PPCC Newsletter - Spring 2012

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PPCC CONTINUES TO OPPOSE LOS ANGELES' CITYWIDE SIGN ("BILLBOARD") ORDINANCE

The most recent hearing by the City Council's Planning and Land Use Management Committee ("PLUM") took place at City Hall on 12.5.11.  It became evident to those residents and neighborhood stakeholders in attendance that two out of the three committee members have turned deaf ears to residents on the big issues - advertising in parks and public facilities, grandfathering sign districts and billboard takedowns.  The draft ordinance is going back to the City Attorney and will be remanded for further PLUM public hearings likely to occur in the first quarter of 2012.

The PPCC urges you to become involved.  Contact us.  Join our efforts and opposition.  Come to a PPCC meeting (every other Thursday night in the Library) or go to City Hall.  Make your voice heard if you care about any of the following issues:

* Advertising and donor signs on public park land and in recreational center spaces (like our gyms, baseball fields and tennis courts at the Pacific Palisades Recreation Center);

* Billboards (including digital displays) in your parks, city owned facilities, schools, apartments and other multi-family property courtyards;

* Light trespass onto, and illumination of, residential properties located at traffic intersections;

* Honoring the intent of the 2002 City of Los Angeles' ban against additional billboards - meaning that for any new billboard put up, the removal of an equivalent amount of old billboard square footage would be mandatory; 

* The installation of 16 massive sign districts (including the LA Zoo) without public hearing, CEQA study, equity or social justice analysis or study of community benefit measures applied for.

The LA Times noted recently that City officials, in their desperate efforts to solve the current budget shortfall, are attempting to sell out our residential neighborhoods, city parks and other public facilities using off-site signage/billboards to "maximize special revenue from advertising opportunities, such as banners and signage."  The PPCC believes that this IS WRONG.

DO YOU?

The use of Gas-Powered Leaf Blowers is against the Law

LAPD has recently issued a citation for the repeated use of illegal leaf blowers on E. Channel Road. They are bad for everyone's health and the environment. Users and their employers may face fines of $100 for each use according to Los Angeles Municipal Code (LAMC) 112 (c). Some residents in our neighborhood have pooled their funds and purchased a legal electric leaf blower for about $100. For additional information please click on
ZERO AIR POLLUTION LA
For a printable flyer to give to your gardener please click on
Gas-powered Leaf Blower Flyer

~Haldis~

We've posted the Minutes from our October 13, 2011 meeting on the PPCC website.  Check out the latest news on:

1.  Things happening in Potrero Canyon, with DWP street markings around tow, motorcycle noise and illegal car sales in the Alphabet Streets (Sec. 7.1).

2.  Police updates including the federally-ordered  release of non-violaent state prisoners starting in January 2012 (Sec. 8.2).

3.  What's going on with the community care facility and billboard ordinances, along with Administrative Citation Enforcement efforts for building code violations (Sec. 8.3, 8.4).

4.  PPCC wants City traffic impacts considered when the County does real estate development.  Case in point is a huge project in Marina del Rey that is going to impact our traffic (Sec. 10.1).

5.  The City's efforts to update laws regarding the aesthetics of retaining walls (Sec. 10.2).

Streamling Traffic Signals on Sunset Blvd, - ATSAC

Work is performed on Sunset Blvd. which requires closure of the eastbound right lane in stages from PCH to Kenter for a project which will streamline the traffic signals. According to the contractor, the work along the street is expected to be completed by March of 2012. This project includes trenching for cables and sensors, upgrade of signal technology, installation of cameras, and left turn arrows.

A number of residents have asked what this is all about.

The upgrade of the traffic signals on Sunset is part of the Automated Traffic Surveillance and Control (ATSAC) System, a state of the art technology that can reduce travel time by 12 percent, intersection delay by 32 percent and intersection stops by 30 percent. Los Angeles is a pioneer in the use of this traffic mitigation technology. At a conference at Duke, they showed what all traffic control centers of the next century will look like. LA is the model for ATSAC.

The installation of the ATSAC technology aims to create a steady flow of traffic at 35 mi/hr on Sunset through the Palisades

The City's ATSAC control center is four floors underground below City Hall East.

The speed/traffic sensors along the freeways and the freeway cameras are part of the ATSAC system.

ATSAC is a computer-based traffic signal control system that monitors traffic conditions and system performance, selects appropriate signal timing (control) strategies, and performs equipment diagnostics and alert functions. Sensors in the street detect the passage of vehicles, vehicle speed, and the level of congestion. This information is received on a second-by-second (real-time) basis and is analyzed on a minute-by-minute basis at the ATSAC Operations Center, to determine if better traffic flow can be achieved by changing the signal timing. If required, the signal timing is either automatically changed by the ATSAC computers or manually changed by the operator using communication lines that connect the ATSAC Center with each traffic signal. To supplement the information from electronic detectors, closed-circuit television (CCTV) surveillance equipment has been and continues to be installed at critical locations throughout the City.

The Department has installed CCTV cameras at 270 locations and new sites are being added. The major benefit of the ATSAC System is the ability to effectively manage dynamic traffic flow. Evaluation studies of the ATSAC System show that travel times, traffic signal delay, vehicular stops, air emissions and fuel use are significantly reduced.

The ATCS will automatically adjust traffic signal timing in response to current traffic demands by allowing ATCS to simultaneously control all three critical components of traffic signal timing, namely cycle length, phase split and offset.

The full report can be found at the LA City DOT site at: http://trafficinfo.lacity.org/html/atsac_1.html

~Haldis~

10,000 Non-violent Prisoners to be Released Starting January 2012

At the Community Police Advisory Board (C-PAB) meeting last Tuesday, LAPD announced that, beginning January 2012, 10,000 non-violent prisoners will be given $200 each and released unsupervised from LA County prisons. LAPD warned that citizens should be prepared for a significant increase in crimes.

C-PAB is attended by leaders of neighborhood and community councils and home owners associations and an urgent request was made by LAPD to distribute this information to the residents.

The release of the prisoners is the result of a controversial decision by the United States Supreme Court which requires that tens of thousands of California state prisoners will be released because of violations of cruel and unusual punishment.

The order is due to overcrowding, leading to what the court calls "constitutional violations." It is one of the largest prison release orders in U.S. history.

~Haldis~

LA City Administrative Code Enforcement - ACE

Residents in the Palisades and elsewhere in the City have been frustrated by the non-enforcement of City Ordinances and laws, generally contained in the City Municipal Code: Barking dogs, noisy parties, construction without permits, illegal construction, dog bites, gas powered leaf blowers, and the list goes on. Non-enforcement affects public safety, creates visual blight, and creates public nuisances.

A violation of the Municipal Code is a criminal act and the City Attorney's office says that they are not prosecuting such "minor" infractions criminally with staffing shortages and the courts overloaded with much more severe cases, alas: no enforcement, lawless behavior and citizen frustration.

The City Departments are just as frustrated. The public safety aspects of increasingly brazen violators of the Municipal Code are of major concern especially within LAPD, Animal Services, Housing Authority, and Building and Safety, and in the City Attorney's Office itself.

Council member Paul Koretz with the support from City Attorney Carmen Trutanich has sponsored an enforcement program that addresses the many unenforced violations of the City's Municipal Code. It decriminalizes minor violations and allows the inspectors in the field to issue tickets similar to parking tickets. This Administrative Code Enforcement (ACE) system is designed to be self funding through the collection of fines and not a burden on the tax payers.

PPCC has taken a position of support for the ACE program with special emphasis on enforcement of Building and Safety code violations. We must support this ordinance to bring law and order back to our community, stop the brazen scofflaws, and bring respectability back to the City Inspectors and Officers who are charged with enforcement but find their efforts negated by the City Attorney's refusal to prosecute.

The link to the LA Times article below provides additional details.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-code-20110926,0,4753148.story

~Haldis~