REWIND 2008 : January 28 Board Meeting

When we last left our Board, two weeks ago, on January 14, 2008 the following items were left in limbo:
1. A new "transfer" permit ordinance.
2. Regulations for the "Elephant Walk" and similar events.

Neither item is on the agenda for further discussion or resolution at this meeting.

We still don't know if the January 14 meeting even took place because there are no minutes posted at http://laanimalservices.com/commission

And now..the January 28, 2008 Board Meeting:
+/- Read more...

MINUTES
BOARD OF ANIMAL SERVICES COMMISSIONERS
CITY OF LOS ANGELES
Monday January 28, 2007
10:00 A.M.
CITY HALL
200 N. Spring St.
Room 1060
Los Angeles, CA 90012

BW comments are in bold italics.

ADMINISTRATIVE APPEAL HEARING
Commission Vice-President Riordan called the Administrative Appeal Hearing to order at 10:20 A.M. Present were Commissioners Riordan, Brown, Ponce, and Quincey.

President Khero is M.I.A.

First up are 3 appeal hearings for Barking Dog cases.

3 citizens have complained that neighbors' dogs bark too much which has resulted in an Administrative Hearing for each dog owner.

Boks has made 3 decisions. From what we can tell from the minutes, Boks issued terms and conditions to 1 dog owner in order for them to keep their dog licenses. Boks revoked the licenses for the Appellants 2 and 3 . Revocation of a license bans the dog from the City permanently and revokes the licenses of all other dogs owned by the "Respondents." See Municipal Code Sec. 53.18.5.

It would be interesting to know if these banned dogs were "deposited" at the shelter and then killed or if the owners somehow managed to get them new homes outside the City. We suspect all dogs are dead for barking.

The Board voted to uphold Boks's decision in the first 2 cases, but they overturn Boks's decision to revoke the third party's license and issue terms and conditions. They also fine the third Respondent $250. This was likely Qunicey's idea.

The Board recesses after 55 minutes at 11:15 AM.

COMMISSION MEETING

1. ORAL REPORT OF THE GENERAL MANAGER – EDWARD BOKS The General Manager reported on the No kill Equation. Many in the community are asking why we are not implementing those recommendations. This report demonstrates what we have been doing. In addition, the 2007 Statistical Report for the Department. This report compares our progress in previous years. Both reports are in your binders. The General Manager requested the Commission to review both items so they could be placed in the minutes as reviewed.

Notice that Boks does not answer the "community's" questions.
Boks does not read the report in his ORAL report so we don't know what's in there. Nor is the report linked on the Commission agenda pages. The report is therefore not made public. This may be a violation of the Brown Act. This detail escapes the Commissioners and they let it slide. Luckily, Boks has done extensive disingenuous blogging about this at "From the Desk of Ed Boks." It's drivel and bullshit so we won't link it here.

2. COMMISSION BUSINESS

A. Approval of the Commission Meeting Minutes of December 17, 2007.
Commissioner Ponce motioned to approve the minutes of December 17, 2007. The motion was seconded by Commissioner Quincey and passed on a vote of 4-0.

B. Oral Report by the Commission on Meetings and Events Attended
Commissioner Ponce attended the funeral of Department employee Christina Winzer and met with Councilman Huizar’s field deputy to discuss the “Be Kind to Animals Week – Humane Education For the Youth” event to be held at the North Central Shelter. Commissioner Riordan attended the funeral for Department employee Christina Winzer.

That's it. That's all the Board has to bring to the table! They approved minutes and reported on their community involvement. We commend Riordan and Ponce for attending the funeral of a Department employee. Shame on everyone else.

3. GENERAL MANAGER RECOMMENDS FOR BOARD ACTION
A. Proposal to Amend the Los Angeles Municipal Code to Require Dogs and Cats to be Sterilized.

Jim Bickhart from the Mayor's office chimes in to grab credit for putting this ordinance together. Usually, an appearance by Bickhart means they are expected to toe the line.

PUBLIC COMMENT:(1 minute)


Teri Auston [sic] (former TV Star and President of The Amanda Foundation): Supports the ordinance. A big part of any ordinance is enforcement. This in not based on AB 1634.

Judy Mancuso: On a city ordinance you can be more specific. In a local level, you can put in microchipping that would never pass at the state level.

Haze Lyn: Supports this effort. The tougher the better. This is a good stepping stone

Phyllis Daugherty: Supports what Mr. Bickhart said. Hope deterrent and fees will help reduce breeding.

They vote to approve this new ordinance 4-0.
It then passed in City Council and is now law.
A subsequent audit by City Controller Laura Chick determined that Boks does not have the money to enforce the new ordinance so it is meaningless , just like the ordinance that says all dogs must be licensed.
The minutes do not include discussion by the Board as to whether the Department has the funds to enforce this new law.

4. DISCUSSION ITEMS
None

Yeah. NONE. With all of the animals killed daily in the pound. The Board has nothing to discuss to stop this.
They have no other items which they feel will improve the Dept. or the conditions for the animals. They have failed us again.

5. PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD (3 minutes)

Teri Auston [sic]: Saw a man with puppies for sale on top of his van and saw a dog left out in the rain. Called the local shelter and was happy with the response. She supports the Departments response to the issues. Believes the carrot and stick works to bring dog owners around.

Phyllis Daugherty: Thanked the Board for a vote on the ordinance as it closed another loophole. Believes Department officers are not aware of new ordinance 53.70. Believes they are using old ordinance. Furthermore commented on the officers not writing citations.

6. FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS
Requests from Commissioners For Future Agenda Items:
•Commissioner Ponce would like to consider another meeting day.
We have no idea what she is talking about because the minutes don't tell us. What, she doesn't like Mondays? Does she want a 3rd meeting per month. No clue. This is Ross Pool's job to let us know.
The Board has nothing meaningful that they want to place on their next agenda. Nothing.

7. ADJOURNMENT

Yep. All done. The Board voted to pass a new ordinance at the order of the Mayor.

The next meeting will be on Monday February 11, 2008 at 6:00 P.M., WEST VALLEY ANIMAL CARE CENTER 20655 Plummer Street, Chatsworth, California 91311.
These off-campus meeting are fun. Lots of people show up because the meeting is at a reasonable time of day.

BoardWatch Meeting rating: D- They brought nothing to the table. They rubber stamped an ordinance which would have passed even if they hadn't.

We welcome your comments. Just make up a name if you don't want us or anyone to know who you are.

REWIND: 2008 January 14 Board Meeting

"The Board lacks the power and the will..." - fellow LAAS Critic, December, 2008.

Let's rewind through 2008 and see what got done and what didn't, shall we?
At the end we'll have a snappy spreadsheet and a performance grade for 2008.+/- Read more...

Well, let's see...why don't we start with the agenda of the first meeting of 2008.
BW Comments in italics

Drum roll!

Commission Meeting Agenda for January 14, 2008

10:00 a.m. City Hall

President: Tariq Khero, V.P.: Kathy Riordan;Glenn Brown, Irene Ponce, Archie Quincey, Commissioners.

There are no posted minutes nor cancellation notice for this meeting. Ross Pool's job.
Surprised?
Did it happen?
We don't know.
If it did happen, here's how they would have spent the meeting--

1. ORAL REPORT OF THE GENERAL MANAGER

No report filed on the Commission web pages. Ross Pool's job. It's okay, these are usually filled with skewed "euthanasia" statistics.

2. COMMISSION BUSINESS
A. Approval of the Commission Meeting Minutes for November 13 and December 10, 2007

That's it! That's all the Commissioners had planned to address at this first meeting
of the year. Minutes from 2 months ago from a meeting no one can remember. Ross Pool's job.

B.Oral Report by the Commission on Meetings and Events attended.
Oh, and this too. Sorry.

Here's Ed Boks's agenda:
3. GENERAL MANAGER RECOMMENDS FOR BOARD ACTION

(That's Ed Boks-"rhymes with 'hoax'"- for you newbies-sounds serious!)

A. Policy to Guide the Handling of Permit Applications which include Elephant Walks and Similar Events for the Public (Revised Report)
"Policy to Guide the Handling"? WTF is that if you translate from bureaucrat(EB) doublespeak?

Here's the summary:
That the Board adopt requirements for issuing permits for elephants or other inherently dangerous wild animals, as detailed in the body of this report, and direct staff (that's EB-he likes to be called "staff". It's works well when the blame finger swings around if he who fucked up was not Ed, but "staff.") to implement the requirements immediately.

Basically, this is aimed at the very controversial "elephant walks" staged by Ringling Bros. Circus which a lot of us despise. Lots of rules and regs for the Circus: IDs for each elephant, health records, "dangerous" history of the elephant, if any, etc. This is instead of banning the elephant exploitation because, hey, it's profitable!*

What did they decide?

Who knows? No minutes. Ross Pool's Job.

We'll see when/if they come back to this. Also Ross Pool's Job-to keep things on the agenda until they are disposed of.

4.DISCUSSION ITEMS

This is when they make a plan to talk about stuff they can do nothing about until they place it on the agenda for a vote or "board action." The "discussion" has to be placed on the agenda, prior to the meeting, too. No, it's good. They need to discuss things. This is when they usually ask "staff" (Ed) for more info or for a report to be generated which nobody has time to generate.
So, minimum time to get from discussion to voting= 6 weeks because Meeting 1 gets the discussion item on deck, Meeting 2, they discuss, meeting 3 they act --or not..maybe they need more info or forgot about the whole thing-it happens!

A. Update on City Attorney’s Draft of Revised Proposed Transfer Permit Ordinance
-Update report regarding Board’s modified approval to make Transfer Permit Ordinance apply to all animals.

Sheesh! That's Assistant City Attorney Dov Lesel, to you mister! This a new set of subsections in the L.A. Muni Code aimed at breeders and back alley animal peddlers. Pet stores and "other commercial" entities are exempt of course. Seems that the last time this was on in Nov. 07 (yes , 2 months ago), the board wanted to change it to cover "all animals, " not just dogs and cats. I sense Kathy Riordan in there. She's on top of it.

So, I guess this means that all non-commercial transporters of animals (who does that leave?) will be required
to purchase a permit and show where the animal came from and where its going. That little iguana has to be micro chipped, too. Yes, micro chip that snake and that little songbird in Santee alley.

• First offense-a warning.
• No permit 5 days after the warning-$500 fine.
• Still no permit in 45 days-A misdemeanor which the City Attorney will not prosecute and no one will go to jail or pay a fine.
• How will they catch these folks smuggling animals or selling pit bull puppies out of a pick-up truck? Why, it will be "complaint driven", of course, and those ACO's[Animal Control Officer] will rush right out there and ...give a warning.
• Then they'll follow up in 5 days and write a $500 citation.
• Then they'll follow up in 45 days and arrest someone. Right!
This is busy work for the Board to keep them distracted and another headline-seeking lame idea from Ed Boks that would accomplish nothing. He's good at that.

5. PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD - (Comments from the public on items of public interest within the Board’s subject matter jurisdiction and on items not on the Agenda.)

This is you. Speaking your mind for the animals. You get 1 minute on each item and 3 minutes at the end to vent.
You got the cancellation notice, didn't you? Sorry, maybe Ross will pick up that $20 parking tab.

6. FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS
Requests from Commissioners for future Agenda Items.

Did they make any? No idea. No minutes of this meeting, if it ever took place.

7. ADJOURNMENT:
Next Commission Meeting is scheduled January 28, 2008, at Los Angeles City Hall, 200 North Spring Street, Los Angeles, California 90012.

[END OF AGENDA] (11:30 already?)
_______
Issues resolved: NONE (we don't count approving the minutes of past meetings).
Preview of 1/28/08: NONE of the above items are revisited.
BoardWatch Meeting Rating: F

We know, it's painful-- but stay with us. We don't get paid for this either.

*Care about Elephants?
Assembly Bill 777 which would have toughened the elephant cruelty lawin California died January 31, 2008- right around this meeting time. Ed Boks is a headline-seeker which is why, knowing that Sacramento would not pass this bill, he sought to be the elephant hero for L.A. Not a bad thing, but his motives are suspect. Remember the painted elephant for which Boks signed the permit ?



We welcome your comments. Just make up a name if you don't want us or anyone to know who you are.