GALPERIN FOR CONTROLLER - I am voting for Ron Galperin for Controller because he will be a tenacious watchdog for the Citizens of Los Angeles and the Ratepayers of our Department of Water and Power.
Ron has distinguished himself as the chair of the City sponsored Commission on Revenue and Efficiency, which, under his forceful and focused leadership, identified hundreds of millions of dollars in uncollected revenues and operational savings and efficiencies. He is also President of the City’s Quality & Productivity Commission. As a result of his intimate knowledge of the City’s finances and its operations, Ron will be an effective Controller starting on July 1, 2013.
Unfortunately, Ron has not endorsed the LIVE WITHIN ITS MEANS charter amendment. However, while Ron agreed with the concept of long range planning, balancing the budget, funding the City’s severely underfunded pension plans, and fixing our streets, he made a conscientious effort to outline why he did not support amending the City’s charter.
Ron’s opponent, Council Member Dennis Zine, did not even address the LIVE WITHIN ITS MEANS. Rather, when asked about this common sense charter amendment during meetings of various Neighborhood Councils, the garrulous Zine evaded the question, changed the subject, and babbled on about unrelated issues.
Furthermore, during his 12 years as a member of the City Council, Zine was not a budget hawk. Rather, he was a member of the Executive Employee Relations Committee, the closed door body that approved budget busting raises for City employees and outlandish compensation arrangements for the employees of our Department of Water and Power.
He even had the audacity to claim that the recent 15% multiyear raise for DWP workers represented by the Union Bo$$ d’Arcy represented a significant savings!
As for DWP, Zine, as the Vice Chairman of the Energy and Environment Committee, has failed to pursue the findings and recommendations of PA Consulting regarding DWP’s excessive compensation levels and its very generous health care and pension benefits, its overly restrictive work rules and overstaffed support services, and the failure of DWP to benchmark its inefficient operations against other regional utilities.
So it is not surprising that the campaign funding IBEW Union Bo$$ d’Arcy has endorsed his loyal ring kissing ally, Double Dipping Dennis Zine.
Galperin, on the other hand, has indicated that he will be more aggressive in reviewing and analyzing the findings and recommendations of PA Consulting and their implementation as well as investigating the many pet projects that are ultimately paid for by the long suffering Ratepayers.
Ron has been endorsed by The Los Angeles Times, The Daily News, and La Opinion as well as a wide cross section of prominent Angelenos, including Mayor Riordan, Controller Laura Chick, budget hawk Bernard Parks, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, and Kevin James.
Ron is not more of the same. A former member of his Neighborhood Council, he is a leader who represents a fresh approach to helping our City to avoid insolvency. He deserves our vote.
(Jack Humphreville writes LA Watchdog for CityWatch. He is the President of the DWP Advocacy Committee, the Ratepayer Advocate for the Greater Wilshire Neighborhood Council, and a Neighborhood Council Budget Advocate. Humphreville is the publisher of the Recycler Classifieds -- www.recycler.com. He can be reached at: [email protected]. Hear Jack every Tuesday morning at 6:20 on McIntyre in the Morning, KABC Radio 790.)
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 11 Issue 40
Pub: May 17, 2013