Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Monday

The Great Debate was a great success. I did a little Twittering here but network problems prevent a true live blogging effort. However, upwards of 60 people watched the live stream courtesy of Antonio Watch. Joe B. did a great job organizing everything. Our panel of Ron Kaye, Debbie Lopez and Jill Stewart rocked the house. For the best recap, check out Joseph Mailander at Street Hassle.

Update: Daily News story on the debate.

LAist post on the debate.

Both Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom were invited to participate in an fundraiser for the Lung Association where they would climb the steps of the tallest builidngs in their city to raise money for the charity. Apparently both eventually opted out with a Villaraigosa press aide, saying "It's not even on his radar."

The City is replacing some historic bridges in LA and preservationists are up in arms. The plans to replace the legendary but crumbling sixth street viaduct resemble something out of a Wal-Mart. Yet some good news is that plans for another famous local bridge, the Glendale-Hyperion include not only keeping the bridge looking the same but actually restoring it to it's original appearance from 1928. Considering modern construction techniques and how well Walt Disney Imagineering does in recreating vintage LA locales it shouldn't be that hard for the City to actually make public works look decent.

The City of LA gave up on the idea of building an airport on 17,000 acres of land it owns in Palmdale and now - as a part of shady Measure B - it wants to turn it into a solar farm. As great as that idea sounds LA County Supervisor Mike Antonovich - in whose district the land sits - makes a good point that the City of LA took that land from local owners in Palmdale with the purpose of building an airport. Thought the City of LA couldn't make a go of it in running an airport there's no reason that Palmdale couldn't. Decency requires the land be returned to the local community; LA doesn't need to be running an empire.

Speaking of Measure B, appparently USC students are split on the issue. The university's paper, The Daily Trojan, quotes Mayoral candidate David "Zuma Dogg" Saltsburg “There really is no plan, and the DWP is not prepared for a project of this size. It’ll drive up rates, and then we won’t get a real solar plan, because we’ll just have this inefficient boondoggle.” An on campus forum will allow students to debate the matter on Wednesday.

If you're wondering what some of the fish or shrimp you eat may have eaten back on the farm, it may very well have been your dear departed dog or cat or other dead animal picked up by the LA City Department of Sanitation. Neon Tommy reports that the City has a contract with a rendering works located in Vernon where some 60,000 pounds of dead animals are dropped off by the City each month. The carcasses are boiled down where the remains are used for everything from biofuels to cosmetics to the meal fed to farmed seafood in Asia, that eventually makes it way back to LA diners' plates.