|
|
It was a long day for the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency, whose board spent more than six hours Thursday sorting through such controversial matters as Blossom Plaza, a seven-story residential complex being built in Chinatown with $41 million in public money.
But the redevelopment board also did some business in the San Fernando Valley, voting to provide $9.8 million to bring a Costco and Best Buy shopping Center to Pacoima. The project, formally known as Plaza Pacoima, drew such supporters as Councilman Richard Alarcon, who held his 5-month-old daughter Camila as he courted the redevelopment board on the matter.
Plaza Pacoima will go up on Paxton Street next to the 118 Freeway on the site of a factory operated by Price Pfister, which manufactured faucets in the neighborhood for decades and closed its doors in 2001.
The site, which is currently contaminated, will be cleaned up by the developer, Primestor. The project will also get a freeway sign twice as tall as the city normally allows, according to redevelopment officials.
-- David Zahniser
Starbucks' decision to close stores has shaken up the coffee-drinking world. Now Starbucks has listed all the stores to be closed. Locally, Ontario lost three; Mission Viejo, Fontana and Riverside, two each. The big loser: San Diego, which will see 10 stores shutter. Two Starbucks in the Crenshaw area of Los Angeles are going. Check out the full list.
Restaurant 15 in Echo Park opened last year with a three-course deal appropriately named $15 @ 15. Unfortunately, inflation has forced an awkward name change, according to the restaurant website: Hey folks just a reminder, we did recently raise the price of the special from $15 @ 15 to $19 @ 15. We are sorry any problems this may have caused.
Sounds like a restaurant name-change is in order.
-- Jesus Sanchez
 Delta Air Lines is expected to announce later today that it's ending its relationship with ExpressJet Airlines, which provides connecting flights to Delta customers from Los Angeles International Airport to 13 smaller Western cities, including Boise and Reno. It's the most recent example of the airline industry retrenching and cost-cutting in the face of soaring fuel prices and the usual drop in traffic that follows the busy summer travel season. The Times' Peter Pae is working on a full story.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Ricardo DeAratanha / Los Angeles Times
Cool baseball video, right? Amazing catch by an athletic (and adorable) ball girl, fun play-by-play as the announcer gives her a shout-out and gives the players a hard time. Except that leap looks too good to be true. And the catcher's a righty at the beginning of the play and a lefty when it's over.
It's all a fake, according to the blog Tonic Health. The video is part of a viral marketing campaign for Gatorade, directed by Baker Smith of harvest in Santa Monica.
What makes going viral so hard? Some answers in Tonic Health's full post here.
--Veronique de Turenne
 The prospect of two rival biker gangs -- the Mongols and the Vagos -- riding into town would normally generate visions of deadly violence and mayhem. In Palm Springs, however, the bikers' arrival means sold-out hotels and jam packed bars and restaurants.
That may explain why some of this resort town's business and civic leaders have for several years now put aside concerns about possible violence to welcome the Mongols, Vagos and many other bikers for October's American Heat Palm Springs Motorcycle Weekend.
For this year's event, the City Council voted to move the event to its main drag, Palm Canyon Drive, chip in $35,000 for public safety and clean up and even suspended its noise ordinance for American Heat, reports the Desert Sun. Police and some council members warned about possible violence, especially with the presence of two of California's most notorious biker clubs: The Mongols and Vagos Motorcycle Clubs are identified as outlaw motorcycle gangs in the Organized Crime in California Annual Report to the California Legislature 2005 document prepared by the California Department of Justice.
"When you get this event, you have Vagos, Hells Angels, the Green Machine, and when they all come together, they are bitter enemies," Palm Springs Police Chief David Dominguez said. "That's when we have the potential for violence."
Mayor Steve Pougnet conceded that there is a potential for violence but noted that police have done a good job of keeping the peace in earlier American Heat events.
If there are problems in October, however, Pougnet will most likely not be around. As he has in previous years, the mayor usually leaves town during American Heat because he said he "can't stand the noise."
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Don Kelsen / Los Angeles Times
 Enough people have apparently pretended to have disabilities to force Knott's Berry Farm to end its policy of letting disabled guests cut to the front of line at its amusement park rides. Now, disabled customers will have to wait about as long as other customers, eliminating the incentive for able-bodied people to pretend they are disabled, reports the OC Register.
"There were abuses to the system, and at some point the [disabled] line was almost equal to the regular line, so it really wasn't serving its purpose," said Knott's spokeswoman Jennifer Blazey.
A disabled patron will be able to come back at a specified time to board the ride or wait in a nearby area until his or her companions have made it through the line.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times
 How could the owner of a place that sells toffee truffle mints, caramel apples and fudge-dipped strawberries be the recipient of death threats? That's part of the fallout facing the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory franchisee in Huntington Beach after employees refused a 5-year-old girl with diarrhea permission to use the store restroom, reports the OC Register. The girl ended up soiling her clothes.
Word about the incident last Thursday spread quickly after the girl's mother contacted the Internet site The Consumerist, which posted an item about the girl's ordeal. That post triggered an apology from the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory's corporate office and, apparently, death threats against Bonnie Overturf, the franchisee who operates the chocolate store in the Bella Terra Mall: Overturf, who said she apologized to the mother earlier, contacted police once death threats began and her home address was posted on an unknown Website. People also threatened to throw feces at her home, she said.
Overturf said that it could be dangerous for customers to walk through their hallway, which is lined with supplies, to their back bathroom. "Even if insurance wasn't an issue, there is the possibility of theft and people getting hurt," Overturf, a mother of three, said Wednesday.
The girl's mother, who would not reveal her name, said Overturf has not apologized. She also turned down an offer of free Rocky Mountain products from the company's chief operating officer.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Mark Boster
 Cara Mia DiMassa, who covers downtown L.A. for The Times, talked to Tom Gilmore today. He's the developer whose vision for L.A.'s center (yes, we do have one) sparked the renaissance in the city's Historic Core district, located mere blocks from the Times buildings now for sale (or lease, depending on terms) by Sam Zell. Here's Cara:
Downtown guru Tom Gilmore flippantly suggested that the building could be used "as a mausoleum for Sam Zell, or maybe a theme park. Call it 'the times of our lives.' "
Then, he got serious: "It is virtually worthless as a piece of real estate, other than the L.A. Times ... Maybe in 20 years, when downtown is so overbuilt, and we are really dying for space. But we are still building out buildings in downtown. Someday, it will be a lovely shopping mall or something ... or maybe it could be sold to the government. .... The federal, state and local governments are constantly complaining about space."
The Times building, he said, was unsuitable for lofts or live/work spaces -- the choice du moment for building conversions in the city center, mostly because of the way the windows work "unless you tear the middle of it out. It’s got great parking, though."
The suggestion box is now open.
--Veronique de Turenne
Photo: Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times
 Empty stalls. Fewer customers. Tacky merchandise. These are some of the problems facing the beloved L.A. landmark, says the Downtown News' Kathryn Maese. Perhaps most disturbing is the fact that the Grand Central Market is down to only four stalls selling fresh produce (and two of these are owned by the same vendor). And, as Maese and anyone who has recently shopped at Grand Central knows, the fresh food is not necessarily all that fresh:
"...some vendors stock their shelves with poor quality fruits and vegetables, which can be overripe or on the verge of going bad. Once I bought a box of avocados only to find that every one was rotted."
The owners of the approximately 90-year-old market blame the soft economy and years-long shut down of Angels Flight, the funicular railway that once brought down hordes of Bunker Hill office workers to the market between Hill and Broadway. While the owners have recruited new vendors, turnover has been high and few of them actually sell fresh food. As Maese points out, without fresh produce, Grand Central is nothing more than a "glorified food court."
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Los Angeles Times
 The number of parking spaces in Los Angeles County's 25 largest shopping centers: 133,521.
The number of people living in Los Angeles County: 10.4 million.
Numbers courtesy L.A. Business Journal.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times
 Every time shoppers leave an outlet of Los Angeles-based Forever 21, they walk away with a bit of spirituality along with their sequined tunic (only $22.24!). A story by the Times' Leslie Earnest notes that Don and Jin Sook Chang, owners of the fast-growing apparel chain, are devout Christians who often attend 5:30 a.m. prayer services and have given millions to their church. Evidence of their strong religious convictions can also be found at the bottom of every Forever 21 shopping bag:
Each bag is inscribed with "John 3:16" -- the New Testament passage that says, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life."
That may seem odd to some but not to those who consider shopping a religious experience.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Stefano Paltera/Los Angeles Times
Kids have been swaying and playing with hoops made from everything from dried grape vines to wood for centuries. But leave it two Los Angeles businessmen to turn these ancient toys into a nationwide sensation by remaking the ring out of brightly colored plastic and giving it a wacky name: Hula Hoop. It was 50 years ago today that Richard Knerr and Arthur "Spud" Melin , founders of a company called Wham-O, filed a trademark application for their new product.
The Hula Hoop was test marketed and promoted to young Baby Boomers in playgrounds across Southern California. Within a year, Wham-O (which later made the Frisbee) sold 100 million of the hoops, re-affirming Southern California's reputation as a fad factory.
Celebrate the 50th anniversary by watching a 1960s commercial of the Hula Hoop and Frisbee. It's not as fun as playing with the real thing but your aging Baby Boomer hips will thank you.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: AP
That's what the music makers say, when pile drivers and excavators for a new condo project tear into the earth just 18 feet away from the signature tower's famed echo chambers. Our own Bob Poole has the full story here.
And here's some fun stuff from Bob's notebook: It was the world’s first circular office building when construction started in 1954 on Hollywood’s landmark Capitol Records tower, but it wasn’t designed to resemble a stack of records, architect Welton Becket always insisted.The shape was chosen for the “economy of construction, operation and maintenance, plus maximum utilization of space,” Becket said.
According to Capitol officials, it didn’t take long for the jokes to make the rounds when the building finally opened in 1956. They’ve kept a copy of a record trade magazine that two months after the tower’s opening reported some of the laugh lines the place had inspired:
“It’s round like a record, but what are they going to do when the industry changes to tape?”
“There are no squares in the Capitol Tower.”
“You ought to put a coin machine in front of the building so tourists can drop in fifty cents and watch the Tower revolve.”
“Secretaries are going to love the new building because their bosses can’t corner them there.”
“I hear they’re changing the speeds on the freeway behind the Capitol Tower to 78, 45 and 33 1/3 m.p.h.”
“Song publisher’s lament: ‘I went to Capitol and they gave me the run-around.’”
“We hear there’s a huge record changer on the roof that ejects floors.”
“Now that the intersection of Hollywood and Vine has the ultra-modern Capitol tower, the name’s being changed to Hollywood and Vinyl.”
“After they put an Italian restaurant on the roof, they’re going to call the building the Tower of Pizza.”
More new condos vs. a signature sound. Is it worth it?
--Veronique de Turenne
Photo: Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times
 OK, there's no actual begging in the news release announcing the how-to website launched by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and the city's Convention and Visitors Bureau for same-sex marriages in the city, but it comes mighty close.
"With sunny skies, beautiful beaches and world-class attractions, Los Angeles is the picture perfect place where couples can finally take their vows and enjoy an unforgettable honeymoon,” Mayor Villaraigosa said. “From Hollywood Boulevard and Universal Studios to the Venice Boardwalk and L.A. Live, the wedding bells will be ringing all summer long in the City of Angels.”
By clicking on the new “Gay Travel” link on the discoverlosangeles.com website, couples can find information on a variety of lovely settings for their ceremonies. The site also features a Frequently Asked Questions section that walks prospective visitors through the process they will need to follow in order to walk down the aisle this summer. In addition, the site provides a list of Travel Alternatives Group-approved hotels, deemed gay-friendly establishments, where couples can host receptions, spend their wedding night or enjoy an extended honeymoon.
The same-sex marriage boom could bring as much as $684 million to California in the next three years, the news release states, extrapolating figures provided by The Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law. Estimates for Los Angeles, when you factor in ceremonies, food and lodging for brides and grooms and families and friends, gifts, honeymoons and related tchotchkes, come to an additional $57 million per year. (Full release after the jump.)
--Veronique de Turenne
Illustration: Susan Tibbles
Read on »
 
Our own Peter Viles has been tracking the price of a gallon of gas at his local Mobil station. How much time transpired between the photo on the left and the one on the right?
A disheartening answer (and a few more pix) at his fine blog, LA Land. --Veronique de Turenne
Photos: Peter Viles
 ... mingled with the Hollywood film crowd last night as Warren Beatty got a lifetime achievement award at AFI. Here's a (somewhat tart) note from Susan, one of our readers, who was at the event:
Maybe we have [his] nephew to thank for Clinton showing up at the AFI Life Achievement Award for Warren Beatty tonight -- those of us in the audience were surprised to see him. A frail but very sharp McGovern was there, so were Jerry Brown and a few others.
Besides of course, Jack and Dyan who raced over from the Lakers' loss. Faye Dunaway and Elaine May looked like they had the same doctor for cheek implants; makes you appreciate Diane Keaton's natural approach to aging gracefully.
More coverage -- actually about Warren -- from Anne Thompsons excellent "On Hollywood" blog, People, The Gossip Girls (where Hugh Hefner and his posse of blonds take center stage), USA Today, the ever-cranky Fox News (Hollywood Left-fest!) and of course, AP.
--Veronique de Turenne
Photo: Getty Images
 If you can stand to read about how the Lakers blew the biggest first-quarter lead in NBA Finals history, then wrote their names in the record books with the biggest breakdown in the NBA Finals in the last 37 years, and how Kobe Bryant walked off the court with time on the clock, then by all means, read our coverage. Bill Plaschke's righteous rage will actually make you feel better. T.J. Simers blames Phil Jackson. The game story pulls no punches. The photos, well, they'll just break your heart. Thank God it's Friday.
And now onto the real world:
L.A.'s top cops have a turf war of their own going. L.A. County Sheriff Lee Baca says race plays a big role in gang violence, while LAPD Chief Bill Bratton says it's actually about drugs and money.
Manson acolyte Susan Atkins may be released from prison because she has brain cancer.
Judge Alex Kozinski wants you to look at some porn -- his own. Specifically, he's called for an investigation into the fact that he kept hard-core images on his website to determine whether he's considered fit to judge obscenity cases.
The Japanese gangster who wanted a liver transplant at UCLA tried to pay $1 million for a U.S. visa.
Got a Q about same-sex marriage in California? Chances are, we've got the A.
Meanwhile, the Kern County clerk says she's hurt by the criticism at her decision to halt all civil marriage ceremonies.
Feeling a particularly vicious pinch in your wallet? You're not dreaming: May's jump in inflation was the biggest in six months.
Check out our coverage of the "Georgia O'Keeffe and the Women of the Stieglitz Circle" exhibit now in the San Diego Museum of Art. What's Hillary Clinton got to do with it? Ironic, in light of today's piece in the NYT.
-- Veronique de Turenne
Photo: Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times
 The creation of a 150-acre reef to anchor a forest of giant kelp is taking shape in San Clemente.
An interview with "Weeds" creator Jenji Kohan in LAist.
Those reservoir balls the DWP dumped in Silver Lake might not be so safe after all, says Donna Barstow.
Dinner parties gone very, very wrong. Jacket Copy
MTA ridership just keeps going up. Bottleneck Blog
The Olsen twins incur the wrath of PETA. LA Unleashed
Kid fails driving test five times in one day -- video! YouTube via Fishbowl LA
Ride your bike to work in LA -- a how-to guide from LA MetBlogs.
Start planning for the L.A. Film Festival next week.
Compton will get a new skateboard park in September. Curbed LA
--Veronique de Turenne
Photo: Los Angeles Times
 That's what the San Gabriel Valley Tribune is reporting after league officials sat down with the billionaire for football talks earlier this week. Roski, you may recall, is the developer who wants to build the "Los Angeles Stadium" on a 600-acre parcel he owns in the City of Industry. Here's more from the Trib:
National Football League officials, who initially had little reaction to Roski's proposal, now call the plan "an interesting possibility" after a sit-down meeting earlier this week with officials from Roski's Majestic Realty Co.
"At their request, the Roski group provided us an update on their stadium project," wrote NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy in an email to this paper. "Mr. Roski's site certainly seems to present an interesting possibility. The permitting and construction processes seem to be more defined than other sites we have seen."
Majestic proposed the stadium in April, and McCarthy at the time said NFL staffers are "monitoring all stadium-related developments at this time."
Majestic Realty Co. Vice President John Semcken, who is the lead for the project, said the NFL brass are now showing a little enthusiasm.
"They have seen the plan now," he said of a meeting he had Monday at the NFL headquarters in New York. "They're very impressed."
Out in the real world, the plan has as many skeptics as supporters. Online though, several thousand football-starved fans have already signed up for tickets. The full story from the SGV Trib is here.
—Veronique de Turenne
Photo: AP
 Riverside's historic Mission Inn has more than 200 rooms. But none were available when lawyers for toy giant Mattel, which is fighting Bratz doll maker MGA Entertainment in a nearby courthouse, tried to make reservations. The reason? MGA attorneys were already staying at the Mission Inn and didn't want their legal opponents in the same hotel (for fear that legal documents and info might get mixed up).
What did Mattel's lawyers do? They went to court, of course. Read the outcome in AP via the Press-Enterprise.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times
 This was bound to happen. A doctor was arrested at a Costco gas station in Cypress last night after he allegedly threatened another driver with a tire-iron for cutting in front of him in a long line of cars, reports the OC Register.
Can't wait to see what happens when gas goes above $5 a gallon.
-- Jesus Sanchez
Photo: EPA
 Perhaps Southern California's most high-stakes courtroom trial doesn't involve murder, sex or celebrity (Britney, where are you?). It involves dolls, the Bratz line of dolls, and the financial outcome could be enormous. The Times' David Colker was in the federal courtroom in Riverside today, where the focus was on a very important date:
Never has the birth date of a doll been so important -- possibly billions of dollars important.
It was critical, because El Segundo-based Mattel -- home of the Barbie empire -- claimed in a copyright-infringement lawsuit that the dolls were secretly created by one of its employees and then taken to rival MGA Entertainment, based in Van Nuys. If Mattel can prove that, the company might be able to claim a stake in the saucy Bratz empire, which analysts estimate could be bringing in as much as $2 billion a year for MGA.
The matter came to the fore in U.S. District Court in Riverside when trademark lawyer Lucy Arant took the stand. She oversaw the preparation of the trademark applications for the Bratz doll names. Documents from her office, shown in court, said the “date of first use” of the doll names at MGA was in June 2000.
Score one for Mattel, because the creator of the doll was still working for them at that time.
But MGA lawyer Tom Nolan disputed the date, showing that on the official U.S. Patent and Trademark Office registration, the “first use” date was liste
| |
