Some of the most interesting parts of last night’s Long Beach City Council discussion of apartment renters’ rights weren’t just the heartrending testimony of disabled tenants who feared being pushed out in the street by future condominium conversions–or the plain speaking from several landlords, one of whom used a phrase you don’t hear much anymore: [...]

Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster’s pursuit of time-saving simplicity at city council meetings is becoming increasingly time consuming and complicated.  His latest suggestion for streamlining the process – proposed at Tuesday night’s meeting in tandem with Ninth District Councilmember Val Lerch — would create two categories of meeting agendas and require the council to vote on which items belong where. At this point, perhaps [...]

Six of Long Beach’s nine City Council members got out of bed early this morning to attend the Breakwater Forum, a public update and discussion of the city’s $100,000 investigation into a possible breakwater configuration. The recurring theme was a growing realization of how massive a task Long Beach is undertaking. The word “unprecedented” was used a lot.
Perhaps just [...]

Long Beach City Council changes its policy on public comment

After much discussion and comments from a dozen members of the public–the largest number of audience members to comment on any item on last night’s city council agenda–Long Beach City Council voted 5-3 last night to change, and very likely restrict, the public’s ability to open [...]

Eighth District Councilwoman Rae Gabelich takes the hard road

PHOTO by RUSS ROCA
Eighth District Councilwoman Rae Gabelich became the best listener on the Long Beach City Council by remembering how it felt not to be heard when she was a community activist. Actually, that’s how she came to represent the Eighth District representative, period. “I got [...]