Los Angeles Politics for Tuesday

Lots of fun stuff in the race to succeed now Congresswoman Janice Hahn in her vacated CD15 seat. The latest is an unconfirmed report posted by one of our readers that the firefighters union executive board split 3-3 on an endorsement of their President, Pat McOsker, for the Council seat. With the panel deadlocked, McOsker claimed the right the cast the deciding vote. If true, this would be a shocking display of hubris by a wannabe elected official.



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Los Angeles Politics Hotsheet for Monday

As public employee pensions become a bigger and bigger issue in the news the City of Los Angeles received even more bad news.  According to Chief Administrative Officer Miguel Santana pensions and health benefits for City workers will jump nearly $800 million in the next four years so much so that by 2015 the cost for these pensions will consume nearly a third of the City's budget. While the Council looks for a way out of the mess they received stern warnings from union leaders about messing with the pensions.

The Daily News reminds us that when Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa was sworn in in 2005 he laid out a grand vision of Los Angeles as a "Venice of the 21st century."  Yet the City remains to be perceived as unfriendly to business and the local economy is in the crapper.  The News recommends three courses of action where the Mayor could "re-brand" the City as amenable to business.  Among them; streamline city permitting and processing, have Villaraigosa serve as the "pitchman" for LA (okay that one is funny), and repealing the business tax (won't happen until there is new leadership in LA).

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