My $300 an hour hike at Runyon Canyon

Runyon Canyon

by Jack Witt

Special to MayorSam

Over the past 10 years I have enjoyed hiking the popular urban LA hike with great vistas called Runyon Canyon. The main trailhead is accessed off of Mulholland. There is barely enough parking in the small dirt parking lot, and so for most of the last 10 years or so I end up street parking on Mullholland itself, along with multitudes of other hikers and outdoor enthusiasts.

Just last week when I returned from my 60 minute hike, I ended up having to chase down a tow truck I spotted driving away with my car on it. They said I was parked illegally since they put new parking signs up on Mullholland. They charged me $230 to get my car off the back of the truck there on the spot. Then to add insult to injury, there was a $90 parking violation citation on my windshield from the city.

To be fair, I did notice some new signs posted about not being able to park on Mullholland and an arrow pointing towards the trail head from about 50 yards out. Therefore, I parked in the direction the arrow wasn't pointing on the side of the road within the lines. When I told the tow truck driver that, he said that they only allow the first 3 cars/spaces of parking where I was, and I happen to be in the 4th space for a car. Well, nowhere on any signs did it say "no parking in a 4th space and beyond" or "legal parking only for the first 3 cars here on Mullholland". And then when I asked him about the cars parked along the other side of the street on Mullholland, directly across from where I was parked, he said those spaces hadn't been designated as legal or illegal, so they don't bother with them. Oh jeez I thought, this is like a kangaroo court of arbitrary rules and Alice in Wonderland parking spots.

Jack Witt

As a health and fitness coach this concerns me, because with obesity and chronic disease rates so high and out of control in the country, we should be encouraging healthy communities and active lifestyles, not setting up barriers to them here in LA. And, as a former volunteer Chamber of Commerce President, this concerns me because I know the history of the city of Los Angeles and its inability to budget, provide incentives for businesses, and its peculiar efficiency at handing out absurdly costly tickets and citations to good, hard working, law abiding citizens.

As my father used to say, "enough is enough"! It's no wonder so many businesses decide to leave Los Angeles every year because of the hostile business environment, and every-day ordinary people who live and/or have moved here to strive for some upward mobility can't get any traction, because the ticket/citation/parking meter happy city keeps trying to drag then down to their level of incompetence and bureaucracy.

Jack Witt, MS, CPT is a North Hollywood based Fitness and Health Coach who works with individuals  as well as groups and corporate clients. He recently published a companion set of fitness books Tight, Tone, and Trim for women and Cut, Cool, and Confident for men, currently available at Amazon. He can be contacted via his website at www.getfitwithWitt.com.

Friday Free for All

I'm back.  Yet another visit to the Pacific Northwest with the added opportunity to avoid YAWNmageddon.

Free Matt Dowd!

Now that Janice Hahn is going to Congress, the fight begins for her seat with yet another special election. While I don't have a horse in this race, it appears that firefighter union head Pat McOsker is quickly becoming the bloggers' favorite to be the whipping boy of this race.  McOsker, part of a politically connected family equally known for it's salty and surly aggressiveness as for it's dominance on the LA political scene, is already showing a need for anger management therapy.  Street Hassle reports that McOsker gave an expletive laden retort to questions as to his ability to simultaneously helm the union and run for Council. In the meantime, anonymous detractors of McOkser have started a blog and apparently endured the wrath of McOsker's brother, Mike.

Read more »

Friday Free for All

Spruce Up Your Dog Park!

Controller Wendy Greuel notes the existence of a Department of Transportation program that allows elected officials to reduce or eliminate parking violations fees. Over 1,000 tickets were handled by the program in the last two years, however it goes back about 20 years.  Several Council Members told the Times that they think they knew of the program but have never used it.

Radio talk show host Tom Leykis has offered up a $50,000 contribution to the reward to find the attackers of John Stow who was beaten by thugs in the Dodger Stadium parking lot following the Dodgers-Giants home opener.  Apparently city officials do not want Mr. Leykis contributions with representatives from Councilman Ed Reyes' office belligerently insisting Mr. Leykis as a private individual can not join the Dodgers and other private organizations in making the contributions.

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Controller Slams City Gold Card Program Which Allows Politicians to Fix Parking Tickets

Did you know that the Mayor and City Council members can reduce or eliminate fines on parking tickets for the well connected through the Department of Transportations "Gold Card Desk?" I didn't. Controller Wendy Greuel spills the beans. 

Los Angeles Politics Hotsheet for Tuesday

Mayor Villaraigosa likes free stuff; apparently so does Sheriff Lee Baca.  Since assuming office the Sheriff has received over $120,000 in free gifts from companies that do business with the Sheriff's office.

Here's yet another reason to stand up for public employee unions: two LA traffic officers have been creating porn films while on the job.  And KNBC is reporting City officials failed to discipline the duo.

Film and television executives who shoot outside LA are finding these productions are often more positive than those locally.  The Midwest work ethic of residents in places like Chicago and Pittsburgh was noted by one producer.
Read more »

Mayor Sam's Hotsheet for Thursday

Explosive new charges at Zuma Times.  Zuma Dogg reports that tipsters are telling him that President Obama is fuming that Mayor Villaraigosa and the City Council took Obama stimulus money for "shovel ready" projects and funneled it to the City's general fund to plug up the budget gap.  Obama apparently has cut off the supply of spendalus money to LA because of this.  Even worse for the Mayor, Zuma's source says pensiongate indictments are coming down soon.

Phil Jennerjahn, Carlos Alvarez, Zuma Dogg, Joe B and Mayor Sam all support the taco trucks. And so do the county courts.  A Superior Court judge overturned a ticket issued to a taco truck owner for violating a City law that limited the amount of time a taco truck can park in a specific location.  Story at LAist and SaveOurTacoTrucks.org.

CurbedLA reports that residents around Dodger Stadium tired of game fans parking in front of their homes have taken to putting up their own no parking signs.  Now that it has been blogged about I am sure the City will take action against these folks.

Popular San Fernando Valley schoolteacher Mary Ann Farber will be retiring after 18 years in the classroom at Beckford Elementary.  Story at Beckford Parents Blog.

The dumbasses at LADOT are at it again.  In cities like New York, San Francisco, San Diego, etc. pedicabs are all the rage.  But LA has this odd paranoid control freak mentality and they've been illegal for years.  So when rules were written by the Department that would effectively regulate the cabs out of business the folks on the Transportation Commission had the sense enough to tell staff they were on crack and to redo the whole thing. Among LADOT's lame-ass rules not mirrored even in nanny state San Francisco were that the cab operators could not wear Hawaiian shirts and that passengers must wear helmets. Read the rest at Streetsblog.