From My San Pedro
With the rebranding of San Pedro as a tourist destination, POLA takes an entertaining break from environmental and industrial development issues in the 4thepisode of its 30-minutePORTfolioTV series (produced quarterly and broadcast on Channel 35 at 10 am on Thursdays) to focus on the colorful history of the harbor. [Skip to the bottom to watch the episode.]
Read more at: https://www.mysanpedro.org/2012/01/san-pedro-stories-notorious-port-of-los.html
As Donald Trump’s failed coup recedes slowly in time, Republicans are working furiously to bury it much faster. But they can’t, for the simple reason that Trump is still there — not in the White House, not even on Twitter, but looming everywhere they might think to look, like an ancient, sinister eldritch, otherworldly terror from a combined product of William Randolph Hearst and H.P. Lovecraft. And he has the tentacles to prove it: his easily riled-up fan base.
How Trump’s impeachment trial will play out is anybody’s guess, there are simply too many variables. A huge factor standing in the way of it resembling justice is the lingering impact of the QAnon conspiracy cult. It may be severely shaken by having suffered the ultimate disconfirmation of its central prophecy — “The Storm” in which Trump vanquishes all his enemies.
“Trump did not declare martial law in his final minutes in office; nor did he reveal a secret plan to remain in power forever,” NPR’s Camila Domonoske noted. “President [Joe] Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi were not sent to Guantánamo Bay. The military did not rise up and arrest Democratic leaders en masse.”
But the storm had repeatedly failed to occur before when it should, only for new interpretations to appear. So that could still conceivably happen once again. More likely, something similar, but new (perhaps modeled more on how it worked than what it argued) will emerge to take up where it has faltered. Because, make no mistake, QAnon not only played a vital role in Trump’s failed coup, it’s still helping to keep Trump’s hold on the GOP intact. One of its earliest boosters — newly elected Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene — has emerged as the embodiment of Trumpism’s spreading stranglehold on the party.
Two Classic Anti-Semitic Conspiracy Theories
At its core, QAnon is a combination of two classic anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, slightly reformulated for the post-modern age: The oldest is the medieval blood libel, the false claim that Jews kidnap and murder Christian children to use their blood for ritual purposes — primarily as an ingredient in the baking of Passover matzah (unleavened bread). The earliest such ritual murder charge took place in Norwich, England, in the 12 century, two centuries before similar sorts of charges ignited witch hunts across the European continent. The second is Protocol of the Elders of Zion: the claim that a small coterie of Jews is secretly controlling the fate of nations, if not the world.
QAnon — first hatched on a neo-Nazi infested message board — combines elements of both conspiracy theories. It alleges that a cabal of Satan-worshipping cannibalistic pedophiles is running a global child sex-trafficking ring (recycling the earlier discredited “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory) and plotting against U.S. President Donald Trump, who is allegedly fighting the cabal. The very first QAnon post implicitly claimed Trump was secretly working with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the exact opposite of Mueller’s openly stated purpose.
An earlier post claimed “Hillary Clinton will be arrested between 7:45 AM – 8:30 AM EST On Monday – the morning of Oct. 30, 2017,” to which Q responded. “HRC extradition already in motion effective yesterday with several countries in case of cross border run…. Expect massive riots organized in defiance and others fleeing the US to occur.”
What actually happened on Oct. 30 was the exact opposite of what Q claimed. Mueller’s initial indictments against Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort and Manafort’s former business partner, Rick Gates. Yet, QAnon continued to promise that Mueller was working with Trump. This was the first in a seemingly endless pattern of discredited claims reinterpreted after the fact.
As indicated above, a key element of the theory is that Trump is planning a day of reckoning known as “Storm,” when thousands of members of the cabal will supposedly be arrested. That first post was the first glimpse of what the Storm promised to be. The vast majority of QAnon believers conflated the Jan. 6 insurrection with the Storm, and, of course, Trump leaving office puts the Storm beyond the realm of possibility.
QAnon as “gaming’s evil twin. A game that plays people.”
But it’s long been understood that cults can survive the disproof of central beliefs, and can actually grow stronger, by creatively reinterpreting events. Although unlikely for QAnon, something remarkably similar in spirit is very likely to emerge in some form. To understand why, we need to view QAnon as seen by the alternate reality game — sometimes called ARG — community, several members of which have described QAnon as intentionally creating an alternate reality, just as alternate reality games do.
The most chilling of these analyses, A Game Designer’s Analysis Of QAnon by Reed Berkowitz, described QAnon as “gaming’s evil twin. A game that plays people.”
“It is the differences that shed the light on how QAnon works and many of them are hard to see if you’re not involved in game development,” he went on to say. “QAnon is like the reflection of a game in a mirror, it looks just like one, but it is inverted.”
Take for example apophenia, “the tendency to perceive a connection or meaningful pattern between unrelated or random things (such as objects or ideas).”
“In most ARG-like games apophenia is the plague of designers and players, sometimes leading participants to wander further and further away from the plot,” Berkowitz explained.
But QAnon thrives on just such wandering.
“In real games there are actual solutions to actual puzzles and a real plot created by the designers. It’s easy to get off track because there is a track,” he explained.
QAnon is a mirror reflection of this dynamic. Here apophenia is the point of everything. There are no scripted plots. There are no puzzles to solve created by game designers. There are no solutions.
QAnon grows on the wild misinterpretation of random data, presented in a suggestive fashion in a milieu designed to help the users come to the intended misunderstanding. …
There is no reality here. No actual solution in the real world. Instead, this is a breadcrumb trail AWAY from reality.
The “reality” that people think they are finding is actually one they’re creating. But it’s one they’re creating around an identifiably core of “almost pure propaganda,” that’s deeply manipulative.
“That IS the sole purpose of this. It’s not advertising a product, it’s not for fun, and it’s not an art project,” Berkowitz writes. “There is no doubt about the political nature of the propaganda either. From ancient tropes about Jews and Democrats eating babies (blood-libel re-booted) to anti-science hysteria, this is all the solid reliable stuff of authoritarianism. This is the internet’s re-purposing of hatred’s oldest hits.”
QQAnon’s Origins:
It’s no surprise that this should be so. As explained in a Twitter thread by The Q Origins Project, the pol/sub-board of 4Chan, where Q first posted, from Oct. 28 through Dec. 1, 2017, “always had a large, racist, Nazi-friendly contingent before, during, and after Q’s time,” as well as a culture of hoaxes, with multiple other pretend insiders like Q. But it wasn’t just the board in general. It was even more specific: “many of the key ideas in the Q mythos were present in this very thread before Q started posting. … [F]ar from breaking new ground, Q gave his audience what they already wanted. ”
Things changed, however:
But by the time Q left 4chan at the end of November ’17, the composition of the board had changed — many boomers had been brought onto the boards by YouTuber tracybeanz, who can fairly be described as the first QAnon influencer.
So by late November, there were frequent skirmishes between Nazis and Q believers (and, interestingly enough, arguments among the Nazis: was Q bad because he wasn’t overtly antisemitic, or good because many Q believers were coming to 4chan and getting “pilled” on Nazism?).
Which is why QAnon is crucial in supporting Trumpism: It provides a common language for promoting hard-core white supremacists ideas, whether those promoting them fully realize it or not. And that’s what Trump’s takeover of the GOP is based upon.
A Co-Created Fictional Reality
Berkowitz goes on to make a series of illuminating key points. First, that Q is a fictional character:
QAnon uses the oldest trope of all mystery fiction. A mysterious stranger shows up and drops a strange clue leading to long-hidden secrets which his clues, and your detecting power, can reveal.
Someone with real earth-shattering information would not tease people like this. They’d release it the way Edward Snowden or the anonymous source behind the Panama Papers did — no spotlight on the messenger, no hints or mystery, just overwhelming mountains of evidence.
“Real people in the government with important information to disseminate deliver it as fast as possible usually all in one go,” Berkowitz wrote. “They don’t make you solve things. They try to be as specific as possible.”
Q is NOT a whistleblower. Q is a “plot device”. Q is fictional and acts exactly like a fictional character acts. This is because the purpose of Q is not to divulge actual information, but to create fiction.
That fiction is much more convincing, if the audience co-creates it themselves, which is the actual reason behind the fictional one that “Q wants you to ‘do your own research’ and come to your own conclusions.”
Berkowitz further notes that “Strongly held beliefs are literally a part of us,” which is why challenging them with facts — no matter how well documented — is generally not just useless, but counter-productive: “attacks on core beliefs are treated very much as attacks on us, even as strongly as a physical attack.” Thus, by setting things up so that people co-create their beliefs, “If we ‘create’ the ideas in our own minds, they become fused much more intently into our personality. They’re OURS.”
And that is what the fictional Q does with their “breadcrumbs,” cryptic hints that aren’t facts, but questions: “Puzzles and clues for the ‘investigators’ to uncover.” One reason for this is the “Eureka Effect.”
“Puzzles and knowledge gained through our own efforts are incredibly rewarding and also come with a hit of dopamine, the brain’s pleasure drug, as a reward,” he explained.
Another reason is to feed distrust of existing experts and information sources. “Do your own research” means “Don’t trust other people. Don’t trust institutions. Listen to me.”
“Solving puzzles together is a great way to form community and to join community,” Berkowitz explained. “ARGs are famous for this. Everyone has something to focus on, a shared interest, and something to do.”
With this combination of incentives and consequences in place, QAnon followers “can continue the game for themselves with very few cues. The game is everywhere.” And, indeed, QAnon has proved remarkably adept at cannibalizing other conspiracy theories and conspiracist obsessions — a trick that has proven particularly helpful when social media platforms have belatedly tried to push back against it.
It’s NOT A Conspiracy
While Berkowitz convincingly explained how QAnon functions as “gaming’s evil twin, A game that plays people,” that doesn’t necessarily mean it was created as such. Assuming that it would take us in the direction of turning this descriptive account into just another conspiracy theory, with powerful shadowy figures pulling history’s strings.
We do know that Q is a fictional character — a recent study of character patterns shows that the original 4Chan posts came from one author, while later posts, which continued on 8Chan, come from another one. But the rest of what Berkowitz describes cannot be firmly nailed down as to how much intentionality was involved, much less how much coordination. After all, there were other Anons before QAnon, and much of what Q did was simply copying them, which makes it impossible to determine how deeply he understood what he was doing, much less what commitments he had. There were also at least three main individuals responsible for dramatically boosting Q from obscurity, as NBC reporters Brandy Zadrozny and Ben Collins first described in August 2018: a YouTube video creator and two moderators of 4Chan.
So, rather than see QAnon as some carefully crafted creation masterminded by sophisticated puppet masters, we should be open-minded as to how it originated and evolved, how much intentionality and coordination there was at different points, etc. Paradoxically, if it were the creation of a sophisticated small cabal, that would probably be relatively comforting. Trump’s departure from office and the failure of the Storm to arrive have dealt quite a blow to QAnon, putting any such cabal in a difficult spot.
But the more unintentional and uncoordinated QAnon’s origin and evolution were, the more easily we could see it evolve, replicated in a functional way, not necessarily with any of the same specific elements. As long as the ingredients Berkowitz describes and the online social environment in which they played out are with us, either QAnon — in some mutated form — or its replicants, or both, will continue to provide a fictional alternative reality which at least roughly a third of all Americans seem happy enough to live in.
This column was originally published in Not Shutting Up, a newsletter about the issues facing journalism and democracy. Sign up for ithere.
Examining the News
On Jan. 7, The New York Times published an obituary for Neil Sheehan, the veteran foreign correspondent who broke the story of the Pentagon Papers, the U.S. Department of Defense’s deeply critical secret history of America’s involvement in Vietnam. The obituary was accompanied by an article, which Sheehan insisted be published only after his death, that purported to reveal for the first time Sheehan’s account of the “greatest journalistic catch” of a generation: how Sheehan had obtained the top secret documents from Daniel Ellsberg, a Rand Corporation analyst who had turned against the war.
Read more at: https://www.propublica.org/article/seeing-the-pentagon-papers-in-a-new-light
After Lula Davis-Holmes’ election as mayor of Carson, her first order of business was her vacant seat on the city council. Since the city switched from an at-large system to a district-based one. Davis-Holmes is keenly aware of the new circumstances.
Davis-Holmes said that a process will have to be formed to fill the seat given that the city now has district voting. Each district has more than 20,000 residents and the city is working out how to function under the circumstances. Under the new state of affairs, the electeds will have to be more conscious of the particular needs of their districts while the mayor’s focus as the chief executive will be focused on how Carson will function as a city.
“Well … that means you don’t run all over the city … [it means] you have your district with specific interests,” Davis Holmes said. “But our commonalities will remain [the] city as far as the big developments … coming into the city and parks. My desire is not to say, ‘OK, now that you’re in District 3 you get less revenue than another district.’”
Davis-Holmes explained that she had already begun working with consultants on how to govern going forward.
“What I’m going to be asking when we start appointing commissioners and board members is that they come from all over the city,” Davis-Holmes said. “As a resident and if you’re my elected official, I’d want to know that I’m represented in your district and how are you going to govern.
“We’re going to start having workshops, once I’ve laid down the bones. This is not new to other cities. I will look at how other cities function, but we’re not LA. We’re not that big. We have 14 parks in the city and they all will remain beautiful.”
Due to the census, a change in the population could change the political boundaries. Davis-Holmes noted she opposed changing the city’s governance to a district-based system so quickly.
“Like I told my colleagues last night, I’m not a last-minute person,” the new mayor said. “Those districts were picked, even though we looked at them because of the lawsuit.”
Davis-Holmes was referring to the lawsuit filed by the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project used to push for districts in Carson in 2019.
“In my mind, we should have fought it because no judge has yet told us that we were in violation. We jumped the gun,” Davis-Holmes said. “At the end of the day, everything they were trying to do, it didn’t happen. We still have the same elected officials.”
Davis-Holmes noted that if she wanted to be divisive she could ensure there are four African-Americans on the city council instead of three.
“My seat is open,” Davis-Holmes said. “All we need are three people to say ‘OK, appoint this person.’ That is my district and I’m going to have a lot to say on who gets elected or appointed to that seat. I want a diverse council because it’s so diverse.”
When asked about what’s needed to have the council to be even more reflective of the city it serves, she replied that residents need to get involved.
“You must take ownership of what’s going on in your city and not just come to council to tell us what a terrible job we’re doing,” she said. “What are you doing to help change that?”
Davis-Holmes noted the city has put out a call for residents to submit applications to serve on the city’s advisory boards.
“We have over a hundred applications in right now today.” Davis-Holmes said. “I want new blood in and I want new people. I’m gonna have some of the old ones because they have the knowledge and expertise, but you got to get involved in your city.”
Helping Small Businesses through the Pandemic
On helping small businesses through the pandemic, Davis-Holmes noted that Carson has been receiving community development block grants and directing them to small businesses. The new mayor said the city council was looking to help 50 businesses with the money but is tasking staff with reducing some hurdles in the application process.
“What I’m asking my consultant to now do is to streamline the process…” Davis-Holmes explained. “The [application process for the] CDBG money is so cumbersome. You have to have all your data in order. What I’m finding is that with our small businesses, they don’t have all that information, the whos, whats and whens in order.”
Affordable Housing and Struggling Families
Another of Davis-Holmes priorities is wrestling with the question of how the city is going to live after the pandemic.
“The city is not going to look the same and we need to address homelessness, even though we don’t have a large [homeless] population,” Davis-Holmes said.
She pointed to the city’s rental assistance program and expressed shock that only 10 people applied for the assistance, which offered $1,000 a month for three months for struggling renters.
“Are you kidding me?” Davis-Holmes asked incredulously. “It’s like I told the city manager (Sharon Landers, the first female city manager in the city’s history), if you have not identified every apartment building where there are renters, then you have dropped the ball. Not everybody is on social media.”
Davis-Holmes described seeing lines wrapped around the corner filled with struggling Carsonites and a number of them mobile home park residents, during recent food giveaways during the pandemic.
“We got some 20 mobile home parks in the city. Are you telling me those people don’t need help paying their rent?” asked Davis-Holmes, rhetorically. “I don’t believe that. But they’re in line three days a week for food.”
The four-time former city councilwoman recounted the circumstances of one resident she encountered. The resident was behind four months in lot rental fees for her mobile home and found the process for rental assistance to be too cumbersome.
“I don’t want to be the person, or the city staff that’s keeping you from paying your mortgage when we know we have $3,000 we can give you,” Davis-Holmes said. “There are a lot of people out there … we’re having a party, but nobody knows we’re having it.”
The new mayor noted that the city only has so much power to stop the sale of a mobile home park.
“There is a process that you must go through,” Davis-Holmes said. “Once the owner meets that criteria the park is for sale, but we as a council, we can’t stop it.”
With that said, Davis-Holmes explained that there are things the city can do to protect residents. She cited the Imperial Mobile Home Park as an example.
“Never in the history of a sale of mobile home parks have residents received a package like we’re putting together,” Davis-Holmes said. “My request for them was this … if you take this park (and they could have told me no), I want you to allow x number of people to move back in at the same rate that they were paying right now.”
The residential housing complex being planned for the site is going to be a senior city. Davis-Holmes requested that Imperial’s residents be given relocation expenses and that they be allowed to move into the residential complex and allowed to stay there as long as they live. Davis-Holmes noted that the cheapest price the developer can purchase a mobile home coach was for $85,000.
“Now we have some people that’ve been in that mobile home park who paid $35,000 for their coach, so you’re gonna walk away with $85,000 in relocation fees and the opportunity to come back,” the new mayor said.
“I’ve also asked and the Faring Company has been very amenable to me,” Davis-Holmes said. “I have some seniors who cannot move and are never going to move. I don’t want them stressed out.”
In response to the organizing efforts of mobile home park residents, she believes it is the doing of Donald Trump-supporting outsiders.
“What we have right now going on is a lot of outsiders coming in, you know, the Trump mentality inciting them,” Davis-Holmes said. “The park across the street, Avalon, they got wind of the offer, because they were upset too. But when they realized the package that we as a council had put together to assist our residents, they said we want that same package.”
Davis-Holmes concluded that it’s a good deal and noted that it’s changing the landscape because the City of Carson is changing.
While the city is replacing its affordable housing stock, Mayor Davis-Holmes has pledged to refocus her attention on middle-income housing. The mayor noted that she has been approached by a developer wanting to purchase the Renaissance at the City Center and retooled a bit for middle-income buyers.
“We have to look at all of these, but we also need to know that to be a viable city our residents have to have some disposable income,” Davis-Holmes said. “Because we’re talking about bringing in retail and these restaurants, we have to have people with the disposable income and I think Carson is that city.
“We are the fifth highest-grossing income level in the South Bay. You need to look at where we’re spending our money. Our monies are going outside Carson. I want our dollars to stay here in Carson. We live, work and play in Carson.”
“My philosophy is to wait and the right developer will come along,” the mayor said. “I’m waiting on a project right now that everybody says is going to be a landfill. But as soon as I won the election….”
Davis-Holmes refrained from saying the name of the developers, who’ve shown interest in the city. But she described Carson as more than just a warehouse city or a low-income city.
“We need to attract those businesses that will bring those high-end technology jobs into our city, she said. “If they can do it in Silicon Valley, we could be the Diamond of the South Bay.”
Read the online version of this story to learn what Mayor Lula Davis-Holmes had to say about the city of Carson’s relationship with Cal State University of Dominguez Hills and Dignity Health Sports Park.
On diesel truck traffic in Carson, she said she and most Carsonites are “trucked out.”
“They tear up our infrastructure when they come in,” Davis-Holmes said. “I know the warehouse people are upset with me, but at the end of the day who elected me?
“How do you want our city to look in the next five or 10 years? Do you want to be known as the city close to the ports that has trucks running up and down affecting the quality of life for all of our residents? We need to come up with a plan that addresses where we are with trucks running through our communities, because at the end of the day, it affects my residents.”
On Cal State Dominguez
Davis-Holmes noted she mentioned twice that she would be working to build a better working relationship with Cal State Dominguez Hills. She already has a good personal relationship with Dr. Thomas Parham.
“I’ve already met with Dr. Parham and we’ve had this conversation about partnering,” Davis-Holmes said.
“What I’ve wanted in this city since forever is a performing arts center … and a museum which talks about the greatness of this city and the university,” the mayor said. “Let’s tie all those things together and let’s spin off of each other because you know, we need to be promoting Cal State Dominguez Hills.”
In describing why the city and the university have had such a rocky relationship over the past few years, she gave an answer that obliquely pointed to the aggressive stance taken by former Mayor Albert Robles, particularly when the university broke ground on University Village without taking the city under consideration.
“We had it, then it dropped,” the new mayor said. “We changed presidents … you got different personalities of your mayors and your councils … I’m an alumni of Cal State University and I know that’s a jewel of the South Bay. When you’re a diamond of the South Bay with a university, we should be touting that, we should be saying, our banners and everything should be saying Cal State University Dominguez Hills.”
With Dr. Parham, Davis-Holmes sees wonderful things happening.
“I’m gonna continue to build the relationship with him from when he came on board,” the mayor said. “I’m not here to fight the university. I understand that we are local government and that they are state property. How can I work with you to help move these projects? I don’t need to be a hindrance to you and ruin projects that’s going to benefit our city. That’s what happened in the last administration.”
While the mayor is conciliatory in regards to the university and touts her positive relationship with Dr. Parham, she’s clear about wanting a seat at the table when it comes to development issues.
“I don’t want to delay their projects, which was about to happen at one time,” she said. “I want to be the vehicle that helps them and we will have that partnership and how we can look at things that may not happen during my tenure but they’re on the table for future councils.”
On the Dignity Health Sports Park, the mayor is adamant that the relationship between the sports complex and the city has to grow.
“Everybody in this city needs to pay their fair share when [the city is] supporting it,” the mayor said. The owners of the Dignity of Health Center have the same owners as the Staples Center. They have a wonderful relationship up there and the city of LA is benefiting from the Staples Center being there.”
Davis-Holmes noted that the majority of the people who come to the soccer games don’t live in the city of Carson.
“How are we gonna develop a relationship where the city benefits also?” the mayor asked. “ I have residents who have not ever put a foot on that site. So how do we build a relationship that is all inclusive?”
The mayor says that this sense of everyone paying their fair share is the reason why the sales tax passed.
“It’s not just for our residents [who are paying]. Most of the sales tax will be passed on to people who come through our city because of the daytime population,” Davis-Holmes said.
Davis-Holmes said she would not dwell on her conflict with former Mayor Albert Robles because of a pending lawsuit.
The mayor concluded the interview noting that she is the people’s champ following the election and pledged to continue to be the voice of all of Carson.
“We are one city, one people,” she said. “We’re in this together. I have not changed. I’m unbought and unbossed.”
During the past half-century the Queen Mary has changed hands between owners and or operators more than a half-dozen times. Today, like many other hotels worldwide, it suffers the economic pains the pandemic has brought on with a sharp decline in demand for hospitality services. Making things worse for the floating hotel, on Jan. 20, Eagle Hospitality Trust, a real estate investment trust which operates the Queen Mary announced it is seeking Chapter 11 protection.
The Trust, created in 2019 by Urban Commons to operate the Queen Mary, owns a 66-year lease to operate the ship and rights to develop the 65 acres around it.
The City of Long Beach, which owns the Queen Mary, has always intended for the ship to be the centerpiece for events and leisure in the city. Until recently, the ship was the site for food festivals like the West Coast BBQ Classic and the Delicious Chili & Brewfest. In 2017, renderings of the Queen Mary Island entertainment complex revealed plans for a site full of stores, restaurants, sports venues and entertainment facilities. Queen Mary has also been the site for seasonal events that Southern Californians have come to look forward to such as the Queen Mary’s Dark Harbor for Halloween and Chill for the winter holiday season.
Even while hosting such major regional events, the Queen Mary continued to be a destination for both tourists and locals eager to see the famed art deco ocean liner. Featuring restaurants, a museum and a hotel, the ship was intended to serve as a tourist attraction. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the National Trust for Historic Preservation has accepted Queen Mary as part of the Historic Hotels of America.
Though the former Cunard ocean liner has become a strong draw as a destination spot, trouble was starting to brew even before the pandemic hit.
In October 2019, the City of Long Beach warned Urban Commons that the company was failing to uphold its commitment to maintain and repair Queen Mary and was in danger of defaulting on its 66-year lease agreement. Urban Commons responded with an updated plan for repairs.
In December 2019, the city announced a review of the finances of Urban Commons to determine whether the City of Long Beach had received all revenues owed.
In a recent statement, the City of Long Beach said it will request information from Eagle Hospitality Trust to understand their immediate operational plans and will take appropriate legal steps to ensure the city and the Queen Mary are protected.
Lastly, the city manager and City Council will schedule an open discussion about Queen Mary in February to review the situation, future plans, and requirements that Eagle Hospitality has to the city under the master lease.
The Queen Mary has been closed to public operations due to the pandemic since May 7,
2020.
Now, the question is, will the 85-year-old vessel survive the pandemic.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health or Public Health has confirmed 256 new deaths and 5,189 new cases of COVID-19. To date, Public Health identified 1,129,503 positive cases of COVID-19 across all areas of L.A. County and a total of 17,308 deaths.
Public Health, Feb. 3, confirmed a third case of COVID-19 variant B.1.1.7, the variant discovered in the United Kingdom (U.K.). Presence of the B.1.1.7 variant in Los Angeles County means virus transmission can happen more easily, and residents and businesses must be more diligent at implementing and following all standard public health safety measures, including face coverings, distancing, and handwashing, put in place to prevent additional cases, hospitalizations, and deaths.
Public Health is reminding everyone of past tragic consequences of gatherings. In the weeks following every holiday, and many major sporting events, the county experienced increases in cases, and then hospitalizations and deaths. Public Health recommends residents enjoy the Super Bowl and cheer for their team from their home with those they live with. Residents should connect virtually with their friends and not gather with people from outside their household to watch the Super Bowl.
Of the 256 new deaths reported today, 69 people who passed away were over the age of 80, 92 people who died were between the ages of 65 and 79, 51 people who died were between the ages of 50 and 64, 24 people who died were between the ages of 30 and 49. Thirteen deaths were reported by the City of Long Beach and seven deaths were reported by the City of Pasadena.
Testing results are available for nearly 5,543,000 individuals with 19% of people testing positive. There are 5,165 people with COVID-19 currently hospitalized and 27% of these people are in the ICU.
Along with the majority of the State, Los Angeles County is in the most restrictive purple tier in the State’s Blueprint for a Safer Economy. In order to move into the red tier and have additional opportunities for re-openings, L.A. County’s daily case rate must be at or below 7 new cases per 100,00 people and the county’s test positivity rate must be at or below 8%. As of Jan. 23, L.A. County’s adjusted case rate is 38.7 new cases per 100,000 people and the test positivity rate is 11.3%.
It is clear LA county has quite a way to go before transmission in the county is considered no longer widespread; hopefully, through following all the rules, good progress will be made to slow the spread and move into a less restrictive tier.
Published Jan.29 By Marlowe Clark
Proposition 19 has now passed in California, and with it brought changes to how property tax is reassessed for some purchases, effective April 1, 2021. The new law replaces Prop 60 and Prop 90, affecting replacement property by homeowners who are over 55, severely disabled, or whose home has been substantially damaged by wildfires or natural disaster. It allows the homeowners to transfer their original home’s taxable value to a replacement property. It’s unclear as of yet how properties sold prior to April 1 will be treated if the replacement purchase occurs after this date. Regardless, the replacement purchase must occur within two years of the original property’s sale.
Under prior law, this type of reassessment could only be applied if the purchase was made in the same county as the prior residence or in specific counties. Under new law, it applies throughout California. Additionally, prior law required the replacement home to have equal or lesser value than the original home. Prop 19 has provisions for an adjusted rate in a circumstance where the value is greater. The adjusted rate is calculated as the original home’s taxable value plus the difference between the replacement home’s purchase price and the original home’s sale price. This reassessment can be applied up to three times, or indefinitely any time that it is applied under the provisions for substantial property damage.
With Prop 19 also came a change to intergenerational transfers. Previously, a child or grandchild could inherit a property with no change to the property tax amount. Effective February 16, 2021, that exemption from reassessment applies only while the heir is using the property as their primary residence, and only if the heir claims a homeowner’s or disabled veteran’s exemption within one year of the transfer. The new law also requires that the property continue to be used as the child or grandchild’s primary residence. Once the property is no longer their primary residence, the property will be reassessed.
If the value of the inherited property is more than one million dollars greater than the original purchase value, there will be a partial reassessment. Essentially, the heir is allowed to use the original purchase value, plus one million dollars as the baseline property value. Above that, normal property taxes are applied.
In addition, family farms are now also included in properties that can retain their taxable value when transferred. Farms are not subject to the primary residence test, however all other qualifications and exemptions apply.
Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash
https://www.beachchatter.com/2021/01/29/prop-19s-new-laws-for-property-tax-exemption/
By Bruce Rushton, Illinois Times
B.L. “Billy” Cozad, a fourth-generation cockfighter who raises roosters in Oklahoma, wrote this on his web page devoted to blood sport that’s illegal in 50 states, plus the District of Columbia. Congress and former president Donald Trump added Puerto Rico to the list two years ago.
Read more at: https://www.illinoistimes.com/springfield/cockfight-crusades/Content?oid=13121652
OAKLAND – Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Biden-Harris Administration today announced a pilot project to establish community vaccination sites in Oakland and Los Angeles.
These pilot sites, which will be based at the Oakland-Alameda Coliseum and California State University, Los Angeles, are part of the wider effort to establish 100 vaccination sites nationwide in the federal administration’s first 100 days. The sites will be co-run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency or FEMA and the State of California through the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services or Cal OES.
FEMA will provide resources and federal staffing support to establish these new community vaccination centers as well as operational support.
The two locations chosen for these efforts are in some of the most diverse and socioeconomically challenged communities in the country. They are also communities that have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 and are home to essential workers who have borne the brunt of keeping the economy open over the past year.
The goal of establishing these joint federal pilot sites is to continue to expand the rate of vaccinations in California in an efficient, effective and equitable manner, with an explicit focus on making sure that communities with a high risk of COVID-19 exposure and infection are not left behind.
In order to expand the reach of these state-federal sites further into the communities, each of these new sites will be paired with two mobile vaccination clinics which can be deployed to multiple locations to amplify and provide distribution to areas that otherwise lack sufficient support.
Preparations and buildout of these two locations are now underway and the sites are expected to be open to eligible members of the public beginning Feb. 16. Registration for vaccine appointments at these two sites will be available through the state’s MyTurn scheduling system in the coming days.
The State of California is coordinating closely with FEMA to ensure the vaccine doses used at these sites will not decrease the available supply for other sites in the hosting counties.
Area is designated a California Cultural District in highlighting diversity and unique artistic identities.
The last First Thursday Art Walk probably feels something like a distant memory since the COVID-19 pandemic began nearly one year ago. However, on Jan. 26, a group of San Pedro arts partners and stakeholders, led by Angels Gate Cultural Center executive director Amy Erickson met virtually to discuss relaunching the First Thursday Art Walk and how to promote, market and move forward the art created in the district.
The group intends to use the remainder of a $10,000 grant the San Pedro Arts District received from the California Arts Council in 2017. The San Pedro Arts District was the first to be chosen out of 14 districts throughout the state.
Thus far, grant funds have been spent on creating a Facebook group for the Arts District, a page on the San Pedro Chamber’s website providing links to all contributors in the cultural district, light pole signage and sponsoring events with Chamber members and artists and networking with local businesses.
But the question that remained was, what can First Thursday Art Walk look like going forward?
About 50 meeting participants separated into breakout discussion groups with scribes sharing their group’s top ideas, some of which RLn has shared here. We also solicited the thoughts of local artists and gallery owners such as Gallery Azul’s Cora Ramirez and Ray Vasquez and Michael Stearns of Michael Stearns Studio at The Loft who couldn’t attend the meeting.
Meeting attendees were drawn largely from the nonprofit sector with relatively few artists and gallerists in attendance. Most importantly, the meeting’s attendees were not reflective of San Pedro diversity given that the body was largely senior, white, and female.
Breakout groups best ideas
A few of these suggestions have been applied previously, albeit executed with slightly different tweaks — like food truck locations. Given the time constraints of virtual meetings and the choreography of moving from a full panel to breakout rooms, a thoughtful and robust discussion was missing. But foremost, the art walk needs to be an art led event within an artist led cultural district. Historically, this hasn’t consistently been the case.
Gallerists input
Proprietors at Gallery Azul — active First Thursday participants since 2006 — said they chose to open shop in San Pedro for its small town feel, the growing art scene, its closeness to the water and its friendliness. As artists themselves they wanted to add some Latinx/Hispanic flavor to the San Pedro art scene. Gallery Azul prides itself in being a gallery of diversity.
As Chairs of the San Pedro Waterfront Arts District Board, they agreed the majority of ideas presented provide excitement for the future of the artwalk.
“When we are finally able to resume the art walk, people [will] be looking forward to participating in activities, and events,” Ramirez wrote in an email. “I suspect that people will especially be more comfortable with outdoor activities, and will be easing into indoor events. The art walk is a perfect segue for this … People will [want] to reconnect, they will appreciate an aesthetically pleasing environment and one that also appears safe. The art walk can be that.”
Ramirez said they don’t agree with street closures because people tend to stay confined to those spaces, people should be encouraged to roam. And food trucks need to be revisited.
“When we have gone out to visit other galleries, the placement of the food trucks, in our opinions, is counterproductive to galleries, they tend to create clutter, and block the art galleries,” Ramirez said. “Our restaurants should be our priority and should not be overshadowed by the food trucks. Now that outdoor dining is a reality, the art walk can become more dynamic and interactive for restaurants.”
Cross coordination with restaurants and galleries may be effective, Ramirez noted. As gallery owners, they’re constantly asked for recommendations and happily refer people to the various local restaurants.
She continued, one of the most important components — publicity — needs to go beyond San Pedro. The arts district would benefit from diversifying publicity efforts by advertising in multiple magazines that promote art scenes, such as Artillery, Art Scene, and Los Angeles magazines, to name a few. Also, take advantage of podcasts, and programs that highlight local LA events. San Pedro should also publicize other neighboring art walks.
They agree, street performers, music or DJs should be dispersed throughout the art walk and suggested creating a mural or public-art walk to encourage people to explore the city’s public art.
In a final note, the couple asked their 19-year-old daughter, who grew up in the gallery and with the art walk, for her feedback: She approved live music throughout the art walk. She recommended not getting rid of the food trucks completely — adding that her peers typically won’t go into a sit down restaurant, there should be less and different ones every month, and they shouldn’t block restaurants or galleries. She also recommended more ice cream trucks — everybody likes ice cream.
Michael Stearns said some of what was done before with the art walk works, like promoting the event in local media such as this newspaper is absolutely required. And adding a map of the art district helps.
“‘Where else is there to go?’ Is part of the marketing concept,” Stearns said.
Stearns was just getting started. Next, he said, “If we’re really trying to grow this, we need to do something with the Vincent Thomas Bridge, some sort of marketing in Long Beach. It’s natural. The bridge is an icon with the lights, maybe some sort of special lighting with the bridge on First Thursday nights … It could be done.”
He suggested the two art groups on each side of the bridge could combine forces to get something done in the form of marketing to both communities.
On food trucks Stearns said people have to eat and food trucks are a draw.
“Because people eat on a food truck doesn’t mean they don’t want to look at art,” he said.
Stearns supports advertising, specifically in Artillery magazine which covers local artists. He added where artists must get involved is in creating a database to market to or else, how will anybody find them?
He agreed, having chalk art events is a good idea that always draws people. But he said no to street vendors.
“It’s good for the locals but is it an artwalk?” he asked. “The key is to keep it clean … What kind of marketing piece are we going to put together?
He suggested laying out a map, working on advertising and talking about internal marketing as a group.
“The arts district needs to cross market … if Angels Gate has an event [that falls] on First Thursday, connect it to the artwalk,” he said. “It comes down to communication.”
The goal of the district is to present these priorities to the community by the end of February, then decide how to launch them. From there Erickson said it may be six to eight months to see many of these ideas come to life at the art walk.
Real people. Real news. Random Lengths is the Los Angeles harbor area's remaining independently owned progressive news magazine. We cover news in Carson, Wilmington, Long Beach, Lomita, Torrance, Rancho Palos Verdes and San Pedro.
Contact us: letters@randomlengthsnews.com
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