LA City Council Authorizes Arizona Boycott (Updated)
[Guest post by DRJ]
Los Angeles won’t balance its budget and both Fitch and Moody’s have downgraded LA’s debt, so what does the City Council do? Vote to boycott Arizona:
“Los Angeles on Wednesday became the largest city yet to boycott Arizona over its tough new law targeting illegal immigration in a move that likely will affect some $8 million in contracts with the state.
The City Council voted 13-1 to bar Los Angeles from conducting business with Arizona unless the law is repealed. The vote followed an emotional council discussion during which many members noted that their ancestors were U.S. immigrants.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa already has said he would approve the boycott.
The proposal could affect investments and contracts worth as much as $52 million, including contracts for airport, harbor and trucking services, according to a report from the city’s chief legislative analyst. That report recommends the council consider suspending travel, cutting contracts and refraining from making any new ones with Arizona-based companies.”
However, the boycott may be selective:
“But Councilwoman Janice Hahn, who co-authored the resolution, said it would be impractical to cancel most of those deals and only about $7 million to $8 million in city contracts probably would be affected.
“US Airways is based in Arizona and they certainly fly in and out (of Los Angeles)” and it would hardly be feasible to end those flights, Hahn said before the council vote.
Hahn said the Los Angeles boycott also won’t affect the city’s Department of Water and Power, which has wind farm and nuclear energy contracts in Arizona. Among the contracts with Arizona companies that conceivably could be terminated include those for helicopter services, Taser guns, waste management, engineering and surveillance equipment.
Hahn said “the best scenario” would be to turn around and give those contracts to California suppliers.”
This boycott sends a message that illegal immigrants are welcome in LA, and I bet they get the message.
— DRJ
UPDATE — A Highland Park, Illinois, high school girls basketball team has joined the boycott, although some parents and players aren’t happy about it:
“The Highland Park High girls varsity basketball team won’t be making their way to Arizona for a tournament as originally planned in a move that’s thrust the school into the middle of the debate over that state’s new controversial immigration law. While school officials are citing safety concerns as one reason to cancel the trip, team members and their parents say that it’s a political play, one that has no place in high school athletics. The team is coming off a championship season and had been raising funds for the trip. But District 113 Assistant Superintendent Suzan Hebson gave the Tribune some fishy statements.
Hebson said Arizona is off-limits because of uncertainty about how the new law will be enforced. Signed by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer last month, it makes it a crime to be in the country illegally and requires police to check suspects for immigration paperwork. Hebson said the turmoil is no place for students of Highland Park High School, which also draws from Highwood.
“We would want to ensure that all of our students had the opportunity to be included and be safe and be able to enjoy the experience,” Hebson said of the tournament, which will be played in December. “We wouldn’t necessarily be able to guarantee that.”
Asked if there are undocumented players on the team, or if anyone associated with the team is in the country illegally, Hebson said she did not know.”
Yet another unconstitutional act by the Los Angeles city council.
Typical.
SPQR (26be8b) — 5/12/2010 @ 3:03 pmRegarding US Air, that’s interstate commerce. The LA City Council doesn’t have the power to ban their use of LA Airport.
Steven Den Beste (99cfa1) — 5/12/2010 @ 3:04 pmI’d like to get in on those renegotiated contracts:
1. All invoices paid in full within 30 days or interest penalties.
2. After 3 months the mayor and city council members are personally responsible for the interest penalty payments until the bills are paid in full.
We are familiar with the quote that democracy dies once 51% of the voters realize they can grant themselves whatever they want- well, when it is 51% who are used to demanding from others and the others don’t want to play along, whatcha goin’ to do then?
MD in Philly (ea3785) — 5/12/2010 @ 3:15 pmIt would be interesting to see that list of AZ based companies currently doing business with the City of Los Angeles, and to find out how many of them could be replaced by CA, or other non-AZ businesses, and how many couldn’t.
AD - RtR/OS! (04f5c9) — 5/12/2010 @ 3:29 pmDo the “rocket scientists” at City Hall ever ponder that they might have a sole-source located in AZ who just might dump them?
Ronnie Barrett of Barrett Firearms famously told the LAPD to come and get their M-82 rifles that were at his shop for service when L.A. (and the CA legislature) declared .50BMG weapons as verbotten in The Golden State, and that he would neither sell nor service his guns to CA LE agencies from that moment forward. LAPD had to dispatch two officers to TN to retrieve its rifles.
Wasn’t hard to find the case I was thinking of, UNITED BUILDING & CONSTR. TRADES v. MAYOR, 465 U.S. 208 (1984) .
SPQR (26be8b) — 5/12/2010 @ 3:34 pmNext up – a law requiring bananas to be grown in all lawns, parks, etc., to celebrate the type of government prominent in California.
How about allowing child rape so Polanski can get out of his house? Supporting one illegal act should not bar supporting others?
cedarhill (77b72d) — 5/12/2010 @ 3:38 pmAs for the boycott of travel to AZ I say good riddance to bad rubbish. The good folks of Az don’t need the vermine from Los Angeles. Get ready CA. All those illegals that all this racist hysteria a scaring are going to head your way. And if we here in NM don’t get our act together they’ll be coming to the land of entrenchment.
PatriotRider (8d9a6f) — 5/12/2010 @ 4:20 pmLet them get their nuclear power and water from some other source. Boycotts go both directions.
PatAZ (9d1bb3) — 5/12/2010 @ 4:41 pmDoes Palo Verde sell power west of the river?
AD - RtR/OS! (04f5c9) — 5/12/2010 @ 4:52 pmWe do have San Onofre and Diablo Canyon.
But, there are some coal-fired power-plants that are owned/under contract, to the LADWP located in the Four Corners area.
And, as for water, I think all sides are now bumped up against their allotments.
So now a majority of the Los Angeles City Council declared themselves to be anti-American traitors.
Michael Ejercito (249c90) — 5/12/2010 @ 4:58 pmstupid fing politicians…. double stupid pendejo mayor…. wanna bet the contracts don’t have out clauses for BS like this?
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 5/12/2010 @ 4:59 pmanother joyful thought: wanna bet those AZ buisnesses were the low bid, and the new replacement contracts will cost much more, since the cost of everything in CA is higher, and the City needs the contracts right now?
stupid, stupid fing political hacks. a pox on all of them.
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 5/12/2010 @ 5:13 pmOK, then I’ll do a little boycott of my own. I live out near the Eastern LA county line. No big problem to drive an extra mile of so and buy in San Bernadino or Orange county. Screw LA and LA County.
I previously bought office supplies and personal items from a few LA-based companies. If they want my business now, they will have to move out to Ontario and beyond.
A week ago, my wife said: “We need to take a vacation NOW. In Arizona!” Guess this will move the priority up a bit.
If anybody wonders where this leads, take a look at Detroit. Also take a look at a partial listing of companies who have left California in recent years: http://thebusinessrelocationcoach.blogspot.com/
Idiots!
GaryS (8351a3) — 5/12/2010 @ 5:18 pmA city on the verge of bankruptcy (and we all know one of the main causes) and they waste money and time on a purely political grandstand?
Not only that, a grandstand that most americans think is foolish?
Nice
harkin (865845) — 5/12/2010 @ 6:41 pmHey! If they couldn’t grandstand, they wouldn’t have any function at all.
AD - RtR/OS! (04f5c9) — 5/12/2010 @ 6:46 pmI updated the post with news of an Illinois group that is also boycotting Arizona, and for a novel reason.
DRJ (d43dcd) — 5/12/2010 @ 6:46 pmBrian Williams and Chuck Todd of NBC tonight looked like they just bit into a lemon as they reported that 64% of Americans approve the AZ law while only 34% oppose it. “And we read them the law verbatim…” I guess the truth just makes sense to most Americans. Heh.
I wonder if LA can get sued by the folks who find their contracts canceled by this council action?
in_awe (44fed5) — 5/12/2010 @ 7:01 pmIf school super’s are going to take it upon themselves to dig into every law passed in the country, interstate student and staff travel will have to be suspended into the unforeseeable future while they expand their staffs with lawyers – but just think of the savings we will accomplish by disbanding the District and Circuit Courts that would normally handle these questions.
AD - RtR/OS! (04f5c9) — 5/12/2010 @ 7:06 pmOf course that will generate a great deal of self-satisfaction within the EduCrat community, but won’t do a great deal for the educations of their charges.
“The vote followed an emotional council discussion during which many members noted that their ancestors were U.S. immigrants.”
SHEER GENIUS AT WORK!!!!!!
daleyrocks (1d0d98) — 5/12/2010 @ 7:51 pmSure wouldn’t want to jeopardize that if some of the players were ‘undocumented’ and from, say, Haiti.
EW1(SG) (edc268) — 5/12/2010 @ 8:00 pmI went to Highland Park High School. The reason the story mentions Highwood is because it currently has a fairly large Hispanic population although it used to be a fairly large Italian population (lots of Italian restaurants too).
One thing I just thought of, the superintendent thinks said that he doesn’t know how the law would be enforced. Doesn’t matter. The law doesn’t take effect until the end of July. Long past the game that the girls raised money and have already paid for.
kimsch (2ce939) — 5/12/2010 @ 8:08 pmL.A. City Councilman Paul Koretz today compared Arizona law to “the very beginning of what went on in Nazi Germany”, and added that Arizona “needs to be stunned in every possible way until they stop this behavior. We cant’ let this advance any further, this is absolutely dangerous.”
The opposition reprehensibly claims the, uh, moral high ground.
Dana (1e5ad4) — 5/12/2010 @ 8:28 pmMeanwhile, a lot of those city council members probably avoid spending much (or any) time in the areas of Los Angeles that might be described as “over there.” Areas where the populace is poorer, the potential for crime is greater, the schools are crappy, and both the economy and culture are too Third World-ish to feel any pride in. IOW, those council members are all RACISTS!!!! (Actually, they’re your garden-variety, phony-ass limousine liberal.)
Mark (411533) — 5/12/2010 @ 8:47 pm“Long past the game that the girls raised money and have already paid for.”
kimsch – Isn’t the tournament in December?
daleyrocks (1d0d98) — 5/12/2010 @ 9:07 pmSome liberals just cannot leave kids out of their politics. Especially kids who aren’t theirs. This is a perfect example. There’s no fear the kids will be deported. That’s absurd. If this Suzan Hebson has questions about how the law will be enforced, she should read the law. She shouldn’t punish kids because she has paranoid questions that are easy to answer.
Arizona is tired of the murders and kidnappings and needs to do something about it. 70% or so of the public agrees with this. Those who don’t agree weren’t really going to visit Arizona to begin with, but I’m pretty sure we’ll see a lot of tit for tat from conservatives.
Millions of people who strongly support this law and actually do take vacations see LA, which relies on tourism quite a bit, as their enemy now. What happened to United We Stand? Where’s the great post partisan uniter?
Our currency and economy is not stable. Our military is far more popular than our elected leaders. Our borders are broken. Racial supremacist groups are celebrated while violently protesting Arizona enforcing normal laws. Why add fuel to the potential fire by having governments boycott other governments across the same nation? This could really get out of hand, and this is the primary reason I hoped Texas would have adopted Arizona’s idea. It’s much more difficult to boycott Texas, and probably would have nipped this concept in the bud.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 5/12/2010 @ 9:35 pmInteresting, LAT article on the ban has 600+ comments. Scrolling through them, it would appear the vast majority repeat the same riff, something along the lines of the LA Council being the dumbest group of people on the planet…
Dana (1e5ad4) — 5/12/2010 @ 9:36 pmWhere do you get December?
kimsch (2ce939) — 5/12/2010 @ 10:02 pmkimsch – The following is the Trib version of the story DRJ linked. If it’s not in the body, it’s in the comments.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/northnorthwest/ct-met-arizona-trip-canceled-20100512,0,7753920.story
daleyrocks (1d0d98) — 5/12/2010 @ 10:25 pmThe December date was when another local high school, Mundelein High School, went to Scottsdale for a different tourney.
From what I can tell, this trip is planned for soon, since school lets out late May and early June around here, depending on the district.
kimsch (2ce939) — 5/12/2010 @ 10:50 pmIt may be incorrect but the article I linked in the Update has this from the school’s Assistant Superintendent, Suzan Hebson:
DRJ (d43dcd) — 5/12/2010 @ 10:58 pmWith all these boycotts by CA government entities of AZ (wouldn’t that be making it illegal for the government to do business with another state?), I suggest AZ just finish the work and pass a state law making it illegal for any AZ business to do business with any government entity in CA until all these boycotts are ended.
And enforce the AZ law until SCOTUS acts.
John Hitchcock (9e8ad9) — 5/12/2010 @ 11:01 pmReciprocity is a bitch!
AD - RtR/OS! (04f5c9) — 5/12/2010 @ 11:08 pmDRJ – That’s where I saw it, which makes sense.
kimsch, the girls basketball season parallels the boys, late fall and winter. They would not be allowed to practice or travel out of season as a team typically according to high school rules.
daleyrocks (1d0d98) — 5/12/2010 @ 11:11 pmIf my plan were put into place, LA would have NYC garbage-strike issues, Rodeo Drive would have no water to wash their windows, and CA would have rolling blackouts in 10-minute intervals, to name just a few issues.
John Hitchcock (9e8ad9) — 5/12/2010 @ 11:19 pmokay. I finally found the reference. The superintendent and the assistant are still absolute idiots.
The one sentence that says “…which also draws from Highwood…” is your money quote here. Highwood is just north of Highland Park and just south of Lake Forest. It used to be a very Italian town with lots of Italian restaurants. In the past 30 or 40 years it has slowly become more and more Hispanic. That’s where the Dist 113 admin is getting their “fear of safety” from. What a crock. These girls have raised the funds themselves to go on this trip. The District canceled the trip the day before Governor Brewer actually signed the law.
Hard to believe I actually graduated from there. So did Gary Sinise and F. Gary Gray…
kimsch (2ce939) — 5/12/2010 @ 11:31 pmand yet The Mole believes in gun control, just like the Nazis.
go figure.
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 5/12/2010 @ 11:58 pmI’m asking Gov Brewer to order it illegal to sell power from our nuclear plant to any LA utilities grid. Brownout the LA scum, let the mexicans and blacks riot this summer and tear the city apart.
stinkfattbeans (453185) — 5/13/2010 @ 3:42 amHebson said Arizona is off-limits because of uncertainty about how the new law will be enforced. Signed by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer last month, it makes it a crime to be in the country illegally and requires police to check suspects for immigration paperwork. Hebson said the turmoil is no place for students of Highland Park High School, which also draws from Highwood.
If the school officials would read and use a little logical reasoning, they would know they have nothing to fear unless their students commit a crime or are suspected of committing a crime with the same standard of probable cause as anybody else.
The Arizona tournament officials could point this out and let them know they are not interested in teams that are planning to commit crimes anyway, and thanks for the warning.
MD in Philly (ea3785) — 5/13/2010 @ 5:48 amYes, if that basketball team has “suspects” it would be a good idea for them to stay home.
I would expect the LA boycott to increase Arizona tourism since LA is about 1/3 illegals and they will be staying home or vacationing in Mexico, instead.
The LA city council is desperate to talk about something besides cutting spending. They had just better hope that those electricity contacts have no cancellation clause.
Janice Hahn is a piece of work. She came down to my yacht club to talk about the new harbor development. The conversation quickly got to the firefighter lawsuit, in which the black firefighter who had a reputation as a bully, got tricked into eating dog food by his station mates and sued the city. She showed that she is extremely hostile to men and all of the male bonding sorts of activities that occur in fire stations where guys work 72 hour shifts.
There was widespread outrage about the settlement since there were lots of other firefighters ready to testify about his bullying other firefighters. He is 6-5 and had a reputation within the department for outrageous pranks. Well, he won’t have to spend any more 72 hours shifts in the fire house.
Hahn got very heated when the subject came up. The meeting was soon after the settlement was announced.
Mike K (82f374) — 5/13/2010 @ 6:18 amSo Mexico is the new Auschwitz?
Secret Squirrel (249c90) — 5/13/2010 @ 11:11 amComment by John Hitchcock — 5/12/2010 @ 11:19 pm
John – Rodeo Drive is in the City of Beverly Hills, not Los Angeles; but your point is well taken.
AD - RtR/OS! (2aae98) — 5/13/2010 @ 11:23 amNazi Germany
Typically when a conservative uses the words “Nazi” or “Hitler” it is automatically considered over the top and guaranteed to be scoffed at and ignored, even when there is some merit to it, like the underlying pinnings of eugenics and euthanasia/late term abortions/infanticide, etc.
But now all of a sudden the left goes nuts with a ridiculous, foolish, and insulting false analogy. To say the AZ law has any comparison to Nazi Germany is to say the SS was about as terrifying as Col. Klink or Sargeant Schultz on “Hogan’s Heroes”.
What is really disheartening is that people can say these things and be taken seriously.
MD in Philly (ea3785) — 5/13/2010 @ 12:11 pmNot surprisingly, our friend Dr. Suzan Hebson of the softball team boycott has been in the news previously–
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2007/03/08/Parents-object-to-gay-panel-at-high-school/UPI-30951173387862/
elissa (2769fa) — 5/13/2010 @ 12:45 pmWho takes them seriously?
Michael Ejercito (249c90) — 5/16/2010 @ 11:21 pm