September 15, 2009

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From the Department of Homeland Security

DHS Announces New Information-Sharing Tool to Help Fusion Centers Combat Terrorism

Release Date: September 14, 2009

For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
Contact: 202-282-8010

The Departments of Homeland Security (DHS) and Defense (DoD) today announced an initiative to grant select state and major urban area fusion center personnel access to classified terrorism-related information residing in DoD's classified network.

Under this initiative, select fusion center personnel with a federal security clearance will be able to access specific terrorism-related information resident on the DoD Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet) a secure network used to send classified data. This classified data will be accessed via DHS' Homeland Security Data Network (HSDN). DHS will be responsible for ensuring that proper security procedures are followed.

"This initiative reflects the federal government's strong commitment to improve information sharing with our state, local, and tribal partners," said DHS Acting Under Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis Bart R. Johnson. "Fusion centers are a critical part of our national security enterprise, and this new tool enables federal agencies to share information with these partners while utilizing our advanced technical capabilities for secure information sharing."

"With this action, DoD continues its work in supporting states and localities who are leading our efforts to secure the nation from domestic terrorism attacks, said Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Americas' Security Affairs Paul N. Stockton. "We look forward to exploring other opportunities where DoD can help our state and local partners effectively defeat terrorism."

This joint initiative will promote collaboration between DHS, DoD and other federal departments and agencies, enabling the trusted and secure exchange of terrorism-related information in order to detect, deter, prevent and respond to homeland security threats.

State and major urban area fusion centers provide critical links for information sharing between and across all levels of government, and help fulfill key recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. This initiative will serve as a valuable resource to enhance situational awaeness and support more timely and complete analysis of national security threats.

Increasing the breadth of law enforcement that have access to terrorism-related data will further improve the ability of fusion centers to prevent, detect, deter, and respond to terrorist attacks, and advance the combined missions of DHS and DoD to protect the nation's security.

DHS and DoD remain committed to protecting privacy and civil liberties as well as data and networks in an increasingly vulnerable cyber environment.

http://www.dhs.gov/ynews/releases/pr_1252955298184.shtm

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Secretary Napolitano Announces H1N1 Preparedness Guide for Small Businesses

Release Date: September 14, 2009

For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
Contact: 202-282-8010

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano today joined Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Karen Mills and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Influenza Division Deputy Director Daniel Jernigan to announce a preparedness guide to assist small businesses in planning for the H1N1 flu.

"Small businesses play an essential role in our national effort to prepare for all disasters and emergencies including the H1N1 flu," said Secretary Napolitano. "This guide will help America s small businesses maintain continuity of operations and resiliency as the fall flu season approaches."

"Small Business owners should take the time to create a plan, talk with their employees and make sure they are prepared for flu season," added Administrator Mills. "For countless small businesses, having even one or two employees out for a few days has the potential to negatively impact operations and their bottom line. A thoughtful plan will help keep employees and their families healthy, as well as protect small businesses and local economies."

Outbreaks of H1N1 flu are occurring now across the country and will likely coincide with the return of seasonal flu this fall and winter. The preparedness guide offers small business employers tools and information to help them plan for and respond flexibly to varying levels of severity of an H1N1 outbreak which may lead to increased absenteeism, and, if the outbreak becomes more severe, may include restricted service capabilities and supply chain disruptions. Additional preparations may be necessary if a more serious outbreak evolves during the fall and winter.

Employers are encouraged to put strategies in place now to protect their employees and their businesses in advance of the fall flu season. Included in the preparedness guide are tips on how to write a continuity of operations plan, steps for keeping employees healthy, frequently asked questions about the 2009 H1N1 flu and a list of additional resources that employers can access online.

For more information and to view the preparedness guide, visit www.flu.gov.

http://www.dhs.gov/ynews/releases/pr_1252958525673.shtm

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From ICE

September 15, 2009

Missouri poultry processing plant pays $450,000 fine for hiring illegal aliens

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. - A southwest Missouri poultry-processing plant where 136 illegal alien workers were arrested in 2007 paid a $450,000 administrative fine Friday as a result of a worksite enforcement investigation conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

George's Processing Inc. (George's) paid the fine on September 11 as part of a settlement agreement. George's was ordered to pay the fine within 30 days in federal court on Aug. 14, 2009. ICE will use the funds to promote future law enforcement programs and activities in worksite enforcement.

The settlement further directs George's to train its human resource managers and employees on how to avoid hiring illegal aliens, and to establish a compliance program to ensure that it's hiring and employment practices are in accordance with U.S. immigration laws. The fine paid by George's does not constitute any admission of wrongdoing by the company

"Significant fines help hold businesses accountable to ensure a legal workforce," said Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for ICE John Morton. "ICE works diligently to oversee corporate responsibility and to protect jobs for this country's lawful workers."

During a May 2007 enforcement action at the George's plant in Cassville, Mo., ICE agents administratively arrested 136 illegal alien workers from Mexico and Guatemala. Twenty-eight of those workers were criminally prosecuted for various immigration violations, including falsely claiming U.S. citizenship. Two of the company's hiring personnel were subsequently convicted of harboring illegal aliens and inducing illegal aliens to remain in the United States.

George's Processing Inc. is headquartered in Springdale, Ark., and employs 4,000 workers at its three poultry processing facilities in Arkansas, Missouri and Virginia.

This case was prosecuted by Supervisory Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael S. Oliver and Assistant U.S. Attorney Gary Milligan, Western District of Missouri. ICE was assisted in the investigation by the Social Security Administration's Office of Inspector General, the Missouri State Highway Patrol, the U.S. Marshals Service and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

In April, ICE implemented a new, comprehensive strategy to reduce the demand for illegal employment and protect employment opportunities for the nation's lawful workforce. Under this strategy, ICE is focusing its resources on auditing and investigating employers suspected of cultivating illegal workplaces by knowingly employing illegal workers.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/0909/090915springfield.htm

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From OurLA

Begging, Borrowing and Now Stealing -- City Hall's Exercise in Futility

Written by Ron Kaye

Monday, 14 September 2009

At 1 p.m. today, Councilman Bernard Parks and his Budget Committee will lead City Hall through an exercise in futility:Closing a $405 million budget deficit that will double and triple in the next three years, without facing the truth that salaries and benefits cost too much and too much is spent on unaffordable programs. The day of reckoning for years of failed leadership is here. The future of Los Angeles is at stake but there is little reason for hope. Having exhausted their ability to squeeze any more money out of the public and their ability to go even deeper into debt, the bureaucrats, politicians and union leaders have spent the weekend furiously devising schemes to solve the worsening budget crisis by the only means left: Outright stealing. On Friday, Sept. 11, the city's top bureaucrats -- Chief Legislative Analyst Gerry Miller and City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana admitted the obvious in a joint report that "we find that an Operational Plan that assumes the approval of ERIP and the Coalition Agreement would devastate City operations and would not be sustainable." The ERIP is the Early Retirement Incentive Program that grew out of a year of negotiations. It was offered to the 22,000-member Coalition of City Unions in June without a financial analysis as part of the so-called "Shared Responsibility and Sacrifice" plan that was supposed to save $320 million. The mayor and everyone else knew it was faulty fiscally and legally then but were too weak to resist union pressure. Now, just three months later,  they face the consequences. The city's financial condition has worsened dramatically. Santana, in his own 9-11 "First Financial Status Report" revealed the Reserve Fund is down by nearly 40 percent, $91.7 million below what is legally required and fiscally necessary to deal with emergencies. Revenue is falling short of their projections by $35.8 million because "the recession is more severe than was anticipated" -- a recognition in bureaucratese for City Hall's delaying hard decisions by using ridiculously rosy estimates of revenue in the worst recession since the Great Depression. Spending remains out of control. City Controller Wendy Greuel reported the city is spending $1 million a day more than it takes in. Some departments are exceeding their overtime budgets, the voluntary furlough program has netted just $284,000 in savings. The ERIP, even if implemented, will save only $23 million of the $111 million promised in the budget. The Fire Department is only saving three-fourths of the $52 million it was supposed to save and negotiations with its union on a new contract are at an impasse. The Police Department situation is worse. Negotiations on a new contract are going nowhere and nothing has been done to meet the $129 million in savings it was supposed to achieve. Then, there's the problems of the state taking $130 million in property taxes and the $41 million set aside for liability claims that is nearly exhausted already with another $40 million in legal settlements and judgments expected in coming months. In fact, the only part of the budget that is real is the furloughs imposed on the 6,400 members of the Engineers and Architects Association to save $34 million. The EAA, under siege from the powerful and well-connected SEIU, is singled out for total elimination through layoffs in the CAO-CLA report since it is not part of the Coalition of Unions which has been promised exemption from all layoffs and furloughs under the ERIP. The report notes that if this were done, there would be no community planning, financial audits, technology services or criminalists in the LAPD. And even if all EAA and non-Coalition workers were laid off, "approximately 2,000 (25%) of non-Coalition employees can bump back into a Coalition represented class that would not be subject to furloughs and/or layoffs." In other words, city contracts and rules make layoffs almost impossible at worst or a process that could take six months or longer at best. That, in the lingo of pool players, is a corner hook -- one of the many that officials face as they confront the budget catastrophe they have created. They have no shot, no solution except stealing. And that's what they are proposing to do. They have begged the public for every rate, fee and tax dollar they can get. They have borrowed $1.1 billion -- a quarter of the entire annual budget -- to have the cash to pay their bills. So now they must steal. That's what they are proposing to do. A motion introduced by Parks and Councilwoman Janice Parks puts it this way: "Given the enormity of the potential General Fund shortfall, the City should immediately explore reprogramming surplus Special Funds, as well as surplus funds at the proprietary departments, in a manner that will utilize to the extent possible the personnel currently funded through the General Fund that are being considered for reduction as part of the operational plans. Doing so will allow for the continuation of those City services while avoiding layoffs of experienced City personnel and mitigating cuts to City services." In plain language, they are going to take every cent they can from a wide variety of funds set aside for basic city services and put the money into the general fund to keep from laying anyone off. And they are going to charge the Harbor, Airport and Water and Power departments tens of millions of dollars for services that they already have staff providing. They are prepared to do absolutely anything to avoid facing the truth: Only layoffs or reducing salaries and benefits of city workers will bring the budget into balance. That's what is going on all over this country. It's painful and one way or another nearly every family in America has felt the pain of job loss or reduction in income. All the machinations proposed in the CAO-CLA report -- a minimum number of layoffs and furloughs that only temporarily reduce payroll costs -- are intended to avoid doing what has to be done. Every action they propose only will delay the day of reckoning for City Hall's failure to manage the public wealth for the public benefit. And when that day of reckoning comes, it will be that much worse because the budget hole will be so much greater. This crisis has been building for years. It should have been faced two years ago when the economic bubble burst. It should have been faced last spring when this year's budget was being written. It should be faced today before it gets worse. But that's not going to happen. It will only happen when there's an uprising of the people from the ordinary folks out in our sprawling neighborhoods to the civic elite which for too long has stood by and done nothing. Libraries and parks will close, police and fire services diminish. LA will become the shell of a city unless the awakening of the public occurs sooner rather than later when it will be too late. http://ourla.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=569&Itemid=3233             Round-the-Clock Talks on LA Budget Crisis     Written by Chelsea Cody and Ron Kaye, OurLA Writers    Tuesday, 15 September 2009 More than nine hours after its session began Tuesday, the City Council ended a daylong closed session and President Eric Garcetti announced negotiations would work through the night to try to resolve the $405 million budget crisis. He told members to stay on call and be available to resume the recessed session sometime between 9 p.m. Tuesday and 9 a.m. Wednesday for a vote on an early retirement package being worked out in talks among unions, the mayor's office, Council members and top bureaucrats. The negotations are taking place under threats of union legal action if the Council rejected the Early Retirement Incentive Package (ERIP) and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's threat to veto it -- an action that would require a super-majority to overturn. Even if employee contributions were to be increased, the city's hands would still face severs challenges in saving the hundreds of millions of dollars needed to balance the budget because of guarantees of no layoffs or furloughs for the 22,000 workers it covers. The mayor has twice pulled his support for the package that gives employees who take it five extra years credit on their pensions, $15,000 in cash and requires remaining city workers to pay .75 percent more toward their pensions -- generating about half of the full cost they are required to pay under the plan. The brief session that began about 6:40 p.m. started with private acturial consultant Paul Angelo presenting a seven-page PowerPoint presentation from his July 30 report to illustrate how employee contributions must be increased even under the 15-year payback period approved by the LACERS pension fund board. The mayor first supported the ERIP initially, then pulled it off the bargaining table, then backed it on June 26 when the City Council approved it and on Monday withdrew his support, saying the city could not afford the cost of giving 2,400 city workers five extra years of credit on their pensions and other parts of the deal. His veto threat came as the Council met behind closed-doors in a daylong session of bargaining with city unions over how to close a $405 million budget deficit, and indicates most Council members are prepared to go along with the plan to cut spending and avert a threatened lawsuit by employee unions. At one point during two hours of public comment, mostly by city workers who insisted the Council approve the ERIP, Councilwoman Janice Hahn exuberantly declared a deal was near in behind-the-scenes negotiations with union leaders and city officials. But no announcement was forthcoming and the full council went into closed session at 11:30 a.m. and still had not emerged two hours later. The unions boasted they had identified $60 million in additional savings to cover the fact that the Early Retirement Incentive Program (ERIP) would only generate $12 million in saving this year, a fraction of what was prmised. Part of that deal is the Coalition of City Unions was promised there would be no layoffs or furloughs in exchange for them deferring contracted pay raises for two years -- raises that would be rapid with interest in the following three years. A series of cost-cutting measures including layoffs of 926 workers with the least seniority and lowest pay levels but across the board furloughs were part of a series of measures pending before the Council.. (Special Meeting Agenda) After a lengthy meeting Monday that went late into the night even as negotiations were going on behind the scenes, the Budget and Finance Committee voted 3-2 to support the ERIP Plan despite the recommendations of City Administrative Officers Miguel Santana and Chief Legislative Analyst Gerry Miller that it would leave the city in a financially "unsustainable" situation. Councilmen Bill Rosendahl, Jose Huizar and Paul Koretz backed the union position while Committee Chairman Bernard Parks and Councilman Greig Smith opposed it. Taking into consideration input from the Budget and Finance Committe, the council will have to make some hard decisions as to whether or not it will approve the ERIP. Take a look at the documents the City Council will be reviewing: The Budget and Finance Committee Report relative to budgetary cash flow The Controllers Interim Year-End Closing Report The City Administrative Officer's Report http://ourla.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=577&Itemid=3233               Tuesday is D-Day for LA s Council    CityWatch By Ken Draper Tuesday is D-Day for the LA City Council. The City is in dire financial straights. It s Decision Day for the electeds that the citizenry of this city has chosen to stand up and make the tough decisions. At the rate it s been going, most folks would appreciate any decision. Tough or otherwise. As you read this the City s treasury is bleeding more than $1 million a day. The City s Controller says the LA will be out of money by May, 2010. Or sooner. And some of the blame goes to the LA Council members who have known about this crisis for months. Discussions of an early retirement program to help close the budget gap began more than a year ago. Warnings of this day of severe crisis were discussed during last year s budget plans. As the LA Times editorialized on Monday: The City Council s  & own dawdling has exacerbated the city s financial problems.  Former Daily News Editor calls it  The day of reckoning for years of failed leadership is here.  (Ron Kaye column .)    Council: Make the decision! Even at Monday s Budget and Finance Committee meeting & Council members seemed oblivious to the Chief Operating Officer and Chief Legislative Officer warnings that there is not another day left for LA to delay .To dance. To procrastinate. They both have said that the Early Retirement Initiative Program is no longer workable. The Mayor today withdrew his support for the E-RiP program & which he helped negotiate. It is too late. The council waited to long. Yet Committee members continued to fish for more time. To dance. To posture. To avoid the inevitable. It s D-Day City Council. Step up and apply the tourniquet. Before our city bleeds to a financial death. http://www.citywatchla.com/content/view/2690/                   Hollywood s No-Man s Land    Box Soap By Stephen Box            The Metro s Red Line stations are all unique, each one decorated with public art that reflects the character and personality of the surrounding community. At Hollywood & Western, the Metro selected overflowing trashcans, human waste and a homeless encampment, all in tribute to the No-Man s Land   (Video ) status of the area that finds the LAPD and the LASD treating the Metro station like a jurisdictional hot potato. This past Saturday evening, arriving at the Metro Station a little after midnight, we discovered five of the six escalators inoperative. Proponents of the "Broken Windows" theory would suggest that this "indicator" communicates a complete lack of oversight. Walking to the third staircase, we came across a little old lady, halfway up, standing still, unable finish the journey to street level. As my wife assisted the reluctant pedestrian, I went to notify the authorities only to find that the emergency intercom was out of order. At street level, the LAPD was out in force, driving up and down the Boulevard in vehicular insulation, never slowing down or so much as glancing at the Metro Station or the homeless encampment that sits below City Council President Eric Garcetti's 4th floor office in the Mayer Building. Of course, this is not their beat. Years ago the Metro awarded the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department a lucrative contract to provide law enforcement services for all Metro property. A subsequent Memorandum of Understanding between the LAPD and the LASD clarified the jurisdictional details and the lines were drawn. All Metro property is the responsibility of the Los Angeles Sheriff s Department. None of this really matters to the person on the street who wants help, only to find themselves lost in the "No-Man's Land" of the Metro Red Line Station. I called the LASD Watch Commander at Metro Rail HQ to let him know of the five inoperative escalators, the broken emergency intercom, the stench of urine and feces, the overflowing trash cans, and the homeless encampment, pointing out that they all indicate a significant failure on the part of the LASD. Sgt. Bedogne explained that staffing was thin on Saturday nights and that their focus was fare evasion. I pointed out this seems to be in sharp contrast with the Metro s CEO claim that public safety and customer service were his priorities for the Metro. Crickets chirped. It took 28 minutes for the LASD to arrive at Hollywood & Western, four cars with five Deputies. They descended into the station, returned to street level, chatted with the two armed Metro Officers who joined them, hung out some more, and then they all left. Net result of the visit, 22 minutes of scratching, spitting and huddling together on the mean streets of Hollywood and Western. At no time did any of them simply walk the perimeter of the street level property. Sgt. Bedogne explained "The LASD only handles the Metro Station itself, not the surrounding property." In fact, we discovered that night, the Sheriff's surveillance cameras don't even cover the third level of stairs. Meanwhile, Sgt. Lawrence, the LAPD's Watch Commander informed me that the Metro Station including the homeless encampment is the responsibility of the Sheriff's Department. Neither Watch Commander seemed alarmed in the disconnect between the two departments and both referred me to supervisors who were not available. This neighborhood has been in the news quite a bit lately. The LA Weekly has run a couple of great articles on the issues of homelessness and emancipated youth in Hollywood and in both articles the Hollywood & Western Metro Station is featured as the de facto drop in center for the under challenged and homeless youth of the area. Most recently, the CIM Group was taken to task for their blighted properties located to the north, trashed, abandoned and filled with squatters. Garcetti deferred to Councilman LaBonge (they split the intersection, Garcetti to the south, LaBonge to the north) As Garcetti and LaBonge engaged in the jurisdictional hot potato dance, the City Attorney and Building & Safety got involved and at the prodding of local activists, the properties were razed and the area was cleared of blight. LaBonge, who has never passed on the opportunity to engage in an end-zone victory dance, gathered community leaders in the parking lot of the Rite-Aid to claim credit for cleaning up the neighborhood, missing the fact that destroying a squat doesn t provide housing for the squatters, it merely drives them across the street into Garcetti s district. Perhaps that was his strategy. It would be consistent with the behavior of others. The LAPD purportedly has professionals that handle homeless issues but according to Sgt. Lawrence, the Watch Commander on duty Saturday night, they are available during traditional office hours. The LASD also has professionals to handle homeless issues but according to Sgt. Bedogne, the Watch Commander on duty Saturday night, they are also available during traditional office hours. Somehow the collective oversight of City Council President Garcetti, Councilmember LaBonge, the CRA, the Metro, the LAPD, the LASD, Building & Safety, the City Attorney s office and anyone else charged with addressing the homeless issue in Hollywood completely missed the fact that when you destroy homeless camps, you don t reduce homelessness. The Sheriff s Department is not without a plan for addressing homelessness. Ride the Metro Rail to either end of the line and you'll see Sheriff's Deputies whose only job is to make the homeless exit the rail cars, stand sleepily on the station for a few minutes with their abundant possessions, teeter and totter and then reenter to resume sleeping on the journey to the other end of the line. The LAPD has a similar strategy for the vehicles and motorhomes parked on residential streets, occupied by folks who simply move their vehicular campsite from one side of the street to the other to accommodate street cleaning, necessary to address the trail of trash and human waste left behind. The Senior Lead Officers typically use the 72 hour chalk to keep them moving in circles, ignoring LA Muni Code 85.02 which prohibits people from inhabiting parked vehicles on public streets. In either case, the strategy seems to be based on the belief that if the homeless are annoyed enough, they will simple grow weary of the inconvenience of homelessness, snap out of their stupor, resolve to prosper, buy a home in the Valley, and leave Hollywood behind. I ve lived in Hollywood for a dozen years. I believe in Hollywood and I proudly refer to it as the center of the universe,  a claim I make with utmost sincerity based on its history, its industry significance, its creative community, and its potential.  For three years my wife and I have hosted Bike to Work  events at the Hollywood & Metro Station. We have organized rides that use the Metro Station as the meeting place. Hollywood & Western is where we meet friends, where we shop, it s often the beginning and end of our journeys and it is, in many ways, the center of the universe. It s the heart of our neighborhood. The Hollywood and Western Red Line station is the tip of an iceberg that can t be neglected or ignored any longer. It is imperative that the many departments that have responsibility for some aspect of development, public safety, homeless services, law enforcement and simple quality of life issues in Hollywood to come together, put down the jurisdictional drama and to simply work together to make Los Angeles a Great City. (Stephen Box stands vigil on the City of Angels and writes for CityWatch. He can be reached at Stephen@ThirdEyeCreative.net This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it ) %Ø http://www.citywatchla.com/content/view/2689/                   CityWatch Got It Wrong Again    NC Funding Rollover Clarification By BongHwan Kim This is to clarify some erroneous information that was written in a recent City Watch article about the status of the roll-over balances for Neighborhood Councils.   I instructed my staff to place a temporary hold on roll-over balances.  This was necessary so that we could confirm accurate remaining balances from prior years.  This is the problem:   I inherited a financial management system which lacked adequate checks and balances.  One key weakness of the system is that annual reconciliations were never done  from its inception. As a result, our records of the accumulated roll over balances for each Neighborhood Council are inaccurate.  Further compounding the problem is that the City had differing interpretations of how the three-year roll-over policy was to be applied.  Our Department s financial reconciliations have been recently completed. We will be asking the Controller for final confirmation of our records.  After the necessary approvals have been received, all Neighborhood Councils will be able to access their roll over balances which will have accurate figures going forward.  We anticipate roll over balances to be available by September 25.   In the meantime, Neighborhood Councils should rely on their current year s allocation of $45,000.    I issued a memo to all the Neighborhood Council Board Members on August 19 which explained that the Controller is conducting an audit of the Neighborhood Council Funding Program - at my request.  We are in the process of re-designing the Funding Program so that it meets the needs of both Neighborhood Councils and City departments charged with financial management that we report to, including the City Council and Mayor.  Neighborhood Councils are responsible to account for and manage their funds and this is clearly articulated in both the Plan and in our Treasurer s training curriculum. In spite of that, many Neighborhood Councils, rather than maintaining their own records, have appeared to rely solely on our on-line data, which was intended to provide transparency of expenses  not to substitute for individual Neighborhood Council account reconciliations.  I will be working in partnership with Controller Greuel, the CAO, City Treasurer, elected officials, and Neighborhood Council Boards to design a much stronger and robust financial management system that provides accurate, timely, and transparent data.  The Funding Program is an essential resource for Neighborhood Councils and I will focus our remaining Department resources on getting us to where we all want to be.   I ask for your patience and cooperation so that we can collectively work together on solving a long standing problem that is now being addressed under my leadership.  (BongHwan Kim is the General Manager of the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment. He can be reached at BongHwan.Kim@lacity.org This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it ) %Ø http://www.citywatchla.com/content/view/2692/        ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~       When the City Has $$ Trouble, Should the LAPD's $ Be Cut? September 15th, 2009 by Celeste Fremon As most of us are aware, a great many city jobs are getting cut because, like the state, LA has serious money troubles. So, shouldn t the Los Angeles Police Department also have to take a hit to their personnel along with the rest of the city s agencies that are dealing with layoffs and hiring freezes? In an editorial in this morning's LA Times, the paper has answered the question with a resounding NO. The opinion may prove to be an unpopular position given the number of city workers who are getting furlough days, or worse, bounced out of the workforce altogether. Yet I agree with the Times. For decades, Los Angeles had the lowest officer to resident ratio of all of the nation s six largest police departments, a fact that did not serve our city well. In 2006, for example, New York City had a 228 to 1 ratio of residents to cops. Chicago had 216 to 1. LA had 426 to 1. Over the years, the department coped by instituting its now famous command-and-control paramilitary model that resulted in such methodology as SWAT and the helicopter pursuit, all of which other departments came to emulate. Yet it is also the same model that led to the kind of entrenched problems and abuses that broke most infamously into the open during the Rampart scandal. Doing something to raise the numbers was one of the most important changes that Bill Bratton told me he felt he had to make when he first came the the LAPD, if he was to institute the reforms to the department s so-called culture that he believed were necessary. He cited the out of kilter officer/resident ratio as being one of the elements that led to the attitude within certain quarters of the department that produced Rampart. It [became] all about control, Bratton said in January of 2003, during my very first interview with him, (and his first for any LA print news outlet since his arrival as chief). It was all about controlling the community, not working with the community. It starts out as the desire to control the criminal component of the community. It ends up spreading to all the aspects of the community.  Chief Bratton fought hard to raise the number of uniformed officers on LA s streets, and, at the same time, while crime stats dropped, the relationship between the police and the communities they served began to improve. There is still farther to go in the twinned realms of community relations and &let s just call it &the less productive side of the department s culture, but one thing is for sure, we cannot possibly afford to go backward. Here s how the LATimes described that same issue in this morning s editorial: After years of toying with expanding the size of the Los Angeles Police Department, advancing and then retreating when a limited funding stream evaporated or the economy turned sour, Los Angeles has begun to make some headway. It has been an important development. A growing LAPD, together with smart deployment decisions, have helped to keep crime in check and to improve the working relationship between the department and the neighborhoods it serves. A larger number of officers helps the LAPD to move away from the occupying force -style of policing that once prevailed in Los Angeles, keeping some communities secure and others geared for confrontation. Allowing the LAPD to drop in size would be a setback for Los Angeles Yep. It would. And, as unfair as it might seem given the cuts being visited on others, it would be an imprudent choice to allow that setback to occur particularly during this stressed and insecure time. Posted in Chief Bratton, LAPD, law enforcement | 27 Responses Woody Says: September 15th, 2009 at 5:22 am The budget for the LAPD should not be cut. The taxpayers should be forced to cough up even more money. You read it right. May I suggest that the city create special tax districts where crime is highest and police presence needed most and raise the property and sales taxes in those particular areas and on those residents. There s no sense of people in good areas and who conduct lawful lives having to pay for crime control in areas where people make things worse. reg Says: September 15th, 2009 at 8:55 am Agreed on the first sentence. Then: May I suggest &  Gee - it actually turned out to be a stupider suggestion  than I could have possibly imagined. Janet Says: September 15th, 2009 at 9:55 am THANK YOU THANK YOU CELESTE FOR BEING THE VOICE OF REASON. I couldn t agree with you more. For decades LAPD were the only ones who shared the sacrifice working with fewer officers. Now, because of the incompetence of our council members who wasted millions they expect LAPD to again sacrifice. NO. When Parks was Chief of LAPD we lost over 1,000 officers so its interesting now he s calling for fewer instead of being accountable for the ones we lost. How he became chair of the budget & Finance committee is shocking to many. E-mails are flying and people are tired of these politicians and the financial mess they ve made of the city. Yet, they ll be celebrating in front of city hall today spending $75,000 on a special event waiver and they wonder why word is a ballot measure is going to call to cut their salaries in half. reg Says: September 15th, 2009 at 11:11 am The truth is most big cities need more and better cops, trained for effective community policing, not fewer. I d trade deadwood in city bureaucracies for more cops any day & Woody Says: September 15th, 2009 at 12:36 pm reg: more cops for community policing What happened to Bill Clinton s 100,000 cops program? Don t tell me that was just a slick political move that didn t make any permanent change (as though that was really the intention). First this: Invisible COPS - How Clinton s plan to field 100,000 new police turned into a pork barrel as usual. Now, this: Clinton-era community police program gets new life under new Democratic administration (complete with distortions, if you fall for that sort of thing) Where s this change  that I hear about? Yeah, bring back the politics, the pork, and temporary financing that gets permanently shoved on local governments with not much to show for it. Get in line for the money, LAPD. Just make sure that the union gets most of it. Woody Says: September 15th, 2009 at 1:23 pm Ahhh, it seemed like a good idea, but, although it didn t accomplish its stated goals, let s do it again! House votes to revive Bill Clinton's COPS program Legislation that the House of Representatives passed overwhelmingly Thursday would send billions of dollars to thousands of communities to help them hire and retain 50,000 police officers. The 342-78 vote was the latest step in reviving a Clinton-era cops on the streets  program that provided $6.9 billion to help hire nearly 117,000 police officers starting in 1994. The Community Oriented Policing Services program then withered under the Bush administration. &[Republicans] objected to saddling local governments with the cost of the personnel once the federal dollars ran out. Grants varied, but often they lasted only three years. &In a 2005 study, the Government Accountability Office found studies of the impact of the grants on crime have been inconclusive.  It disputed Democrats  claim that at least 100,000 officers had been funded, saying that the number at the time was closer to 88,000, and noted that factors other than COPS funds accounted for the majority of the decline in crime during this period.  Where are the cops that L.A. hired then? Gone, because the buck was passed from the Democrats to local taxpayers? Don t count on that money to help reduce crime in L.A., but relish in feeling good from the thought of spending that money. When Democrats say that they want to be tough on crime, they don t mean it and sound more like the ACLU. reg Says: September 15th, 2009 at 2:28 pm Woody - go stuff it. Nobody cares about your idiot ranting. Woody Says: September 15th, 2009 at 2:53 pm I ve given you three possible solutions for affording more police: (1) Increase taxes in areas requiring more police coverage (2) Keep using those cops hired under Clinton s plan, or (3) Get new cops with a similar Obama plan. Since the last two really haven t worked and will not work, try the first one. My plan is like a gas tax. Those who use the roads pay for them. Those who require more police get to pay for them. Your plan is like taxing people in wheelchairs to maintain the interstates. roy Says: September 15th, 2009 at 3:19 pm quit trying to make sense woody or reg won t understand, or he will refute you with a simple insult and think he won the debate. WBC Says: September 15th, 2009 at 3:52 pm We re a woefully underpoliced city, even once we reach the 10,000 figure. I ve heard Bratton make convincing pitches that we really need 12,000 before he (and now his successor) can stop shuffling cops around to where they re needed most, angering people like the affluent Westsiders who argue they pay way more in taxes than they get back. That may be, but if there s violent crime elsewhere the whole city suffers. However, as a result there has been an apparent upswing in property crimes in the less-policed affluent areas, from the Palisades to the hillsides to parts of the W. Valley; with increased focus on those and community activism, it seems more cops are being put back there and a new station was opened out near your way in Topanga. It s a tight situation, but would only get worse with fewer cops. The Times was right (for once) in editorializing that we need to keep up police hiring toward the goal - though not without making a dig at Villaraigosa for being responsible for the mess we re in now. (Not sure that s true: where were Parks and the rest of them on the Budget Committee?) Still, this half-hearted endorsement does buck the Police Protective League and its conservative head Paul Weber and his gang, who want to preserve the salary and benefits of current cops instead, and have put out scare stories in fluers and emails, tactics similar to what the LAFD union head s Pat McOsker has been doing by the way. McOsker was at this morning s Council meeting siding with the union workers who argue that the June deal (not sure it it WAS a deal or tentative pact) must stand, even though it s been proven fiscally irresponsible by new nunbers and continuing revenue declines. Wrong: much as I don t want to lose any firetrucks or vital responder services, the LAFD will have to find internal ways to cut costs. Those councilpeople and officials who ve been siding with LAFD and LAPD the unions against the mayor on this for political reasons, the Zines and Trutanich s, have to put the needs of taxpayers above their own politcal one- upmanship against the Democrats, for once. As for where to cut in other services: seems the Council is finally getting down to brass tacks. Even Beverly Hills significantly cut back library hours and some other services to preserve its famed police dept. force. (Don t know if they re being required to take any furloughs etc., but they re a much richer city than we are demographically and in terms of business revenue especially.) Among other big cities, isn t San Francisco looking pretty pot-holed lately, for all of Newsom s touting his financial prowess? And they couldn t even help with the Station fire, pretty pathetic. We re not the only ones who have to make hard choices. Mavis Beacon Says: September 15th, 2009 at 5:06 pm There s no sense of people in good areas and who conduct lawful lives having to pay for crime control in areas where people make things worse.  Just FYI, plenty of people in bad areas  lead lawful lives. That you don t realize that speaks volumes about your prejudice against the poor. I ll also add that the people you are trying to stick with the bill are the most common victims of crime. Next time we hear Woody accuse liberals of not caring for victims of crime, let s remember that he would like a policy where if your block is victimized by more crime, it costs you more money. We can call it Woody s Victim Tax. WBC Says: September 15th, 2009 at 5:34 pm Woody would love our very own Carmen Trutanich, City Atty, whose graffiti injunction and I assume other ideas are pretty much what Woody s espousing here: if you re unlucky enough to be growing up in an area with more graffiti vandals than most, and if you re caught hanging  anywhere near them, you can and will be treated like a criminal, too, in some end of the earth scenario  he s painting. Wish WE could send him to Alabama or Georgia (forgot which one Woody lives in) Randy Paul Says: September 15th, 2009 at 6:35 pm We re a woefully underpoliced city, even once we reach the 10,000 figure. I agree. New York City has some 36,000 police officers. The land area of LA is greater than that of New York City by some 30 square miles and the population of LA is a little less than half of NYC. The number of police is woefully small. Sisco Says: September 15th, 2009 at 6:43 pm People in high crime areas wouldn t be able to afford a tax increase. Literally not afford it, not meaning that it s an inconvenience, which is what rich people mean when they say they can t afford it. So, because the cost of everything would go up in high crime areas via a sales tax, people would have to commit even more crimes to pay for goods. The results would be disastrous, and would make the LAPD s job 20 times harder. You re an idealistic fool, Woody. Woody Says: September 15th, 2009 at 7:25 pm It s the first time I ve been called idealistic, but you guys regularly call me a fool. However, I m no fool because I don t want to have to pay for other people s problems. What do other cities do that get completely taken over by poverty and crime? After the criminal culture drives out the decent people through higher taxes for their self-created problems, the only people left are those that you say can t afford the taxes. Not ony do those who remain have to pay for expanded police services, they now have to pay for everything else, too. They do it somehow. Newark comes to mind, although I m not up to date on changes to that city. I guess they drop all the art and poetry programs. Woody Says: September 15th, 2009 at 7:30 pm I m also reminded of the Watts riots in which people looted and destroyed their own neighborhoods. How stupid. It s hard to hold sympathy for people who ruined their own homes and businesses and forced good people to leave. At least those responsible all got new TV s in the process. I hope it was worth it to them. Sisco Says: September 15th, 2009 at 7:40 pm Woody, you re an idealist. The definition of idealism is to believe in things that won t work. Raising taxes on the poor? Fuckin  stupid. Sisco Says: September 15th, 2009 at 7:44 pm Woody, poor people will continue to riot, and everyone else will pay for it. That s life. Grow up. Be glad you have what you have. Be glad you don t live in Watts. I think if you spent a little more time taking inventory of what you do have and a little less time graveling over the benefits that the poor get, you d be a happier person. Give it a try. Gava Joe Says: September 15th, 2009 at 7:50 pm RIP Patrick Swayze. I certainly had the time of my life  watching your perfectly sculptured bod on the big screen. You ll be missed. RobThomas Says: September 15th, 2009 at 10:57 pm Gava Joe - I know what you mean. Swayze was so hot, I can t believe I won t get to enjoy his sexy loins anymore. I m going out to rent Ghost right now! RobThomas Says: September 15th, 2009 at 11:04 pm Sisco, do you live in Watt s??? Kelvin Says: September 15th, 2009 at 11:21 pm The Mayor s threat to cut LAPD is a typical chicken-s***t response and exactly what I would expect from the egocentric fool we allowed into the Mayor s Office. Villaraigosa is doing the the same thing the Sheriff does when his budget is threatened; he says he ll have to let more people out of jail. Usually that strategy succeeds in forcing the County to come up with the necessary Benjamins to solve the problem. Unfortunately for the Mayor of Failure, the man who couldn t pass the Bar Exam, there s nobody to force into providing more money for a failed City. Cutting LAPD and Fire services will only do one thing, it will make life worse for those who are least able to protect themselves, and by that I mean the regular people who live in the north, south and east of Los Angeles. The Westside will just hire more wannabe cops aka private security firms. So our Chicken-S***t Mayor of Failure will continue to photo-op his way through the destruction of the City s finances with more pathetic platitudes like Shared Sacrifice  and will bail out of Los Angeles before the end of his term to take up some highly paid job as a lobbyist for SEIU - they own him anyway. Trutanich was right when he said the ERIP solution would have worked if the Mayor had the muscle to make it happen when it was first talked about. Now it is too little, too late. The Mayor could no more get the unions to agree to ERIP than he could convince that bunch of hand wringing indecisive useless council members to do something, anything, to solve the City s problem. The problem is really not that hard to understand; the City pays out $1M more than it receives, every week. It pays out most of it s budget in salaries. LAPD and the Fire Dept are but only 2 of many other City departments, and it s in those departments where the deepest cuts need to be made. Slash Parks & Rec, Building & Safety, Department of Transport, and the City s own private police force, and you can balance the budget no problem. But this Mayor hasn t got the brains or guts to do it. And before I finish, let s talk about that Shared Sacrifice  crap. First of all, I wonder how much the Mayor s Office paid to some friendly PR company to come up with that meaningless catch-phrase? Second, why is it that the Mayor s Office has expanded it s staff of highly paid deputies and assistants by 26%? Where s the Shared Sacrifice there? Los Angeles Magazine was right to put Villaraigosa on their front cover with the word Failure  across him. That s what he is, a good time Charlie, and a abject failure when times are hard. Sisco Says: September 16th, 2009 at 12:08 am No, I don t live in Watts. Sisco Says: September 16th, 2009 at 12:09 am Mayor of Failure  is so catchy, Kelvin. WBC Says: September 16th, 2009 at 1:13 am Kelvin, hello, hello. the mayor is the one adamantly opposed to cutting the # s of cops at LAPD; re-read the Editorial, for once they get it mostly right: this is about his wanting to keep his promise to grow the force to 10,000 (and he s fought to put the tripled trash fees toward same, at least to public safety vs just being swept into Gen l Fund), while the PPL is what s more analagous to how Baca s operating. The PPL wants to retain all current benefits, salaries & perks, while the Mayor (as editorial details) says sorry, we have to cut back for now, which will allow us to retain the officers we have on duty and expand to the min. nec y number, until the overall budget situation improves.  It s the PPL and LAFD Union/ Pat McOsker that you need to address your grievances to. (I m not defending the mayor here per se, but just insofar as he s echoing what Bratton says and wants  as Randy Paul says, our numbers vs. NYC are ridiculous, and it s amazing that Bratton s as successful as he s been w/ his Comstat or whatever it s called, the shuttling around business. But that s wearying for the cops and for the communities.) WBC Says: September 16th, 2009 at 1:23 am Kelvin, just read your comment a little more carefully, and don t see how Trutanich (who you regularly speak up for) was right saying the ERIP plan would have worked a few months ago but now it s too late. The opposite seems to be true: that we d have been locked into a bad situation, given new numbers and continued decline in revenue. MAYBE the mayor, Garcetti and all the rest of them should have been tougher then about furloughs and layoffs (and no doubt the whole bunch including the self-styled budget hawks like Parks, Zine, Smith, and the CFO/CLA whoever, should have sent out sirens years ago), but it s NOT true that the June proposal would have worked out splendidly if etched in stone at the time, and frankly, it s dumb for Trutanich to say that when he s supposed to defend the Mayor s position vs. a likely lawsuit from the unions. Sounds like he is, like you, more focused on the mayor with hatred and on grandstanding even when he makes no sense, than focused on what s best for the city. (All while he announced right off the bat, as reported here, that he wants to ADD 200 cops fully equipped with cars and fancy gadgets, and admits he d need to hire upto 100 high-priced specialist lawyers  Rocky had allowed half that to fade away by attrition, as ordered for budgetary reasons  before the ofc. can actually handle more in-house cases. Right now, he s still farming them out to the same firms, whatever he claims.) DON T get me started on this guy, I wish there were a one-way slow bus to Alabama for him. Woody Says: September 16th, 2009 at 5:41 am Hey, I m not saying that the people in high crime areas have to pay for more police any more than the anyone else saying that they have to have collision insurance on their cars. But, if they want the protection, they (those who need it) would have to pay for it. If they can t afford the costs of more police, then make do rather than tell others to pay for the problems of their own making ghttp://witnessla.com/lapd/2009/admin/when-the-city-has-trouble-should-the-lapd-be-cut/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Is L.A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich Screwing Over a Little Guy? By Patrick Range McDonald Monday, Sep. 14 2009 @ 9:00AM Ever since his arrival as the new Los Angeles City Attorney this summer, Carmen Trutanich has loved to come across as a man of the people.  Trutanich has sparred with the L.A. City Council to the delight of many community activists; he has also personally held a town hall-type forum inside City Council chambers in August that was jammed with ordinary citizens who talked directly to Trutanich, and he applied pressure on a wealthy real estate developer to demolish slum properties in Hollywood after community activist Ziggy Kruse asked for his help. But now that reputation may be in danger, especially since the City Attorney's Office is going after a homeless man -- the littlest of little guys -- in a way that looks shadier and shadier by the minute. The homeless man is Naser "Jimmy" Nasralla, whose story was featured in L.A. Weekly in late July. Titled "Jimmy on the Edge of Town," the article examines Jimmy's battle with the Union Pacific Railroad Company and the L.A. City Attorney's Office, who want him to vacate his makeshift home near a stretch of railroad tracks in Northridge. From all accounts -- from the LAPD to local citizens and businesses -- Jimmy hasn't bothered anyone. But Union Pacific gave him a ticket for trespassing on its private property. The case went to court, with Apraham Atteukenian as the prosecutor from the L.A. City Attorney's Office. As events unfolded, though, it became questionable if Jimmy was actually living on Union Pacific property. The LAPD, for example, was unsure if the homeless man lives on railroad land, and L.A. City Councilman Greig Smith's office, which represents Northridge, told the Weekly that Jimmy lives on "county property."  Longtime real estate expert Mary Cummins, in fact, said that she had no doubt Jimmy resides on county land. Since two of the three charges against Jimmy involve trespassing on Union Pacific land, the findings were a major blow to the city attorney's case. Incredibly, the private/county property question came as a surprise to Atteukenian, whose boss is Carmen Trutanich. When Atteukenian was confronted with Cummins' findings during one of Jimmy's court hearings this summer, the prosecutor was caught off guard, said he would make some calls, and asked for a continuance. Atteukenian obviously hadn't done the basic homework of finding out if Jimmy lived on private or county property -- if justice, in fact, was being properly applied to the homeless man's case. Atteukenian's less than exemplary work as a prosecutor only got worse from there. At another court hearing on August 3, Atteukenian started to realize the impact of Cummins' and City Councilman Smith's findings. Before the hearing started, the prosecutor approached Jimmy and his friend, Edward Muzika, holding out a business card. With his fingers purposefully obscuring most of the card, Atteukenian used it as proof that he had a contact with the county's Department of Public Works, and said that the unnamed official wanted Jimmy off county land. Muzika asked for a better look of the card, but Atteukenian refused. The prosecutor pulled a similar stunt at another court hearing this past Friday on September 11. This time, Jimmy, who had been representing himself, went to court with a public defender, Joseph McInnis. At the hearing, Atteukenian forgot all about Union Pacific railroad and claimed Jimmy lives on the private property of someone else. Atteukenian told Judge David W. Stuart that he "wasn't comfortable" with providing the exact name of the property owner, but assured the judge that the person owned Nordhoff Plaza -- a shopping center that Jimmy lives directly behind and home to such corporate chain stores as Best Buy and Bed, Bath and Beyond -- and wanted the homeless man to leave the site. The claim was not only astounding because Atteukenian refused to say who approached him -- the prosecutor must turn over such information to the defense -- but the man who operates Nordhoff Plaza, Pat Murphy, told the Weekly that Jimmy doesn't live on his property.  During the reporting for the "Jimmy on the Edge of Town" feature story, Murphy told the Weekly he looked into whether or not Jimmy lived on his land, with the idea of getting the homeless man away from his shopping center. But Murphy said he found that Jimmy was not living on Nordhoff Plaza property, and couldn't take legal action against the homeless man. Atteukenian's newest claim, therefore, doesn't seem to add up, and it's just one more example of a prosecutor who appears more interested in putting the screws to a homeless man than getting his facts straight and making sure justice is being properly carried out. Jimmy's next hearing is September 29. L.A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich still has time to clean up a mess that's going down on his watch. Contact Patrick Range McDonald at pmcdonald@laweekly.com. http://blogs.laweekly.com/ladaily/politics/is-la-city-attorney-carmen-tru/  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~         Sandy Sand: Antonio's Day of Infamy     Written by Sandy Sand, Our LA Writer    Sunday, 13 September 2009 Some are calling Sept. 11, 2001, America s new Day of Infamy. So it was that on Friday there was not just one tribute to those who died on 9/11, but memorials services were conducted in the largest cities and smallest hamlets across the country. It was also a day when our mayor, Antonio We Can Get Along With Fewer Firefighters Because They re Costing Us Too Much Money  Villaraigosa spoke at one the largest tributes here in Los Angeles at Elysian Park. That was a personal Day of Infamy for the citizens of Los Angeles that he had the colossal nerve to show his face at an event honoring the heroic acts of firefighters at the World Trade Center in New York City when he treats ours as if they were dog food. Taking a break to watch a local noon newscast became a fly out of my tree  moment when the reporter covering the event said the mayor had just spoken and hailed as selfless heroes the firefighters who died in New York by going into those burning buildings unconditionally to rescue those who were trapped. Villaraigosa s presence there was a slap in the face to all of us and the height of hypocrisy. How dare he I thought, punctuated by a few unprintable expletives. How dare that two-faced, hypocritical man dare show his face at an event commemorating heroism on the part of firefighters when he treats our own like they re dog food? Chutzpah! Chutzpah to the max is the only explanation! Firefighters at the event must have wanted to barf on his shoes that are as highly polished as the smarmy smile that s always painted on his face. The man standing on the podium uttering platitudes of heroism is the same man who is in a death battle with the firefighters union for cutting firefighting and rescue ambulance services in the city, which already has too few for a huge population of more than four million people. Because of Villaraigosa, who along with the City Council, squandered billions of tax payer dollars that are driving the City into financial ruin and the brink of bankruptcy, he callously chose emergency services as one of the first places to cut spending and called it shared sacrifice.  Only the fire department along with the tax payers and DWP rate payers have shared the sacrifice. Only four City employees have lost their jobs. Oh, he ll tell us he cut his over-bloated staff by 10 percent, but I have it on good authority they he merely shifted them to other jobs outside his office so he can say -- with a straight face -- that he reduced his staff. The mayor has personally put every citizen in Los Angeles at risk, and he was warned that it could happen just as he was warned more than two years ago that the city was facing financial ruin. The drowning death of a three-year-old boy in Bel-Air may have already occurred due to Villaraigosa s elimination of several emergency services, including 15 fire engines and nine ambulances at various fire stations throughout the city in the name of closing a $56.5 million shortfall in the fire department s budget. The fire station closest to the boys home had been shut down on the day the swimming pool accident occurred. Firefighters and rescuers will tell you that in cases like this, seconds matter. LAFD Battalion Chief Ronnie Villanueva told the Los Angeles Times that the engine company that had been idled is one-tenth to three-tenths of a mile closer to the house than the two units that responded to the drowning. "There's no way to tell if it would have made a difference," he said. Made a difference or not, the boy s family should sue Villaraigosa for personally being responsible for their child s death. If nothing else, a jury could convict him for malfeasance in office, reckless endangerment or plain old-fashioned stupidity. Police, fire protection and emergency services are the last places a responsible mayor chooses to cut budgets, not one of the first. Villaraigosa doesn t give a rat s ass for the safety or well being of the citizens he s supposed to be serving. His every action from his all too frequent jaunts out of town, to allowing the city to fall into fiscal disrepair, to spending only 11 percent of his time on the job, to constantly asking us for more money for more taxes and fees for the sake of his CYA and mismanagement are proof. No, he doesn t give a damn about our safety, and if I d been in the audience when he spoke at Elysian Park, I would not have shouted obscenities as him while he was at the speakers podium, I would have quietly stood and turned my back on him in the same way he turns his back on us. (Sandy Sand is a freelance writer and frequent contributor to OurLA) http://ourla.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=567&Itemid=3235          ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~     Franklin Hanock: City Problems Go Unsolved, Letters Unanswered     Written by Franklin Hanock    Sunday, 13 September 2009 I trust that, at least, most of us in the San Fernando Valley know that we have a Canyon Road that takes hundreds, if not thousands, of people, from the Valley to West L.A. and other areas of the greater Los Angeles. If you have driven that road, as I do , at least twice a week, you are aware that, on the North side of the road just before Mulholland you will see the remnants of what was a huge white stucco mansion on the hillside surrounded by cyclone wire fencing. That home was hit hard during the January 1994 earthquake. Though some of the debris was removed, after many many years of looking like it had been hit by bomb, there it sits, in all it's ugliness. Losing track of time is not hard, when you write to the City (Managers), as often as I have regarding that eyesore. The City Council President, Eric Garcetti and then Council person, Wendy Gruel, never had the courtesy, of answering my pleas for help. So for now it still sits, but I have not given up! The second most critical problem, with Laurel Canyon, is the condition of the winding, curving road, from Mulholland South to Sunset Blvd. Without exaggeration the road is, as one you would expect to look like, in a heavy war zone. Deep potholes, ruts, cracks, poorly patched areas rising above the surface -- dangers to drivers and costly, to the maintenance of their vehicles. As you head down, the hillsides, both east and west, are filled with massive dry brush, not attended to and just waiting, for a fire to happen and would that be a disaster, to property and also potentially to lives. I have addressed this problem, with the Council, the Mayor, the Supervisors and then Council person, Wendy Greuel, at least, four times a year, for the past five years. No replies and no action taken either. Really frustrating. I will still press on. It's important! If I had the power, I would remove them all from office and replace them with other good,bright and talented folks, not beholden to the Big Money Power Brokers, the Unions ( all of them). I believe we would be shocked how easy it would be to install good effective management, while shocking those Biggies, with their ocmplete loss of control. After a few strikes and their membership losing serioius income, things would change. Sure it might be painful, but very much worth it. What do you think?? http://ourla.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=565&Itemid=3235        ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~       From Ron Kaye   Threads of Corruption that Tie Together Like a Noose By Ron Kaye  on September 15, 2009 7:50 AM Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa "does not discuss his friends' private business matters with them...It's not part of the mayor's agenda to worry about people's private business dealings." That is one of the most laughable quotes of all time, laughable if it wasn't the best that Deputy Chief of Staff Matt Szabo could do to deflect questions about a dirty deal that stinks so bad all the hot air in City Hall won't be able to blow it away. In a story that took many weeks of tough reporting to nail down, David Zahniser in the LA Times revealed today how mayoral insider, pal and key adviser Ari Swiller' outmaneuvered the Department of Water and Power to buy the 68,000-acre Onyx Ranch in Kern County for a wind farm site. The deal "highlights the dual roles played by ...Swiller, an entrepreneur whose field, renewable energy, has received a significant boost from the mayor's pledge to make Los Angeles 'the greenest big city in America," Zahniser reports The threads of the story tie together like a noose. Ties between the mayor and Swiller date back to when Villaraigosa and Swiller were both employed by supermarket billionaire Ron Burkle in 2001. Swiller was a key fund-raiser in that campaign and subsequent campaigns, emerging as the man in charge of those operations and political appointments even as he was buying the valuable wind farm property DWP had tried to get for years. Swiller's company, Renewable Resources Group,  was founded in 2004 to develop and invest in clean energy with the help of David Freeman, who was appointed in April to handle environmental issues for Villaraigosa and who has taken the lead in driving the mayor's effort to make LA "the greenest city in America." Swiller's partner in the Onyx Ranch deal is none other than the CIM Group, the Hollywood-based real estate company that ranks near of the top of the list of beneficiaries of City Hall's special-favors-for-special interests practices. "City Hall. Over the last seven years, city agencies have agreed to provide CIM with $58 million worth of loans and subsidies," Zahniser report. "And two city pension boards have agreed to invest up to $115 million in CIM funds on behalf of city retirees...CIM Group had persuaded the California Public Employees Retirement System to invest up to $200 million in a new infrastructure fund managed by the firm." It's not like Swiller doesn't give a damn about the city he's helping the mayor to ruin. He offered to sell half the Kern County property to the DWP for $65 million -- a property he bought out from under the DWP for $48 million. Business is business, just ask DWP General Manager David Nahai who is doing everything he can to engineer billions of dollars in solar, wind and other renewable energy projects for distribution among the friends and allies of the mayor. "(Swiller) has this friendship to the mayor. He's an advisor to the mayor. But at the same time, he's a business person," Nahai said. "So if nothing untoward occurred here, he'd be as free as anybody else to try to do a business deal." That, my friends, is the moral sensibility of the people who running LA , the people who want blank checks for billions of dollars in public money so they can profiteer from the environmental concerns we all share. It's a small world inside City Hall, small and laughable if it weren't so dirty. http://www.ronkayela.com/