Dear Mayor Villaraigosa, dear Councilman Rosendahl,
Starting last week, thousands of Venice residents began circulating and/or signing petitions to implement the new “No Oversize Vehicle” ordinance on their blocks to remove at night RVS and campers, which have been documented dumping and/or leaking sewage on our streets.
I am writing to address several questions about the process for authorizing the signs once the petitions have been submitted.
The City Attorney’s Office has advised us that under the petition process set out in the ordinance, no “implementing ordinance” is required, and that the City Council has the authority to unilaterally authorize the signage for six block areas by Council resolution. Nonetheless, Councilman Rosendahl claims that an “implementing ordinance” is required to install the signs. Any new ordinance is subject to the Mayor’s veto; the Council’s override of a veto is not a foregone conclusion. Thus, we would ask:
Mayor Villaraigosa, will you indeed sign the ordinance?
And, Mr. Rosendahl, have you spoken directly to Mr. Villaraigosa and secured his promise to sign the ordinance?
Finally, Mr. Rosendahl, if the Mayor, who has previously expressed his antipathy to the new Oversize Vehicle Ordinance by refusing to sign it, is not willing to sign your new Venice-specific “implementing ordinance,” why do you not take the City Attorney’s advice and pass several Council resolutions for six block areas that are most burdened by oversize vehicles? We are advised, again by the City Attorney, that this is the quickest means to authorize the signs and this procedure is immune to a Mayoral veto.
I am respectfully yours,
Mark Ryavec, President
The Venice Stakeholders Association is dedicated to civic improvement. The VSA supports slow growth, protection of the limits of the Venice Local Coastal Specific Plan, neighborhood safety, better traffic circulation, increased parking for residents, neighborhood beautification projects, historic preservation and protection of coastal waters.
