
If more reasons are needed I guess I could say, and it’s true, that the recent anti-Ryavec rant posted by my intemperate colleagues is turning out to be quite popular. Also, the perennial talk about a Venice Business Improvement District has risen from its coma recently, and if that nightmare ever comes to pass I’m going to make it a major focus of this blog. As bad as BID security is Downtown and here in Hollywood, it will surely be several orders of magnitude worse in Venice, a neighborhood that’s closer to my heart than any other, not only in this City, but in this world.
Even thought almost everything I ever loved about Venice has been systematically destroyed and then rebuilt as commercial self-parody, it’s never true that it’s gotten as bad as it’s going to get, and in 42 years of loving Venice I’ve never been able to just let it go. I’m going to obsess over it anyway, so why not cover this lawsuit, which reflects many of the conflicts and issues that are going to go nuclear if they ever set up a BID there?
Image of the Boardwalk is free-as-in-beer and we got it here.
- This is a term of art in Venice Boardwalk regulation. These are the painted spaces on the West side of the asphalt, which as a result of one of the innumerable lawsuits that have slowly carved out the compromise rules that regulate the Boardwalk now, are part of a “free speech zone.” (An Orwellian term if ever there was one. But there’s never just one, is there?)