[daviddennis]

I actually live in one of the canyon communities - Woodland Hills, South of the Boulevard, high up in the hills. The big reason I didn't buy a house before now is that I didn't think I could afford a house on the hills, and I didn't want to commit to staying in the flats.

I love my neighborhood and community, but I think everyone here resents that we pay through the nose for bad city services. "It's a miracle we get trash collected up here," says one of my neighbors.

Speaking of living up in the hills ...

Road contracts are issued for ease of job instead of where needed because kickbacks. Ill-conceived public works projects for image sake of politics.

Of course this means our hillside roads will never be fixed, since they would cost genuine bucks to repair.

I really wonder why anyone in the Valley voted against the Valley Secession measure. I am not new to the Valley - I'm just new to owning a home. I rented for three and a half years in the flats, about a mile or two from where I live now. So I researched the secession measure and voted for it.

I can understand why people outside of the Valley voted to keep Valley money in the city, but it seems so much in the self interest of all Valley residents to have a Valley city that it puzzles me the measure did so badly. (If my memory serves, it didn't get a majority in the Valley and of course it was murdered in the city as a whole).

My main problem with that measure is that I feel even the Valley city is too unwieldy. I think each individual label (Woodland Hills, North Hills, etc) should be a city of its own. Only that way can we have government even close to being responsive.

I read the LA Weekly articles on Valley Successsion, and they had all sorts of blather about it being better for us to fight problems together than separately, but no defense of the quality of services anywhere in LA City. Personally, I think all parts of LA city would find succession an improvement, since LA City proper would also have to find ways to work more efficiently.

It doesn't matter how much money government has, it's how it's used that counts. My snap judgement, for a long time, has been that LA City/County has plenty of money, it simply doesn't deploy it properly.

I think the current system may serve union bus drivers well, and union trash collectors, and city employees reasonably well, but I think it serves the public horribly.

I'd like to figure out some way to initiate change in that regard. Perhaps we can work together as freepers to help with the situation?

D

[truth_seeker]

"My main problem with that measure is that I feel even the Valley city is too unwieldy. I think each individual label (Woodland Hills, North Hills, etc) should be a city of its own. Only that way can we have government even close to being responsive."

That may be part of the answer of why Orange County fares better than most of LA County (which is stuck with the one huge city, and the normal problems of inner city, demographics, etc.).

Santa Ana has about the highest Hispanic percent, of any major city in the US. But as bad as it is, their crime rate is probably below major old eastern/mid-west cities.

So the answer isn't just demographics. Southern California has some interesting old and newer areas.

When OC went bankrupt, the voters wisely turned down sales tax increase, which was supported by the dems as well as the "New Majority" republicans-read moderates/builders/etc.

The bus system in run by the county. The county does contract police/fire for some incorporated towns, and for all remining unincorporated areas. Most of South OC remained unincorporated for years-only recently becoming separate cities (Dana Point, Mission Viejo, etc.

With the state continuing to steal property tax money from local government, cities are run pretty tight. Directionally, I disagree with Arnold taking still more of that money.

Happy home ownership - the American dream. Can't beat our weather. Bad as it can be, we have pretty good highways.

San Diego is a little like LA, wherein La Jolla is part of San Diego City. IOW a big city, with better sections. I'd say Woodland Hills is a better section of LA, too.