Dateline Jerusalem — Things are settling down a bit.
One of the most important things I have learned is that I can communicate with people who do not understand English.
I just say “Ani lo medeberet Ivrit,” which means “I do not speak Hebrew.”
Between their broken English and my broken Hebrew (mine is so broken it needs to be fixed ASAP), I have been able to get much accomplished.
How did they win?
How did Andy Weissman, Chris Armenta and Mehaul O’Leary — three disparate gentlemen whose previous lives rarely intersected — beat out six opponents for the prized seats on the City Council, starting Monday, April 28?
Councilman Steve Rose said the key in each case was name recognition. The winners were the best known personalities across Culver City.
Others said it was because the winners operated the three best organized campaigns.
With the spent emotions of the exhausting City Council election two days old and smeared on rear view mirrors, a burgeoning argument over the prospective Entrada Office Tower will be the next hot political potato of the spring season.
They roared about it last night at the monthly meeting of the Culver City Democratic Club, and voted to fire off an objection to City Hall.
But that little display was like romping in a sandbox compared to the shout and blame war that will detonate in Council Chambers, starting at 7 on Monday evening.
Spending two evenings in a row in the pleasant environs of Culver City have failed to improve the chances of Los Angeles City Councilman Bernie Parks in his race to win the retiring Yvonne Brathwaite Burke’s chair on the County Board of Supervisors.
Mr. Parks stopped by the home of the realtor/journalist Mike Cohen on City Council Election Night to support Dr. Luther Henderson in his bid for City Hall.
However, Dr. Henderson ran out of the money, placing sixth in a 9-candidate field.
Have you seen it? No, really. I mean did you actually read it?
Twice in the past six weeks, our Culver City has rated front page treatment from the Los Angeles Times. The first, in early March, gave the Culver Crest neighborhood special treatment. By reporting on the Crest, the Times called it a “close knit community . . . isolated from the rest of the city”, a cozy neighborhood with “no commercial zones,” on a par with the best view homes in areas farther north.
In this young century, hardly any Culver City resident has wanted to serve on the City Council more achingly than Mehaul O’Leary.
Foiled in his first attempt by personal document confusion and done in two years ago by his own questionable preparedness, he decided on an atypical political strategy for this election cycle.
Sincere humility. An apologetic posture
From the warm, sunny morning last September that he announced his City Council candidacy down to the raucous scene last night in the lobby of the ornate Culver Hotel when he clinched a seat, Andy Weissman was pitched as the choice of the people, the birds, and anything else in Culver City that moved.
The claim went unchallenged.
None of his eight rivals had received the on the job training at City Hall, in commissions, committees and every government body south of the City Council, that Mr. Weissman has served on since the ‘90s.
Christopher Armenta, tall, dark and yes, handsome, he of the electronic smile and the infectious, capacious outgoing personality, may end up being the most closely watched of the three new City Council members.
Council watchers want to know:
Is he or isn’t he?
Or is he a blend?
“For a variety of reasons,” City Councilman Gary Silbiger said this morning, he sought on Monday night to postpone a vote on once again waiving a $12,000 fee to be paid by the Exchange Club for staging next month’s Downtown classic cars extravaganza known, simply, as the Car Show.
Even though he spoke against the proposition, as it was presented, and even though he offered a substitute motion that died, Mr. Silbiger said the 3 to 1 vote reported in yesterday’s edition was incorrect.
After resisting, the Councilman said, in fact, he joined his colleagues in supporting a waiver of the fee.
The legendary entertainment giant Carl Reiner and County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky were the big winners last Saturday at the closing of the third Backlot Film Festival at the Vets Auditorium.
Mr. Reiner accepted the Thomas Ince Award for excellence in filmmaking.
The Founders Award was
presented to Mr. Yaroslavsky for his support of the arts.
