Bernard Parks officially wins City Council District 8 election



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Bernard Parks officially won a third term on the Los Angeles City Council today after the City Clerk’s Office released a final tally giving him 51.21 percent of the vote in the March 8 election.
 
Parks received 9,482 votes, while his closest challenger, Forescee Hogan-Rowles got 8,058 votes, or 43.52 percent, according to the clerk’s figures.

Parks did not wait to declare victory—he announced that he had won on election night after unofficial results gave him 50.89 percent of the vote. Hogan-Rowles, however, did not concede,
saying the number of provisional and vote-by-mail ballots meant that Parks might not have the 50 percent of the vote needed to avoid a runoff.
 
In a campaign update sent via email, Hogan-Rowles said, “I’m proud of our campaign and the coalition we built together with workers and neighborhood leaders. We came just a few votes away from forcing Bernard Parks into a runoff—even though he used to be one of the most popular leaders in the City.”

She continued, “Our campaign sends an important message to elected leaders like Bernard Parks, who ignore their constituents and the workers who keep our city working: no matter how popular you think you are you can’t take the people for granted.”
 
Photo by Sarah Golden

Read more on this topic:
Hogan-Rowles advocates a run-off election
Bernard Parks celebrates election in Leimert Park
City Council candidates discuss the issues in South LA

Incumbent Bernard Parks talks about his achievements



This story is a part of our series of interviews with the candidates for Los Angeles City Council Districts 8 and 10.

Listen to a story by Annenberg Radio News:

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Emily Frost: Why are you running?

Bernard Parks: I’m running because I’ve had significant success in the first eight years of bringing back the community on a variety of levels. And I think we’ve turned the corner on a number of issues, whether it’s economic development or looking at the rails coming in, bringing in grocery stores for the first time in 25 years. I think the community is looking to see how this community can continue to flourish in the next four years.

Frost: How do you think you’ll respond to Governor Jerry Brown’s cuts?

Parks: Well, I think it’s going to affect us in that most of the cuts are cuts that are going to affect the county. But we will see the end result of it. Because those that can’t get those services are going to spill out into the city street. The thing that’s going to impact the city the most is if he’s successful in cutting the CRA. Then poor communities will certainly suffer in their ability to gather funds to help their community.

Frost: What’s your number one issue?

Parks: The number one issue for the district is increasing job growth.

Frost: What’s the most important thing we should know about you?

Parks: Integrity and honesty.

Frost: The most important thing about your district?

Parks: We have a district in transition, that for many decades has been ignored. There’s a great deal of frustration about being ignored. What you find when talking to people is that they’ll tell you that nothing is going on in their district. And then you start to recite to them things that are going on in their neighborhood. Just today I talked to a lady and I said, ‘Are you aware that there’s a Kaiser health facility going in on Manchester? Did you know that your library has brand new and increased number of Internet free access computers?’

Frost: What do you want people to have in mind on voting day?

Parks: The list of things that they gave me when I came into office. Many of them are achieved. They wanted to see dirt alleys paved. We paved 50 percent of them, 15 miles of dirt alleys. They wanted to see Vermont/Manchester come alive. We put a $100 million office building there. They wanted to see issues of Baldwin Hills shopping revitalization. They’ll get a new Staples, and Magic Johnson theater, a new Buffalo Wild Wings. They wanted to see public transportation. We have two new lines. We worked very hard to get Measure R passed so that we could fund public transportation, coming down Crenshaw Boulevard and the Expo Line. These are things that in each instance, we tried to make sure the community was heard and we listened to their needs. When they asked about the fact that there are no community cultural events in the district — we have now the Taste of Soul, we have the Leimert Park MLK parade, we now have jazz festivals in Leimert Park, we have fire works on the 4th of July. These are all things given back to the community that they asked for.

Read more interviews with city council candidates.

Candidate Forescee Hogan-Rowles focuses on job creation



This story is a part of our series of interviews with the candidates for Los Angeles City Council Districts 8 and 10.

Listen to an audio story by Annenberg Radio News:

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Forescee Hogan-Rowles is running for the second time.

“I lost that race to Bernard Parks and I determined then that if the district wasn’t doing better in eight years, I would run again,” Hogan-Rowles said.

If elected, Hogan-Rowles says she intends to bring jobs into the community through redevelopment.

“There’s a number of things that have gone unattended under the leadership or lack of leadership of Bernard parks,” Hogan-Rowles said. “The first thing I want to work on is new job creation because we have the highest unemployment and that’s coupled with expanding local business and expanding new local business development within our district. Our corridors don’t have enough businesses operating in them and so if you have new business, then that will create new jobs.”

Hogan-Rowles served as commissioner for the Department of Water and Power, as well as commissioner for the California Commission for Economic Development. In both positions, she said, she focused on how to create jobs, and “impact new industries and support existing industries.”

Hogan-Rowles is one of incumbent Bernard Parks’ competitors. But Hogan-Rowles says what distinguishes the two of them is their relationship with the community.

“I actually like to attend meetings and enter into dialogue and hear the responses of and requests of people so we can work through and build consensus,” Hogan-Rowles said. “So when we do make a decision, everybody knows what it is. The people united will never be defeated, so we will win on March 8.”

Listen to more interviews with city council candidates.

Candidate Andrew “Andy” Kim says he’s all for businesses



This story is a part of our series of interviews with the candidates for Los Angeles City Council Districts 8 and 10.

Listen to a story by Annenberg Radio News:

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When Andrew Kim immigrated to America from Korea at the age of 14, he was most impressed with the American political system.

“It’s largely a grass roots system that I really like,” Kim said.

Kim was inspired to go to law school. He practiced civil litigation for more than 20 years and, now, he is running for city council.

“I think it is very important that a person like me, who really in this district working and living it the district, really be a part of the political system,” Kim said. “Right now, the city is not responsive to the average individual professional like myself.”

Kim is running for city council in District 10, which covers diverse areas from Koreatown to parts of the Vermont corridor and the University of Southern California.

Kim says his experiences working within District 10 have helped him understand how important this area is.

“This is really the heart of Los Angeles in terms of its geography, demography and just its cultural and ethnic composition,” Kim said. “I think this area needs a change first, for Los Angeles to change.”

What changes would Kim make? He says the biggest change needs to be an economic revitalization through the creation of new jobs and incentives for business to stay in the district. He says he will use other cities as models to make sure businesses comes to and stays in his district.

“This is an area that has been economically depressed for a long time,” Kim said. “We need to have new leadership, business friendly leadership. We have nearby cities like Burbank that have business coming in and they must be doing something right in comparison to what we are doing in our district.”

Kim says most importantly he is in the race to be a voice for the average citizen.

“Throughout my law practice, I have been representing those who are weak and helpless,” Kim said. “Many senior citizens, and those hard working people, hard working couples, I think these people need to be represented in city hall. I bring in my 20 plus years of legal practice but I also bring in my heart, which is for the average citizen.”

Kim says he hopes to give back to the country and the city that has given him so much.

Read more interviews with city council candidates.

Tenth District write-in candidate Gavin Glynn prioritizes education on March ballot



This story is a part of our series of interviews with the candidates for Los Angeles City Council Districts 8 and 10.

On March 8th, voters in Council District 10 will vote for city council. Incumbent Herb Wesson, Jr. is facing challenges from Chris Brown, employment specialist; Austin Dragon, private business owner; Andrew “Andy” Kim, attorney; Luis Montoya, small business owner; and Althea Rae Shaw, victim advocate. Gavin Glynn is a write-in candidate.

Listen to an audio interview from Annenberg Radio News:

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Sarah Erickson: What made you decide to run for this position?

Gavin Glynn: I adopted five beautiful children from the Department of Children and Family Services and having to advocate for their rights through LAUSD, through the county, I got to learn to navigate city government and how things were being spent appropriately or inappropriately. Really, it’s to create a better life for my children, safer parks, safer streets to walk down. That’s how I got involved with my neighborhood Quality of Life Committee and the West Adams Avenue neighborhood meeting once a month.

Erickson: What is it you see as the foremost issue on this year’s ballot?

Glynn: The first thing is education. Our students and our community in district 10 are far behind other students within the city. Those are the kids who live in the neighborhood who attend local schools. A majority of parents farm their kids out, they go to other schools. It’s a huge issue for district 10. We have little community. We have to shop outside our community. We send our children to schools outside. We’re doing everything outside of our community. We’re not even nesting in our own community. District 10 has to take a very serious look about how we can attract business and development.

Erickson: If you were elected to be the representative for your district, how could you bring about improved schools, more funding for them, more local businesses? What is your plan once elected?

Glynn: The point I’m making is that I have to go to a PTA meeting over here, and then I have to go to a West Adams Avenue neighborhood meeting over here. They need to be in the same place. That’s what I want to do. I want to streamline.. see what the LAUSD is doing, what the city is doing, where the carry over is. We need to streamline. We shouldn’t be paying for satellite offices for the council person when we have public schools to use at night. Too often, everyone thinks that LAUSD is a separate entity from city government. They are budget wise but not voter wise. The voters are the same people and the recipients of quality education in the community.

Erickson: What is your plan for getting these priorities done?

Glynn: First and foremost is corporate responsibility. The unemployment rate in America is 9.5 percent. In district 10, it’s 16 percent. It’s almost double. However, we have the number one McDonalds, Jack in the Box, Starbucks. We have all these fast food places that are the number one performers in Southern California.

Read more interviews with City Council candidates.

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map from lacity.org

OPINION: The Prosperity Gospel according to Eddie Long



imageSikivu Hutchinson is the editor of blackfemlens.org and a senior fellow with the Institute for Humanist Studies. Become a fan of Blackfemlens on Facebook.

Who was it who said that it would be easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than a filthy rich pastor with a $350,000 Bentley to get into the Kingdom of God? And how long will it be before the Lord, working mysteriously, delivers New Birth Missionary Church Bishop Eddie Long — Bentley ditched for a Pinto — sobbing Jimmy Swaggart cum Ted Haggard-style in a warm lather of repentance on cable TV?

Accused of sexually abusing young men in his congregation, arch homophobe and macho man mentor of boys Long would seem to be the devil’s latest casualty.

In a week in which “God” has been routinely invoked to immunize crooks from criminal investigation and social condemnation, the Long allegations are yet another shining example of the sexually, morally and fiscally corrupt business of organized religion.

In the scandal-plagued city of Bell, California an indicted City Council member/pastor trotted out his belief in God as a cover for alleged misconduct. In an investment fraud case reverberating through the Los Angeles Police Department, victims cited the “Christian” orientation of the suspects as the primary motivating factor for their trust. Arguing for clemency, supporters of Virginia Death Row inmate Teresa Lewis piously vouched for her Christian prison “conversion.”

Having learned zero from the global pedophile priest scourge, our stridently Judeo Christian culture still routinely uses the assignation man or woman “of God” to shut down debate or consideration of how religion and religious authority gives license to those who act immorally. Indeed, how many times have we heard that a certain person could not have committed ‘that there’ serial murder because he was a good man of God, a devout Christian and a churchgoer who could regurgitate scripture on demand? And how many times have predators and hardcore career criminals been given a figurative pass or viewed as above suspicion because they were churchgoing Christians doing the Lord’s (dirty) work? Conversely, how many times have we heard the caveat that a certain person could not have committed ‘that there’ serial murder because they were a humanist, atheist or agnostic?

imageThe ATL’s very own ringleader of the prosperity gospel, Long has blazed a trail as an anti-same sex marriage Christian soldier and self-proclaimed “spiritual daddy” to a nationwide army. After the death of Coretta Scott King in 2004, Earl Ofari Hutchinson notes that, “Long’s anti-gay phobia was so virulent that then NAACP president Julian Bond publicly declared he would not attend (her) funeral service at Long’s New Birth Missionary Baptist Church.” A prominent supporter of George W. Bush and his anti-gay policies, Long and several other prosperity gospel predators were the subject of a 2007 federal probe on fiscal mismanagement of their tax exempt status. Launched by the U.S. Senate, the investigation was spearheaded by the Trinity Foundation, a nonprofit “religious media watchdog” dedicated to exposing fraud and financial improprieties within the billion-dollar megachurch industry.

imageLong’s empire of niche ministries, books, gospel shows and seminars powers a robber baron’s lifestyle of expensive cars, homes and private jets. One of these niche ministries involves spiritual counseling for young men and “delivering” men from homosexuality. According to a former New Birth parishioner, Long evoked themes of hyper-masculinity and required obeisance to himself as divinely ordained patriarch. The trespasses of Long and other good Christian evangelicals was scrutinized in Sarah Posner’s 2008 book God’s Profits: Faith, Fraud and the Republican Crusade for Values Voters.

Yet while the sex abuse epidemic in the Catholic Church has received much coverage, similar epidemics in Protestant churches have remained underreported. Commenting on the 2008 Chris Brown/Rihanna abuse incident black feminist anti-violence activist Kevin Powell recounted how he’d been approached for advice by a young woman who had been sexually abused by her pastor since she was five years old. Similarly, a young woman of my acquaintance related that she had been repeatedly molested by her pastor after her parents had entrusted her in his care. Clearly, sexual abuse is an endemic social issue that is not peculiar to organized religion. However, the mindset of the religious sexual predator is markedly different from one operating in a secular context because of the presumption of righteous morals and a higher calling. Further, religious hierarchies (be they Muslim, Christian, Mormon, Orthodox Jewish, etc.) delineating masculine roles, responsibilities and privileges perpetuate a culture of patriarchal entitlement and heterosexist control.

The Bible’s sanction of violence against women (e.g., rape and forced marriage) provides theological justification for viewing and treating women like property. If women are deemed to be second class citizens in scripture, and consigned to helpmate roles in the church, why wouldn’t male clergy act with impunity when it comes to sex and power? And if the culture of compulsory heterosexuality demands that men hew to rigid gender norms, it stands to reason that some closeted gay clergy will abuse their power by sexually abusing young male parishioners. Indeed, the heterosexist cult of the exalted pastor is based on the belief that “real men” should be inscrutable in their exercise of power and authority. Thus, the religious sexual predator may rationalize his behavior as being “ordained” by God. God confers him with ultimate authority and moral license. “His” ways are part of a divine moral order that mere laypeople don’t have access to.

From the time African American children become socially aware, the dominant culture reinforces the heterosexist perception of male clergy’s invulnerability and “above the law” status. Preachers are revered as founts of knowledge, wisdom and “reason.” In middle to working class black communities the absence of formal religious training or education is no barrier to having the title “Rev” “Dr.” or even “Reverend Doctor” slapped in front of one’s name. Consequently, the strong preacher (father) figure is one of the most universally respected models of masculinity in African American communities. Available for counsel and succor to male and female parishioners, the “daddy” pastor’s biblically sanctioned faith pimping spiritual ministry translates into emotional manipulation, psychological control, and sexual exploitation.

In America being a macho man and a professional homophobe is big business, one that jeopardizes the lives and mental health and wellness of thousands of gays and lesbians. Regardless of whether the allegations against Long are true or not, his prosperity gospel of gay-bashing and robber baron profiteering at the expense of poor black people is another indictment of the moral injustice that happens on “God’s” watch.

Sikivu Hutchinson is the editor of blackfemlens.org and a senior fellow with the Institute for Humanist Studies. This article originally appeared here.

Voter apathy threatens Inglewood’s special election



What if there were an election and no one voted? That’s what happened in Inglewood, or nearly so. In the November 3, 2009 countywide election, only 86 Inglewood voters cast ballots– less than one twentieth of one percent of the city’s electorate.

Inglewood’s 0.18 percent turnout took place during L.A. County’s consolidated elections. By comparison, turnout rates in other cities for the same election included 8 percent in Compton, 10 percent in Pasadena, and 11 percent in Lancaster, according to the Los Angeles County Registrar’s Statement of Votes Cast. Ballots consisted mainly of city council and school board races.

The specter of low voter turnout concerns Inglewood leaders and community activists, especially in light of an upcoming special municipal election slated for June 8 to fill the mayoral seat vacated by Roosevelt F. Dorn, who pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor conflict of interest charge in January.

“Nobody believes in government anymore because there are so many crooks, and people don’t care. There is no care in the government anymore,” said Stacie Williams, a community activist and advocate for youth facilities and housing. “It’s just a lack of professionalism and a lack of care in the city of Inglewood and that needs to stop.”

But the publicity surrounding Dorn’s departure may have the opposite effect, actually increasing voter turnout, said Michael McDonald, a voting expert at George Mason University. “It raises the profile of the election,” he said. “People are talking about it and anything that helps communicate to people that there’s an election will improve the turnout.”

A recent election that was strictly municipal fared somewhat better, by comparison. On June 12, 2007 about 18 percent of the city’s registered voters cast ballots in a runoff for council district 1. The victor, Daniel Tabor, won by 200 votes.

“It [was] a local special election,” McDonald said. “Those are the kind of races that tend to draw the lowest level of turnout.”

Yvonne Horton, Inglewood’s city clerk, said the city’s voter turnout is “no more poor than others.” She said she does plan to do her part to raise awareness about the upcoming election.

“I am going to keep on asking them, every Tuesday [during council meetings] and every time I go out,” Horton said. “We can always try, [but] we can’t make people vote.”

Inglewood voters, like voters everywhere, are far more likely to turn out for a presidential race, said Michael Falkow, Inglewood’s chief information officer. About 84 percent of Inglewood voters cast their ballots in the last presidential race. It was a voting rate that reflected the enthusiasm generated by Barack Obama’s candidacy, which helped push voter turnout nationwide to a 40-year high, according to the Associated Press.

But within the context of national and statewide turnout rates, Inglewood’s voting rate in that election was about average. “The president is the most visible political symbol of America,” said Curtis Gans, an expert in citizen political participation in the U.S at the American University in Washington. “We have an eroded community; therefore fewer and fewer people are participating in local government and the people that do participate tend to be the same people.”

Falkow said that city leaders are hopeful that increased community attendance at city council meetings in the wake of Dorn’s departure will translate into ballots cast in June. But he is skeptical.

“I highly doubt that they’re all coming out just because the Mayor resigned,” Falkow said. “I would think that they’re coming out because they are finding out a lot of things about what’s going on that maybe they didn’t know.”

In the case of Inglewood resident Raynald Davis, that is exactly what happened.

“I want the city council to be transparent and let us know what is happening,” Davis said. “Tell us what we need to know, not what we want to hear.”

According to Gans, it is up to the city to restore the confidence of its residents in local government and inform them of what they stand to lose if they don’t cast their votes.

“They need to improve education, promote civic values, reduce the negative impact of media, strengthen unions, and change the way candidates conduct their campaign,” Gans said.

More on Inglewood’s political struggle:
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