Morning Briefs and Outtakes on Water Wasting Councilman and other Topics

"Councilman Waterwaster with Mayor Waterwaster. BTW, what has Villaraigosa's interest??"

An act of civil disobedience or flat out lawbreaking??

Los Angeles City Councilman Greig Smith or else known as "Mitch Englander's boss", is taking on the DWP's draconian water restrictions as Rick Orlov reports in today's Daily News.

Add City Councilman Greig Smith to the list of scofflaws violating Los Angeles' water conservation restrictions.

In a direct challenge to the Department of Water and Power, Smith announced Wednesday he is violating the twice-weekly watering limitations -- and believes he is saving more water by doing so.

"And my grass is greener than it's ever been, and I bet I'm using less water," Smith said.
Smith said he waters his lawn for eight minutes, three times a week.

He proposed that DWP revise its conservation rules, which allow watering for 15-minute periods before 9 a.m. and after 4 p.m. on Mondays and Thursdays only.

My first thought upon reading this was "what is former "Senator Jim Alger's" spin on this blatant act of lawbreaking by Councilman Smith?? But upon finding the website for his e-mail chat, errrrrr, radio talk show "Common Sense with Jim Alger", all I found was this. Maybe the "Do It Center" dropped its advertising??

But the bigger issue here is not whether DWP "blue shirts" will descend upon Smith's residence, but can we believe anything that originates as policy from DWP's General Manager H. David Nahai and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa??

After all, both Nahai and Villaraigosa have less than stellar records of preserving water at their respective residences, but then it was the gophers or faulty timers who were to blame, right Mr. Mayor??

Then there are those like myself who support practices that cut back on water waste, but wonder if the focus on the local drought, takes attention away from the man-made drought in the northern reaches of the state?? Can you say Delta Smelt Fish??

OTHER NEWS:

** LA Weekly's Christine Pelisek reports that the Los Angeles County District Attorney Office is mulling over whether to charge former City of LA Building and Safety General Manager Andrew Adelman with sexual assualt.

** The subject is Medical Marijuana and a interview with City Councilman Ed "Density" Reyes who gives his toke , errrr, take, on the issue of medical weed dispensaries, you may want to pass this one around.

** What is going on within the Los Angeles Unified School District Police force?? The "Weekly of Record" Max Taves has the latest in this brewing scandal.

** Can it be?? A proposed new football stadium in the City of Industry area, cleared a major hurdle when the City of Walnut dropped its lawsuit. Just hope that it is anyone but the Raiders that may call Industry their new football home.

** Did your kid learn this new song at school?? Hmmm, Hmmm, Hmmm.

** Why is it that the "Old Gray Westside Hag On Spring Street" and animal rights activists care so much about Elephants at the Zoo??

Your thoughts.........

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Friday.

What's one way to help the City raise desperately needed cash without raising taxes? Sell the LA Zoo and the LA Convention Center. Who was the local elected official who said "Why do we have to own a zoo?" Give up? Mayor Villaraigosa suggested such during a conversation with the LA Business Journal (via Reason) that privatizing the Zoo and Convention Center might be the way to go. 

Snappy repartee between the City Council and LA Departmen of Animal Services General Manager Ed Boks. Following criticism over his decision to cut the City's low income pet onwer spay/neuter program over Department budget woes Boks responded, "This was a crisis situation. When the Titanic is sinking, you go and plug the holes first." To wit Council Member Richard Alarcon offered this smart rejoinder, "I wouldn't heed the advice of the captain of the Titanic any more than I trust Ed Boks in this regard."


The campaign of City Attorney Candidate Carmen Trutanich has released a statement saying that both Trutanich and City Council Member Jack Weiss are in a dead heat with 35 percent of the vote each and 30 percent undecided in a recent poll. The Trutanich campaign also says that Weiss appears to have alienated his own political base, "Twice as many voters in Council District 5 rate Weiss unfavorably as favorably (34 percent to 15 percent, respectively)."

San Francisco Mayor and Gubenatorial candidate Gavin Newsom in LA to take Antonio's cameras, microphones, and most importantly money.  Newsom is also by far beating Antonio in the Twitter wars with nearly 92,000 followers compared to Antonios's 900.  And as Joe Mailander noted Antonio's Twitter page has that "not so fresh" feeling when compared to Newsom's.

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Monday

Word is just starting to trickle out that Santa Monica City Councilman, the Governor's brother-in-law and Kennedy Family scion Bobby Shriver is considerng a run for State Attorney General and he's already getting the usual treatment from Mayor Sam readers.  An opening in the race for the Democratic nomination for AG is contingent upon the likely entry of Jerry Brown into the Governor's race.  If that happens, Shriver may face off against Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo (his second try) and San Francisco DA Kamala Harris.

The City's Primary Election was nearly two weeks ago but two of the candidates for Mayor may not have got the message.  Walter Moore dukes it out with Phil Jennerjahn in the comments section of a Mayor Sam Hotsheet.

The LAPD will move to it's new headquarters, only it's third in 113 years, this November.  Steve Harvey recaps the history of the last two police HQs, Central Headquarters in use from 1896 to 1955 and Parker Center, best known from the Dragnet TV series, which has been the LAPD's home for the last 55 years.

It made for some beautiful photos but the LA Zoo has done one of the dumbest things I've seen - cover numerous animal exhibits in snow trucked in from local mountains.  Most of the animals who found their pens covered in the white stuff may have descended from snowy country but were born in captivity and live in LA so they're not used to it.  More and more it becomes clearer that zoos need to be re-thought and that it's cruel to hold these animals in captivity in environments that are a fraction of the size they need.

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Monday

If as claimed by some supporters of Measure B that the controversial plan would not benefit the politically powerful International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers union, then the massive investment in the campaign to pass the measure seems to be a huge waste of money. The last working journo at the LA Times, David "Z-Man" Zahniser reports that nearly 2/3 of the support for the plan - which would requires that all new solar panels in Los Angeles be owned by the DWP and installed by IBEW members - is coming from the union and affiliated groups. In the meantime, No on B leader Jack Humphreville illuminates a little more on the shady plan and it's contributions at MS2.

Whatever happened to Mayoral candidate Walter Moore? I haven't received one of his usual pieces he sends out and his campaign blog hasn't been updated in nearly two weeks. If anyone has seen Walter lately please let us know.

The Greater Los Angeles Zoo Association reports that the results of an online poll show that seven in ten people support leaving Billy the Elephant at the Los Angeles Zoo. However it should be noted online polls are hardly accurate. In the meantime the County of LA warns the City that if construction does not move forward on the controversial exhibit meant to house Billy it would be required to refund $5 million in County money spent on the project.

A piece at Bloomberg details that many of the owners of LA's upper priced homes unable to meet their mortgages due to the slumping economy are working to hard to get their homes rented out as locations for both legit and porno film shoots. One location scouting firm says that "more than a dozen calls are coming in each week, up from about two a week a year ago."

Reports are that Sex In The City star Sarah Jessica Parker would like Britney Spears to star in the sequel to film that follows up the hit cable television series. “It’s time to inject some young blood into the movie,” Parker is reported as saying.

Big Week for LeBong

Two biggies this week for aging Marshall High football star Tom LeBong.

On Tuesday, PLUM takes up the issue of the Griffith Park Historical Monument. Proponents get to finally find out what cuts, slashes, and overall emasculation LeBong and his office have managed to do to the Griffith Trust's original application since the Historic Resources Commission passed its recommendation to make the entire park a historic cultural resource last October.

If PLUM (Reyes, Huizar, and Weiss) passes the proposal, file 08-3086 is set to be heard in full Council on the 27th, which, coincidentally, is the last day the council can take action on this item. Does this suggest what the Autocrat of Griffith Park's real strategy may be to kill this perceived threat?

Rumor has it that Friday the Clowncil votes yet again on the Zoo's new $42 million elephant exhibit. This time LeBong has the support of celebrity zookeeper Jack Hanna as he tries to make the case that the clowncil wasn't wrong the first two times it voted for the project. Meanwhile, we're just waiting for Guido Cardenas to resurrect his idea for the City to go into the Elephant Sanctuary business using taxpayer money and public lands. As ridiculous an idea as this is during such financially difficult times in the City, clowncilmembers simply love the sound of their own clever ideas. So we know Cardenas's brainstorm will definitely ....be baaaaaaaack.

Zoo Meets Circus at City Hall Today

This issue goes before the full Clowncil on 12-3-08.

UPDATE: The Budget and Finance Committee voted 3-to-2 to kill the Zoo's Pachyderm Forest project. Parks, Huizar, and Rosendahl for, Greuel and Smith against. Rosendahl missed all of the public comment on the subject, citing more important concerns (a sewer pipe in Venice.)

This opens the door for passage of Cardenas's other motion -- to spend all that money by having the City of LA go into the Sanctuary business.

This is also precedent-setting in that it opens the door for the Clowncil to revisit any and all other previously-passed council motions... something they've refused to do in the past even when faced with evidence demonstrating that they probably should...

Your suggestions for what they should review next?

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Today at 1pm, the City Clowncil's Budget and Finance Committee considers one of the two controversial Zoo-Elephant motions recently made by Guido Cardenas. The meeting will no doubt be a total circus, complete with a ringmaster (Parks), lot of clowncil clowns, the freak show barker (Cardenas), the puppet master (Alarcon), the fat lady preparing to sing (LeBong), the guy being shot out of a canon (Zoo GM John Lewis), the ubiquitous elephant in the room (Billy), and a crowd of alternately thrilled and horrified onlookers.

The proposal being heard today is CF 08-2850, which calls for all work to stop on the Los Angeles Zoo's $40 mil Elephant Pachyderm exhibit and to actually outlaw all future elephant exhibits at the Zoo. It also requests yet another CLA/CAO report on the costs associated with transferring the remaining elephant (Billy) to an elephant sanctuary, the alternative uses for the current Elephant Pachyderm exhibit and the possible transfer of other zoo animals into the intended Elephant Pachyderm Exhibit, the status of elephant exhibits that have closed and currently do house elephants on the zoos premise throughout the United States; and the fiscal implications for closing the elephant Pachyderm Exhibit.


Once again, the public will queue up to plead for Billy's future. Unfortunately, few public comments will be about the bigger issues that impact the citizens of Los Angeles: money and land. Guido and the Zorro Marxist are looking to take control of a substantial portion of that $40 mill, while benefiting rich developers in their district through the theft of public lands. Meanwhile, LeBong sees this as an opportunity to steal more of Griffith Park by taking part of Harding Golf Course to expand the Zoo footprint.


The future of Cardenas's other motion, CF 08-2849 which calls for a brand new “Elephant Satellite Sanctuary Advisory Group (ESSAG)” to search for 60 acres on private OR PUBLIC lands in the City to create a new elephant sanctuary, probably relies on what happens to this afternoon during the Budget and Finance Committee hearing.

With the City facing an ever-increasing deficit, let's hope the important fiscal fiducial issues and responsibilities aren't lost to the very committee tasked with these things during the tertiary animal rights discussion.

LA Doesn't Need To Build An Elephant Sanctuary

Leave it to politicians to jump on high emotion, high profile issues where they seen an opening to pull a scam.

Council Member Tony Cardenas is on the right track when he says that construction on the LA Zoo's wrongheaded multi-million dollar elephant pen needs to be halted.  He's also correct that the Zoo's last elephant (after killing nearly 15 of them over 30 years), Billy, needs to be moved to a sanctuary where he will have the space to roam and companionship of several other elephants.

However Cardenas and his partner-in-crime Council Member Richard Alarcon are absolutely wrong to pursue the City of Los Angeles going into the animal sanctuary business.

Cardenas and Alarcon seem to think that if we halt the elephant pen at the Zoo, then they get to build an animal sanctuary in their Districts.

When the City is in fiscal crisis, folks are losing their homes and a boatload of City employees are about to be laid off, this is the last thing the City needs to do.  As the Daily Breeze said "Rome is burning here, and this is no time for fiddling about over elephants."

Most everyone who has a heart, except for Councilmember Tom LeBong who thinks he owns the zoo, Zoo officials who want to keep their jobs and a cadre of LA Zoo fanatics who think it's okay to keep majestic animals in cages, agrees that Billy needs to go to a new home.  Numerous elephant preserves exist throughout the US that would be more than happy to take Billy.  Citizens including retired game show host Bob Barker have offered to cover the costs of Billy's move.  Those who want Billy out of the zoo and are not up to speed on how LA politics really work need to resist the siren song of the Northeast Valley Boyz and not support the LA sanctuary.

"Rome is burning here, and this is no time for fiddling about over elephants."
Daily Breeze

Los Angeles is not a proper place for such a preserve as much as we would like to perhaps have one nearby.  Assembly Lloyd Levine, who is in favor of moving Billy to a sanctuary and closing down the Zoo exhibit, does not see the need for an LA based sanctuary.  As he said sure, we'd like to see elephants in LA.  But we might also might like to see glaciers.  But we're not going to haul one down from Alaska and park in the LA Harbor.


As PetraFried in the City so well put it, Alarcon and Cardenas are looking to benefit rich developers in their district and have yet another "legacy" to their administrations.  That's the kind of thinking that moved the Children's Museum from Downtown to Lake View Terrace, miles from most kids in LA, which has become a boondoggle of it's own.

Those who care about both Billy and LA need to advocate to immediately send Billy to an established sanctuary and at the same time shut down both the LA Zoo's elephant exhibit and Cardena's boondoggle preserve.

Elephant-Zoo vote: It's about $$$ and stealing public land, folks.

Today the City Clowncil votes on whether they feel they can get away with stealing more public $$ and land without anyone noticing.

Under the guise of animal rights, last month Tony 'Guido' Cardenas proffered two council motions aimed at the LA Zoo, one (#08-2850) to halt construction of the Zoo's new $40 million dollar elephant exhibit and outlaw elephant-keeping completely at the Zoo, and the other (#08-2849) to create a task force to study stealing 60 acres of rare public park land in the park-poor San Fernando Valley for an elephant "sanctuary".

Guido originally voted for the new $40 mill elephant exhibit and its hard to imagine that a change of heart is the only thing driving these motions. So what's this all about, then?

In the eyes of the public, this is all about Billy --the Zoo's remaining elephant. Emotions run high with animal activists falling on both sides of the fence. Both sides have their experts lined up for a battle of 'our experts verses your experts'. Public comment will be full of emotional pleas on Billy's behalf.

The real fight, however, is what is in the eyes of the greedy Clowncilmen involved: LeBong, Guido, and the Zorro Marxist, Alar'con'. These motions are all about opportunity. LeBong's been looking for an excuse to steal more of Griffith Park land to expand the Zoo, and Guido conveniently provided the excuse. On the other side, Guido and Zorro want part of that $40 mill, most of which cannot be re-allocated to projects outside the Zoo. So why not have the City go into the Elephant Retirement Home business with the Zoo as the puppet department in charge? Odds are Guido and the Zorro Marxist both have a healthy financial stake and a campaign donor or two in mind for the project.

What is the real bottom line here?

If it's ultimately decided that Billy needs a much larger enclosure, he can be retired to an existing elephant sanctuary somewhere at minimal cost compared to the new exhibit cost. No new sanctuary is needed; no public lands need be taken; and the City does not need to spend our tax dollars on going into the Elephant Retirement Home biz.

...Hell, these clowns can't even provide fundamental services to taxpayers or balance a budget. Now they want to run a circus?

As for the partially-complete exhibit? It could be re-purposed for other animals, again at minimal expense compared to the cost of the new exhibit. In other words: NO STEALING OF PUBLIC LANDS AND MONEY NECESSARY.

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Thursday

It may have taken the parents of an innocent young man killed by gang members joining with Walter Moore; but after weeks of denying it, Mayor Villaraigosa and Chief Bratton have admitted that race may play the part in the recent rise in killings. Earlier Wednesday, Mayoral candidate Walter Moore joined with the parents of murder victim Jamiel Shaw in calling for laws that would deport criminal alien gang members and allow police to question criminals who are illegal aliens about their immigration status. Could the end of Special Order 40 be coming soon?

Westchester Parents points out that its not that the DWP rates that are responsible for the DWP's aging infrastructure (which General Manager H. David Nahai shamelessly used as a reason to raise rates) but the fact that the City regularly siphons funds off the DWP.

Thursday Laura Chick will release her audit of construction on LAPD's new headquarters which is severly over budget and behind schedule (that's putting it mildly).

Not only is the City raising water and power rates, they're jacking up the price kids have to pay to go to the LA Zoo.

If you were planning to go to the Council Meeting on Friday or watch it on TV 35, don't bother. It's been cancelled.

The City wants more parking meter money so their promise of free parking to hybrid vehicle drivers may be coming to an end.

Here in Van Nuys posts up a photo of Van Nuys in 1945 thinking the place looked a lot better back then compared to now. On the other hand readers pointed out that they would prefer not to go back to those days of folks beating up Blacks or gays.

And finally if you enjoyed Britney Spears portrayal of a crazed doctor's office receptionist on last week's episode of How I Met Your Mother, don't get used to it. The show's producers have no plans to bring her back.