Neighborhoods Offering Ideas

Jay Handal, a member of the mayor's Neighborhood Council budget committee, and representatives of about 45 different neighborhood councils, signed a letter looking at various aspects of city finances and presented it to the City Council's Budget and Finance Committee."We want to have a place at the table and be able to do more than just provide advice to the city," Handal said. "We are concerned the city is heading toward bankruptcy and no one at City Hall seems to know how to stop it.".... Stephen Box of the Hollywood Neighborhood Council and an activist for the Los Angeles biking community, said one proposal is to have an advocate for the public serve on the pension boards - similar to a proposal for a ratepayer advocate at the Department of Water and Power. "We want someone there who can speak for us when the pension boards are considering anything," Box said. "Right now, the city is looking at a $200 million deficit this year. Next year, it is projected to be over $400 million and growing to over $1 billion in 2013, unless something is done."

Neighborhood councils may be allowing the misuse of public funds through "a systematic failure of accounting and fiscal oversight," according to the audit released Jan 12.An audit of 89 neighborhood councils found at least $880,000 in purchases in the previous fiscal year that did not have proper paperwork and authorization, City Controller Wendy Greuel said. Also, six neighborhood councils have been or are currently under police investigation for about $276,000 in questionable purchases. "Until we get the actual backup (documents) for that, we don't have appropriate information how those funds were spent," Greuel said.