ValleyVote Update for 5-8-01 |
We are sending you this E-mail as you have requested to be notified concerning ValleyVote
One has to be constantly amazed at the colossal arrogance and impudence of politicians. As the secession pot begins to simmer, our feckless mayor has run over to the cardinal asking him to shake his finger at the Valley and call us naughty, immoral children.
This from the man who sits atop the compost pile we call city government, now validated as the most corrupt, inefficient and incompetent in the country. So Mayor Riordan, don't bother to poke your nose over the hill sniffing out immorality in the Valley. You guys have darn near cornered the market within spitting distance of city hall.
-- J. Donald Adams Sylmar
Pardon me, what are the religious leaders doing getting involved in the secession issue that confronts us? Isn't there supposed to be a separation of church and state? Is the study being conducted as a religious affair or a government affair?
And if the religious leaders do get involved, then I am confused. Being a Catholic, I want to know, on Saturday night when I go to confession, do I see a priest or go to City Council?
Sarah Lucas North Hills
It seems to me that Cardinal Mahoney should have more pressing things to consider in the archdiocese than the morality of the San Fernando Valley seceding from Los Angeles. To let himself be drawn into a discussion on this issue by none other than its chief provocateur, Mayor Riordan, is foolish to say the least.
Since when is a peoples' right of self-determination a moral issue on the part of those exercising it? If one is to be guided by Mayor Riordan's logic, the American Revolution was immoral. What about the unfair and immoral treatment the residents of the San Fernando Valley have suffered at the hands of those corrupt bureaucrats in City Hall? Perhaps the cardinal should fix his moral gaze on them.
L.A. Calabro Northridge
Cardinal Roger Mahony has been invited to shove his nose into the secession debate. The excuse is that secession might be "immoral." A vampire, encouraged to remove his fangs from a victim's neck, might protest that doing so would be immoral, since his sustenance depends on a continual flow of fresh blood.
As to the mayor and the cardinal, a few words should suffice: "When in the course of human events. ..." But then, they'd probably have been on the side of King George, had they been present at that time.
James F. Glass Chatsworth
WE can only hope -- and pray -- that Cardinal Roger Mahony and other religious leaders know what they're doing by stepping into the political fight between the San Fernando Valley and Los Angeles' downtown power structure.
Great moral issues are involved, and the insight of the city's spiritual leaders could be helpful to enlightening the debate and populace.
Mahony, in cooperation with the nondenominational Council of Religious Leaders, has convened a working group to "identify the moral and ethical implications of Valley secession ... to gain a clear understanding of the issues and concerns" of the proponents. This is a worthy, if vague, goal.
Perhaps we, as longtime observers of the morality at City Hall (or its absence), can provide some assistance.
The secession movement came to life out of a generation of neglect of the neighborhoods of Los Angeles by City Hall, the failure to respect the values and interests of ordinary residents and the denial of their fundamental rights to self-determination.
Throughout its history, the ruling elites of Los Angeles have used their position to enhance their wealth and power while enjoying virtual immunity from scrutiny or even prosecution by virtue of their domination of the political system.
Even as signs of democracy have sprouted in the last generation, L.A. politics have remained largely an insiders' game. Influence peddlers, well-connected developers, public employee unions and wealthy individuals dominate a system that has ill-served nearly every neighborhood of the city.
The use of force and human rights abuses by the Los Angeles Police Department have been tolerated, if not condoned, by the political leadership that acted only after intervention by the federal government.
Laws against slum housing conditions, even granny-flat firetraps, have rarely been enforced, even as streets and sidewalks in much of the city have been allowed to deteriorate.
The business community that generates jobs has faced such unrelenting attacks that L.A. no longer is home to any major banks or corporations.
City Hall's longtime failure to serve the people is matched by its service to itself. L.A. has the nation's highest paid bureaucrats and highest paid City Council members, who have chosen to spend $300 million to renovate a palace to themselves -- money that could have saved thousands of youths from a life of crime, drugs and violence and rejuvenated dozens of deteriorating neighborhoods.
Nothing shows the degree of corruption of city politics better than the current mayoral campaign, where special interests of all kind are being strong-armed into funding the costliest race in the city's history with the implied threat of the consequences of their failure to write sizable checks.
This is the moral backdrop against which many people in the San Fernando Valley, Hollywood and the Harbor area have rebelled. They fought City Hall to win state legislation restoring their right to political self-determination and have chosen to exercise their legal right.
Mayor Richard Riordan, who turned to Cardinal Mahony to raise the moral issues surrounding secession after his own credentials on the subject were challenged, has claimed that Valley secession represents an abdication of the community's responsibility.
His statement flies in the face of his own knowledge of the Valley as the city's most integrated and racially balanced part of Los Angeles and as a community with an unparalleled level of volunteerism. The most honored citizens of the Valley are those who give of themselves to help the sick and needy. The Valley could well bear the name City of Volunteers.
There is not a shred of evidence to suggest that the Valley secession movement has any motive beyond residents' longing for local control, improving the quality of life and providing opportunities for all.
Indeed, the poorest and neediest neighborhoods produced more support for the formal study of secession than the wealthiest neighborhoods of the Valley.
A thorough and open exploration by the community's spiritual leaders of the backdrop to secession and the possibilities of more democratic and effective local government in the future would contribute greatly to the public knowledge.
But rather than focusing on the morality of secession, why don't the religious leaders also examine the morality -- or immorality -- of what City Hall has done to the Valley over the years?
We urge Cardinal Mahony and other religious leaders to open the doors of their meetings to the public so the witnesses who come before them can speak to all L.A. citizens and lend credibility to the conclusions they draw from their investigation. [As of 5-8-01 the meeting are to be held in secret behind closed doors]
By operating behind a veil of secrecy as planned, the study of the morality of Valley secession runs the risk of becoming more of an inquisition than an inquiry.
By Harrison Sheppard Staff Writer
Religious and secession leaders welcomed Friday a study of the ethics and morality of breaking up Los Angeles to be conducted under the auspices of Cardinal Roger Mahony and the interfaith Council of Religious Leaders.
Harbor Study Foundation executive director Andrew Mardesich said he can't wait to jump into the discussion because he feels the question of morality favors his side, in that impoverished residents of his community have been ignored by the city. "Our issue with city services is secondary to the moral issue of abuse by the city of Los Angeles," Mardesich said.
Mayor Richard Riordan has often argued that secession would be immoral because, he says, it would hurt the inner-city poor by removing wealthier areas from the city. Riordan in the past has urged Mahony to get involved in the issue, although the study group was Mahony's proposal. The cardinal does not have a position on secession, according to his spokesman.
The working group will be appointed by the 12 members of the Council of Religious Leaders, representing different faiths. The final list is not yet ready.
Riordan has acknowledged neglecting the Harbor community but has partly blamed it on the neighborhood's own lack of organization.
Mardesich said the poverty and lack of business growth in the San Pedro and Wilmington neighborhoods are a result of the city favoring development at the port over the rights of neighborhoods. "The mayor has made a big mistake when he has, on moral grounds, said that secession is immoral," Mardesich said. "The immorality is what he has done to us in his eight years down here."
A Riordan spokesman said the mayor has recently tried to boost the neighborhood through initiatives such as increasing parkland, but the port serves a key economic role -- like Los Angeles International Airport -- for not just Los Angeles, but also the region and state.
"The Harbor is an important part not only of our economy, but of our identity," said Deputy Mayor Ben Austin. "Los Angeles as the Pacific Rim trading hub and one of the international trading capitals of the world is partly because of LAX but in a large part because of the Harbor."
Other religious leaders said they are eager to study the morality of the three secession proposals -- in the Valley, the Harbor area and Hollywood -- but are wary of taking sides.
Religious council member Bishop Paul Egertson of the Southern California Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America said when the council agreed with Mahony to create this group, it was careful in saying it doesn't want to take a position on secession but to raise ethical questions to help political decision-makers.
"It would include what impact that would have on services to both the Valley community if it secedes and on what's left in Los Angeles," Egertson said. "Is that going to increase the quality of life in one place, at the cost of decreasing it in another place? I would hope they would be looking for ways in which the decision would enhance both communities, not just one against the other."
Rabbi Mark Diamond, executive vice president of the Board of Rabbis of Southern California, said his organization has not yet appointed its representative to the study group, but he's glad to see the council taking an interest in the issue, and he feels it is an appropriate role.
"Indeed this is a very appropriate role for religious leaders of the different faiths and traditions," Diamond said. "To make an artificial distinction between politics and religion to me does not serve the greater good of the community. The prophet Jeremiah taught to pray for the welfare of the city. Our welfare is bound up in the welfare of the community at large."
By Harrison Sheppard Staff Writer
At the urging of Mayor Richard Riordan, Cardinal Roger Mahony has stepped into the secession debate by appointing a group of religious leaders to examine the "moral and ethical implications" of breaking up Los Angeles into smaller cities.
The Los Angeles Roman Catholic Archdiocese sent a letter this week to Valley Voters Organized Toward Empowerment, as well as to leaders of the Hollywood and Harbor Area secession movements, inviting them to an initial meeting May 23 with representatives of the Council of Religious Leaders. A spokesman for the archdiocese said Thursday that Mahony has no official position on secession but acted in response to a request from Riordan who has repeatedly argued that secession is immoral because he believes it would not serve the poorest residents of Los Angeles.
"We're not saying there are moral and ethical issues right now," said spokesman Tod Tamberg. "We're studying it to see if there are."
Leaders of the Valley VOTE secession movement welcomed participation in a dialogue on the morality of secession, saying a smaller Los Angeles and the new San Fernando Valley city would be able to serve the poor and all their residents more effectively with government closer to the communities they serve.
They noted that the Valley has its own pockets of urban poverty and closely reflects the demographics of the city as a whole as shown in the new census, which found that Hispanics slightly outnumbered whites in the Valley and that minorities were in the majority.
"I think we will demonstrate that this proposal for a Valley city which will allow two strong cities to exist is in the best interest of people of all economic, ethnic and racial backgrounds," said Valley VOTE Chairman Richard Close. "The question being asked is fair and we will show how it benefits those groups," he said.
Secession leaders noted that the highest proportion of residents signing Valley VOTE's petitions for a secession study hailed from the heavily Latino Northeast Valley, where community leaders have complained for decades about being ignored or short-changed by City Hall.
"We feel it is the proper thing to do to give people local control and allow them to control their own destiny," said Valley VOTE President Jeff Brain. "Whether they're affluent or impoverished, people have that same right. It's the more impoverished communities that supported this effort the most."
Valley VOTE, which plans to send Close and former Assemblyman Richard Katz to the meeting, made two requests: inclusion of Valley residents involved in serving the needy and that the working group spend time in the Valley and get to know the community and its residents.
Mahony is spearheading the effort with the support of the Council of Religious Leaders, which includes representatives of 12 religions in the Los Angeles area.
A spokesman for the mayor said Riordan had asked Mahony to get involved in the issue but was uncertain whether Riordan proposed the study group. "He's talked to Mahony about him taking a leadership role in the secession issue," said Deputy Mayor Ben Austin. "He thinks there's a very productive role he can play in the debate."
"The mayor is very focused in building a coalition of groups to make the case against secession. He believes it is a moral issue in that we all need to stick together and make sure the neediest in our society get taken care of."
Mahony's study group will hold a series of round-table discussions with researchers, proponents, analysts and ethicists, according to the letter from Thomas A. Chabolla, a senior archdiocese official. The group will then prepare a report for the Council of Religious Leaders.
Ethical experts and religious leaders are divided over what, if any, are the moral consequences of secession.
John P. Crossley, director of the University of Southern California's School of Religion, compares Valley secession to a form of white flight in which white middle-class families abandon the city for the suburbs, hurting the poorer residents left behind. [See the next story on the minority status of whites in the valley.]
"I would say it's essentially a selfish move," said Crossley, who is not affiliated with Mahony's group. "It's designed to not care about those who need the greatest help, and to care about those who need the least and who want out of being obliged to help the more needy."
Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis, head of one of the Valley's largest synagogues, Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, cautioned against either side speaking in terms of good and evil.
"The worst scenario is to pulverize the argument into saints and sinners, into good guys and bad guys," said Schulweis, who has not yet decided which side he supports. "I think that's not going to be the issue."
Rather, he said, it might be a question of which side achieves the greater good. To determine that, he said, one must carefully weigh each side's intentions and the consequences, intended or not, of their actions.
"The issue is not always good versus bad," he said. "It may be good versus good. That is where it seems to me moral reason has to be used. You have to weigh how much good versus how much good."
By Jason Kandel Staff Writer
Tony Cortes and his family moved from downtown Los Angeles and bought a home last year in Panorama City because of its diversity and open space, and good malls."The area is quiet and it's near malls and the main streets, and the people around here are peaceful and mixed," said Cortes, 61, as he, his son, his son's wife and two boys ate a McDonald's breakfast Saturday at Balboa Park. "On my street, there's Chinese, Taiwanese, Latinos, Filipinos, everybody."
Two days after officials released the final results of the Census 2000 data, San Fernando Valley residents discussed why they choose to live in the Valley, and what is so unique about their neighborhoods.
The Census data released Thursday shows that the Valley, which had traditionally been a white, middle-class region, shares an diverse ethnic mix with the rest of the city.
Hispanics now outnumber non-Hispanics 42.1 percent to 41.6 percent. The Hispanic, Asian and black populations in the Valley rose sharply in the decade, while the white population declined by 18.5 percent. The Asian/Pacific Islander population jumped 29 percent. The black population grew 18 percent.
Many Valley residents Saturday described a peaceful coexistence with residents from diverse cultures, and said it enhanced their experiences in the Valley, where there is good weather, parks, and more space than downtown.
Naseema Bhinderwala, 35, moved with her husband, an engineer, to Chatsworth about five years ago so they could raise their child and meet new people. "I am not alone here," said Bhinderwala, as she kept a close watch over her 14-month-old son under the shade of a tree at Balboa Park. "There are people from many parts of the world here. It makes you feel comfortable. I like the diversity of the Valley."
Other residents agreed. "Diversity is good," said Nemer Hage, 29, a Lebanese doctor, who lives in Encino, as he and his niece played at Balboa Park. "I don't like to live in a very homogenous neighborhood. This is America. This is how we started the country. People came from all over the place."
Buzz Brown, 64, of Woodland Hills, who has lived in the Valley since 1958, said he was surprised at the surge in the numbers of minorities living in the Valley over the last 10 years. There were few Latinos when he was growing up in the Valley. "I couldn't believe it," he said, reacting to the large numbers of Latinos at Balboa Park on Saturday. "I mean, it's like Mexico City. I don't mean from a Hispanic point of view, I mean culturally speaking.
"The race mix of Southern California is so diverse. I feel like a minority. If I'm not bilingual, I feel inadequate."
Robert Cortes, 32, who is Tony's son, doesn't mind driving the slow 30 miles from his home in Panorama City to his job as a nurse at a hospital downtown. "I think most of us really prefer Southern California because of the weather and the diverse mix. We just bought a house in Panorama City. It's a nice place."
By Beth Barrett Staff Writer
VAN NUYS -- Despite nearly two dozen residents protesting a citywide plan for high-density, low-income apartments, the Los Angeles City Planning Commission on Thursday unanimously passed it along to the City Council.
With little comment by commissioners beyond acknowledging that community sensitivities should be considered, the board disregarded pleas from community leaders that the plan be delayed until neighborhood councils are created under the new charter to deal with housing issues on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis.
While several people said the plan is needed to meet the city's growing housing demand, most of those speaking criticized it as incomplete and drafted without adequate public comment.
"Our concern is that this list of recommendations to increase density will be fast-tracked to the City Council prior to the formation of neighborhood councils," said Tom Paterson, a Valley Village resident. "Then the neighborhood councils will be stuck with these higher-density regulations."
The city plan would ease land-use controls and provide bonuses to developers, with city planners hoping those incentives would spur construction of about 60,000 new apartments by 2005.
Joan Luchs, president of the Cahuenga Pass Neighborhood Association, criticized the proposal to increase housing density, saying the city first should address how roads and services would be affected. As written, the plan she said, "is an outline for disaster."
AOL version 6.0 now properly reads HTML mail . I would recommend it to all AOL users. Get the free update from AOL. It will make all your HTML mail work so you can see the formatting and highlights and use the jumps to see referenced documents.
But until you get it to see the update and use the jumps you need to go to the website http://www.ValleyVote.org/updates/index.html and read the update from there with all the information that AOL strips.
** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C., section 107, some material is provided without permission from the copyright owner, only for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of federal copyright laws. These materials may not be distributed further, except for "fair use," without permission of the copyright owner. **If you friends want to be added to our E-mail list please send an E-mail with ValleyVote as the subject. We share our e-mail list with no one. Charles Brink Webmaster. If you want to have your name removed from the list just reply with remove as subject |