Department of Neighborhood Empowerment
Newsletter 9/24/02

September 24, 2002

Re: Contact Information Needed, Budget Day, Community Impact Statements, Trust, Funding Program, Web Site, Congress Workshop Transcripts, Attending Conferences, Sharing Information and Talent, Early Notification System, Free Computers, Secession and the Neighborhood Councils.

CONTACT INFORMATION

If you're a Neighborhood Council that has been certified, you've been invited to participate in Budget Day. This event is the beginning of a change in another culture at City Hall. Mayor wants the public, through their Neighborhood Councils, to affect the substance of the city budget by involving them at the earliest stages of the process.

This is another example of the need for us to have mailing addresses for each certified and developing Neighborhood Council. In this case, and in others that will arise, the material that we need to get to you must be mailed or hand-delivered.

Our public list of certified and developing Neighborhood Councils can be found on our Web site at www.lacityneighborhoods.com in the Neighborhood Councils section.

COMMUNITY IMPACT STATEMENTS

The City Council's Education and Neighborhoods Committee is in the process of developing a process through which the Neighborhood Councils can have a summary of their official position on the agendas of the City Council, the Council committees, and the commissions. As the plan is being conceived, Neighborhood Councils will be able to send their positions to the City through e-mail. As mentioned in an earlier newsletter, this will require each Neighborhood Council to have an e-mail address that everyone knows will be used just for its official business, and they are available for free from a number of sources.

CONTINUING THE TRUST

The use of the City Seal, letterhead, and e-mail by Neighborhood Councils requires a degree of trust. The City and the public trusts that the Neighborhood Councils will only use their letterhead and official e-mail addresses for official positions of the Neighborhood Council. We're trying to avoid the need for signed paperwork.

Recently, there was concern that the chair of one Neighborhood Council used their official letterhead to file a position with a City agency that only represented the chair's personal position.

One way to deal with this problem would be for each Neighborhood Council to develop its own rules for the use of their letterhead and e-mail address. Another possibility is for each communication that reports a position taken by the Neighborhood Council to include a statement of how that position was established – unanimous vote of the governing board on August 15, 2002; majority of the Land Use Issues Committee on September 1, 2002; determination of the President of the Board of Directors as permitted by the bylaws in accordance with a blanket policy adopted by the governing board; etc.

FUNDING PROGRAM

If you still have the August 2, 2002 version of the Neighborhood Council Funding Program, you've got the most current version. It was passed unanimously by the Board of Neighborhood Commissioners, and the Education and Neighborhoods Committee. The plan was before the Personnel Committee last Tuesday, but the report from the City Administrative Officer (CAO) was not ready, so the matter will be taken up again on October 1 at 2 p.m. on the 10th Floor of City Hall.

As soon as the CAO report is released to us, we will make it available to you.

The final step before the full City Council will be the Budget and Finance Committee. Unless you object, we will make every attempt to schedule these final two meetings as quickly as possible.

The forms that would allow the Neighborhood Councils to apply for the funds through e-mail or fax have been drafted so that we will be able to get the money flowing as soon as the program is approved.

WEB SITE

Newest additions to our Web site include:

Transcript of an interview that I did on Adelphia Cable many months ago. Look under Newsroom. Right now it's under News Releases, but that will be changed soon to Transcripts.

Copies of articles and news releases that have been written about Neighborhood Councils. We'll be adding the older ones as time permits. Look under Newsroom > Articles.

Bibliography. Click on Reference Library > Bibliography. Feel free to suggest additions.

Transcripts of Congress of Neighborhoods Workshops. They'll be added as they are transcribed. First is the opening (plenary) session. Each workshop will include the full transcript and the summary version. Take your pick. If you see you name in there and it's spelled wrong, let us know. The transcribers used phonetic spellings when the going got rough.

CONFERENCE ATTENDANCE

We're constantly being invited to difference conferences. More than we can attend. From time-to-time, I'll ask all of you if one among you would like to attend certain conferences. If there's a fee, we'll pay. In return, we'd like you to collect the important handouts, and a prepare a report that can be shared with the Neighborhood Councils and the world, because we'll put the reports on our Web site.

The first one will be the Urban Sustainability Conference this Thursday. For those of you who don't know what this means, you're in the majority. We'll all find out together when the report is filed.

ALLIANCE OF NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCILS

If you didn't attend last Saturday's meeting, I'd like to share with you some of the answers that I provided to questions from the audience:

SHARING INFORMATION AND TALENT

Our Web site will include a special section, as I mentioned before, called Best Practices. In it we'll list examples that you send us regarding the successful techniques that you've used in outreach, communication, running meetings, solving disputes, dealing with the media, structuring a board, organizing committees, etc.

We will also include a place for those of you who have skills and advice that you'd like to share with other Neighborhood Council leaders.

Most of the applications have been scanned, and we'll be loading those on to our Web site ASAP.

EARLY NOTIFICATION

The City is currently working on enhancements to the Early Notification System that will include the ability to be sent only information of a certain type and/or within a certain geographic area. Since no one in the nation has done this, we don't have any technology to pull off the shelf. This is all new.

CLOSING THE DIGITAL DIVIDE

We can't provide every person with a computer, but we will provide every Neighborhood Council with one, and the training to use it. That announcement will be coming soon.

SECESSION AND THE NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCILS

LAFCO, the agency that approved the secession measures for the ballot, felt that our system of Neighborhood Councils should remain in effect during the one year transition period. However, a new City Council can do whatever it wants once it's sworn in. What's unique about Los Angeles is that its NC system is guaranteed in the City Charter which can only be changed by the voters. In other cities, and in the new cities if the secession measures were to the pass, the system would only be in ordinance form, and could be easily changed. In other cities, there have been attempts, some successful and some not, to gut their neighborhood council system. New mayors. New City Councils. The desire to stop sharing power. You get the picture. If new cities were created in the Valley or Hollywood, they would not have city charters.

Greg Nelson

213 / 485-1360
866 / LA HELPS toll-free
213 / 485-4608 fax
done@mailbox.lacity.org email