CD Elections and Councilman Wesson's Missed Vote

Category: Eye On Wesson
Published on Saturday, 04 December 2010 12:36
Written by Dianne Lawrence

Currently nine potential candidates, vying to represent CD10 at City Hall, are jumping through the preliminary hoops (gathering 500 signatures and raising a minimum of funding) in order to qualify as a viable candidate for the March elections.

Chris Brown, Austin Dragon, Gavin Glynn, Andrew Kim, Mike J. Manley, Luis Montoya, T. Rodgers,  Althea Rae Shaw and Herb Wesson have felt the call to service. Herb Wesson, our current Councilperson, with his solid political resume, ability to raise funds, and old school politicking, has been able to handily ace the last two elections and assumes this one will go without a hitch. But something is in the air and there is unrest and murmuring in the crowds, so a strong candidate may actually give Wesson a run for his money...and he has a lot of money.

Mike J. Manley ran against him in 2007 (contrary to mistaken reports in other publications that Wesson ran unopposed) and Mike was able to raise an impressive $21,934 but Wesson had a stash of $314,620. Of the current class, other than Wesson, only Austin Dragon has raised any funds at this early stage, $2,125, while Wesson has come in at $18,000. We thought we would take a look at who has been funding the current Councilman’s campaign so far and share it with you. What we discovered is particularly interesting in light of recent activity in City Council.  On Wednesday Nov. 17, the City Council, without allowing any public comment,  unanimously approved radical changes of the process for local development.

 

From Steven Leigh Morris in a recent Nov. 18 LA Weekly article Click here for article
“L.A. May Say Good-bye to EIRs and Public Notice”

“Only one week after it was green-lighted on Nov. 3 by the city Planning and Land Use Committee, the “Community Plan Implementation Overlay” ordinance was approved, in 10 minutes, by the Los Angeles City Council on a vote of 12-to-0 last Wednesday. The hyper-rushed ordinance sets in motion the machinery for director of planning Michael LoGrande to roll over 35 Community Plans that contain hard-fought standards to protect all local neighborhoods in L.A. from overdevelopment and outsized buildings.”
“But the greater issue is that the ordinance hastily approved by the City Council last week sets the stage to wipe out a long-standing legal and social contract between City Hall and L.A.’s dwellers: It does so by removing many requirements for public notices, public hearings and Environmental Impact Reports, which allow Angelenos to question what is happening or fight back.”

 

Councilman Wesson, avoided this important vote. Why? Could it be that on the one hand he represents one of the most aggressive community preservation districts in Los Angeles and on the other hand...well let’s take a look at his current contributors......

H. S. ‘Sonny’ Astani  Developer

Marlene Shammas (CFO, Astani Enterprises)
Douglas Bigley  Urban Housing Communities LLC
William Cockrun R. E. Investor, Genton Property Group
CST Construction Company Long Beach
Frank Fonseca  Developer, American Communities
Jensen Construction Mgmt Inc./Jensen & Ptnrs.
Melanie Joseph  CFO/COO, Genton Property Group,LLC
Kevin Joseph  Unemployed
Soleyman Kahan  R. E. Developer, Seven Seas Holdings, LLC
M & S Development Group, LLC
Monroe HoldingsPalmer Construction Services, Inc.
Paramount Contractors & Dev., Inc.
RSS Development, Inc.
Shangri-La Construction, LP  Encino, CA 91436
Southern California Land Use
Tammy Teng  Office Mgr., CST Construction
Mark Walther  Partner, American Community Builders
Intercontinental Affordable Housing
International Finance, LLC
Gary Shafner  Billboard Promotion and advertising
Assi Super, Inc. fish import company
Brent Blackman Engineer Insight Structural Engineer,
Detroit Flanagan  Publisher, DT Flanagan Company
G & D LLC  Trucking company
Ira Handelman Consultant
Andrea Holland  Sr. Purchasing Agent, Boeing Co.
Bang Kim  Owner, Century Spa
Edward Kim  Owner, Century Spa
Heang Sook Kim  Housewife
KT & CP Entertainment/Feel Karaoke
Lewis & Company Inc.  Industrial products
M2 and Sum  media and marketing
Monique Danielle Scott, LVN, Park Manor
Daun St. Amand  Vice President, RTKL engineers
Konstantinos Zinelis  Restaurant Owner, Riteir-Tanetoria