League of Conservative Voters (LALCV) Questionaire
List of Questions
1. What is the most pressing environmental issue facing the County of Los Angeles and how will you deal with it?
The inter-related challenges of air quality impacts of the ports and LAX, transportation and transit, and smart and sustainable growth policies together constitute the most pressing environmental issue facing the County.
Air Quality
Air quality is especially complex, given the origin and mix of sources that contribute to it and the fact that it knows no jurisdictional boundaries. The location of many communities in the Second District relative to prevailing wind and flight patterns makes them vulnerable to emissions from the two most toxic hot spots in the country --- the ports and LAX.
As a candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles, I advocated the cold ironing of ships calling at the Port of Los Angeles, an initiative now embraced by both ports. The ports have also done a good job developing the Clean Air Action Plan with special emphasis on dramatically reducing emissions from diesel trucks. And they are introducing environmental requirements to their tenant leases and lease renewals and taking measures to become greener with respect to their own operations. In a few short years, the ports have moved from air quality renegades to models of air quality advocacy and practice. While there is a long way to go before full implementation, including defending against likely litigation, these measures demonstrate what is possible with proper leadership and commitment.
LAX is an even more difficult challenge than the ports by virtue of Federal preemption of most airline activities, including the emissions loads of commercial aircraft. As a member of the Los Angeles City Council, I supported the recent upgrade and expansion of Ontario airport and I
continue to have hopes for Palmdale notwithstanding chronically poor ridership on flights to and from that location. And as a member of SCAG, I have worked with officials from throughout the region on regional approaches to taking some of the air traffic burden off LAX. Ultimately, significant mitigation of air quality impacts from airport operations will
come with more efficient aircraft and aircraft engine design, and great advances are being made with respect to both. Once the technology for cleaner engines is developed, it is more plausible to work to federally mandate its use, which as Supervisor I will certainly do.
Transportation
Air quality in the region is also adversely impacted by the region’s reliance on the automobile with extraordinary traffic volumes and suffocating levels of congestion. Transportation is the largest single source of greenhouse gas emissions in California and the Second District likely has the most concentrated carbon footprint of any District as a result. The District is traversed by eight freeways and the busiest surface street corridors in the region. It is also the most transit-dependent District, with the highest ridership MTA bus routes as well as the Blue Line, Green Line, Red Line and the Exposition Line under construction. As a Los Angeles City member of the MTA Board as well as a member of the City Council’s Transportation Committee, I have steadfastly advanced measures to make public transit more accessible to more people and to incentivize commercial and residential development at MTA subway and light rail stations. I have supported the expansion of the City’s highly successful DASH program as well as the traffic calming, “smart streets” program for the coordinated timing of traffic lights to adjust for flow of traffic and the Mayor’s initiatives on everything from accelerated pothole repair to installation of more left-turn lanes.
As Supervisor, I will retain a seat on the MTA Board and continue my transit advocacy in that venue. A county transportation-related function also comes with being a Supervisor, with discretion over expenditure of gas tax receipts and county programs relating to such things as “smart streets.” There is a “doughnut hole” of transportation planning south of the Santa Monica Freeway and I would work to fill it. I would expect to bring the same vision to that role as I have brought to my service on the City Council and the MTA Board.
Smart and Sustainable Growth & Development
The Second District includes nine cities and very large swaths of unincorporated area. Each of the cities has its own planning ordinance to guide growth and development and the Regional Planning Commission, consisting of appointees of each Supervisor, has jurisdiction over the unincorporated areas.
I am an outspoken advocate of economic development, housing and jobs creation in areas of need. The Second Supervisorial District has the most poverty-impacted census tracts in the country with the highest unemployment rates in the state. As I have demonstrated on the City Council and MTA Board, I believe that economic development need not come at the expense of smart planning and sustainable principles. Joint use developments around subway stations, commercial and residential developments along light rail routes should be incentivized and housing should be a significant component of mixed-use developments to promote a jobs-housing balance.
A major impairment to smart and sustainable growth in the Second District (as well as other areas of the county) is the fact that most community plans are woefully out-of-date and need to be brought current. It is difficult for a commercial or residential developer to make an investment without knowing its “by-right” options and one cannot know what those are without a current community plan with thoughtful and intelligent land uses specified. As a condition for such development, I would support the incorporation of sustainability principles relating to energy efficiency, native landscaping, and the capture and beneficial use of urban runoff.
2. What are three to five specific environmentally related tasks (legislation, policies, or enforcement actions) you intend to accomplish if you are elected?
I would support county compliance with TMDL requirements adopted by the Regional Water Quality Control Board, support the expansion of municipal and County water recycling programs, and support the Integrated Regional Water Management Planning process for the allocation of funding under Proposition 84. I would also seek to have the County lead the effort to quantify the carbon footprint of all sources of greenhouse gases in the County, including those that result from its own activities.
Finally, I would continue the extensive work of the Second District on the development of the Community Standards District and the completion of the EIR process related to the Baldwin Hills oil drilling by PXP.
3. What measures would you propose to make Los Angeles Countyan environmentally leader on a global scale?
There are several initiatives we should pursue to make the County a globally significant environmental leader. For starters, we can make it our stated objective to be the most AB 32-compliant county in the state and incorporate implementation measures into our land use planning process, procurement practices, and standards for residential and commercial development. If the County were a country, we would be the 14th largest in the world, so the global significance of the implementation of such an objective cannot be over-stated.
Secondly, given the role the County and its respective cities play on the County Sanitation Districts, we should make our objective to beneficially reuse every drop of treated effluent produced by the Sanitation District’s waste treatment plants to completely eliminate the disposal of effluent into the ocean. Given the volume of effluent produced, an unrelenting commitment to the beneficial use of recycled water would make the County a global leader in water supply sustainability.
Another environmental initiative that would have global implications relates to the provision of health care to the County’s 100,000 employees and 50,000 retirees. While not fully developed, I am considering a proposal to eliminate the County contribution to the health care plan of County employees and retirees who make demonstrably unhealthy life style choices such as smoking. The employee would be eligible to pay the discounted pooled rate for his or her coverage, but the County itself would not contribute. To me, that is a health initiative, environmental initiative and taxpayer savings initiative all rolled into one. I am not aware that such a policy is in place in any other jurisdiction in the world.
4. Would you support the ban of plastic bags in the County? How do you intend to ensure that this measure is passed in the future?
I support the action taken by the Board of Supervisors in February. The action requires retailers to document that they are reducing plastic bag use, increasing recycling opportunities and providing reusable bags to consumers. If retailers do not reduce plastic bag use by 30% by 2010 and 65% by 2013, then the County will ban plastic bag use.
The County should take a cue from the City of Los Angeles by recycling most plastic bags; the City also just purchased 50,000 reusable bags and formed a partnership with retailers to give these bags away free to consumers.
There are too few grocery stores in huge swaths of the 2nd District as it is. Generally, they charge more for grocery items than stores in more affluent areas. It would be difficult to justify increasing the cost to the consumer that a mandated ban would produce, especially when alternatives to an outright ban exist. A phased ban with a public education and recycling component makes more sense to me.
5. Would you support a Los Angeles County ban on Styrofoam program? What would you do to expand and improve it?
No. I believe a ban would unnecessarily increase the cost to consumers without any assurance that the alternatives to Styrofoam do not themselves have unanticipated and harmful consequences, much as we discovered with MTBE in gasoline. As with plastic bags, I think bans send the wrong message to the public. Instead of educating to change behavior with respect to litter and blight, we are essentially saying it’s not alright to litter Styrofoam but it’s alright to litter a corn-based coffee cup.
6. What steps would you take to support facilities for the homeless in Los Angeles County? Do you think this is an environmental issue?
First of all, I do believe that homelessness is an environmental issue, just as poverty and public health are environmental issues. It is only relatively recently that the County has recognized its responsibility to the homeless. No County general fund monies were spent on homeless programs until 2006. Here’s the approach I would take as a Supervisor:
- The “Rule of Five” for the allocation of monies for homeless programs (and many others) must be changed to an allocation system based on need, relying on data from the homeless bi-annual estimate/count done by the Los Angeles Homeless Service Authority and augmented by the three cities outside of the local Continuum of Care (Glendale, Long Beach and Pasadena).
- Embrace and lead an initiative to End Homelessness among Older Adults, an extremely vulnerable population that consists of 3,000 to 4,000 individuals on any given night. Shelter Partnership is about to release a Plan to provide the framework to accomplish this end.
- Enhance year round emergency shelters countywide and include significant mental health clinicians and health clinicians, as well as housing specialists to work on getting people out of the shelters.
- Accelerate the County’s processing of applicants to qualify the poor and homeless for Social Security and Disability living allowance. At any given time, there is a backlog of more than 5,000 cases. That to me is inexcusable.
- Programs that receive County funds must be audited by outside agencies.
- Decentralize homeless services within the County in a manner that is fair and provides the resources to the areas of the county that are most impacted by homelessness.
- Integrate homeless services in a way that requires the different homeless services agencies to work together to collectively and collaboratively manage the homeless challenge. The County Mental Health Department is leaving homeless housing dollars on the table because of its inability to work with the Community Development Department, for example.
As can be readily seen, I do not believe that the homeless challenge is a mere matter of finding “facilities”. It is a multi-faceted, multi-jurisdictional challenge that cries for County leadership and I have outlined a few of the many steps I will take as Supervisor to meet that challenge.
7. In terms of renewable energy, how would you use the County’s purchasing power to implement such measures such as using solar energy panels and performing energy conservation/retrofits on its buildings? Furthermore, how can the County entice more local investments in renewable energy to avoid outsourcing of services jobs?
If I’m not mistaken, the County is incorporating LEEDS standards into its new facilities. Given recent increases in DWP power rates, combined with DWP’s solar rebate program, it seems to me that the County can debt finance its investment in retrofitting facilities within the City to save energy and repay the debt with saved costs. The same economic formula should already work with respect to County facilities outside the City that are within SoCalEd’s service area.
The County also offers financial incentives to employees who purchase alternative fuel and hybrid vehicles for their own use.
8. Do you believe that Angelenos are ready for recycled water? Will you use your soapbox to defend recycled water when critics call the process "toilet to tap”?
Absolutely. The “toilet to tap” controversy that occurred in the City and has occurred in some other communities resulted from a total abdication of political leadership and, in the case of Los Angeles at the time, the silence of the environmental community. Frenzied demagoguery filled the vacuum and recycled water use has been set back fifteen years as a result. I will support the dramatic expansion of recycled water use for beneficial reuse, including spreading for recharge.
9. Please describe your understanding of how the County park system functions. Is there anything about the system you would change? If so what?
As is the case with the allocation of funds for homeless programs, the Rule of Five largely governs the allocation of parks money within the County. As correctly noted in the next question, the Second District suffers disproportionately as a result. The Board of Supervisors needs to adopt needs-based formulas for all County programs and eliminate the long-standing institutional practice of simply dividing the County into five separate entities for funding purposes.
10. The Second District has been identified in numerous studies, such as the Green Visions study by the University of Southern California’s Center for Sustainable Cities as providing below State and National averages of open space. How would you address public health issues as they relate to the environment such as the provision of urban parks and open space in which residents, especially children, can safely travel to on foot or bicycle to exercise?
For most of what constitutes the Second Supervisorial District, the Green Visions study found the highest population density, the highest poverty level, the highest number of children and the lowest open space acreage per person, the fewest parks, the smallest park size, the fewest community amenities, the most poorly maintained facilities with the least on-site security measures of any region in the three-county study area. Those findings were refined by The City Project report issued in mid-March of this year.
The area of the County that needs passive open space and recreational parks the most has the least. And the same area has the highest crime rate in the region. As you might expect, I have a long-established and frequently articulated philosophy on public safety that speaks to the relationship between crime and the physical environment, among many other things, including education, mental and physical health, social services and recreational opportunities for young people. With respect to parks and recreational opportunities for young people, I think I’ve done a good job on the Council to increase both in my District.
At the County level, and it remains largely true in the City as well, there is a disconnect rather than an integration of services. Departments with seemingly separate but certainly mutually dependent functions operate independently of one another. At the Board level, needs are addressed on a Balkanized basis. Funding is divided by five rather than by need. And changing that mathematical formula may be the most difficult challenge I will face as a Supervisor.
But clearly the paucity of open space and parks in the District is in large part a function of that institutional practice. It is also true, however, that the County often does not get its fair share of state bond funding opportunities, as we have most recently seen with the division of state housing bond funds. I fear the same may be true with some categories of funding from Proposition 84, once the guidelines are adopted and money is appropriated starting in 2010. In that case for some reason, the Rule of Five apparently doesn’t apply. The Second District has the fewest projects in the Integrated Regional Water Management Planning process to take advantage of the limited Proposition 84 funds the region will receive for watershed and habitat restoration, stormwater capture and reuse and other water-related amenities. In this case, I will insist that the Second District receive its fair share, if not disproportionate share based on need, of those funds.
Proposition 84 also makes $90 million available statewide for urban greening projects, with priority for communities of greatest need and $400 million available for competitive grants for local and regional parks, again with preference for parks in underserved communities. Since the Second District is the most underserved urban area of the state, I would fight to obtain funding from both categories.
Finally, the absence of Quimby Funds, in the Second District, is the direct result of the imbalance of the current market rate housing developments in the County of Los Angeles. I will fight to change this imbalance.
11. More than 11 hospitals including Martin Luther King, a county-owned hospital, have closed in less than five years. While the County may not have authority or responsibility for financing for the private health system, The County clearly plays a decisive role and has an impact. What will you do as Supervisor to help increase funding and stabilize both the public and private hospitals?
Fundamentally, there is not enough money to sustain health care facilities in Los Angeles County and other major jurisdictions around the country. The safety net is frayed and in danger of collapse. The main reason we have this circumstance in Los Angeles County and elsewhere is because of our growing population of uninsured and underinsured people. 25% of the residents in Los Angeles County --- 2.5 million people --- have no health insurance at all. They nonetheless have medical needs, often in emergency circumstances, that must be met. Those needs cost money to service. The County, the state and the federal government do not provide enough money to do it.
Add to the absence of adequate government funding the fact that MediCare and MediCal reimbursements for providers are declining and more and more providers are refusing to provide services to MediCare and MediCal patients as a consequence. In that regard, the Legislature in February voted to reduce MediCal reimbursement for certain providers by 10%, resulting in an imminent exodus of even more doctors from the program.
The net result is hospital closures, the reduction in emergency care facilities and medical professionals refusing particular categories of patients. The closure of Martin Luther King, Jr. Hospital emergency rooms resulted from all of these factors on top of chronic poor administration and an uncommonly incompetency of some of its staff.
To reverse this steady erosion in the availability of medical care in this County and elsewhere, what we need more than anything else is a national system of universal health care, a system that will provide through patient funding the resources needed to keep hospitals open and health care professionals able to afford to provide services. That is without a doubt the foremost domestic need this country has.
12. If elected, who would you turn to for advice on environmental issues?
There is no specific individual I rely on for advice on any issue. I do listen to anyone and everyone with specific subject matter expertise and on environmental issues that includes members of the environmental and environmental justice communities.
13. Studies show that slow-moving and idling vehicles create far more dangerous air pollutants than those moving at a more rapid speed. What will you do to address the traffic congestion on the 710 freeway (710) and the resulting air pollutants?
Commuters in the Los Angeles region spend an average of 93 hours a year just idling in peak period traffic, compounding emission levels that occur by virtue of the sheer number of vehicles. The 710 Freeway is by far the worst freeway in the state from an emissions per mile standpoint because it was not built to handle the current traffic load and because of the relentless flow of diesel-powered trucks from the ports.
I believe the truck component of the ports’ Clean Air Action Plan will help reduce the emissions load. Additionally, however, the 710 needs to be expanded either laterally or decked like the 110 with dedicated truck-car separation. And I have long argued that the 710 needs to be completed to Pasadena.
14. Some business groups and their allies assert that environmental regulations cost the southern California economy job and have a negative effect on growth. What is your view of this issue for the region and the district?
I disagree with that view and I’m not sure the business community as a whole has that view any longer. Economic growth and a sustainable environment are not incompatible. In fact, the Second District is a proving grounds for the proposition that economic growth is impaired by environmental degradation rather than environmental regulation.
15. Explain your plans to incorporate your environmental agenda into your campaign.
The Second District is a laboratory of environmental challenges. You name it, we have it, or in the case of parks and open space, we don’t. As a philosophical matter, I embrace principles of environmental stewardship and environmental justice and equity. I believe that natural resources are properly public resources to be preserved and protected rather than privatized and exploited. My environmental agenda is not separate and distinct from my agenda as a whole and that fact is reflected in my campaign.
16. Why do you want LALCV’s endorsement? How you will use it in your campaign?
I applaud the work of the League and share the principles you advance. I would be honored to have your endorsement and will feature it proudly in my campaign materials and presentations.
