The actors are in place, costumed as the King and His Court. Hundreds of extras fill the Chamber of Horrors, ready to howl and moan on cue. Quiet on the set. Roll cameras, we're shooting LA Bankruptcy, The Movie.
At 10 a.m. today, the City Council will take up deliberations of a far-reaching plan to downsize and restructure city government in hopes of avoiding the unthinkable, bankruptcy of the nation's second largest city, the once glittering capital of glamour that has fallen on hard times, a victim of the Greenback Plague.
Oh, what a day it will be.
The rabble in their rags -- laborers, peasants, cripples, stoners -- will storm the Palace of Opulence that serves as City Hall, so handsomely refurbished with gold and marble adornments for $300 million across the meadow from the $500 million Bastille of Gendarmes.
Minister of Finance Miguel de Santana will tell the 15 princes and princesses on the Council of Blather how dire the situation is. The Treasury is bare. Bankers and creditors are demanding action.
There is no option but to take the bread from the rabble's plate to feed the army of royal servants and fill the coffers of the Lords of Finance.
The Council of Blather, dressed in their finery, will nod their heads in agreement and then nod off to sleep, weary from their life of self-indulgence.
And then the king himself, King Antonio, will slip into the Chamber of Horrors from the back room where he has been cowering in fear for so long and announce they must act today or he will assert his royal prerogative and slash and burn under his own authority.
Nothing for the homeless bums, the blind and disabled, not even crumbs for the multitudes of peasants.
Prince Rosendahl dares to interrupt, demanding the king "explain to me and my district how he can better spend that money than what we're spending it on. We don't waste a penny."
Crown Prince Eric glares coldly at him and says, with the restraint he is so renowned for, "It's not that those funds are used for bad things. It's that we have people who are about to lose their jobs."
Those people, the royal servants, cheer and clap in support and break into chanting "Feed Us, Feed Us, Feed Us..."
The lower classes mutter and grumble amongst themselves until one fearless soul, hat in hand steps forward and meekly asks for mercy, "Just a crumb, please just a crumb from your table, oh Lords and Masters..."
Tears welling up her eyes, the ambitious Princess Janice, touches the peasant's shoulder with her gloved hand and says she hears his plaint and announces she will give up one of her body servants.
"If we're asking everyone else to sacrifice, we have to also be willing to offer up," she declares.
"Let these humble beings eat cake but only a small piece."
When the king sneaks out the back of the Chamber much as he arrived, the Council engages the arduous labor of agreeing to everything demanded of them.
But then the unexpected happens, brave young Shawn Simons of Arc rushes forth and demands to be heard. She passionately calls on the Council to retreat from their actions, to see the disaster that will occur, how the whole kingdom could fall into poverty and chaos.
Her pleas fall on deaf ears. She refuses orders to be silent but as the gendarmes move to escort from the Chamber, the masses of nobodies behind her rush forward and a voice in the crowd shouts, "Off with their heads."
At that moment, the director shouts: "Cut, and print."
At 10 a.m. today, the City Council will take up deliberations of a far-reaching plan to downsize and restructure city government in hopes of avoiding the unthinkable, bankruptcy of the nation's second largest city, the once glittering capital of glamour that has fallen on hard times, a victim of the Greenback Plague.
Oh, what a day it will be.
The rabble in their rags -- laborers, peasants, cripples, stoners -- will storm the Palace of Opulence that serves as City Hall, so handsomely refurbished with gold and marble adornments for $300 million across the meadow from the $500 million Bastille of Gendarmes.
Minister of Finance Miguel de Santana will tell the 15 princes and princesses on the Council of Blather how dire the situation is. The Treasury is bare. Bankers and creditors are demanding action.
There is no option but to take the bread from the rabble's plate to feed the army of royal servants and fill the coffers of the Lords of Finance.
The Council of Blather, dressed in their finery, will nod their heads in agreement and then nod off to sleep, weary from their life of self-indulgence.
And then the king himself, King Antonio, will slip into the Chamber of Horrors from the back room where he has been cowering in fear for so long and announce they must act today or he will assert his royal prerogative and slash and burn under his own authority.
Nothing for the homeless bums, the blind and disabled, not even crumbs for the multitudes of peasants.
Prince Rosendahl dares to interrupt, demanding the king "explain to me and my district how he can better spend that money than what we're spending it on. We don't waste a penny."
Crown Prince Eric glares coldly at him and says, with the restraint he is so renowned for, "It's not that those funds are used for bad things. It's that we have people who are about to lose their jobs."
Those people, the royal servants, cheer and clap in support and break into chanting "Feed Us, Feed Us, Feed Us..."
The lower classes mutter and grumble amongst themselves until one fearless soul, hat in hand steps forward and meekly asks for mercy, "Just a crumb, please just a crumb from your table, oh Lords and Masters..."
Tears welling up her eyes, the ambitious Princess Janice, touches the peasant's shoulder with her gloved hand and says she hears his plaint and announces she will give up one of her body servants.
"If we're asking everyone else to sacrifice, we have to also be willing to offer up," she declares.
"Let these humble beings eat cake but only a small piece."
When the king sneaks out the back of the Chamber much as he arrived, the Council engages the arduous labor of agreeing to everything demanded of them.
But then the unexpected happens, brave young Shawn Simons of Arc rushes forth and demands to be heard. She passionately calls on the Council to retreat from their actions, to see the disaster that will occur, how the whole kingdom could fall into poverty and chaos.
Her pleas fall on deaf ears. She refuses orders to be silent but as the gendarmes move to escort from the Chamber, the masses of nobodies behind her rush forward and a voice in the crowd shouts, "Off with their heads."
At that moment, the director shouts: "Cut, and print."
Ron Kaye
I'm calling B.S. on the Mayor's offer to transfer general fund employees to the proprietary departments. Employees were sent notification after business hours on Friday and given until the end of Monday to apply, so many did not get the notice until it was too late. Addtionally, the proprietary departments did not disclose all of their vacancies to the Mayor's office. There were hardly any administrative postions made available which is a complete lie. Of course, the Mayor's staff doesn't have a clue on how to check the information given to them.
STOP THE PRESSES - we have a new crisis - the land around the Hollywood sign is available a bargain price - we might unite the Hollywood rabble to acquire it, then we can donate it to the City "for posterity", where the Council can immediately sell it (or at least install parking meters), lest the Chicago owners (there's that Chicago connection again) turn it into a hillside of condos!
On LU's news (Channel 5 10:00) last night the Hollywood residents were united in the belief that this was the biggest crisis by far to come down the pike in years.
I know the Valley tried to secede several years ago - can we just kick Hollywood out and let them deal with their own little insecurities by themselves
I'm calling B.S. on the Mayor's offer to transfer general fund employees to the proprietary departments. Employees were sent notification after business hours on Friday and given until the end of Monday to apply, so many did not get the notice until it was too late. Addtionally, the proprietary departments did not disclose all of their vacancies to the Mayor's office. There were hardly any administrative postions made available which is a complete lie. Of course, the Mayor's staff doesn't have a clue on how to check the information given to them.
I'm calling B.S. on the Mayor's offer to transfer general fund employees to the proprietary departments. Employees were sent notification after business hours on Friday and given until the end of Monday to apply, so many did not get the notice until it was too late. Addtionally, the proprietary departments did not disclose all of their vacancies to the Mayor's office. There were hardly any administrative postions made available which is a complete lie. Of course, the Mayor's staff doesn't have a clue on how to check the information given to them.
Well, maybe this filming happens. The LA film permit office wants signatures, isn't sure it will issue a permit and suggests this filming doesn't upset neighbors by any means. Perhaps it might be better filmed in another state that welcomes the revenue and jobs.
Socco! Boffo! Great at the box office! Bid already in on "L.A. Bankruptcy, Part Deux."
Unbelievably, Alarcon says he speaks "for a number of us on the Council" who believe that NO LAYOFfs at all need happen - that all those people can be moved to other positions or depts.
The mayor came in to boo's from the union people, but gamely went on with proposing layoffs. However after Alarcon's socialist damn-the-taxpayers speech, he's saying he hopes to move hundreds if not all to other dept., many are leaving under ERIP, and it will take months to actually lay anyone off. Meanwhile the city has over hundreds of Millions in outstanding depts. from parking citations etc., but for some reason claims it will take 6 years to collect all the money. In the end though, he's telling Alarcon that no layoffs is not feasible. The other options are eliminating depts. but even then. Depleting the reserve fund which lowers the city's credit rating should not be done.
Antonio points out that 5 councilmembers including "who, me?" Zine signed off on the 1000 layoffs, going back to Alarcon who's making him out the bad guy to make himself look good to the unions.
But as noted in another thread a report in today's LA Times says that L A county has fewer middle class and more poor than elsewhere (clear from the low homeownership, despite Alarcon wanting to increase that by mandating "living wage") 4 of 10 people in L A county who are poor are considered in extreme poverty, and most of them are in L A city, with high need for social and public services.
Alarcon is right that the city should have done more to create "good jobs" but that's not going to happen overnight, and not with the way the homeowner groups fight job-creating jobs like building Expo, development and construction, etc.
Koretz insists we cut LAPD - to applause from the unions in chambers - but disregarding that his residents in CD5 are already angry at having fewer cops than they feel they need to be safe. He knows that, having attended Rosendahl's townhall meeting last December where they both demanded Bratton deliver - yet they both want to cut LAPD. These people are something.
During 2002-03, ITA argued to the City Council that ITA needed an additional Temporary Telecommunications Regulatory Officer position to help ITA complete cable television franchise renewal negotiations.
ITA then proceeded to hire two TROs who had no cable television regulatory work experience. The Temporary hire, William Imperial, was noteworthy for having resigned from the California Bar after having been repeatedly disciplined by the California Bar.
Not surprisingly, ITA failed to complete cable television franchise renewal negotiations, thus wasting thousands of hours of City employee time and hundreds of thousands of City dollars, if not more.
One of the above two TRO hires (Richard Benbow) resigned from City employment and now works for Time Warner Cable.
Mr. Imperial, the "temporary" hire is still at the City, collecting over $120,000 a year in salary plus City benefits.
Does ITA have a justifiable reason for continuing to employ Mr. Imperial?
Not once, during his tenure at the City, has the City ever imposed monetary penalties against a cable television company for a violation of the City's video/cable customer service standards.
Cable television franchise fee reviews are farmed out to private CPAs. The City doesn't need to pay someone $120,000 to renew these contracts with outside CPAs.
Mr. Imperial has done virtually nothing to put meaningful Public, Education, and Governmental Access programming on Time Warner's Cable System. There is a bulletin board on one channel in the 90s and another potential channel lies fallow. Imperial is not significantly responsible for the programming on Channels 35 and 36.
Why does the City continue wasting money on William Imperial?
An amazing scenario! And just when you think the drama and pathos can't be topped, King Tony the Turncoat does just that, demanding that the princes and princesses give up money from their allowances to bolster the kindom's faltering reserve!
Oh No!, Not I, shout the princes and princesses! We need that money more than anyone else, especially those who will lose all! We watch every penny! We can't possibly survive without a staff that earns $111,000.00 or our other perks! Then in a show of defiance, and just to show everyone who's boss, the princes and princesses transfer the very allowances the King has targeted into other "special" funds, therefore ensuring that the peasants will be forever put in their place.