Tag Archives: Taylor Bazley

Vicki Nussbaum Applied In June 2018 For John Walker’s Job At The Studio City BID — The BID Asked Kerry Morrison’s Opinion On Vicki Nussbaum Cause Why Not? — Kerry Morrison Doesn’t Know Vicki Nussbaum — Ben Besley Found This Fact “Telling” — Sarah Besley Told Hubbie Ben Besley That Vicki Nussbaum Didn’t “Participate In The BID Community” — Sarah Besley Found This “Concerning” — Ben Besley Is On The Hiring Committee — Vicki Nussbaum Interviewed In June — But Seems Like She Didn’t Get The Job Cause They Interviewed Taylor Bazley In September — Seems Like Sarah Besley Did A Hatchet Job On Vicki Nussbaum — Sad If True — But There Are No Innocents In BIDlandia

October 8, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

The short version of the backstory is that the Studio City BID is hiring a replacement for its executive director, Dr. John Walker Ph.D. You can read the details and see a copy of the job announcement here in yesterday’s post. Yesterday we talked about applicant Taylor Bazley. Today’s topic is Ms. Vicki Nussbaum. Here’s what I know about Vicki Nussbaum. She was the director of the Village at Sherman Oaks BID at least since January 2016 and likely earlier than that.¹ More recently she was appointed executive director of the Century City BID.² So she’s been around BIDlandia for at least three years if not more.

Oh, and I also know that she applied for Dr. John Walker’s job and not only that but just a few days after the job announcement was published Dr. Walker Ph.D. offered her an in-person interview!³ The interview was set for July 11, 2018, and I have no reason to suspect that it didn’t come off exactly as planned. Of course we know they didn’t hire her right then because in early September they interviewed Taylor Bazley.

And BID Board member Ben Besley is on the hiring committee. And he claims to be married to Sarah McPherson Besley, well-known for the fact that she used to work for Kerry Morrison in Hollywood where she was famous for hating Peruvians and hating overpasses. Don’t know which she hates worse. Anyway, for reasons that aren’t yet clear, Sarah Besley went and asked Kerry Morrison about Vicki Nussbaum and Kerry Morrison didn’t know her. And Sarah Besley didn’t know her either. And … oh, heck, why not let Ben Besley tell it. In this stunning little email chain he says:

I also got some interesting feedback, or telling lack of feedback, on Vicki from my wife Sarah, who used to Chair the Los Angeles BID Consortium. Sarah doesn’t know Vicki and neither does her former manager Kerry Morrison. This is telling of someone who is now managing multiple BIDs. Sarah thought it was concerning that she hasn’t been participating in the “BID community” over her the course of her career.

How’s that for hard core, friends? If you don’t know Kerry Morrison and Sarah Besley you don’t get the job! It wasn’t listed as a necessary attribute,⁴ but man, it sure freaking turned out to be. Pretty tragic for Vicki Nussbaum, I think, cause obviously she had no idea this was a job requirement. At least the publication of this vital information makes it clear for all future applicants! You gotta kiss up to Kerry Morrison and Sarah Besley if you wanna be a BID zeck dreck! Anyway, turn the page for transcriptions of all the emails arranging for Vicki Nussbaum’s seemingly fruitless visit to the damn Studio City BID!
Continue reading Vicki Nussbaum Applied In June 2018 For John Walker’s Job At The Studio City BID — The BID Asked Kerry Morrison’s Opinion On Vicki Nussbaum Cause Why Not? — Kerry Morrison Doesn’t Know Vicki Nussbaum — Ben Besley Found This Fact “Telling” — Sarah Besley Told Hubbie Ben Besley That Vicki Nussbaum Didn’t “Participate In The BID Community” — Sarah Besley Found This “Concerning” — Ben Besley Is On The Hiring Committee — Vicki Nussbaum Interviewed In June — But Seems Like She Didn’t Get The Job Cause They Interviewed Taylor Bazley In September — Seems Like Sarah Besley Did A Hatchet Job On Vicki Nussbaum — Sad If True — But There Are No Innocents In BIDlandia →

Business Improvement Districts

Emmy Winning Studio City BID Zeck Dreck Dr. John Walker Ph.D. Is Quitting — Mike Bonin Field Deputy Taylor Bazley Applied For His Job — Listed Shadowy Venice Beach BID Boss Tara Devine As A Reference — John Walker Told Hiring Committee What A Loser Tara Devine Is And Maybe Her Recommendation Wasn’t Valuable — And She Wasn’t Returning Their Calls Anyway — Plus Kerry Morrison Was All Like Taylor Who?!?! —It Seems That The Position Is Still Unfilled — Except That These BIDdies Violate The Brown Act Constantly So They May Well Have Filled It In Secret

October 7, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Right now there is no BID more interesting to me in the entire City of Los Angeles than the Studio City BID. I mean, I dropped by one of their furtive little meetings last month and one of their directors, famously angry clown Matthew Dunn, was so rattled by my presence that he stormed out of his own meeting.¹ And then they committed such an astonishing series of so very flagrant violations of the Brown Act that I was forced to send them a demand letter asking them to pinky swear that they’d never do it again.

And man, when it comes to his CPRAiatic duties, SCBID zeck dreck Dr. John Walker Ph.D.² is a freaking pain in that thing that writers often resort to mentioning pains in for metaphorical purposes, but once in a while a few items trickle through the border wall as they did yesterday when he, or at least his pocky little minion Damian Gatto, sent over a few righteous goodies! And amongst these was this announcement from June 2018 in which the Studio City BID gave notice to the BID Consortium that it was hiring a replacement for Emmy-winning Zeck Dreck Dr. John Walker!! There is a transcription of this remarkable document after the break.

And then the applications started rolling in! The first applicant I have information about was evidently Ms. Vicki Nussbaum, who used to be the executive director of the Sherman Oaks BID and may still be for all I know, but is at least also the executive director of the Century City BID.³ You’ll hear more about this lady’s application quite soon, but not today.⁴

And the next applicant that I know anything about is our old friend Taylor Freaking Bazley! That’s right, Mike Bonin’s creepy little field deputy for Venice, deeply implicated in the horror show that is the Venice Beach BID, is out looking for another job! Do his friends at CD11 know about this?! Probably not, because he obviously isn’t using them as references! You can read everything I know in this September 12, 2018 email from SCBID Board member Ben Besley⁵ to John Walker, Board president Tony Richman, and fellow hiring committee members Barry Wise and Dean Cutler.

Here’s the story in brief, and you will find detailed discussion and transcriptions of all relevant emails after the break! About a month ago Taylor Bazley interviewed for the job. After his interview he sent a sycophantic thanks-friend! email to Board president Tony Richman about how the committee’s shit smelled like roses and so on.⁶ Also, he seems to have given shadowy BID president Tara Devine’s name as a reference. The hiring committee evidently found it difficult to get in touch with Tara Devine. Finally, Ben Besley got an email from admin@venicebeachbid.com, a well-known pseudonym of Ms. Tara Devine, splaining that Tara Devine was too busy to talk to him right now but maybe later!

Then John Walker weighed in with a story about how TD was being investigated for not spending BID money properly and also how the SCBID didn’t hire her to be their renewal consultant because she charged too damn much. He closed this defamational little missive with the defamer’s favorite excuse: “This is not meant to sway your investigation but I think you should be aware of some history.” So yeah, just another example of how the Los Angeles BID world is like one big seething daisy chain but without the sex.⁷ Turn the page for transcriptions of all relevant material!
Continue reading Emmy Winning Studio City BID Zeck Dreck Dr. John Walker Ph.D. Is Quitting — Mike Bonin Field Deputy Taylor Bazley Applied For His Job — Listed Shadowy Venice Beach BID Boss Tara Devine As A Reference — John Walker Told Hiring Committee What A Loser Tara Devine Is And Maybe Her Recommendation Wasn’t Valuable — And She Wasn’t Returning Their Calls Anyway — Plus Kerry Morrison Was All Like Taylor Who?!?! —It Seems That The Position Is Still Unfilled — Except That These BIDdies Violate The Brown Act Constantly So They May Well Have Filled It In Secret →

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.¹

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.² 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!³

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 →

Venice Beach BID

Venice Beach BID Board Unilaterally Raises Everyone’s Property Taxes By 5% In The Face Of Universal Opposition — The BID Spends About 10% Of Its Annual Income On Lawyers — And About 10% On Tara Freaking Devine — George “Demonic Goatee” Francisco And Taylor “Smartest Guy In Room Cause UCLA” Bazley Spent What Seemed Like The Whole Damn Meeting Cooing Icky-Sticky Satanic Incantations In Each Others’ Ears

June 16, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Last Wednesday the Venice Beach BID board of directors met. I was able to attend and record video of the entire dark and bloody ritual, which you can watch either on YouTube or else on Archive.Org depending on which way your pleasure tends.¹

Anyway, the most sinister part was the fact that the board voted to raise assessments 5% for next year. You can watch the actual vote here — it was five to one, with useful idiot and legitimacy-lender Connie Brooks voting against despite Mark Sokol’s unsuccessful attempt to bully her into abstaining.² This from a BID which didn’t start operations until far more than a year after it was created and did so little its first year that the City forced it to refund everyone’s money.

As late as March 2018 the City was still having to threaten this BID with disestablishment due to its inability to meet even the most basic terms of its contract. These are the people who are boosting everyone’s taxes by 5% next year. And what do they need that money for given that they have not actually done anything with all the money they’ve already bled out of the people of Venice?
Continue reading Venice Beach BID Board Unilaterally Raises Everyone’s Property Taxes By 5% In The Face Of Universal Opposition — The BID Spends About 10% Of Its Annual Income On Lawyers — And About 10% On Tara Freaking Devine — George “Demonic Goatee” Francisco And Taylor “Smartest Guy In Room Cause UCLA” Bazley Spent What Seemed Like The Whole Damn Meeting Cooing Icky-Sticky Satanic Incantations In Each Others’ Ears →

Los Angeles City Government, Venice Beach BID

Last Friday, May 18, Devine And Heumann Got Called On The Carpet At City Hall To Get Yelled At By Wolcott, Hoppes, Moreno, Bazley, And Possibly Molnar! — We Have A Copy Of The Refund Affadavit Letter Being Sent To VBBID Property Owners! — As Of This Wednesday, May 23, Tara Devine Still Hadn’t Submitted The Freaking Annual Planning Report — Moreno Coming At Her All Salty! — And Rightly So!

May 25, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

A bunch of new documents for you this morning, friends! You can look through the whole pile of them here on Archive.Org, and read on for some selected gems!

First of all, recall that the Venice Beach BID is being required by the City to refund most of the money collected from property owners in 2017 because they were too damn arrogant and/or incompetent to actually do anything other than pay themselves salaries with the almost two million dollars the City handed over to them.¹

You can read this copy of the letter to property owners along with instructions for filling out the necessary affadavit. This was scheduled to be sent out on May 11. What’s more interesting, though, is this email exchange from May 8 between Tara Devine and Rita Moreno about when this letter was to be sent. First Rita Moreno emailed Tara Devine at 3:20 p.m. and said:

Hi Tara,

For your information, attached is the notice and instructions that will be mailed out on Friday. Also included will be the actual Affidavit and the return envelope.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Rita

A mere seven minutes later² the shadowy one fired off this intemperate reply:

Thank you. To clarify, we want to sit down before anything is mailed . It is important that we understand the entire process.

I’m working now to schedule something as early as possible next week. (Monday is launch, so it can’t be Monday.)

Amazingly, Tara Devine does not seem to understand that she’s not in charge of this situation. She and her BIDdies out in Venice have messed up far, far beyond what’s acceptable to the City, and it takes an awful lot to get to that point. She does not have the leverage to set terms. Which is essentially what Rita Moreno said to her in reply.

Turn the page to read that reply as well as the story of Tara Devine and Steve Heumann’s May 18 meeting at City Hall with a bunch of angry City officials and the story of how as of this Wednesday, May 23, Tara Devine still hasn’t gotten that damn annual planning report in!
Continue reading Last Friday, May 18, Devine And Heumann Got Called On The Carpet At City Hall To Get Yelled At By Wolcott, Hoppes, Moreno, Bazley, And Possibly Molnar! — We Have A Copy Of The Refund Affadavit Letter Being Sent To VBBID Property Owners! — As Of This Wednesday, May 23, Tara Devine Still Hadn’t Submitted The Freaking Annual Planning Report — Moreno Coming At Her All Salty! — And Rightly So! →

Los Angeles City Government, Venice Beach BID

Mike Bonin Told Taylor Bazley To Ask Rita Moreno If It Was Possible To Remove “A Specific Affordable Housing Development From The BID” — Rita Moreno Wrongly Told Him It Was Not Possible And Cited Tara Freaking Devine In Support Of Her Incorrect Theory — Yet Again The City Of Los Angeles Cedes Its Lawful Authority To BIDdies For Nefarious Reasons Of Its Own

May 14, 2018 Mike Leave a comment

Remember at the end of the hearing at which the City Council established the Venice Beach BID in November 2016 CD11 repster Mike Bonin told the audience that he was going to help get residential-use properties out of the BID. Listen to him here, and here’s what he said:

And I would just say one final thing to those who talked about the fact that they have properties that are zoned commercial but are used as residential. As I said when I met with [unintelligible] recently, I am happy to help those folks get their properties rezoned as residential properties.

Bonin reneged on that promise, and since then he’s been parroting Tara Devine’s mendacious theory that there’s no way for commercially zoned properties to be removed from a BID even though the PBID law very clearly states otherwise.¹ It empowers the City Council to lower assessments and/or to remove properties from a BID for any reason or no reason at all.²

Mike Bonin is so committed at this point to hewing to Tara Devine’s bizarre interpretation of the law that he even lets her respond to press inquiries on the matter using his name. And the City Clerk, Ms. Holly Wolcott, is also all-in on this theory, even though it’s provably wrong, wrong, wrong. So presumably her staff in the Clerk’s office are also true believers.

Thus it was not much of a surprise to learn from this January 2018 email exchange between CD11 Venice field deputy Taylor Bazley and City Clerk BID honcho Rita Moreno that Bonin was still obsessed with finding legal support, no matter how shaky and wrong it might be, for never ever removing any property from the BID ever.³

The short version is that Taylor Bazley wrote to Rita Moreno and was all can we remove a particular affordable housing project from the BID?! And Rita Moreno, who is evidently not even worried about getting popped for the unlawful practice of law, was all no way Taylor!! Properties can’t be removed from the BID for any reason whatsoever until the end of the BID!!

And to support her position she quoted a bunch of wrong-headed contradictory nonsense from Tara Devine! Anyway, there’s a transcription of the email thread and some commentary after the break, so read on, friends!!
Continue reading Mike Bonin Told Taylor Bazley To Ask Rita Moreno If It Was Possible To Remove “A Specific Affordable Housing Development From The BID” — Rita Moreno Wrongly Told Him It Was Not Possible And Cited Tara Freaking Devine In Support Of Her Incorrect Theory — Yet Again The City Of Los Angeles Cedes Its Lawful Authority To BIDdies For Nefarious Reasons Of Its Own →

Hollywood BID Patrol

Evidently CD11 Staff Is Telling Concerned Constituents That BID Patrol Security Guards Cannot Touch People At All. That They Cannot Do Anything That You Or I Could Not Do. The Second Claim Unfortunately Is True. The First Is False. We Have Proof.

August 27, 2016 Mike Leave a comment

One of over three hundred people arrested, shackled, and physically transported by the Hollywood BID Patrol in 2015.

According to a recent post on Facebook, Mike Bonin’s Venice Field Deputy Taylor Bazley is telling concerned constituents that¹ they [the BID Patrol] cannot touch people at all. He said “They can not do anything that you or I could not do. They just alert police. That’s all.”

The second claim, that BID security cannot do anything that any private person can’t do, is true, but it doesn’t make the point that Taylor Bazley wants it to make. California has one of the most weirdly expansive citizens’ arrest statutes (PC 837 et seq.) in the known universe. A lawyer of my acquaintance once said² that it essentially authorizes fricking Batman. So actually, you yourself can physically restrain people with handcuffs if they e.g. sit on the sidewalk in your presence.³

Sorry, Taylor. You're cute, but you're wrong. — Sorry, Taylor. You’re cute, but you’re wrong.

But Taylor Bazley’s attributed claim that BID security can’t arrest people is just wrong. The Hollywood BID Patrol, run by Andrews International Security, has made physical custodial arrests of far more than 10,000 people since they began their work here in 2007. In 2013 they made more than 1% of the arrests in the entire City of Los Angeles. You can watch videos of their arrests, read arrest reports and daily logs, and even look at photos of the people they’ve arrested:
Continue reading →

Venice Beach BID

LAFLA Questions Legality of Venice Beach BID Approval Process in Letter to Mike Feuer, Holly Wolcott. Ballot Tabulation Published By City, Demonstrating Anti-Democratic Nature of BID Process. CD11 and Shadowy BID Consultant Tara Devine Play Favorites With Information Access

August 24, 2016 Mike 2 Comments

Today two interesting items hit the Venice Beach BID Council File. First there is a letter from LAFLA Attorney Shayla Myers demonstrating that the City did not follow the strictly mandated procedure for hearings prior to establishing an assessment district. The issue is that Council President Herb Wesson cut off public comment without allowing everyone present to be heard. This is completely acceptable under the Brown Act, which regulates general public meetings in California. In the cases covered by that law, agencies can put reasonable limits on public comment. However, the hearings that must be held before BIDs can be established are described in the Property and Business Improvement District Law of 1994, which at section 36623 requires that the “notice and protest and hearing procedure shall comply with Section 53753 of the Government Code.” This section requires…well, I’m going to let Myers explain:
Continue reading LAFLA Questions Legality of Venice Beach BID Approval Process in Letter to Mike Feuer, Holly Wolcott. Ballot Tabulation Published By City, Demonstrating Anti-Democratic Nature of BID Process. CD11 and Shadowy BID Consultant Tara Devine Play Favorites With Information Access →