Friday, August 17, 2007

Odds and Ends 26

This post marks the mid-year Odds and Ends. I never had an idea that we would get to this point on this blog. There have now been over 14,000 visits since last September and I thank all of you for remaining interested in this blog and the issues surround Bob's blight.
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Perhaps it is now time to refer to the 61.53 acre site in northwest San Pedro as Bob's blight. Continuing to call it something akin to "bridge view" is less notable that referring to the site as it really is, right now.

Bob's blight diminishes any views of any bridge, as far as I am concerned. If Bob wishes to attempt to use truths in his commentary, then I feel it is reasonable, realistic, responsible, and even respectful to call the site what it now has truly become....Bob's blight.
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I am glad to have read that the Harbor City Neighborhood Council's Board unanimously opposed Bob's plans to build 1,950-units on his property.

The Neighborhood Council fell one vote short of calling for R1 at the site. Perhaps a future vote will find that Board calling for R1 or some number of homes, far fewer than 1,950.

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Again on Friday we found two letters to the editor in the Daily Breeze from opponents of Bob's blight.

Kyle Boone is a name I do not know, but the letter was insightful from a resident of Harbor City and bringing Kyle's issues into focus.

You need to know that when Rob Thorsen writes a letter to the editor, it is from another member of the Rudderless Steering Committee of R Neighborhoods Are 1. Letters from folks like Rob and I should be taken with the knowledge that we are both thick into dealing with Bob's blight. Rob, of course, makes great points, but he is not someone who isn't as involved with the issues as folks like Kyle Boone are.

It is always wonderful to read letters from folks who are opposed to Bob's blight.

It is also rather humorous to read letters from those who spout B.s. (Bisno support) who condemn folks living in R.P.V., when they themselves, live in R.P.V.
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For those who know my wife Terri, her mother Patricia Ann Duffy Page passed away on Monday August 13, 2007. Pat had been in Hospice Care for just over a month and lived as long as she wanted to live. Patricia chose to live her life for as long as she wished to, and when she was ready to not live any longer, she didn't.

Pat lived and died with dignity.
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The City of Rancho Palos Verdes will be holding an election in November which will include voting for three of the five seats on the City Council.

In the short future, I will be listing the candidates. I have my own personal recommendations, but those can wait, too.

Some of us are hoping for a candidates forum on the east side of R.P.V., like the one we had for the last City election to council seats.

It is now time to prepare for Eastview and eastern R.P.V. residents to come out and learn about the candidates and vote! Our area CAN make up a voting block that would not be ignored by anyone in R.P.V.

With what R.P.V. residents have done in dealing with Bob's blight, now it is time for us to come together in our own city and look for representatives who will listen very carefully to us and will do OUR bidding. It has always been our own residents' fault that we may have been ignored by our own City Government. Now that we have numbers of residents dealing with Bob's blight, we need to also focus on how our own government will assist us in dealing with Bob's blight, too.

If and when a candidates forum can be arranged, I will post information about it, on this blog.
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The City of Los Angeles receives $0.10 of every Sales Tax dollar generated within the City of Los Angeles.

The City of Los Angeles receives $0.09 of every Property Tax dollar generated from properties within the City of Los Angeles.

These two amounts need to fund schools, fire, police, trash, other emergency services, and many other infrastructure needs the City has.

No matter how few residents ever move into Bob's blight, there will never be enough revenue generated by those residents to cover the added costs to the City for those residents.

The more residents of Bob's blight, the more the rest of the residents of Los Angeles will have to pay to cover the added costs.

With so few places to create revenue within the five-mile radius of Bob's blight, and still within the limits of the City of Los Angeles, Bob's blight will need to have revenue from other parts of the City, especially from the San Fernando Valley area, just to keep the goods and services the City of L.A. must provide, flowing.

Putting such a large development so far from real revenue generation streams within the City of L.A. and also so far from any real transit hubs that could accommodate a large development like Bob's blight, make any development the size that Bob wishes, much too costly to the rest of the area of Los Angeles, including San Pedro, according to knowledgeable sources.
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The next CAC meeting seems to be the last one. At the meeting, the recommendations passed by the group at their previous meeting will be finalized.

I feel we all should attend this meeting and demonstrate our thanks to thirteen members of the committee who worked so hard, for so long, to consider what is best for OUR community.

The CAC spoke with almost one complete voice when they determined that what Bob wants is NOT in the best interest of OUR community.

I think Ms. Hahn, the Planning Department, and OUR community benefited greatly from the work the CAC did. They brought into focus what OUR community wants and needs, no matter what Bob thinks.
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It appears we are still being victimized by paid petition gatherers who refuse to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Shame on all of them.

I guess Ms. Swanson's attempts went unheeded or she just gave up. Perhaps she now knows that she could not change the leopard's spots, so she just accepts half truth, misleading word usage, and other attempts by the paid petition gatherers to get as many signatures from unsuspecting victims as she can.
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Please keep signing the R1 petition, if you haven't done so already. There is no need to repeatedly sign because we are going through and eliminating repeated signatures and names.
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In the near future, we will be dealing more with traffic, revenue generation and spending, school enrollment and the need for more classrooms, environmental issues, infrastructure issues, and the general current climate in OUR community.

We are not just really starting to jump into the ring with round two. It appears that round one went to us and it looks like round two will further cement our position as the better fighter in the ring.

This fight may have 20-30 rounds and we are determined to win every single round. We need you help to do this. We ask that you stay informed and caring. We hope you understand that we are up agains not only an out-of-town developer, we are now having to deal with the greater L.A. area and the idea that many other developers have to provide weapons of mass development, that very few people want.
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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mark, I am confused and I would like you to clarify, if bob's property caught on fire tomorrow, or if someone was murdered out there, wouldn't LAFD and LAPD still have to go there? Why do the property tax revenues hurt the city of LA? Also I know that most residents of san pedro leave the city and go to torrance for car shopping and to go to del amo, i just thought id point this out.

M Richards said...

Thanks anonymous 7:08 PM,

Property Tax Revenues are great and a must for every city.

The problem with property tax revenues coming into the City of L.A. from residents of Ponte Vista is that they won't cover the added expenditures created by such a large development. The more residences, the more costs, even though there would, indeed, be more property tax revenue created.

It is true that if Ponte Vista caught on fire today, the L.A.F.D., and probably County Fire would respond and put out fires.

My contention here is that if there was less fuel to burn, there would be less of a chance for a large fire. With Bob not paying that much in property taxes at this point, his project is probably at risk to cost more to the City of L.A. right now than it would be if it were cleaned up.

When I bought my Honda at Carson Honda, the City of Carson got sales tax revenue from me. That would have been true if I lived in the City of Los Angeles.

The City of R.P.V. gets an extremely small amount of revenue from sales tax because there are so few businesses to create the source for sales tax. R.P.V. has now risen just above Lawndale in the amount of revenue per capita, in the south bay. Our city is a little like San Pedro in that it does not have the sales tax revenue stream to help support it.

If Ponte Vista were built inside the City of Torrance, there would be a much larger sales tax base to help support the infrastructure necessary.

With Ponte Vista planning to be a giant housing development, essentially in an area where there is not enough sales tax revenue generation streams, it could cost the rest of the residents of L.A.

Of course, Ponte Vista residents may not care about others in their City and would enjoy being supported by others.
MW