PLANNING WATCH / PLAN-IT LOS ANGELES

DICK PLATKIN, City Watch LA,   25 FEBRUARY 2016 LOS ANGELES PLATKIN ON PLANNING-In Los Angeles real estate speculators have refined their tool box of scams to either block or contain local neighborhoods when they push back against projects that are out-of-character, out-of-scale, exceed the capacity of local infrastructure and services, or that require a parcel level legislative action by the City Council for investors to pull building permits.  Scam #1. Label neighborhood opponents NIMBY’s,  which stands for Not in my Backyard. The implication is that the only problems with the speculators’ projects are their locations in areas where local luddites are so stuck in their backward ways they just cannot get on board with big, beautiful, trendy projects.  Scam #2. Layer on zoning and environmental conditions.  To overcome local opposition to such discretionary actions as zone changes, zone variances, General Plan Amendments, and their accompanying environmental reviews, City Pl

DICK PLATKIN, City Watch LA,   03 MARCH 2016 LOS ANGELES PLATKIN ON PLANNING-If you are concerned about planning issues in Los Angeles, then you have undoubtedly heard about the  Neighborhood Integrity Initiative , and perhaps a counter-initiative, the Build Better LA Initiative.  Affordable housing:  You have may have also heard the repeated claims by the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative’s opponents that it would block the construction of affordable housing. Nice try, but it takes far more than repetition of a talking point to actually make it true.  This is why I still stand by my previous  Citywatch  articles: the critics have not yet presented evidence that LA's zoning laws and General Plan designations impede the construction of affordable housing projects. While Neighborhood Integrity Initiative supporters are already looking under every rock for any relevant data, we also invite those who make the “affordable housing argument” to back it up.  More specifically,

DICK PLATKIN   10 MARCH 2016 LOS ANGELES PLATKIN ON PLANNING-Vince Bertoni, the new Director of Planning, has only been on the job a few weeks, but the ball is already in his court. No one predicted that the Mayor would have told his processor, Michael LoGrande, to clear off his desk, and the Mayor’s reasons have not yet been made public.  Despite the appearance of murky power plays at City Hall, the new Director of Planning has no choice. He must quickly take of the reins of power at the Planning Department and he must then marshal available and new resources to remedy a planning process so dysfunctional that it has spawned two separate planning-related initiatives: the  Neighborhood Integrity Initiative  and the Build Better LA Initiative.  At this point, Mr. Bertoni, therefore, has several choices … all daunting.  As indicated in his interview in  The Planning Report , the new Director of Planning will apply some spit and polish to the practices of Mr. LoGrande.