How many times have we heard Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts Jr. say “no public money will be used towards these projects”? Too many times to count if you ask me.
Once again I’ll say a prophet isn’t honored in his own home and the City of Inglewood’s first quarter budget summary, although colorful and uniquely worded, doesn’t hide the fact that the first real economic numbers indicate the City wasn’t too far off in declaring a fiscal emergency on August 3, 2021.
After multiple delays with the official opening of Sofi stadium, and the impending completion of the new Los Angeles Clippers basketball arena, the City’s anticipated budget report shows the city council isn’t acting in a manner that neither benefits nor represents the entire City as a whole.
They are acting on behalf of a few developers who have made grand promises of being in a “community partnership ” with Inglewood when come to find out their intentions were to commandeer the elected officials to siphon off tax dollars from the same community they claim to want to help.
This isn’t science and in hindsight, we shouldn’t be surprised that the manner in which these projects were approved, with minuscule public input, wasn’t by design. Had residents had the opportunity to chime in like we did when Walmart tried to come to town, Kroenke would still be in St. Louis, and Dean Spanos still in San Diego or perhaps in Carson with Mark Davis.
Emilie St. John’s reporting on the questionable admissions tax figures is very important because the City’s explanation doesn’t pass the smell test, and is an insult to everyone’s intelligence because if the City is offering creative financial jargon it’s akin to “putting lipstick on a pig”.
Despite the City’s best effort to paint this utopia where manna and honey ŕains from heaven, it’s clearly obvious that Inglewood was dragged kicking and screaming over a financial cliff that could have easily been avoided.
Kudos again for focusing on the admissions taxes because what Inglewood City Treasurer Wanda Brown predicted has come to fruition in saying the City is heading towards dire financial straits and without intervention from the residents and taxpayers we are headed for disaster.
In fact, had Emilie St. John / 2UrbanGirls not kept bearing down on the details of the Inglewood Transit Connector project the public wouldn’t know that the project has been moving forward without the required insurance. Didn’t Melanie McDade allege the same happened when they moved the shuttle through the City years ago?
If anyone understands the concept of liability shouldn’t it be our mayor, who likes to remind everyone he was a police chief and has run how many agencies whose main focus is reducing liability on the taxpayer? I guess it’s foreign to Butts because how many lawsuits are we entangled in because of him?
This is going to be ugly and we shouldn’t expect Inglewood’s financial troubles to reverse themselves anytime soon as public safety costs associated with the sports and entertainment district were heavily underestimated. It’s clear the City doesn’t come close to breaking even from any revenue from the stadium because of the costs associated with public safety. The mayor can’t say I am making this up because it’s written in the staff report attached to the budget numbers.
Mayor Butts was well aware of the financial peril of bringing in the stadium but he couldn’t have pulled this off with Judy Dunlap or Mike Stevens on the council so he had to import two new members whose sole job was to shut up, sit down and let him do all the talking. Isn’t this why a former Inglewood accountant is no longer in her job and our treasurer hasn’t been seen at a city council meeting in well over a year because they know it too?
In closing, the warning signs were there that becoming a “sports epicenter” wasn’t going to be smooth sailing but the manner in which residents have been played is downright disgusting. If we’re to take the elected body by its actions and words let us look no further than the August 3, 2021 city council meeting when the Mayor and Council took emergency action in declaring a fiscal emergency. Their “quick fix” failed miserably when the two bond measures presented to Inglewood voters were met with fierce opposition and ended with residents soundly defeating Measure I which would have yielded the City over 4 million dollars a year to support infrastructure and public safety.
Residents only knew because the hidden documents buried in the staff report was reported on by 2UrbanGirls. This was the money the City desperately needed to stay afloat, meanwhile, the council feels the need to hire more social media employees because why not? It’s only money.
The City is still faced with the tall task of finding the money needed to finance the day-to-day operations of the Inglewood Transit Connector and don’t be surprised if the City starts poking around in your house looking for spare change under your couch cushions.
Marvin McCoy is a lifelong Inglewood resident and can be reached at therealmccoymarketinggroup@gmail.com or on Twitter @MarvinM83905936
1 Comment
Thank you for your important comments !
2 Urban Girls is to be commended for publishing the comments of Emile St John.
For those who have not been able to invest the time and researching the background it helps that there are those who can summarize the absolutely insulting behavior of the Mayor and his collection of go-alongs.
To those who have been paying attention to the misrepresentations a simple summary would be that the Mayor seems to lack the ability (?) or the interest (?) in truthtelling.
{Oh the super scary – he was a police chief with many under his command – who may have felt to do as they were told when dealing with those arrested… When did truthtelling become unimportant to him?}
From feeling he has the right to use a City owned car, feeling he can use tax dollars to sue someone to silence them from showing “snip its” of Council meetings, to telling a community member to go choke herself all recorded and available for review in public records….Wow , there is no media consultant who can clean up the bad acts of this administration – (yes each who vote yes share in the bad behavior) no matter how many of our dollars are spent to attempt the clean up.
Unfortunately many fail to understand these actions impact us all.
As our taxes are used to pay attorney fees, or for the police contracts to protect event fans, or settlement dollars to women who tell us there are Workplace harassment issues…..each one of those dollars mean residents live without the service we are paying for!!!
Some may ask who benefits ?
The billionaires we subsidize
and yes the “go along” council members,
their “assistants” at $100,000.00 per year,
and the assorted employees in created especially-for-them without mandatory education/experience/skill sets for the creative job titles.
Could the reason the city employee whose job description is providing public documents creates road blocks or claims the documents can not be made available be that the Mayor and administration don’t want residents to have the truth?
Why on earth, given the lies we have been told, does anyone believe the council members have bothered to read the documents they cast votes for?
The best lie our Mayor ever told list should include “not to worry about the FOOTBALL STADIUM traffic – there will only be 8 games all years long.
Shall we make the list of other not exactly truthful?
Otis our money, our community and our quality of life.
Oh back to that list what was address thing – about- really living ”with his in-laws”?