CD5 Hyatt Regency Century City candidates forum

WESTSIDE L.A. - On Monday night the six candidates vying for the city council seat for the 5th District in the March 3 elections took part in a forum at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel in Century City. Around 200 people attended the event, to hear Adeena Bleich, Ron Galperin, Paul Koretz, Robyn Ritter Simon, Robert Schwartz and David Vahedi address the most pressing issues facing the district.

The forum was hosted by the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, the Century City Chamber of Commerce, the Los Angeles Business Journal and Time Warner Cable, and was moderated by Lee Kanon Alpert of Time Warner Cable.

In all, seven questions were posed to the candidates, six of which were formulated by representatives from the Century City Chamber of Commerce, the Los Angeles Business Journal and the LA Area Chamber of Commerce. The seventh question came from the audience.

Responding to the initial question of what tough decisions each candidate would make to fix the city’s current budget problems with the deficit currently standing at just over $400 million, Ron Galperin said the first task would be to encourage economic growth. “We’re seeing a decline in our business taxes and other revenue sources,” he said, arguing that the city needs to do a better job when it comes to collecting debts. He cited $5 million in elevator inspection fees that have not been collected, and that the city could also save millions of dollars by changing the cell phone contracts that city employees have.

Robert Schwartz recommended bringing filming back into Los Angeles, noting that 40 other states have tax incentive legislation for filming. “New York alone increased its film spending by $500 million” last year, he noted.
Adeena Bleich picked up on Schwartz’s suggestion and added that filmmakers should give money to a fund that would go towards tree trimming, pothole repair and street lighting for those who live in the neighborhoods where filming takes place.

Paul Koretz cited his experience as a former West Hollywood city councilor, arguing that the city needs to streamline its permitting process and develop a marketing corporation. “[In West Hollywood], we created a retention and attraction task force to identify the kinds of business we wanted to pull in and to stop businesses who were thinking of leaving.”

“As a business woman and former executive with the Chamber of Commerce I understand the contributions that business makes to this city,” said Robyn Ritter Simon. She recommended lifting the gross receipts tax for small businesses from $100,000 to $250,000 and cited Controller Laura Chick’s suggestion of possibly turning certain industries over to the private sector, while David Vahedi suggested using the city’s five percent attrition funds to shore up current city services including tree trimming and fixing sidewalks. Given the current state of the economy Vahedi said, “Now is not the time to back away from services for infrastructure.”

Given that traffic is a major issue for the entire city, it was no surprise that candidates were asked what they felt was the best plan to alleviate traffic on the Westside and how they would implement their plan.

All candidates agreed that long-term mass transit was essential including the light rail Exposition Line and the Subway to the Sea. However, Koretz said that the Subway to the Sea hitting Westwood in 25 years was “a joke” and promised over “my dead body” would the rail take that long. He cited his experience as 42nd District Assemblyman in moving up the 405 and 101 traffic improvements to six years instead of 10, and promised to work to speed up the subway to the sea. He also recommended a more comprehensive bike lane system.

Schwartz also argued there was no reason to wait five years to even begin building the subway. “It makes me shake my head,” he said. “Five years for what? We already decided to do it so let’s move it along.” He also recommended public private partnerships, such as those done with Google and Microsoft and which Westfield and Trammel Crow are currently discussing by providing shuttle services for employees in the area. “Maybe we can [also] have residential developers provide free bus passes for those moving into their developments,” he said.

Vahedi expressed concern that the MTA, the Expo Authority and the County want the Expo line to go ahead at grade, which he said would “have barriers coming down on Overland, Westwood and Sepulveda for up to 20 minutes” in peak hour traffic. He said he would push to have grade separation on the expo line, and also suggested park and ride programs including shuttle buses from the 405 into Century City.

Galperin argued that there simply isn’t a comprehensive transportation plan for the city and that he would work to create one. He also spoke of low-hanging fruit and what could be done today. “We should encourage more flexible work hours on the part of employers,” he said, along with flex cars and flex bikes. He also recommended better use of mitigation fees paid by developers and using “good old fashioned paving. It’s one of the lowest tech solutions,” he said but one of the cheapest and would encourage people to take buses especially if the traveling down major arteries wasn’t akin to “taking a roller coaster ride.

Bleich argued for a comprehensive program and said should she take office, she would have experienced urban planners and a traffic engineer on staff.

Candidates were then questioned as to whether they supported Proposition B, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power’s Green Energy and solar panels program initiative.

All candidates said they were not happy with how the measure made its way on to the ballot, citing the lack of transparency or involving residents and homeowners, but agreed that the city needed to go green. Only Bleich said she did not support the measure. Vahedi said he supported Prop B hesitantly because he was concerned about the lack of solar panels in Southern California and that they would instead have to come from China. In the future, he said, “I’d want to make sure more jobs were based out of LA.” Koretz said he would like set a date that would see the city have 100 percent alternative energy sources, while Galperin said given that more than 50 percent of the DWP’s power is derived from coal, the city definitely needs renewable energy and Los Angeles can be an example to the rest of the country.

When asked point blank whether they support business or developers who want growth or neighborhood residents who often oppose development, most candidates argued that it didn’t have to be an “either or” proposition.

Ritter Simon said, “If we approve projects we need to bring on infrastructure to support those projects, while Galperin argued that the problem lies with “a capricious planning process. We have community plans, a general plan and specific plans [and nobody] is paying attention to them and following them consistently.” By providing consistency, Galperin argued everyone would benefit.

Koretz was forthright, arguing that it’s about meeting with all sides: developers, residents and government and identifying the real problems that exist. “If they can’t be solved you say ‘no’ to the project” he said. However, he noted that while on the West Hollywood City Council, his experience was that in most cases developers would respond to changes requested. He also recommended that LA adopt a policy similar to West Hollywood by not building structures over three stories.

Vahedi, though stated he took the perspective of a homeowner’s representative, and said until money is found to focus on infrastructure over the next two to three years to bring in more police to the area and build a fire station in Century City, “I can’t support more development.”

All the candidates were in favor of the Greening of Century City project with varying views on how to ensure there is enough funding for the project. Bleich suggested finding ways to bring in revenue sources from outside the city through the private industry as well as using city services money for greening plan throughout LA. Koretz suggested the city take a leaf out of other cities books and stop subsidizing the development process and instead charge developers and use some of those funds to complete the Century City Greening project, while Robert Schwartz said a fund similar to the Quimby fund should be used, “which unfortunately the City can’t seem to keep track of what’s in there.”

All candidates also agreed that the city is unfriendly to business and addressed the question of how to improve the situation. Galperin said not only has the city not been business friendly, it hasn’t been resident friendly either and said, “We have to simplify and reform our business tax, and amend our city charter for the council and mayor to provide incentives.” Ritter Simon said she would put a business deputy on staff to deal directly with businesses and liaise with the community, while Vahedi recommended
Creating a public parking structure on Pico Blvd to help small businesses attract people, save preferential parking and generate money for the city.

The last question of the evening was audience generated and concerned the illegal and electronic billboards around the city. Candidates were asked how they would take action to adopt an enforceable offsite advertising ban.

Schwartz said the digital billboards “make us look like a scene out of Blade Runner. Times Square is Times Square and they should live and be well, but it’s not what we want on Wilshire Blvd.” He recommended taking an inventory; taking the billboards down and making those who put them up, pay. Bleich suggested asking parking officers to take an inventory of the billboards. Galperin took a tough stance, saying “The law is the law is the law and there is no excuse for the city to not be enforcing its own laws.” He recommended bringing in enforcement officers and seeing them as a source of revenue rather than as an expense to the city. Vahedi vowed to raise the fines on illegal billboards from $500 to $10,000 per month, while Koretz said self-enforcement was the best tactic, by having such high fines the billboard companies “will have to jump to pull them down.” He recommended a two-month warning to the posters followed by a $10,000 a day fine.

The entire forum, along with the candidates' opening and closing statements will be available to all Time Warner Cable subscribers on demand from February 1.