The SoCal Spin 10/23

Please, is it possible for this city to make it through a single week without some sort of public relations nightmare? Obviously not, as TMZ's Harvey Levin might tell you after the Managing Editor of the gossip site--without a touch of irony-- declared that he will be pursuing legal action against the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department after police apprehended his personal phone records last month. So what do authorities hope to find, exactly, in these tapes? The plan is to discover how Levin was able to recover classified information concerning Mel Gibson's 2006 drunk-driving arrest.

That whole "balloon boy" story certainly took a dive into the bizarre this week when the Henne family's one-time landlord came forward to describe the father of the "weird" ex-tenants as an "angry" person and general "opportunist." And what of the fact that the parents had once moved to Burbank with acting aspirations? Well, let's just say this whole thing feels increasingly like another Wife Swap audition.

Of course, rare bits of honesty do remain here and there in Southern California. Echo Park artist Shepard Fairey, for one, admitted his illegal use of an AP-licensed photo as the basis for the "hope" poster that now famously depicts President Barack Obama in red, white, and blue. But is honesty always the best policy? It did hurt, after all, when soon-to-be ex-Police Chief William Bratton quite forth-rightedly stated his preference for the East Coast last week, a place where "things get done." Los Angeles, Bratton explained, has more or less remained "a city that doesn't work" throughout his tenure here. Ouch.

At least the "city that doesn't work" is inching closer to having itself a new NFL stadium, with Gov. Schwarzenegger signing legislation this Thursday exempting the proposed stadium from state environmental laws. Depending on your disposition, I suppose this could be either a win or a loss, but at least it doesn't appear to have involved the foul play allegedly endured by Staples Center owner Tim Leiweke this past June. According to Leiweke, L.A. City Attorneys threatened to "go after" the AEG President if he didn't agree to foot the bill of Michael Jackson's funeral. Talk about big government.

If corruption does continue to poke its head, it might well be time to turn over to the oversight page of the LAPD playbook. City Council themselves are already hot on this idea, proposing that a third-party inspector begin to regularly audit the Department of Water and Power. But could an audit of LAUSD also be in order? With veteran substitute teachers now being kept out of the classroom against their will, maybe so.

By the way, it's not 1980 anymore, so that whole thing between Northern and Southern California? Forget it; our problems no longer revolve around catty regional loyalties. Instead, we've got to figure out how we'll be dividing this finite water supply of ours among all too many lawns and fish. Got to believe this could be an important (first?) step towards thinking of this state as a single entity. Well, that or the ever-present fear of quakes.

And, really, it's been all but impossible to ignore the current national coverage of our local marijuana tribulations. Proponents of hyperbole are even suggesting the use of the word "war" to describe forthcoming events--a little extreme, I have to say---but regardless of your positioning, it's no doubt a surprise to hear that 74% of L.A. County voters support the use of medical marijuana (54% are in support of all-out legalization). So who are we fighting again? If you want to get caught up on all this drama, KCET's Brian Doherty synthesizes this kind of info better than anyone.

Elsewhere on the health front, H1N1 clinics have been set up around L.A. County for the uninsured, so get the word out to the youngins please, because it's them who'll be getting sick. And as for last week's AIDS Walk, I'd like to attribute the 20% drop in donations to a temporary decrease in disposable income, rather than some sort of declining awareness.

However, we don't want to leave you on the regular downer, so if you're searching for something brighter, check out this wonderful collection of fantastic Los Angeles street art. Yeah, there might be a lot going wrong these days, but at least the people throwing this stuff up are holding the whole culture thing together.

This image was taken by flickr user erjkprunczyk. It was used under the Creative Commons license.