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| Photo Credit: Alex Datig |
Whewww, what a week.
I could give you a hundred breakdowns of what happened and what it all means, but it comes down to this:
We’re in troubled waters on a ship without a captain, and though there might be a few pretenders on the bridge, nobody trusts them.
We found out on Tuesday that although the city and county spent $600 million last year to chip away at the number of homeless people, the total increased by 16% to nearly 60,000.
That same day, voters said absolutely, positively no way to a parcel tax that would have raised money for struggling L.A. Unified schools, and the vote reflected a resounding lack of faith in school administrators to spend the money wisely. A shame, in my opinion. Whatever the sins of the past, shorting 600,000 mostly poor kids at a time when poverty has spilled onto our streets is not the smartest plan.
But this comes back to the leadership problem. Judging by my reader responses, it did not help that one of the parcel tax advocates was L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti. That would be the guy who has presided over the astounding spread of homeless encampments and trash-strewn streets after persuading voters to reverse the trends by taxing themselves.
I could give you a hundred breakdowns of what happened and what it all means, but it comes down to this:
We’re in troubled waters on a ship without a captain, and though there might be a few pretenders on the bridge, nobody trusts them.
We found out on Tuesday that although the city and county spent $600 million last year to chip away at the number of homeless people, the total increased by 16% to nearly 60,000.
That same day, voters said absolutely, positively no way to a parcel tax that would have raised money for struggling L.A. Unified schools, and the vote reflected a resounding lack of faith in school administrators to spend the money wisely. A shame, in my opinion. Whatever the sins of the past, shorting 600,000 mostly poor kids at a time when poverty has spilled onto our streets is not the smartest plan.
But this comes back to the leadership problem. Judging by my reader responses, it did not help that one of the parcel tax advocates was L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti. That would be the guy who has presided over the astounding spread of homeless encampments and trash-strewn streets after persuading voters to reverse the trends by taxing themselves.
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