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Citizen’s Legal Action Halts LA City Council’s $1 Billion CRA Steal

REPRINTED FROM PRESS RELEASE
Contact Miki Jackson 323-855-0764  mikijackson@sbcglobal.com

Brown Act legal action by local Hollywood businessmen causes Council to forgo voting on motion to move nearly $1 billion in public funds away from Governor Brown’s attempts to recoup the money for schools, fire, ambulance,  police and other endangered local services. State is watching the largest CRA pot of gold moved around like a peanut by LA wheelers and dealers.

A taxpayer “Cure
and Correct” letter regarding Brown act violations at the CRA/LA
Special meeting of Jan. 14, 2011, today (2/8/11) halted City Council’s
attempted consideration on motion 
transfer almost a billion
dollars from the CRA to the City Council and then to an as yet
undetermined “shell” entity in order to keep it from Governor Brown’s
attempts to use the funds for much needed City services for those
taxpayers, like schools, fire, police and ambulance service.  The
item before the City Council today was based on the Actio of Jan. 14,
2011 and should that action be found in violation of the Brown Act it
could be nullified and any actions taken based it would be nullified as
well. 

Governor
Brown and State officials are keenly watching what happens in L.A., the
State’s biggest City is sitting on the biggest CRA pot of gold, nearly a
billion dollars. Other cities throughout the State are working overtime
to try and slide their CRA riches out of reach of the State as well
and, as usual L.A. is the bellwether. Whether this billion dollar game
of “three card monte” between just turned 40,Council President Garcetti,
and  the veteran 70+ Governor Brown is successful is yet to be seen. 
 
Aaron
Epstein and Robert Blue, prominent Hollywood businessmen, are
represented by Attorney Dennis A. Winston, a well known expert on the
Brown Act and Public Records. Mr. Epstein  earlier prevailed on a case
involving the Brown Act with meetings conducted by the Business
Improvement District.

Bob Blue is Vice-President of the activist “Hollywood Highlands Democratic Club
and a member of the Hollywood Project Area Committee (PAC) of the
Hollywood area CRA. Blue gained national recognition when he and fellow
activists fought CRA eminent domain to save a historic building that houses his family business, “Bernard’s Luggage”.

It
is believed that this strategy was hatched by the statewide
organization of local CRA officials, developers and other “interested
parties and individuals” – the very connected and powerful 
Community Redevelopment Association. LA’s
own CRA boss Chris Essel sit on the Board along with such prominent
development movers and shakers as Larry Kosmont of Kosmont Companies and
Tom Kelly of Keyser Marston Associates. A key figure in this strategy
is thought to be long time CRA lawyer and mastermind Murray Kane. Kane
lists Los Angeles CRA among his many CRA clients.
 
Mr.
Winston was most recently successful in prevailing over California
State University, Stanislaus and its private foundation violated the
state’s public records law when they withheld a speaking contract for
former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin earlier this year, a judge has ruled.
A motion was again put forward at today’s (2/8/11) LA City Council meeting to  
Brown
has proposed to close the CRAs throughout California and use the
taxpayer funds in them for services for the taxpayers instead of
underwriting developers. By law, the City Council has 30 days to respond to the letter.
This entry was posted in City Hall, Community Activists, Development/CRA, Hot Topics, Los Angeles and tagged , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

2 Responses to Citizen’s Legal Action Halts LA City Council’s $1 Billion CRA Steal

  1. G. Shepherd says:

    My mom and I get up very early every morning, but my pal Bruno’s dad gets up even earlier, because Mom checkes out his columns first thing after the coffee’s brewed.
    Every morning it’s the same thing: Mom swears she’s never doing it again; the news about the skullduggery at City Hall is always so depressing. Better to read Ron later in the day.
    But she keeps doing it. I don’t think she’s daft — you know, doing the same thing repeatedly expecting a different result — just hopeful that one morning there will be good news to start the day.
    Today must have been her lucky day (mine, too) because when she got her second cuppa, I got an extra morning snack of boloney and Milk Bones.
    Whooopee! If dogs could smile, I would. A glimmer of hope that the City Hall gangsters may be meeting their match in community activists and people who care enough to do something to stop them from continuing to cheat hard-working tax payers.
    This should have happened years ago, but it’s never to late. People have got to start somewhere.
    Here’s a three-Milk-Bone salute to news that bodes well for L.A. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Hope. Hope. Hope.
    Woof,
    Bruno’s Pal G.

  2. Anonymous says:

    Eric Garcetti’s fingerprints are all over this massive hood wink of the people of California. Let’s stop Garcetti’s billion dollar boondoggle money shift in its tracks!

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