Are L.A politicians and city employees stupid or corrupt (San Francisco: high crime, day care)

[jm1982]

I am just trying to figure out if L.A politicians are stupid or corrupt. It seems that they just don't care much or they make no attempt to prevent crooks from taking advantage of the city.

For example the medical marijuana issue. The city as we speak is doing nothing for the most part about people opening "medical" marijuana dispensaries. One opened a couple recently on my block. I just get the run around regarding the issue. Interestingly there are parts of the city where they are actually closing them down, but in certain areas it appears to be a free for all.

Everything either takes forever or never gets done in this city ,which is really frustrating. There is a liquor store and a pawn shop in the same crappy center ,owned by a slumlord that doesn't care about the neighborhood. There is also a child day care center .1 miles away . The pawn shop was supposed to send out notices to neighbors but nothing was ever sent out and the stupid city approved it. Of course they have a bunch of illegal signage up and it looks really tacky and I am sure will not help home values. This kind of **** doesn't happen much in other cities. This is already a high crime area and these types of operations clearly don't benefit the community. It's much better for a neighborhood to let stores sit bankrupt rather than bringing in some crappy place such a pawn shop when there are already other similar shops around.

Although there is a "department of planning" their actions to not match up with what they are supposed to do. There are pages and pages of people that work for these departments and it's impossible to get anybody to talk to you about the issue.

It seems like L.A is only good if you can live in the multimillion dollar areas like Brentwood. Funny how they don't have any dispensaries of pawn shops..

[smokingGun]

Westside areas like Brentwood & Westwood have very pro-active & vocal homeowner's associations that threaten politicians and businesses alike with lawsuits if they don't get their way. That Mulholland bridge/405 shutdown was the doing of certain activists. In fact the reason why Westwood is so dingy & dead is because residents in Bel Air & Westwood WANT it that way... they abhor traffic & tourists.

My advice to you is to network with neighborhood churches & PTA groups and circulate petitions & threaten lawsuits if you don't get what you want. And I'm not sure who your councilman is, but if it's Garcetti, Perry or Gruel, remind them that mayoral elections are coming up.

[jm1982]

Yes, I totally agree with you. I used to live on the Westside for a long time and the problems faced by those residents are relatively small versus the ones in a community like mine. The area I live in is primarily Hispanic (over 70% or so) , they generally are not politically active it seems , at least at the local level. The sad part is many of these councilmen pride themselves on being from the neighborhood , but I feel they are to blame for many of the problems.

My councilman is Cardenas.

The sad part is it seems that City Councilmen and other politicians focus so much time on certain things that they can stamp their name on like a park or something..a tangible type of monument.

The idea of working with neighborhood churches and PTAs is a good one. I was also considering doing like a mailing locally as well, but I don't know how well that would be received.

[bigdumbgod]

Originally Posted by jm1982

The sad part is many of these councilmen pride themselves on being from the neighborhood , but I feel they are to blame for many of the problems.

Maybe they like MMJ, pawn shops and liquor stores. (Surely business owners and politicians wouldn't work hand-in-hand to promote their own interests even when locals would rather they not?)

[ccm123]

Don't know you even need to ask that question! You pretty much outlined it with your statement! (Which is correct, in my opinion.)

[Patrolman]

The City Council is too concerned with "Meatless Monday" proclamations than the quality of life in their respective districts.

[West of Encino]

I say they're carelessly corrupt.

[git45]

Originally Posted by jm1982

I am just trying to figure out if L.A politicians are stupid or corrupt. It seems that they just don't care much or they make no attempt to prevent crooks from taking advantage of the city.

For example the medical marijuana issue. The city as we speak is doing nothing for the most part about people opening "medical" marijuana dispensaries. One opened a couple recently on my block. I just get the run around regarding the issue. Interestingly there are parts of the city where they are actually closing them down, but in certain areas it appears to be a free for all.

Everything either takes forever or never gets done in this city ,which is really frustrating. There is a liquor store and a pawn shop in the same crappy center ,owned by a slumlord that doesn't care about the neighborhood. There is also a child day care center .1 miles away . The pawn shop was supposed to send out notices to neighbors but nothing was ever sent out and the stupid city approved it. Of course they have a bunch of illegal signage up and it looks really tacky and I am sure will not help home values. This kind of **** doesn't happen much in other cities. This is already a high crime area and these types of operations clearly don't benefit the community. It's much better for a neighborhood to let stores sit bankrupt rather than bringing in some crappy place such a pawn shop when there are already other similar shops around.

Although there is a "department of planning" their actions to not match up with what they are supposed to do. There are pages and pages of people that work for these departments and it's impossible to get anybody to talk to you about the issue.

It seems like L.A is only good if you can live in the multimillion dollar areas like Brentwood. Funny how they don't have any dispensaries of pawn shops..

The ban has been suspended, luckily. But they still will crack down on those who don't pay taxes/are not registered, of which there are many. LA has more dispensaries than it has Starbucks', which is astounding. But the threat to Med Marijuana concerns me a lot. My girlfriend has pretty bad scoliosis and feels pretty pained after a day's work, and really benefits from it as a painkiller. Unlike prescription painkillers, Weed isn't criminally addictive, you can't die from it, and it doesn't rot out your liver and kidneys. Marijuana is over stigmatized in general. Big Pharma approves of things that can be physically harmful and psychological in the long run (adderall is literally a speed pill with a different name), but something far less benign than alcohol is still nationally prohibited with the exception many states.

[jm1982]

I do think that people with actual medical issues should be able to use marijuana if it helps them. The thing I don't like it as you mentioned is practically no regulation going on. It sets a bad example and makes the city look bad. They do it right in San Francisco and Oakland they limit the amount of dispensaries and they make them pay big licensing fees. When you let these fly by operations up it cheapens communities. We don't even have pharmacies on every block, so we don't need "dispensaries" providing only one time of "medication" . I'm willing to bet most people that voted for the proposition 215 would not have voted for it if they knew the city wasn't going to put in the effort to regulate it.

[munchitup]

Originally Posted by git45

The ban has been suspended, luckily. But they still will crack down on those who don't pay taxes/are not registered, of which there are many. LA has more dispensaries than it has Starbucks', which is astounding. But the threat to Med Marijuana concerns me a lot. My girlfriend has pretty bad scoliosis and feels pretty pained after a day's work, and really benefits from it as a painkiller. Unlike prescription painkillers, Weed isn't criminally addictive, you can't die from it, and it doesn't rot out your liver and kidneys. Marijuana is over stigmatized in general. Big Pharma approves of things that can be physically harmful and psychological in the long run (adderall is literally a speed pill with a different name), but something far less benign than alcohol is still nationally prohibited with the exception many states.

The guys that work at my dispensary were saying that a lot of the dispensaries open up with the knowledge they will get shut down eventually and try to make as much money as possible while they are in business. It's a shame they cannot figure out a way to get it under control short of shutting every dispensary down because there is no question the situation is out of control.