My Auto Accident Means UBOC Update w/be Delayed

(Not my car pictured; I'm too exhausted to take one as the tow truck just brought me home).

Sorry to say, I think my car is totaled. I'll follow up on the Union Bank Story (see below) Friday.

Equal Rights for Midwestern Couples, but not on the West Coast

Apropos of the passage of Prop 8 last year, the Golden State, the People's Republic of California, as right-wingers like to call this bastion of progressiveness, now has the distinction of having a proud bigot as our representative in the Miss USA Pageant (yes, grown-up beauty pageants still exist).

Blonde "lovely" Carrie Prejean believes God was testing her faith by having judges ask for her opinion on gay marriage. The hubris of Ms. Prejean (maybe when gets out of pre-jean status and grows up to be a full-fledged "jean" she'll have a little more tolerance for others) was revealed in an interview with Fox News Channel:

"It did cost me my crown," the beauty queen said. Your crown? Unless there's something about beauty pageants that escapes me (and I'm sure there is), it's not your crown unless you win.

Prejean continued. "I was raised in a way that you can never compromise your beliefs and your opinions for anything."

There's something Shakespearean about the fact that some California couples have to go to places such as Iowa and Vermont to legally marry the ones they love. Welcome to the new Golden State: Oklafornia.

Banks Hoarding Bailout Money, Won't Even Loan to Themselves

Banks across America are hording money given them (okay, loaned to them--theoretically) by the U.S. Government. The the bailout money was meant to free up stalled credit markets, i.e., give banks money to lend to businesses and consumers. The idea is to reinvigorate the economy with a little spending. But we have just learned (again) banks who got bailout money loaned less money in March than they did in February! A Wall Street Journal investigation found that the more money banks got, the less they lent.

Though not a bailed out bank, and having told me late last year for a story I wrote in the Business Journal that they have money to lend and are lending it, I posted this Union Bank of California image because of an interesting anecdotal connection to the tight-credit angle of this post: Union Bank of Calif. has had a new branch under construction on Santa Monica Blvd. in West Hollywood for almost two years now. Progress on construction has been slow to say the least. Even banks borrow money to build. Has UBOC found credit markets too tight to get on with opening the much-anticipated (the nearest location now is in the heart of Beverly Hills' worst traffic area) branch in WeHo? Stay tuned...I'll learn and let you know Wed., April 22 what's the delay.

Space-based Solar Energy Coming to Earth

I was in Mrs. Litton-Smith's sixth grade class at Hohokam Elementary School in Scottsdale, Arizona in 1978 the first time I ever heard about the concept of capturing solar energy in space for use as electricity on Earth. Now, a California Company says it wants to make the concept happen...REALLY! (via bldgblog.blogspot.com). Image courtesty of Wikipedia.

Region's Largest Mall in Bankrupcty; Northridge Fashion Center not Closing--for Now

The Great Recession is pounding once-bustling malls across Southern California and the nation, moreover. Case in point, General Growth Properties, the nation's second largest mall owner/operator, has announced it is bankrupt. GPP is seeking Chapter 11 protection in U.S. Bankrupcty Court.

GPP's Northridge Fashion Center, the largest mall in northern Los Angeles County is assuring customers and tenants that, as general manager Danielle Gordon put it, "...the mall will be open today and tomorrow, and going forward."

What was interesting to me, however, was the fact that I did not ask Gordon if the mall was going to stay open. I only asked what impact there would be locally in the face of the parent company's Chapter 11 filing. In Chapter 11 bankruptcies, companies generally continue operating while they restructure their debt with the protection of the court from adverse actions by creditors. The $30 billion real estate investment trust is believed to owe more than $28 billion to its creditors.

Phantom Billboard Artist, Gias, Strikes on La Cienega

Remember L.A. artist, David Browne's little doves hanging over intersections across the city? Well it may be that artist Gias is the next David Browne. Check out this amazing video of the artist's rogue billboard (on La Cienega just south of Pico on the west side of the street) message about the perils of TV, Drugs and Religion in time-lapse progression over the course of four days and nights (courtesy joosbox.tv):

Dedication of Hunter Allen Trail

They say only the good die young. I don't know how true that is, but I know the people who gathered at the west end of Victory Blvd. last Saturday morning for the dedication of Hunter Allen Trail at Ahmanson Ranch in the far west part of the San Fernando Valley would rather have seen Good Hunter Allen live into his thirties and beyond.
The ceremony was officiated by a Chumash Indian medicine man, who, in full-native prayer garb, dedicated the trail to Hunter's family, the American People, Native Americans, and their ancestors, who are buried on lands across the continent.
Hunter died tragically a year ago when the pain of his personal life became too much for him to bear.
However, the way Hunter lived his public life earned him the name Baby Dragon. Though somewhat diminutive in physical stature, he was a force to be wreckened (as fomer WaMu CEO Kelly Killinger learned. Killinger lost his battle with Hunter, a young West Hollyood activist, determined to save a large swath of hilly California meadowland, which the bank owned and developers salivated over. With no money and a gut full of passion, Hunter used cunning, irony, and friends to succeed in making the land part of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy--forever protecting it from the voracious appetites of California's sprawl-driven developers. Thanks to his efforts and the efforts of others, banks and developers are now looking at urban redevelopment as the wave of the future for building in Southern California.

A Model for Rivers and Greenspaces

L.A. City Councilman Ed Reyes has invited Seoul's deputy mayor for infrastructure to show us how it's done...building a riverwalk and a park with environmental sustainability as the guiding principle, that is. All snarkiness aside, this is actually a great idea. The South Koreans have done good work in urban planning in terms of such projects. There will be a presentation at City Hall, open to the public, Friday, April 17 at 2:30, where
Dr. In-Keun Lee will talk about and show images of how Seoul has transformed a canal into a beautiful river walk. Expect to see more of these kinds of exchanges as L.A.'s new 4-block great park to be installed at the foot of City Hall downtown, and the L.A. River project unfolds (however slowly completion of the two shall meet the light of day).

Ipod Touch Here: A solution for a Frustrated Verizon Blackberry User

For more than a year, I've struggled with my Blackberry. Don't get me wrong; I know how it works. That's the problem: I hate how it works! I think there are two kinds of people. There are those who get algebra and the Blackberry algorithm. Then there are those of us who think a whole other way.
However, I don't want AT&T. So, for now, no iPhone. My plan is to ditch the Blackberry, get a regular, non-PDA camera phone, and and iPod Touch for my other, net-based needs. Tell me what you think of this solution if you have any experience with similar situations--especially if you know about the mythical world of unlocking the iPhone for use with Verizon (which I understand to be impossible because Verizon doesn't use removable chips).

Mark to Market: Other Big Financial News

FASBE, the rule-making body for the accounting industry (think of it as the lawyers' bar, except for CPAs), has bowed to political pressure and approved "more flexibility," i.e., more generosity, in the valuing of legacy, i.e., toxic, assets. The bottom line? Better-looking bottom lines for banks and other financial institutions. But is this just institutionalizing the kind of willy-nilly analysis that was the problem way back with Enron, and during the current crisis on Wall Street? Or, is it a necessary evil to grease the gears of the U.S. and world economies? I'll try to get some answers from leading accounting firms later at the Business Journal's website: sfvbj.com. (Maybe accounting is not such a bad beat for this reporter after all). Meantime, here's Reuters U.K.'s take on the so-called mark to market issue: http://uk.reuters.com/article/regulatoryNewsFinancialServicesAndRealEstate/idUKN0226528020090402