In the face of opposition from Neighborhood Councils, the Los Angeles City Council last week delayed a decision on pursuing a $3 billion bond measure to repair city streets.
City Council members Mitch Englander and Joe Buscaino proposed asking voters to approve the bond measure on the May 2013 citywide general election ballot. If approved, owners of a $350,000 home would pay $119 per year in added property taxes over the course of the 29 years it would take the city to pay off the debt. The tax on a property's assessed value would start low and increase as the city borrows more heavily to fund the street repairs, with the rate eventually declining as the city stops borrowing more money.
Englander and Buscaino told the council the bond measure is needed to clear a 60-year backlog in street repairs that has left a third of city streets in poor condition.
Adult filmmakers and actors sued Los Angeles County today, alleging the new law requiring porn actors to wear condoms is unconstitutional.
The complaint, filed in federal court by Vivid Entertainment, Califa Productions and porn actors Kayden Kross and Logan Pierce, contends that Measure B violates the First Amendment right to free expression and is unnecessary because the industry already regulates itself against HIV/AIDS and other diseases.
The lawsuit also challenges the county's jurisdiction to regulate adult production on performer health and safety.
A pair of Los Angeles City Council members today proposed a $3 billion, 20-year bond to repair thousands of miles of damaged city streets.
City Councilmen Mitchell Englander and Joe Buscaino, who represent the far corners of the city, from the Northwest San Fernando Valley to San Pedro, introduced a motion to place the bond measure on the May 21 citywide general election ballot.
If approved, the owner of a $350,000 home would pay about $24 more in property taxes during the first year of the bond, according to Buscaino Chief of Staff Doane Liu. The property tax increase on such a home would peak at about $120 above current levels in 10 years before the city's rate of borrowing begins to decline, Liu said.
A city initiative that would apparently allow continued operation of about 100 medical marijuana shops in Los Angeles is significantly closer to enactment, the city clerk disclosed today.
City Clerk June Lagmay determined through a sampling process that backers of the initiative to allow and regulate a certain number of storefront medical marijuana shops have gathered the necessary 41,138 signatures.
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77 candidates for a variety of offices have qualified to appear on the March 5, 2013 ballot, L.A. City Clerk June Lagmay announced today.
The most crowded race -- at 12 candidates -- is for Council District 13, which Eric Garcetti is vacating to run for Mayor, a race of eight candidates in itself. Other L.A. positions up for grabs are City Controller, City Attorney, and seats for seven more districts, most which will bring new faces to the City Council. Board member positions for LAUSD and the L.A. Community College District will also be on the ballot.
UCLA researchers hoping to induce mayoral and City Council candidates to spend more time discussing long-term sustainability in political races dominated by fiscal and economic issues today released a sweeping environmental blueprint to turn Los Angeles into a green metropolis.
The 85-page report, titled "Vision 2021 LA: A Model Environmental Sustainability Agenda for Los Angeles' Next Mayor and City Council," details goals and deadlines in 11 areas, including energy and climate, transportation, water and waste, among others. It calls on the city to adopt a sustainability plan by 2014 and review it every other year.
"These are realistic, sustainable goals that the city has the capacity to do in an eight-year period, two mayoral terms," said Megan Herzog, an Emmett/Frankel Fellow in Environmental Law and Policy at UCLA and one of the plan's seven authors. "We're looking at ideas where the funding is available, with implementation measures that could be deployed right away. These are shovel-ready projects."
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