City Councilwoman Wendy Greuel: September 2009 Archives

What nobody seems to be talking about in the CD2 race is that being on the City Council isn't about reforming government or stopping downtown corruption.

For those of us in the district, it's about getting the services we need.

It's an established L.A. thing: If you want something done, you call your local council office, the put-upon person on the other end of the line acts like they're going to help you (even if you're a wack job), and then if the councilmember is smart and has a good staff and a lot of downtown juice, stuff gets done.

In my neighborhood, the street that had been crumbling since the 1940s finally ... FINALLY ... was resurfaced a little more than a year ago. It still seems like yesterday when the crews came and ripped the pavement down to the dirt below, flattened the whole thing out and in a series of heavy-equipment machinations laid down a thick layer of sweet asphalt over it.

Gotta give credit to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former Councilwoman Wendy Greuel, the latter of who's office probably got a few hundred phone calls from the neighborhood in the years before the job got done.

But a paved street (and picked-up garbage) provides the road to voters hearts (and their votes.

So ... which candidate can take the best care of CD2? Good question. I haven't a clue.

This week's L.A. Weekly examines the motivations and records of two candidates for the open Council District 2 seat who until recently did not live in the district, Paul Krekorian and Christine Essel.

It's not pretty.

Krekorian, who didn't even live in L.A. until he made his move, is slammed for first leaving the Burbank school board and now the state Assembly as each institution was in the process of imploding.

And Essel is hit for both encouraging zoning changes to allow for more high-rise development as well as being a transplanted Westsider whose efforts to keep film production in L.A. seemed to do the opposite.

Also worth reading is my former boss Ron Kaye's assessment of the moneyed pair:

How can voters choose between a candidate that has represented the entertainment industry and downtown development interests for years and a state Assembly leader who bears a full share of responsibility for putting California in such dire financial straits?

It may well come to a choice between Essel, with heavy backing from the increasingly unpopular mayor, the powerful DWP union IBEW, and the same developer and Hollywood interests, and Krekorian who is backed by City Hall unions and the Democratic Party organization.

Before voters from Sunland-Tujunga to Sherman Oaks face that choice, they first need to ask themselves if either of them is qualified to represent their values, their needs - whether either of them will stand up to the City Hall machine and fight for what the residents in CD2 want?

Neither of them lacks the intelligence or experience to serve CD2. The biggest problem they share is they are carpetbaggers, moving into the district just in time to run for the Council seat left vacant by Wendy Greuel's election as City Controller.

The Weekly's contention, and I'm buying it, is that the powers that be in the city of Los Angeles would love to bring in a candidate of their choosing to count on for a vote; hence the support from major political players for Krekorian and Essel.

Right now the mailers are flying fast, and Krekorian and Essel — yeah, two candidates nobody's ever heard of, at least in CD2 — are dragging in the big-time endorsements.

My last Krekorian mailer lists the following endorsers: Congresspersons Brad Sherman and Loretta Sanchez, Assemblyman (and ex-Councilman) Mike Feuer, and Councilman Paul Koretz. And there's a picture on the front of Krekorian with former President Bill Clinton. "See ... I know Bill Clinton ... I'm a huge Democrat, and if you're a Democrat ... I know Bill Clinton ... never mind the mess in Sacramento, where I'm a member of the state Assembly," Krekorian never said (but his whole campaign seems to be putting out that vibe).

No word yet on whether Bill Clinton (or his wife, the current secretary of state, or the pope or Dalai Lama for that matter) is endorsing in CD2. But we know that Paul Krekorian and Bill Clinton have posed for a picture together.

Essel has brought the high heat endorsement-wise: Now-City Controller and former holder of the CD2 seat Wendy Greuel is in her camp, as is former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan. You don't find bigger players than that. The Greuel endorsement is huge (and she figures very prominently in Essel's mail campaign).

According to a recent mailer (my postman is very, very busy these days), Essel's endorsers include State Sen. Fran Pavley (who?), Councilmembers Janice Hahn, Jan Perry and Herb Wesson, former State Sens. Sheila Kuehl and Betty Karnette (again ... who?), environmentalist, actor and perennial Studio City man about town Ed Begley Jr. (again, huge, because we've heard of him, the Studio City Residents Association, the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council, the Los Angeles County Democratic Party (hey, I thought Essel was a Republican .. how did that happen?), Paramount biggie Sherry Lansing (Essel also worked for the studio), L.A.'s favorite liberal Ed Asner and a whole bunch of union locals.

Clearly the party boundaries are being bent considerably for what is supposed to be a nonpartisan race in any case.

I say Essel isn't being very smart in her mailers, what with her "Chris Essel for City Council 2009" committee being headquartered on Wilshire Boulevard. What, she couldn't find office space in the district? Does she know how to get here? (Don't take Coldwater Canyon until the sinkhole work is done. Myself, I'm partial to Benedict Canyon-Beverly Glen when I have to hike it over the hill.)

One thing both Krekorian and Essel do in their many, many mailers is talk about their past associations with the Valley. Krekorian grew up in the Valley, and Essel attended CSUN. But that was then. Way, way back then.

My concern about the other "major" candidate in the race, non-carpetbagger and current L.A. school board member Tamar Galatzan, is that each and every one of her mailers bears her school-board title and address and solely covers her LAUSD accomplishments. That's great but doesn't pass the smell test.

It appears as if she's burning off leftover school-board campaign money and either hasn't raised any CD2 campaign cash or is loath to spend what she's dragged in. Any way you look at it, it's not going to get the job done. Except for where the money's potentially coming from (and I'd like some clarification from Galatzan on this), it's "taking the high road" in some way, only talking about what she's accomplished on the school board and not slagging the other candidates. But I want to know what she's going to do for CD2, not just what she's done for LAUSD.

Frank Sheftel appears to be getting around a bit lately. He's been in the Daily News office (I neither met nor spoke to him ...), and I saw the Candy Man at Wednesday's Cruising Van Nuys Boulevard event (which, by the way, was as well-attended as usual and will be continuing on the second Wednesday of next month).

I haven't seen any other candidates pressing the flesh, but maybe we will at tomorrow's Part of Sherman Oaks victory picnic.

In case you're enormously interested in the whole thing, I've been saving my campaign mailers. There have been puff pieces, hit pieces and Wendy-Greuel-loves-me pieces.

Just by numbers, here's how many mailers I've received from the candidates:

Paul Krekorian: 7
Christine Essel: 4
Tamar Galatzan: 3
All of the other candidates: 0

I encourage each and every CD2 voter to check out all the candidates for themselves.

You can start on the Web with this list of CD2 candidates and their Web sites. I'm sure there are complete lists of endorsements (and maybe more than school-board puffery from Galatzan). I'll be going there myself in the days ahead of the Sept. 22 vote to either fill the seat or choose two top candidates for a December runoff.

CD2 candidate Web sites

• Mary Benson: www.benson4cd2.com
• Augusto Bisani: http://augustobisani.org
• Chris Essel: www.essel09.com
• Jozef "Joe" Thomas Essavi: http://www.vote4essavi.com
• Tamar Galatzan: tamarforcd2.publishpath.com
• Paul Krekorian: paul4council.com
• Michael McCue: www.mccuefor2.com
• David "Zuma Dogg" Saltsburg: zumadogg.googlepages.com
• Pete Sanchez: www.votepetesanchez.com
• Frank Sheftel: www.sheftel2009.com

Leslie Young of the Part of Sherman Oaks movement was kind enough to invite me to the group's celebratory picnic from 4 to 7 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 12 at Van Nuys Sherman Oaks Park (specifically at the corner of Tyrone Avenue and Huston Street).

I wrote back to Leslie that I wasn't so much opposed to Part of Sherman Oaks as not in favor of it. Since the area in question, bounded by Oxnard Street to the north, Burbank Boulevard to the south, Sepulveda Boulevard to the West and Hazeltine to the east, is so geographically well-definied (in fact, it's square, Daddy-o), it would've been cool to pick a totally new community name. My favorites remain Xanadu, Shady Acres, Flood Plain, West Los Feliz, Autotopia and Starbuckistan (the latter only if we were promised a dozen more Starbucks, which I welcome anyway).

For those who want to read the real press release about Saturday's picnic, I've included a link to the PDF.

Allow me to get all newspapery with that very material:

"This is a celebration that embraces the spirit of civic activism and inclusiveness," said Part of Sherman Oaks organizer Laurette Healey, an early candidate for the open Council District 2 seat who declined to pursue that candidacy.

"We have discovered along the way that we are a community that cares about the lives of everyone in the Valley."

Healey says the Part of Sherman Oaks movement will continue and will be working on projects that include solar-powered street lighting and neighborhood beautification.

Since the area in question (where I also happen to live) hasn't exactly been fawned over by the Van Nuys Neighborhood Council (which still is the NC that covers the area, despite its "Sherman Oaks-iness"), I welcome and encourage any effort to better the look and safety of the neighborhood.

Healey also said in the press release that "the neighborhood," meaning the area and not her group in specific, I imagine, will aim to become more involved in the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Association, "the local chamber" (would that be the Greater San Fernando Valley Chamber of Commerce?) and the neighborhood councils.

Bet those NCs, particularly the VNNC, will be welcoming. (OK, not so much, if you didn't pick up on that).

Anyhow, the main event at the picnic will be the 5 p.m. speech by former CD2 Councilwoman (and now City Controller) Wendy Greuel, who's OK on Part of Sherman Oaks paved the way for the rest of the City Council to approve the change in neighborhood boundaries on July 14.

The picnic includes a catered barbecue (free food!), a raffle, music, and face-painting, games and a moonbounce for the kids.

I'm still coming to terms with the whole used-to-live-in-Van-Nuys-but-now-Sherman-Oaks nature of this whole thing, and while this has been done many times before in dozens of Los Angeles neighborhoods (and in many cases the "boundaries" of these real-estate-mandated communities are more than a little arbitrary), I still find the whole thing (the Sherman Oaks envy) a little unsettling.

But now that we're in the "what's done is done" phase of the operation, it seems to be time to look forward, not back (and grab the free grub).