Secession Watch Archive
Archive Aug. 1 - Aug. 10
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• Jack Weiss, a ten-month vet of the L.A. city council whose Westside district spills into the Valley, predicts a humbling crash of the secession juggernaut in an interview with the L.A. Business Journal (fee on-line). The former assistant U.S. attorney, who clerked for U.S. District Judge Lourdes G. Baird and calls Bill Bradley his most admired person, also has disdain for the boroughs idea: "This is not an East Coast town. It has a different sensibility." On break-up:
"Secession reminds me of the classic story arc of a Hollywood flop. The treatment sounds pretty interesting. After all, smaller government is intuitively more appealing. Then when you see the script, you start to have some doubts about the issue. By the time opening day rolls around in November, nobody's going to see this picture...Support for secession in the Valley is a mile wide and an inch deep."
• Although their boroughs suggestion was spiked by a city council increasingly confident that secession will fail, L.A. council members Wendy Greuel and Janice Hahn, joined by Tom La Bonge, are pushing some changes to decentralize local government. Howard Fine says in the L.A. Business Journal (fee) they are floating an idea to manage city services in seven regional sub-areas within the city and add a half-dozen new council committees to deal with local issues.
• In the Daily News, Harrison Sheppard gives a longish state of the campaign account and notes that the pro side "could use the boost" from a big turnout at today's rally. Campaign leader Richard Katz insists the effort has a plan and is on schedule, and will raise at least $5 million, but there are rumblings from pro-secession friends in other parts of the city. Andrew Mardesich, who led the Harbor secession effort, asks: "Is there an organized effort outside of their area to support their leaving? I haven't seen that organization yet."
• The race for Valley mayor begins as a contest between assemblyman Keith Richman and longtime activist Mel Wilson, a former president of the SFV Board of Realtors and appointee to city commissions during the Riordan administration, the L.A. Times story says. Wilson says he may spend as much as $500,000 to run. Overall, eight of the Valley candidates are board members of Valley VOTE, the group which put the secession drive on the ballot. CSUN professor Thomas Hogen-Esch, who has studied secession, says the lack of experienced, big-name candidates has to be a disappointment, though the spin from the secession camp is that it's a fine turn of events. The Daily News has the full list in the paper but only the story is on-line.
• SFV Independence holds what it calls the campaign kickoff this morning at 10 a.m. at the Airtel Plaza at Van Nuys Airport. They're hoping to attract lots of families and candidates to make a big show, but the weather report says it'll be mondo HOT in the Valley. Meanwhile, judicious editing has pared down the group's online list of "Declaration of Independence" signers but new pranks include Mr. Whiskers and James Hahn.
• We stand chastened: most SFV City candidates stepped forward on the last day. The county website lists 121, including some new declarers, who returned papers to run by the 5 p.m. deadline. Three council races on the Nov. 5 ballot ended up with 11 or more hopefuls, and no race has fewer than four. In the contest for mayor, Keith Richman is joined by 11 other men -- in fact, men outnumber women about 5-1 on the list. The mayoral candidates represent ten separate Valley communities, but no one has anything close to the head start that Richman, an incumbent Republican assemblyman, enjoys. Next to watch for: since only Richman and former assemblywoman Paula Boland are known to many Valley voters, will candidates form slates to pool resources? Will an unofficial SFV Independence slate form, to carry the message of the secession mainstream? Not on the final list is Horace Heidt, who apparently dropped out.
Election district maps, in PDF format
• Watch for a story on secession in the August 19 issue of The New Republic, by senior editor Michelle Cottle. It's not on the street or on-line yet, but the cover headline is Can L.A. Survive Secession? and the contents page summary reads: Down in the Valley: This fall Los Angelenos will vote on letting the San Fernando Valley secede. If secession wins at the polls, it could cripple L.A. But if it loses badly, it could remove the pressure for L.A. to reform -- which would be almost as bad. It's the liberal journal's first visit with the cityhood issue -- when the article is posted, there will be a link here.
• One of the issues SFV City candidates should be forced to take a position on is the cleanup of nuclear debris at the Rocketdyne Santa Susana Field Lab above Chatsworth. Rocket tests from the 1950s through the 1970s used to thrill -- and annoy -- Valley residents, many of whom didn't know there were also nuclear reactor experiments going on up there. As the Daily News and Times both note, the Bush Administration wants a lesser cleanup, some residents and Sen. Barbara Boxer want a more costly effort.
• Mayor Jim Hahn plans to propose a city budget for the next fiscal year that does not prepare for the possibility of secession, and Richard Katz of SFV Independence has some words for the mayor.
• The Valley candidate ranks figure to thin dramatically later today when nominating petitions are due in Norwalk, at the county Registrar-Recorder's office. Only about a third of those who originally showed intent by taking out papers had filed by last night. Valley Democrats were warned Thursday by Jeff Daar of One Los Angeles that if they run, there will be no campaign help from Demo clubs in the Valley. Meanwhile, Richard Close is OK with the LAFCO summary that will be mailed to voters; L.A. city hall is still pondering.
• The same week that he makes his conversion to anti-secession official, West Valley councilman Dennis Zine takes a roasting on the Daily News editorial page. Zine is grilled -- "L.A.'s oldest Boy Scout" -- for opposing the Ahmanson ranch development while favoring the big expansion of the former Topanga Plaza shopping mall (the West's largest indoor mall when it opened in 1964). A double standard and really about the city of L.A. wishing to pocket more sales taxes, the DN sniffs.
• On its website, the Economic Alliance of the San Fernando Valley has posted a For the Record message clarifying it has no position on secession, noting that board members are "passionately involved" on both sides. The group represents 135 leading businesses across five of the Valley's six cities. In contrast to some secessionist rhetoric, the website refers to an "ever-improving sense of community, quality of life and prosperity" in the Valley. The Alliance will host a forum to talk over the business perspective on secession on August 22.
Other Valley business groups so far:
United Chambers: For
VICA: Members to vote
• Secession talk in another region -- northern Santa Barbara County -- is the subject of Life & Times Tonight, channel 28 in Los Angeles at 7 p.m. and again at midnight. There, it's the ranchers of the north county versus the big bad city folk of Santa Barbara proper.
Real Audio of show and Transcript
S.F. Chronicle story on dispute
• Washington Post media writer Howard Kurtz revisited some secession columns by L.A. Times "Points West" writer Steve Lopez, in a broader piece back on August 5. Kurtz gave Lopez points for creativity on two pieces: one where he asked Valley porn workers (kinda cliche, but still kinda fun) their views on secession, and the June 5 column where he embraced the "good riddance" position and urged L.A. to happily take the divorce. Lopez got off with no mention of his lazy May 22 column when he drove out to a single Peet's, talked to three people, then pronounced the breakup doomed. That column did, however, contain the sharpest Jeff Brain zinger on record: ...if this guy's name is Brain, somewhere in the world is a guy named Dolt who's a genius. For a relative newbie in town, Lopez seems to exhibit an odd level of anger toward the whole secession idea, or maybe that's just the schtick. He favors strong opinions and a bit of old-school crusading, and while he's no Peter King or Robert Jones yet in his grasp of the fabric of L.A. life, he's admired nationally and in the LAT newsroom. He does have vocal detractors too, like Marc Haefele at the L.A. Weekly and the editors and some readers of LAExaminer.com.
• A pastor with the Valley Interfaith Council spoke up against secession at a form sponsored by the Valley chapter of NOW, but we already knew that the organized clergy is officially opposed. NOW says it will take a position soon.
• L.A.'s new Neighborhood Councils could turn into hotbeds of secession sentiment once the volunteers find out how city hall really works, Jill Stewart offers in her weekly New Times column: Hahn is lucky that only about half of the councils will be operating when the Valley cityhood vote is taken. Stewart covered the first Congress of Neighborhoods last weekend, where Hahn tried to make nice but got a mixed reception. Stewart also praises the Daily News' July 28 examination of donors to Hahn's unity campaign. The head of the city's new neighborhoods department, by the way, is Greg Nelson, longtime chief of staff for the retired Valley councilman Joel Wachs. Added: In tomorrow's L.A. Weekly, Marc Haefele vacations in Paris and of course is smitten. He employs its charms to muse on the Congress of Neighborhoods, boost boroughs and skewer, in order, Valley VOTE and Burbank. This skewer has a dulled point, especially compared to other L.A. Weekly secession critiques. For a more amusing read, try Lili Barsha's verse on life "Just Over the Hill" (bottom of the column).
• Hidden Valley angles can be found everywhere. In his fine LAT op-ed piece today urging that the ball field be restored at the Manzanar relocation camp, author and playwright Steve Kluger could have mentioned that among the baseball teams that played there were the San Fernando Aces. They were formed of some of the 3,000 Valley residents of Japanese descent -- most of them U.S. citizens -- who were relocated in 1942 and interned until the end of World War II. At the time, many Valley farms and flower nurseries were operated by Japanese American families.
• The anti-Hahn editorial du jour in the Daily News bashes the $3 million that city hall pledged for neighborhood councils. Not enough, the paper says. Meanwhile, on the LAT op-ed page, ever-present good government guru Erwin Chemerinsky, a USC law professor, writes that the antidote to secession is to expand the L.A. City Council. If each council member represents fewer people, he argues, city hall would be more responsive -- exactly the argument friends of secession have been making. They have the right idea, just the wrong ultimate solution, he contends. As if adding highly paid council members won't be unpopular enough in taxpayer land, he also calls for rethinking Proposition 13.
• Los Angeles city controller Laura Chick will come out against secession today, the Daily News' Harrison Sheppard reports. Chick used to represent the West Valley on the city council, and now lives in Silver Lake.
• A famous name in Valley lore has joined the race for SFV city council: Horace Heidt. Junior, that is. Horace Heidt the senior was a major Big Bands star known locally for the quirky Horace Heidt Magnolia Estate apartments he built in Sherman Oaks. The ten acres have waterfalls, an aviary and a golf course -- and the complex is built on the site of Laurel and Hardy's Fun Factory, where the comedy duo tried out new material. Heidt Jr., an entertainer himself who used to be music director for the Los Angeles Raiders, signed up to run in the 14th district. Heidt escapes the notice of the Daily News, which does report that the prospects will rally in Van Nuys on Saturday, and which on the editorial page praises the hopefuls for their "courage" and urges more to sign up. With three days left, only 31 candidates for all SFV offices have returned papers.
• Secession is a factor in the deliberations over hiring a new LAPD chief, the New York Times' Michael Janofsky reports. Mayor Jim Hahn will choose from among three candidates put forth by the police commission, and the NYT suggests that the wish to avoid fueling secession fervor will be on the mayor's mind. The new top cop then would have to be all right with the Valley and acceptable to black voters who still like the ousted Bernard Parks. Notes councilman Jack Weiss, it would also be nice if the prospective chief is sensitive to "the difference between Pacoima and Palms."
• The website of the L.A. County Young Democrats voices displeasure with the anti-secession L.A. United effort, saying it must ramp up on two parallel tracks. One, a negative campaign "that the mayor needs to be far away from," and a more warm and fuzzy Los Angeles-is-World-Class campaign with Hahn as point man. "The secession battle is the City leadership's to lose," the site concludes. Just above the item is a fascinating recap of the politics behind the juggling of Board of Education seats in reapportionment that led to the Valley's representatives to LAUSD being shifted -- or in the case of Julie Korenstein, shafted.
• The Los Angeles Police Protective League held an anti-secession rally tonight on the athletic field of the LAPD academy next to Dodger Stadium. The LAPD officers' union, like other city employee unions, is actively fighting municipal divorce.
LAT: 200 officers show up
SFV Independence statement on cops
• The San Fernando Valley Business Journal weighs in with a story on the business community wanting to know whether SFV City candidates would keep or shed L.A.'s "living wage" ordinance, and a column by Jacqueline Fox chastizing L.A. city council president Alex Padilla for spreading "confusing misinformation" about secession. The SFVBJ makes you buy the paper or pay $3 each to read the items online.
• Suburbs in the news: the Weekly Standard dubs the fast-growing outer 'burbs Sprinkler Cities. The Valley may not be a true suburb any more, but it feeds plenty of ex-patriates to these "Sprinkler Cities" and endures their commuters. Also, the L.A. Times reports on a new study from the Public Policy Institute of California finding that the state is growing more diverse but with a rising number of small cities and suburbs becoming more segregated -- meaning dense pockets of Hispanic residents. The story doesn't mention the Valley but could have. In mega-diverse Los Angeles, the high school with the most languages spoken by students is Granada Hills High (28 native tongues in 1998). Of the top 20 L.A. schools for language diversity, most are in the Valley. At the same time, the Valley schools with the least variety were in -- guess where? -- Pacoima and San Fernando, traditional minority areas. There, the language list tends to be far shorter: English and Spanish.
• Jim Hahn is trying hard to repair his relations with blacks upset over the firing of police chief Bernard Parks, the L.A. Business Journal's Howard Fine reports. Some black community leaders had implied they might urge a vote for secession in reaction to Parks' dismissal. Now Hahn has revived talks for a light-rail line or busway along Crenshaw Boulevard. "Damage control," says author and political commentator Earl Ofari Hutchinson.
• Jeff Brain is out as campaign head and Gerry Gunster of the political public affairs firm of Goddard Claussen Porter Novelli will run the SFV Independence campaign, in hopes of stoking the secession embers. GCPN is known for mounting successful campaigns for business groups and the insurance industry and for creating the "Harry and Louise" TV ads that helped doom President Clinton's health care program in 1994. Brain, subject of an unflattering LAT story July 22, tells the Times he supports the move and will stay on as president of Valley VOTE. But it was time to call in the pros, admits Valley VOTE board member Richard Leyner (also a council candidate). Indeed, says Republican political analyst Arnold Steinberg in Calabasas: "This is an effort which never consolidated its own base in the San Fernando Valley." (Deep in LAT story on complaint against Hahn).
DN on hiring of Goddard Claussen in April
• Don Seastrom of Reseda gives voice to the visceral tug away from L.A. felt by many Valley inhabitants, in a Daily News op-ed piece. He likens it to his own divorce: "We both were going in different directions and realized that we needed to move on."
• Another attempt to take Valley culture upscale bit the dust -- at least temporarily -- when the El Portal Theatre closed its doors and cancelled the current season. The El Portal's stages were supposed to be the anchor of an urban hip transformation in the so-called NoHo Arts District, a creation of the city's Community Redevelopment Agency. Maybe it's not that easy. Anyone remember the Valley Music Theater?
• West Valley city councilman Dennis Zine began his political career as a secession proponent and recently weighed a run for mayor of the Valley, the Daily News reports. But now he's come out against, with a message that must be chilling to the separatists. "I don't see secession gaining momentum," Zine said. "I see it imploding on itself."
• Politics in the Zeros, the eclectic anti-breakup blog, discusses the bloc most crucial to secession's hopes -- voters outside the Valley -- and says they've been given no reason to support the split. Good point. Secession leaders have always known that to make a serious run at winning independence -- in contrast to just gaining some political concessions -- they must sell the idea to a sizable chunk of non-Valley L.A. voters. Those voters have almost as much at stake as Valleyites. Earlier, the dream was to combine secession drives in Hollywood, the Harbor and the Valley into a bloc of votes, appeal to anti-city hall sentiment in Westchester and the West Side, entice some African Americans by arguing their influence would gain in a trimmed-down Los Angeles -- then hope for a low citywide turnout. Now, with the Harbor drive terminated and Hollywood's tanking, it's not clear there is a viable strategy for winning in November. Will the upcoming campaign be merely symbolic?
• Secession advocates filed a complaint with the L.A. city ethics commission charging mayor Jim Hahn with improperly using his city office, website and staff to fight the breakup. The United Chambers of Commerce of the San Fernando Valley and the San Fernando Valley Independence Committee also sent their complaint to the state Fair Political Practices Commission. Meanwhile, Hahn unveiled a package of business tax reforms that the chairman of the Valley Industry and Commerce Assn. called "an important first step."
• On this day in 1769, Spanish explorers under Gaspar de Portola "discovered" a valley covered in wild mustard and oats, with a gentle river and gentler native settlements. They named it El Valle de Santa Catalina de Bononia de los Encinos. Not until 1797 was it called El Valle de San Fernando. The rest is history.
• An LAT editorial complains that city hall has been doing a lot to reform itself, including more meetings with neighborhood councils and planning to take city council sessions out to the districts. But the "negative" secession leaders have rejected the moves. Not one of the stronger LAT arguments. On the opposite page, former West Side congressman Mel Levine tries to make the case that L.A. (and the Valley) will lose the clout that comes with being a monolith in Washington if they divide. This may be true -- unless the two cities decide to work together -- but it's doubtful it will be a decisive a factor for many voters.
Collected LAT editorials on secession
• Keith Richman has become the "marquee player" for secession, the Times says in a mini-profile of the leading candidate for Valley mayor. He's hedging his bets, running simultaneously for reelection to the Assembly, and it's win-win for him no matter what, says Republican campaign guru Allen Hoffenblum, who knows the Valley turf (in 1978 he masterminded a GOP grab of the always-Demo 39th assembly district seat). Richman is a pro-choice, fiscal conservative, party-switcher Republican who grew up in the Valley (Birmingham High). He's a physician and the son of a physician. He had endorsed the Ahmanson Ranch mega-development, a community hot button, but now says he's rethinking his position. Added: In Patt Morrison's LAT column, Richman accidentally sends a fundraiser come-on to Alex Padilla (third item). And the hidden clout of the Valley is revealed (fourth item): A bevy of elected officials including Yaroslavsky, Delgadillo and the very-against-secession Cindy Miscikowski strode the runway at a fashion show put on by the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn., possibly the most influential homeowner group in the Valley. SOHA has been run for many years by secession organizer Richard Close.
Earlier Morrison NPR commentary on "Camelot"
• Rick Orlov's Monday politics column in the Daily News rags on all the joke names being added to the secessionists' online "Declaration of Independence." He mistakenly credits the Arletan blog for exposing the fakes first -- it was here actually.
Arletan aka Valley Secession Fever disagrees and takes a few shots
• Traffic from future home building out beyond the Valley -- in the Valley's own suburbs in Santa Clarita and Ventura County, and closer on the Ahmanson Ranch -- will sock the freeways, the Daily News reports in its top Sunday story. It's a topic that SFV city candidates should be talking about, since the Valley itself is divided on growth issues. Would a SFV city council be pro-Ahmanson Ranch, like the Woodland Hills chamber of commerce, or anti like the city of Calabasas? In favor of intensive economic development to bring jobs, or slow growth to save the hills and oaks and views? For carpool lanes, double-deck freeways and busways through residential areas? The package is thin on the secession angle, which is fine. But the DN looks just sloppy with a lede saying the new cars will add to "freeway gridlock" and a graphic describing the 101 and 5 freeways as already "gridlocked." They're not -- not even close. Yes, traffic is bad. It will likely get much worse -- slower speeds, more hours of tie-up, more delays. Even then, only on the very worst days will it even approach the rare condition of gridlock. (See Aug. 3 item below for more on DN gridlock abuse.)
"Which Way L.A." show on the 101
• Jim Hahn spent Saturday in the Valley preaching the Keep Los Angeles Together gospel, with mixed results. He pledged more city hall backing for the new L.A. neighborhood councils at the first Congress of the Neighborhoods, but both the Daily News and Times found civic-minded attendees who intend to vote for secession anyway. At Hansen Dam, Hahn met a more friendly audience in an anti-secession rally of L.A. firefighters. Quip of the day goes to Richard Katz, the secession leader, who says it's no surprise the city employees are "singing from the mayor's hymn book" since he signs their checks. The DN's editorial page, meanwhile, urges Hahn to stop fighting secession and use his time to combat gang murders. And op-ed regular Kimit Muston uses his weekly plea for Valley supremacy to defend the "nobodies" behind secession against the "somebodies" with family ties in city hall.
• Ninety hopefuls have taken out papers to run for Valley mayor and city council with five days left. The Daily News looks at some of them and reports that secession leaders are somewhat disappointed in the number of candidates and their general lack of experience. Ninety, though, is a lot better than the meager 10 who have signed up in Hollywood. The DN also profiles the biggest beneficiary yet from decades of talk about secession. After the last breakup boomlet in the late 1970s, Hal Bernson was elected to the L.A. city council. He's been there ever since, pushing a pro-development agenda that has transformed the once-wild hills around Porter Ranch and Browns Canyon and encouraged reopening of the Sunshine Canyon landfill.
• About 300 people, some in tuxes, attended the $100-a-pop San Fernando Valley Independence Ball on Friday night, the Times says. Entertainment included a mariachi band and a color guard dressed in Revolutionary War garb. It's doubtful Ernani Bernardi was there: deep on the LAT's letters page, his chiding runs again.
• Mayoral candidate Keith Richman comes out firing again, this time standing in front of the DWP headquarters downtown to attack the money flowing into the anti-breakup campaign committee formed by Jim Hahn. Secession leaders seem to have adopted a strategy of making their campaign for cityhood about Hahn, in this case the donations to his campaign from firms that do business with Los Angeles city hall. Richman takes some license, though, by accusing Hahn of shaking down contributors, without offering any evidence that givers felt shook down. This has the ironic effect of giving big contributors a forum to say they donate freely because they think secession is a bad deal. The Times and Daily News have stories, plus they pick up on reactions to the Grigsby report on blacks and secession. It now looks like Yvonne Brathwaite Burke plans to hold the final report until September, closer to the election, then milk it for full effect on the secession debate among African American voters. Burke hasn't officially opposed the breakup yet, but signaled her anti feelings at the LAFCO hearings.
Hahn: $100K Please
Hahn: "Thanks"
• Editorial writers should argue their case with passion and strength, but without slipping into hyperbole. The Daily News tarnishes its case for traffic relief by overstating that parts of the Ventura Freeway are "hopelessly gridlocked most of the day." Plain old ordinary congestion from too many cars is not the same as gridlock. Hopeless? The Ventura is overbooked, and will only get worse, but it moves. If extreme language is used cheaply, what do we use to make the point when things turn extreme?
• Not much secession coverage today. UCLA's Eugene Grigsby releases a study concluding that secession would not add to black political clout in the Valley or in L.A. The study was commissioned by anti-secession county supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke. The Jewish Journal examines the backgrounds of some candidates for Valley offices.
• Here's a way that the big Valley is not like tiny Burbank: There have been 68 murders in the Los Angeles portion of the Valley so far this year, 59% of them gang related. The Daily News, which has the story, has done a good job tracking the breakdown of truces that had, until recently, given a few years of relative peace between the Valley's gangs. Today's story cites a weekend softball game between the rival Langdon and Blythe gangs as a sign of progress. An injunction against the two gangs contacting each other had to be waived for the day. Added: The Valley gang wars are the topic of this evening's "Life & Times Tonight" on KCET Channel 28.
Transcript and audio
Gangs website from 300+ SFV Links
• Another sign that strong passions are at play on secession: the pro-breakup Valley Secession Fever blog dissects a "Secession Sketchbook" comparing street conditions in Burbank and North Hollywood. The blog concludes the story displays L.A. Times bias. The LAT story touches on an interesting side effect of the secession debate: Burbank's hot new image. The city named for a dentist (turned ranch owner and subdivider) -- derided in the 1950s as corrupt to the max, and skewered later on TV by Johnny Carson -- is often proffered by secession forces and their friends as an exemplar of how well a smaller city can be run. Even Mayor David Laurell acknowledges there's some hyperbole involved: "This is not Shangri-La. This is Burbank."
• The largest disclosed contributor to the Valley secession campaign so far is Gene LaPietra, the nightclub owner who heads the Hollywood secession move. He gave $50,000. That could make it hard for the Valley folks to disassociate from LaPietra's faltering effort, if they are so inclined. Not reported in Wednesday's filing -- which shows a total of $75,000 in contributions -- was any donations on behalf of secession before June 18 or since June 30. The Daily News says, however, that lawyer David Fleming and Galpin Ford owner Bert Boeckmann each have given between $100,000 and $200,000 over the years. The story is a bit different in the Times, where the campaign says that $275,000 has come in since June 30, that almost as much has been pledged, and that Fleming intends to either bring in or donate $200,000 himself. On Wednesday, Fleming provided the spin on the poor showing, saying the coming fight will be between "the big checks and the little people," a reference to the major L.A. donors tossing their open wallets on the defeat-secession pile. (Hahn's forces have collected $1.9 million). It's a time-honored tradition of lagging campaigns to demonize the other side's big givers and to vow to prevail without cash, riding the passion and sweat equity of gallant volunteers to victory. Sometimes it's even true. You can bet, though, that secession leaders would prefer to see more bucks from leading Valley business figures. They'll try to get the checks rolling in at a black-tie-optional fundraising ball on Friday at the Warner Center Hilton.
• Quite a range of pro and con letters to the editor in the Daily News this morning. The grabber is the one signed by Ernani Bernardi, who represented Van Nuys and environs on the L.A. city council for a few decades. He's as old-line Val as they come, against secession, and offended by the pro campaign's tacky "Declaration of Independence:" Our freedom from taxation without representation was one of the liberties fought for in the American Revolutionary War. And the San Fernando Valley, since it first became part of the city of Los Angeles, has been represented fully in accordance with the laws of the land... There is no comparison. Period.
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