Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Watch: Scandal Plagued Mayor Allows Governor to Cut LA Rail Transit Funds
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mrs. Villaraigosa, and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa at the Mayor’s inauguration, July 1, 2005.
While Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is filling pot holes and opening Panda Express retaurants in Universal City, the Governor has cut Los Angeles rail transit funds by $336 million.
Bill Bradley over at LA Weekly has the poop.
With Antonio preoccupied by an affair, L.A. loses its rail funds. You can thank Mike Villines.
THE BIG CUTS IN LOS ANGELES public-transit funding by state lawmakers have a sudden impact on Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who, in his current scandal-struck state, didn’t show up to lobby for his own program. The Legislature stepped into the power vacuum, slashing $336 million earmarked for Los Angeles and imperiling the long-promised Expo Line to the Westside.
The proposed state budget, now weeks past deadline, was approved by the state Assembly with the support of Villaraigosa’s ally and longtime friend Speaker Fabian Núñez of Los Angeles, and aims to take $1.3 billion in gas-tax revenue intended for transit to bail out the state’s general fund.
The loss is a clear setback for Villaraigosa, whose administration is hurtling forward in approving tens of thousands of new units of controversial, dense, high-rise housing in Los Angeles, to be serviced by a now-vanishing state transit budget.
So, the Expo Line rail line linking West LA and downtown Los Angeles is dead because of Telemundo political reporter and main squeeze of the Mayor, you ask?
Yes, sure looks like it.
While the Mayor is hiding out in Los Angeles and at news conferences praising the journalistic ethics of Mirthala, the Governor and GOP raid the funds.
Pretty pathetic that folks from the West Side will have to endure more traffic gridlock because the Mayor could not keep it in his pants.
Los Angles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa at Panda Express opening at Universal City Walk, JUly 25, 2007
Sooner or later some LA pol will have the “COJONES” to call the Mayor out on this lack of attention to the job.
Jimmy Hahn are you listening?
And NEVER let it be said that Arnold doesn’t know how to press an advantage.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa directs high school students during a clean-up project in the Chinatown section of Los Angeles Tuesday, July 10, 2007, as a kick-off event for a summer youth employment program.
Previous:
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Watch: NBC Universal Development Surrounds Villaraigosa – Salinas Scandal
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Watch: Villaraigosa on WHOSE Side?
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Watch: Will Telemundo Decide Mirthala’s Fate Today?
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Watch: Mayor Denies Affair With Anita Moreno #2
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Watch: Mayor Denies Affair With LAPD Officer Anita Moreno
And a print rendering of this original cartoon by Patrick O’Connor of the Los Angeles Daily News can be purchased by clicking the link here.
Technorati Tags: Antonio Villaraigosa, Mirthala Salinas, TelemundoUnivisionArnold Schwarzenegger
