After Two Hours of Hearings, Downtown Gets Good News

Thanks for giving up your tickets to cover this. Somebody hasn't pissed me off as bad as this douche in quite awhile. Just a note of encouragement for everyone to keep contacting this guy and those around him.

Daniel Green (213) 978-1304 dan.green@lacity.org

After watching the meeting two things are very clear:

1. Dan Green does not understand what is happening here in downtown and should not have a hand in its future development;
2. Commissioner Martorell ("on medication") or not is not up to the task of making the necessary decisions to guide the city.

It was great seeing so many people tonight not just "blog the blog" but actually "walk the walk" and let the Central Area Planning Commission know that people in downtown truly care and will not stand idly by as inept decision makers such as Mr. Green try and derail the future prosperity of this ever growing experiment that is "downtown L.A."

The expansion of Skid Row, i.e. the $50 million scares me.

In one aspect, I must agree with Mr. Green: this decision will set a precedent for the future development of Downtown, and, yes, it is a very GOOD precedent.

Any precedent bringing life, activity, interaction, economic motion and community to the streets of Downtown cannot help but be a good one.

Now let's get those bars up and running. I've seen pictures of Main Street from 50,60,70 years ago and there were plenty of them in Downtown. Back when it was a vital area.

Ok, what's the next step? It doesn't sound like the issue is done and over with. There is an unwritten policy in place and we need to express opposition. I've written an email to Dan Green and plan to call him, but I anticipate deaf ears. What about his superiors? The new City Planner from San Diego? Is the Neighborhood Council taking a look at this? The BIDs?

I am stunned, frankly. I guess I've been reading wrong sources recently who say city planners want to decentralize servics across the county (which would do more to help homeless than dumping them into one area downtown). Their actions clearly do not line up.

Tell us, oh wise blog, what do we do now? Who do we write (besides Dan Green)? Who do we call? How do we get involved to preserve the momentum downtown towards a liveable, healthy, vibrant community of working folk?

Somebody hasn't pissed me off as bad as this douche

It's a shame there isn't something to the magic of voodoo. Otherwise, I'd be creating dolls that look like Dan Green and sticking a lot of pins in them right now.

Quite (or more) seriously, I'd like to see the Downtown News do a story on Mr. Green just to understand how such an incompetent, moronic person has been given a position of authority or decisionmaking importance.

Thank you blogdowntown for the coverage! I appreciate your efforts guys SO MUCH! I just wrote Mr. Green an email explaining my opinions on the matter. I dont' expect any response (or that he might even read the email), but at least I did my part. We dodged a bullet!

Is this guy f*ing serious? What's the dirt on this guy? Does he live downtown?

I just wrote him an email.

I think downtowners should have a website dedicated to political issues. There should be phone numbers, office locations, names, etc. This website should also have all of the meeting schedules up on a calendar so people have a central place to go for all dealings downtown.

the LA city council has destroyed enough of LA. This dumb decision making needs to end. Because downtown LA is so small and focused, it will only take 20 residents to make a stink. That means that many of you downtowners are extemely POWERFUL politicaly. Downtowners have more influence on their neighorhood than any other urban place outside of SF. This is the last Urban frontier, and with the tremendous amount of power you have, you guys need to make sure it is developed properly.

Downtown is the only place where 90% of you sing to the same tune and are quite active in your community.

Go out and kick some a$$ the same way you did last night!

Inserting myself into an issue I know very little about, on a blog I just began following last week; it may be helpful if someone could point me towards:

1) green's actual recommendation to the apc (this would be a public doc) 2) The proposed Green Principals 2) Some context for the anti-homelessness sentiment I'm disappointed to see here.

On that note, I've been in downtown for just under a year, just off skid row, and while I agree the homeless can be a nuisance, I had been under the impression that there was something of a respect for their right to exist, and wider consensus that we would have to balance development against the reality that there is a historic and real value to LA's Skid Row.

What I'm reading here, however, strikes me as pretty direct resentment and anger for the people and institutions that have been the downtown community for decades before our arrival.

It seems to me that it would, therefore, be the city planning department's structural role to propose and advocate principals for balancing these divergent economic, social, and historical interests on this land. Who else would do it?

To Dan Green above:

You must be kidding. Please let that be sarcasm.

Respect for their right to exist? By exist, do you mean sleep on the sidewalk, hit me up for money (many times aggressively), shit wherever it strikes them as prudent, piss on the walls, scream at things for no apparent reason, etc, etc? Well then, no.

There are certainly many homeless people on the street for any variety of reasons. Some deserve help getting back on their feet, others need to be hospitalized, some should be flat out locked up, but the majority should be back in the areas where they came from, not dumped into one convenient hole where the rest of SoCal gets to put them out of sight, out of mind, while downtown residents get to enjoy their "quirks".

"A historic and real value to LA's Skid Row"? OK, I can now die happy because I've officially heard it all. Calling skid row a "community" is like calling that woman who drowned her kids in Texas a mother. Technically, maybe it's true but in reality, there is nothing that could be further from the truth.

Who else would balance the divergent economic, social, and historical interests? The Free Market. We are in America, after all.

^ Dan, please don't mistake our confusion and outrage for anti-homeless sentiment. I, for one, give of my own money to a service provider a few blocks from a loft I own. I support rehabilitation and applaud the efforts of all the providers on Skid Row.

My confusion and outrage stems from conflicting messages from city leadership. On the one hand, they express a desire to decentralize services and spread them across the county. This, I believe, makes sense. Why congregate drug addicts and the mentally ill alongside people who truly want and need help to get off the streets? Why foster a dumping ground for the rest of the county? This has been the policy for decades, and this is not working. It is only now, when

This is the confusion (and consequently, the emotion) you read on the blog recently. Why are we hearing conflicting messages from city leadership? Why are their actions different from speech after article after policy outlining a plan to help the homeless get off the street. Instead, Dan Green's recent motives for rejecting CUPs seek to expalnd Skid Row, not decentralize it.

I think my concern is the dangerous intersection along Sixth and Los Angeles.

There's a Metro Rapid on that street and very little visibility from Sixth east into the intersection with Los Angeles Street.

In my opinion, development along Sixth between Main and Los Angeles will need to include valet parking stops on Main and Los Angeles but not Sixth.

Pedestrian protection along Sixth and the elimination of the parking spaces would also increase the sense of sidewalk safety.

I haven't looked at the Kor proposal to see if these have been included tasteful vehicle barricades.

"On that note, I've been in downtown for just under a year, just off skid row, and while I agree the homeless can be a nuisance, I had been under the impression that there was something of a respect for their right to exist, and wider consensus that we would have to balance development against the reality that there is a historic and real value to LA's Skid Row."

Affordable housing provisions, removing clubs that attract gangsters like club 740, outlawing strip clubs that bring in predators, cracking down on gang bangers, drug dealers and prostitutes all help keep the homeless away from negative elements. Saving old dilapidated hotels for low income housing also save homeless. Protecting stablizied rent areas, allowing homeless service providers to remain in the area, and advocating for the protection of homeless people from forceable removal will help the homeless. These are also the measures currently in place to help them.

Preventing downtown LA to rise out of the ashes DOES NOT HELP THE HOMELESS. Keeping downtown crappy and slummy DOES NOT HELP THE HOMELESS. Not allowing places like Royal Claytons to operate DOES NOT HELP THE HOMELESS.

I agree, we need to consider the homeless whenever we can, however outlawing wine bars at the met lofts does not help the homeless? Outlawing high end retailers because that may make the area too nice and thus too expensive is also ridiculous. More over, you cant sell condos for 350k then refuse to put in basic attractions for buyers.

If anything, development helps generate property taxes and sales taxes which could be used to help service the homeless in a distributed manner.

If downtowners really hated homeless they wouldnt move downtown. They merely hate to see projects (that have very little to do with the homeless) cancelled for no good reason. It isnt like we are bulldozing homeless shelters or putting in cheap grimy liquour stores in the area.

Besides. LA county is over 1500 sq miles. Plenty of space for all the homeless to be spread out instead of concentrated, ignored, and ripe for abuse.

In summary: The homeless do have a right to existence, but their presence shouldnt prevent a great neighborhood wine bar from being allowed to operate, or a great cafe to open up. That is just ridiculous.

I think the important issue here is that Dan Green's solution (denying a permit to a bar/restaurant) in no way helps homeless people.

It's like saying that I care about the environment, so I'm going to start walking on my hands.

The chosen course of action does not solve the problem that is of concern.

However, what it does do is prevent development of services for loft dwellers who have chosen to reclaim downtown from the squalor it has been in for decades.

And doesn't a planning department guy who wants to "expand Skid Row" sound ... um ... a little crazy?

Skid Row is not a solution, it's the lack of a solution. Mr. Green wants to expand upon this failure of public policy?

Sixth, sixth, sixth & Main, main, main: echoes of Woodie Guthrie, John Rechy and Jack Kerouac who partied, played and swayed hereat. Of John (Juan Largo) Warner who lived there, he the neer-do-well who may be the most under- appreciated historical figure the the city's entire history. And of the old Burbank Theater which replaced his adobe, the venue which brought the city it's first true taste of nightlife. And most of all there must be remembered the old Century Stockhouse Cafe at 6th and Main, whose claim to fame became burlesque. Lon Chaney worked backstage and was highly regarded for his wizardry in applying makeup. The Stockhouse's pre-eminent night time attraction was a notorious blonde bombshell of the name 'Texas Guinan'. She paved the way for Mae, folks, and later proceeded onwards to greater fame in a similar establishment in Manhattan where she was ensconced upstairs in separate living quarters and bathed each day in a solid gold bathtub. Sixth and Main ought to be the heart of the city's nighlife, if for no other reason than to memorialize Tex, John, Juan, Jack and Woodie.

John, thanks for that tidbit. I wasn't aware of the adobe on the Burbank Theater site.

Skid Row is not a failed policy, it is a successful one. It keeps the undesirables out of the other parts of the city that don't want them. We are seeing the powers that want to maintain that segregation flexing their muscles, which are formidable. But they are in no way invincible.

Dan Green has a good point in wanting to keep the homeless in downtown. He doesn't want them running over to his part of the city, where they'll end up loitering and littering on the street where his residence is located, peeing on his front lawn, and then sometimes squatting and leaving behind fragrant droppings on his front porch.

He may be a selfish bastard, but he ain't no dummy.

I'm not sure we can change Daniel Green's mind. Does anybody know who his superiors are, so we can write to them?

I've lived downtown or near downtown for about 20 years. At one time just a few block from skid row(I called it skid row adjacent). I currently have a childhood friend living at a hotel on Los Angeles Street. The overwhelming number of homeless are drug addicts or belong in mental institutions. I've walked many alleys littered with needles. Stepped over countless crack viles. Seen lots of deals made in front of SROs. I've been approached by countless mumbling or screaming half naked homeless people. A small(think tiny) number are homeless due to economics(loss of job, etc...)

Why would we want to enable more homelessness by giving drug addicts and crazy people cheap housing(think free)?

I don't believe that enabling a community that destroys it's environment(think graffiti, public urination, simple littering) helps anyone - least of all the homeless.

Downtown is rising out of the ashes. Creating safe, clean streets, encouraging business and investment will go a long way in helping the truly unfortunate.

Just my two cents

I'm meeting with some City officials regarding this next week. It's really encouraging to see this level of concern and commitment from everyone.The original denial of the Santa Fe application was absurd. I hope to be able to share this dialogue with them. I truly think at this point, some within the City bureaucracy continue to be unaware of how positive the changes down here are and how sensitive they need to be to the concerns of ALL downtown residents, not just those who have dominated this discussion for decades.The CRA plan is a hopeless mess and will assure the new era of Skid Row 2.0, to no ones benefit. I hope all of you are ready to express your opinions at City Hall when the time comes, because there is a lot of organized opposition to the continuing revitalization of the Main St. area. They will try to wrap it in the guise of NIMBYism and sound bite-based social policy, however, with thoughtful, neighborhood based advocacy, we can promote a healthier neighborhood for ALL - formerly homeless included.

If someone gives me a script and tells me who to e-mail, I'll actively promote our agenda. I just need something I can cut and paste and then tailor to my own style. I'm not sure what exactly needs to be said to public officials. Can someone help with that? I'll do the rest. :}

Thanks!