Category Archives: BID-Free Los Angeles

BID-Free Los Angeles, Featured, Hollywood Property Owners Alliance, Los Angeles City Council, Street Vending, The Race Card

Tamales Nos Cuidan: Social Cleansing, Kerry Morrison, Donald Trump, And The Battle For Legal Street Vending In Los Angeles And Beyond

February 2, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Tamalera on Hoover Street, South Los Angeles, January 2018.

Recently, a little after 7 a.m. on a fine cool Los Angeles Winter morning, I found myself on Hoover Street a little South of Vernon. If you know the area, or areas like it, you won’t be surprised to hear that at that time of day there were tamaleras everywhere. At major intersections, of course, and also near schools, selling tamales y champurrado for breakfast. You can see a picture somewhere near this sentence that I took while waiting my turn in line.

The whole scene is entirely social. There are grandmothers buying a dozen at a time to take home, people on their ways to work buying two or three for breakfast, maybe for lunch too, and schoolkids buying singles to eat while they walk.¹ The tamalera creates a little bubble of warm sociability around her, momentarily protecting those inside from the chill of the foggy damp onshore flow.

This doesn’t happen only on the streets of South Los Angeles, of course. Last month Gustavo Arellano published a lovely article in the New Yorker entitled The Comfort of Tamales At The End Of 2017 about the significant social role of this ancient food² in Mexican-American culture. And you can feel that sociability strongly while waiting in line to buy tamales on an L.A. street in the morning.

But as you’re probably aware, it’s looking more and more likely that the City Council, despite their generally supportive pro-vendor rhetoric, is going to allow business interests and property owners to veto street vending on a highly localized basis for essentially no rational reason at all. One of the most random exclusionary zones recommended in the November 2017 report of the Chief Legislative Analyst is anywhere within 500 feet of Hollywood Boulevard.
Continue reading Tamales Nos Cuidan: Social Cleansing, Kerry Morrison, Donald Trump, And The Battle For Legal Street Vending In Los Angeles And Beyond →

BID-Free Los Angeles, Business Improvement Districts, CD13

Epic Fact-Finding Journey to Echo Park to Document What Will Be Lost if the Proposed BID is Established and Call to Political Action!

May 7, 2016 Mike 1 Comment

If the BID is established forget about food trucks. BIDs freaking hate food trucks. Especially if they're near a restaurant, like this one on Logan Street North of Sunset is. — If the BID is established forget about food trucks. BIDs freaking hate food trucks. Especially if they’re near a restaurant, like this one on Logan Street North of Sunset is.

If the Echo Park BID is established forget about little old ladies selling flowers, like this one on Sunset Blvd. just West of Echo Park Avenue. BIDs freaking hate little old ladies!

If the Echo Park BID is established forget about signs like this. BIDs freaking hate signs on the sidewalk.

If the BID is established in Echo Park say goodbye to RVs around the Park itself. BIDs freaking hate RVs.

Due to some kind-hearted click bait³ bestowed by loyal FOMs Esotouric, my colleagues’ recent post on the resurgence of the long-dormant proposed Echo Park Business Improvement District has turned out to be one of our most popular posts of 2016. The colleagues left out some absolutely essential information and so I’m following up on their behalves. Also I used the whole situation as an excuse to ride the 704 Eastbound to Echo Park Avenue and Sunset Blvd. to check out the situation on the ground.

First the essential info: This thing is on the agenda for the Economic Development Committee meeting on Tuesday, May 10, in room 1010 in City Hall. You can go tell them what you think about it. Unfortunately I have other commitments, and I’m sure approval is a foregone conclusion, but there’s the info if you want it.

Second, as you can see from the images accompanying this post, if the BID’s approved a lot of stuff is going to change out there. They’re going to chase off taco trucks. BIDs hate taco trucks with a passion that’s hard to understand. They even, believe it or not, hate taco trucks parked on private property. Showing an astonishing ignorance of the rights of property owners in a free society, they’ve been known to express amazement that they’re not against the law.

If the BID is approved, sidewalk signs have got to go. BIDs freaking hate sidewalk signs. In fact, one of the very first things Kerry Morrison did in the 1990s after the Hollywood Entertainment District BID was established was to go after businesses with signs on the sidewalk. Why? Who the hell knows? It offended her sense of order or something. Why should Echo Park expect anything different.
Continue reading Epic Fact-Finding Journey to Echo Park to Document What Will Be Lost if the Proposed BID is Established and Call to Political Action! →

BID-Free Los Angeles, Stop LAPD Spying Coalition, Street Vending

Stop LAPD Spying Meeting Yesterday and Fabulous Street-Fried Potatoes at MacArthur Park

March 16, 2016 Mike Leave a comment

Potatoes fried to order at the MacArthur Park Red Line station yesterday afternoon. I don't even like French fries, and I could have eaten any number of orders of these. — Potatoes fried to order and drizzled with Mexican-flag-colored sauce at the MacArthur Park Red Line station yesterday afternoon. I don’t even like French fries, and I could have eaten any number of orders of these.

Last night I attended my first meeting of the Stop LAPD Spying Coalition. It was interesting, heartening, and full of people worth meeting. I will be going to future meetings, and you should too! But that’s not what I’m here to tell you about. I’m here to tell you about the lovely order of papas fritas I bought from a woman who was cooking them right there in a pot of sizzling oil on the East side of Alvarado Street, tucked away in the South end of the Red Line plaza.
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BID-Free Los Angeles

Music, Freedom, Sharing, Love, Humanity: All Flourish Unhindered by Creepy Zillionaire Social Engineers in Not-So-Rare BID-Free Zone in the Valley; Contradictions Regarding Street Vending Heightened Beyond Sane Believability

September 20, 2015 kohlhaas Leave a comment

A sign showing the way to an underground, illegal concert in a home in the Valley that's not in any BID. We can only imagine the hissing, spitting, convulsive fit that BIDs would throw if this kind of thing were discovered on their territory. — A sign showing the way to an underground, surely illegal concert in a home in the Valley that’s not in any BID. We can only imagine the hissing, spitting, convulsive fit that BIDs would throw if this kind of thing were discovered to exist, let alone to be flourishing, on their territory.

Last night a few of us MK.org staffies were blessed to attend something called a house concert at someone’s home in Van Nuys. This is, as you might guess, a concert in someone’s house. The audience donates money to get in and the money all goes to the musicians. There was food at the break for free, but with donations accepted. We found out about this by chance, and soon discovered that it’s not a one-off thing or even just some local eccentricity, but part of a full-blown fricking nationwide movement! Also, these people in Van Nuys have been doing this about once a week for, we believe, more than twenty years. We’re going to be vague about the details because the whole thing is certainly illegal and we don’t want to be the ones to tip off the heat, but nevertheless it’s all operating suprisingly openly.

Instruments on the floor of the garage/performance space in the back yard of a house in Van Nuys before the music began. Look, it's someone's freaking garage! — Instruments on the floor of the garage/performance space in the back yard of a house in Van Nuys before the music began. Look, it’s someone’s freaking garage!

Here’s the deal. Some people we met at a show in Silver Lake¹ the other day told us that this thing was happening and where to find contact info on the web. We looked it up, emailed the contact, phoned the contact, were told the address, took the Red Line to North Hollywood and the Orange Line to Van Nuys and then walked over to an actual normal house on a normal street in the Valley. You can see from the images what we found there, and the music was fabulous, and we met a bunch of very interesting people. I mean, we’re as opposed in theory to vicious criminal conspiracies as the next folks, but this one had really positive results! We’re as in favor in theory of governments of laws rather than of men as the next folks, but damn it, this whole thing was just too wonderful to seriously be illegal. And what does this have to do with the BIDs? Why, we’re glad you asked! Turn the page to find out.
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BID-Free Los Angeles, Hollywood Property Owners Alliance

Unvandalized Tree Flourishes in Rare Hollywood BID-Free Zone

November 15, 2014 kohlhaas Leave a comment

Emmanuel Goldstein or the Vine Street Tree Vandal: You decide! — Emmanuel Goldstein or the Vine Street Tree Vandal? You decide!

The Vine Street Tree Vandal was a topic of conversation at the November 11, 2014 meeting of the Sunset-Vine BID as he or she has been for so very long now.¹ Sarah Besley reported that, despite her announcement last month of an imminent arrest, the tree vandalism continues.

Just as she did last month, Besley claims that there will be “more to report next time.” You can see even earlier discussion of the Tree Vandal in boffo security king Steve Seyler’s reports to the Joint Security Committee. The investigation has been about to produce results for an awfully long time now. If we hadn’t seen the damage with our own eyes we’d be starting to wonder if the Tree Vandal might not be named Emmanuel Goldstein.

We suggested previously that the vandalism might be an act of protest against the repressive atmosphere the BIDs create in Hollywood. Here’s more circumstantial evidence that this is the case:
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BID-Free Los Angeles

Exuberance, Freedom, Commerce, Blossom in Rare DTLA BID-free Zone

November 8, 2014 kohlhaas Leave a comment

The RAND corporation, imagined as the Pied Piper, plays the tune called by the one who pays, while happy imaginary children under the influence of LSD obtained from Herman Kahn — The RAND corporation, imagined by Kate Greenaway as the Pied Piper, plays the tune called by the piper-payer while happily dancing imaginary children under the influence of LSD obtained from RAND-ite Herman Kahn frolic about

Like many superfluous, quasi-criminal, quasi-public institutions, the BIDs of Los Angeles are terrified that people will notice they’re a dangerous nuisance and proceed to abolish them. One symptom of this anxiety is a craving for academic justification stronger than the craving of tweakers for meth.

So one rich guy calls another rich guy and soon enough the RAND Corporation of Santa Monica, California, mostly famous for paying cold warrior par excellence Herman Kahn to analyze potential preemptive nuclear strikes on China while under the influence of LSD,¹ has prepared a report on how beneficial the existence of BIDs is to the city of Los Angeles. TL;DR: Confuse correllation with causation and the tune that was called by the piper-payer ends up played by the piper.

BID free zone on the East side of Downtown Los Angeles — BID free zone on the East side of Downtown

We decided that we were going to do some research of our own. Luckily, the existence of a small sliver of land surrounding Olympic Boulevard between Central and Stanford is not claimed by any BID and thus allows us to analyze how beneficial the nonexistence of BIDs is to the city of Los Angeles. We obtained a small private grant and set out into the field.² We think you’ll be interested in our results.
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