Grass Roots Venice Neighborhood Council update
By Alice Stek, District 7
Councilmember
After months of
process-oriented activities, the new Grass Roots Venice Neighborhood Council may
soon be taking action on issues impacting our community.
As reported in last month’s
Beachhead, on June 13 the new neighborhood council elected its first board of 21
members; 8 are from the Progressive Candidates slate. The board has been meeting
for almost 2 months. Some of these meetings have been purely social or for
“team-building.” We received training in legal and ethical aspects
of local government organizations and are working on the required conflict of
interest policy. The board proposes to expand the useful “strategic
visioning” session to define our community’s assets, problems and
priorities, and to involve the entire membership. Half the board attended the
Congress of Neighborhood Councils on August 3. Although this City-sponsored
event was clearly designed to support the City’s anti-secession campaign,
many of the 700 attendees from neighborhoods throughout LA expressed support for
Valley and Hollywood secession. Will we be discussing Venice cityhood in
2004?
Regular executive committee, full
board and general membership meetings will be scheduled within the next month.
Some committees (such as conservation and outreach) are already meeting
regularly. As with any new organization, there is still the need to address
process. Soon real issues will be discussed; these include GRVNC’s advice
to the City budget office on where to allocate the funds for neighborhood
improvement projects. The City is likely to make this formal request this month,
with a very short response time, so we need to pay attention. Although the
neighborhood councils’ roles are officially only advisory, their influence
is likely to increase, at least according to our “dynamic” mayor
Hahn.
Any Venice
“stakeholder” (live, work, own property in Venice) 16 or older may
register. You need not be a citizen or eligible to vote for state elections or
have a green card to register, but you must be able to document stakeholder
status. Register and have input into local
government!
Grass Roots Venice official
website, for registration info and meeting announcements:
www.grassrootsvenice.org
Visit the
Progressive Candidates website: http://home.attbi.com/~venicecandidates or call
310-280-3411.
Stay tuned for future
neighborhood council reports.
Posted: Thu - August 1, 2002 at 05:29 PM