CITY COUNCILMAN FUENTES GETS REVENGE ON STNC See story below
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FRIDAY • OCTOBER 16, 2015
TELLING THE TRUTH FOR OVER 10 YEARS!
VOLUME 11 • NUMBER 21
ST Neighborhood Council When Will It Stop? Evicted by CD-7’s Fuentes David DeMullé
spoke.” Things like that tended to make the council member’s Over the past year, efforts staff even more unreachable. to communicate with CD-7 I was in the Logistics Felipe Fuentes appear to have Manager’s office when the fallen on deaf ears. With a locksmith came in to change multitude of counselor aides the locks. I jokingly stated coming and going as though “Well at least you’re going to the front door was a turnstile, leave the master keys for the in Ed Rock’s office. I tried to no one seemed to be responstaff.” His answer was “No, speak with the councilman’s sible for anything other than I’m changing them all today.” making sure that no one got to This effectively would lock- aid, Asatur Hovannisyan, but Laena Shakarian, Fuenspeak directly with Fuentes. out the STNC from their city tes’ field rep, answered the Phone calls were not hall offices and create a major councilman’s office door and returned to media staffers or problem for City Employee re-iterated to the locksmith, even to STNC representatives. Ed Rock who is charged with “Change them all!” Some kind of media blackout putting together the agendas, Over the years, in became Fuentes’ trademark. making copies for all board speaking with different city And heaven forbid if one of members and setting up the councilmembers, it became his field reps—such as Wesley tables and chairs for the meetvery apparent to me that Hernandez—came out with ing. One other drawback of about one-third of them had a statement; it was quickly the eviction is the locking up see STNC, page 10 stated that “[Fuentes] misof all the community archives by
INSIDE: Vons Gets Locking Shopping Carts ................ Montrose Community Church Reunion ................
2 9
DEPARTMENTS What Folks Are Doing........... 2 My Two Cents....................... 2 View from the Rock.............. 3 Letters and Perspectives........ 3 Chef Randy........................... 5 Pets Page............................. 8 S-T Crime Stats................... 10 Take My Card..................... 11
Two senseless deaths on Foothill Blvd in the past two weeks. All that’s left are two simple memorials from their friends. by
David DeMullé
Last Friday James “Slim Jim” Ballard was struck and killed in front of Giamela’s Pizza on Foothill Boulevard. The driver was not cited or arrested because “It was an accident,” stated an LAPD
seargent who was directing the investigation. The most plausible story is that the driver did not see Ballard as he crossed the road heading to the 7-11 to get drinks for his friends. His friends were sitting on
see Memorials, page 9
Tujunga Gets Ready for The End of Daylight Savings Time by
David DeMullé
When Mark Seigel decided that enough time had passed since the clock worked correctly, he decided to fix it himself. What he found when he opened up the electrical box was that someone had cut off a length of wire. He was able to replace it and when he reconnected the Commerce clock, he set it back an hour so he won’t have to reset it in November. The Commerce clock cost the Commerce Owners & Business Restoration Association (COBRA) almost $13,000 and was attacked by Michael Higby’s “Mayor
Sam” hate site almost daily until it finally gave up and shut down operations in 2011. The clock stopped at 9:05 because a vandal cut and stole the wires going to it. With prodding by COBRA, Councilmember Krekorian sent a letter to the Bureau of Street Lighting to place a street clock at the corner of Commerce Avenue and Tujunga Canyon Boulevard as part of the revitalization of Historic Old Towne Commerce Avenue. One day later, the clock tower was approved and installation was scheduled to begin. No one had ever heard of the city process working so quickly.
The vandalized Commerce Avenue clock was repaired by Mark Seigel after months of trying to deal with the city and with no response. In his letter, he asked the Bureau of Street Lighting to use the existing streetlight electrical system for the clock, as it “makes the best
fiscal sense,” he wrote. With the rise in a pedestrian traffic along Commerce Avenue, residents took note when see Clock, page 9
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