This one is coming in pretty late, but better late than never. The two most significant item on tonight's agenda appears to me to be an appeal against a planning commission decision to license a Goodwill drop-off center in a Northwest Pasadena commercial center on Orange Grove Boulevard and a a new solid waste ordinance.

The Goodwill center was green-lighted by the planning commission about 10 days ago, over the protests of a group of business owners in the Northwest part of the center. The thinking, I believe, is that the area is recovering commercially, and that the last thing it needs is to give up prime real estate to a non-profit company that is associated with poverty. Larry Wilson wrote about the issue recently.

The solid waste ordinance, I am told by Public Works Director Martin Pastucha, is an attempt by the city to clarify some vague rules about who can haul waste, to increase the amount of material that is recycled, and to put new enforcement rules into place for people who are not complying with city rules.

These rules would apply to industrial, commercial, and apartment trash dumping that is done not by city contractors, but by licensed disposal companies. A lot of the issue appears to be construction materials that are thrown away- state law requires that 50 percent of materials at sites by recycled, according to Pastucha. The city is upping the requirement to 75 percent for construction sites.

Additionally, there are a couple of contract over-runs mentioned on the agenda. They don't appear to be related, both in both cases the city did not allocate enough money to complete the project, and additional funding is now required, a total of about $550,000 between the two contracts.

Lastly, there is a closed session real estate negotiation that may be another potential site for the oft-mentioned urgent care clinic. I'm still trying to confirm or dis-confirm this.

UPDATE: The real-estate negotiations are NOT for a new urgent care clinic site. The property in question, is, in fact the former Shakey Pizza's site at 2180 E. Foothill Boulevard, where a fight over allowing a strip club in East Pasadena erupted two years ago when a club tried to buy the property. There was a neighborhood protest, and ever accommodating, the city purchased the property to try to find a more g-rated business to take it over. They may now have found it- the city's closed session tonight is about looking at a deal from a potential buyer.

UPDATE II: According to Mayor Bill Bogaard, the Goodwill store appeal will not be heard tonight, after all. Apparently a formal appeal has been filed with the city, and it will not go to the Board of Zoning Appeals. If that board does not overturn the permit, the opposition can then have the City Council look at the appeal, according to Bogaard.

There has been a big brouhaha recently over the fact that a registered sex offender was allowed to play on the PCC football team. The university, as a matter of fact, put the coach on administrative leave until they decided how to handle the issue.

But that could be changing. The incoming president of California's community college system, Sen. Jack Scott of Pasadena, said Wednsday, according to PCC's paper, that sex offenders should be given the chance to attend the school.

"I'm a strong believer in second chances. If someone has served his time and is deemed worthy to reenter society, a public school should not prevent that person from obtaining an education," said Scott

It isn't a popular stance, but a fully reasonable one: is it better for sex offenders to go live under a bridge only to emerge in the dark of night? Especially considering that community colleges are not exactly teeming with underage children.

Also, I have to commend the paper for getting the story on this- some may know I teach at PCC, and some of my former students work there, so it is nice to see them do good work.

The meeting mentioned in the article that Scott was speaking at, by the way, was a faculty seminar that I would have been required to attend if it was scheduled on a Tuesday or Thursday (my class days). Sounds like Scott said just about the first interesting thing I have ever heard at one of those events.

UPDATE: Thanks to a commenter for pointing out that Scott is, in fact, the upcoming president of the entire state community college system, not PCC. Changed above.

The Open Secrets web site, ran a feature this week that noted that those congressional members who voted in favor of the bailout package received 51 percent more in contributions from financial services industries than those who voted against. The average 'yea' voter in favor received $883,400 in donations from the industry, while the average 'nay' voter still received a robust $586,700.

I decided to apply the model to our local representatives. Here are the numbers for the 2007-08 cycle for how much money each congressman took from financial/insurance/real estate interests. They are much lower than the above numbers, because those correlate to the entire career of the average congressman, while the below ones are just the last two years.

Yea
David Dreier, $254,000
Gary Miller, $152,000

Contributors from those industries are the single largest contributors to both Dreier and Miller's campaigns. Let's look at the 'nay' votes.

Nay
Adam Schiff- $78,000
Grace Napolitano- $18,000
Hilda Solis- $39,000
Linda Sanchez- $36,000

If you are curious, here is who is making the largest contributions to each of the above members, who clearly do not take that much money from financial services interests.

Schiff- Lawyers and Lobbyists, $126,000
Napolitano- Labor, $80,000
Solis- Labor, $181,000
Sanchez- Labor, $119,000

Doug Willis, a local realtor who runs a local real estate blog, noticed this month that, oddly, prices on a lot of Pasadena homes jumped back up in September after dropping for several months. His explanation of the phenomenon has nothing to do with an upswing in the local economy:

The real estate agents were manipulating the price of the homes in an attempt to increase the short term visibility of the property

Willis goes on to say he even saw a home moved down in price from $619,000 to $618,000 just to be able to say that the price has been reduced.

So is there anything wrong with doing this? I'm not sure, but here is Willis' take:

While this practice appears to be acceptable (no bylaws prohibiting it) at least for a while, to me it borders on unethical. Manipulating a home price without the approval of the seller is a violation of the MLS and the California Department of Real Estate.

When Sarah Palin cames to Los Angeles County this Saturday, the Courage Campaign plans to welcome her with an overhead plane flight trailing a banner. They are still deciding what they want it to say.

You can submit your ideas here. I don't think there is any prize except to see your words annoy the woman who could be the next vice president of the U.S.

Some links to articles/blogs/economists on the bailout plan and its future.

House members from safe seats voted against the bailout- L.A Times

Newt Gingrich stirred up opposition to the bailout- Huffington Post

Frank Girardot doesn't see the parallels between the Great Depression and the current crisis- Pasadena Star News

GOP lawmakers should stop blaming Nancy Pelosi for their 'no' votes- Wall Street Journal

Adam Schiff's plan for the bailout (see previous post)- San Gabriel Valley Tribune

Drops on the stock market don't necessarily lead to an economic collapse (an economist's view against the bail out)- Dean Baker

How California lawmakers voted on the bailout(account required)- Capitol Alert

Lawmakers who voted for bailout took more money from financial services industry on average than those who voted against- Open Secrets

Our Pasadena representative has another plan for handling the economy he is hoping to help into place (Schiff is still in Washington D.C. today, unlike most other representatvies). We published an editorial on the plan in today's paper. Schiff spends a lot of the editorial explaining his 'no' vote, something we reported on yesterday, but I find it more interesting to hear about what he is proposing instead:

Here's what I think we should be doing instead: To deal with the credit crisis, raise the cap on FDIC insurance of banks and credit unions, so that Americans know that whatever money they have in the bank is safe and backed by the full faith and credit of the government. This would stop people from withdrawing money from community institutions, and free up lending to small businesses. The Department of Treasury essentially did this with money market funds, and is helping to restore confidence in that sector. Next, instruct regulators to stop requiring financial institutions to mark down their mortgage-backed securities to market value, and give them time and assistance in working out their capital and liquidity problems.

Most important, we must confront the epidemic of foreclosures by establishing local home loan corporation boards or some other mechanism to help homeowners restructure their mortgages over longer or different terms so that we can stem the tide of foreclosures. And we should enact a strong stimulus package directed at the local economy, putting people to work, restoring purchasing power and improving home values.

This approach - starting with the local community and working up, rather than bailing out Wall Street and working down - far more directly addresses the underlying ills and puts far fewer taxpayer dollars at risk. I believe it would be every bit as reassuring to the markets as the Paulson plan, and do more to deal with the root problem. It would also save countless billions of taxpayer dollars on the front end, so we have the resources we need to deal with the additional problems that are most certainly heading our way.

I think he makes a good point that we have lost sight about the base problem behind this financial crisis: people can't make payment on their home loans. I can't remember the last time I read extensive reporting on what congress/state/local governments are doing or not doing to deal with that fundamental issue. I'm actually looking at a couple of things that Pasadena is considering, and looking to get something in the paper over the weekend- obviously, though, any plan a city can put into place would be much stronger if it had some sort of federal backing.

Also, as I understand it, we are still looking at millions more foreclosures happening in the near future, so it seems like even if we neutralize lousy mortgage-based securities now, there are only going to be more shocks to the system later on as more foreclosures happen- wouldn't it make sense to try and stop them in the first place?

Aye: Gary Miller, David Dreier
Nay: Hilda Solis, Adam Schiff, Grace Napolitano, Linda Sanchez

In an unusual split, our area Democrats voted against the bailout, and our area Republicans voted for it. Nationally, 140 Democrats voted for it, with 95 against, and 65 Republicans voted for it, with 133 against.

It seems that people's ideological stance was not an accurate predictor of how they voted: some liberal Democrats voted for it, some against. Some conservative Republicans voted for it, some against.

The Democrats I spoke to felt it gave too much power to the executive branch, particularly for Secretary Paulson- Schiff raised concerns that taxpayers would not get their money back since Paulson would be able to decide which equities taxpayers would get a share in, and which they wouldn't.

They also strongly believe that the bill does not do anything to address the root of the problem: home foreclosures. Without legislation that gives homeowners a way to renegotiate their mortgages so they can find a way to make payments, Solis and Napolitano are not likely to vote for it.

I spoke with David Dreier, on the Republican side, and he portrayed the bill as a necessary evil.... he did not have much to say on what specific issues could be addressed to bring Republicans who voted against the bill on board.

More to come in tomorrow's paper.

UPDATE: The Washington Post has a voter database that breaks votes down by several categories, some of them minimally irrelevant at best. One category I did find interesting is breaking the vote down by region. Legislators from the 'Northeast' region voted for it overwhelmingly, 54-29. Every other region voted against it.

Mike Spence, of the California Republican Assembly group, says his group is going to discuss supporting the recall campaign at the state GOP convention this weekend . Spence was a delegate to the national GOP convention earier this month.

The story from Capitol Weekly:

The recall campaign, launched by the disgruntled prison guards' union has not been taken seriously thus far, but the endorsement of a GOP group could go a long way towards getting people's attention.

The CRA, which is very conservative, is doubtlessly very unhappy with the governor's proposal to raise the sales tax to close the budget deficit. In the budget negotiations that finally ended last week, Schwarzenegger has consistently been closer to the Democratic proposals than the GOP ones.

But. of course, that is what it takes to get elected as a Republican candidate in a very Democratic state.

Though the state budget last week was trumpeted as a "no-tax" budget, the San Diego Union Tribune has revealed that's not entirely so:

Drivers will be tapped for an additional $11 when they register their car or motorcycle starting Dec. 1. That will raise about $300 million for California Highway Patrol programs this fiscal year.

Funny, since Gov. Schwarzenegger's started his time as executive of the state with massive cuts to the vehicle licensing fee in 2003 that were not accompanied by similarly-sized cuts in spending.

The U.S. House of Reps today passed legislation co-sponsored by Adam Schiff that would put automated crash avoidance systems in Metrolink trains.

Basically, the systems take control away from an engineer if he is making the wrong decision. From Schiff's press release, the system explained:

* Digital communications are combined with Global Positioning System (GPS) technology to monitor train locations and speeds.

* If engineers do not comply with signals, the system automatically brings the trains to a stop.

For some reason, despite the GOP's utter lack of chance to win California, Sarah Palin is coming to L.A. County for a campaign rally. I believe she is also here to fundraise, which is typically the only reason national politicians come here..... Obama, McCain, Clinton, and Romney are among those who have been here frequently in the last year for just that reason.

The rally will take place October 4 in Carson. Details below provided by the state GOP party:

Thank you for your dedication to Senator McCain and Governor Palin. We have officially confirmed the time and location of the Palin Victory rally in California. Drum Roll Please...........................

2:00pm
Saturday, October 4th, 2008
Home Depot Center
ADT Tennis Stadium
18400 Aviation Blvd.
Carson, CA

TICKETS ~

We have 3 types of admission tickets we will distributing to the public: VIP, General Admission, and Day of Event General Admission Tickets
They will be available at all Victory offices or can be acquired via email RSVP to
california@johnmccain.com

· VIP Tickets: Available to any volunteer who makes 100 phone calls at a local McCain-Victory phone bank. These tickets will be available for pick up at any Victory Headquarters Office with verification of calls made. These ticket holders will get preferred seating.
· General Admission Tickets: Available for pick up at any Victory Headquarters Office around the state. Ticket holders who pick up or email requests in for tickets in advance will be allowed to enter the arena when doors open.
· Day of Event General Admission : On the day of the event, same day tickets will be issued on a first-come-first-serve basis.

The question is, should we cover this event as a paper? Considering the governor is not coming to the San Gabriel Valley, and that the press hasn't been allowed within 10 yards of Palin since her candidacy began, I am inclined to think, if anything, we use the Associated Press version of the story, rather than sending a reporter (likely me) there. Anyone want to weigh in?

Last night the City Council voted its opposition to Proposition 5, the state ballot prop that would mandate drug counseling for criminal offenders as an alternative to prison. Most law enforcement agencies oppose the thing for giving too many types of offenders options to do drug counseling instead of going to prison, and for shortening too many prison sentences.

I haven't read the proposition yet (yes, I am the type who actually painstakingly reads the proposition text, even though it can be extremely painful) so I can't really evaluate those claims. Here is the text if anyone wants to do the honors.... tell me what you figure out.

That now means Pasadena is opposed to Proposition 7, the solar energy initiative ( as I discussed here), and is for Proposition 11, the redistricting initiative (according to Ballotpedia, Pasadena was in fact the first city in California to endorse it). Apparently, the city plans to continue looking at ballot measures and weighing in... up next appears to be the half-cent sales tax measure to fund transit projects that local governments all over the San Gabriel Valley are already lining up to denounce.

The city council voted last night to buy a new chopper for the city to take on night flights... it is supposed to have new quiet helicopter technology that cuts rotor noise in half. It also is supposed to be one of the safest helicopter models in history, and can reach speeds of 175 mph, compared to 125 mph for the current helicopter fleet.

Also, it uses air pollution for fuel and emits a fresh, minty odor.

OK, I made up that last one. It is very much just like Pasadena, though, to buy a super quiet helicopter that won't disturb residents at night, especially when Glendale and Burbank already have them (got to keep up with the Joneses).

And while it is a good time to poke a little fun at the city for prioritizing quiet night flights, in all honesty, I've heard the night chopper they have now, and you can't hear a thing when it is hovering over your neighborhood.

We'll have more on the chopper later this week.... and coming up tomorrow some of the more pressing issues from last night's meeting.

Pasadena is finalizing its agreement with its incoming city manager and will be paying him a robust $265,000 annual salary. The total benefits of his contract will be $336,500. That's $21,500 more than the city had slated for the position in June's budget.

Meanwhile, former Pasadena city manager Cynthia Kurtz just took a temporary city manager position in Covina, and will make about $154,000 in annual salary (though she may not be there a year). The contract arrangement is only for her to work 30 hours a week, and if she does more, she will make more.

Kurtz made about $235,000 annually when she was city manager of Pasadena, and interim city manager Bernard Melekian makes about $230,000 annually in his role as interim manager (though, of course, he has not worked a full year in position.)

I believe the salary makes Beck the highest paid city-manager in the San Gabriel Valley- according to stories from this paper last year Kurtz was the highest paid at $235,000 and I don't think anybody has garnered that huge a pay raise since.

Two city council meetings ago, city staff pressed the council on accepting on urgent health care site at a Del Mar Blvd property that the city owns. However, neighborhood opposition to the project stalled the council from moving forward- they asked staff to look at other options.

They found one. According to city mayor Bill Bogaard, there is a site at 40 N. Altadena Drive that the city is looking into- the city is also looking at several other options that were discussed at that council meeting.

However, Bogaard says that the Altadena site is one that the city's hospital and foundation partners approve of (they really want to locate the clinic in South-east Pasadena). He also added that the building's owners are very happy at that prospect of having a "credit-worthy" tenant, which the project would provide, and hence are dangling some very appealing financial numbers in front of the city.

Finally, Bogaard adds that the site could be easier to install medical equipment in than the Del Mar site. That would be a plus for the city, considering it is in a time crunch to get moving on the project to guarantee holding on to a $500,000 grant.

On a related note, a broker for an office building at Colorado and Kinneloa that Sid Tyler mentioned as a possible location called me early this week and said the city had not contacted him about the property yet. He said he was eager to begin talks about the project. They may have contacted him by now, for all I know.

Yesterday I wrote a post about David Dreier's abstention on an energy bill vote. I am taking the post down as I now have been informed that the congressman is with his family due to the recent death of his mother and is not presently in Washington at all. I had been informed of his mother's death earlier in the week, but unfortunately, it simply didn't register when I was looking at the voter roll log online (it simply marks down 'abstention' regardless of whether a member is absent or chose not to vote.)

For more information on the energy bill, read here

My apologies to the congressman for not checking in for more detail before the post.

Cynthia Kurtz, the former city manager of Pasadena, is slated to take over as the interim city manager of Covina. The story will be in tomorrow's paper.

Covina fired its city manager about a month ago for unspecified reasons. I used to cover the city, and there were an awful lot of people who thought the man, Paul Phillips, was abrasive and insulting. In fact, at one of the first meetings I went to, Phillips more or less directly called an audience member a liar (though it is perfectly possible that she was, or at least an exaggerator, but come on, a little subtlety goes a long way for a public servant.)

I wasn't here when Kurtz was city manager, but I've certainly heard she was very direct, in-charge, and not afraid to knock some heads together when she felt it was necessary.

Still, I am guessing the city of Covina badly wants her to stay on permanently, since they are very eager to copy the economic development and urban density model that Pasadena mastered over the last 20 years or so. They want downtown Covina to be a smaller version of Pasadena, essentially, so I can see why they wanted to get Kurtz in the job, even if it is only as interim manager.

Alfred Lee has the story in today's paper (and online). The short summary: Pasadena's violent crime is up 22 percent, even as property crime dropped. How did the city compare with surrounding areas? Alfred gets into that lower in the story:

After Pasadena, Alhambra reported the area's next-highest number of violent crimes in 2007, with 285. That was a slight decrease from 2006, when 297 such crimes were reported.

Crime numbers increased in Los Angeles County as a whole in 2007, with violent crimes and property crimes rising about 7 percent and 2 percent from the year before.

I don't see any pattern. I wonder if any crime experts have ever figured out if city crime rates just fluctuate by chance on an annual basis, or if there is always an explanation for it.

There are quite a few folks out there who have interest in the Dreier/Warner race that I wrote about last week. I've received a few emails, some critical, about the race, and about our coverage of Dreier in general. The irony of the emails, is that the thing some people feel angry about is that we have not given serious coverage to opponents of Dreier- which is exactly what the intent of the Warner article was in the first place.

Two other emails/calls of interest: first from the Courage Campaign, a local progressive activist group that did an admirable job last winter of pushing for county voters to get their primary ballots counted in the double-bubble debacle. They cite Congressional Quarterly voting data that indicates that Dreier voted with Bush 93.6 percent of the time, and do a summary of the votes they consider most offensive here (quick rundown: the list includes votes against renewable power, a vote against the GI Bill that would increase educational benefits to veterans, the Terry Schiavo vote, and most of the Iraq war votes).

The call of interest came from Ted Brown, the Libertarian party candidate who is also a candidate for Dreier's seat. He pointed out, rightfully, that he should be included in articles about the seat. So to give him some (limited) exposure until the next article on the race, I offered to do an online interview to run on this blog later this week. Stay tuned.

An email written to the newspaper from a Pasadena native who is running for president:

Bill Warren here in Calif. I am running for Pres. as a write-in candidate and am seeking a successful American lady for my VP running mate. Know anyone? I don;t have much time to make my announcement and file in 32 states. This is not a joke. If you are not interested, please tell me who might be that you know. I have run for US Congress twice. I am 64 years old. I am open to interviews. If you take the time to read my bio below you will discover a very unusual man. I think a man this country needs. I don't have a lot of money. I don't have a hug ego. I am not married to a rich woman. I was not raised a Muslim. I don't hang out with known criminals. I can lift both my arms over my head. I don't have an anger problem. And oh, there was a President who had no wife. James Buchanan 1857. I have just returned from living, teaching and singing in Ukraine and have been to Russia. I understand the Russians and know they are a threat. I care about people and have proven it over the years by participating at charities using my God-given musical talents. Like most Americans, I don't like the two choices we have before us. True, no American write-in candidate has ever won but then consider the fact that in the history of America, never has the Republican party had a woman VP and never has America had an African American run for President and come this far. All things are possible in America.

There is also a long list of Warren's achievements set on a time line (the highlights include time spent as a cruise line entertainer, as well as runs for congress in San Diego and Tennessee). If there is interest for readers, I can post the entire bio. Here is the entry for 2008:

2008 Bill decided to run for United States President as a 'write-in' and at present, is seeking a female to be his running mate. Preferably an African American business woman.

How about a Warren/Proctor ticket? I know he isn't an African-American businesswoman, but that would be the grassroots underdog ticket of old time. I wonder what the Warren platform is?

Oh, and if anyone wants to be his VP, please contact me and I will pass along his email.