Tag Archives: Donald Duckworth

Business Improvement Districts, Homeless Issues

“They’re Saying It’s A Constitutional Right To Have Stuff” — More Performative Insanity From Batty Little Fusspot Blair Besten — The Finest Legal Mind Of Her Generation — As She Explains The Mitchell Injunction To You — From The Point Of View Of A Whiny Entitled Privileged Stupid Person — A Constituency That Doesn’t Get Nearly Enough Attention In Los Angeles — That’s Sarcasm — They’re In Charge Of The Damn Asylum — And Listen To Her Run Her Poormouth About How Her Putatively Underfunded BID Makes Do With Low Budgets By Being More Efficient Than The Fashion District — Which Spends Proportionately Half Of What Besten Spends On Administration — Lie Or Incompetence? — The Perennial Besten Question

March 5, 2019 Mike Leave a comment

It’s been a long while since we here at the blog have heard from Blair Besten, the half-pint Norma Desmond of the Historic Core.¹ Well, it’s because, like with El Duckworth, she is so convinced that she is above the law that I haven’t gotten any substantial records out of her infernal BID in ever so long, and without records I will not, I can not, mock.

And of course, as you know, I’m in the process of suing her and her damnable BID to enforce compliance with the Public Records Act. And she’s going to lose, because losing is what she does best. So at some point the records will be rolling in again and the full-time mockery will resume. Until then, though, well, I have always relied on the kindness of strangers, and they are strangely kind to me.

In particular, just recently, unsolicited, was handed to me² an audio track of an unscheduled appearance made by Ms. Besten at some bullshit meeting conducted at some bullshit Downtown residential bullshit location, having something to do with some bullshit or other. So I made it into a video³ and you can listen here on YouTube and here on Archive.Org, where you can also download it more easily. And of course there’s also a complete transcription after the break!

And best of all, this unexpected bit of Besteniana means that it’s gonna be like the good old days around here what with all the mere mockery unloosed upon the world! Gonna mock around the clock tonight! Turn the page, I’m gonna lay it on you in increments, but before then let’s just spoil the ending and take a look at the single most incomprehensibly lobotomized proclamation proclaimed by Ms. Blair Besten in a long unbroken chain of incomprehensibly lobotomized proclamity!

What, you may ask, does Ms. Blair Besten think that the plaintiffs in the lawsuit Mitchell v. Los Angeles are so freaking wrong about? Why “they’re saying that it’s a constitutional right to have stuff in Skid Row.” If you stop and think about it, Ms. Besten, that’s kind of like, almost, what the Fourteenth Amendment to the constitution is saying with all that jive about “nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”

See the part about property? That’s what grownups call “stuff.” And I don’t see anything about it not being true in Skid Row. In fact, all kinds of people have “stuff” in Skid Row. Like e.g. all those property owners in the Downtown Industrial District BID. Gonna tell them they can’t have stuff there?

And the amendment goes on to say that states may not “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” They seem to have left out the not in Skid Row bit there too. So on Blair Besten’s testimony it’s hard to see why she’s so upset at the prospect of the City settling Mitchell. But she is very upset. Can see how it might get confusing to folks like Besten. And listen, lest you think I’m being pointlessly mean to Blair Besten, please keep in mind that this is not just some kook spouting her theories to the waves on Venice Beach.

She is the head of a major Downtown Business Improvement District, hand-picked by Jose Huizar over the objections of its board of directors to administer its outrageously high $2.2 million budget. She is widely considered by City officials to be some kind of expert on homelessness, to the point where they appointed her to the damn HHH citizens’ oversight committee over the objections of a lot of sane and accomplished people. She’s not just a kook, although she is a kook. She’s a dangerous kook with a lot of power. So yeah, I’m being mean to Blair Besten, but not pointlessly mean. Anyway, read on, friends!
Continue reading “They’re Saying It’s A Constitutional Right To Have Stuff” — More Performative Insanity From Batty Little Fusspot Blair Besten — The Finest Legal Mind Of Her Generation — As She Explains The Mitchell Injunction To You — From The Point Of View Of A Whiny Entitled Privileged Stupid Person — A Constituency That Doesn’t Get Nearly Enough Attention In Los Angeles — That’s Sarcasm — They’re In Charge Of The Damn Asylum — And Listen To Her Run Her Poormouth About How Her Putatively Underfunded BID Makes Do With Low Budgets By Being More Efficient Than The Fashion District — Which Spends Proportionately Half Of What Besten Spends On Administration — Lie Or Incompetence? — The Perennial Besten Question →

Business Improvement Districts

Donald “El Duckie” Duckworth — Pirate King Of The Melrose Avenue BID — Takes Himself And His BIDdie Buddies Out To Lunch On The BID’s Dime All The Freaking Time — And Probably Violates The Brown Act While He’s Doing It — Think I’m Exaggerating? — Try $133 For A Committee Meeting At Off Vine — A Restaurant That Is Not In The Melrose BID — So It’s Illegal For The BID To Meet There — And Why The Hell Don’t They Buy Their Own Lunch?!

March 3, 2019 Mike Leave a comment

It’s been a damn month now since last I wrote about BIDological freak show specimen Donald R. Duckworth, the pirate king⁴ of the Melrose Avenue Business Improvement District. But it’s El Duckie’s own damn fault that he’s not getting the publicity he craves from MK.Org.

For whatever reason, the baleful influence of Carol Humiston, his own mulishly porcine intransigence, something as-yet-unguessed-at, he is chronically unable to comply with the tender mandates of the California Public Records Act. And I can’t very well mock him without public records, the very fuel and the flavor of MK.Org-style mockery.⁵

But recently I managed to lay hands on an interesting set of goodies, which are all of El Duckie’s requests for reimbursement from Melrose BID coffers for the last few years.⁶ I originally asked for these because last summer the property owners of Melrose were in open and fiery rebellion against the Duckworthian regime and one of the underlying causes was Duckworth’s irrepressible profligacy.

If you don’t want to or can’t read the PDF, there’s an html conversion at the end of this post.⁷ And it reveals that Duckworth and his BIDdie buddies, most especially the notorious Weintraub gang, Deny and Sylvia, are indeed basically flinging the property owners’ assessments to the winds like rain.⁸

Just for instance, on January 19, 2018 the BID bought Duckworth, the Weintraubs, and a couple other BIDdies lunch to the tune of $122.09. Sure, that’s not over the top for lunch for five, but why is the BID buying lunch in the first place? I have to go to work meetings all the damn time and no one buys me lunch. But I, for my part, have to ask an accountant for permission. Donald R. Duckwalk just has to ask Deny Weintraub, and Deny Weintraub is right there at the trough with him.

Or see on November 29, 2017 when The Duckster put in for $75.07 for a “work session” with Kim Sudhalter. Kim Sudhalter is the BID’s social media flunkie, so she already gets paid for the work she does. As does Donald R. Duckandcover. So what was the 75 bucks for? More food for the work session? The usual arrangement, Duckfellow, is to pay for your own food when you’re working.

And there are plenty of these instances, where Duckworth, the Weintraubs, and sometimes an unindicted co-conspirator or two, will go out to lunch at some ritzy place and charge it off to the BID. But the most egregious of these are the ones that are labeled as committee meetings. Because, as we know, the BID is bound by the Brown Act, and the Brown Act has very strict rules about where and how committee meetings can be held. And it’s likely that these violate them.

In particular, on September 1, 2017 Duckworth, the Weintraubs, and Kim Sudhalter spent $133.89 on lunch at a committee meeting at Off Vine, a super-ritz joint near the southeast corner of Vine and Sunset. This is highly problematic, friends, and turn the page to see why!
Continue reading Donald “El Duckie” Duckworth — Pirate King Of The Melrose Avenue BID — Takes Himself And His BIDdie Buddies Out To Lunch On The BID’s Dime All The Freaking Time — And Probably Violates The Brown Act While He’s Doing It — Think I’m Exaggerating? — Try $133 For A Committee Meeting At Off Vine — A Restaurant That Is Not In The Melrose BID — So It’s Illegal For The BID To Meet There — And Why The Hell Don’t They Buy Their Own Lunch?! →

Business Improvement Districts

How BIDological Freakshow Specimen Donald R. Duckworth Wrote A Bunch Of Letters Of Support For The Melrose BID — And Then The Property Owners Revolted When It Was Time To Renew The BID — So El Duckworth Told Them That The Letters Were Written By Paul Koretz And LAPD Captain Anthony Oddo And BID President Deny Weintraub — And Tried To Make Them Feel As If Hating The BID Meant Hating The City — And Hating The Cops — Which Might Be Standard Practice But It Is Still Sketchy As Hell

February 4, 2019 Mike Leave a comment

I know my readers eagerly await, nay, hunger, crave even, more news about Donald R. Duckworth,⁹ the Melrose BID‘s hatchet-faced goblin¹⁰ of an executive director. But you will recall that El Duckie essentially shut down my CPRA requests recently, to the point where I had to literally sue the literal freaking pants off the guy. And he knew he done wrong, so his BIDdie employers had to pay beaucoup de bucks for the error of his ways.

And because I am basically a naive optimistic believer in the good faith, honesty, and sense of fair play of my fellow human beings, I neglected to pin down this sclerotic old crow¹¹ in the settlement with a CPRA response time-table. Which is why, even after his principals had to pay $13K to settle up his misdeeds, did he start right in again with his CPRA-flouting ways. Thus it was only yesterday, five months after I first made the request,¹² that I finally received a significant stack of goodies from the Melrose BID.¹³ And thus the mockery of Donald R. Duckworth can finally recommence!

Now, back in January of last year, the Melrose BID was beginning its renewal process. And as part of the process, El Duckie was putting together a brochure to convince property owners to sign renewal petitions. And as part of the brochure assembly process Donald Duckworth solicited a letter of support from CD5 repster Paul Koretz and another letter from LAPD Wilshire Division CO Anthony Oddo. But he didn’t just solicit letters from these worthies, he actually wrote the letters for them.¹⁴

And, you know, I understand that this isn’t sketchy in and of itself, and it happens even in much more consequential circumstances. E.g. lawyers often submit proposed orders to judges, who have the option of signing them, editing them, or ignoring them. But cast your mind back to the golden days of last summer, when the Melrose BID was in open revolt against all manner of Duckwortharian shenanigans, like paying himself a damn fortune to do pretty much nothing, and spending $10K per month on the BID’s hilariously self-parodying blog, and so on.

And hostile anti-BID letters were flying this way, that way, and yonder way! Anat Escher wrote a letter! And Laura Aflalo wrote a letter! And Richard Jebejian wrote a letter! And this was all while the BIDdies were trying to collect enough petitions to move the renewal process to the next phase! And man, were they ever worried! About the petitions, that is, cause if these rebels had their way, the BID might not even be renewed!

So Duckworth wrote a response letter to the rebels! And then BID board president Deny Weintraub pretended that he wrote the letter that Duckworth wrote. Which is a not-unheard-of phenomenon amongst BID Board presidents! And in the letter that Duckworth wrote that Deny Weintraub pretended that he wrote, Duckworth cited the letter that Duckworth wrote that Paul Koretz pretended he wrote and also the letter that Duckworth wrote that Anthony Oddo pretended that he wrote. And he said to the rebels essentially that the cops loved the BID and Koretz loved the BID so who were they to not love the BID?!

But really he himself wrote all the love letters to the BID. So basically the whole thing was a really vigorous conversation between Donald Duckworth and his stable of sockpuppets! And at the end of it Melrose Avenue had their damn BID renewed for another ten years! Anyway, turn the page for some excerpts from this pernicious sockpuppetry and some metadata showing that El Duckie really did write everything!
Continue reading How BIDological Freakshow Specimen Donald R. Duckworth Wrote A Bunch Of Letters Of Support For The Melrose BID — And Then The Property Owners Revolted When It Was Time To Renew The BID — So El Duckworth Told Them That The Letters Were Written By Paul Koretz And LAPD Captain Anthony Oddo And BID President Deny Weintraub — And Tried To Make Them Feel As If Hating The BID Meant Hating The City — And Hating The Cops — Which Might Be Standard Practice But It Is Still Sketchy As Hell →

Business Improvement Districts

CIM Group BID Project Coordinator Catherine Randall Met With Clerk BID Analyst Rita Moreno In December 2018 To Discuss West Adams BID — At Recommendation Of BIDological Freak Show Specimen Don Duckworth — Who Has A Lot To Answer For In This Life

January 22, 2019 Mike Leave a comment

This is just a short post to update you on newly obtained information about the impending West Adams Business Improvement District. For a decent recap of the situation read my last post on the subject over here. The BID consultant is Marco Li Mandri of New City America, but according to some emails that I obtained this evening, Donald Duckworth was also talking to Catherine Randall of CIM Group, who seems to be heading up the BID establishment project in support of her employer’s growing investment in West Adams real estate.

Duckworth, of course, is famous in these parts for the surreal level of cruelty and slapstick incompetence with he manages to imbue the ordinary everyday BID facism to which every BIDologist is accustomed. They’re against street vending, he forces local business owners to denounce themselves for supporting street vending. They obstruct my access to their documents in violation of the California Public Records Act. His violations are so flagrant that I had to sue him twice on the same day. They illegally lobby City officials. He…well, he also illegally lobbies City officials. They’re a bunch of white supremacists. He lives in Arcadia, California, a city with a population of 57,000 which includes fewer than 700 African-Americans.

He’s quite a piece of work, is our Mr. Duckworth, and the thought of him having anything whatsoever to do with West Adams, even the thought of him walking the very streets, let alone being involved with such a powerfully satanic tool of cultural mutation as a West Adams BID will be, is nauseating indeed. Even the very emails that are the nominal subject of this post, well, I mean, they pale in comparison, but they’re pretty pale to begin with other than the revelation about El Duckie.¹⁵ You can read transcriptions after the break.
Continue reading CIM Group BID Project Coordinator Catherine Randall Met With Clerk BID Analyst Rita Moreno In December 2018 To Discuss West Adams BID — At Recommendation Of BIDological Freak Show Specimen Don Duckworth — Who Has A Lot To Answer For In This Life →

Business Improvement Districts, Lawsuits, Public Records Act Pragmatics

VICTORY!! On Advice Of Carol Humiston, The World’s Angriest CPRA Lawyer, Melrose And Westchester BIDs Both Agree To Pay My Even-Tempered Attorney, The Incomparable Anna von Herrmann, Beaucoup De Bucks To Settle CPRA Petitions Brought Due To The Weirdo Incompetence Of Donald Freaking Duckworth, Their Hatchet-Faced Goblin Of A Zeck Dreck — Perhaps They Will Be More Compliant In The Future? — Perhaps The City Of Los Angeles Will Intervene And Enforce Compliance To Stop BIDs Bleeding Public Money Out Of Arrogance And Inability? — Probably Not, But I Can Dream

September 7, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Of course you recall that in June of this year, my hand forced by the bizarro-world intransigence of BIDdological freak show specimen Donald Duckworth, executive director of both the Westchester Town Center BID and the Melrose BID, I had no recourse but to file a couple of writ petitions asking a judge to splain them that it wasn’t cool to openly flout the California Public Records Act just because they happen to be a gang of zillionaires and zillionare-associated minions. Soon thereafter El Duckworth suffered a severe attack of conscience and handed over all the disputed records.¹⁶

This development was good in at least two senses. First of all and most importantly it was good for the immortal soul of Mr. Duckworth, although as he was pretty clearly motivated by his anticipation of exposure and/or punishment his contrition was imperfect. Second of all it was good for my case because if a previously noncompliant agency, such as a BID, hands over records as a result of a petition being filed, the petitioner, such as me, automatically wins and the judge is required to award attorney’s fees.

This nondiscretionary outcome gives the respondent a powerful motive to hurry up and settle once records have been produced. Since they’re going to have to pay the petitioner’s attorney their best move is to minimize the amount of work done by opposing counsel. El Duckie’s two BIDs hired Carol Humiston, the world’s angriest CPRA attorney. And those, after a lot of characteristically Humistonian bluster and bullshit, are precisely the lines along which she seems to have advised her clients, which is why they have agreed to hand over a lot of damn money in exchange for settling the case.

This of course is a great victory for the forces of good, the side of the better angels of this City of Angels, and so on. Now let’s hope that this development along with the high costs that other BIDs have already paid,¹⁷ will convince them that it’s cheaper, easier, and more responsible to just hand over the damn records when I ask for them rather than fooling about wasting other people’s money in a series of ultimately futile and expensive attempts to keep the goods away from me just because they don’t like being called mean names on the Internet.

Also we can hope that this victory along with the others, past and future, will convince the City that if the BIDs can’t act responsibly they need to be made to do so. Whatever happens, of course you’ll read about it here! And turn the page for a rare and coveted image of MK.Org secret headquarters this very night just after we got the news! And here’s the damn soundtrack!
Continue reading VICTORY!! On Advice Of Carol Humiston, The World’s Angriest CPRA Lawyer, Melrose And Westchester BIDs Both Agree To Pay My Even-Tempered Attorney, The Incomparable Anna von Herrmann, Beaucoup De Bucks To Settle CPRA Petitions Brought Due To The Weirdo Incompetence Of Donald Freaking Duckworth, Their Hatchet-Faced Goblin Of A Zeck Dreck — Perhaps They Will Be More Compliant In The Future? — Perhaps The City Of Los Angeles Will Intervene And Enforce Compliance To Stop BIDs Bleeding Public Money Out Of Arrogance And Inability? — Probably Not, But I Can Dream →

Venice Beach BID

Donald Duckworth Was The Very First BID Consultant Involved With Venice Beach BID Formation — In June 2014 Debbie Dyner Harris Introduced El Duckie To Carl Lambert — Meetings Were Held — Duckworth Drafted Petitions And Gave Advice — Then El Duckie Seems To Have Stopped Returning Carl Lambert’s Emails —Then Nothing Until Tara Devine Took Over — Reason For That Not Yet Clear

September 1, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

The story of Tara Devine and the Venice Beach BID has been told repeatedly and in great detail starting in 2016 when the ultimately successful push to establish this most-despised of Los Angeles BIDs¹⁸ was revived. But the pre-2016 history remains obscure, not least due to zeck dreck Devine’s obstreperous obstructionism with respect to providing public records.¹⁹

Of course, everything about this BID is interesting,²⁰ so what a pleasant surprise it was to find in a recent release of goodies²¹ by BIDdological freak show specimen Donald Duckworth a series of emails from 2014 showing that when Mike Bonin first kicked off the Venice Beach BID formation process his staffie Debbie Dyner Harris turned to El Duckworth to hook up with criminal conspirator and founding BIDfather Carl Freaking Lambert to get the job done. Internal evidence strongly suggests that this was the beginning of the modern VBBID formation process.²² Strangely, Estela Lopez, the wickedest woman on Skid Row, was also slated to be involved.²³

The story begins on June 5, 2014 when Debbie Dyner Harris emailed El Duckworth with a little proposition:

Hi Don. I hope all is well. The Councilmember is hosting several property owners and business owners along Ocean Front Walk in Venice at a meeting this Monday, June 9, to discuss creating a BID. He was wondering if you’d be able to attend, to help answer any questions on the creation and operation of a BID, and providing your insight. We will be joined by Miranda Paster of the City Clerk’s office, as well as the founding director and the current president of Central City East’s BID.

I am sorry for the late notice, we’ve been trying to develop our agenda. It will be held this Monday, June 9, at 9:45am in our Westchester community room. I hope you can make it!

Thanks,
Debbie

And turn the page for the rest of the story, along with links to and transcriptions of the evidence!
Continue reading Donald Duckworth Was The Very First BID Consultant Involved With Venice Beach BID Formation — In June 2014 Debbie Dyner Harris Introduced El Duckie To Carl Lambert — Meetings Were Held — Duckworth Drafted Petitions And Gave Advice — Then El Duckie Seems To Have Stopped Returning Carl Lambert’s Emails —Then Nothing Until Tara Devine Took Over — Reason For That Not Yet Clear →

Business Improvement Districts, Los Angeles City Council

Some Insight Into How Mike Bonin Arranges For Business Improvement Districts To Present His Policy Positions To The Public Is Provided By A Moderately Bizarre Email Exchange Between Don Duckworth And Bonin Chief Of Staff Chad Molnar On Mike Bonin’s Position On Street Vending Opt-In Versus Opt-Out And Requiring Vendors To Obtain Property Owner Permission — After Which Don Duckworth Wrote To His Bosses On The BID And As Good As Accused Mike Bonin Of Being A Whiny Little Baby

August 28, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Oh, man! Don’t you hate it when you tell your followers and minions and networkers that your Councilmember supports some policy position and then his chief of staff flips out on you and “requests” that you eat your words and you have to do it cause if you don’t the Council District might cut off the flow of zillion dollar bills pouring down on you and the damn zillionaires as whose henchman you serve from the heady cornucopian heights of the fourth floor of 200 N. Spring Street?²⁴

What?! That never happens to you?! Well, it certainly happens to BIDdological freak show specimen Donald Duckworth like, all the freaking time. This is the story of one such episode from 2017 having to do with street vending, which began on January 11 when 2017 Donald Duckworth sent out the Westchester Town Center BID‘s Winter 2016 newsletter.

It contained a typically stupid but essentially innocuous article on the infamous CF 13-1493, which is, of course, the street vending matter. I don’t have the original email attached to which he sent the thing, but he also forwarded a copy to Rita Moreno of the City Clerk’s office. And therein we find the following exhortatory paragraph, which evidently accompanied the newsletters sent out to the BIDs willing minions:

We are sending the newsletter now so that our readers have an opportunity to voice their preferences with respect to the proposed City action that is being supported by Councilman Mike Bonin. Think of taco carts, fruit vendors, and cheap merchandise together with all of the litter, sidewalk mess, and clutter caused by vendors that don’t pay rent, taxes, or fees as the brick and mortar stores they are competing against do. The Westchester Town Center BID has requested our Councilman to not force street vending on the community of Westchester and to require property owner approval before any vendor could set up shop in front of their property. If some neighborhoods want it fine, but we don’t think Westchester is one of those places. The Neighborhood Council and Chamber of Commerce have agreed. How fair is it to require property owners to repair their sidewalks but not allow them to have a voice in whether or not someone can set up a business there?

Well, it seems that Councilmember Mike didn’t like this claim that he was in favor of the street vending apocalypse²⁵ and he called Donald Duckworth on the morning of January 12, 2017 and was all like hey dude, not right and therefore apologize. And Donald Duckworth, whose job is to bring home the bacon rather than to aggravate the pigs, begged forgiveness and agreed to correct the damn record. And the whole detailed story along with links to and transcriptions of the emails and other records can be found directly after the damn break!
Continue reading Some Insight Into How Mike Bonin Arranges For Business Improvement Districts To Present His Policy Positions To The Public Is Provided By A Moderately Bizarre Email Exchange Between Don Duckworth And Bonin Chief Of Staff Chad Molnar On Mike Bonin’s Position On Street Vending Opt-In Versus Opt-Out And Requiring Vendors To Obtain Property Owner Permission — After Which Don Duckworth Wrote To His Bosses On The BID And As Good As Accused Mike Bonin Of Being A Whiny Little Baby →

Business Improvement Districts, Street Vending

If Street Vendors Are Required To Get Consent From Business Owners Commercial Landlords Will Coerce Businesses Into Withholding Both Permission And Bathroom Access — Maybe Even By Rewriting Leases — Actual Conspiracy In The Westchester BID Shows How This Will Work — Did I Mention That Zeck Dreck Donald Duckworth Is A Horrible Person Who Forced A Local Barber To Write A Quasi-Maoist Self-Denunciation For Helping Out A Food Truck Operator??

August 17, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

One of the most hotly contested components of the evolving street vending framework in Los Angeles over the last few years has been a clause requiring vendors to get permission from businesses that they operate near. BIDs and other organized gangs of zillionaire-identified minions have pushed, and pushed hard, for such a requirement.²⁶ And, as usual, their public-facing reasons are exceedingly altruistic. They’re looking out for the small business owners or whatever.

This requirement, greatly desired by BIDdies of all stripes, was heavily promoted by their spokescreepers at the Central City Association. Their position on this issue was described in a set of talking points propagated by the CCALA in March 2018, where the BIDdies talk about how such consent is necessary for the success of the program, but don’t worry cause e.g. “Property or business owner consent should not be an unreasonable hurdle for vendors it is a much more straightforward process than a public notification process.”

And maybe it should not be unreasonable, but don’t forget that these businesses are situated in commercial buildings, and BIDs are made up of commercial property owners. That is, the very people who are pushing one anti-vendor initiative or another are, on the surface, trying to give their tenants, the business owners, power over the vendors, and it’s presented as being for the good of the vendors. But some emails, newly obtained from Karen Dial’s embarrassingly Freudian monument to Daddy AKA the Westchester Town Center BID, reveal how commercial property owners are likely to abuse such a requirement.²⁷

The discussion, between BIDdological freak show specimen Donald Duckworth, zeck dreck of the WTCBID, and Karen Dial’s consensual Svengali AKA Miki Payne, vice-president for gratuitously creepy zillionairitude at H.B. Drollinger Inc., took place in January 2017, right at the height of gratuitously creepy BID anti-vendor hysteria.

And the idea is as simple as it is deadly to street vendors, who are, don’t ever forget, part of the heart and soul of our City. It is to convince commercial landlords to write clauses into their leases forbidding their tenants, the business owners, from granting permission to vendors both to use adjacent sidewalks and to use their bathrooms.

Turn the page for more ranting, along with links to and transcriptions of the emails, and also a special bonus item revealing an incident in 2011 when a businessman in Westchester allowed a food truck operator access to his restroom and was forced to publicly recant his permission and confess his sins after pressure from the BIDdies.
Continue reading If Street Vendors Are Required To Get Consent From Business Owners Commercial Landlords Will Coerce Businesses Into Withholding Both Permission And Bathroom Access — Maybe Even By Rewriting Leases — Actual Conspiracy In The Westchester BID Shows How This Will Work — Did I Mention That Zeck Dreck Donald Duckworth Is A Horrible Person Who Forced A Local Barber To Write A Quasi-Maoist Self-Denunciation For Helping Out A Food Truck Operator?? →

Business Improvement Districts

What Is Donald Duckworth Spending The Melrose BID’s Money On Besides $6,000 A Month On His Own Damn Self? — Believe It Or Not He Seems To Spend Almost $10,000 Per Month On Public Relations And Paying Freelance Bloggers To Write What Passes As Content For What Passes As The BID’s Blog

August 9, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Turn over a rock and don’t be surprised that crawlie lil creatures wiggle out, friends! As you probably recall, BIDdological freak show specimen Donald Duckworth in his guise as zeck dreck of the Melrose Avenue BID, stopped responding to my requests for public records early last year. So I lawyered up and filed a petition and now not only, I will deign to predict, is his BID gonna be on the hook for beaucoup de bucks but he actually started handing over goodies! One of these provides the text of today’s sermon, which is this list of transactions of the MBID from 2013 through this June organized by payee.

And lord, there’s a lot of weird stuff in there. For instance, note that in April and July 2017 Duckworth paid Hollywood Superlawyer and world famous Jeffrey Charles Briggs $1,000, presumably to ask his advice about the CPRA requests he had stopped responding to. Maybe Jeffrey Charles advised him to ignore me? Expensive advice, Mr. Superlawyer! Or maybe El Duckworth ignored his lawyer’s advice? Expensive mistake, Mr. Duckworth!²⁷

And of course there’s a lot of normal stuff in there, like their security guard and their clean-up crew, and so on. But what really stands out is the money the BID is spending on social media content and blogging and public relations. Not only is the amount of money astonishing, many thousands of dollars per month, but the idiotic nonsense the BID is paying for is even more astonishing.

This cannot possibly be what all these property owners think they’re paying extra property tax for, which is no doubt related to why they’re fomenting revolution lately. It makes no sense at all. It’s much more likely that Donald Duckworth, having cut himself a piece of cake to the tune of $6,000 per month to run the damn BID part time has to blow the rest of the money on something to justify his existence and he doesn’t care what it is because it’s not his money. Turn the page for examples and payments. Sheesh!
Continue reading What Is Donald Duckworth Spending The Melrose BID’s Money On Besides $6,000 A Month On His Own Damn Self? — Believe It Or Not He Seems To Spend Almost $10,000 Per Month On Public Relations And Paying Freelance Bloggers To Write What Passes As Content For What Passes As The BID’s Blog →

Business Improvement Districts

How I Went To The Westchester Town Center BID Meeting Yesterday And Everyone Was So Freaking Nice — The Cops Explained How They Shoo The Wrong Kind Of People Out Of Westchester — And Everyone Smiled — The Trash Lady Explained How If Homeless People Sleep In Alleys Just Privatize Alleys — And Everyone Smiled — Bonus Question: Did You Know Criminals Rent Bird Scooters So They Can Scope Out Break-In Targets More Efficiently? — Zillionaires Think It’s True So It Must Be True!

August 3, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Here’s how we got to this place. You will recall that, due to the unhinged intransigence of Donald Duckworth, zeck dreck of the Westchester Town Center BID, I was unwillingly forced to file a writ petition against his masters to get them to take their obligations under the California Public Records Act seriously just for one damn time. And I learned from the agenda for yesterday’s meeting that they were poised to hire the world’s angriest CPRA lawyer, Carol F. Humiston,²⁸ to defend their case.²⁹

Well, the doings of La Humiston interest me no end, as why shouldn’t they? So I hopped aboard the good old 115 east on Manchester out to Sepulveda right into the heart of occupied territory, attended the meeting, and, as per usual, filmed the whole thing and you can watch it here on YouTube or if you prefer free-as-in-freedom here on Archive.Org. And the Humiston episode turned out to be utterly anticlimactic. You can watch all very few seconds of it right here.

Basically El Duckworth just said that he and Karen Dial, hereditary president for life of the BID, had interviewed the ballistical barrister and they wanted to hire her.³⁰ Then there was a motion and a second and the usual unanimity carried the day. Oh, snore. But the trip was by no means wasted! In fact, this BID turned out to be even more interesting than I expected it to be even accounting for the extreme level of interest that attends any situation with which Don Duckworth, the pirate king of BIDlandia, associates himself.³¹

As usual, the main points are summarized in the headline, and turn the page for all the details, links in to the video, and transcriptions that you could ever possibly desire!
Continue reading How I Went To The Westchester Town Center BID Meeting Yesterday And Everyone Was So Freaking Nice — The Cops Explained How They Shoo The Wrong Kind Of People Out Of Westchester — And Everyone Smiled — The Trash Lady Explained How If Homeless People Sleep In Alleys Just Privatize Alleys — And Everyone Smiled — Bonus Question: Did You Know Criminals Rent Bird Scooters So They Can Scope Out Break-In Targets More Efficiently? — Zillionaires Think It’s True So It Must Be True! →