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# Editor’s Memo: Déjà Vu All Over Again
December 05 2016
Written by Ken Draper.
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CITYWATCH TODAY—It’s déjà vu all over again … the baseball legend Yogi Berra is said to have said. In this case, I’m talking about LA’s neighborhood councils and the talk of secession.
Former LA City Councilman Joel Wachs came up with the idea for neighborhood councils. He brought the motion for NCs to his City Council colleagues in 1996 … saying, ‘the people have become cynical about their elected officials … they feel we’re no longer listening to them.’
Fifteen years ago, three communities tried to secede from Los Angeles … saying ‘our elected officials no longer listen to us.’ Los Angeles certified its first neighborhood council (Wilmington) 15 years ago and suggested NCs were an answer the ‘City Hall isn’t listening’ complaint and voters rejected the calls for secession.
**Tim Deegan** tells us … in **Today’s CityWatch** … that the talk of secession is back in the LA air. In particular, in Venice. The reason, Tim says, is because a bunch of Venice folks think that City Hall ‘is no longer listening to them.’ And, Tim wonders aloud, ‘isn’t that what neighborhood councils were created to handle?’
Secession. Neighborhood councils. Déjà vu all over again. In Today’s CityWatch. Worth a look-see.
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There are more questions to be answered, in Today’s CityWatch. Thirty-plus lives were lost over the weekend when an old warehouse in Oakland burned to the ground. In addition to the event taking place on the second floor, people were living there. It was affordable. It was a deathtrap. A tragedy waiting to happen. Not unknown to the neighborhood. Not unknown to the city of Oakland. Your government at work. An example of the high cost of affordable housing. Shame on the city of Oakland. Shame on anyone who votes any of those city officials back into office.
Ken Draper-Editor, CityWatch
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