Romer v. Villaraigosa
The superintendent's comparison of the mayor's strategy to propaganda used to incite fears about Japanese Americans during World War II has the mayor and the J-A community "outraged." The
Daily News story focuses on that angle, the
Times plays it high and also notes that Romer has hired former lawmakers Richard Polanco and John Burton to help fight against Villaraigosa's compromise bill.
'Sharp rise' in restaurant takeover robberies
Barone's, the Ventura Boulevard institution that recently moved downscale to Valley Glen, is the latest. The
Times reports on the trend and blogger Zach Behrens
bemoans the hit on Barone's at LAist.
New politics column in LAT Calendar
Cause Celebre "will explore the juncture between celebrity and politics." Tina Daunt has the first installment.
Bad time for public murals
Artist Kent Twitchell
filed a claim against the U.S. Department of Labor for
painting over his six-story "Ed Ruscha Monument" downtown, while Caltrans workers partially painted over two freeway murals.
Library Tower uses Homeland Security ruse again
Edward Fuentes was taking photos of the farmers market on 5th Street when roaming guards from Library Tower told him that he could not shoot there, reportedly telling him "It's the policy of Homeland Security, and all the buildings in Los Angeles have this policy." Fuentes writes about his later exchange with the director of security, who admitted there is no such policy, at his blog
View From a Loft.
What if nobody misses them?
Writers on the CW show "America's Next Top Model"
walked out for an hour and threatened to strike over not being allowed to have a contract with the Writers Guild.
Council gets what it really wanted from Bratton
Forget all that rhetoric about an apology. Following his hug with Councilman Dennis Zine, the LAPD chief
blessed Jose Huizar with a joint press conference and there has been much
making of nice behind the scenes. "The chief is very methodically reaching out to members of the council," Council President Eric Garcetti said.
Carson cracks down on "Reno 911"
The Comedy Central show films a lot at the sheriff station and on residential streets in the city of Carson, but the council there has now
banned "loud, lewd or improper" language on location. Apparently the scene where two cops watch a dominatrix whip a man in front of a large picture window on Marine Street pushed things over the edge.
Villaraigosa proposes "free transit week"
MTA would pay for the
free rides. When they tried it in the Bay area, ridership went up a whole 10% — while it was free.
Daily News picks up on tonight's Ludlow fundraiser
Story credits the LA Weekly's report yesterday and quotes Bob Stern, president of the Center for Governmental Studies, saying, "I'm always concerned when elected officials are raising money," said Bob Stern, in Los Angeles. "I'm less concerned about Connie Rice and John Mack. But elected officials can oversee contracts and make decisions affecting people. The question is, how much arm-twisting are they doing to get people to contribute to this. And, of course, the contributions are much higher than what can be given to a City Council member."
Pellicano a cooling media story?
Variety's Gabriel Snyder
writes today that "the Pellicano beat is going cold" and goes story-by-story through some of the past work to see what reporters did and didn't come up with.
Once hyped by the media as Hollywood's version of Watergate, the continuing federal investigation into Anthony Pellicano's alleged wiretapping has yet to produce the shocking plot twists originally anticipated.
Some observers still believe, as Ken Auletta writes in this week's New Yorker, that the Pellicano saga will go down as "the biggest, and dirtiest, scandal in Hollywood's history."
But three months before Pellicano and seven other co-defendants are scheduled to go on trial, and nearly four years after his Sunset Boulevard offices were first raided, the predictions that Hollywood A-listers would be nabbed, studio chieftains dethroned and celebrity dirt unearthed have so far failed to pan out....
the lack of big names facing criminal charges is not for a lack of trying on the part of the reporters -- particularly at the New York Times and Los Angeles Times -- assigned to the Pellicano trail. Never have so many reporters dug so deep for so long to find so little.
Another LABJ departure
Rachel Brown is the latest reporter to leave the Los Angeles Business Journal.
Compare leads
Today's
San Francisco Chronicle, reporting on the controversy over compensation of University of California administrators:
About 60 top executives in the University of California system can keep more than $1 million they received in unauthorized extra compensation, the UC governing Board of Regents agreed Thursday.
"The beneficiaries of this didn't do anything wrong, so they shouldn't be penalized," Gerald Parsky, chairman of the board, said after the meeting in San Francisco.
The retroactive approval was, in part, a response to three separate audits that were launched after a series of stories in The Chronicle revealed that millions of dollars in extra compensation and questionable perks had been handed out but never publicly disclosed.
And the drier L.A. Times top:
In an effort to tighten controls over executive benefits and restore public confidence in the university's leadership, the UC Board of Regents on Thursday approved the creation of three high-ranking jobs supervising finances.
By launching searches to fill those positions, the regents acknowledged criticism from legislators and independent auditors that too many decisions about executive salaries and perks have been poorly handled and lacked proper oversight.
"Events of the past year have been traumatic for the university," said Regent Judith L. Hopkinson, who heads the committee on compensation and led the movement for increased oversight.
The L.A. Report
New from Don Rose, the
site bills itself as "your digital digest for all things LA and beyond."
It feels cooler already
From the L.A. Times:
Heat wave: An article in Wednesday's Section A said the "urban heat island" — an effect created in large cities when heat is trapped and then released by concrete and asphalt — could increase the temperature by 50 degrees. It should have said 10 degrees.
Warren Olney has our man in Iraq
Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad guests on "To the Point" at 1 pm on KCRW and streamed on the website.
Barry Bonds not indicted
No action from the grand jury in San Francisco, but feds say the
probe remains very active.
Meanwhile in below-.500 land...
The Dodgers
lost seven of eight games on their just-ended road trip and now stand at 47-49, one game out of last place.
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The Times breaks out a new Hollywood and politics column, the City Council gets the love it wants from Chief Bratton, and the city of Carson isn't laughing at "Reno 911" (but then who is?) Details on those items and a big bunch o' news from around L.A. inside the Morning Buzz. 
