Sneaky Shit-Sneakers Sneakily Sneak Sneaky Shit Into Current Version Of Street Vending Legalization Process, Setting The Stage For Continued Persecution of Vendors in Business Improvement Districts

Yum, danger dogs!
So today the City Council moved forward with CF 13-1493, which, of course, is the famed street vending thing. For a good, objective,1 discussion of today’s developments, take a look at this article in today’s Times by the incomparable Emily Alpert Reyes.2 This is just a brief post to note the fact that the various anti-human opponents of legalized street vending won a major, seemingly unnoticed by anyone but me, victory via amendment in the current version of the motion.

Today’s motion doesn’t actually legalize street vending. What it does is direct the City Attorney, the Chief Legislative Analyst, and the City Administrative Officer to put together a proposed ordinance. This was to be based on this detailed set of recommendations from the Public Works and Gang Reduction Committee report. This report was amended in Council today before being adopted, and at least two of the amended recommendations are quite sneaky, and, I predict, will undermine the future ordinance in quite underhanded ways that will please business improvement districts and other business interests who have been working tirelessly to keep street vending illegal for years now. See the details and some3 predictions after the break.
Continue reading Sneaky Shit-Sneakers Sneakily Sneak Sneaky Shit Into Current Version Of Street Vending Legalization Process, Setting The Stage For Continued Persecution of Vendors in Business Improvement Districts

Share

Plaintiffs: Your Honor, We Respectfully Request That You Pay No Mind To Brant Blakeman’s Request For Judicial Notice Because It Is Late, It Is Irrelevant, It Is Not On Point, It Constitutes Unprofessional Subterfuge, And It Is Stinking Amateurish Bullshit Of The First Water

For background take a look at this excellent article from the Times on this lawsuit.

Oh dear, friends, more drama swirls around the Lunada Bay Boys case.1 You may recall that, the other day, defendant Brant Blakeman asked the Judge to take judicial notice of the fact that proposed class representative Diana Reed had a default judgement against her in L.A. County Superior Court for a bunch of torts including one or more flavors of fraud and that that fact made her somehow unsuitable to represent the class of plaintiffs in this case. Tonight the plaintiffs’ response hit PACER, facetiously but accurately summarized in the headline, along with some other stuff, and I have copies for you along with descriptions, find it all after the break.
Continue reading Plaintiffs: Your Honor, We Respectfully Request That You Pay No Mind To Brant Blakeman’s Request For Judicial Notice Because It Is Late, It Is Irrelevant, It Is Not On Point, It Constitutes Unprofessional Subterfuge, And It Is Stinking Amateurish Bullshit Of The First Water

Share

Despite His Generally Sympathetic Rhetoric, It Turns Out That Since 2015 Mike Bonin Has Moved Or Seconded Almost 60% Of Anti-Homeless Oversize Vehicle Bans, Helping To Make Revised Ban On Car Sleeping Even More Draconian Than Anticipated

RVs on Lillian Way between Santa Monica Blvd and Melrose Avenue, banned in 2016 with the help of Mike Bonin.
Here’s the story so far: Last year the City Council repealed its law against sleeping in cars, which it more or less had to do because the Ninth Circuit told them they couldn’t enforce it anyway. Then in November they passed a new version of the law, published as LAMC 85.02, which supposedly corrected the last version’s problems. The new law, according to guidelines published by the City of Los Angeles, purports to allow living in a vehicle under these circumstances:

  • Between 6:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. – more than one block (500 feet) away from licensed schools, pre-schools, daycare facilities, or parks.
  • Between 9:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. – in non-residentially zoned areas which are more than one block (500 feet) away from licensed schools, pre-schools or daycare facilities or parks.


When the law was passed last November, CD11 Councilmember Mike Bonin was quoted in the Times to the effect that these restrictions would leave half the streets in the City open to homeless car dwellers. More recently, the incomparable Gale Holland reported that, not only did the official City map only show about 10% of our streets open, but that that estimate didn’t even take into account so-called block-by-block restrictions. According to Gale Holland, Mike Bonin used this insufficiency as a reason to hurry along his proposed Safe Parking program, which would open up some City property for homeless parking. So I decided to look at these weirdly specific1 block-by-block restrictions, which seem to have been passed almost exclusively post-Desertrain, from 2015 on. Read on for statistics and links to all of the Council Files.
Continue reading Despite His Generally Sympathetic Rhetoric, It Turns Out That Since 2015 Mike Bonin Has Moved Or Seconded Almost 60% Of Anti-Homeless Oversize Vehicle Bans, Helping To Make Revised Ban On Car Sleeping Even More Draconian Than Anticipated

Share

Lunada Bay Boys Plaintiffs Ordered To Reveal Names Of Witnesses Including, Presumably, The Weasel. Meanwhile, Blakeman Is Ordered To Cough Up Videos, Etc. Only From 2013 To Present. Perhaps The Meet-And-Confer Didn’t Work Out, As A Telephonic Conference Is Scheduled For Wednesday.

Why is it so hard for everyone to believe that my actual real-life name actually is “The Weasel”?!!?!
For background take a look at this excellent article from the Times on this lawsuit.

A quick note to announce a recent order in the Lunada Bay Boys case that hit PACER last week and somehow I missed it. It’s an order by magistrate judge Rozella Oliver to compel discovery and production, binding on both plaintiffs and defendants. The plaintiffs are ordered, in part, like this:

Plaintiffs are ordered to identify witnesses in response to Interrogatory Numbers 1 through 12. For each interrogatory, Plaintiffs shall identify the responsive witnesses by name. For each witness, Plaintiffs shall specify whether that witness is represented by Plaintiffs’ counsel, or, if Plaintiffs know, by other counsel. For each witness, Plaintiffs shall provide contact information for that witness or state unambiguously that Plaintiffs do not have contact information for that witness.

This seems to be in response to interrogatories propounded by defendant Blakeman, copies of which can be found in this declaration starting at page 92. Famously, one of the plaintiffs’ witnesses seems to be known only as “The Weasel.” Presumably, in response to this order, The Weasel’s true name will have to be revealed.
Continue reading Lunada Bay Boys Plaintiffs Ordered To Reveal Names Of Witnesses Including, Presumably, The Weasel. Meanwhile, Blakeman Is Ordered To Cough Up Videos, Etc. Only From 2013 To Present. Perhaps The Meet-And-Confer Didn’t Work Out, As A Telephonic Conference Is Scheduled For Wednesday.

Share

There Is At Least One Substantial Way In Which Slavering Psychopath Mark Ryavec Is Not Like Donald Trump And That Is That We Have His Freaking Tax Returns

Something is happening and you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?
This has nothing much at all to do with businesss improvement districts, but it’s Saturday night and I just felt like laying some Form 990s on you. These five beauties are from slavering psychopath Mark Ryavec’s agressively moronic Venice-based gang of subliterate meatheads, known to the mundane world as the Venice Stakeholders Association. They are available here on Archive.Org for your reading and researchical pleasure.

These items are interesting for any number of reasons. One is that they show that the VSA is not just a vision of sugar plums dancing ‘neath the fevered brow of Mark Ryavec, but that there are actual real-life other people involved:1 Michael King, Bonnie Felix, Anil Comelo, Robert Feist, Richard Myer(s).2 Had they appeared in another context I’d have been willing to bet that these names were merely selected from the myriad to be found in Ryavec’s floridly diverse collection of multiple personalities, but I don’t know many people, even the really, really, crazy ones, who have a lack of foresight sufficient to cause them to swear under penalty of perjury in a document submitted to the Federal government that the names of their imaginary friends represent real-life actual human beings.3

Another interesting thing is that the forms contain descriptions of accomplishments the VSA deems significant enough to brag about to the Federal government. These have the perhaps unintended effect of revealing both the breadth and the depth of the slavering psychopathy at work out there in the lorn, lost, lamented, former utopia west of Electric Avenue. Selected instances may be found after the break.
Continue reading There Is At Least One Substantial Way In Which Slavering Psychopath Mark Ryavec Is Not Like Donald Trump And That Is That We Have His Freaking Tax Returns

Share

Mitch O’Farrell’s Universally-Reviled, Kerry-Morrison-Inspired Anti-Playground-Access Motion Is Roundly Opposed But For The First Time Not Unanimously By Los Feliz Neighborhood Council, Which In Context May Be Seen As A Sorely Needed Victory For Mitch, Who Has To Play ‘Em As They Lay In This Debacle

This is a playground in Griffith Park, which if the Los Feliz Neighborhood Council has its way will continue to be open to all Angelenos, whether or not they remembered to bring a child before using the swing set.
BACKGROUND: Recall, if you will, that this L.A. Times editorial kicked off a somewhat misguided firestorm of opposition to Mitch O’Farrell’s recent Council motion 16-1456 seeking to develop a legal tool for banning adults without children from playgrounds in parks in the City of Los Angeles.

The latest development is that the Los Feliz Neighborhood Council registered its opposition to this Kerry-Morrison-of-the-HPOA-inspired trainwreck of a motion with this eloquent statement:

A city ordinance banning adults from accessing a public playground/park area unless “accompanying a child” would unfairly penalize people by virtue of their age and deny them a public benefit afforded to others. The proposal, by its very nature, seems unduly discriminatory, and fraught with enforcement problems.

Instituting an overreaching policy by penalizing a vast majority of law‐abiding citizens in what is generally regarded as “park‐poor” city is counterintuitive. It seems to be motivated out of allaying a fear rather than ensuring a freedom. Nor does it currently contemplate the dozens of gray areas it will create regarding how it will be administered (playground boundaries, proof of age, proof‐of-guardianship, etc.), and the discord it will sow by awkward attempts to enforce it.

All good points.1 The big difference in tonight’s case is that one person actually voted against the motion to oppose,2 which means, I guess, that besides Kerry Morrison, at least one other resident of the City of Los Angeles stands with Mitch on this issue. Perhaps this will teach Mitch that it’s not always safe to do what she asks… but probably not.
Continue reading Mitch O’Farrell’s Universally-Reviled, Kerry-Morrison-Inspired Anti-Playground-Access Motion Is Roundly Opposed But For The First Time Not Unanimously By Los Feliz Neighborhood Council, Which In Context May Be Seen As A Sorely Needed Victory For Mitch, Who Has To Play ‘Em As They Lay In This Debacle

Share

Historic Core BID Executive Directrix Blair Besten Nominated For Measure HHH Citizens’ Oversight Committee, Opposed By Skid Row Organizers, Service Providers, and Sane People Everywhere

Blair Besten, Executive Directrix of the Historic Core BID, all decked out in her patented EZ-clutch pearl necklace.
L.A. voters recently approved Measure HHH, which will fund homeless services via the sale of $1.2 billion in bonds. Last December the City Council approved the creation of a citizens’ oversight committee to monitor the expenditure of this vast sum of money. That committee consists of seven people, three appointed by the Council and four appointed by the Mayor. The Mayor doesn’t seem to have nominated anyone yet, but last Friday the Council, in CF 16-1060-S1, nominated their three. The only weirdo in the bunch is Blair Besten, executive directrix of the Historic Core BID downtown.

Of course, anyone who follows the bad BIDness propagated by our City’s business improvement districts knows this is a bad, bad idea for any number of reasons. It was therefore heartening to see, tonight, explicit opposition to Blair Besten’s appointment coming from a coalition of Skid Row organizations and service providers. Their eloquent and well-argued letter hit the Council file mere moments ago. You can read the whole thing after the break if you don’t like PDFs. Now, I have to say that I agree with their reasoning, and from the point of view of sound public policy, I completely agree that her appointment is a terrible idea. However, for for purely selfish reasons I kind of hope she makes it on, because the potential for chaos is high. Note that this is up for a vote TOMORROW.
Continue reading Historic Core BID Executive Directrix Blair Besten Nominated For Measure HHH Citizens’ Oversight Committee, Opposed By Skid Row Organizers, Service Providers, and Sane People Everywhere

Share

Gang Members, Seeking Respite From The Seething Urban Hell That Is Present-Day Santa Monica, Pour Over Northern Border Into Pacific Palisades, Bringing Crime, Fear, Misery — LAPD Unleashes Helicopters Against Palisades Homeless — The Last Days Are At Hand! Build That Wall, Mr. Bonin!

You probably thought that this place was nothing more than a colony of self-satisfied zillionaires and their floofly little dogs, just strolling around on the bluffs in their $1,400 Jimmy Choos, but it turns out that it’s a seething urban hell, generating crime wave after crime wave in the Palisades. Build that wall, Mr. Bonin!
OK, remember after the Venice Beach BID was approved for the second time and Mike Bonin gave a meandering, semi-sensical, victory speech, pronouncing definitively that he

…acknowledge[d] that there have been issues and problems with BIDs in other areas. But there have also been BIDs that have been very successful and have been great partners in solving homelessness. In Pacific Palisades we have a BID that has actually worked with the Pacific Palisades Task Force on Homelessness and has helped get people housed.

Combine this statement, just begging to be fact-checked, with the fact that Mike Bonin’s weirdo staff is engaged in a criminal conspiracy to violate the California Public Records Act, thereby bringing the legally authorized investigations of brave citizen journalists into the shady shenanigans of CD11 to a grinding halt, and how could I resist asking Mike Bonin’s darling Pacific Palisades BID for a bunch of public records?

Well, last night, PPBID executive directrix Laurie Sale, in addition to coming at me all salty with a bunch of copypasta lawyerese about how she wasn’t handing over anything unless God and the FBI told her she had to,1 also provided me with a year’s worth of agendas and minutes from her according-to-Mike-Bonin-exemplary little BID out there to the northwest of reality in zillionaireville. Of course I put it up on Archive.Org immediately. And there’s some fine craziness in there, friends.

Greetings homeless neighbors! On behalf of the Palisades BID I would like to announce that we are from the LAPD and we are here to help the old amongst you, especially those whose health has deteriorated!
First of all, with respect to the homeless population of the Palisades, which according to Mike Bonin this BID’s handling of is a pattern of enlightened BIDolatry, take a look here at the Minutes from February 3, 2016, where we read, in the words of Laurie Sale her own self, that:

Older homeless are receptive to services as their health deteriorates. On the enforcement front, Michael Moore will be here soon to attest to the fact that they’ve gotten a lot more support from LAPD. Have provided more air support and foot support and they’ve mapped out all of the encampments. The signage has helped and allowed them to go in and get people off of the bluffs. Currently have a count of approximately eighty (80) homeless in the area but no market
[sic] increase.

Continue reading Gang Members, Seeking Respite From The Seething Urban Hell That Is Present-Day Santa Monica, Pour Over Northern Border Into Pacific Palisades, Bringing Crime, Fear, Misery — LAPD Unleashes Helicopters Against Palisades Homeless — The Last Days Are At Hand! Build That Wall, Mr. Bonin!

Share

Lunada Bay Boys Defendant Brant Blakeman Raises Questions About Proposed Class Representative Diana Reed’s “credibility and interest in litigating the case” On Basis Of Default Judgment Against Her For Fraud Involving, Inter Alia, Aerosmith Concert in Mexico City

If you want to know what Aerosmith has to do with anything you have to read the blog post!
Oh dear. Hitting PACER just now is Defendant Brant Blakeman’s Request for Judicial Notice in Support of Defendants’ Opposition to Plaintiffs’ Motion for Class Certification. It seems that plaintiff Diana Reed was sued in LA County Superior Court for breach of contract, fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and a few other such torts, arising out of a music promotion business run by Reed and her husband Gabe. Blakeman is arguing that these allegations, along with the fact that Reed didn’t defend the suit, make her unfit to represent the class of people harmed in the Lunada Bay Boys case.

According to the complaint in the fraud suit,1 the Reeds accepted tens of thousands of dollars from the business manager of some band in exchange for the band being allowed to open for an Aerosmith concert in Mexico City and to go on some rock tour that the Reeds were promoting. None of this ever happened, the band didn’t get its money back, they sued, the Reeds didn’t defend the case, and the court entered a default judgment for more than $440,000.

Bay Boys defendant Blakeman is asking the court to take judicial notice of the complaint and the default judgment against Reed as part of his argument that she’s not moral enough to represent the class of people harmed by the actions of the Bay Boys. The reasoning runs like this:2 Continue reading Lunada Bay Boys Defendant Brant Blakeman Raises Questions About Proposed Class Representative Diana Reed’s “credibility and interest in litigating the case” On Basis Of Default Judgment Against Her For Fraud Involving, Inter Alia, Aerosmith Concert in Mexico City

Share

Mitch O’Farrell’s Malcriado Anti-Playground Motion, Propounded At The Behest Of Ms. Kerry Morrison, Is Now Batting 0 for 2 As Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council Weighs In With Unanimous Eighteen To Zero Opposition

If the Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council has its way, and really, why should they not, this park will remain free and open to the public at large.
You may recall that this L.A. Times editorial kicked off a somewhat misguided firestorm of opposition to Mitch O’Farrell’s recent Council motion 16-1456 seeking to develop a legal tool for banning adults without children from playgrounds in parks in the City of Los Angeles. The Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council weighed in a couple weeks ago with a unanimous statement of opposition, and that trend continued last night as the Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council filed its own unanimous statement of opposition.

Lincoln Heights has a unique take on the issues involved in banning people without kids from a playground:

Limiting teenager and young adult access to swings and limited park space in areas where there is already limited access to green open space is unfair to our young adult population. If a 17 year old wants to swing on a swing or study in the grass under a tree, they should not be prevented from doing so. In Lincoln Heights, there is already limited activities for teenagers and denying them the use of park space is discriminatory There is no differentiation between playgrounds and the grass that surrounds it.

This is a completely reasonable point, and one that as far as I can see has not yet been made on the public record. And the fear that such bans will be enforced against teenagers is not imaginary.
Continue reading Mitch O’Farrell’s Malcriado Anti-Playground Motion, Propounded At The Behest Of Ms. Kerry Morrison, Is Now Batting 0 for 2 As Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council Weighs In With Unanimous Eighteen To Zero Opposition

Share