NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCILS ... YOU ARE YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD’S VOICE-As president of the Los Angeles Neighborhood Council Coalition (LANCC), I have had conversations with many of our members from the 96 Neighborhood Councils that are in support of the Mayor’s and City Council’s bid to host the 2024 Olympics in Los Angeles, but are adamantly against the City enjoining current and future taxpayers to absorb potential cost-overruns. This is the same position that was communicated to the Los Angeles City Council from the Neighborhood Council Budget Advocates (NCBA) of which Jay Handal and I are Co-Chairs.
According to an article by former City Councilmember Bob Ronka in The Daily News, history could repeat itself:
“When an intransigent International Olympic Committee insisted that L.A. accept financial responsibility for any Olympics deficit, then-Mayor Tom Bradley announced he was withdrawing the city’s bid for the ’84 Games. The next day, the IOC folded and agreed to drop that onerous requirement. Charter Amendment N stiffened LA leaders’ resolve and provided an inarguable legal reason why they couldn’t agree to cost overruns. Since the charter amendment prohibited LA from incurring a deficit from the Olympics, the IOC’s only alternative was to let the Games be run by LA’s highly competent, private Olympics organizing committee. Peter Ueberroth told me that he would cite the charter amendment when letting the IOC know why various demands for more spending could not be met.
The U.S. Olympic Committee and the IOC know Los Angeles has existing facilities in place and the proven experience to stage a spectacularly successful Olympics Games. Unless it wants to stage budget-busting Games only in autocratic states like China or Russia, where taxpayers don’t question authority, the IOC has no reason to reject the formula for success that it agreed to before and that worked so spectacularly for LA in ’84. The cost-control charter amendment was a key element in that success story.
It may be that a tradition-bound organization like the IOC would fear the influence of voters and taxpayers in the bidding process of potential Olympics host cities. But any attempt by Olympics officials to “fly under the radar” and seek to quietly obligate a host city to accept full financial liability -- before voters have had a chance to weigh in -- is a mistake that could backfire. Charter Amendment N proved to the IOC, the USOC, LA’s leaders and local Olympics boosters that Angelenos were excited to have the Olympics return to LA in ’84 -- as long as they weren’t stuck with the bill for any cost-overruns or revenue shortfalls. Los Angeles did it before; it can do it again.”
The question that has been posed to the Los Angeles City Council through the Council President’s Office is: Is Prop N that was passed in 1978 by Los Angeles voters to change the Los Angeles City Charter still in effect? If so, as president of LANCC, I firmly request that the City Council votes to instruct the Mayor that the City Council that according to the Charter, it cannot agree to cost-overruns. If Council does not vote for this instruction, Council President Wesson should provide true leadership to the Council – by advocating language in the motion that represents the spirit of Prop N -- to prohibit the City of Los Angeles from enjoining current and future taxpayers to absorb potential cost-overruns of the production of the 2024 Los Angeles Olympics.
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If the City Council is determined to move forward without protecting the taxpayers of Los Angeles from potential cost-overruns of the 2024 Olympic bid, the City Council will force the members of the Neighborhood Councils to stand tall and support a new Charter Amendment that will mirror the 1978 Prop N.
LANCC will be discussing this issue and the possible next steps at their next General Board meeting on September 5, 2015 at the LADWP Headquarters 111 N. Hope Street Los Angeles, CA 90012. The meeting is scheduled from 10:00-1:00PM.
LANCC is requesting that all stakeholders in the City of Los Angeles send emails voicing their concerns about the City Council and Mayor of Los Angeles enjoining current and future taxpayers to absorb potential cost-overruns of the production of the 2024 Los Angeles Olympics.
Emails need to be received by the City Council’s next meeting on Tuesday, September 1, 2015. Send your emails to [email protected].
(Terrance Gomes, MBA, is the President of the Los Angeles Alliance of Neighborhood Councils (LAANC), co-chair of the Neighborhood Council Budget Advocates and an Executive Board Member of the South Robertson Neighborhood Council.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 13 Issue 71
Pub: Sep 1, 2015
