Council Blow-by-Blow for 2-9-09

We've got water, trees again and Nina Chomsky's backyard on the agenda. A long one with nothing that matters much unless you want to sell your backyard, too.

Bogaard does the pledge. Holden, Robinson and Haderlein aren't there at the start.

No back pats for Council pals. Bogey talks about how there's a chance for more pals to be on the General Plan Committee.

PUBLIC COMMENT: Trabia Simms says congrats on the Rose Parade and talks about how he had a kid born on New Years and he got stuck in parade traffic. Marvin Schecter bitches about how California's a mess and we need action on the Obama's recovery plan.

Tyler's in a hurry to do the trees, but Bogey says it's happening at 8 o'clock.

CONSENT CALENDAR: They're spending an extra $230K on Hamilton Park and trying to get $90K for forestry grants.

WATER PRESENTATION: Tim Brick from MWD staff says we got no water left and they're gonna raise the rates and force people to conserve. No surprises. Long talk to tell me what I already know. Guess he's earning his $$$. Can you say drought?

PLAYHOUSE TREES: Tyler has a plan but wont' say what it is. C.M. Beck wants to kill carrotwoods and save ficus trees. Tree huggers and a JPL scientists say save the big trees. Playhouse people and their pals say get rid of them. Sidewalks are a mess, trees are ugly. A guy in a wheelchair says the tree sap gets all over his wheels and he rolls it everywhere. He hate ficus trees. Old Town guy, Playhouse people, Chamber of Commerce guy say follow the plan. They dance around what the rules are but finally diss Tyler and keep the plan. Robinson's there now and looks kinda wasted again. Holden's here too. Nobody goes with Tyler's motion to change what they did before so bye bye ficus trees. Hello ginkoes. People are right, the sidewalks are a mess and the trees are kinda trashed anyway. They talk about some other stuff after thats' pretty confusing before the lawyer decides they can't talk about that so they decide to have a agenda item about trees sometime soon.

NINA CHOMSKY'S BACKYARD: City's back trying to by empty land for the Livvies for $6 million. Beck says they're gonna pay with park money. Nina and her pals want City to spend the cash so they won't get developments back there. Poindesxtery dude from the Santa Monica Conservancy says this is great. Chamber dude Little says the city's to broke to be buyin' the property but Gordo says it's not general fund $$$ and Beck agrees. They're buyin' some space for parking, too and say they got a group that'll do trails for free. Trails don't matter, nobody's gonna go there so Nina gets her backyard safe from new neighbors. Ugly buncha biddies comes out for this one, including bitching biddie queen Crystal Balvin. Council's doin' it. Mayor's pals get a buncha money. Is anything gonna happen in my Garfield heights neighborhood anytime? Do we get $6 mil too?

BUDGET: They're gonna do the budget by May and plan projects for the next five years.

WATER PLAN: We got no water. They're wantin' us to save more. It's gonna cost us and they're gonna change the rates and put in penalties so we either save or pay. Lot's of talk to say we gotta save more water and if we don't we're gonna have to pay a bunch more.

LEAF BLOWERS: Are a total pain the butt, but they keep gardeners from hosing. The city's got a law about how loud and messy they can be and the health Department dude is gonna have it enforced and that means fines. Sounds like there's also money to replace old ones with quiet new ones. Makes sense. A coupla public commenters really hate leaf blowers.

ORDINANCE: Changes something about redevelopment areas downtown.

McAustin talks about how the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments (that COG they talk about) is all about traffic and the Gold Line and trying to get an urgent care center in the east valley. There's a homeless study from something called SKAG. The COG's got no treasurer 'cause nobody's happy bein' responsible for the money so it's gettin' outsourced. Holden wants to know about commissioners and gettin' new people to do it. Beck says they're gonna see about advertisin' it better.

Nina's got her backyard playground so Bogus keeps his pals happy. Playhouse gets new trees and that's about it. Five hours with nothin' much happening.

Pretty dull.

D.