Dear Friends,
This afternoon at 4 o’clock, the Los Angeles City Council's Rules & Elections Committee will hold the third and final public hearing on the Redistricting Commission's plan to gut the Eighth and Ninth Council districts, leaving them with nothing but poverty:
No thriving business districts or economic engines, and only the poorest residents in the city.
It's amazing to think that this April will mark 20 years since the Rodney King verdict and the civil unrest that followed. We have made significant progress in those 20 years, rebuilding and bringing new development and jobs into South L.A., but there is still much to be done.
We were within a month of acquiring and then developing a six-acre property at Vermont and Manchester that has been vacant since 1992, when the state eliminated community redevelopment agencies. Without the CRA, it might now be another 20 years before anything is built on that land. Recent federal cuts to the Community Development Block Grant program will result in less money available for South L.A. projects.
Now the City Council appears eager to rubber-stamp a deeply flawed redistricting plan that will eliminate one of the few remaining tools a future Council member could use to improve South LA. With redrawn districts that contain no economic engines, future Council members will have no way to leverage new development to provide for the poor areas.
For example, when new market-rate housing is put in, a developer is required to set aside money to build or improve parks through a law called the Quimby Act. Or, a developer is often required to complete a “nexus study” before any large project, and as part of the conditions for approval, a Council member could require them to create nearby affordable housing, or something else that has a positive impact on the community.
But none of that can occur in a district that has only high poverty and no resources.
Councilmember Jan Perry and I are committed to fighting for economic justice for South L.A., which is why we retained a lawyer and had him send, at our request, a letter to City Atty. Carmen Trutanich, detailing the numerous violations of the City Charter, the federal Voting Rights Act, and the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. We are urging him to warn the City Council that approval of this flawed plan will result in certain costly litigation for the city. But it doesn't have to come to that.
If six other Council members will stand up for what's right, and join Couniclmember Perry and me in opposing these maps, we can fix the problems and avoid a lawsuit.
We need your help.
This afternoon is the final public hearing of the Rules & Elections Committee, before the full City Council votes on the proposal.
4 o’clock – City Hall, Downtown, Council Chamber 200 N. Spring St.
Councilman Parks may be contacted at Bernard.C.Parks@lacity.org
