Los Angeles Politics Hotsheet for Tuesday

"I think this is one of the best years we've had. I love my job and I have it three more years." 
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa


As we get closer to Christmas not much is going on in LA politics but here are a few assorted tidbits.

Nina Royal will be happy.  Developer Dan Palmer's Las Lomas development is officially dead.  The California Supreme Court denied the appeal of the developer in their case against the City of Los Angeles.  I doubt Palmer can take this to Clarence Thomas and the Wise Latina but he I guess he can try.

Brady Westwater reports on a business improvement district gone bad in Downtown LA.  The Toy District BID was not renewed by property owners and only has enough dough to empty trash though the end of December.  After the new year the place becomes a dump.  Westwater says however that with the demise of toy trading as the central focus of the area other growing sections of downtown will consume the geography, repurpose it and bring it under their BIDs.

Would this have happened if Measure B passed? A fund manager who received an invitation to a Manhattan meeting held by First Solar was told he was not invited upon arrival and then promptly took a cab back to his office. Andrew Kaplan - who holds a short position in the company and apparently First Solar's cause for ire - then sent First Solar the bill for the $9 cab ride.  No word if he's been reimbursed yet.

Apparently Tom LeBong is bound and determined to turn America's largest City park and Los Angeles' greatest open space into Disneyland.  The good news is that the Griffith Park Wayist blog is on the case and keeping a constant eye on LeBong.