June 2010 Archives

Ousted Hawthorne Police Chief Michael Heffner has been offered a settlement agreement from the city that contains a one-time $78,000 payout among other perks, according to city officials.
In addition to getting a healthy check for unused vacation and sick time, Heffner's cash payout would boost his (probably already healthy) CalPERS retirement credit.
Heffner, a 30-year department veteran appointed chief in 2006, officially retired in early May but was reportedly under pressure from the city leadership to leave. He was replaced by Lt. Bob Fager.
He has not yet agreed to the settlement offer the City Council approved Tuesday.

The Center for Responsive Politics recently took a look at the flow of money from oil giant BP to California politicians in the wake of the giant, ongoing gusher in the Gulf of Mexico.

Guess who's on the list of state electeds receiving funds in May? Our own state Sen. Rod Wright, who was elected in 2008 with backing from energy and business groups.

Wright, who represents Senate District 25 (including Hawthorne, Gardena, Inglewood, Compton and the Palos Verdes Peninsula), in January came under fire from environmental groups for his record after an initial year in office.

CRP reports that Wright received $7,000 from BP's political action committee in May. He was one of nine state-level California candidates and/or officeholders to receive such funds, the Washington-based watchdog group reported.

I'll let you know if I hear anything back from Wright's office on this.

(h/t PolitiCal)

The Wall Street Journal today has a front-page story on the poop and plumage that embody the good and bad of peafowl on the Palos Verdes Peninsula.

The feature story focuses on the ongoing debate in Rolling Hills Estates, which Breeze reporters Sandy Mazza and Donna Littlejohn kindly covered for me when I was on vacation earlier this month.

There's a video with the WSJ story that gets some nice footage of the pesky but beloved birds. Worth a read and a watch.

A Redondo Beach couple who met while volunteering at the Camp Ronald McDonald for Good Times (http://www.CampRonaldMcDonald.org/) got married there, and decided to give back to the cause as part of the ceremony.

Laura Littrell, 30, and Tres Wilcox, 31, first met as volunteers in July 2007 at the camp, where kids with cancer spend the summer having fun. A year later, Wilcox proposed, and this May, the couple said their vows on the porch of the camp "med shed," where kids receive health care during their stay.

The couple enlisted the camp executive director as their wedding planner, and opted to serve food for roughly 90 guests from the camp menu. The rehearsal dinner the night before even include s'mores for dessert around the camp fire. Wedding guests stayed in the camp cabins.

The couple is also donating $2,000 to Camp Ronald McDonald, along with the décor they used at their wedding.  They will of course return to volunteer as counselors again this summer; Camp Ronald McDonald kicks off its 2010 season at the end of June.

Littrell, an elementary school teacher, and Wilcox, an information technology consultant and former Air Force Officer, are the third couple to marry at the camp, and the 19th couple to have met and married as a result of volunteering there, officials said.  

 

 

A Saturday front-page article about a Hallmark greeting card that has angered some local black leaders got a lot interest from readers. A handful of bloggers also posted the article, generating some fierce online discussions.

Daily Breeze editors decided not to allow people to make online comments. This is primarily because online comments are often racist (presumably because people can hide behind anonymity) and stories that address race issues usually get a barrage of racist feedback, which we then have to delete.

In response to the story, I got quite a few e-mails and was glad to see that racist comments made up a very small minority of the feedback. Of course, it's always disappointing to be confronted with any racism...
In any event, here are some of the e-mails I received. None were in favor of the NAACP's decision to protest the card:

"I can't help but think you have to (be) out looking for a fight to find this offensive. I think they would be better served showing their outrage and voting their resolutions to the rap music industry. An innocent greeting card isn't offensive, the lyrics and the lifestyle that is portrayed in many rap songs is. I just think they could choose their battles more wisely. Otherwise, they come off looking rather foolish."

"I have heard a lot of complaints from people for the last 58 years but this is absolutely ridiculous!! People can choose to hear what they want to however I played the card over and over and over again and could here the word hole, not whore..." -- Kim Alaimo

"As a professional black male, I am embarrassed. I am embarrassed that an organization like the NAACP is so petty as to waste their time pursuing such a ridiculous insinuation. Anyone with ears can easily decipher the message in the card and I don't see how it is being misinterpreted. Perhaps the NAACP is crying for attention? It's pretty sad to be honest with you. Hallmark was kind to play along." -- Phil Carter

"Really? This is what the NAACP and the city of Carson have time too worry about? Do they understand what Black Holes are? It's 2010, this really qualifies as front page news??" -- Tim Miller

 

Dean Backlund of Redondo Beach was 18 in 1978 when he cast his very first vote for Gov. Jerry Brown. 

Today, his daughter -- Roya, who just turned 18 -- also cast her first vote for Brown.

"Thirty-two years later, my 18-year-old daughter cast her first ballot for the very same person running for the very same office," Backlund, 50, said. "We were just kind of blown away at how unprecedented that was."

Backlund was a high school senior in Rancho Palos Verdes when he voted for the first time. He was impressed with the ideals espoused by California's young (40 in 1978) governor at the time.

"He was running for a second term and I thought he was a remarkable guy," Backlund said. "I liked the fact that he was so low-key and unpretentious ... he rejected the limosine and even rejected the governor's mansion in favor of a small apartment.

"He seemed like a guy who was centered on public service and I think he's still kind of that person."

His daughter, Backlund said, hold similar ideals. When she asked her father about Brown, he told her to read up on him. "She was extremely excited and proud (to vote for the first time) just as I was. She's just very conscientious and a very politically-aware young lady."

Voting for the first time was a meaningful moment for Roya, her father said. "She was proud to be doing her civic duty," he said. Sounds like he raised her well.

"So many kids these days -- and grownups for that matter -- don't even do something that simple," he said.  

So today, father and daughter -- who hopes someday to be an attorney or a writer (or both) -- went together to the polls at the Rolling Hills United Methodist Church to vote after school was out.

 

 

Backlund once again cast his vote for Brown, who had no serious opposition in the Democratic primary.

And he thinks the state's former boy-wonder Democrat has a shot at winning the governor's office once again in 2010.

 

The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles issued a statement Tuesday slamming U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican who flew to Catalina Island last week to confront the deputy consulate general for Mexico.

Rohrabacher, who represents Palos Verdes and Catalina, said he was "horrified" that the consulate was issuing identification cards to Mexican nationals, which can be used to open bank accounts and conduct other business.

Angelica Salas, executive director of the immigrant rights organization, said the congressman "overstepped his authority"  and acted like a "playground bully" in interrupting services being offered at a Catholic church in Avalon.

"It is an outrage that Mr. Rohrabacher felt he had the right to walk into a place offering confidential services by a consular branch and rant about illegal immigration right in the middle of the hall without informing himself of the facts at hand," Salas said. "His anti-immigrant rhetoric has taken a step beyond what is acceptable and diplomatic and he should be made to apologize immediately to all immigrants and the Mexican consulate officials involved."

For the record, both Rohrabacher and the Mexican conslutate general of Los Angeles told The Daily Breeze that the conversation was cordial, though the two sides certainly disagreed on what was taking place.  

County leaders from large urban areas across the country gathered in Marina Del Rey Thursday to share how they plan to implement the massive changes coming over the next four years in health care.

The 2010 Large Urban County Caucus, hosted by Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe, included county officials including health services director John Schunhoff and public health director, Dr. Jonathan Fielding.

Most agree that the biggest challenage will be a massive expansion of Medicaid, or Medi-Cal in California. Schunhoff provided hard numbers on just how significant the changes will be in the local region.

The county system, which includes County Harbor-UCLA Medical Center near Torrance, saw 731,000 patients in 2009, nearly all of them uninsured. When health reform is fully implemented in 2014, roughly 350,000 of these patients will qualify for Medi-Cal.

The challenge for counties, officials said, will be reorganizing the system to keep these patients, who will now be paying customers. Big changes are likely in store.  

A Santa Monica-based consumer group is keeping tabs on the wild campaign contributions and "independent expenditures" from outside/lobbying groups in the eight-way Democratic primary to replace Assemblyman Ted Lieu.

Consumer Watchdog lumps the 53rd Assembly District race in with a handful of other state races that the group says are "major battlegrounds" for the insurance industry.

The nonprofit (left-leaning) advocacy group points out that the Civil Justice Association of California, which has spent a lot of money to defeat AD 53 candidate Betsy Butler, has many insurance groups on its board. (CJAC is essentially focused on tort reform and limiting liability in civil cases.)

And, as I reported in Sunday's Breeze, a number of medical insurance groups that have spent tons to oppose Butler have starting putting money behind one of her opponents, James Lau.

Doug Heller, Consumer Watchdog's executive director, sees the spending as tied to Prop 17, the ballot measure backed by Mercury Insurance.

"Insurers are spending millions of dollars to influence the outcome of Tuesday's election, but most voters don't know insurance companies are out there propping up initiatives and attacking candidates," Heller said in a press release (see the full thing after the jump).

Here's Heller's breakdown of insurer-backed AD 53 spending:

Assembly District 53 - In Opposition to Betsy Butler
$165,000 - Put California Back to Work Sponsored By The Civil Justice Association Of California
$16,500- Californians For Balance And Fairness In The Civil Justice System, Sponsored By The Civil Justice Association Of California
$19,000 - Californians For Civil Justice Reform Pac, Sponsored By The Civil Justice Association Of California
$221,000 - Cooperative Of American Physicians Independent Expenditure Committee
$186,000 - Californians Allied For Patient Protection Independent Expenditure Account
 
Assembly District 53 - In Support of James Lau
$39,000 - Cooperative Of American Physicians Independent Expenditure Committee
 

A Senate race in San Diego (a slugfest between Assemblywoman Mary Salas and Juan Vargas, an executive in a small insurance company) has seen even more insurer-backed money thrown at it: $1.47 million, according to Consumer Watchdog.

On another note, we've seen some interesting mailers in this race. Fun! There have been a lot of negative ones targeted at Butler from the above-mentioned independent expenditure groups.

But yesterday, a mailer came to Editor Toni Sciacqua's house that appeared to show a Daily Breeze editorial in support of Lau.

In fact, the clip featured was from a column that ran *by Lau* about himself -- on our opinion page. It had been edited to switch the copy from first person to third person ("I" to "James Lau").

The Breeze opinion section ran pieces by all the candidates. You can find them on our election page.