Live from the Mayor's Budget Day at City Hall
Neighborhood Councils out in force at City HallGreat Saturday morning from the John Ferraro Council Chambers, as the City of Los Angeles Neighborhood Councils, gather for mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's Sixth Budget Day. As I type, Mayor Villaraigosa is speaking in lukewarm terms about the budgetary picture.
The diverse groups of Neighborhood Councils will elect regional "Budget Advocates", to work with the Mayor and City Council on the upcoming 2011-2012 Fiscal Budget.
As Mayor Villaraigosa speech continues, one cannot help but notice the somber mood of the Mayor as he discusses the dire economic situation facing the city. He hopes to get more concessions from the unions while pledging to move forward with pension reform.
In the area of revenues, the stream of money coming into City Hall has "flat line". Simply, the flow of tax money has stop falling but it is not increasing. Villaraigosa is broaching the idea of a "tax amnesty" (thanks Jack H.), to stimulate business in Los Angeles. He also is mentioning his favorite Deputy Mayor Austin B.
The City of LA is currently $63 million in the red, Villaraigosa keeps harping back to his days as the Speaker of the California Assembly, when spending money was so much easier. he is asking the assemble masses what they think are the core services that need to be prioritize.
One gets the impression that the budgetary crisis is taking a mental toll on the Mayor, he harps upon the protest outside his Getty House home, he reminds the crowds about the numerous protest that assail his actions. For a man who craves attention, the recent negative attacks on his leadership are showing.
More later as City Attorney Carmen Trutanich takes the podium.
Your thoughts..............
Scott Johnson in CD 14
Labels: 2010 Mayor's Budget Day, done, Mayor Antonio Villarigosa
Posted by Red Spot in CD 14 @ 10/16/2010 08:54:00 AM
10 Comments:
"As Carmen takes the podium." That's funny. Maybe the police can stop him and he can prosecute himself. He shouldn't take the podium. He should leave it there for other speakers.
What time do they start serving the drinks?
You needed one just for the Mayor's portion.
Who believes that AV cares one ounce about what the public feels about the budget?
Regarding Tru, he should be commended for the hindsight to create his "Reservist Attorney Corps" which is a group of young attorneys who are working free for the city.
In addition, it was nice to see Tru and Wendy embracing after their settlement of the CA's Workmens Comp issue.
The City Attorney's six-month-long internship/pro bono commitment is a very interesting concept; given the soft job market for graduate-level degrees at the moment (JD, MBA/MPA/MPH, BS/MS engineers/EITs, etc.) seems like something similar could be extended to early career professionals in almost every city department.
Partnering with the appropriate graduate schools at UCLA, USC, CSUN, Caltech, CSULA, CSUDH, CSULB, Cal Poly Pomona, LMU, etc, plus the law schools in the city/county, would be an obvious approach.
Offering a small stipend, or even a scholarship for continuing education, along with the job experience, would be an extra incentive for top graduates.
We live in an area with a strong academic presence, including some of the finest universities in the United States; taking advantage of that would seem fairly straightforward.
Best,
Brad Smith
http://smithforcouncil.org/index.htm
Trutanich is going to need a whole bunch more volunteers. I heard the Mayor slashed his budget another $7M, thanks to his pals in city hall, Jan 'Hamburger' Perry and Bernard 'A Man's Gotta Know His Limitations' Parks.
Maybe it was payback for the comments following Tru's interview on Neon Tommy, especially the comment that gives the answers to the questions Tru dodged.
http://www.neontommy.com/news/2010/10/carmen-trutanich-theyre-frightened-im-strong#comment-163080
Simple, lowest bid for a company to win, an government contract. Same for pension and pay for all city workers. Abolish the pensions and return all city workers to social security. EQUAL TREATMENT UNDER THE LAW. MEANS WHAT IT SAYS. EQUAL
"Reyes, god bless him, is not very bright, but I'm working on him." Ha-ha, how's that going? (from that neontommy.com link.) Actually it's Jane Usher his planning nemesis AND med pot nemesis AND all around Jane the Joke as dubbed here, who's "not too bright."
But if there's a just god who values honesty he won't bless her. She could be forgiven for being dumb, lord knows that's no bar to office in this town, look at her boss the night school law grad and the mayor who couldn't pass the bar at all (there's a battle of mental heavyweights.)
But the way she's deceived gullible voters, mostly the older naive folk at the likes of SOHA on the history behind billboards and other issues, how she let the Council walk into this mess of closing down virtually all the shops, how she and Carter called Chick and her lawyer liars and losers because they no longer needed them, their using blogs like this to play dirty when it suited them then threatening bloggers with retribution from the city attorney staff which they claim can't even deal with needed tasks, will NOT be rewarded by the Big Guy.
Having said this Perry should not be Mayor and did deceive the public as well and unfairly accused westsiders of not caring about the poor, "being more concerned with aesthetics than with poor people who need parks" or words close to that, in order to push through her deal with Clear Channel for a couple of giant LED's flashing right next to a highway into drivers' eyes.
She may well also be a puppet for AEG and Leiwike, look at how he openly wants a billion bucks from the city to help fund his stadium and Perry needs him for her campaign so wonder how she's going to feel about THAT issue. However a blowhard bully like Clown Carmen blew any credibility he had before he even took office and lacks the gravitas to challenge him or anyone. That leaves the likes of Garcetti, with his own ambitions for mayor and need of money, or Greuel, who has no lawyers of her own or teeth to back up her audits and has been denied by Trutanich the right to even audit officials. Lucky we still have Rosendahl the flip-flopper who wants to agree with whoever he's talking to the moment, Reyes, Zine the Two-face who also wants to be mayor or controller lord help us, Alarcon and Parks-Perry!
Can't wait for all the pensions to hit the fan. Stupid people encouraged by more stupid people. We need to get back to local people who share our beliefs for a better run city. Too bad colleges have failed terribly at doing that. So much for stats.
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