Saturday Hotsheet

With the City in a deep financial doo doo Los Angeles' elected leaders are being asked to share the pain but some of them are going kicking and screaming.  Ten of Los Angeles City Council members have agreed to some pay cut, five have not.  Newest member Paul Krekorian and President Eric Garcetti have agreed to a 10% pay cut. Krekorian's staff has also volunteered for pay and budget cuts and have given up all their City owned cars. The Mayor has agreed to a 16% cut while Controller Wendy Greuel is forgoing 7%.  However Councilman Bernard Parks and City Attorney Carmen Trutanich are among those refusing to cut their pay.

What is one reason to vote yes on the coming California ballot measure to legalize pot, according to CurbedLA? With legal pot in stores drug related violence in Mexico could lessen.

It was good for Hillary Clinton so why not for a neighborhood council? Silver Lake daVine reports that The Silver Lake Neighborhood Council will be open today for "listening." Whatever that means.

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Los Angeles Politics Hotsheet for Tuesday

But Antonio's seats are better than mine!

Man, being an elected official sure has it perks. We all know about Mayor V's free tickets. The latest politician to score free Lakers and USC tickets as well as wine, whiskey, tequila, cigars and cologne is District Attorney Steve Cooley. Of course a spokes-flack says that Cooley has the "highest integrity" and these were gifts from friends. It's nice to have friends in high places.

Speaking of perks for pols Walter Moore makes a good point. Though City Controller Wendy Greuel has released the salaries of City workers her report does not list the perks they receive such as free cars, per diems, insurance, etc. Moore recounts that during an interview with KABC's Peter Tilden, Councilman Dennis Zine hemmed and hawed when asked what perks he gets.

Attorney General Jerry Brown is investigating the pay scandal in the City of Bell but a new report recounts outrageous pay for officials in the City of Oakland when Brown was Mayor there. The situation was so bad that an auditor was brought in following Brown's departure that found a tangled web of high salaries as well as unknown bonuses, paid leaves and vacation buybacks far in excess of salary agreements. The situation was so bad an unnamed Democratic leader said that Brown was “the worst administrator ever to come down the pike.”

Despite serious ethical allegations against her, Maxine Waters, like Richard Alarcon, seems to have not lost support amongst her supporters. Daiquiri Jackson, a member of a South Central church, told reporters that Waters was being targeted because she is a minority woman. However this is nonsense because most of the House members - Republican and Democrat - who have been brought up on ethics charges the last few years have been white males.

The Los Angeles and First blog has given Mayor Villaraigosa a report card and he averages a C minus. With an F in budgeting and a D+ in the economy it's hard to go up from there.

Mulholland Terrace brings to our attention a ridiculous exercise sponsored by the Mayor and the CRA: a "contest" for the best ideas on how to build a "clean corridor" in LA. The purse? $11,000.

Activists and parents from the North Valley are not giving up until an independent review into the death of teenager Zac Champommier. You may remember that Zac was shot down in cold blood by LA Sheriff's Deputies in a shopping center parking lot for no apparent reason. For two weeks now protesters have held rallies in Studio City near the site of Zac's murder.

Saturday Hotsheet

We're just going to sell propane and propane accessories.

Never doubt the power of well organized citizen activism when going up against brain dead bureaucrats when it comes to land use decisions. Residents in Sunland-Tujunga successfully fought off an industrial propane refilling station in their community with the help of Councilmember Paul Krekorian. Other communities are not as lucky to be as organized nor to have as decent a Councilmember as Krekorian when a koo koo for Cocoa Puffs planner such as Milena Zasadzien see no problem with such a facility in a retail zone. "It may not be an ideal retail use such as a cafe or restaurant, but it is still a retail site," Zasadzien told the LA Weekly.

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Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Tuesday

Coastal San Pedro Neighborhood Council member Doug Epperhart has a great idea - cut the salaries of the Los Angeles City Council, Controller, Attorney and Mayor in half. Currently, with perks and salary local electeds pull down Fortune 500 salaries and are the highest paid elected officials in the US. Currently the electeds' salaries are tied to that of judges. Epperhart's amendment to the City Charter would insert the word "half." Villaraigosa might have to give up having foie gras for dinner and head back to King Taco where he dined with Hillary Clinton.

If you think being an elected in LA is the way to cash in; you're better off however serving as a former department head. Rich Connell writing in the LA Times catalogs the former LA city general managers who are earning lifetime six figure pensions. Former DWP General Manager Ron Deaton, for example, pulls in over $325,000 a year. However you're even better off if you're a former Chief of Police AND a City Councilmember, Bernard Parks is paid $265,000 a year on top of his $180,000 Clowncil salary. That means Bitter Bernie is pulling in more per year than President Obama. Wow! No wonder these people work so hard to get elected!

Ginny Here and There reports that two LAPD Central Division officers roughed up a board member of the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council who is a homeless activist who works with the LAPD on homeless issues. General Jeff was holding court and lecturing to stakeholders on the street when the officers jumped out of their vehicle, threw Jeff against the wall and handcuffed him. Apparently this flies in the face of Jeff's efforts to gain trust amongst the local community for the police and ensure them that the days of harrassment were over. Maybe we need to hold back on some of the praise for Bill Bratton.

Some folks are thinking that LA Live, our version of Times Square, is looking pretty ugly. CurbedLA describes the multi-million dollar government funded tourist attraction's design scheme as "1983 Tuscon, Arizona mall." Ouch!

Atwater Village Newbie has discovered an establishment that is serving up a hemp enhanced taste treat. This time however it's not a medical marijuana dispensary but The Yoga Lab, a Glendale Blvd. yoga studio, health store and smoothie bar. Yoga Lab is now dispensing "iced hemapcinos" made with purified water, herbal organic coffee, vanilla hemp milk and agave. Drink up!

According to Franklin Avenue long time all newser KFWB is changing its format since abandoning "color radio" and rock & roll for the news. Starting this fall the station will build a talk offering anchored around longtime radio shrinker Dr. Laura Schlesinger who is bolting from KFI after a couple decades. One promising point is that KFWB will offer local talk programs both in the morning and afternoon drive slots; something that will hopefully prompt KABC to drop New York based talker Mark Levin and opt for local programming.

Zuma Dogg reports that a documentary filmmaker is interested in lensing the legendary local activist's life. According to LA Daily Blog the project is not a reality show as some had expected but a theatrical release documentary film. Principal photography may start this week.

Open Thread for Friday

Rick Orlov: Chick goes with Trutanich: City Controller Laura Chick, who has battled City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo over her authority to audit his office, said Wednesday she is throwing her support to a city attorney candidate who would side with her position.

LA Weekly: Jan Perry's Grand Avenue Conflict: An L.A. politician votes for public subsidies that boost her home's value.

LA Weekly: Should LA City Council Agree to Slash It's $178,789 Salaries?: 15 richly paid politicians are happy to cut their pay — by 2.5 percent?

Curbed LA: WeHo Taxi Rates Set to Raise: Hey, drunkies, soon you'll have to pay more to come home from a West Hollywood bar.

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Monday

The City is going broke yet salaries continue to skyrocket. The Daily News has compiled a database of city salaries. The list of employees who make over $200,000 a year is staggering, including LAPD Chief Bratton who makes $300,000 a year to tell his constituents where to go. City Chief Administrative Officer Karen Sission makes $220,000 and her replacement - Marcus Allen - wants another $70,000 per year. Do these people know this is the taxpayer's money not theirs?

Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Arnold Schwarzenegger all say that immigrants to the United States need to learn English. Schwarzenegger, an immigrant himself who came to America not knowing how to speak English urges Spanish speaking immigrants to turn off Telemundo and watch English television. However, Joe Mathews of the Washington Post disagrees; his view is that local Spanish television news does a superior job of covering the municipal scene.

A transit blogger says that Mayor Villaraigosa's and Supervisor Antonovich's Gold Line extension encourages sprawl and should be ditched in favor of two light rail lines that would serve Glendale and Eagle Rock.

In the Daily News Sunday, Doug McIntyre recounted a recent road trip across the country which allowed him to reflect on life here in LA. While Councilwoman Janice Hahn is reportedly paying gang members to fight gang crime she's been working on ownership of chickens in Los Angeles, a serious issue facing our city.

There could be something sinister happening in Hollywood; development of the area's first skyscraper on the former site of CBS's Columbia Square at Sunset and Gower. Strangely, the project's website is blank.

A group of Black Republicans are raising funds on the notion that the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Republican. According to the group the civil rights leader registered GOP in 1956.