I am very disappointed by the California Supreme Court’s ruling to uphold Proposition 8.
Our nation was founded on the principle of equality and justice for all. This proposition was a step backward in the movement toward achieving that vision.
We have so much work to do to achieve marriage equality in California, and I stand in solidarity with all of those who believe in the right of same sex couples to marry.
If you’d like to come out to protest today’s Prop 8 decision, there is a rally and march in West Hollywood at 7:00pm. Meet at the corner of Santa Monica & San Vicente for a march to Hollywood & Highland.
If you can’t make it to West Hollywood, there will be a rally at Hollywood & Highland around 9:30pm.
Can you come out and help build the newest garden in the Hollywood community?
Tomorrow, May 2nd, from 9am to 12pm, you are invited to come together with other members of the Hollywood community to help fill garden beds, weed, spread mulch and plant fruit trees at the Fountain Community Garden. The garden is located at 5620 Fountain Ave. (@ St. Andrews.)
We first broke ground back in February, you can read about it and watch a video from that event HERE.
Tomorrow night the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority will be conducting the next stage of their 2009 count of the L.A. homeless population here in Hollywood. Getting an accurate count of the number of people living on the streets or in shelters in our city is a crucial step toward getting the funding we need to ultimately end homelessness in Los Angeles. Essentially, what LAHSA is doing is taking a census of those among us who are living in the shadows. For them to count, they need to be counted and that’s where you can help.
LAHSA is looking for volunteers to interview homeless people both sheltered and unshltered in Hollywood tomorrow night. There will be an extensive 2 hour training at 8pm and then at 10pm volunteers will canvass the area in groups of 3 or 4 at a time to interview as many homeless people as we can to obtain crucial demographic data. LAHSA has more details of what the count will entail:
Homeless Demographic Surveys collect demographic data (age, gender, etc.) and descriptive data (length of time being homeless, services used, etc.) about homeless individuals in our region.
The General Population Telephone Survey seeks to enumerate the “hidden homeless”; that is, those who currently would not be counted via the Unsheltered Street Count or the Shelter & Institution Count because they are camping on private property, living in unconverted garages and garden sheds, and other such areas.
The Unsheltered Street Count utilizes volunteers to enumerate unsheltered homeless persons on a given night (e.g. living on the street, in encampments, in cars) in census tracts throughout the Greater Los Angeles area.
The Shelter & Institution Count estimates the number of homeless individuals and families housed overnight in shelters (emergency and transitional shelters, motels/hotels that accept homeless vouchers) and institutions (residential alcohol & drug treatment centers, jails, detention centers, hospital emergency rooms).
Getting an accurate count of our homeless population is a necessary step toward ending homelessness and coming out and helping LAHSA is a safe and rewarding way to give back to the community.
To sign up for the Hollywood count please contact Sarah MacPherson at the Hollywood Business Improvement District at sarah@hollywoodbid.org.
I voted at 7:15 this morning. Turnout at my polling location looked to be slow but steady.
Polls will be open until 8pm tonight. If you’re not sure where to vote, you can look it up here. Then be sure to join us at our election night party at the Avalon. Details are here.
What was your voting experience like today? Hearing of or seeing any problems at the polls?
Remember, parking restrictions will be loosened near polling places to make it a bit easier to vote. Please remind your friends and family to get to the polls.
Come out and join us tomorrow for our final precinct walk before election day. We’ll be walking door to door in East Hollywood reminding folks to vote on Tuesday and, more importantly, listening to the issues and concerns on their mind.
Details:
Saturday, February 28th
9:30am-12:30pm
meet at 1057 North Oxford Ave., Los Angeles 90029
(1 block south of Santa Monica and 2 blocks east of Western)
Precinct walking is one of my favorite aspects of my job, which is why I do it even when I’m not running for re-election. For me, connecting in person with my constituents is the purest form of democracy. Eight years ago, when I decided to run for City Council, I bought a pair of shoes, put them on, never took them off until I went to sleep each night and literally walked holes through them as I went door to door introducing myself to voters and listening to their concerns. While tomorrow will be the final precinct walk before election day, I hope voters will give me the opportunity to continue to discover my city and meet you all face to face for four more years.
Yesterday I attended a meeting of Hollywood High School’s Young Feminists Club, which was founded by Hollywood High senior Sandy Merida with the assistance of the Hollywood chapter of The National Organization for Women. I arrived at the classroom as a discussion about domestic abuse was underway and I was extremely impressed with the size and diversity of the group (among just under 20 attendees, 3 or 4 were guys) and the level of discussion they were having.
I told them I was proud to call myself a feminist and that I’ve been one all my life. Growing up with a sister and female cousins all around me and being a minority of one, I came to have great respect for women and always saw them as my equal. It’s difficult even to think that someone might not think that way, but the reality is that our society still does not put men and women on equal footing, which is why groups like Sandy’s are so important.
We spoke a lot about power at the meeting and while most of the discussion focused on the abuse of power, I suggested to them that power in and of itself is neutral; in most relationships we’re in, one person has more power than the other, whether it be teacher-student, parent-child, employer-employee, siblings or spouses. That’s not inherently a bad thing. It’s how that power is used that is crucial. Merely by founding this group, Sandy used her own power as an individual and by coming to that meeting, those kids were empowering themselves, not only with information but also by the mere fact of gathering and organizing. They have more power as a group than they think. I invited them to think about what laws they might want passed, whether it be to strengthen teen dating violence laws or change funding for girls’ sports programs versus boys’ sports programs. Imagine if they could say they helped pass a law that made this a more just world. Now that is powerful.
Meet Sandy in a video we put together of my time at Hollywood High below.
