Villaraigosa's Self-Inflicted Budget "Crisis"

Villaraigosa’s Self-Inflicted Budget “Crisis” By Walter Moore, Candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles, WalterMooreForMayor.com December 14, 2008 Villaraigosa deserves as much sympathy for his budget “crisis” as Lizzie Borden did for being an orphan. 1. Villaraigosa Increased Spending 32% The current budget “crisis” resulted from Villaraigosa’s excessive spending, not from a drop in revenues. The City’s tax revenues are at an all-time high: over $7 billion per year. The City receives $1.7 billion more per year than when Villaraigosa took office. That means if Villaraigosa had shown even modest restraint, we could have had 12,000 police (rather than 9,700), lower DWP rates, no trash fee hike, and a budget surplus. Instead, Villaraigosa increased spending from about $600,000 per hour to around $800,000 per hour. Translation: Spending is up 32% since Villaraigosa took office. Does your neighborhood look 32% better? Neither does mine. Do we have 32% more police? No. We have about 4.2% more police. 2. Villaraigosa Ignored The CAO’s Written Warnings. Villaraigosa ignored repeated written warnings, year after year, from the City Administrative Officer (CAO) that he was spending too much. (You may remember my “Sergeant Schultze” essay on this from May 2008.) Here’s a recap: 10/17/05: CAO projects $246.5 million shortfall 3/13/06: CAO projects $279.0 million shortfall 1/17/07: CAO projects $243 million shortfall 8/9/07: CAO projects $218 million shortfall 10/19/07: CAO projects $300 million shortfall So the current “crisis” was not just foreseeable, it was, in fact, foreseen. But if, as the L.A. Weekly reports, Villaraigosa spends just 11% of his time here in town doing the job for which we pay him, perhaps he never saw the CAO’s warnings. 3. Villaraigosa Gave Away Our Multi-Million Dollar Assets After redistributing taxpayers’ money to contractors to build new fire stations, police stations, libraries and animal shelters at absurdly inflated prices (e.g., $71,795 per animal for an animal shelter), Villaraigosa decided we suddenly had too many such buildings and -- presto change-o -- the existing structures transmogrified into “surplus property.” Villaraigosa then gave his cronies sweetheart “lease” deals on those structures. For example, “Aztecs Rising” is now leasing a “surplus” fire station for one dollar per year for 10 years. And that is just one of over 100 such leases with so-called “non-profits.” According to Villaraigosa’s latest budget memo, he is now trying to sell: an animal shelter for $2.5 million; one fire station for $2 million; two others for $1.4 million each; one library for $600,000; and another for $400,000. (No word on whether the books are sold separately.) It makes you wonder exactly how many millions of dollars’ worth of our property is being used for free by sketchy, unregulated groups to which we would never voluntarily donate a dime -- you know, like the one run by “Big Weasel,” who received $1.5 million of our money from Villaraigosa the year before was arrested for arming his gang with machine guns. BOTTOM LINE: So get a free yard sign and bumper sticker already! If you sit by and do nothing to help elect me, you can expect more of the same: Villaraigosa and the City Council will continue to spend more than the City takes in, and will raise your taxes and fees to offset the self-induced crisis. We can win, but only if you take action to spread the word. This isn’t one of those elections where you get to be a spectator. You actually have to participate, but it’s not like you have to stand in front of a Chinese tank or anything. Just get a free yard sign and a free bumper sticker today to spread the word to our fellow voters. Our fellow citizens can't read about me in the local papers, but they can read about me on your yard sign or bumper. Click here to get a sign and a sticker.