Outside of policing, firefighting and education, it is arguably the biggest job of a city government: fixing and maintaining the streets and roads. In Los Angeles, a city that lives and dies with its cars, the health of the streets is akin to the heath of arteries leading to a heart—and L.A.’s arteries are clogged and the patient is sick. Recently ranked as having the second worst roads in the country and made worse by record rainfalls this year, undermanned road crews fanned out across the city this weekend in an effort dubbed “Operation Pothole” with the goal of repairing 20,000 potholes. Mayor Villaraigosa’s office estimates that 250,000 potholes are fixed each year and points to the success of the 311 phone service that allows motorists to report potholes—but the road repair agencies admit that budget cuts have limited their ability to act. The craters remain problematic and there are questions about how the city determines when a pothole should be filled versus when an entire street should be repaved. How are the potholes in your neighborhood and is the city acting quickly enough to fill them?
Join Patt for the latest installment in a transportation series with Metro chief Art Leahy, with updates on the Metropolitan Transit Authority’s plans for new highways, railways, and extensions of the existing Orange and Gold Lines. How will the Metro’s decisions to eliminate some bus lines and significantly reduce others affect its low-income ridership, which is expected to increase in light of rising gas prices? Whatever came of the controversy surrounding the construction of a new station in Leimert Park? And are you prepared for the temporary closing of the 405 freeway, July 16-17? Plus, check out the Metro’s new online bus-tracking service, NexTrip, and its revolutionary Spanish-language blog El Pasajero, which attempts to put a “Latino face on Metro.” Weigh in with your transit questions and comments.
A teacher charged with exposing middle school students to pornography; another arrested on charges for crimes from prostitution to petty theft; a substitute teacher who urinated in the classroom in front of students and banned from teaching for one year… these are among the cases highlighted by the California state auditor in a scathing report issued earlier this year on how the Commission on Teacher Credentialing handles, or mishandles, reports of teacher misconduct. Finding slow or no action on hundreds of files, including a three-year backlog of 12,600 arrest or prosecution reports, Auditor Elaine Howle called for major changes, telling the Sacramento Bee, “It’s one of the worst-run organizations we’ve seen in a long, long time – of any state agency that we’ve looked at.” Top managers of the commission have stepped down and California lawmakers are demanding change, but what is the collateral damage to students and schools when misconduct isn’t investigated and questionable teachers are allowed to stay in the classroom?
“That picture was of me, and I sent it,” confessed Rep. Anthony Weiner of New York in a press conference this afternoon, speaking of the now-infamous crotch photo sent from his Twitter account to a female college student last week. Weiner also admitted to having publicly lied about the image’s origins and to electronic relationships with three women over the past six years. Despite the emotional apology, however, he has refused to resign. Will Weiner keep his congressional seat in the consequent storm of public anger and distrust? And what does Weiner’s case say about the intersection between personal privacy and public knowledge in an age where social networking is the norm?
Lady Gaga expects to take more than just the perfume world by surprise when she unveils her first fragrance this September—she’s requested it “smell of blood and semen.” Too bad that doesn’t raise many eyebrows in the perfume industry, where scents inspired by bodily fluids, even skank ones, have been a longtime in the making. There was the 2006 Secretions Magnifiques, by L’Etat Libre D’Orange that featured “salty, metallic, medicinal, milky and decayed-white-florals-in a-coffin notes.” There was also this year’s La Petite Mort, which “embodies the elusive substance that is created by a woman as she is about to climax” with hints of warm skin, milk, urea secretions and “animalic darkness.” Even Sarah Jessica Parker has announced she’s working on a perfume with a B.O. note. How will Gaga’s scent be received? Patt talks with an expert about the history and origins of perfumery and we also hear from a perfumer about what it takes to develop that special scent.
Patt Morrison is known for its innovative discussions of local politics and culture, as well as its presentation of the effects of national and world news on Southern California.
