Westside Councilman Mike Bonin is proposing a plan to allow round-the-clock bathroom and storage access for the homeless; are confusing laws on voter registration causing voter suppression and a sperm bank lawsuit is sparked by the misrepresentation of a donor.
Bathrooms and storage: Debating Venice's plans to help the homeless
In an effort to quell the burgeoning homeless population in Los Angeles and specifically Venice, Westside Councilman Mike Bonin is proposing a plan to allow round-the-clock bathroom and storage access for the homeless.
The plan outlines several sites to be converted into facilities for the homeless. Among other things, it would open the bathrooms at Venice Beach all day and night and reopen the Westminster Senior Center on Pacific Ave. to become restrooms and storage for the homeless. There’s also a provision to turn a city-owned parking lot on N. Venice Blvd. into housing for the homeless and public parking.
Councilman Bonin and Venice Stakeholders Association president Mark Ryavec joined Larry to share their thoughts on how this proposal addresses the homeless problem in Venice and around Los Angeles.
Interview Highlights
If you have restrooms unlocked at night in Venice Beach, how are you going to keep people from living in them?
Bonin: The bathroom question is one I’m going to be duking out in the city budget process this year because it’s going to cost more to have them open later for security, for maintenance, for cleanliness and stuff like that. What I should say, though, is that I lived a block and a half from Venice Beach for 18 years. The number of times I looked out my back window and saw someone urinating on my building…and it wasn’t homeless people, it was tourists. This is about giving anybody an opportunity a place to go to the bathroom.
But will it be able to be used for that as opposed to people moving into it to sleep overnight and get out of the elements?
Bonin: The bathrooms in Venice Beach are actually tall and small, so it’s not a space you could actually lie down in.
What do you think about 24/7 bathroom access, Mark?
Ryavec: This has been proposed by homeless advocates in Venice for many years and has been roundly rejected by the residents and the business community. One of the things [Councilman Bonin] has not spoken to in this proposal is that to allow anyone to use the beach restrooms in Venice overnight will require that he roll back the beach curfew from 12-5 a.m., otherwise someone will be subject to citation or arrest if they step across the boardwalk and out to those beach restrooms. We are opposed to relaxing the beach curfew because it’s the only enforcement mechanism that has some proactive effect at cutting down on camping on boardwalk and along the beach and also on the crime that was associated with those bathrooms being open.
What if there are attendants on duty around the clock?
Ryavec: It’s unrealistic to think the city is going to pay someone to be there overnight for each one of those restrooms. I think that’s a ridiculous cost. Our organization continues to believe putting in restrooms is simply more enablement and will make it harder to get people off the street.
Many of the belongings to be stored in the old senior center will probably be dirty or smell bad. Is there a proposal to clean those belongings?
Bonin: The city has had a phenomenal program for the past few years downtown run by Chrysalis, which employs people who are formerly homeless, and they’ve had a very successful storage program down there. Yes, it involves some cleaning and it also involves some intake into our coordinated entry system to get folks into services and housing.
Mark, what about converting the old Westminster Senior Center?
Ryavec: We’re particularly opposed, as are the residents in the area, to turning the Westminster Senior Center into storage. That area has been a crime generator for years because of the homeless people camping there. The cops in the last year or so have cleared it and really gotten the crime there under control. What [Councilman Bonin] is proposing to do is to bring back a couple hundred people who would constantly be coming to check in their stuff or get stuff out of there. We’ve identified another site in an industrial zone that’s very nearby where the city could rent a warehouse space and accomplish the same storage without forcing it right on the residents.
What about the loss of parking that would come from converting city-owned parking lot into housing and how would that housing work?
Bonin: There wouldn’t be any loss of parking. The proposal is to build the housing over parking, so there will be no net loss. There could, perhaps, be a gain in parking. There won’t be encampments, it’s going to be housing. We have some beautiful examples in my district. Del Rey, for example, has three or four different projects and folks don’t even know they’re there or that they’re homeless housing because they blend in.
Are you concerned that, with Venice creating these supports for homeless residents, it will attract more homeless to Venice?
Bonin: I’ve heard people say that. It fails to acknowledge that what we’re doing in Venice is a city and county-wide strategy. We’re going to be doing this in lots of other places. A couple of my colleagues are talking about storage in their districts. We’re going to be building housing on city-owned properties throughout the city, so that magnet effect isn’t going to happen if this happens everywhere else in the city. I just happen to be the first one out of the gate because the problem is so big in my city and inaction just makes things worse.
What's your sense of the source of Venice's homeless?
Ryavec: I disagree with [Councilman Bonin] about why we have so many homeless in Venice. It’s because of a very attractive combination of sun, beach, drugs, all the fast food outlets, and almost no enforcement of existing laws down there. I’ve had a long relationship with The Teen Project down there and the LAPD homeless task force. The staff at both those organizations will tell you that a significantly large number of the homeless population in Venice Beach, unlike elsewhere in L.A., are from out of state or certainly out of L.A. It’s a Mecca, particularly for young people, coming to live this vagabond lifestyle and engage in a lot of drug activity and partying. Venice is being expected to carry burden of these folks, which is often very heavy when you’re thinking of home invasion, assaults, public defecation and urination, intimidation. There are a lot of folks who live in Venice that aren’t comfortable going out on the boardwalk.
Note: This interview has been edited for clarity.
Guests:
Mike Bonin, Los Angeles City Councilman representing Council District 11, which includes Venice, West Los Angeles, Brentwood, and Pacific Palisades
Mark Ryavec, president of the Venice Stakeholders Association
Are voter registration rules like New York’s suppressing votes?
Ivanka and Eric Trump opined on the challenges of registering to vote in primary elections last week after reports revealed both had missed the October 2015 deadline for New York registered Independents to register for a crossover vote in today’s open Republican Primary.
But after their complaints became the butt of late night talk shows, some pundits and voter rights groups are coming forward to argue that the arcane voting rules in some states like New York are tantamount to voter suppression and disenfranchisement.
Moreover, a federal court in New York City is scheduled today to hear an emergency class-action lawsuit that was filed against the state's Board of Elections alleging that thousands of New Yorkers will be heading to the polls only to discover they can't vote.
With many more Californians registering as Independents, how can they take part in the June primary? Are many thinking of re-registering with a party? We review the primary rules you need to know from New York to California.
Guests:
Nate Persily, Professor of Law, Stanford University specializing in voting law
Lonna Rae Atkeson, Professor of Political Science, University of New Mexico; Director for the Center for the Study of Voting, Elections, and Democracy, University of New Mexico; Rae has been monitoring elections in various states this cycle, including Washington this coming Saturday
Mary Plummer, Senior Politics Reporter for KPCC
Debating marijuana’s place on the DEA’s schedule of controlled substances
It’s possible that, by mid-2016, marijuana could be viewed in a very different light by the federal government.
A recent memo the Washington Post obtained from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and other government organizations to eight Democratic U.S. Senators says that the DEA wants to decide whether to reclassify marijuana “in the first half of 2016.” A DEA spokesman tells AirTalk they have yet to publicly comment on the interagency response to Senators Elizabeth Warren and others, and that they have not authenticated the letter or its contents.
Marijuana has long been classified under federal law in the same category as drugs like heroin and ecstasy: Schedule I.
The Controlled Substances Act classifies those drugs as having “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.” This classification has long been a point of contention for marijuana activists, who argue that for cannabis to be considered as dangerous as heroin or ecstasy is ridiculous, especially given that several states recognize medical uses for the plant and have passed laws legalizing for medical purposes.
While a decision to reschedule marijuana wouldn’t mean the federal government views it any differently in terms of legality, it would open up opportunities for government funding and research of marijuana and maybe even lessen penalties for marijuana-related offenses. Those against the rescheduling say that it would mostly be a symbolic victory for advocates.
Do you think marijuana should be rescheduled? If so, where? Do schedule definitions need to be revisited? What about the Controlled Substances Act?
Guests:
John Hudak, senior fellow in Governance Studies and deputy director of the Center for Effective Public Management at the Brookings Institution
Kevin Sabet, founder of Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM) and director of the University of Florida Drug Policy Institute
Debating why large corporations pay a fraction of legal tax rate
Newly crunched data shows two-thirds of American corporations paid no federal income taxes in each year from 2006-2012, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders requested the analysis of corporate taxes because a major component of his campaign is denouncing what he decries as unfair special treatment of so-called corporate America.
The GAO states: "Reasons why even profitable corporations may have paid no federal tax in a given year include the use of tax deductions for losses carried forward from prior years and tax incentives..."
Corporations that make capital investments, such as equipment or real estate, enjoy significant tax reductions. Some economists argue those incentives help stimulate growth in the economy overall, but others say evidence does not support that claim.
The statutory tax rate is 35 percent, but if the majority do not pay that rate, how should it impact policy discussions about taxes? Are current tax exemptions fair and stimulative, or are corporations shirking their duties to contribute to public spending for roads, schools, and the like?
GAO Corporate Income Tax Report
Guests:
Dean Baker, Economist and Co-Director, Center for Economic and Policy Research - a D.C. based think tank
Veronique de Rugy, Economist and Senior Research Fellow, The Mercatus Center at George Mason University - a research center for market-oriented ideas
Income-sharing tuition agreements possible alternative to student loans
Purdue University will be the first American university in recent years to take an unconventional approach to funding student education.
Incoming junior and senior students at the university can add an income-share agreement (ISA) to their list of tuition financing options this fall. “Back a Boiler” is a unique alternative to loans in that the ISA possesses no interest rate. Brian Edelman, the project manager at “Back a Boiler” said an income-share agreement is similar to owning stock in a company.
Funds distributed are based on the projected income a student’s major is expected to yield. For example, a student majoring in chemical engineering would qualify for more funding than a liberal arts major would.
With so many students crippled in debt, could this new approach help alleviate repayment-related stress? Would you be willing to opt for an ISA if you needed supplemental tuition funds?
Guests:
Brian Edelman, Chief operating officer, Purdue Research Foundation and project manager of the Back a Boiler, an income-share agreement fund
Mark Kantrowitz, Publisher and and vice president of strategy at Cappex.com, a free website that connects students with colleges and scholarships; he tweets from
Families sue sperm bank for misrepresenting schizophrenic donor
Three Ontario families are suing a U.S.-based sperm bank and its Canadian distributor, alleging they were misled about a donor's medical and social history, which included a criminal record and significant mental illness.
The families, who all used the same donor, have brought three separate suits against Georgia-based Xytex Corp and Ontario-based Outreach Health Services over the sperm of Donor 9623. The families allege that donor was promoted as highly educated, healthy and popular.
Court papers filed in Ontario this week allege the donor had in fact been diagnosed with schizophrenia and narcissistic personality disorder, had spent time behind bars for a residential burglary and did not have the degrees he claimed to obtain.
The documents allege Xytex failed to properly investigate the donor's education claims and his medical history, and misrepresented him to customers, including suggesting he had the IQ level of a genius.
Statement from Ted Lavender, lawyer representing Xytex Corp:
The first of the lawsuits was filed in Atlanta in March 2015 and dismissed by the judge in October 2015. The appeal of that case was then dismissed by the Georgia Court of Appeals in March 2016. The trial judge and the Court of Appeals got it right. Xytex looks forward to successfully defending itself from the new lawsuits with the same results as the original case. Back in April 2015, there was a lot of media attention surrounding the allegations in that lawsuit when it was filed, but virtually no media attention when the case was dismissed. Pursuing claims in a court of law requires actual evidence and proof. Making unfounded allegations in the court of public opinion requires no actual proof at all, but merely the word of the very lawyers and litigants who already failed in a court of law. Xytex is an industry leader and complies with all industry standards in how they safely and carefully help provide the gift of children to families who are otherwise unable have them without this assistance. My client has no further comment.
Guests:
Nancy Hersh, a lawyer in San Francisco who is representing some of the families in a lawsuit against Xytex Corp in Georgia
Judith Daar, Professor at Whittier Law School, Clinical Professor at UCI School of Medicine and current Chair of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine Ethics Committee