Inglewood Successor Agency land transfer deal stalls

By 2UrbanGirlsAugust 11, 2018Updated:January 1, 2023No Comments3 Mins Read

Is Inglewood Mayor James Butts bullying encroaching neighboring city boundaries? As the Chair of the newly formed Los Angeles County Second District Oversight Board to the Successor Agencies of Carson, Compton, Culver City, Hawthorne, Inglewood, Lawndale, and Lynwood, Butts wields the power to set the agenda for the voting members to consider for an affirmative vote.

The first meeting was held Tuesday, July 24, 2018, with a flimsy agenda with no supporting documentation available to the public. The Mayor knows how to promote music events and himself to the public, yet, when it comes to matters he doesn’t want us to know about, we the public aren’t notified.

It would appear Mayor Butts is trying to get some peculiar deals authorized, that he has found himself defending in litigation. The deals center around property formerly owned by the Inglewood Redevelopment Agency (RDA), which upon its being dissolved, was turned over to the Inglewood Successor Agency.

A couple of those deals involved select Inglewood business owners. Michael and Louise Koper initiated a lawsuit over land the mayor wanted to be developed into an Auto Mall. The state disallowed RDA transactions that went towards a new building built on Regent and there was a huge outcry over an $18 million dollar loan, made to Madison Square Garden (MSG), to rehab the Forum. The latest litigation surrounds Successor Agency-owned parcels on Century Blvd. At one point MSG held a land lease that was subsequently broken and the land was bequeathed to Murphy’s Bowl LLC to build a Clippers arena.

Mayor Butts appears to be going to extreme lengths to keep his shady deals from being fully revealed to the public. The mayor has enlisted city staff to participate in his fraud, possibly under the guise that they would lose their job and increase salaries if they went against him. Each makes in excess of $100k although it is unclear their educational background or skill set. Both have worked for the city since the Dorn Administration.

He has city staffer Yakema Decatur signing staff reports, as opposed to the city manager. When former Accounting Manager Barbara Ohno discussed the switcheroo of Successor Agency property parcel numbers, Secretary to the City Manager, Tunisia Johnson’s signature was used to notarize the documents. All are detailed in the exhibits to Ohno’s now-settled lawsuit.

Eventually, Mayor Butts will have his hat brought to him and Inglewood residents are anxiously awaiting the day he is removed from the dais by the power of law enforcement.

A newly filed lawsuit by Inglewood Residents Against Takings and Evictions alleges violations of the Brown Act. Under state law, the Oversight Board can not vote on land matters that are involved in litigation, which means Steve Ballmer will not be building anything in the city of Inglewood anytime soon.

2UrbanGirls ponders whether 2nd District County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas will cooperate in a federal investigation, into Mayor Butts, to get him and his son Sebastian Ridley-Thomas out of their own federal investigation surrounding a dubious campaign donation USC played intermediary to?