Measure R Goes to the Voters

LA Times transportation writer and blogger Steve Hymon has an article describing Measure R, the LA Metropolitan Transportation Authority's half-cent county sales tax increase ballot measure. The measure is on next Tuesday's Los Angeles County ballot.

Measure R's potential revenue is supposed to fund traffic and transportation projects such as the so-called Subway-to-the-Sea on LA's westside. The measure has been opposed by some San Gabriel Valley groups and politicians who argue that the money generated would be not be evenly distributed and is unfairly LA-centric.

The article lays out the measure's supporters and opponents:

Who is for and against Measure R?

There is a healthy list of elected officials on both sides of the issue. Editorials among daily newspapers have varied -- The Times, the Daily News, the Daily Breeze and La Opinion are for Measure R and the Press-Telegram, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune and the Antelope Valley Press are against, to name a few.

The Los Angeles County Federation of Labor and the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce support it.

Among prominent politicians, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky and Assemblyman Mike Feuer (D-Los Angeles) have been the most vocal proponents.

Supervisors Mike Antonovich, Don Knabe and Gloria Molina have been fighting the measure, saying the MTA's spending plan favors the Westside and denies other parts of the county their fair share of sales tax revenues.

The MTA and Measure R supporters rebut that, pointing to a variety of projects that would be built in different parts of the county.

Claremont Mayor Ellen Taylor recently had an opinion piece in the Claremont Courier that argued against the sales tax proposal. Taylor mentioned the MTA decision earlier this year to deny $80 million in MTA funds to the Gold Line Foothill Extension with the promise of Measure R funds. The trouble was that the the MTA's failure to fund the $80 million resulted in the Gold Line Extension being denied $320 million in federal funds for the project. The feds were requiring MTA to supply the $80 million as matching money.

Instead, MTA is dangling the prospect of $735 million from the Measure R honeypot for the Gold Line. However, there is no guarantee that LA Mayor Antonio Villarigosa, who is the primary force behind Measure R, won't raid the promised Gold Line funds to fund other projects in his city, including the westside subway. Taylor's article states that "the last time the MTA committed mass transit funds to the San Gabriel Valley was nearly 3 decades ago," so according to line of thinking, there is probably no reason to believe that the MTA would suddenly change 30 years of behavior once the election is over.

It is more than a little ironic, though, to see Taylor and the city of Claremont having to fight a much larger governmental entity. Karma's a bear to deal with, as Taylor may be learning by getting a little of the ol' Taylor treatment thrown back at her. There are always bigger fish in the local agency sea, and one would hope that Taylor and the city would remember the experience of being unfairly snubbed and ignored the next time a Claremont area resident comes before them with a objections to a city project or initiative.

Gold Line's Future Tied to Sales Tax Approval

Friday's Los Angeles Times carried a front-page story about the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority's (MTA) decision to pursue passage of a half-cent sales tax increase for LA County. Money from the proposed measure would go to fund transportation projects throughout the county, including the Gold Line Foothill Extension from Pasadena to Claremont. The measure will be placed on the November ballot, assuming it is approved by the state legislature.

Back in June, the MTA board decided to put off until the November election the decision on whether to include the Gold Line Foothill Extension in the agency's Long Range Transportation Plan. That decision not only cost the Gold Line $80 million in LA County money, but also may have cost the Foothill Extension $320 million in federal grants that were dependent on the county funds as a match.

The sales tax increase is being pushed by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who is the MTA board's chair. The increase would raise the county sales tax from the current 8.25% to 8.75%, which would tie LA County for the highest sales tax rate in the state along with Alameda County. Estimates are that the half-cent increase would generate up to $40 billion over 30 years.

The MTA board approved going forward with the sales tax measure on a 9-2 vote, with the only "NO's" being the two San Gabriel Valley representatives, LA County Supervisor Michael Antonovich and Duarte Councilmember John Fasana.

Antonovich and Fasana objected to the fact that the MTA board would not commit to making a solid pledge of $735 million to the Gold Line. The sales tax measure allocates that amount, but there are no guarantees that the money could not be moved to other projects, such as the Expo Line Extension to Santa Monica, which has been competing with the Gold Line for MTA funds. The measure only promises a minimum of $325 million to the Gold Line and indicates that an additional $400 is available.

LA County Supervisor Gloria Molina abstained from voting, citing her concerns with the haste with which the allocation of the money was decided.

Supervisor Antonovich has raised his own concerns with the sales tax measure, saying that the way the MTA has allocated money has been too LA-centric and that areas like the San Gabriel Valley have not received their fair share of transportation funds. Antonovich's reservations played into his refusal to support the sales tax measure, and the MTA board's reluctance to commit the total $735 million to the Gold Line Foothill Extension make us wonder if there isn't a Villaraigosa sponsored bait-and-switch going on here.

Villarairgosa's sale tax needs a two-thirds majority to pass, so he needs every San Gabriel Valley vote he can get. We vote to support this tax increase with the carrot of $735 million dangling in front of us, then once the measure is passed, they pull that $400 million and give it to the Expo Line Extension or some other LA project. At least that seems to be the sort of scenario that troubles Antonovich.

Saturday's LA Times had yet another front-page article on the proposed sales tax increase. The article reported that passage of the measure is no sure thing with voters having to approve a number of other state and local tax increases on the same November ballot. The article also reported that four members of California's congressional delegation - David Drier (R-26), Gary Miller (R-42), Grace Napolitano (D-38), and Hilda Solis (D-32) - have issued a joint statement that supports giving more of the sales tax money to the San Gabriel Valley.

The text of the statement is available on the LA Times' Bottleneck Blog, and seems to echo Supervisor Antonovich's concerns about the equity with which the MTA transportation funds are being dispersed. According to Times blogger Steve Hymon, Congresswoman Solis has indicated she may actively campaign against the sales tax measure. Judging from the statement's language, Solis and the other three representatives who signed the statement certainly feel strongly that the MTA is sticking it once again to our area:

If inequity and insult aren’t enough, Metro Board Members said no to a commitment of less than one half of one percent of its capital budget for the only project ready to be built in LA County – the Gold Line Foothill Extension. This project could save our residents money – households that use public transit save an average of $6,251 every year. It could create jobs - every $1 spent on infrastructure results in a gain of $6 in jobs. Construction alone could create at least 2,000 new jobs. It could deliver needed economic development – more than $40 billion by 2030.

The Federal government has stood up and done its part to demonstrate support – our local Congressional delegation has already delivered $27.19 million. If Metro would commit its share, we could fight for an additional $320 million in Federal funds. Rather than join us, Metro said no to the San Gabriel Valley.

“Residents of the San Gabriel Valley deserve better than what Metro delivered yesterday. It’s time to say no to inequity, no to insult, and yes to economic development in the San Gabriel Valley. It’s time to say no to Metro.

Gold Line News Continued

We received a response to yesterday's post about the Gold Line that pointed out that readers might come away with the mistaken opinion that Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael Antonovich is opposed to extending the Gold Line from Pasadena to Claremont.

In fact, Antonovich has been supportive of the extension, as a recent editorial by the supervisor demonstrates. In the piece, Antonovich argues for equitable revenue sharing for the $40 billion or so that would be generated by a proposed half-cent increase in Los Angeles County sales tax that would fund transportation projects in the county.

Antonovich points out that in 2006 California voters passed the $19.9 billion Proposition 1B transportation bond partly with the help of residents and elected officials from so-called county subregions like the San Gabriel Valley. (In Claremont, Prop. 1B funds will be used to pay for the Claremont Trolley.)

Antonovich writes that once Prop. 1B passed, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) gave the lion's share of the fund allocated to the county to projects in the City of Los Angeles:

So what happened? Prop 1B passed and Los Angeles city took over 48 percent of the $3.16 billion in funding the county received from bond categories designed for highway, rail, bus, streets, roads and traffic signal synchronization projects.

By contrast, the San Gabriel Valley only received 5 percent of this funding, the South Bay Cities 2 percent, the West San Fernando Valley Cities 0.05 percent and the Santa Clarita and Antelope Valleys 0.7 percent.

This result was well below these subregions’ fair share of funding based on any measurement of equity, most notably population. Once again, they were a victim of Los Angeles city’s greed.

From the three major Prop 1B funding categories for highways, transit and traffic signal synchronization, the city of Los Angeles took home a whopping 61 percent, 52 percent and 94 percent of the county’s share, respectively.

So, the Gold Line's fate is now linked to the successful passage of a half-cent county sales tax increase in November. Unfortunately, MTA is once again in charge of the allocation of those funds, and there is no guarantee that money would be shared fairly with residents outside of the city of Los Angeles. Antonovich says in his article that voters in the San Gabriel Valley, who passed Prop. 1B with 70-percent of the vote, may not feel like getting burned again - fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

There are other problems facing the proposed sales tax measure, as an article in the Daily Bulletin notes. The measure must be approved by the MTA board at its meeting next Thursday, July 24th, and then it a similar version must be approved by the state legislature. All this must be done before the August 8th deadline to get the measure to the county for the November ballot.

The Bulletin article laid out the possible roadblocks to getting the sales tax measure on the ballot:

The county version of the measure might not get passed at next week's MTA meeting, either. Several board members of the MTA said they had objections to the expenditure plan that still needed to be worked out.

Michael Cano, the transportation deputy for county supervisor and MTA board member Michael Antonovich, said his boss would introduce amendments to the proposed ordinance at the meeting.

He said Antonovich wants language that guarantees each region receives a percentage of the sales tax money that is equal to the percentage of the county's population in each region.

The San Gabriel Valley is currently allocated 16.4 percent of the money, while the MTA estimates it has 18.3 percent of the region's residents.

Cano added that the MTA should commit to funding the full $1.4 billion cost of the Gold Line.

He said Antonovich also has concerns that projects on the expenditure list that are not yet approved, like the 710 Freeway tunnel, might end up not being built.

Antonovich will likely not vote for the measure in its current form, said Cano. If the measure does not get passed next week, he said, the only recourse will be for the board to schedule an emergency meeting before the Aug. 8 deadline.

Part of the opposition the MTA and the City of Los Angeles might face in getting this sales tax increase passed is the result a blowback against MTA's track record of project mismanagement and waste (and in some cases accusations of possible fraud) and LA's record of stiffing its neighbors.

Of course, another problem is that what's really needed to move people effectively from the our area to Pasadena and Los Angeles is not a light-rail but a real commuter train like the Metrolink. As the Foothill Transit board could tell you, in a city like Paris, to get to many areas outside the city you take a regional express train (the RER). The smaller metro trains are used mostly for shorter hauls, like a bus system on rails.

But, the Gold Line is what we're left with, so we'll have to take what we can get. Or just choose not to have it.

Our Tin-Eared Mayor

The Claremont Courier's City Council news briefs last Saturday had a mention of Claremont Mayor Peter Yao's intent to seek the governing board seat for the South Coast Air Quality Management District's Los Angeles County Eastern Region.

The SCAQMD's LA Eastern Region is comprised of 61 cities from Calabasas (which seems more west than east) to Claremont and on down to Long Beach. Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich is also on the SCAQMD board. The board seats are assigned by the League of California Cities' City Selection Committee, which will meet next on Thursday, January 3rd, at 7:30pm in Los Angeles. The open SCAQMD seat is on the agenda.

Interested parties can attend the meeting on January 3rd, and the public can address the City Selection Committee. The meeting is located at the Metropolitan Water District building at 700 N. Alameda St., Los Angeles, CA 90012.

Mayor Yao seems to be tilting at windmills again. There's more than a little irony in the mayor's SQAQMD aspirations. After all, the SCAQMD has sent the city a letter in response to draft environmental impact report for Claremont's Base Line Rd. affordable housing project. The SCAQMD urged the city not to build the project at the Base Line site because of the adverse effects of pollution from the 210 Freeway on lung development for children living there.

Supervisor Antonovich's office also wrote in a response to the Base Line Project's draft EIR saying that the project should not be built on the site at Base Line and Towne Ave. because of the EIR's findings regarding air pollution concerns.

Mayor Yao (and City Councilmember Ellen Taylor) are insisting on ignoring the EIR's findings, the letters from the SCAQMD and Antonovich's office and the opposition of individual citizens. They are doing so because the project is being pushed by the Claremont 400, through its unofficial organs like the Claremont League of Women Voters and the Claremont Democratic Club.

Mayor Yao, who will fail to get the SCAQMD seat, is about to find out the reason why Claremont politicians never succeed in winning any county, state, or federal offices. They can't get very far outside the city boundaries because politics beyond the city limits involves building coalitions and not trying to stick it to every group of voters that disagrees with you. Politics is all addition, not subtraction; compromise, not punishment - something the 400 will never figure out.

Claremont 400 candidates have been able to run the city like their own private fiefdom, but their sort of strong arm, power politics doesn't translate well to higher offices, where the candidates can't count on the Claremont Village voters alone to elect them.

If you think Mayor Yao's run for the SCAQMD board seat is hypocritical, you can call, write, fax or email any or all of the SCAQMD LA County Eastern Region cities and ask that their representatives not support Yao at the January 3rd League of California Cities City Selection Committee meeting. You can also speak at public comment at the meeting at the Metropolitan Water District building in January.

After all, how can the interests of the SCAQMD and its member cities be served by a person who's demonstrated a willingness to ignore a 10-year long study by the USC Keck School of Medicine on freeway pollution effects on children's lung development, the findings of his city's own EIR on the Base Line Rd. Project and letters from the SCAQMD and SCAQMD board member Antonovich arguing against the project?

How in the world can Yao be trusted to respect the SCAQMD's air quality mission when he shows such little respect for its recommendations?

You can click on the links to the following Eastern Region cities if you want to contact them to tell their representatives to the League of California Cities Selection Committee to not support Claremont Mayor Peter Yao for the SCAQMD's L.A. County Eastern Region seat - there are more worthy candidates from other member cites:

• Alhambra
• Arcadia
• Artesia
• Baldwin Park
• Bell
• Bellflower
• Bell Gardens
• Bradbury
• Burbank
• Calabasas (no link available), (818) 878-4225
• Cerritos
• City of Commerce
• City of Industry
• Covina
• Cudahy
• Diamond Bar
• Downey
• Duarte
• El Monte
• Glendale
• Glendora
• Hawaiian Gardens
• Huntington Park
• Irwindale
• La Habra Heights
• Lakewood
• La Mirada
• La Puente
• La Verne
• Long Beach
• Lynwood
• Malibu
• Maywood
• Monrovia
• Montebello
• Monterey Park
• Norwalk
• Paramount
• Pasadena
• Pico Rivera
• Pomona
• Rosemead
• San Dimas
• San Fernando
• San Gabriel
• San Marino
• Santa Clarita
• Santa Fe Springs
• Sierra Madre
• Signal Hill
• South El Monte
• South Gate
• South Pasadena (no link available), (626) 403-7200
• Temple City
• Vernon (no link available), (323) 583-8811
• Walnut
• West Covina
• Whittier

Residents of unincorporated areas around Claremont should contact LA County Supervisor Antonovich's office since he is their elected representative. Antonovich's local district office is located at 615 E. Foothill Blvd., San Dimas, CA 91773, and the phone number is (909) 394-2264.

The Windmills are Weakening

The Courier had an informative article in Wednesdays paper (December 12, 2007; you need to buy the paper because the article is not linked online.)

Under the head, "Baseline Project Still Under Fire", Tony Krickl reports the sands shifting even more under the foundation--such as it is--of the Baseline Affordable Housing proposal.

Comes now the spokesman for Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich quoted as saying, "He [Supervisor Antonovich] clearly has concerns about the project, and he has communicated them to the city and the developer."

Might those be the horrible reviews the project has received in the City-sponsored Environmental Impact Report, or perhaps the letter form the South Coast Air Quality Management District saying, "SCAQMD staff considers it [the affordable housing project on Baseline] to be incompatible land use based on proximity to the freeway."

According to Brian Desatnik, the City staffer pushing this project, it would be "in serious jeopardy" if Supervisor Antonovich and the Board of Supervisors deny funding to the developer. (The Courier article discusses why Supervisor Antonovich is important to the funding process)

There is $2.5 million needed from the Feds and the State for this project. One of the things that these entities consider is community support. It is short-sighted for the City to persist in pushing a project that so clearly divides the community while having the manifest health problems that it has.

Of course, Human Services Commissioner Andrew Winnick can always be counted upon to be the stern no-nonsense teacher. No nonsense about economic justice. No nonsense about environmental justice. No nonsense about children's health. No nonsense about community buy-in. No nonsense that I, Winnick, could learn anything from anybody else. He sponsored a resolution at Human Services last week that is quoted in the article: "The Commission believes this project will provide low and very low-income members of the community the opportunity to live in Claremont, and therefore afford their family [sic] the many options and opportunities that go along with living in this city."

And so would the feasible alternative sites.

The handwriting is on the wall on this project, and it is our hope that Mayor Yao can gracefully find an off-ramp. Otherwise, the vision we had, coming from a 60s-era comedy album, might come all too true:

Antonovich Blog

When he's not busy leading cattle drives around the Claremont Wilderness Park, Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael Antonovich spends his spare time using the creative part of his mind to...BLOG!

Yes folks, our supervisor, as well as a number of other rightward thinkers have a site called LA Insight. Supervisor Antonovich, as well as such local Republican luminaries as Congressman David Dreier, listed as Insight writers.

The site seems to be mostly links to local news articles. Antonovich's and Dreier's bits look to be press releases written by their staffs.

We haven't found the left equivalent for LA Insight, but if we do, we'll post it.

Wilderness Park Closure Abuse of Process

The notice above appeared on the City website Friday--no explanation--and we got to wondering: why is the Wilderness Park to be closed to the public on Sunday?

It turns out that the reason for this is that Supervisor Michael Antonovich is sponsoring a "Trail Ride" of some 140 horses that will be in the Wilderness Park sometime during the day on Sunday, October 14. For anyone who has been hiking in the Wilderness Park, it is easy to imagine that the mix of 140 horses and lots and lots of speeding mountain bikes is potentially a dangerous one.

The process, if you want to call it that, of how this came about is interesting.

Apparently the LA County Department of Parks and Recreation, which is arranging things, called the City on or about September 20 for the October 14 event. City staff told them that they would need a permit for this large a group to use the park...this rule is in the management guidelines for the park. And, staff further told them that it would take several months to issue the permit since it would have to go through a commission hearing.

Well, the LA County people said the magical incantation: "Supervisor.... Michael.... D.... Antonovich.... $500,000..... for..... Johnson's..... Pasture" and voila!--

The next day there was an agenda item for the September 25 city council meeting to exempt this event from the Wilderness Park permit rules. Even better, it was on the consent agenda--a non-controversial item; let's avoid discussion.

(Someday, just for fun, go down to City Hall and see how much luck you have getting an item agendized for a council meeting five days away.)

Fortunately Councilmember Calaycay pulled this item for separate discussion--after a member of the public raised a bunch of questions about it. Here it came out there our high-priced city staff simply wanted to exempt the Trail Ride from the permit, and hadn't looked into public safety, policy, or insurance issues involved. The only affirmative reason staff could give for granting the exemption was that there wasn't time to go through the process. The fact that it was the Supervisor's event was not included in the staff report, but did come out in the discussion.

The best moment came when Mayor Yao asked staff if at least they were going to close the park to separate the usual mountain bike sorties from the horses. "We hadn't planned to," was the City Manager's reply.

So it came to pass that all city council members agreed to close the park for the Supervisor, who wants to show Johnson's Pasture to his riders.

We wonder what happened to the process? Where was Defender of the Process Linda Elderkin? Or is this just another example of Claremont English?-- those words in the Management Guidelines may appear to mean something when you or I read them, but they actually mean something very different when used by City Staff and City Council.

The FC Blog already picked up on the Antonovich trail ride.

(We'd like to link to minutes of this discussion, but that is not possible right now. You can run down to city hall and get a tape of the council meeting (September 25, 2007) for a small fee. Also, there was a biting letter on this subject on page 17 of the Saturday, October 5 issue of the Claremont Courier. Unfortunately, the Courier did not put this letter online.)

(BTW, we noticed the typo in the City "Top Stories" release above, but we make too many bonehead errors to have the bad taste to point it out.)