There are so many holes to fill in the City’s budget dike and so few fingers and so little time to stop the hemorrhaging.
The Mayor and Controller combo issued a citywide spending freeze [LINK] on Thursday. No furniture or equipment purchases or food and beverage purchases for employee events or office remodeling effective immediately.
No travel expenses except to Sacramento or Washington DC.
Prompts the question: What took so long? People are losing their jobs here.
Currently the city of Los Angeles finds itself in shambles. The lack of adequate resources to meet the needs of the residents has placed the city on the verge of bankruptcy. A reduction in services that would pose an inconvenience in most areas of the city translates into a major crisis in South Los Angeles because the normal service delivery in our area is already substandard.
You need to be a Phi Beta Kappa from Cal Tech in order to understand your bimonthly DWP bill. But homeowners do not have to be light bulbs to know that something is very, very wrong when their DWP bills have increased by many thousands of dollars a year.
Mr. Mayor, those increases are not, to use your own words, “relatively modest.”
LA's Transportation Commission has a rich legacy of "consent agendas" that routinely rubber stamp the LADOT's proposed speed limit increases with out so much as a question, a bit of discussion, a suggestion for traffic calming or even an acknowledgment that our streets are getting fast, very fast.
GUEST WORDS By Harold Katz (Posted first in the Century City News)
As you read about the city’s budget shortfall, have you ever considered the fact that you or some one you love could die as a result of city’s inability to manage its money?
My name is Art Sweatman. I started working with the City of Los Angeles as a Tree Surgeon Assistant in 1997. I became a Tree Surgeon about three years later.
POLITICS By Paul Hatfield (Posted first at Villiage to Village0
Howard Berman is my Congressman and lives in my community of Valley Village. I suppose he is my constituent as much as I am his owing to my post on the Neighborhood Council Valley Village. It saddens me he is putting his self interests above respect for the people he serves.
Recently I circulated a survey to as many neighborhood council board members and community activists as I could find given my limited resources as a fixed-income senior.
DONE IN THE REARVIEW MIRROR By Former DONE Employee
(Note: The name of the author of this article has been withheld by agreement. An earlier attempt to report irregularities in the Department resulted in demotion. And he/she plans to continue a government career.)
If the walls could only talk today we would hear voices from the past.
Last night, I saw a presentation that was sad on so many levels that I cannot but help think that the LADOT might need a total makeover. Not that it’s necessarily the fault of LADOT employees, but either we’ve all got to change the paradigms in which it operates or we’ve got to make a change at the level of the City Charter.
The minute the flasher began appearing in the tiny coastal town of El Segundo – targeting mostly females from ages 9 to 19, officers didn’t sit around second guessing.
The East Hollywood Neighborhood Council is taking over Santa Monica Boulevard on Sat the 13th, from 2pm to 10pm, celebrating the local art community and LA’s growing bike culture. The EHNC is one of the most densely populated communities, bordered by some of LA’s busiest streets but for one day, the street will belong to the people, [LINK] not to the motor vehicle.
Voters beware: A group of California Democratic lawmakers is attempting one of the most cynical power-grabs in recent memory. The goal is to overturn voter-approved Proposition 11 in order to give themselves the authority to redraw their own district boundaries and choose the voters they want to represent.
At a recent BudgetLA meeting, Deputy Mayor Larry Frank told a crowd of neighborhood council volunteers they were “over-regulated, over-lawyered, and over-bureaucratized.” At the City Council’s Education and Neighborhoods Committee last week, he said advising the mayor and council members—not beautification projects and street fairs—is the core mission of neighborhood councils. It’s a hopeful sign that Frank is saying the right things.
A 13-year-old girl attempting to catch her school bus began to cross Sunset Boulevard at Cliffwood Avenue. She stepped off the curb, into the crosswalk and against the red light just as two cars approached.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is planning to impose a “Carbon Surcharge” of $2.50 a month ($30 a year) on Power System customers to help the Department of Water and Power finance its Renewables program, according to a
While it seems everyone involved with neighborhood councils is focusing on elections and budgets, there’s also a group working on offering recommendations for better bylaws.
Will a Badly Mismanaged City Department take LA’s Neighborhood Councils Down with It?
DONE ON THE EDGE By Max Tves (Posted first at LAWeekly.com)
Stephen Box can neatly trace his metamorphosis from guy helping the Greater Echo Park–Elysian Neighborhood Council to organizer of a middle-class insubordination cum revolution, which began with an un...
When it comes to living within our means, and testing our personal and societal limits, we really ARE our own worst enemies, aren’t we? After all, don’t we all know it when we drink too much, eat too much, party too much…or ove...
In July 2008, the City Council approved the Rate Restructuring Plan (the “Plan”) for consumers which increased the Energy Service Charge for Tier 2 rates to 8.5¢ per kilowatt, a 21% increase over Tier 1 rates of 7¢.&n...
Americans coast to coast are angry at their government and while Congress is doing its level best to corner the market of dysfunctional legislative bodies, sadly you folks in the Los Angeles City Council have them beat.
SCHOOLS By Celeste Fremon (Posted first at WitnessLA.com)
The ACLU of So Cal along with two other groups filed a lawsuit Wednesday on behalf of students at three of the city’s worst-performing middle schools co...
If you’ve been away from the planet for a couple of months you may have missed it: LA’s Mayor wants to merge the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment with the Community Development Depa...
It’s nice to know that, while the immediate financial and budgetary crises are dragging local, state and federal governments into the muck that long-term planning and major project construction is s...
rently the city of Los Angeles finds itself in shambles. The lack of adequate resources to meet the needs of the residents has placed the city on the verge of bankruptcy. A reduction in services that would pose an inconvenience in most areas of the city translates into a major crisis in South Los Angeles because the normal service delivery in our area is already substandard.
u need to be a Phi Beta Kappa from Cal Tech in order to understand your bimonthly DWP bill. But homeowners do not have to be light bulbs to know that something is very, very wrong when their DWP bills have increased by many thousands of dollars a year. 
A's Transportation Commission has a rich legacy of "consent agendas" that routinely rubber stamp the LADOT's proposed speed limit increases with out so much as a question, a bit of discussion, a suggestion for traffic calming or even an acknowledgment that our streets are getting fast, very fast.
you read about the city’s budget shortfall, have you ever considered the fact that you or some one you love could die as a result of city’s inability to manage its money?
y name is Art Sweatman. I started working with the City of Los Angeles as a Tree Surgeon Assistant in 1997. I became a Tree Surgeon about three years later.
ward Berman is my Congressman and lives in my community of Valley Village. I suppose he is my constituent as much as I am his owing to my post on the Neighborhood Council Valley Village. It saddens me he is putting his self interests above respect for the people he serves.
cently I circulated a survey to as many neighborhood council board members and community activists as I could find given my limited resources as a fixed-income senior.
The name of the author of this article has been withheld by agreement. An earlier attempt to report irregularities in the Department resulted in demotion. And he/she plans to continue a government career.)
st night, I saw a presentation that was sad on so many levels that I cannot but help think that the LADOT might need a total makeover. Not that it’s necessarily the fault of LADOT employees, but either we’ve all got to change the paradigms in which it operates or we’ve got to make a change at the level of the City Charter.
minute the flasher began appearing in the tiny coastal town of El Segundo – targeting mostly females from ages 9 to 19, officers didn’t sit around second guessing.
East Hollywood Neighborhood Council is taking over Santa Monica Boulevard on Sat the 13th, from 2pm to 10pm, celebrating the local art community and LA’s growing bike culture. The EHNC is one of the most densely populated communities, bordered by some of LA’s busiest streets but for one day, the street will belong to the people, [
s beware: A group of California Democratic lawmakers is attempting one of the most cynical power-grabs in recent memory. The goal is to overturn voter-approved Proposition 11 in order to give themselves the authority to redraw their own district boundaries and choose the voters they want to represent.
At a recent BudgetLA meeting, Deputy Mayor Larry Frank told a crowd of neighborhood council volunteers they were “over-regulated, over-lawyered, and over-bureaucratized.” At the City Council’s Education and Neighborhoods Committee last week, he said advising the mayor and council members—not beautification projects and street fairs—is the core mission of neighborhood councils. It’s a hopeful sign that Frank is saying the right things.
