Ignore, if you can, Richard Alarcon’s arrogant and despicable treatment of an honorable public servant in this video and focus instead on the ignorant and despicable point he is making.
What Alarcon is saying that he wants to take the nearly $8 million in federal stimulus money the city was awarded to buy computers for poor neighborhoods to reduce the digital divide and use it to retain city workers in the current jobs.
In other words, this labor union stooge who talks endlessly about the injustices the rest of us commit against the poor is willing to protect some of the nation’s highest paid city workers and cheat kids and families in the city’s most impoverished and under-served communities out of the chance for access to the modern world.
For my money, that’s a crime against humanity and ought to be recognized as such.
Alarcon is not alone in this skewed view of the world.
For whatever lip service the rest of his colleagues on the City Council may pay to rhyme and reason, they share his sensibility and vote with extraordinary unanimity to put the city’s workforce ahead of the city.
That is why we are in trouble, why they are willing to sell the city’s assets and mortgage its future, why they are drooling at the chance sock it to us from every direction with higher rates, taxes and fees, why they are for the third time in less than a year back at the bargaining table with the unions begging for help in this budget crisis charade.
They are protecting city jobs, city wages and city benefits at all costs because the unions, with help from developers, contractors and other special interests, put them into the nation’s highest and most lavishly perked municipal elected offices.
They no more care about the poor than they care about the rest of us. If they did, poverty in LA would not be getting worse year after year, unemployment would not be among the highest in the country, there would not so much substandard housing, or many sweatshops.
Their programs to help the poor, the disabled, the disadvantaged are as much a failure as virtually every other thing they do from rotting water and electrical systems to 75-year backlogs in sidewalk and street paving, from the proliferation of digital billboards to the proliferation of marijuana shops.
The mayor is no less guilty.
Together, they have used City Hall to enrich their friends and allies.
They have turned City Hall into a jobs program instead of a services
provider.
And as the crisis deepens by the day, they are moving forward at
continuing those policies with what they hope will be $1.5 billion in
federal money and, as much as they can, raise cash by selling the farm
and borrowing against the city’s future.
The critical elements of the Mayor’s three-year budget plan come before
the Council on Tuesday. It is not so much a plan as an outline of how
to eliminate a vast array of basic services other than police and fire
without anyone in what they call the “City Family” actually losing
their job or the cost of pensions and lifetime health benefits
decreasing.
Don’t blame the bureaucrats whose names are on these plans. They were
just following orders in proposing the closure of numerous parks, sharp
scaling back of library services and hours, elimination of the
inspectors who provide health and safety protection along with planners
who could preserve the quality of life in our neighborhoods.
This is a calamity in the making.
That is not some dark vision of a doomsayer. It is the reality hidden
in plain sight. It can be seen by anyone who will actually read the
details of the failure of leadership and management revealed in the
1,000 pages of bureaucratic documents produced to support this budget
plan
It is visible to anyone who is not walking around with eyes wide shut.
But it is not inevitable.
City workers need to look at the hollow promises the Mayor and Council
have made them over the last year. Again, they are being told there
will be transfers, not layoffs, and if they give back a little more
now, they will be rewarded handsomely in a few years.
They can promise the workers anything but they can’t deliver. Their own
budget experts do not expect full recovery for as long as a decade.
They believe pressure will force more reductions in the general fund
within a few months when no more transfers are possible, when no more
cooking of the books is possible, when borrowing more has become
impossible.
There is another way to save LA, to protect vital services, provide
long-term job security to city workers, change the culture of failure
of City Hall into a culture of success for LA.
It requires extending City Hall’s definition of “family” to the four
million people who call LA home, to the thousands of businesses
operating in town, and bringing all the constituencies to the table
with the unions and city officials.
City workers need to take a step back financially and the public has to
pay its share in a tightly-written and tightly managed three-year plan
that actually puts LA on a sound financial footing.
We cannot save LA by destroying it. That’s what our elected leaders are
planning to do, that’s why we have lost confidence in them.
City workers need to wake up and realize the empty promises of the
politicians jeopardize their futures, The public needs to wake up and
realize they have to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.
We are all in this together. After all, it’s our LA — not theirs.
Richard Alarcon is a world class asshole. Why hasn’t he been indicted yet?
Alarcon is the worst kind of socialist and Latino- centric pol, a hypocritical one: do as I say, not as I do. The old-school lefties like Hahn, Koretz and Rosendahl are also intent on raising property taxes on the middle class again (Hahn still hasn’t given up on her parcel tax for another gang program she wants to control) instead of making the tough decisions, and blame Santana instead for “having no heart.” When the Wizard forgot to give them courage and brains. La Bonge certainly rides along and non-sensical noises in support of this group.
Others have selective memories, like Smith and Parks urging the trash fee hike and “Phone Tax Reduction” for more cops and firefighters, but then telling us that the money was never meant for that ever, but just to replenish the General Fund they both helped run into the ground on the Budget Committee. While fellow Budget Committee member Zine voted for the 1000 layoffs but now tells the Times he can’t remember where that idea came from, joining the blame Santana game. Who’s taking the heat for what they won’t do.
Some of the dumber councilmembers like La Bonge have other skills which presumably make them major assets to L A, however, even as they show how incompetent they are. L A Magazine held a “Get L A Short Film Competition,” with 21 LA “optimists, futurists and dreamers” taking part- literally singing – including La Bonge and a “white witch” called Maya. Watch the video and decide for yourself if this skill, and his annual calendars and leading hikes and bike rides in Griffith Park (managing to lose no weight despite all the exercise), make up for his being a vapid suit on the council.
Hell, this is mild. Alarcon, with his overriding concern for City employees, treats them like crap. I can’t imagine what were to happen to ME if I treated my employees the way he treats civil servants. He rarely understands the issue, and when he gets confused, he usually gets insulting and starts raising his voice. He’s worse over the phone – literally yelling at people and calling them incompetent because they’re recommending against something one of his cronies want, or for something they’re against. He used to be a City employee, too, once upon a time, and I have it on good authority that he didn’t manage to pass probation for one of the positions he held. He’s incompetent AND unethical – a really bad combination.
I can hardly wait to see Alarcon’s next ploy to rip-off children. But keep your eye out for a new program to fight child obesity by reducing the size of school lunches. Hey, if you’ll steal a kid’s computer, why not steal his lunch money, too?
Jack Humpreville, an extremely dedicated and smart civic leader has a very interesting article on the Mayor’s lifestyle in the current edition of Citywatch. The following is an excerpt-”After federal and state income taxes, tuitions at Princeton and Marlborough (sticker price of at least $80,000 after tax), and the support of his about to be ex wife who does not live in Getty House, there is not much, if any, left over to squire a former Miss America around town, dine at the City’s most exclusive restaurants with their fabulous wine cellars, and first class travel around the world. And his tailored suits, custom made shirts, and designer ties do not come from 3-Day Suit Broker.
But that may have been the topic of the dinner conversation between these three public servants: How do you support a million dollar lifestyle without the press, the voters, and the Ethics Commission knowing what the hell is going on?”
A lot of us have asked that question, except DA Steve Cooley. I forgot, he is busy getting his name in the papers going after an old codger in Switzerland, and joining the ghouls in the Michael Jackson misery. If he stands any chance for winning State General Attorney, he better go after the real criminals who have bankrupted this city than gimmicks, noone cares about.
Tony the T_ _ M _ _!!! Tony who?
I know…is it Tony the Tiger? No…?
Does it rhyme with bologny or phoney?…NO!
Hint: George Harrison from the Beatles wrote this song,….Give me a “T”;give me an “A”;give me an “X”;give me an “M”;give me an “A”..again…give me an “N”…what do WE get:
Tony the “Taxman”!!!!!!!!! Yeah!…”Please, no applause, no checks, just your honest hard earned money…and that’s a ALL folks…”
FYI: http://mises.org/story/1853
Don’t believe everything you read now…
Alarcon is the finest manure pile you can find in council. He doesn’t live in the district he represents, his daughter was slid into a nice 6 figure job as a commissioner with no prior experience and his cousin was given a sweet $70,000 a year contract as a field deputy even though the guy was forced to retire from the city for using city personnel to paint his house on city time!
This guy is a Garbage.
Garbage are the folks who elect him.
Very telling.
We would not be talking about this $8M for computers if the City would’ve properly taken care of business in the first place.
Let’s face it; the problem is mismanagement of city funds. AEG got $246M in tax breaks for LA LIVE and a $5M grant from redevelopment funds. The Parking contractors owe the City more than $300M dollars, with Prestige parking as the highest debtor at more than $70M.
All monies would’ve have gone for their intended purposes….if it were in the right hands!
Who is electing this Latin trash? I think all bureaucrats who have to sit before him on Council should just ignore him. Can you imagine the kind of whores who sleep with him?
Garbage, you have it partially right. His cousin, the “chief deputy” was “allowed to retire” in lieu of being fired over fraud/falsification types of issues. He had already had a 20 day suspension for other transgressions that were similar (allowing employees to falsely claim bonuses and OT). The painting incident could never be proven, but it was because he had someone fix the timesheets so that it looked like the employees hadn’t been on the clock that day — and later rewarded that employee with a bonus she wasn’t entitled to, to keep her quiet.
Garbage, you have it partially right. His cousin, the “chief deputy” was “allowed to retire” in lieu of being fired over fraud/falsification types of issues. He had already had a 20 day suspension for other transgressions that were similar (allowing employees to falsely claim bonuses and OT). The painting incident could never be proven, but it was because he had someone fix the timesheets so that it looked like the employees hadn’t been on the clock that day — and later rewarded that employee with a bonus she wasn’t entitled to, to keep her quiet.
DO SOMETHING!!!! We need to let Washington know what our local politicians are doing with money meant for poor areas where kids don’t have access to computers. When the stimulus money was announced Secretary of Commerce Locke, Senator Boxer and Congresswoman Maxine Waters were all in South LA to announce the stimulus $$. Call to let them know the money meant for kids and schools is being hoarded in city hall. You know Maxine will not be pleased.
Secretary of Commerce Locke
TheSec@doc.gov -(202) 482-2112
Deputy Secretary of Commerce Dennis F. Hightower (202) 482-8376
Chief of Staff Ellen Moran (202) 482-4246
Office of U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer
(213) 894-5000
http://boxer.senate.gov/en/contact/policycomments.cfm
Congresswoman Maxine Waters
Phone: (323) 757-8900
https://waters.house.gov/Contact/ContactForm.htm
No matter what she says in public, Maxine could not care less. As long as she gets her share its ok.
She is as bad as City Council and the Mayor.
Alarcon is lining up his daughter to run for CD7 next go ’round.
Alarcon is seen as condescending and slow witted! What a combo!
Alarcon committed felony voter registration fraud.
Why is he still sitting on Council!??
Why is he not in a jail cell right now!!??
Hello there, You’ve done an incredible job. I will certainly digg it and personally recommend to my friends. I’m confident they’ll be benefited from this web site.