Tag Archives: Neighborhood & Business Improvement District Section

Business Improvement Districts, Los Angeles City Government, Venice Beach BID

Here’s Actual Proof That Los Angeles City Clerk Holly Wolcott Is Refusing To Sign BID Establishment Petitions For LA City Property Until Half The Other Property Owners In The Proposed District Have Signed — This Is Not Exactly A Policy But Her “Preference” — According To Clerk Staff Anyway — Also See The Extraordinary Petulance Of Gil Cedillo’s Weirdo Flunky Jose Rodriguez When He Learns About It — And Turns Around And Covertly Threatens Clerk Staffer Rick Scott For Bearing The Bad News

July 24, 2020 Mike Leave a comment

This is a quick update on a technical but highly consequential issue regarding City of Los Angeles property included in business improvement districts. The state law is very clear that BID assessments apply equally to public property, which means that the City of LA gets to vote on BID formation and renewal. Furthermore, in 1996, when the modern era of California BIDs began, the City Council told the City Clerk to always vote yes unless specifically directed otherwise.

Which of course led BID proponents to include as much City property as possible within their boundaries since it made establishment very significantly easier given the guaranteed favorable votes from the City. This strategy reached a hitherto unseen level of absurdity in 2016 with the Venice Beach BID establishment process, in which City property constituted 25.05% of the assessed value and the non-City property owners who signed pro-BID petitions for only 27.26%. The BID would never have been established without the automatic yes from the City.

This already absurd outcome was surpassed in 2017 with the renewal of the San Pedro Historic Waterfront BID. The proponents in that case included huge tracts of essentially empty parcels belonging to the Port of Los Angeles. They brought the City’s proportion of assessed value to 37.24%, which left only 26.04% non-City property owners in favor of the BID. The case of the San Pedro BID seems not to have been widely noticed at the time, but of course the outcry over the Venice Beach BID was monumental, and the City’s role in ensuring its existence was discussed at great length.

It hadn’t been clear exactly what was going on, but something regarding the voting of City property changed over at the City Clerk’s office after the San Pedro BID fiasco. I first heard about it in 2018 in relation to the Byzantine Latino Quarter BID when Donald Duckworth, BIDdological freak show specimen and BID establishment consultant, told his clients that the City of Los Angeles would no longer vote its petitions in favor of formation until 50% of the private property owners had already voted in favor.

As we’ve seen above, this would be a major change. If this policy had been in place in 2016 neither the Venice Beach BID nor the San Pedro Historic Waterfront BID would exist. But Duckworth is a liar and a fabulist and exceedingly unreliable, so while his testimony did in fact convince me that something was happening, it’s not really safe to assume that he’s telling his clients the full story or even accurately relating part of it.
Continue reading Here’s Actual Proof That Los Angeles City Clerk Holly Wolcott Is Refusing To Sign BID Establishment Petitions For LA City Property Until Half The Other Property Owners In The Proposed District Have Signed — This Is Not Exactly A Policy But Her “Preference” — According To Clerk Staff Anyway — Also See The Extraordinary Petulance Of Gil Cedillo’s Weirdo Flunky Jose Rodriguez When He Learns About It — And Turns Around And Covertly Threatens Clerk Staffer Rick Scott For Bearing The Bad News →

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.¹ 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, Los Angeles City Government

Rita Moreno Thinks The “Boundaries Of A BID Must Be Contiguous” — Misty Iwatsu Agrees!! — No! Wait! Rita Moreno Thinks “There’s No Legal Requirement That The Boundaries Be Contiguous”! — Whichever It Is, We Think That Rita Moreno (A) Is Practicing Law Without A License And Ought To Stop It Right Now Cause It’s Illegal And She’s Confusing Everybody And (B) Does Not Know What The Word “Contiguous” Means

July 18, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

OK, I’m sorry, this post is on kind of a technical subject, but I think it’s important and also it reveals a kind of weird off-handed incompetence amongst the City Clerk’s BID analyst staff that I think is worth memorializing. The central issue is whether the Property and Business Improvement District Act of 1994 requires a BID to be in one piece. I’m going to use the technical term “connected” here.²

It’s not just an idle question, either. You may recall that the proposed Hollywood Route 66 BID runs up Santa Monica Blvd. from Vine Street to Hoover Street. The problem is that Vermont Avenue crosses Santa Monica right in the middle of that stretch, and every building that touches Vermont is already included in the East Hollywood BID.

Regardless of what the PBID law has to say about connectedness of BIDs, it’s very, very clear on the fact that BIDs can’t overlap.³ Hence commercial buildings on both Santa Monica and Vermont must be excluded from the Hollywood Route 66 BID, which leaves its territory disconnected. Plausibly, also, the EHBID could cede those buildings to the Route 66 BID, but, interestingly, doing so would leave the EHBID disconnected, so nothing would be gained. Here’s a copy of the map if it’ll be useful.

Thus a correct understanding of what the law allows is essential for the formation of at least that BID, and probably others in the future. And I’m not a lawyer, but I read the whole damn PBID law about a zillion times and the connectivity of a BID is not mentioned in there at all. It’s my not-a-lawyer understanding that if a law doesn’t explicitly forbid something then that something is allowed.

But the famous Rita Moreno of the City Clerk’s Neighborhood and Business Improvement District division didn’t agree with me in 2017! Then she did agree with me in 2018! And Misty Iwatsu spent some time in 2016 babbling on about the matter and thought 2017 Rita Moreno was right! And Rita Moreno didn’t just think, she advised! And it strikes me that her advice looked an awful lot like practicing law without a license, which is illegal in California!⁴

And of course you want to see details! And primary sources! Turn the page and there they are!!
Continue reading Rita Moreno Thinks The “Boundaries Of A BID Must Be Contiguous” — Misty Iwatsu Agrees!! — No! Wait! Rita Moreno Thinks “There’s No Legal Requirement That The Boundaries Be Contiguous”! — Whichever It Is, We Think That Rita Moreno (A) Is Practicing Law Without A License And Ought To Stop It Right Now Cause It’s Illegal And She’s Confusing Everybody And (B) Does Not Know What The Word “Contiguous” Means →

Business Improvement Districts

South Central Hollywood Racketeer Influenced And Corrupt Organization Officially Known As Larchmont Village BID Appears To Give Up Outlaw Ways, Start Announcing Meetings And Change Their Illegal Bylaws, Perhaps In Response To Yesterday’s Scathing MK.Org Post About Them And Rita Moreno!

April 28, 2017 Mike Leave a comment

But DAMN, it feels good to be a gangsta!

Well, I have been chronicling my troubles with the so-called Larchmont Village BID for at least six months now, starting with their stubborn recalcitrance in releasing records having to do with their accursed signal box art contest, to, more recently, my six month long battle to get a copy of their bylaws out of them, to my eight month struggle to get them to notify me of their damnable meetings as required by the Brown Act at §54954.1, to their appearance in a reprehensible series of emails between City employee Rita Moreno, a BID analyst with the City Clerk’s Neighborhood and Business Improvement District Division, nominally tasked with overseeing BIDs but, in actuality, engaged in enabling their misbehavior and lawlessness.

The thing about those emails was that, along with a bunch of other criminal BIDs, the Larchmont Village BID didn’t post its agendas on its website, even though the Brown Act at §54954.2(a)(1) requires it to do so. And Rita Moreno, rather than telling the lawless BIDs that they were breaking the freaking law, handed out gold stars to the ones who were following it.

Well, that’s where the situation stood until 4:48 p.m. this evening, when I received an email from some entity calling itself office@larchmontvillagebid.com. Attached to this anomalous little missive was the agenda for a BID meeting on Tuesday, May 2. Thus, for whatever reason, just one day after my scathing post calling out the City for not enforcing its laws, its contracts, against these serial South Central Hollywood outlaws, they change their ways. How’s that for activist journalism?! Anyway, there’s tons of interesting stuff to say about this situation that’s a lot more nerdish than that, and you can turn the page if you’re interested.
Continue reading South Central Hollywood Racketeer Influenced And Corrupt Organization Officially Known As Larchmont Village BID Appears To Give Up Outlaw Ways, Start Announcing Meetings And Change Their Illegal Bylaws, Perhaps In Response To Yesterday’s Scathing MK.Org Post About Them And Rita Moreno! →

Announcements, Business Improvement Districts

Don Duckworth, Executive Director Of The Westchester BID, Doesn’t Like Negative Obstacle-Creating Problem-Looking-For City Clerk BID Analyst Rick Scott One Little Bit, Asks Miranda Paster To Replace Him With Far More Congenial Bicycling BID Buddy Eugene Van Cise To Benefit Everybody’s Life (And That’s Just One Of 300+ Emails Now Available!)

April 13, 2017 Mike Leave a comment

Just yesterday, Mr. Don Duckworth of the Westchester Town Center BID sent me a big steaming heap of emails, comprising the BID’s correspondence with the City of Los Angeles for 2016.⁵ I am here to tell you, there is a ton of good stuff in there! This is very, very exciting! I will be writing about items from this release for a good while to come, and the City Ethics Commission is going to be hearing about a whole lot of it as well! But this evening, in addition to this general announcement that the material is available, I want to share a gossipy little item from January 2016, which has its locus classicus right here in this email from Don Duckworth to Miranda Paster.

It seems that WTCBID Boss Man Duckworth wasn’t too happy with BID Analyst Rick Scott, felt that he “approaches me and our work in administering the Westchester Town Center BID in a very negative manner.” In fact, sez Le Duckworth, “[i]t’s as if he’s looking for problems or obstacles to create that interfere with a constructive work flow.” Not only that, but, according to the Donald, “[h]e doesn’t approach our work with recommended solutions for mutual gain or a sense of team work.”

And what’s Don Duckworth’s recommended solution to this negativity and problem-slash-obstacle-seeking behaviour? Why, “[i]f it is possible to request a BID Analyst transfer to Eugene, I would like to do so.” Of course, “Eugene” is Eugene Van Cise, famous in these parts for having ridden his bike around the Gateway to LA BID inspecting their litter. No wonder Don Duckworth likes him better than Rick Scott who, as far as we know, does not do two-wheeled litter inspections of his BIDs. So turn the page for some speculation on why Donald Duckworth is so down on Rick Scott, for a transcription of the email if you’re PDF-aversive, and for a link to Miranda Paster’s reply!
Continue reading Don Duckworth, Executive Director Of The Westchester BID, Doesn’t Like Negative Obstacle-Creating Problem-Looking-For City Clerk BID Analyst Rick Scott One Little Bit, Asks Miranda Paster To Replace Him With Far More Congenial Bicycling BID Buddy Eugene Van Cise To Benefit Everybody’s Life (And That’s Just One Of 300+ Emails Now Available!) →

Fashion District BID, Municipal Ethics

Urban Place Consulting Set To Earn $55,712.20 For Dealing With The 2017/2018 Fashion District BID Renewal Process According To Contract, Which May Also Shed Light On The Intersection Between BID Consultancy And L.A.’s Muncipal Lobbying Ordinance

April 1, 2017 Mike Leave a comment

The Fashion District BID in Downtown Los Angeles is set to expire at the end of 2018. This means that they’ll be collecting petitions roughly in the first quarter of 2018 and going to City Council approximately in the Summer of 2018. The process is complicated for property-based BIDs and usually requires a consultant, and the consultant has to start early. The Fashion District is using Urban Place Consulting.⁶ Work began on the process in January 2017.

Thanks to the competence, kindness, and evident commitment to transparency of the Fashion District BID’s executive director, Rena Masten Leddy,⁷ we have copies of (at least most of) the FDBID’s contract with UPC⁸ as well as the first three months worth of invoices. You can get these:

Crucially, the contract reveals that the Fashion District will pay UPC more than $55,000 over the course of the two year process. The contract is supposed to include a schedule of hourly rates and the invoices are supposed to include an hourly breakdown, but, at least so far, they do not.

Apart from the general interest created by the essential role that BID renewal plays in the life cycle of BIDs, this kind of data is also crucial to my ongoing study of the intersection between the BID renewal process in Los Angeles and the Municipal Lobbying Ordinance. Turn the page for a brief discussion of those issues as well as a brief outline of the renewal process itself.
Continue reading Urban Place Consulting Set To Earn $55,712.20 For Dealing With The 2017/2018 Fashion District BID Renewal Process According To Contract, Which May Also Shed Light On The Intersection Between BID Consultancy And L.A.’s Muncipal Lobbying Ordinance →

Business Improvement Districts, Hypocrisy, Los Angeles City Government

Miranda Paster Whitewashed Homelessness Out Of The Hollywood Media District BID’s 2017 Annual Planning Report, Thereby Unilaterally Altering The BID’s Proposed Activities And Yet Again Putting The Lie To Holly Wolcott’s Often-Used But Thoroughly Discredited Excuse That The City Of LA Has No Control Over BIDs

January 5, 2017 Mike 2 Comments

Los Angeles City Clerk Holly Wolcott interpreting the Property and Business Improvement Law of 1994.

One of the many interesting documents contained in the yield of a recent CPRA request to the Hollywood Media District BID is their 2017 Annual Planning Report, the final revised version of which was filed by executive director Lisa Schechter with the City Clerk’s office on December 14, 2016.⁹ The annual submission of these reports is required by §36650 of the California Streets and Highways Code, part of the Property and Business Improvement District Law of 1994, which regulates the establishment and governance of BIDs in California.

One of the purposes of these reports is to keep the City updated on what the BID plans to do during the new year. In particular, at §36650(b)(2) the law states:

The report shall be filed with the clerk and shall refer to the property and business improvement district by name, specify the fiscal year to which the report applies, and, with respect to that fiscal year, shall contain all of the following information: … The improvements, maintenance, and activities to be provided for that fiscal year.

So for instance, the Media District’s plan explains what they’re going to do about cleaning and security, which are two of the core functions of BIDs. Here’s part of their statement on cleaning:

Other expenditures anticipated include tree trimming, purchase of additional trash receptacle, and other similar projects to beautify the District in accordance with the approved Management District Plan.

And part of their statement on security:

Safe Committee meetings address a full range of issues: loitering, public urination, drinking in public, prostitution, vandalism, graffiti, and quality of life issues.

Continue reading Miranda Paster Whitewashed Homelessness Out Of The Hollywood Media District BID’s 2017 Annual Planning Report, Thereby Unilaterally Altering The BID’s Proposed Activities And Yet Again Putting The Lie To Holly Wolcott’s Often-Used But Thoroughly Discredited Excuse That The City Of LA Has No Control Over BIDs →

Los Angeles City Government, Municipal Ethics

How The City Of Los Angeles Arranges For Itself To Be Lobbied By BIDs Even Though The City Attorney Requires Most City Contractors To Be Explicitly Forbidden From Lobbying The City By Means Of A Contract Clause

December 3, 2016 Mike Leave a comment

Kerry Morrison not thinking of herself as a lobbyist, even though she does lobby and the City of Los Angeles encourages her to lobby.

Issues surrounding business improvement districts and the Los Angeles Municipal Lobbying Ordinance have been fraught with controversy at least since 2009, when the Los Angeles Ethics Commission submitted a comprehensive report to City Council proposing a series of reforms to the law.

One minor part of their proposal would have clarified without altering the application of these laws to business improvement districts which then, as now, are almost certainly required to register as lobbyists, even though none of them do nor have they ever. This minor clause in a major reform proposal kicked off a whirlwind of mouth-slavvery craziness on the part of the BIDs, which ended with Eric Garcetti effectively killing the CEC’s proposal in 2010 for no good reason other than that Kerry Morrison giggled at him in a committee meeting.¹⁰

So it was with a great deal of interest that I read in this Power Point thing from 2012 that, according to Miranda Paster, who is in charge of the division of the Los Angeles City Clerk’s office which oversees BIDs, that she considers part of her duties under the heading of “Optimal Government/Taxpayer BID oversight” to be to “encourage BIDs to lobby council members.”¹¹ Continue reading How The City Of Los Angeles Arranges For Itself To Be Lobbied By BIDs Even Though The City Attorney Requires Most City Contractors To Be Explicitly Forbidden From Lobbying The City By Means Of A Contract Clause →

Municipal Ethics, Venice Beach BID

Why Carl Lambert’s Contributions To The Re-Election Campaigns Of Mike Bonin And Eric Garcetti Were Probably Illegal and Should Be Refunded Immediately

September 3, 2016 Mike Leave a comment

Mike Bonin on August 23, 2016, earning his salary, which should be sufficient.

As I reported the other day, Venice Beach BID proponent and shady illegal hotelier Carl Lambert donated $1400 to Eric Garcetti and $700 to Mike Bonin in 2015. Here is an argument that they ought to give that money back to Lambert immediately.

Not just because it’s the right thing to do. We’re all grownups here, and that’s not so much why things get done. But because it’s probably illegal for them to have accepted the money, or at least for Lambert to have contributed it. To explain why this is the case I have to talk about the campaign finance laws of the City of Los Angeles, which can make anybody’s poor head spin. So forgive me, but perhaps you’ll find it worth the trouble. The whole law is at LAMC Article 9.7, but it’s not necessary to read the whole thing.¹² The section we are interested in today is LAMC 49.7.35, which covers Bidder Contribution and Fundraising Restrictions. This muni code section¹³ implements Section 470 of the City Charter, which covers Limitations on Campaign Contributions in City Elections.¹⁴ At Charter Section 470(a) we find this noble statement of the purpose of the whole thing:

The purpose of this section is to encourage a broader participation in the political process and to avoid corruption or the appearance of corruption in city decision making, and protect the integrity of the City’s procurement and contract processes by placing limits on the amount any person may contribute or otherwise cause to be available to candidates for election to the offices of Mayor, City Attorney, Controller and City Council and promote accountability to the public by requiring disclosure of campaign activities and imposing other campaign restrictions.

Now, it is a fundamental principle in the American legal system that actions can only be illegal if there is an explicit statutory statement that they are illegal. Otherwise they’re legal. So while this statement of purpose has some force, mostly as a guide to interpreting the salient laws, it doesn’t in itself make anything illegal. Obviously Carl Lambert’s contributions to Garcetti and Bonin create the appearance of corruption in city decision making, but if that were sufficient to trigger a criminal prosecution then pretty much every donor to every incumbent candidate would have to be locked up.¹⁵ Thus we have to look to the parts of the law that implement this statement of purpose.

The Charter Section that we are interested in here is 470(c)(12)(B), which states in pertinent part¹⁶ that:

The following persons shall not make a campaign contribution to the Mayor, the City Attorney, the Controller, a City Council member, a candidate for any of those elected City offices, or a City committee controlled by a person who holds or seeks any of those elected City offices … A person who bids on or submits a proposal or other response to a contract solicitation that has an anticipated value of at least $100,000 and requires approval by the elected City office that is held or sought by the person to whom the contribution would be given…

Let’s run through the elements of the law here to see why it’s highly plausible that it forbids Carl Lambert from making contributions to either Eric Garcetti or Mike Bonin:
Continue reading Why Carl Lambert’s Contributions To The Re-Election Campaigns Of Mike Bonin And Eric Garcetti Were Probably Illegal and Should Be Refunded Immediately →

Historical and Theoretical Perspectives, Los Angeles City Government

That Time in 2005 When The City of Los Angeles Briefly Investigated BID Financial Shenanigans And Contract Violations Instead Of Pretending They’re Powerless In The Face Of Them Like They Do Now

September 1, 2016 Mike Leave a comment

Former Los Angeles City Controller Laura Chick (right).

Here’s the situation these days. BIDs have a standard contract that they sign with the City of Los Angeles. It has a lot of requirements in it, and BIDs routinely ignore all of them but a few, known as the “reporting requirements.” I’m skipping the details, but they’re mandated to report various things to the City, and if they don’t then Rick Scott or another one of Miranda Paster’s minions in the Neighborhood & Business Improvement District Division (N&BID) of the Clerk’s office will fire off a threatening email like this one telling the negligent BIDdies to cough up the report or they don’t get paid. On the other hand, there are plenty of clauses in that contract, e.g. the ones on record retention and on abiding by the Public Records Act or the Brown Act, that BIDs not only violate with impunity, but which the City Clerk’s office in the persons of Miranda Paster and Holly Wolcott actually just refuses to enforce. I’ll be writing about that more in the future. Tonight I’m just looking at how it came to pass that N&BID staff even enforce any parts of that contract.
Continue reading →