Mark Ryavec, Venice resident and president of the Venice Stakeholders Association, is looking to take Los Angeles City Councilman Bill Rosendahl's seat representing Council District 11, Ryavec announced on Monday.
Rosendahl was diagnosed with cancer earlier this year and announced on Oct. 8 that he would not be seeking re-election in March 2013.
Ryavec is a former legislative analyst for the City Council and chief deputy tax assessor for Los Angeles County. Given that background, Ryavec said in a press release, he'll be running on a platform which will return the city's focus to traditional municipal services like street repaving, fixing sidewalks, tree trimming, putting rangers back into parks and keeping libraries open.
Ryavec also said that he'd fight over-development and coastal drilling, invoking the policies of former L.A. Councilman Marvin Braude.
Other CD 11 candidates include Rosendahl's top advisor, Mike Bonin; former science teacher Odysseus Bostick and Frederick Sutton.
What do you think about Mark Ryavec's bid for City Council? Tell us in the comments.
Oh yeah, there's VSA - his own "God helps those who help themselves" group - which helps "the homeless folks move on to a life" on the street in neighboring communities where you and he don't have to see or think about them. Too bad for him that most of those communities are in the same council district he's running to represent. Their memories are as long as ours.
I did represent Howard Drollinger and several owners of property in the Westchester central business district who were alarmed at the extreme (and illegal) downzoning that Ms. Galanter had imposed on the CBD. The City Planning Commission, led by Dan Garcia, agreed with the property owners and reversed the downzoning for most of the CBD. I will leave it to the residents of Westchester to decide whether the legacy of Mr. Drollinger and his family has been a boon or bane to the quality of life in their burg. I did represent BFI in opposing the move by a City Councilman to prematurely close Sunshine Canyon landfill before its conditional use permit ran out. The landfill was in existence then and no oak trees were removed while I was retained by BFI. Further, I would ask Mr. Tent where all of the City's apartment and commercial trash and debris from beach clean-ups should go if not to a landfill? The sad truth is that LA does a relatively poor job of reducing and recycling trash and that shipping it to remote, desert landfills would greatly increase the trash fees on our already-too-high DWP/utility bills.
The issue in downtown Westchester was to keep neighborhood friendly zoning or high rise zoning. Mr. Ryavec lobbied to keep high-rise zoning. He did not respond to my point about Werner Scharff. Probably has no good way to greenwash that.
"What a creative use of the word "transition." Ryavec thinks Venice should be run like the "Survivor" series, where each week he gets to "transition" someone else off his island." Interesting concept David.... And who or what process is used to transition transients onto the island.... this goes both ways - I once again ask, How many? How long? How funded? and How administrated? Regardless who wins for Council, this is over..... The problems in Venice that will have to be addressed go far beyond maintaining an endangered species habitat for transients...
I have the same question as you - being how much are these non profits (supposedly using public money to its best advantage for the needy) paying themselves. They built 345 Rose Ave., and even though they got the land for free, each apartment cost about three times what they could have bought existing apartments for. In other words, with the same amount of available funds, they could have purchased and provided three times as many units. Or in other words again they deprived two out of every three needy families a home they could have had if the available funds were spent primarily for the benefit of the needy not wherever else it went. I asked the principle person behind this project how they could spend so much and requested an accounting of where the money went. I was of course refused. I also find it reprehensible that a senior member of VNC is on their payroll and thus influencing VNC policy towards their financier’s requirements as opposed to the resident’s needs whom they are supposed to be representing. Now we know where some of the unaccounted for money goes. Follow the money trail and you see why we have people camping on the sidewalks in front of our homes instead of in proper shelters. I do believe Mark Ryavec’s proposals would be better for the homeless and better for the neighborhood than the current situation which is clearly not working for anybody.
According to VCHC's website, they've done more rehab projects than they've done new ones. Pointing to one of the few new ones and using it to indict them is deliberately misleading. Again, Mr. Nott does not distinguish himself as an observer of community affairs, and that reflects upon the candidate whose cult he's chosen to join. When I follow the money trail I find a guy who works for commercial real estate interests (Peter Nott) spewing gibberish and half-truths in support of another guy who just admitted on Patch he's made a career of working for commercial real estate interests (Ryavec), both of whom presumably share a goal of making Venice safer for increased real estate profits. What, and whose, unaccounted-for money is fueling this little choo-choo train?
And since Markie Mark admits in these comments that he's spent a lot of energy over the years attacking other Councilpersons (usually on behalf of big-money interests), I wonder how this "collegial" approach to interpersonal and political relations he seems so proud of will allow him to get a damn thing done in City Hall. Threatening and bullying colleagues doesn't win cooperation there or anywhere (ask the City Attorney, who, according to news coverage, threatened to prosecute City Council members and hasn't gotten any cooperation from them since). I'm sure he'll be trying to explain his in-your-face approach as this mess proceeds. Again, get me some popcorn!
What happens to jobs, careers, consulting fees, etc that support the homeless in Venice if our homeless problem is solved?
We should be so lucky that this problem would be solved in their lifetimes or ours. I've been in L.A. for a couple of decades and I haven't seen any indication that society, the government, the business community or anybody else (except maybe the social service people) are willing to do much about it. The more the voters have become anti-tax and anti-government, the more homeless and poor people there are, the worse schools have gotten, the more we're paranoid about crime despite the prisons being more numerous and fuller than ever, etc. It's like that old saying - the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
You've already shown an alarming inability to get local history straight, let alone learn from it, and despite what you and the others keep saying, social services don't cause or perpetuate homelessness, crime, etc. Increasingly unaffordable housing, lack of jobs, low wages, mental illness, a deteriorated education system - those are some of the causes for the majority of these social problems. Blaming those who are trying to help is a close relative to blaming the victims. Do the "solutions" you guys propose address any of those situations? Hardly. Even when someone does try to address them, you all yell that you don't want it done in Venice. You just want the problems to go somewhere else so you can feel superior and justify raising rents on the rest of us. At least no one can accuse you of not being transparent, or should I say "obvious."
From now on, every time there is a posting about Mr Ryavec on Patch, someone is going to hijack it and turn the subject to suit your agenda of dissing him because he has been somewhat successful in changing the landscape of urban camping and a lawless free-for-all in Venice???? Not fair to Patch readers or residents who could learn about what else Mark has to say - vindictive retribution for a job well done is quite an endorsement to many Venice residents. Do you feel that either of the other candidates will serve your point of view better?? Mike Bonin will more-than-likely continue much as Bill has, and that has brought you where you are today - Trust me, we are not going back..... Will Mr Bostick fulfill your dream of the counterculture campground by the sea???? I don't think so.... so what this is actually about is beating up on Ryavec and his supporters. How old school Venice! Like thinking that crime and garbage in the streets will keep rents and property values to a minimum... Who are you voting for and why???
Promote Accountability When you call 311 to report a pothole or graffiti or tree that needs to be trimmed, you deserve a prompt and efficient response by City officials. I will work to digitize the 311 system so that both your complaint and the City’s follow-up can be entered and tracked online. My office will also keep an ongoing record of resident complaints in CD 11, track the performance of responding departments, and intervene when the job isn’t getting done....... Put More Police on the Street Despite progress in expanding the ranks of the Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles remains the most under-policed major city in the United States. I support the gradual increase in the size of the police force. To fund these additional officers will necessitate creative efficiencies in other city departments and lowering costs through some contracting out.
I will vigorously oppose any and all proposed developments that are not appropriate in scale to their surrounding residential neighborhoods. The CD 11 Council Office has too often green-lighted projects that cannot be tolerated by their neighbors due to size and traffic, causing residents to have to spend countless hours and energy to oppose these projects. And if the residents had not risen up and said “no,” these projects would have caused even more traffic, gridlock, and neighborhood dissatisfaction. It is the job of the councilperson and his or her staff to stop these projects before they enter the approval process. I intend to recruit both a capable planning deputy—possibly an architect—and a land-use and environmental attorney to proactively engage developers to downsize projects and relieve residents of this burden. Our goal should be pedestrian-friendly, tree-lined, walkable neighborhoods that create a shared sense of community, not projects like the Bundy/Olympic Medical Park, for example, which would have added 20,000 new car trips per day. 'til next time…
So your goal is to make Patch worthless as a communication tool????? Sounds like a troll to me............. Politics is politics - there are winners and losers.... so..... Why are you wasting everybody's time with smack talk on Mark and not supporting someone who will help your cause..... or is that because there is no one left who wants life in Venice to return to what -things-were in whatever era they got stuck in.......
As for your challenge, the answer is a simple "ABR": Anybody but Ryavec. I'll figure out who when the time comes, but I know a phony when I see one, Ed Begley Jr. or no Ed Begley Jr. I've seen where Ted Danson used to work with Ryavec once upon a time too, but I don't see him on Ryavec's team now. And it's odd how Ryavec chased all those other folks who no doubt know him from his "public spirited" work on the environment and development issues over the years straight into the arms of Bonin within a week or two of announcing he was running. Begley will figure it out too, no doubt, and he'll be looking for the nearest detox shower.
And he'll recruit an architect as planning deputy (someone whose livelihood depends on doing the bidding of developer clients!) to help him "protect" neighborhoods? Maybe that architect is really going to be there to help applicants game the system. Based on what he's already said about his own career, that's something which Ryavec apparently knows a lot about. If any of his old developer and real estate clients would pay him enough to keep representing them, we wouldn't have to put up with this nonsense. But they won't because they've learned their lesson (or else maybe they want him in city hall greasing the skids for their next wave of projects). It'll be something which the rest of us will have to watch closely over the next few months. It's pretty early but the Ryavec brain trust has already sprung a leak!
1. We're not haters. We want to help homeless folks connect with services that will help them transition back into mainstream society. 2. We're not the minority. If you ask someone if they hate homeless the majority will obviously say no. If you ask them whether we should create services that help people transition off of the street or enable homeless to stay on the street indefinitely - The majority would say that we should help them transition off of the street.
Support for Major Transportation Projects I support the Mayor’s Fast Forward LA plan to use future sales tax receipts to allow the City to leverage bond funding to build major transportation projects in 10 years as opposed 30 years. New high-speed rail projects spur the economy, create jobs, and provide the capacity to increasingly allow our citizens to travel by rail and bus instead of car, while also lessening traffic congestion. While the Westside will benefit from the Expo Line and ultimately from the “Subway to the Sea,” there is little on the drawing board to address the chronic north-south traffic congestion in CD 11. Future transportation spending must provide new north-south rail capacity on the Westside. Encourage Bicycling Cycling improves personal health, reduces traffic and pollution, and saves energy. I myself bike over 50 miles a week and personally know that we have a long way to go make LA more bike-friendly. As a member of the City Council, I will do everything I can to implement the City’s Bike Plan. See more at - http://www.markryavec.com