Author: Charles Crumpley

In recent weeks, Los Angeles has been witness to an embarrassing exposé involving blown money, unrestrained ego and a wasted reputation. No, I’m not talking about Charlie Sheen but about the local community college district.

The Los Angeles Times did a terrific job of documenting the problems, revealing the incompetence and nailing the offenders of the Los Angeles Community College District’s $5.7 billion building spree. The newspaper’s six-part series, Billions to Spend, was a true public service.

A good deal’s been written on the topic since, but something is troubling me: It seems that the root of the problem is not getting acknowledged. The root of the problem is clear. No business people were on the college district’s board of trustees.

Just look at the seven trustees, whose background The Times helpfully laid out. You see a onetime Green Party activist, a retired political science professor, a documentary film maker and various union boosters. Other than Tina Park, who was described as a former New York Stock Exchange auditor, not a single trustee would seem to have the background to ask an insightful question about money.

Assembly Speaker John Perez was quoted in a New York Times story last week saying this about a California city: “How shady its practices have been. And the more I looked at it, the more I realized this was really the center of tremendous corruption.”

He’s talking about Sacramento, right? Or maybe Los Angeles?

Nope. He’s referring to Vernon. A town comprising 5.2 square miles and 80-some residents. In Perez’s mind, tiny Vernon is the source of most of the depravity here in California.

That’s why Perez wrote a bill to disincorporate the town, and he took the time to tour Vernon with a New York Times reporter. And it’s why the Los Angeles City Council last week voted unanimously to support Perez’s bill.

I was an early customer of Netflix. In late 1999, I signed up for its then-revolutionary service – DVDs of my choosing in the mail! I can keep them as long as I want! – and I was a happy customer.

But I wasn’t so happy a few years later when I saw an advertisement from Netflix touting new lower rates for those who sign up now. In other words, new customers were getting a better deal than old customers.

I asked Netflix to give me the lower subscription rate it was charging new customers. I got turned down. The discounted rate is for new customers only, the company said.

So, I thought, this is how Netflix rewards customers loyal from the beginning? It makes them pay more? I quit Netflix, never to return.

Doesn’t it make you groan when smart people do dumb things?

I’m thinking of Andrew Puzder, chief executive of CKE Restaurants Inc., the Carl’s Jr. chain. For a smart guy, he’s made some dumb statements lately.

It started with a Jan. 31 article in the Dallas Morning News in which Puzder said he was about to meet with Texas Gov. Rick Perry to discuss the possibility of moving the headquarters of his Carpinteria company and about 500 employees to Dallas, Austin or San Antonio.

“The discussions will get kicked off in the next couple of days on a more serious level,” he was quoted as saying.

He got in a few jabs at the Golden State. Puzder told the paper it’s “easier to open a restaurant in Shanghai than in California,” and that he is drawn to Texas’ business-friendly atmosphere and the prospect of a 10 percent pay raise, thanks to the state’s lack of an income tax.

Let’s say you and I make a deal. If you agree to move into my not-so-great neighborhood and be a good citizen, I’ll give you something in return. For example, I’ll pay all your utility bills for 15 years.

Now, let’s say you decide to take a chance and you move your family. Over time, you and the other folks who took me up on my deal work to improve your new neighborhood, to make something of it.

But a few years later, I show up and say, “Ummm, you know, this arrangement is costing me money. Deal’s off.”

Now you could say, “Wait right there. You’re backstabbing me. We made a deal, and a deal should be a deal.”

You could – you should – argue that you’re the one who took a chance and moved your family. You and the others who accepted the deal are the ones who worked to improve my iffy neighborhood. The least you should get is your free utilities for the rest of the 15-year term. That was the deal, after all.

Los Angeles city officials are wailing that civilization as we know it may be imperiled if Gov. Jerry Brown has his way and kills community redevelopment agencies.

Maybe I’m just a postredevelopment Pollyanna, but I think our way of life would survive just fine. In fact, we’d be better off without them.

Why? Because CRAs are one of those well-intentioned initiatives that sounded great and started off well enough decades ago and have some accomplishments they can point to, such as the Hollywood & Highland Center. But over the years, they have devolved into corrupt little political fiefdoms that muck up the works and don’t do much good.

Sure, CRAs may encourage project construction in some supposedly blighted areas, but those developments mostly are just shifted over from another area. At least, that’s what the nonpartisan state Legislative Analyst’s Office reported a few weeks ago. It went on to say: “There is no reliable evidence that redevelopment projects attract businesses to the state or increase overall economic development in California.”

The news from the waterfront last week was reassuring. The Port of Los Angeles said it handled 16 percent more cargo containers last year than in the previous year. And next door, the Port of Long Beach reported it handled 24 percent more – its biggest increase ever.

But what’s not so reassuring is this: The ports’ future still remains a bit tenuous.

That’s because the reconstruction of the Panama Canal continues. When the bigger and better passageway opens in 2014, it can begin handling huge container ships that haul all those consumer goods, automobiles and other stuff from China and the rest of Asia.

Now, those cargo ships are more or less forced to come here, which is why the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have become America’s No. 1 and No. 2 ports, respectively. But in about three years, those ships will be free to sail to the Gulf and East coasts – and ports in those areas are beefing up now to lure those ships.

“We have a bull’s-eye on our back,” Geraldine Knatz, executive director of the Port of Los Angeles, told the Business Journal last week.

Do you dream of having your own little business? Being your own boss? Well, here’s a message for you: Don’t do any of that dreaming in West Hollywood.

Why? Because the West Hollywood City Council may crush your little business. And be proud of itself for doing so.

That’s the message from that city’s decision to ban puppy and kitten sales there. The town council is all puffed up and proud of itself for taking a principled stand against some distant puppy mills. But apparently it’s deaf to the whimpers of its own pet stores, which are being euthanized by the city.

As you can see in an article in the current issue of the Los Angeles Business Journal, pet shops in West Hollywood are hurting now that the city’s ban on puppy and kitten sales has gone into effect. One shop apparently is open only sporadically.

The port complex may be L.A.’s greatest economic asset. Not only do thousands of warehouses and trucking firms depend on it, but so do L.A.’s many apparel companies, toy wholesalers and furniture companies, to pick a few.

Unfortunately, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has chosen to politicize the Port of Los Angeles, weighing it down with his plan to promote union workers to such a degree that the port may have trouble keeping up with competition it will face in 2014. That’s when the widened Panama Canal will open and big container ships that are now forced to come here will be free to go to East Coast or Gulf Coast ports.

Oh, well, I thought, at least the Port of Long Beach next door is well managed, highly regarded by shippers and relatively free of political meddling.

Alas, no more.