Results tagged “councildistrict”

Yesterday was election day for those in Los Angeles' second district, spanning a slice of the Valley from Sherman Oaks to the Northeast Valley. Ten candidates put in a bid, but only two came out strong enough to turn the race into a runoff, which will take place on December 8th. Assemblyman Paul Krekorian and Businesswoman and City Commissioner Chris Essel dominated the results, something that was not too surprising, one bit. Here are the full results:

The grassroots, but powerful San Fernando Valley Democratic Club yesterday endorsed Assemblyman Paul Krekorian for the 2nd District Council Seat in Los Angeles, according to wire reports. Krekorian is considered one of the front runners in the race along with Studio Exec Chris Essel and city prosecutor and LAUSD boardmember Tamar Galatzan--he currently represents portions of the Valley and over-the-hill neighborhoods like Los Feliz and Silver Lake. The endorsement gives the Democrat an edge on Essel, who has raised the most money and has been endorsed by former Mayor Richard Riordan. No matter, "money is not going to be a factor in this council race," says his campaign manager. "This campaign is going to be won on the ground, talking to voters directly." The primary for the district, which runs from Sherman Oaks to the Northeast Valley, will be held on September 22nd.

State Assemblyman Paul Krekorian will be soon be voting on the proposed budget solution, which severely impacts local governments including Los Angeles. If it passes, Los Angeles could lose millions and has leaders like Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Council President Eric Garcetti worried. Krekorian also happens to be one of the frontrunners in the race for Los Angeles Council District 2. That's quite a pickle of a situation and when pressed about it, his office declined to comment. Will he vote along Democratic party lines to approve the budget, which could hurt Los Angeles yet immediately help the state, or will he make a statement as someone who really wants to represent Los Angeles on the City Council? No matter what he does, it's not a black or white situation--it's not like the Democrats have many choices with Schwarzenegger, who basically is unwilling to compromise with many workable ideas. Still, politics are politics: if he votes for the budget, expect that to be a major issue his opponents will use against him in future debates.

It's pretty much been known for months, but today Assemblymember Paul Krekorian announced his campaign for Los Angeles Council District 2, which crosses the Valley from Sherman Oaks to North Hollywood to a handful of Northeast Valley neighborhoods like Shadow Hills and Tujunga. Currently, Krekorian represents the 43rd Assembly District, which covers Burbank, Glendale and portions of LA including Valley Village, Valley Glen, Toluca Lake, Atwater Village, Silver Lake and Los Feliz.

Now with Wendy Gruel heading to the City Controller Office on July 1st, her seat will be soon vacant leading to a possible campaign if a special election is approved by City Council (and it's likely to go that way instead of an appointment). Tomorrow is the last day to submit proof of residence and voter registration within Council District 2, which stretches from Sherman Oaks and Studio City through North Hollywood into the Northeast Valley neighborhoods of Shadow Hills, Sunlund and Tujunga (see a PDF map here).

Residents of West LA, South Robertson, Hollywood, the Hills, Sherman Oaks and Encino, on July 1st, Paul Koretz will replace Jack Weiss as your city councilman. Last night, the County Clerk declared that he won the election by a tight margin of nearly two points, according to Jill Banks Barad, President of the Sherman Oaks Neighborhood Council. As listed on the County's website, last updated yesterday afternoon, Koretz received 18,547 (50.99%) votes while David T. Vahedi was less than a thousand behind at 17,825 votes (49.01%). Koretz is both a former West Hollywood Councilman and State Assemblymember. Vahedi, a community organizer and attorney, is expected to concede tomorrow. Don't know if you live in CD5? Check the embedded map below.

Former West Hollywood Councilman and Assemblyman Paul Koretz claimed victory for LA's 5th district seat late Tuesday night. Then an e-mail late yesterday afternoon came with some sobering news.

Although not officially announced by the County Registrar, Paul Koretz claimed victory last night in an e-mail blast: "The L.A. County Registrar of Voters has just posted an update on their website. Paul's lead in Council District 5 has jumped from 551 votes to 702 votes... Although we have been told that there are still approximately 100 ballots left to count, we can now safely claim victory." As for the reported incorrect ballots, the e-mail indicated there were only 50. The total posted was Koretz, 18,286 votes (50.98%), Vahedi 17,584 votes (49.02%). What does this mean for residents of CD5? When he was an Assemblymember, there were lots of community town halls. Lots (but will he have more than Tom LaBonge?). As for improving the area West Hollywood style like he did when he sat on that city's council? If he can do that, then, wow.

As it stands right now, former West Hollywood Councilman and Assemblyman Paul Koretz leads lawyer and community organizer David Vahedi by a close 551 votes. Provisional and vote-by-mail ballots still need to be counted, but some problems have surfaced, earlier examined by the LA Times and highlighted by a Vahedi camp e-mail this weekend:

With all but two precincts reporting, only 316 votes separated candidates Paul Kortez and David Vahedi for the 5th district of Los Angeles, which covers the Hollywood Hills, Westside and Sherman Oaks/Encino. Koretz, a former West Hollywood councilman and state politician, led with 50.51% of the vote, over a point ahead of Vahedi, a community organizer and lawyer, according to the LA County Recorder-Registrar/County Clerk. The race is too close to call because provisional and some vote-by-mail ballots will still need to be counted. UPDATE: 335 votes separate the two with 100% of precincts reporting. Koretz still leads, but because these are preliminary results and the race is so close, the official outcome will probably come in the near future.

It was rumored to be a simple swap. If Wendy Greuel won City Controller, which she did last night, City Controller Laura Chick would run for Greuel's empty seat in Council District 2 in the Valley. In an upset to many, Chick announced this morning that she is moving on from elected city politics.

I live on Gower, south of Sunset, and my street is always filled with homeless people living in RVs. Is there any recourse I can take to get them to leave? Are they breaking any laws?

Technically, these folks are not breaking the law... yet. And all this can change in a matter of a few months all because LADOT got a new General Manager (Rita Robinson, formerly of the City's Bureau of Sanitation). For almost 18 months, the City has had an ordinance on the books that prohibits parking of recreational vehicles over 22 feet long and 84 inches high on City streets between 2am and 6am. This ordinance was not able to implamented because the Council wanted to allow for the loading and unloading (read: parking) of such vehicles on a tempory basis by permit only. Addionally, this ordinance could only be put into effect if signage was posted indicating the new rule. All of this was supposed to be done over a year ago, but just last week, LADOT issued a report acknowledging the plan they have in place to adhere to these requirements.

Here's a theme for City Council: they publish e-mail addresses on their websites so the public can contact them, but you e-mail them and get a bounced e-mail in return. You've seen this before. 1. The city's Webmaster (see the LaBonge story link) 2. Councilman Tom LaBonge 3. Councilman Greig Smith The next victim in the city's published e-mail address shenanigans is Councilman Tony Cárdenas, representing Council District 6 in The Valley. "No such recipient."...

In our attempt to have City Council offices get LAist added to their press release lists, we have found another City Council e-mail address defunct. Enter councilman Greig Smith, the man with one of the best City Council websites (maybe not in design, but an aggressively updated one, unlike other council websites). After failing to communicate with Tom LaBonge, a similar problem now exists with Smith. Unreported on LAist, this exact same thing happened on...

Girl's got mad skillz. And that's why we f'in heart Jenny Lewis. We couldn't say it better than our city council president, however. Pass the mic to E. (Garcetti):Jenny is a third-generation Angeleno and was well known locally before her career took off. She dedicated her award, as she put it, "to all of my neighbors who, for all these years put up with the musical racket coming from my tiny apartment in Silver Lake."...

Tomorrow night, Councilwoman for District 2, Wendy Greuel, will be hosting a rather large public town hall meeting on crime in The Valley. Even LAist is showing up to represent a booth (okay, we'll actually be repping a neighborhood council). In any case, if you live in the Valley and you want the best part of LA to stay the best, then this meeting is extremely important. Greuel, along with the LAPD will declare...

Beyond Obama in '08, local politicos are already talking about 2009 elections here in LA. From Controller to Council, here comes Chick. Who the hell is going to oppose the powerhouse of Mayor V? Wendy and Weiss will leave council and try their hands at Controller and City Attorney.

- The map (pictured above -- "Geles County" is Los Angeles County) that hit the scenes a couple of years ago now has a plan behind it - MetroRiderLA - Six Flags Magic Mountain is staying put, sans two rides: Flashback and Cyclone - SFVBJ - At least the promise of a new LATimes.com is going to be better than LA Weekly's most recent weberration - LAO - LACityNerd joins Council District 13, kinda...

Council President Eric Garcetti represents the Thirteenth Council District which includes all or part of the communities of Glassell Park, Atwater Village, Elysian Valley, Echo Park, Historic Filipinotown, Silver Lake, East Hollywood and Hollywood. Otherwise known as LAist's 'Hood. Because we're represented brilliantly, when we sent our councilmember a request to take part in this collection of Best Of lists not only did he respond quickly and wonderfully, but he reached behind our ear and...

This March, we will vote again. All even-numbered Los Angeles council districts will be up for grabs. Well... sorta. A few will be running unopposed: CD2: Wendy Greuel CD4: Tom LaBonge CD12: Greig Smith Competition will be found in: CD6: Tony Cardenas CD8: Bernard Parks CD10: Herb Wesson CD14: José Huizar (a story about this race) And since Alex Padilla will resign his seat in CD7 to go to the State Senate, there will...

Yesterday, Sean Bonner of Metroblogging Los Angeles, who helped the LAPD birth a blog of their own, caught wind of a video taken on August 11 and posted on YouTube on October 18, showing a splice of an arrest with an officer punching a man in the face. Immediately, LAist wrote Council District 13, requesting a response. They were not aware of it and said they would let us know of any details to...

Last night Council District 2's Wendy Greuel held a community forum, The Intersection of Planning and Transportation, in discussion with Director of Planning, Gail Goldberg and Gloria Jeff, General Manager of DOT. If we were better hackers, we would have live blogged, but LA Valley College protects their WiFi. Nevertheless, some highlights from last night:

The election of Antonio Villaraigosa as Los Angeles mayor continues to have a "musical chairs" effect through city politics, as the players jockey for better seats to get their issues heard. This time it's the unions aiming for the political equivalent of floor seats at Staples Center.

First of all, LAist apologizes for not getting our election story in–we were out at various election night parties to all hours and didn’t have time to write anything.

After complaints at Mayor Sam’s Sister City and the relaunched West L.A. Online blog about the lack of news (and websites) in the LA City Council District 11 race, we have a sudden spate of updates.

Local political junkies are slowly turning their attention from last week’s election to the upcoming City Hall races. The Mayor’s race is attracting the most attention due to the high-profile challengers to Mayor Jim Hahn, though both of Hahn’s fellow City-wide elected officials—City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo and City Controller Laura Chick—are up for re-election. The seven eight odd-numbered Council districts will also hold elections, with six seven incumbents seeking re-election and Councilmember Cindy Miscikowski of the 11th Council District leaving office due to term limits.