused it back to the communication tax issue.
HERE'S HOW THEY DESCRIBE THE NEW PHONE TAX BALLOT MEASURE ON THE AGENDA (I hope this isn't how they will be allowed to describe it on the ballot): "A Reduction of Tax Rate and Modernization of Communications Users Tax Ballot Measure." (You're average person who would read that could think, "A REDUCTION, and a Modernization of Communications...yeah, I'm for that!")
LA City agenda calls it, "a certain proposal to amend Article 1.1 of Chapter II of the Los Angeles Municipal Code to modernize and clarify the Telephone Users Tax by replacing it with a Communications User Tax applicable to current technology, updating the terminology and reducing the tax rate.
[Welp! Sounds good to me! A bunch of modernizations and reductions! Who would wanna vote NO on that?]
TRANSFER $5,100,000 from the Reserve Fund to the Unappropriated Balance and APPROPRIATE therefrom to City Clerk Fund No. 100/14, Account No. 4170 to pay for the cost of the Special Election. The cost for each additional measure is estimated to be approximately $200,000 per measure.
[THAT'S RIGHT TALK SHOW HOSTS...They say, "Oh well, at least people will have a chance to vote, and they can vote "no". But it is gonna cost at least $5 million dollars when it shouldn't even be on the ballot. Then people have to spend a bunch of money fighting it.]
QUESTION: With Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa declaring a financial "emergency" -- does he come out and do a press conference and address the City to let them know that there is an emergency. (Isn't that what you do during an emergency?)
But seriously folks, ZD is still a newbie, but with all the new taxes, rate increases, new "fees", raises given to unions and DWP...and the budget emergency on top of it...WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? Is this just a mere speed-bump...or is the City really in big trouble. Please post a comment to help school ZD's azz. And list all the recent new fees, taxes, fee increases, raises and future upcoming taxes on the ballot.]
zumadogg@gmail.com
What started out as one comment I posted from an email I received today, turned into a whole big deal with LAUSD parents from the Valley area. They are all telling the same stories. So check the comments section for some of that. And I am preparing a big thread story. But out of the past year and a half of blogging...this has gotten the most response from people based on emails sent to me from different people. (zumadogg@gmail.com)
Thanks to CM Dennis Zine for not being a pussy and calling into Doug McIntyre's radio talk show in the 7am hour. Unfortunately, he was the guy most against this new phone tax that is to be put on the February ballot, but took the PR hit on the issue since he was the only CM to give voters some representation for their new taxations.
Bottom line: Big DZ (CM Zine) was there to tell listeners that they would have a chance to vote on it. (About the best spin you can put on it, however weak an angle it is.) And Doug felt that it was another example of constituents having to fight the government against fraud. (Shouldn't even be on the ballot in the first place...then it's up to the public to fight against it. Which isn't so easy, since they are calling it a "reduction".)
And thanks to Doug for mentioning how projects like Grand Avenue Project aren't helping the homeless crisis, that is expected to not only increase, but spread throughout the entire City, now that you can set up tents and sleep anywhere in the City, as long as you are ten feet away from a doorway. And good for Dennis, who focused it back to the communication tax issue.
HERE'S HOW THEY DESCRIBE THE NEW PHONE TAX BALLOT MEASURE ON THE AGENDA (I hope this isn't how they will be allowed to describe it on the ballot): "A Reduction of Tax Rate and Modernization of Communications Users Tax Ballot Measure." (You're average person who would read that could think, "A REDUCTION, and a Modernization of Communications...yeah, I'm for that!")
LA City agenda calls it, "a certain proposal to amend Article 1.1 of Chapter II of the Los Angeles Municipal Code to modernize and clarify the Telephone Users Tax by replacing it with a Communications User Tax applicable to current technology, updating the terminology and reducing the tax rate.
[Welp! Sounds good to me! A bunch of modernizations and reductions! Who would wanna vote NO on that?]
TRANSFER $5,100,000 from the Reserve Fund to the Unappropriated Balance and APPROPRIATE therefrom to City Clerk Fund No. 100/14, Account No. 4170 to pay for the cost of the Special Election. The cost for each additional measure is estimated to be approximately $200,000 per measure.
[THAT'S RIGHT TALK SHOW HOSTS...They say, "Oh well, at least people will have a chance to vote, and they can vote "no". But it is gonna cost at least $5 million dollars when it shouldn't even be on the ballot. Then people have to spend a bunch of money fighting it.]
QUESTION: With Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa declaring a financial "emergency" -- does he come out and do a press conference and address the City to let them know that there is an emergency. (Isn't that what you do during an emergency?)
But seriously folks, ZD is still a newbie, but with all the new taxes, rate increases, new "fees", raises given to unions and DWP...and the budget emergency on top of it...WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? Is this just a mere speed-bump...or is the City really in big trouble. Please post a comment to help school ZD's azz. And list all the recent new fees, taxes, fee increases, raises and future upcoming taxes on the ballot.]
zumadogg@gmail.com
Labels: mayor antonio villaraigosa
Posted by Zuma Dogg @ 10/17/2007 06:52:00 AM
23 Comments:
If we're in such a fiscal emergency, the council should start now looking at ways to trim the budget. Not wait until February. They need to put out their cuts now for all to see. After all the new tax could (and should) get voted down. Let's see if they have enough guts to tell us now they are going to cut 2500 to 3000 cops if it doesn't pass. Something tells me we won't hear another peep out of them about the budget until the tax doesn't pass!!
You are a punk!!!!
Come on down to CD 14 again, PUNK.
We'd like to have a private debate with you.
If we're in such a sad financial shape in Los Angeles, the waivers for constituents events should be ended asap....across the board. If the city needs to tighten it's belt that's a start. NO EXCEPTIONS.
Here are a few recent stories of Mexican gang violence in Los Angeles. Mayor V. this is why we need to deport all the illegal aliens. We have way to too many Mexican gangs committing the most violent and sick crimes imaginable. And the Mexicans wonder why some whites think Mexicans are low life animals. Maybe it’s because a large group of Mexicans are low life animals.
Federal prosecutors Tuesday accused members of a Latino street gang of a violent campaign to drive African American rivals out of their South Los Angeles area neighborhood, resulting in at least 20 killings in the last three years.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-gangs17oct17,1,1478551.story?
In confessions to police, two of the gang members - including Jonathan Fajardo, one of the two charged with Cheryl's killing - said they believed that their friend, Christopher Ash, was the snitch.
And for that, Ash paid with his life, police said. He was stabbed more than 80 times and his throat was slashed
http://www.dailybreeze.com/news/articles/10595267.html
Los Angeles police detectives on Monday searched for three gunmen who opened fire in a bustling shopping district near MacArthur Park over the weekend, critically wounding an outdoor vendor and killing a 23-day-old baby being pushed in a stroller by his mother.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-baby18sep18,1,7786057.story
City Hall needs to start charging The Autry National Center rent for public land. Griffith Park is public land. Autry National Center has a lease for one dollar a year, for fifty years, for that public land. This is one of the ways that City Hall misuses our tax dollars by favoring their campaign donors.
Great now all the terrorists will come to LA since the idiot politicans are saying we're in a state of emergency and won't have enough cops. LA is the perfect city now that is vulnerable thanks to the unbelievable stupidity of Antonio and the losers on council. Go get em John & Ken KFI. Heard they've gotten thousands more listeners since slamming our idiot electeds.
Oh no...I just got a call from an LAUSD parent with some SERIOUS problems goin' down. Maybe it's "ho-hum" stuff in some areas, but I was confused and surprised to hear about this stuff going down in this area.
First of all, this isn't even what the call was about...but has everyone heard about the new style of weapons students are able to sneak into schools. They'll take a sharpie marker, or mechanical pencil and put a needle in the tip. (And other inventive weapons like those.)
Pretty scary stuff. If you see a kid running from class to class; it's not necessarily because they are trying to be on time. But because they are trying to not get jumped.
But this was about non-responsiveness on the part of LAUSD in some other areas. And based on the call put into ZD by this LAUSD parent (who read the LAUSD stuff on this blog a couple months ago, and the little group of parents decided maybe they should give ZD a call.)
Again, I'm flattered to get the call, but it kinda depressed me and ruined my day. I don't even know where to begin. But I should start by calling mi amigos at LAUSD and see if they are aware of the issues brought up by these parents.
Non-responsiveness to some safety issues, principal fast-tracking of important decisions without parental input, retaliation against those who stand up against "status quo/non-responsiveness", and some pretty scary sh*t.
I'm waiting for some stuff to be emailed over to me...gonna make some calls...but i can't imagine any kid being able to improve anything under these circumstances.
I've spoken a lot about certain issues regarding LAUSD...but this parent just gave me some shocking insight (with the "needles in pencil" story, and worse)...and how it appears they system will do ANYTHING to protect the bureaucracy and keep a finger from pointing back to you. (Because when you make mistakes at this level...it's got serious legal ramifications.)
More to come...
zumadogg@gmail.com
Has the judge ruled on the "old" tax yet? Does the proposed new "reduction" include a retroactive aspect that would foreclose on lawsuits seeking repayment of past illegal taxes? How much would be owed back to the public for the illegal tax? Isn't this the bigger issue?
Thanks Zuma. For reals. It seems no matter how much I rant and rave about LAUSD, nothing ever gets done at a district level. It seems it's every school for themselves, and I keep screaming that this district is gonna implode on itself and it's time to take matters into our own hands. It's hard, tho', when you keep getting slapped down because whatever we want to do isn't LAUSD sanctioned, so then the parents start freaking and talkin' CHARTER, and I don't know if that's much better. I'm just so freakin' tired of working my ass to the bone, only to see the fund raising fruits of my efforts being pissed away on shit LAUSD should be taking care of .... LIKE MATH BOOKS!! I SHIT YOU NOT. I was told we may have to make up the school budget (my school's budget) deficit by raising money to buy effing MATH BOOKS. I don't know whether to cry or vomit.
hugs and kisses,
valley doll
oh no...it's like the high school dance. no one wants to be first. but once there are a few dancers on the floor...
zd's email inbox just got an infusion by LAUSD parents. Gonna be a whole thread, i guess at this point. here's an example:
Dear Zuma Dogg,
My name is (parent) and I am a parent of two children at (school).
...The school is Mt. Gleason
Middle School and the Principal is Ms. Debora Acosta.
This year kids wanted to put on a Haunted House that would be held
after school and the community would be invited. The principal is not allowing it. (More...)
Our test scores went down last year.
She said that a lot of the stuff on the test was not covered in class or was gone over too quickly for the kids to grasp.
I don't blame the teachers as they were doing a great job the year before. I blame the new changes that were forced on everyone last year by the "new kid on the block".
My kids used to love school! Now they ask why they have to go.
Zine and Smith crashed and caved in to the Mayor in less than 30 minutes over the phone tax that's not called a tax--it's an Emergency Measure to keep cops on the streets. . .sure it is! I wish i had been a fly on the wall at those very secret meetings. What did the Mayor give Zine to get his vote? That's the big question. The hunch already is that Smith COS Englander will get the Mayor endorsement in his run for CD Twelve next year in exchange for Smith's voting in favor of the phone tax ballot measure.
here's a good one that just came in about lausd: in sunland, the home depot needs approval of lausd, because it is only 450 feet away from a school. how perfect to have tamar and villar's backed school board to give the approval. and oh yeah, city hall folks should be more careful about saying how tamar is gonna run for wendy's seat when greuel runs for controller.
and speaking of sunland...there's a good reason why they need a home depot. the city is gonna claim eminent domain over all that nice undeveloped area and develop it.
To get his vote, the Mayor offered Zine two hours watching ZD videos.
But, if he declined to support the Mayor, Zine had to spend ten hours watching them.
AUSTIN, Texas Escalating violence by drug cartels and deteriorating security in Mexico will make this the most deadly year yet for that nation's drug-related crime, and the violence is spilling into the United States, according to a report released Wednesday for a state panel.
"The deteriorating security situation has profound implications not only for Mexico but also for the United States, since drug violence increasingly crosses the border," says the report, submitted to Gov. Rick Perry's Texas Border Security Council.
GREAT OUR POLITICANS COULD CARE LESS HOW MANY COPS WE HAVE AS LONG AS THEY GET THEIR MONEY $$$$ HOW DO THEY SLEEP AT NIGHT AND ALL I CAN SAY IS THANK GOD NONE OF THEM ARE MY PARENTS. I WOULD BE ASHAMED TO CALL ANY OF THEM MY MOM OR DAD.
Oh my goodness...i guess you have a lot of frustrated parents in the area...and word spreads quickly that there is a forum on mayor sam today.
new email from a new person just now:
Hello,
Yes the stuff that is happening in the tujunga area is true. Kids are afraid to go to class in fear that they are going to be poked with or should I say stabbed with mechanical pencils and the administration is playing dumb. There is minimal supervision at this middle school because the Principal wants everyone to think that things are under control. There are an average of three fights a week in or around this school and parents are starting to get concerned, me in particular. The Principal claims to be too busy to be involved in parent meeting that concern the safety of their children. I demanded that the principal be involved in a meeting between myself and the father of another boy who was assaulting my son on a regular basis, and she acted like we as parents were wasting her time......Big Big problems at this school.........
this is basically the story i am being told. faxes on the way...i have to go over all the emails and return some calls on this...but it's obvious...this is nothing new to the area...but they see an opening here on mayor sam to get their story out there...so i'll present it here.
are they sending a disproportionate amount of students who were kicked out of other schools over to the sunland-t area?
i think superintendent morris knows all about the problems in his district. i'm shocked and horrified at what i am hearing.
another first time email from someone reading this thread. big thread coming...but seriously...out of everything i've ever blogged about this past year and a half...this one has 'em coming out of the woodwork, like i have never seen. grassroots. i have to get everyone's permission to share emails with everyone, cause each person is responding to the other person saying they have been fighting the same fight.
Here's an excerpt from the latest email for the main thread story:
"So yeah, make your PTAs pay a fee to you while we're trying to raise money for shit that you're (LAUSD) supposed to be paying for. Does that make any sense? I'd call that biting the hand that's trying to help feed you."
zumadogg@gmail.com
I hear the Transit Coalition just threatened the MTA and now they're getting a new subway!
This just in from Mayor Opposite Day. . .
Mayor Villaraigosa made his first assignment this year to ensure students' safety at school with the launch of his School Safety Initiative. Based on the successful COMPSTAT system utilized by the LAPD, the Initiative will provide law enforcement and the community with crime statistics around high-risk schools, enabling the City, school district and community organizations to proactively tackle school violence rather than reacting to individual incidents.
You are still apunk-ass loser.
Leave the Mayor alone and stay out of CD 14, punk-ass.
Again Antonio taking credit for someone else's work. He wouldn't know how to turn on a damn computer. If you speak to Antonio one on one you will soon find out he's ignorant and the only reason he got elected is because of tons of promises, stupid Latinos who wanted a Mayor but could care less about the quality of a man, developers who know Antonio would payback for their vote. Look what we end up with, a corrupt, uneducated, failing miserably, cheating Mayor who has put a negative spotlight on our city.
"stay out of CD 14"
The people of CD14 welcome Zuma Dogg. He is the only one we can find the truth from. Villareagrosa lied to us, TWICE Huizar is still lying to us, no one knows where Reyes is AND WHAT HE'S UP TO and Garcetti has too many developer intrests. None of them will help with the scandalous conditions of the Neighborhood Councls, the lies that have been proffered by the Autry. I would rather have Zuma in for dinner than to go ANYWHERE with anyone of those these guys.
VIVA ZUMA IN CD14! VOTE AGAINST THE TELEPHONE TAX!
Comment from San Bernardino County: Let that principal in the Sunland/Tujunga school know that she's famous (infamous?) even out here. Thank you Zumadogg for getting our attention! When is the school board going to realize that PARENTS and the rest of us pay for the schools! If she, that LaCosta woman, was a CEO of a major company, she'd be bouncing all the way to the unemployment line! Hey school board, time to wake up!!
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