Hollywood Blvd: Late breaking news (to us at least)

Our two, so long dead movie theaters, the FOX and the VOGUE, have been purchased by Hollywood enthusiast and successful entrepreneur, CHRIS BREED and are to undergo rebirths as nightclubs. Sans any public subsidy! Damn whut next?

The progenitor of the pioneering and very successful 'Sunset Room, The Lotus Club and the Pig 'n Whistle,' is said to be well advanced in the transformational aspects i.e., movie projectors, etc, have been removed. CHRIS, like most of our stars, is not native but rather one who came here to recreate his visions of the best of our town.

The Pacific Theater:  we are most happy to hear that U.S.C.'s purview will end soon, opening the possibility or a rational exploitation of that magnificent theater may emerge.

The Hillview Apts, now on expensive course to a new life, it seems that three major 'gravesites' are to to be no more on our Old Hollywood Blvd. (see below)

Sadly, we predict the imminent demise of the Assistance League @ St Andrews Place. This due to the great mass of immigrant 'day labor' men who really 'own' the street. Fear, and despair over increasing defecations on private property, insults to passersby, particularly to women, ensure that this 'historic' recourse for older women, youngsters, etc. will soon close. Hopefully, they may relocate to more civil turf... Pasadena? Glendale? West Hollywood? 

Council worries about 'gentrifying' the Sunset Western vicinity are amazingly unworldly.. The public policy bias is to perpetuate it as a Third World icon of grunginess. For demogogic purposes. The same folk who demand 'living wages' of enterprises, encourage the massive incursion of illegals to compete for far less, thus driving down the ability of responsible employers, burdened by irresponsible legislation, to pay net living wages. 

Example:  a recent personal experience--the competitive bid for a legitimate painting service, via licensed, fully insured contractors, amounted to $380.00+ per day for the services of an experienced painter and novice + materials. But the 'novice,' was unable to support his wife and three  children in a neighboring country, save by sleeping in a truck, or whatever...indeed even the senior experienced young painter, was hard put to make ends meet, despite his envied employment by his decent, responsible law abiding employer competing for contracts in a totally irresponsible civic environ. 

Los Angeles has always had 'day labor' locations for the natural convenience of supply and demand.. But they then were never ever seen as uncivil. Never ever feared nor loathed by those nearby. In the Hollywood environs, in the '50's, largely 'white', and by the '70's, mostly 'black'....when MidWay Hardware @ Pico Blvd. peaked in building matters in the '70's, as does Home Depot now, 'applicant day workers' congregated in the parking lot of an adjacent fast food business, with mutual benefits to all and trespass to none, and with memorable civilities and pleasantries, in my experience.

What we have to contend with today, in dire contrast, is a public policy calamity wherein our 'professional' (careerist) public 'servants' advance their careers by being 'politically correct', irrespective of consequence to the commonwealth.

What to do? Term limits have resulted in but a merry-go-round of professionals.

The answer is as obvious, as is the success of our neighboring cities: namely, reduce legislators pay drastically. Abandon that monstrous notion foisted on us in the mid '60's..that we needed a 'professional' legislature composed of career 'specialists' as opposed to citizens willing to participate, with but per diem recompense. Much as jury duty.

We bought that obvious crap by party pols seeking to secure their rule; and, dumbly abandoned our founding heritage, that of men acceding to office part time only, to realize a concept, thence to return to ordinary life, and the realization of that concept in California by now long forgotten luminaries.

In our dear state of California since 1964, we have experienced all the evils and few benefits from abandoning a citizen legislature. Special interests have wreaked unending societal havoc in their advantage. A powerful liquor lobby convinced these party 'professionals' that we were vastly underserved in such. By 1966, South Central L.A. had more off sale liquor licenses that 26 states!  But that was only a prominent modest start.  By well intentioned political interventions, totally naive of consequence. the 'ecology' of our pleasant civilizing apartment 'communities,' was effectively outlawed.  Managers were reduced to a part time presence, anarchy and criminal dominance ensued. Few now remember when apartment buildings haven't had unlocked entry and human welcome. Prison bars, & electronic devices replace. Effective management. has been relegated to attorneys and the courts. And the quality of life of this fundamental lifestyle of California residents is now unrecognizable to that previous. 

Yucca Corridor

With the Studio Cafe on the Blvd. @ Cherokee Ave. closed....major relief on Cherokee from burgeoning drug and street prostitution problems.... peace and quiet there now. How bad was it getting to be? ROBIN MORENO, head honcho at our terrific LAPD/Community center ( Suite B, 1718 Cherokee Ave) reported that the crowd of prostitutes had extended to the front and were demanding free condoms and use of the restroom.!!!! But the drug and prostitution trade has simply shifted......

At the March meeting of the Neighborhood watch, was our Senior Lead Officer Maria Gholisadeh.  Some hi lites:

• Street drug and prostitution trade has migrated to the 1700 block of Whitley Ave. and that a totally indifferent management of the Motel 6 was a principal host and that adjacent Re Tan hotel, a close second. Evidently both are renting to losers, from marginal to total and with concomitant indifferences to civility.  I.e. violence: "Two naked blacks dragged out of the Motel 6 and beaten by a gang of another ethnic, in the early AM hours." Drive-in to Whitley Ave auto customers for street service of drugs or whatever.
• This 'criminal business' activity may be expanding to Wilcox Ave @ the Blvd..but with the customer demand, it alertly shifts to avoid suppression. 
• Happily, we hear responsible adjacent owners are anxious to help in this struggle.
• Some Grace Ave residents in the 1800 block report demoralizing crime..burglaries, vandalizings of autos, break ins, graffiti,... this in our most charming and endearing of streets....their voiced decision: ...to flee.
• S.L.O. BILL SOLLIE mentioned increased burglaries in the hills.

If counsel is needed as to 'removal,' or deterrence, we are veterans and can suggest appropriate paths. Simply call us.

Our motels are reflecting the major decline in tourist presence, thus their occupancy by either criminals or the least competent and most troublesome. This bodes ill indeed. As on Whitley Ave, they become refuges and centers of criminal activity as in the loathsome past.

Sidewalk Graffiti:

The HED (the Hollywood Entertainment District) is paid to cleanup the sidewalks on Yucca Street's South side. Call em @ 323 464-1893, otherwise call us and we'll advise and help. But time is of the essence in removals, the earlier, the easier.

• Doggie doo cleanup of our parkways & sidewalks. ROBIN MORENO, has been temporarily funding a weekly cleanup of such in the Corridor in the absence of a community resolution of the problem. This is her blessedly practical and most economical approach of having needy folk clean the parkways, whilst being innovatively sheltered by worker's compensation coverage, but just once a week!!  We can do better....and this update at publication, happily, is that ROBIN has been promised city waste containers at the intersections of our Yucca Corridor.!!! Stop by and thank her @ our LAPD/Community Center 1718 Cherokee Ave Suite B.
• Hopefully, soon you will be able to walk your pet, with convenient market plastic bag in hand, elegantly dispose of the waste. When we say elegantly, we mean just that.
• In our marvelously convenient time, with market plastic bags aplenty,.... everywhere, owners elsewhere, simply walk their animal, and when it has evacuated its bowels; (their hand safely encased in a plastic bag), they pickup the offal, close the bag, knot the lid and toss all into a corner refuse container, for city pickup....What could be easier??? 

This early residential structure, tho shattered by the '92 earthquake, undermined further by the subway subsidences, and burnt out thru upper floors in 1-1-01.  Is well into a reconstruction venue, via preservational enthusiasts. and special funds available to that 'historic' constituency....plus $2 mil of L.A. contributions, totaling some $16,000,000!! The cost being broadly: $200,000+/- per residential unit., without on-site parking.  A neighboring parking lot on Wilcox Ave. has been leased with an option to purchase for their sole use. Users of this lot will have to seek elsewhere next year, as it now serves both Hollywood Blvd customers and Wilcox Ave residents in the 1700 & 1800 blocks. An unhappy downside indeed in a business and residential vicinity terribly short of parking already. 

We have voiced our concerns: as to the insanity of 'restoring' rather than replicating with modern amenities such as on-site parking. Boiled down, this is the only way, and we're stuck with it's major inconveniences.

We point to the last remaining property suitable for convenient parking for Hollywood Blvd. merchant and residential needs, i.e., the major lot now hosting the Galpin truck rentals on the 1700 Block of Cahuenga Blvd. We urgently requested that this property be earmarked for city parking purposes.

Neighborhood council leaders expressed our common concern: that, despite all 'politically correct' efforts to revive Old Hollywood, they still had to trek to Glendale and Pasadena for their needs, that the failed 'complexes' provided none of the amenities long needed....that the original concept of Hollywood Blvd as a grand Mall of retailers supplying sensible needs, had been subverted to obsolete concentrations, which however 'politically correct', and insider profitable, have proven economically disastrous. After some 20 years, no major retailers, no
successful restaurant chains have been lured to serve what is patently the most lucrative of locations. A location central to the prosperous hillsiders and Hancock Park constituencies. fails to serve a single need.

The CRA Hollywood Project is now requesting new powers to 'eminent domain; for commercial properties as 'needed.'

Curiously, there is no referendum with respect to a popular mandate for it's extension of powers vs. an end to such. And, now without the need of an elected citizen advisory body, control of policy and direction becomes the more incestuously dysfunctional, and susceptible to the influence of 'insiders.'

On the one hand, the fundamental tool of such an Agency is eminent domain. Why else the bureaucratic bother. Lesser revitalization constructs are the more appropriate.

But, given the warping of the concept and the submission to historically incompetent political reigns, i.e., the tyrannic control by elected ideologues sans any expertise in economics, but brimming with private agendas, elementally challenges a rational basis for any continuance of such a massively counter-productive control more the meanly vindictive nature of that Crittur we are assaulting in Iraq than a representative republic. 

Time to say: no more? Fer sure NO to more projects without rational prospect of economic utility or of civic pleasantries such as have blossomed...to massively burden the public purse and to incompetently occupy major sites.

Time to allow the marketplace to sally forth, sans the 'safety net' of 'public assistance.' The prime example is the Pacific Theatre's Cinerama dome project.  A major loser. But, when Pacific Theatre built under the private ageis of Rick Caruso, a wildly successful result emerged. 

On a much happier note, our C.R.A. now has a new Chief, 'Robert 'Bud' Ovrum, and prospects are much brighter. He appears to be a 'mover & shaker' and that institution needs an 8-magnitude earthquake, fer sure. 

Councilman NATE HOLDEN, generously visited our 4-4-03 meeting of the Hollywood Coordinating Council, and spoke of the grim realities we face, having massively compromised what was inherently the most advanced City Charter any city ever had.

We now have a totally 'political' police force. That which our late Charter was specifically designed to prevent.

Now, each new Mayor selects the Police Commission, and it, the Chief. The new Chief removes and replaces deputy chiefs with his cronies...and the hell to pay with those who resist. (see recent headlines.)

With a three-day work week, and an average of at least one day in court, the effective street patrol presence is radically reduced. And, with massive budget constraints, we will be paying more for much less...while criminals frolic.

Homeland 'security'

We are we advised by our folk at the LAPD that we are the front line!  And as such, it is our lot to observe any suspect activity and phone it in to our professionals in the LAPD, and they to the FBI, etc., for their evaluation.

the phone number is 1-877-ATHREAT
numerically:              1-877 284-7528

Just astounding. I'll say no more.

Council Boundaries:

Most of us in the Yucca Corridor were surprised that no change had occurred in the Yucca Corridor despite representations otherwise.

I know I was totally surprised at ballot time to see TOM LA BONGE still there.  Having dutifully ventured out to vote only for the more arcane offices presumed in contest.

Yours for a nicer Hollywood,

 John Ehretz
co-Chair, Steering Committee
ph  323  465-3505
fax  323  465-3525
email  ehretz@pacbell.net
postal  1811 Wilcox Avenue
            Hollywood, CA 90028