Wednesday, March 25, 2009

ALERT: City of Los Angeles To Go BANKRUPT Over City Employee Pension & Retirement Funds (Councilmember Calls It "Armageddon!")

EXCUSE ME!!! Zuma Dogg was absolutley floored and flabbergasted in a VERY REAL way today, during Item 28 of today's Los Angeles City Council meeting. I'm sure it will be all you hear about for the next two years. At the end of the discussion that you can see HERE -- starting off with ZUMA DOGG's Public Comment and followed by the discussion that unviels it all, right before your very eyes and ears. Basically, it was announced that in 2012, if measures (that Zuma Dogg details in the public comment) are not taken, 56% of the city's general fund, 56% of every L.A. City dollar, will have to go to cover the city employee's pension and retirement funds. You see, the city's investment team played fast and loose with the city taxpayer money, and Zuma Dogg feels the mayor strongarmed LACER into investing in risky city development projects and projects of his favorite developers. (See Meurello Maxxox and Grand Ave Project stories) and now LACER has lost $7 BILLION DOLLARS THIS PAST YEAR!!!

And guess what kiddies, these pension and retirement funds are guaranteed by the city, so the city has to pay the difference out of the general fund!!!

As I heard this, and literally became flabbergasted, as you can see in my follow up public comment on the next item (a pure Emmy Award level comedic performance), I asked one of the CMs (who I won't name or CMs may not talk to me), if it was as bad as it sounds, because I don't wanna over-exaggerate: The CM said, "It's Armmagedon." Then did add, "Measures can be taken to help." But the feeling was, massive pain at this point cannot be avoided. Again, if you want to see what it will take to help reduce the financial strain, I detail it in my public comment, that is followed by the discussion. IT'S A DOOSEY! And I am not being arrogant when I say, "I detail" as though "I" came up with the solutions and the city better listen. NO, just the opposite: The benefit of Zuma Dogg being at the Council meetings, allows me access to Councilmembers and top City Hall staffers who I interviewed before the agenda item, to ask the what the things Zuma Dogg needs to be saying that the other CMs are scared or don't want to say. THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE, BUT THE COUNCILMEMBERS AND OTHERS DON'T REALLY WANT TO COME OUT AND SAY IT, SO THEY ACTUALLY DON'T MIND TELLING ME, knowing that I will say it for everyone else. AND OF COURSE YOU COULD HAVE HEARD ALL OF THIS ONLINE DURING THE BUDGET COMMITTEE MEETING HEARINGS, WHERE IT WAS ALL SAID.

I DON'T KNOW WHAT ELSE TO SAY...IF I DO NOT HEAR THE AM RADIO TALK SHOW HOSTS TALKING ABOUT THIS ONE...IT WILL REALLY SAY A LOT TO ME. I REALLY DON'T KNOW WHAT ELSE IT WOULD TAKE FOR A TALK SHOW HOST IN THIS TOWN TO TALK ABOUT SOMETHING BESIDES ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION. THAT IS A PROBLEM, BUT IT IS POSSIBLE TO TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE BESIDES BARACK OBAMA BASHING AND ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION. I can't wait to tune in. I really am optimistic that even local AM Talk Radio show circus clowns can't ignore this one.

MORE ZUMA DOGG PUBLIC COMMENTS FROM WEDNESDAY'S MEETING:

Runway Film & TV Production: Click here (So that's 3 public comments to see on this blog post.)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

"It is the only explanation for Higby's constant pimping of Zuma Dogg."

Or maybe it's because I am the only person attending every single council meeting and am the only person reporting on these local, city issues?

Have you tuned into talk radio lately? Have you looked at Ron Kaye's site lately? He's focusing only on DWP, and "focus" is the most important word in Zuma's marketing book, but Ron ain't blogging about anything besides DWP politics; LA Times/Daily News?, we all know they don't hit up city hall very hard on anything that we don't already know...

So excuse Higby if he includes the most important information that Zuma Dogg feels has ever been presented in the three years of attending council meetings.

If LACERS just lost $7 billion this past year, and the loss is coming out of the general fund at 56% of every dollar, and the city will be bankrupt in the next fiscal budget, and it requires COUNCIL action to take preventative measures to help reduce the financial strain, BECAUSE IT IS ALREADY TOO LATE TO AVOID TREMENDOUS CITYWIDE PAIN, AS IT IS...SO NOW IT IS JUST A MATTER OF EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES ON THE PAITIENT (LA CITY) TO KEEP IT ON LIFE SUPPORT, or else the patient WILL die. I don't know how to be any more emphatic about the situation that you criticize Higby for mentioning among other items.

Maybe he should wait until Walter Moore pipes up about it. Or until Ron Kaye says something. Let's wait until it hits Kevin or Doug's radar...I'm sure David Zahniser of LA Times WILL be covering it soon (probably on a Saturday burried on page 21), so maybe we should wait for all of that to happen, while council sits there and talks about what it will take, then does NOTHING!

I'm tell you people, it's not going to be coming down to decision making at some point, soon. It's just going to be a bunch of people, not getting paychecks -- but I.O.U.'s from the City, and the budget cuts will be simply be made that way.

ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING THAT THE PEOPLE HAVE BEEN OUTRAGED OVER, being the creating of trash collection fees three years ago, the tripling of them, the "UPdating" of parking meter fees (quadrupling), Special Event Fee as covered in LA Times and FOX 11 News recently, condo-conversions in violation of vacancy rates (now put to an end), the forclosure crisis that was coming (predicted six months before it hit the first newspaper headline); that would trigger higher oil prices (that we got); and that the stock market would be bottoming out under the worse economic conditions we have seen it this lifetime (when everyone told me I was full of it, didn't know what I was talking about and it would be boucing right back); the city would be going broke; services and jobs would have to be cut; I COULD GO ON AND ON...IT HAS ALL FIRST BEEN COVERED BY ZUMA DOGG AS HE ALERTS THE MASSES ON TV 35 AS EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THESE ISSUES HAS COME THROUGH THE LA CITY AGENDA...then blogged about.

Check the archives...anything people are complaining about today, has all been covered by Zuma Dogg in the past...BEFORE IT HAPPENS, WHEN THERE IS STILL TIME TO TAKE ACTION. But people like to wait until it comes out in LA Times, when it is already too late, and that's JUST how the city likes it.

So don't be a crybaby-loser, you crybaby-loser...unless Mayor Sam's blog wants to be behind the times, instead of in the present, why wouldn't he include my coverage of the city council meetings? I saw Zanhiser taking all kinds of notes at a fever pace during the item...WHERE'S THE STORY? So excuse me if I'm the only person interview Councilmembers and City Financial experts who were there for the presentation, excuse me for sitting through the presentation that was part of the FOUR HOUR council meeting that I sat through for all of this.

If there were four other new sources on this, then you can mock Higby, but it looks like there's only one person in town covering this stuff. And he does it waking up each day on $0.00 after rolling out of a vehicle. And thanks to the petty A-hole LAPD officers, at 1am last night, who actually stopped ZD, WHILE WALKING ON THE SIDEWALK, because they thought I was drunk driving, even though I told them I haven't drank alcohol in years. WHAT THE HELL ARE LAPD HARRASSING ZUMA DOGG FOR DRUNK DRIVING WHEN I WAS WALKING ON THE SIDEWALK. The whole harrasment session only ended because they saw someone in this residential area, at 1am, without another car in site make a right turn without stopping enough on the brakes.

So the cop says, "Common, we gotta get that car." And the other cop says, "Yeah, I guess they don't know 'California stops just don't cut it."

So the cop says, "Alright, have a nice day." I saw the stop the car made. 1 AM, residential area, not a car in site, the cops were right there, so i doubt the car was trying to break the law. Sure, the car didn't actually make that little backward motion that signals a complete stop, but it just looks like cops driving around looking for sh*t to harrass people over and hope they find something. It was 1am, and the cop was SURE i was drunk cause, "you look really tired, are you SURE you're not drunk." HEY FOOL, it was 1AM, and I was up since 5AM...GUILTY FOR LOOKING TIRED!