Common Cause Not for Sale

I wanted to wait to see the reaction, and I'm glad some in this great city are as outraged as I am about Rick Jacobs being appointed to Mayor Eric Garcetti's staff. In The Daily News, Phillip Ung called out the Mayor on the appointment:

Phillip Ung, spokesman for national government watchdog group Common Cause, believes Garcetti's latest appointment throws up red flags.

"There is concern because of the money raised by Jacobs' group and the prominent position he now has within City Hall," Ung said.

Such appointments raise questions about whether the individuals are qualified for the job or are only being hired because of their support for a candidate, Ung said. (The Daily News, August 7, 2013)

It seems Mayor Garcetti is going to great lengths to make sure everyone who took care of the dirty work on his campaign is taken care of, especially the race baiting population.

Two of his people have even started the Race Baiting Caucus. In his disclosure forms, Kevin James admitted to having a $70 dinner with Rick Jacobs.

(Los Angeles City File, 13-881)

Take a look at the ad Jacobs put up hitting Wendy Greuel, disingenuously hinting that she supported Proposition 187:

Well, normally there would be a video here, but it seems like Mr. Jacobs had it taken down off YouTube, probably because he didn't want to answer any questions about it. But if it's like he says, and that there was nothing factually incorrect in the ad, why was the video taken down? Jacobs comments on the ad in the Los Angeles Times story below:

But Rick Jacobs, co-chairman of the Lots of People group, said he would not remove the anti-Greuel spot and argued that everything contained in it was accurate.

“Wendy Greuel was a Republican for not one, not two but 13 years. She was a Republican when Pete Wilson ran for governor and won. Had he not won in 1990, there would not have been a Prop. 187,” Jacobs said. (Los Angeles Times, May 16, 2013)

To clarify, Eric Garcetti did not ask him to take the ad down and in true Eric Garcetti fashion, tweeted his response:

I trust @Wendy_Greuel when she says she was not for Prop 187. I hope everybody inside & outside the campaigns will act responsibly. #LAMayor
— Eric Garcetti (@ericgarcetti) May 16, 2013

Did he call on his supporters to take down the ad? No, just that he "hoped" everyone would do the right thing.

Mayor Villaraigosa had this to say about the distasteful ads running at the time:

Do we really need more of this type of leadership running our city? Will someone stand up to the mayor rewarding not just campaign helpers, but Super PAC campaign helpers? Where will we draw the line?

Oddity with Heidrich & Struggles

The public information officer at the Los Angeles Personnel Department e-mailed me back today. I commend Bruce Whidden for being very prompt and thorough with the response:

Dear Mr. Charles:

This email is in response to your California Public Records Act (CRPA) request dated August 2, 2013 addressed to the City of Los Angeles Personnel Department seeking “public records related to the firm of Heidrick & Struggles and any relationship with the City of Los Angeles.”

This office is cognizant of its responsibilities under the CRPA and recognizes that the statutory scheme was enacted to maximize citizen access to the workings of government. 

Addressing your specific request, there is no contract between the City of Los Angeles and the firm of Heidrick & Struggles and as such there have been no payments made to the firm as of this time. 

The City is in the process of evaluating this firm for placement on an existing "approved vendor" list with other firms for possible work in the future, but placement on such a list does not guarantee that the City will use the services of the firm.  The process of evaluation is continuing with no estimate of when the process will be concluded.

Nothing has been decided at this time.

If you have any questions or concerns, please call me at 213-473-9080.

Very truly yours,

Bruce Whidden

So now comes the very odd part about all of this. Why is a headhunting agency going around making calls if they don't have a contract with the City yet? Can one of the great Los Angeles reporters poke around a bit on this? Because something is off.

Hot Tip: Heidrich & Struggles and Mayor Garcetti

Received a tip from the hotline. Someone had been called by the headhunting firm, Heidrich & Struggles. I won't reveal who this person is (for obvious reasons) but I thought to myself, "Why would Mayor Garcetti's office hire a headhunting firm?"

This naturally raised a couple of questions:

1. Did the firm go through the RFP process or was this a no bid contract?

2. What is the scope of the contract?

3. Why doesn't Mayor Garcetti's office use the large stack of resumes that I'm sure are on file to begin the interview process?

It might have something to do with this:

Being naturally inquisitive, I sent a Public Records Access request to the Department of Personnel. They have 10 days from the time of my request to respond. So on Monday, August 12, 2013, we should have some more answers.

If you have any information you would like to share on the Hotline, my number is 213-342-1317 or I can always be reached at mistercharles2014@gmail.com or @mrcharles2014 on Twitter.

Kevin James Did His Homework, But Who Was His Tutor?

So as I sat in Council Chambers watching now President of the Board of Public Works, Kevin James get confirmed, I was confused and impressed by his knowledge of the Port of LA and ways to improve the environment through stack cap technology.

For those that were dosing off here is the clip:

Also recall we were told here that the election is over and I couldn’t agree more. I just wish someone would remind Mayor Garcetti of that as well. 

Going back to the testimony of Commissioner Kevin James’s knowledge about the Port of LA I thought to myself, someone had to be his tutor.  I think I found him.

His name is Ruben Garcia.

Background

Ruben Garcia is the owner of ACTI, a fairly controversial company for lots of reasons, but first I’d like to start off with a small timeline on this gentleman and his company.

Remember 2005?

In May of 2005 then City Councilmember Jack Weiss and Councilmember Bernard Parks introduced a motion into the city council that you can read here: (Los Angeles City Council File, 05-0964))

Here is the best part of this resolution:

FURTHER MOVE that the City Attorney and City Ethics Commission be requested to immediately initiate an investigation into financial transactions between the President of the Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners and any registered lobbyists to ensure full compliance with all City and State laws. FURTHER MOVE that the City Attorney and City Ethics Commission be requested to comprehensively review the relationship between Advanced Cleanup Technologies, Inc. and the President of the Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners to ensure that no conflict of interest exists with his current or prior participation on the Board of Harbor Commissioners. FURTHER MOVE that the United States Attorney and District Attorney be requested to expand their current investigations to include a review of all of these allegations to ensure that any misconduct is identified. (Los Angeles City Council File, 05-0964)

The motion was killed in February 2006 and never voted upon according to the City Clerk’s website.   One month after Councilmember Garcetti became President.

ACTI – 2010

Perhaps those two councilmembers knew something was wrong with this company because in 2010 they were accused of bouncing checks to staff, at least according to a news affiliate in Bakersfield and the Cunningham Report, which you can view here: (Cunningham Report, May 17, 2010)

And here: (KCET, December 14, 2010)

Here are the best parts: 

Cunningham Report

Contract negotiations for the Advanced Maritime Emissions Control System, or AMECS, have stalled while the port waits for assurances from ACTI that their financial troubles have stabilized, said port environmental planner Heather Tomley. (Cunningham Report, May 17, 2010)

KCET Report

State of California Sues ACTI
In 2011 Attorney General Kamala Harris sued ACTI and forced them to pay for environmental damages the company caused.  You can view the lawsuit here.

Connection with Carmen Trutanich

As ACTI moved into 2012 they were pushing hard to get the Port of LA to use their unproven technology. LA Weekly’s Gene Maddaus covered the owner of ACTI because of his large campaign donations to then City Attorney Carmen Trutanich’s campaign for District Attorney.  You can read his story here.

Now you might be wondering, why does any of this matter? – again I point to this clip of Kevin James at his appointment hearing:

When the City Council was giving its approval of the controversial Kevin James attached was this letter from the City Ethics Commission: (Los Angeles Ethics Commission, July 25, 2013)

In this PDF Kevin James had to show the various gifts he get, now before I really dig into why pro-immigration reform, pro-environment supporter Rick Jacobs took Kevin James to dinner, or why the Publisher of the Daily News paid for Kevin’s dinners or why a reporter would give Kevin James tickets to the Dodgers Game – don’t even have me begin to link to all the radio shows he did when the Mayor and Council were fined for Laker and Dodger tickets being received.

No, none of that is as important as Mr. Garcia paying for 3 dinners and 1 lunch with former candidate for Mayor Kevin James after the primary election in March. (Los Angeles Ethics Commission, July 25, 2013)

But we can surmise that this meeting happened after the general in May. On June 4^th 2013 Mr. Garcia contributed the maximum allowed to Kevin James campaign $1,300 a full 3 months after he came in 3^rd place in the primary.   You can view that here:

Mayor Garcetti also received money from ACTI, but it was either returned or maybe the check bounced:

But it looks more like he didn’t want anyone to know about it because after the election, Mayor Garcetti received a maxed out donation from Ruben Garcia:

It was those tutorial sessions given by Ruben Garcia where we see why Kevin James during his question and answer session decided to repeat the companies unproven claims to the entire City Council.  Weird that ACTI’s website says the same thing Kevin James testified to. (ACTI Website, AMECS)

Now while Commissioner Kevin James has not done anything unethical or wrong, we figured we would help the new City Commissioner by highlighting this relation to ensure this company never receives any taxpayer dollars. Ever.