Recently in Government
Where We Are:
The downtown stadium gets a coat of "greenwash." AEG gets a pass. And CEQA gets sacked.
Where We Are:
Most cities in California have a city manager whose job, among many others, is to turn good ideas into workable programs. It would be a bad idea to junk what city managers do.
Where We Are:
California's cities earn overwhelming approval from voters. The Legislature has a dismal rating. So why is the Legislature dismantling cities and concentrating authority in Sacramento?
Where We Are:
Buckling sidewalks, decomposing streets, leaking water mains, and failing sewers add up to a city that's lost focus and is losing the faith of its residents.
Where We Are:
You can still get to the pier in Seal Beach by bus, but it's going to be whole lot harder for riders. The reasons reveal how difficult it is to be "transit oriented."
Where We Are:
What could be wrong with local self-government? If the goal is "municipal consolidation," incorporation is just one more inconvenience.
Where We Are:
The county's two largest cities are near the end of their ability to "make do." There's plenty of blame for what's happening in Los Angeles and Long Beach.
Where We Are:
A streetcar called Broadway may be the desire of Councilman Huizar, but downtown's loft dwellers will decide.
Where We Are:
California's fiscal house of cards falls on four Riverside County cities. One of them expects to disincorporate next year, killed by the Legislature's indifference.
Government:
This last week makes it clear: California's State Parks doesn't really want to take care of the Providence Mountains State Recreation Area. They should give it to someone who does.
Where We Are:
In Cudahy, Compton, San Fernando, Santa Ana, Santa Fe Springs, Stanton, Vernon, and Westminster, city officials are giving local government a bad name.
Commentary:
The South Coast Air Quality Management District refuses to tell Coachella Valley officials what's happening with $53 million in grant funding.
Where We Are:
The "exclusively industrial" enclave is a zombie city: leaderless, stumbling, hungry, and apparently uncontrollable.
Where We Are:
The waning of voter participation and media oversight made L.A. County corruption inevitable.
Where We Are:
In the competition for transit funding, inequalities, windfalls, and politics.
Where We Are:
Los Angeles can be a tough place to make a buck making beer.
Where We Are:
It's not just California that has adopted a peculiar form of civic vandalism. Cities everywhere - particularly mid-size cities with limited revenue options - feel the pressure.
Commentary:
Brown styles himself as an iconoclast but his attacks on California's landmark environmental law are politics as usual.
Where We Are:
Murkier and murkier are the politics of the Central Basin Municipal Water District, affecting how much two million L.A. County residents pay for water.
Where We Are:
The County Board of Supervisors plans a poll of property owners to win approval of a parcel tax to begin remediation of urban runoff.
SoCal Focus is a daily blog about the people, places and issues in and around Southern California.
I Am Los Angeles: Strings of Success
Sasha is content just to be living his life on his own terms, doing something he thoroughly enjoys: building and playing guitars.
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