PasadenaNow Outsources Local News Coverage UPDATED

Yes, you heard that right. Our very own Pasadena Now has outsourced its local news coverage to India. No, I kid you not. The news is spreading, fast (hell, it's already in Boston).

Before I launch into a curmudgeonly tirade about the downfall of local journalism, let's give James Macpherson a chance to make his point, as quoted by the AP:

James Macpherson, editor and publisher of the two-year-old Web site pasadenanow.com, acknowledged it sounds strange to have journalists in India cover news in this wealthy city just outside Los Angeles.

But he said it can be done from afar now that weekly Pasadena City Council meetings can be watched over the Internet. And he said the idea makes business sense because of India’s lower labor costs.

"I think it could be a significant way to increase the quality of journalism on the local level without the expense that is a major problem for local publications," said the 51-year-old Pasadena native. "Whether you’re at a desk in Pasadena or a desk in Mumbai, you’re still just a phone call or e-mail away from the interview."

That's true, to a certain degree. The type of journalistic coverage Macpherson is talking about really could be done by someone in another country, largely because their "coverage" often consists of little more than glorified press releases and parroting of the local media.

To be sure, there's a lot of good work that can be done online. Lord knows the majority of our information comes to us online and we depend upon the web as invaluable research tool. But there are clear limits to using the internet to report on local news and politics.

At the least, it would be very difficult to understand the issues Pasadena faces, from a development perspective, without having your feet on the ground, without walking the streets of Pasadena. To understand why Robin Salzer and Jacque Robinson both emphasized neighborhood security in their campaigns, it helps a lot to walk up and down the streets north of the 210, just to get a feel for the neighborhood. And it's difficult to imagine anyone being able to offer original content on the renovation of Pasadena's City Hall without ever being able to visit.

Of course, that's not to stay that the state of local journalism in Pasadena and the Foothill Cities is just hunky dory. If anything, McPherson's decision demonstrates that the opposite is the case. Expectations for local reporting are such that it's not beyond the pale for him to hire someone in India. And as the proliferation of a local blogosphere demonstrates, from the Claremont Insider to your very own Foothill Cities, there are a lot of folks who want more.

Local journalism is entering into a tumultous transitional stage. From part-time bloggers like ourselves to the full-time efforts like Pasadena Now to the Pasadena Star-News, everyone is trying to figure out just what niche they can carve out, how they can contribute to local news coverage and debate, and (perhaps most importantly) how they can make a buck. How it will end up is anyone's guess, but we certainly doubt that it will end up in India.

One final ironic note: from what we can tell, this eminently local story was picked up by, of all people, an Associated Press reporter—not the local press. In other words, as things stand the local media already often takes its cue from outsiders. We don't fault MacPherson for simply being logical given the sorry state of local reporting, but clearly this isn't carrying the ball forward—its simply accepting the sad state of the status quo.

UPDATE:
Props to Kevin Roderick for the link. As he notes, the AP report was also printed in the SF Chronicle, which reveals that "Associated Press Writer Matthew Rosenberg in New Delhi, India, contributed to this report." It also links to the original craigslist advertisement, which says:

We seek one to two 500-word articles each day Monday through Friday (depending on news that is occuring) PLUS two weekly in-depth Special Reports which focus on the City Council's weekly Council Meeting ... The Council meeting is televised on the Internet.
...
We do not believe that geographic distance betwen California and India will present unsurmountable problems, and that working together with you will result in your development of a keen working knowledge of this City's affairs. This will result in accurate and authoritative News reports.

Of Consulting Firms and City Managers. . .

Remember our post (and, more interestingly, your comments beneath it) about Sierra Madre hiring Mathis and Associates to find their next city manager?

The Claremont Insider makes some interesting points about Mathis and Claremont's former city manager. Thoughts?

And again, will any of the city manager's in the FC ever blog?

Sierra Madre, Quiet Again?

Well, Molly R. Okeon reports that "the council held a tame meeting of reasonable length." I think Councilman Buchanan is right: everyone's tired.

Anthony Ha of the Hollister Free Lance recently penned some lines of interest for Sierra Madreans:

The Hollister Downtown Association recently selected Irvine-based RBF Consulting to prepare a new downtown strategy plan...

RBF Consulting comes not just with a long list of experience, but planning awards as well. The firm's downtown-specific plan for the City of Sierra Madre won an American Planning Association Award for its public outreach in 2005. John Gillison, Sierra Madre's former city manager, said that although the specific plan has since been caught up in political turmoil, he's still happy with RBF's work.

"It was a very well-designed outreach process," Gillison said.

Surge Failing, Violence Rising

No, we're not talking about Baghdad. Violence in the Crown City is threatening to undermine claims of success for Operation Safe City. Mary Frances Gurton reports for the Star-News:

Escalated gang-suppression efforts by the Pasadena Police Department will continue indefinitely following the shooting deaths of two men this week in the most recent spate of violence in the city, officials said.

The three-month-long effort, dubbed Operation Safe City, began after a surge of six shootings left two young men dead in early February. It had been scheduled to end Wednesday, according to Pasadena police Chief Bernard Melekian.

But that deadline is now forgotten as the department tries to figure out how to quell the killings.

So much for Mission Accomplished. Unfortunately, the violence isn't limited to shootings.

Later, around 4:40 p.m., a stabbing was committed in the 700 block of East Orange Grove boulevard, said Cmdr. John Perez. The assailants were two male Latinos and the victim an African-American man.

Talking to a friend who lives in North Pasadena (not far from the recent violence) last night, I discovered that he was unaware of any of the three shootings or the stabbing. That fact seems hardly surprising given the coverage the shootings intially received and the general difficulty for average folks to know what's going on in their community (even people like ourselves who are keeping eyes peeled for this kind of news).

Azusa Joins Pot-Busting Party

Not only did Azusa police break up a $4 million marijuana growing operation on Tuesday, they allowed an SGVT photographer to do a slide show of it (the operation, that is, not the take down). For great pictures, check out the impressively named Watchara Phomicinda in the SGVT.

Of course, this means that many latter day teens may go without their pain medication. Ah, the travails of adolescence.

This Post Has Been Removed: Pomona City Attorney Threatens Foothill Cities

This post has been removed from our humble blog as per the threat of the Pomona City Attorney.

Bad News Unbearable?

Remember the recent shooting in Pasadena? It wasn't the only one in Pasadena. And the West Coast Grrl thinks the Star-News is burying bad news.

I didn’t go to “J” school (as journalists call it), but it strikes me as odd to put this “hard news” in Around Pasadena, buried on page 2 of the Local News section–right where the police (? say it ain’t so!) or the developers want it, no doubt.

Indeed. The Grrl's eyes are better than ours, because we gave the front page headlines a quick scan and missed page 2 entirely. While it's hardly news that gangs are operating in Pasadena, homicidal gang violence should always be. As the recent runoff election demonstrated, for some districts it's the biggest concern (yes, PSN, even bigger than traffic). Is it the nefarious pressure of public safety officials and/or developers? That is beyond our ken. But either way, the Grrl's point stands:

Pasadena residents will never be able to address complex issues of gang violence if they don’t even know there is gang violence in this city. Notice I say residents, because the police cannot solve this problem. C’mon Star-News, time to step up. I don’t want to read about how the Pasadena Fire Department is saving pets on page one of Local News (with color photos), then read about our dead and wounded young men on page two.

Read all WCGB's commentary here. The PSN's page 2 coverage can be found online here.

Unclear in Arcadia

A commenter writes in response to the news that Measure B won out in Arcadia:

Help! I don't understand. The SVGT article didn't clear it up for me either. Measure A would have stopped Rusnak's expansion, but Measure B is seen as a protection against eminent domain abuse while allowing Rusnak to expand? Is there a paradox I don't get here?

Ah, some confusion remains. That could be due, in part, to the fact that I didn't answer my own questions (curse you, day job). Or it could be due to the fact that the Arcadia is a convoluted one, with mixed motivations and the lines of good and bad harder to determine than Chris Sutton's principles (I jest). So, we promise (Scout's honor) to revisit the Arcadia issue tonight or tomorrow. Stay tuned for a painfully in-depth discussion of the ins and outs of this case.

This Ain't Hazzard County

Susannah Rosenblatt of the LAT tells us about the new layer of bureaucracy that will soon be added to Los Angeles County government.

The dramatic reorganization that will grant Los Angeles County's appointed administrator sweeping new executive authority is expected to cost $1.7 million a year and create five executive positions, according to a report released Monday.
...
Each of the five deputy chief executive officers will oversee a cluster of connected departments, help integrate their services, and act as a liaison between department heads and the board.

Not that the $1.7 million cost is anything more than spare change for the county. There is a nice summary of the "highlights" of this year's proposed county budget here. You know, just a little $21.241 billion county budget—nothing to write home about.

I'd much rather see them spend $1.7 million on upgrading their website (which is for all intents and purposes one's public face these days) thus allowing for more and better direct interaction between people and their government, rather than using the money to put more distance between us and the Supes.

And wait a sec, if one's website is one's public face, we're pretty damn ugly looking right now. But here's an anonymous tip for you: construction of the FC Blog's online Death Star is ongoing. In the next few weeks, it will be fully operational.

Griffith Park Fire Coverage

The sun came through the smoke yesterday a sickly yellow and dropped ash over a number of the western FC cities. We drove by the fire twice, once in the early afternoon and again in the evening. Crossing the 134/2 interchange at around 9:30PM, the fire had grown explosively. Massive tongues of flame leapt up from the expanding fire, and it was readily apparent the fire was less contained than earlier in the day. Indeed, the latest tally claims more than 600 acres burned and there was concern the Greek Theatre might in jeopardy at points last night.

Our attempts at citizen journalism must end with that description and summary, however. Taking pictures in the dark while on a freeway is a recipe for blurriness, and we only came away with pictures that looked like a blend of Dali and Kandinsky.

So, for this one, we recommend the professionals blogging over at the LA Times. There has been fascinating documentation of the fire by Flickr users and blogging.la, which also posted this cool footage.

Ruiz on Renatta

It looks Renata Cooper is wasting no time in becoming a force on the PUSD Board:

It was universally assumed the school board would pick for its president member Scott Phelps, who was named vice president some months back when Peter Soelter appeared to game the system to ascend to that position.

Apparently newly elected member Renatta Cooper had something different in mind, as she nominated Esteban Lizardo when the question was brought. And with what had to be uneasy unanimity, everyone accepted that.

Sorry, Scott and Pete, but you know how it goes; the best laid plans...

Todd Ruiz has more at Under the Dome.

Even better, Ruiz also has the full list of tunes on those CDs Paul Little was passing out. Fishbone, Paul? Wow, you're a hipper than we would have expected.

Rusmackdown in Arcadia

That would be Rusnak putting the smack down.

Yes, even though the Rusnak Auto Group enlisted the city's aid to force out local businesses (at least way back in the beginning of this brouhaha), it looks Measure B passed and Manny Romero's Measure A fell short (by a lot).

Of course, Romero's measure had an air of vindictiveness about it, seeing as how it would have put his nemesis out of business entirely (along with an innocently bystanding Jiffy Lube).

At least Rusnak got some anti-eminent domain religion, as least where his wallet is concerned:

In the Measure B camp, Rusnak Arcadia gave $15,000 to Citizens Against Eminent Domain Abuse, and loaned it another $10,000, according to statements filed with the City Clerk's office.

The loan will be forgiven and the unused portion will be returned to Rusnak, said Harbicht, who is the treasurer of the committee.

Ah, but now that Measure B has passed, no business or homeowner in Arcadia will ever have to worry about the city threatening to use eminent domain for a redevelopment project, right? Hey, we can hope, though I'm skeptical.

Patricia Jiayi Ho tells all about it in the SGVT.

Paul Little Defies the Man

That's right, Paul Little's an anti-establishment renegade. Why else would he listen to "The Wall?" Todd Ruiz describes the changing of the guard at Pasadena City Hall.

Paul Little won't be remembered as a politician of few words, but on Monday night he summarized his dozen years on the City Council with music.

"My City was Gone" by the Pretenders, Neil Young's "Crime in the City" and Pink Floyd's "The Wall" rounded out a home-made CD that Little gave to his colleagues as he made his bow with Councilwoman Joyce Streator and made way for their successors.

"When you're on your way home at night and it's 2 a.m., and you're thinking it was so much fun having Paul around, pop this into your CD player," he said, before apologizing to Mayor Bill Bogaard for not including a track from punk rockers The Ramones.

More in the PSN.

Pasadena Shooting Update

The PSN account of yesterday's shooting can be found here. No word yet on whether it's gang-related, but we'd be very surprised if it wasn't.

TMIWOTP

Haven't you always wanted to visit "The Most Important Website on the Planet?" If you trust Bruce Sterling, now you can.

Some people have very high praise for WorldChanging, but our concern is with a single post. "LA Local Blogger Foster Kerrison" writes up the MyGo Pasadena initiative. What is it?

MyGo Pasadena provides commuters who take the Metro Gold Line from one of 3 stations in Pasadena an instant $500 rebate towards an electric bike, as well as a monthly cash reward based on the amount they use the bike to connect to transit – all towards the goal of demonstrating the value of these electric vehicles as new transportation options to connect to Metro Gold Line transit stations in lieu of the single occupancy automobile.

MyGo Pasadena is the first program in the country to provide incentives for connecting bikes to transit.

Okay. Okay. Okay. Let's think this one through. MyGo's going to be subsidizing the purchase of an electric bike (not just a regular bike), so you can ride your electric bike to the heavily subsidized light rail station nearby.

Then, you're commuting costs will be further subsidized, increasing the more you commute via the Gold Line.

So, even though light rail is already subsidized much more than the bus, you'll essentially get a free electric bike and have your Gold Line tickets even further discounted. Pretty soon they'll be paying you to commute!

Does anyone else see a slight flaw in this logic?

And yes, I did sign up for the program. Hey! It's a free electric bike and I'm on the Gold Line anyway; why not have someone pay me? Get on the government gravy train: it's leaving Del Mar Station. I'm only sorry that the program doesn't subsidize the purchase of old cars from the Balkans. They could call such a program, MyGo Yugo Pasadena.

Racism and the City Development Corp.

That's it, we've got to start attending city council meetings more regularly, if only to avoid hearing this news a week later.

A dispute on the City Council over a multimillion-dollar Northwest development project exploded last week with accusations of racism when a prominent African-American developer was not awarded exclusive negotiating rights.

The regular City Council meeting went into meltdown after nearly three hours of debate on whether to enter into sole negotiations with the Bakewell Company and its partner Century Housing for the contract to build Heritage Square, a residential and commercial complex on 2.82 acres at the northeast corner of Fair Oaks Avenue and Orange Grove Boulevard.

The city paid about $9 million for the property, which staff now estimates is worth about $11 million.

Wait a sec? The city paid $9 million for this property? Why is the city involved? Last time I checked, commercial and residential development was a task that private developers were perfectly capable of handling. You want to build a new development? Buy the property, hire contractors/developers whatever you need, and then try to sell your new office space or condos. There's no reason for the city to be involved.

Unless, of course, the city is steering tax dollars back into the city through this "redevelopment," precluding those dollars from going through the Sacramento washing machine. I'd have no problem with that except it creates situations like this one: suddenly the city council is deciding what private developer gets to build on the property. What happens if the city picks the wrong developer and costs balloon? Who picks up the tab? Well, as history demonstrates, the taxpayers of Pasadena:

Mayor Bill Bogaard, along with City Councilmen Steve Madison, Sid Tyler and Steve Haderlein, said they weren't ready to award the contract exclusively because of concerns arising after an independent financial analysis by Keyser Marston Associates said Bakewell underestimated the project's cost and left a $5.12 million funding gap.

Some of their misgivings are fueled by Bakewell's development of Renaissance Plaza across the street, which required a significant municipal subsidy.

Let's not dress it up: "a significant municipal subsidy" is dollars out of the pockets of Pasadenans, to pay for a development that we had no say in. The incentive structure is all wrong here: when you're the owner of a development, you have a lot of self-interest to make sure that you pick the right person from an economic viewpoint. When you're a city councilman, you have lots of other competing incentives: perhaps one developer is a big campaign donor, or, as it's been alleged here, the council has a "preferred" developer.

The allegations of racism here, particularly given that they seem rather out of the blue, are secondary to a much bigger problem; namely, the city performing a function it shouldn't. I think we can all agree that "municipal subsidies" for developers is nothing more than a handout for business. Free market fanatics and anti-capitalists can both agree that's a bad thing.

Pasadena Blogger Meet 'n Greet

A bunch of FC bloggers got together over the weekend, at the invitation of Jill.

Some folks may have been under the impression we weren't able to make it. On the contrary! As the picture notes we had an excellent view of the proceedings from our vantage point on the far side of a nearby parked vehicle.

Ah, the curse of anonymity.

Of Lampposts and Mayors

To paraphrase an old saying, would you rather be a lamppost in Arcadia, or Mayor of Sierra Madre?

So begins Mike Lucas' article on new Sierra Madre Mayor Enid Joffe in the San Marino Tribune. Mayor Joffe says, “There is no point in pretending we have a consensus council ... but that’s okay." However, "Joffe tends to laugh off reports that her city is on the verge civil unrest or anarchy." Overall, Joffe comes off as pretty level headed in the article—even to the point of wisely refraining from wise-cracking about Arcadia politics.

FC Has Bad Traffic; Star-News Gripes

File this one in the "So what should we do about it" category. The PSN has an editorial saying that traffic is the worst part of being alive and living in the FC.

That's right: worse than terrorism, worse than gangs ("Gang members tend to kill other gang members; only when innocents get in the way does the greater community take notice." Um, "get in the way?" Sounds awfully like they're blaming the victims), and worse than global warming (No! Impossible!).

So, what else is new? This traffic epidemic didn't just explode on the scene. And what does the PSN recommend? Massive public investment in infrastructure? Innovative new private toll roads to offer alternate routes? Deregulating the bus industry to allow better service and competition? Broader commitment to light rail?

Actually, no, all the unsigned editorial says is that "Southern California transportation officials ought to take note. We, too, have a crisis on our hands that demands swift, immediate attention."

Ah, yes, if only local transportation officials would just take note. Next time, guys, let's come up with some solutions, because folks in the Foothill Cities are aware of traffic. After all, we're the ones sitting in it.

150 lbs of Medicine for 18-yr-olds With Headaches!

Anyone able to make it to the Claremont city council meeting on the pot shop issue? We want to hear your version of what happened.

Meanwhile, in West Covina, Alison Hewitt tells us that police busted an illegally operating "medicinal" distribution center, "confiscating more than 150 pounds of [medicine] and more than $10,000 [cash, I presume]." Oddly enough, at the time of the bust police found "a dozen 18-19 year olds...all in perfect health, complaining of migraines." Afterwards, "[a] hand-written sign on the door of the dispensary Monday read 'Closed for Good.' A 20-year-old who said he had a prescription for arthritis stood at the door after reading the sign." No, really? I'm shocked! But if my memory serves, we were just talking about these issues, weren't we?

Honestly, this whole "issue" cracks me up. The emperor wears no clothes. Consider that "[the tables were also covered in a wide variety of pot-laced food, such as lollipops, brownies with multi-colored sprinkles, beribboned bon bons, peanut butter, jelly, sodas, hot sauce, chocolate syrup, peppermint patties and bottles of 'Mother's Finest Medicinal Cannabis' and 'That Time of the Month Potion.' Mint patties, lollipops and "Reefer's" peanut butter cups appeared to be the cheapest items at $10 each, while some of the larger bags of marijuana were priced at $540."

Sounds like a veritable pharmacy, doesn't it? Except, the opposite...