CityWatcher
By Harold Katz
I have been following Ron Kaye’s effort with interest and I congratulate him. On August 1, Steve Lopez wrote one of his usual great columns headed “Political Integrity tossed in the trash.”
 I know that the writer generally has nothing to do with the headline,
but in this case it was a great headline. The column dealt with Dennis
Keene who Mr. Lopez heard scold the LA City Council about the Mayor’s
plan to raise trash fees again.
Mr. Keene said he thought these fees were an end run around Prop 13.
He told the council that he is paying city taxes on his cable bill, his
natural gas bill, his phone bill and more. Adding them all up they
roughly equaled his property taxes of $674.83. Mr. Lopez stated Mr.
Keene’s age and I was going to omit it but I realize it is pertinent to
the discussion as Mr. Keene is 73. He acknowledged that the $120 raise
wasn’t going to make him a pauper, but he continued, “they lie to you.”
The council proceeded to raise the trash collection fee $10 a month or
$120 per year.
In Mr. Keene’s discussion with Mr. Lopez he said that it ticked him off that the Mayor had reneged on a promise to use all of the money from the last trash hike to hire more police officers. If you haven’t read the column I suggest you check it out on the LA Times archives.
After reading this column and Ron Kaye’s posting, I decided to offer a few comments.
Every level of government is owned by the lobbyists who generate the contributions to the political funds of every elected official. On page B3 of the LA Times in which Mr. Lopez’s column appeared, there is a headline – “Villaraigosa raises $1.6 million for 2009 campaign”. Money raising is a fact of political life. It is how the system works and he who gives the money gains access.
What is strange is that people in general have no use for elected officials but when asked about their own council person, assembly person, state senator, congress person or federal senators, they will say they are okay, and they are right. So, while condemning electeds generally, voters keep sending their own representative back to office.
So the question is, how to get the elected officials to always act in the best interest of the people? The answer is that the people have to be ready to step up and agree to pay the amount it would take to make all elections publicly financed, without any slick side legislation which allows for unlimited and unidentified contributions to be made to 529 organizations such as the “Swift Boat Group” and “Move On” (note one from each political side, this is not a political party issue). The fight against this idea is based on the argument that limiting contributions is an infringement on free speech.
In the long run, the cost of financing political campaigns would be far less then the cost of what the taxpayers have to pay for when the lobbyist get through doing their magic. For instance, I have read in legitimate publications that the lobbyists for Bank of America wrote the mortgage bail out bill the President recently signed and of course Bank of America had just made a bargain purchase of Country Wide. The taxpayers pay for defense contracts to buy things the military really don’t want, but some powerful chairperson has the clout to make it happen. The costs to the taxpayers are astronomical.
It is important to point out that many people feel that much of what lobbyist do is in the best interest of the City. Every reader of City Watch has their own definition of what is and is not in the best interest of the City.
I moved my office into Century City in 1965 and a few years later I went up to the offices of Century City, Inc., a subsidiary of ALCOA, and I saw the model they had for the future of Century City and I immediately realized that the Westside was going to become an economic power in the city. For almost 40 years I fought for what I knew the Westside was going to have to have in the way of infrastructure.
The first of my many lost battles was the Beverly Hills Freeway. I remember NIMBYs saying it would reduce land values, just look at the Santa Monica Freeway they said. When I asked about the Ventura Freeway and would they direct me to the cheap land so I could buy it, they changed the subject.
Another lost battle was in the early 80s, the Wilshire Blvd. Subway to the Sea. Even that was fought by various groups of NIMBYs and then a Congressman acting in what he thought was good faith derailed the project. During the next 20+ years the federal government spent Billions of dollars on subways in various cities.
Almost every attempt to address traffic problems was beaten back so as to prevent development, but the development came anyway, as well it should have. Guess what, there were no lobbyists paid to fight for the required infrastructure so they didn’t happen.
I know a few lobbyists personally and they are good people. The problem is that a project cannot be built in this city without the help of a lobbyist at some level. A few lobbyist will put there clients desires ahead of the good of the city, but that is what they are paid to do. Wouldn’t it be better if developers didn’t have to hire and pay lobbyists?
Do I think public financing will happen? Certainly it will not happen in my lifetime. Without public financing of political campaigns, everything else that is accomplished will be band aides. But a band aide is better than nothing.
So Mr. Kaye I wish you well on your journey to save LA. The place to start is local government, the higher you go the tougher it is.
There are two things that must be accomplished and I have no idea how to accomplish them, as I have tried to do it for 40 years without success. First you have to reach the sleeping giant, the masses of people who don’t participate in anything having to do with the government, most of them don’t even vote. I used to think they were apathetic, but I realized that wasn’t true, they were just too busy living their lives, making a living, raising their families, etc.
Secondly, the leadership of your group cannot be made up entirely of those that I classify as NIMBYs. They are opposed to everything. They are basically known within the halls of government and while at times they have a disproportionate amount of power, generally speaking they lose the big ones.
I recently testified at the first public hearing on the Westfield’s Century City New Plan for their Center. There were 500+ people there. A large group of union workers fighting for the jobs it will provide hundreds in favor of the project and about 100+ opposed. As I pointed out to the Chairman of the meeting from City Planning, consideration should be given to the 100,000+ neighbors that were not there and would not be heard from but who would benefit from the changes to the shopping center.
My point is that 100, 300, 500 people cannot win the battle with the lobbyist who raise $100,000, $300,000 and $500,000 and more in political contributions.
Mr. Kaye, I wish you well in your Don Quixote like quest. If you succeed we all win.
(Harold Katz is a long-time City activist, lives on the Westside and is a CityWatch contributor.) ◘
CityWatch
Vol 6 Issue 66
Pub: Aug 15, 2008
|
