We hereby request that the Los Angeles County Civil Grand Jury open an immediate investigation into practices and decisions made by City of Los Angeles elected and appointed officials and their staffs, involving possible "pay-to-play" and other forms of corruption in land-use, building development, infrastructure and environmental decisions and related areas that fit within your mission of probing public malfeasance and investigating the operation of city and county government to ensure that the county is being governed honestly and efficiently and that county monies are being handled appropriately.
Below, we detail large land development projects that are have come before City of Los Angeles decision-making entities, including but not limited to, the Office of the Mayor, the Los Angeles City Planning Commission, Area Planning Commissions, the Los Angeles City Council and the Los Angeles City Council's Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM).
We and many other civic leaders and groups from across Los Angeles are deeply concerned about the City of Los Angeles processes and practices, its lack of transparency, and the FBI probe into possible corruption among elected and/or appointed officials and staff, both current and former. We stand ready, as do many in our coalition, to provide whatever details, documents such as California Public Record Act Requests, and similar help that we can.
Los Angeles City council members, including key appointees to the Planning and Land Use Management Committee are currently part of a widening investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation which in November raided Council member Jose Huizar's home and City Council office, taking boxes of documents.
The expanded investigation includes: Council member Price, who sits on the City Council's powerful Planning and Land Use Management Committee and represents part of South L.A.; Deron Williams, chief of staff to LA City Council president Herb Wesson; Joel Jacinto, a Mayor Garcetti appointee who serves on the mayor's paid five-member Board of Public Works; and other City Hall aides who had worked for Council member Huizar. On January 18, Jacinto submitted a resignation letter effect immediately.
In light of this investigation, and considering the mission of the Coalition to Preserve LA, which strongly advocates for open government and other key necessities of urban governance, it is within the scope of our mission to file a complaint asking the Los Angeles Civil Grand Jury to investigate — separate from the FBI — the transactions of the Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM) and numerous other entities under the umbrella of Los Angeles City Hall.
The Planning Commission made up entirely of political appointees of Mayor Eric Garcetti, who serve at his will and submit their pre-signed resignation letters upon appointment to the panel, is the first political hurdle in the project-approval process. It has the power to decide if discretionary changes proposed by private developers should be considered by the next rung of power, the City Council's powerful PLUM Committee.
Developments that come before the Planning Commission are seeking and have been recommended by the City Planning Department for, "discretionary" approvals involving special exemptions, waivers and other exceptions from existing land-use rules such as requests for height increases, density increases, General Plan amendments, zoning changes, parking reductions.
According to the Los Angeles Times, "Such exceptions to zoning laws have become commonplace across L.A., an L.A. Times analysis of nearly 1,000 cases found. About 90% of requests for general plan amendments, zoning or height district changes heard before the city's Planning Commission and local planning commissions have been green-lighted since 2000, city documents show." (See Attachment 5. L.A. Times, 2/10/17, "When developers want to build more than zoning allows, L.A. planning commissioners almost always say yes, Times analysis finds").
The PLUM Committee is made up of five City Council members appointed by City Council President Herb Wesson, who serve at his complete discretion. PLUM is the second hurdle, in the private-approval process, and has the power to decide if land-use developments and building projects already approved by the Planning Commission should be approved by PLUM and sent on to the full Los Angeles City Council to approval.
The City Council is made up of 15 elected officials who represent specific geographic areas of Los Angeles and make the vast majority of final decisions on whether a "discretionary" project seeking exemptions from the city's rules and plans should be approved.
Coalition to Preserve of LA, for three years, has been seeking greater transparency in this process and has called for an end to campaign contributions made by land developers to the key players described in the above process. Prior to the formation of the Coalition to Preserve LA as a non-profit, the principals of the organization launched a 2016 ballot effort, Measure S, seeking to temporarily halt the most extreme of these developer exemptions, called "General Plan Amendments," which allow the construction of inappropriate, outsized buildings detrimental to the community, the environment, the public infrastructure, the existing Community Plan, and long-term planning.
Ryu's motion died in the Los Angeles City Council Rules Committee, controlled by Council President Herb Wesson, who repeatedly refused to place hearings on the matter on the calendar he controls. Pressed by the Los Angeles Timesafter Wesson went six months without scheduling a hearing, Wesson said he "was busy," and that campaign reform was not "a priority," and insisted when pressed, that "I don't sit on anything." (See Attachment 7. L.A. Times, July 30, 2017 "What happened to L.A.'s push to end its pay-to-play reputation? So far, not much").
After the November 2018 FBI raid on Council member Jose Huizar's home and office, followed by federal warrants issued to other key city leaders as mentioned above, Council member Ryu reintroduced a new version of his failed reform motion on January 15, 2019, co-authored by a larger group of City Council members than Ryu could rally in 2016, now including Paul Krekorian, Paul Koretz, Nury Martinez, Mike Bonin and Joe Buscaino. It is telling that only 6 Council members see the urgency.
We have evidence that a disturbing practice by the City Council known as The Rule of 15 is fostering a non-democratic, easily corrupted system. Under the widely acknowledged Rule of 15, each City Council member holds unofficial, but very real, veto-or-approval power over all proposed "discretionary" development in his or her City Council district. Despite the elaborate system of public hearings by the City Planning Commission, PLUM Committee and full City Council, no project moves forward unless the sole City Council member in whose district the development is proposed, gives it their quiet thumbs up.
The Rule of 15 has led, in the past 15 years, to the City Council's grotesque practice of 100% unanimous votes on many major issues – in particular on proposed projects that face serious questioning and/or opposition from social justice, non-profit, anti-gentrification, public safety and environmental groups; Neighborhood Councils; advocates for updating the city's aging infrastructure; historic preservation groups and many others.
Los Angeles elected officials get around contribution limits and other campaign finance laws by setting up special accounts with no oversight.One of the richest in U.S. history is the account controlled by Mayor Eric Garcetti, which he calls the "Mayor's Fund for Los Angeles" and has pulled in $35 million – controlled entirely by Garcetti.
KCBS Investigative reporter David Goldstein unveiled a troubling nexus between disastrous mayoral policy and donations to the Mayor's Fund by Turf Terminators. Garcetti praised the obscure firm in his April 2015 State of the City address. Goldstein found that Turf Terminators had made 13 contributions via company associates and family members to Garcetti's campaign,totaling $25,650.
Goldstein reported that, the day of Garcetti's State of City Speech, an L.A. City Council committee accepted $50,000 in free landscaping from Turf Terminators for the LAPD Topanga Police Station. Turf Terminators' business was based on converting people's lawns to drought-resistant landscaping for free — if they signed over special water-saving rebates offered by Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and LADWP. Turf Terminators soared from unknown to awash in $23 million, but the love affair didn't last. They were severely criticized in reports, including LA Weekly's, "Turf Terminators Has Gotten Rich Turning Yards into Gravel, but Is It Creating Blight?" for killing crucial shade trees, swamping poor areas with hot gravel yards, and perverting an important rebate intended for clear-cut, sustainable-environment results.
Garcetti has verbally stood for campaign finance reform over the years. But as KPCC points out, "The payments seem to contradict some of his public statements against money in politics." In his first run for mayor in 2013, Garcetti pledged not to accept campaign contributions from Walmart, criticizing it for paying workers low wages. The next year, records show, Walmart made a $100,000 contribution to the Mayor's Fund, at Garcetti's behest.
We are deeply concerned that malfeasance and a failure to follow a legal, democratic process has been created by pay-to-play — private deals in which developers seek unofficial "discretionary" approvals from all-powerful City Council members under the Rule of 15, which are then rubber-stamped by the mayor's appointed Planning Commission and the City Council PLUM Committee.
This behavior comes at great cost, well beyond the cost of the undoing of democratic processes and public right to transparent government decision-making. Pay-to-play sends huge sums of money flowing into lobbying, campaign contributions and gifts, all of it unfolding as development deals are shaped behind closed doors, leading to poor decisions that have devastating public outcomes.
These outcomes include destruction of affordable housing, gentrification that creates a domino effect of rent hikes in affordable areas, record-high evictions of low-income people standing in the way of developers, and the related tragic upswing in homelessness, extreme congestion on roads zoned for far smaller buildings, destruction of open space and the urban tree canopy to build far larger than zoning allows, and the crushing of hard-fought neighborhood livability, particularly in low-income areas.
Corruption swept through Los Angeles City Hall in the 1960s, leading to major reform of land use rules that set high standards, requiring the City of Los Angeles to develop a General Plan and Community Plans whose rules meant something. During the vote-selling scandal of 1966 through 1970, a grand jury found that L.A.'s planning and zoning process was up for sale. Numerous major newspapers of the day covered the revelations — and the convictions for bribery and vote-selling that followed.
During the 1966 Los Angeles County Grand Jury probe of the Los Angeles City Council, the Grand Jury's Criminal Complaints Committee investigated City Councilman Thomas D. Shepard over a Planning Department case in the San Fernando Valley that involved zoning variances and the possibility of building Jack Kent Cooke's proposed Forum basketball arena in the agriculturally-zoned (and today cherished) open space of the Sepulveda Basin.
Residential groups in the West San Fernando Valley led the call for an investigation because they felt Councilman Shepard and the Recreation and Parks Commissioners were failing to protect parkland. Shepard eventually was convicted on bribery charges in Nov. 1969 and served a 15-month sentence in state prison. (See Attachment 14. LA Times, January 9, 1970, "Ex-Councilman Shepard Gets 1 to 14 Years on Bribery Count").
Today, the reforms instituted after the Sepulveda Basin corruption scandal have faded almost to the point of vanishing. The city's Community Plans and General Plan are repeatedly overturned by city officials awash in developer contributions, developer gifts and developer lobbyist wining and dining. Vast wealth is being created for global-level developers through closed-door meetings and discussions with City Council members, City Planning Department staff and mayoral appointees at which developers seek the unofficial nod to "upzone" specific pieces of land.
The resulting "discretionary" decisions are voted upon in public, where the projects are often promoted by city officials as "sustainable" or said to provide needed "housing." But they in fact often tax the city's aging infrastructure in severe, unsustainable ways. Mayor Eric Garcetti and the City Council have been warned by their own Los Angeles Housing & Community Investment Department, that these practices are creating a glut of unneeded luxury housing and failing to provide more than a fraction of the badly-needed affordable housing. The 2016 report to Mayor Garcetti warned: "A contributing factor to the acute housing affordability problem is a mismatch between what is being built and what needs to be built. In 2013, (the most recent year for which full data are available), of the 1,605 units needed for low-income households in the City of Los Angeles only 593 were built." Meanwhile, the report warned, the mayor and City Council were approving far more market rate luxury apartments than needed, all of them unaffordable to below-median residents. (See Attachment 15. "Report Back Identifying Local, Permanent Funding Sources for The City's Affordable Housing Trust Fund (AHFT) and Request to Fund a New Affordable Housing Benefit Fee Study).
The Ethics Commission processes and provides public access to disclosure statements filed by candidates, committees, officeholders, city officials, lobbying entities, bidders, contractors, and others.
Yet the Ethics Commission has never seriously challenged the growing pay-to-play culture. Its role is more akin to an educational service than a watchdog, providing a website that is largely unknown to Angelenos, where the public can review donations made to candidates and officeholders and the levels of lobbying activity. From time to time, it issues fines for illegal contributions or goes fater minor wrongdoing, shirking its far greater duties.
The Ethics Commission's website allows the public to search for significant levels of lobbying activity. City law requires those who qualify as lobbying entities to register with the Ethics Commission. One can search to determine who has hired a given lobbyist, and in very broad terms one can track City Hall actions the lobbyists attempt to influence, city agencies involved, and the amount of money spent to influence decision-makers.
The Ethics Commission updated its widely-criticized contributions and lobbying search system in 2017, making it more user-friendly. But along with ease came even more non-transparency: The weak and timid Ethics Commission no longer provides the exact dates that a lobbyist wined and dined or met with a city official — the only way to link major pay-to-play meetings with influence-peddling.
Now, the Ethics Commission provides only the quarter in which the lobbying took place, a major win for those who benefit from a less transparent city governmentand may be involved in corruption and malfeasance.
(See image of Ethics Commission site on next page).
But the final directive was an empty gesture by Garcetti and the City Council. It applies only to developments once officially submitted — typically 2 years after the backroom meetings begin. Garcetti's directive allows ex parte discussion for "scheduling, administrative or emergency purposes" if his commissioners claim nothing substantial was said and no one got a favor — impossible, on its face.
And as our published 2016 report, "Pay-to-Play at Los Angeles City Hall," shows (see attached below), the private meetings begin with City Council members, their staffs and city planning staff YEARS BEFORE a developer application to construct a major project is filed publicly— and finally become known to the public itself.
The FBI investigation has thrust this issue of developer money influencing votes and possible malfeasance and corruption back into the spotlight. Council member Ryu has revived his motion and is trying against great odds.
We believe from the above evidence that corruption threatens our democratic system and our fundamental need for transparency and honesty in government.
The Coalition to Preserve LA's "Pay-to-Play" report, below, demonstrates direct correlations between contributions from developers to elected city officials, as well as private meetings between these developers, elected officials and City of Los Angeles employees. But we have not exhausted these areas. We've only scratched the surface.
Our report lays the foundation for a broader and deeper official investigation by the Grand Jury, to determine if criminal acts have occurred, and to shine a far brighter light on Los Angeles City Hall.
1) Campaign contributions to all City of Los Angeles elected officials or candidates made by developers, their relatives, friends, employees, lobbyists and contractors.
2) Private meetings between developers and their teams, with members of the City Council, the mayor, city department heads, city political appointees and City of L.A. employees.
3) All private communications, including email and cell phone calls, between developers, their teams and the above L.A. City officials and employees.
4) Whether influence-peddling in Los Angeles has entered the realm of criminal behavior.
Below is a sampling of projects involving pay-to-play activity, allegations of corruption or impropriety, and/or extensive private meetings between City of L.A. officials and developers. In the Sea Breeze case, the developer was charged with conspiracy to commit campaign money laundering and bribing a legislative body member.
Colony Holdings LLC, a group of investors headed by Mike Hakim, originally proposed a larger-scale 35-story mixed-use project with 270 units, ground retail and 663 parking spaces at a site on South Catalina Street south of W. 8th Street.
In late 2009, the Los Angeles Planning Commission rejected zoning changes for the project because it was incompatible with the surrounding low- and mid-rise neighborhood of older homes and apartments and the narrow residential roadway.
The company re-submitted the project as a smaller 25-story, 227-unit tower, with 3,600 square feet of retail and 454 parking spaces, and a rooftop helipad, the city planning department. Colony Holdings officials then outlined the project at the city Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM) meeting.
The developer wanted a zone change and an amendment to the city's General Plan.
The mayor's action had the effect of reducing the number of City Council votes Hakim needed for approval, from 12 to 10. The City Council approved it on an 11-0 vote.
Then, when the City Council approved the project, Hakim agreed to contribute $1 million to the city's affordable housing trust fund, which helps pay for construction of low-income housing. Hakim also committed $250,000 to a fund for community projectsin Wesson's district.
Then, in November 2018, two community groups sued the City of Los Angeles over this backroom deal, and a judge agreed, overturning the approvals of the City Council and Mayor Eric Garcetti. The judge ordered a badly needed Environmental Impact Report. Mayor Garcetti had long insisted that NO environmental study was needed to put a skyscraper on a quiet, narrow, two-story, residential street.
The developer Rick Caruso, in the midst of getting approval for his luxury 17-story-high tower, the tallest ever allowed in the Beverly Grove community, held private, unpublicized meetings with the local City Council member and donated heavily to Mayor Garcetti's Mayoral Fund.
On November 10, 2016 the Los Angeles Planning Commission unanimously backed this project, granting Caruso two dramatic exemptions from existing zoning and planning rules, a General Plan Amendment and Height District Change.
The developer, Samuel Leung, gave more than $600,000 to support former mayor James Hahn, Mayor Eric Garcetti and other L.A. area politiciansbetween 2008 and 2015, as Leung sought city approval for a $72-million development in L.A.'s Harbor Gateway, specifically in a manufacturing area where he wanted to build a large residential project incompatible with the warehouse zoning and activities.
At one critical point during the approval process, Garcetti invoked a mayoral prerogative to reduce the number of City Council votes required to push through the project.
In several cases, Los Angeles elected officials received the money from Leung as they were poised to make key decisions about the development, known as Sea Breeze.
The Los Angeles Times broke a major story on Sea Breeze, reporting that tens of thousands of dollars had been donated to city officials making decisions on Sea Breeze — but the money came from working-class people interviewed by the Times who had no idea what Sea Breeze was, couldn't afford to make contributions, and hadn't actually written the checks.
Leaung was charged with felony conspiracy to commit campaign money-laundering and offering to bribe a legislative body member. He has pleaded not guilty to using straw donors to funnel tens of thousands of dollars to the campaigns of more than a half-dozen L.A. politicians.
The Millennium project is disturbing example of L.A. City leaders trying to get a massive development approved despite formal warnings by the State of California of the project's proximity to the Hollywood Earthquake Fault.
This "rupture fault" is capable of actually rupturing the surface of the land, splitting buildings into pieces.
State Geologist John Parrish said his agency launched a study of the Hollywood fault after several independent studies suggested it may be active. He warned that that if a deeper study, expected by 2014, found the Hollywood fault to be active, the City of L.A. would be required by state law to withhold permits for new development projects until testing could prove that there is no risk. (See Attachment 20. Letter from John Parrish, State Geologist, California Geological Survey).
Caltrans also jumped in, warning that the massive proposed twin skyscrapers, of a precedent-setting height and size for Hollywood, would severely back up the 101 Freeway, creating hazards and environmental effects that could not be mitigated.
City safety officials agreed with the developer and ignored the California State Geologist, using old maps pre-dating the new findings, and insisting that there was no active fault and the proposed twin skyscrapers were appropriate.
On July 24, 2013, in a 13-0 vote and backed by Mayor Eric Garcetti, the project was approved by City Council.
In 2015, a judge halted the project, ruling that the City of Los Angeles failed to fully assess how the $1-billion project would affect surrounding neighborhoods.
It is chilling that today, the investor-developers still seeking to build the Millennium skyscrapers in Hollywood, are the same investment partners who built the disastrous sinking Millennium Tower in San Francisco. That building is sinking into the earth, and leaning over because of its failing foundation. Millennium Partners anchored the building in sand, not rock.
Yet today, same Millennium Partners group of investor-developers are trying, a second time, to get their twin skyscrapers approved — and they have moved one of their proposed tower directly atop the Hollywood Quake Fault, in defiance of the California State Geologist.
The proposed Millennium twin skyscrapers also have a new name, "Hollywood Central," to escape the Millennium Partners' stained name from its sinking building in San Francisco. The name change has worked so far: there's been no L.A. media coverage linking the sinking San Francisco skyscraper to the two men proposing twin skyscrapers next to and atop an L.A. quake fault.
However, the Los Angeles Timesdid report the following: "Most alarming is the fact that theproposed new project is sited astride the Hollywood Fault Zone and the 7.0 magnitude active Hollywood Earthquake Fault, as officially Alquist-Priolo mapped by the State of California." Any construction of an occupied building across this fault is unsafe folly. (See Attachment 24. Los Angeles Times, April 12, 2018, "Controversial $1-billion Hollywood high-rise project relaunched by developer").
In the fall of 2018, The New York Timesreported even worse news: Earthquake scientists gathering in Los Angeles unveiled a seminal new study that upwardly revises estimates of damage to West Coast skyscrapers from a quake. The Southern California Earthquake Center, a research organization of seismologists and engineers, has found that the severity of shaking in L.A. and West Coast cities has been significantly under-estimated. L.A.'s tall buildings are, as a result, dangerously under-designed.
Engineers found that buildings higher than 20 stories can suffer far more damage, with greater potential for collapse and widespread death, than believed by local engineers.
The mayor, City Council and city departments took no steps to respond, yet researchers at the Southern California Earthquake Center warned that municipal engineers would undoubtedly push back against the shocking findings. (See Attachment 25. New York Times, June 27, 2018,"A Seismic Change in Predicting How Earthquakes Will Shake Tall Buildings").
A troubling example of gentrification and land-flipping directly fueled by favors granted to developers by the Los Angeles City Council is the proposed skyscraper originally called The Reef. This $1 billion South L.A. project was touted for its 1,400 residential units and 28,000 square feet of restaurants at Hill Street, Broadway, Washington Boulevard and 22nd Street.
The project, proposed in a very poor area, faced fierce opposition from affordable housing advocates and social justice groups who feared displacement of thousands of low-income residents. In Dec. 2016, Golden State Environmental Justice Alliance and SAJE filed a complaint claiming the City Council violated state environmental laws by approving the project. (See Attachment 26. Courthouse News Service, Dec. 30, 2016, "Groups Fight $1.2 Billion Development in Los Angeles").
SAJE, a tenants-rights group, also claimed that L.A. City planners and city officials violated government code and the Community Plan by rushing through final approval — to beat the effective date of a new city law that imposes minimum affordable housing requirements on many large luxury developments.
In 2017 the "badly needed" project was approved by the City Council — but never built. The owner, who was rewarded great wealth when the City Council granted him a "zone change" and other lucrative exemptions to build far bigger than the zoning allowed, is trying to flip his asset or find a financing partner. The Reef land has been redubbed as Broadway Square, and the project could now change hands many times in the global market of buying and selling land assets turned into gold by politicians. (See Attachment 27. Los AngelesDowntown News, Oct. 17, 2017 "At the Reef Mega-Project, a Battle and Resolution").
This project developed by AMCAL Equities sits a few yards from the 101 Freeway in Woodland Hills near Topanga Canyon and Ventura boulevards. The Clarendon is an example of the City Council approving housing dangerously close to freeways, buildings are known as a "Black Lung Lofts." Such developments endanger the lifelong health of children who live in them.
In July 2017, the Los Angeles Timesexposed more malfeasance by the City of Los Angeles regarding their willful exposing of children and others to devastating health problems caused by Black Lung Lofts. City leaders' answer was to install air filters in all the buildings.
Researchers, however, say that even the highest-quality filters capture only some of the highly dangerous microscopic river of metal and rubber particulates that float next to freeways. Filters must be frequently replaced, and the building's ventilation system must run virtually full time with all doors and windows closed, an impossibility.
Compounding the uselessness of filters is that the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety has no procedures for documenting whether the filters are installed. LADBS doesn't conduct follow-up inspections, nor ensure that the filters are maintained and replaced.
Developers are harming thousands of children. The L.A. Timesreported that in 2015 alone, the City of L.A. issued building permits for 4,300 homes close enough to freeways to threaten occupants' health — more Black Lung Lofts than in any year over the last decade.
The City of Los Angeles misleadingly insists residents are safe if they live at least just 60 feet from freeway traffic. This is untrue. The seminal USC study found residents must be a least 500 feet (two blocks) from freeway traffic for children to be safe. The City Council continues to grant exemptions to allow Black Lung Lofts.
In a similar case, the Il Villaggio Toscano was proposed directly abutting the 401 and 101 interchange but was sued by Valley residents in 2013. It was approved unanimously by the L.A. City Council over the very rare objections of the AQMD, and the city required only that developer M. David Paul install air filters — and that he permanently close certain windows facing the freewaysin his 325-unit luxury building. The hotly disputed project remains unbuilt.
In 2016 the Planning Commission recommended granting lucrative waivers of the existing height, zoning and Community Plan rules, to allow the Clarendon to be built. On March 3, 2017, the City Council approved the project, whose construction is now well underway.
The Los Angeles City Planning Commission approved a distribution center with diesel trucks coming and going 24 hours a day 7 days a week in a family neighborhood in the Harbor Gateway area of Los Angeles. This project generated a rare response from the California Attorney General, Xavier Becerra.
A website post on the Coalition to Preserve LA's site chronicled what happened at the City Planning Commission hearing.
The article notes that under Los Angeles City Planning Commission President David Ambrose (recently asked to step down from the presidency by Garcetti, but still on the Commission), the city has taken a distinct stance that negatively impacts working-class neighborhoods and environmental equity.
In February 2018, at the Los Angeles City Planning Commission hearing, residents voiced their opposition to the trucking and distribution center proposed for their residential community. Logistics REIT Prologis was seeking permission to build a 341,000 sq. ft. warehouse with 36 truck-loading positions and parking for up to 71 truck trailers that would operate 24/7. The site sits just across the street from apartments, houses, healthcare facility, a convalescent home and a public park.
Community members strongly opposed it, fearing impacts from diesel truck exhaust and noise from a trucking and distribution center that was going to operate 24/7. The community is considered disadvantaged by the California Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA) because of its proximity to the 110 Freeway. The freeway carries hundreds of diesel trucks through the area every day, causing CalEPA to rank it in the highest percentile for pollution burden.
The Prologis Distribution Center will bring hundreds of diesel trucks in and out of this residential community, all through the day and all through the night. Prologis argued that they can mitigate air quality and noise impacts to the point where they're not significant.
Reacting to the letter from Attorney General Becerra and the lawsuit by the community, Prologis withdrew their application AFTER the mayor's appointees on the City Planning Commission had voted to approve it. Representatives from Prologis then asked the City Planning Department to withdraw the project from an upcoming Nov. 27, 2018 Planning and Land Use Management Committee hearing. The letter said Prologis was not able to reach an agreement with the appellants.
Prologis indicated in the letter that they intended to work with the City to prepare an EIR and process the new project for approval.
Elected and appointed city officials have looked the other way throughout, requiring that Attorney General Becerra step in to protect residents. The Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM) will hear the project on February 8, 2019.
It should be noted that while the legal challenge by neighbors forced the developer to submit an EIR, in most cases the L.A. Department of City Planning lets the applicant run the environmental review process without providing meaningful oversight. Department of City Planning staff will offer suggestions, the City Planning Commission will set some conditions, but the result is widespread and disturbing rubber-stamping of exemptions from zoning and land-use rules for developers.
This 40-story skyscraper would have been the first major skyscraper to dramatically alter the Hollywood skyline, create far more traffic and act as a domino, creating a precedent for skyscrapers in a community where they are banned by the Community Plan and area zoning.
According to the LA Weeklyin 2008, during the "due diligence" period, (when a developer researches a property before it makes a financial commitment.) Molasky Pacific took its plans for Columbia Square to then City Council president Eric Garcetti's staff, claiming they only had a single meeting in May 2006. But public records showed the developer met with Garcetti's aides four timesthat spring — three in a nine-day period in May, complete with a "site visit" at which Garcetti's staff was present, on May 5 of 2006.
"The first thing you do [as a developer] is make sure your plan is in line with the council member's vision," says former Councilman Art Snyder, a defender of City Council's closed-door, fiefdom–based culture, who represented the Eastside from 1967 to 1985.
Three months after the series of backroom, unpublicized meetings with Garcetti's staff, Molasky Pacific closed the $66 million deal for Columbia Square.
Molasky Pacific then attended a private meeting with Garcetti himself on Valentine's Day, 2007, according to the developer's spokesman. Several days later, in March, the firm sent an application to the city's Planning Department for the project's approval.
In the application, it was noted that the height limit of 45 feet would be thrown out to allow a "no-limit" building,essentially allowing a building 922 percent taller than the permitted 45 feet.
Besides then-City Council President Garcetti's February 2007 meeting, Garcetti met privately with the firm in October 2007, and again in February 2008. In addition to the private meetings and the pay-to-play activity that took place during the approval process of this project, was a much ignored "traffic-impact study," prepared by Fehr & Peers/Kaku Associates. The study, which was reviewed by city transportation officials, said that eight of the 27 Hollywood-area intersections affected by the two proposed towers would "significantly impact" thousands of commuters — a rating that signals mass congestion.
At the time, Robert Nudelman of Hollywood Heritage, commented on the impact of more cars in Hollywood, "If you put up something as big as Columbia Square, it's going to be catastrophic. And no one is going to use the subway. People who own condos don't take public transit. They drive cars — and they probably own two of them." (See Attachment 33. LA Weekly, April 30, 2008 "Doomscraper? Here comes Hollywood's First-Ever Mega-Skyscraper).
The project was approved by the City Council on July 28, 2010. On April 10, 2011 the City Council approved a 15-year developer agreement for the project.
In October of 2014 the project was flipped without a single stick of construction, to Kilroy Realty Corp. for a whopping $65 million, most of that instant profit for the original developer, easy private wealth created by the City Council's upzoning of the land.
A Hollywood activist wrote in a letter to the City Council: "Approving the CBS Columbia Square project only serves to enrich the current owners of the property by granting massive land use entitlements while severely impacting the surrounding residents and businesses with gridlocked traffic, increased pollution, and literally overshadowing the delicate Selma La Baig Historic District area." (See Attachment 34. LA Weekly,"L.A. City Council Approves Hollywood's Massive Columbia Square Project").
Pan Am Equities, the parent company of 2800 Casitas LLC, is owned by the Manocherian family, which owns 85 buildings in Manhattan. Their company, Pan Am, wants to build a large luxury housing project on next to the Los Angeles River, whose Master Plan is now underway. According to The Real Deal, this project is thought to be this extremely wealthy New York family's first project outside of New York City.
The mayor promised the Los Angeles River will "be restored to its natural state," but the Manocherians have pushed hard for an outsized luxury complex of 419 apartments, with just 35 of them, or less than 10%, designated as affordable. This gentrification plan, in a working-class riverside area, is against what the area wants or needs. The building would include roughly 40,000 square feet of commercial space on the ground floor. The site at 2750 West Casitas Avenue and 2800 North Kerr Street is currently occupied by a 30,000-square-foot warehouse, built in 1999.
The Manocherians are seeking a General Plan Amendment — allowing them to get around existing rules, ignore local zoning and planning, and change the land from jobs-oriented heavy manufacturing to a limited industrial land-use designation that allows for luxury housing. The Manocherians also want a lucrative Density Bonus exemption to erect a building that is 35% bigger than what is allowed. Under the land's current zoning, it is illegal to grant the Manocherians the Density Bonus.
To achieve these goals, Pan Am held unpublicized backroom meetings with top city officials. Seeking community buy-in, Pan Am met with the Atwater Village Neighborhood Council's Environmental and Land-use Committee. During that meeting, Pan Am lied to residents, claiming the project was merely in preliminary discussion stages. In fact, City Planning records show, they had already filed a formal application for their major land zoning change — a key indicator that the project was years along, using the backroom system of private meetings with key city officials.
Most significantly, in its filing with L.A. City Planning Department, the 2800 Casitas developers asked for a stripped-down environmental review called a "Mitigated Negative Declaration" which does not require an environmental study of impacts on traffic, air quality, the river or surrounding area, and can be completed in under 45 days. An "Environmental Impact Report" (EIR) requires extensive study and can take up to a year.
According to Curbed LA, the City of Los Angeles planned to launch an extremely rare "eminent domain" — a taking of the land — to secure a piece of property in order to add a bright orange bridge across the river that would serve and enhance the luxury dwelling in the Manocherian project. A report to the Los Angeles City Council's Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM) from the L.A. City Attorney said the city was seeking eminent domain taking of the land because it has "reached an impasse in negotiations" with the property owner.
The city assessed the value of the 7,711-square-foot parcel at $2,500 — a scandalously lowball number. The owner "demanded payment in the hundreds of thousands of dollars," in line with values in the rare riverside area.
The Los Angeles City Attorney's report said that construction of the bridge would proceed on time in April 2019. (See Attachment 37. Report, Aug. 28, 2018 to LA City Council PLUM Committee from LA City Attorney, "Draft Ordinance Finding that the Public Interest and Necessity Require the Acquisition Via Eminent Domain of Real Property Located at 2433 Birkdale Street, Los Angeles for the Construction of The Taylor Yard Bikeway/Pedestrian Bridge Over the LA River").
This proposed triple skyscraper for luxury housing, which would include 21 liquor licenses, rooftop bars and nightclubs, would displace a historic, diverse and thriving community of 84 multi-generational Latino, black and white families near Sunset Boulevard and Highland.
This project began in earnest in 2013 when, behind closed doors, Harridge management and developer Morton La Kretz began their quest for lucrative, major exemptions from city zoning rules and development standards. They were also seeking to get an exemption from major state environmental impact protections.
Below is a timeline that outlines the money donated by Crossroads Management, Harridge Development Group and the principals of those companies. It also indicates the private closed-door meetings they had with Los Angeles City Council members and their staff. All information obtained was gathered either through the California Public Records Act, or from the Ethics Commission website.
March 21, 2013 Morton La Kretz, founder of Crossroads Management, donates $1,300 to Eric Garcetti's campaign for mayor.
Development Group, donates $1,300 to Eric Garcetti's campaign for mayor.
Development Group, donates $700 to Mitch O'Farrell's campaign for City Council.
April 8, 2013 Morton La Kretz, founder of Crossroads Management, donates $700 to Mitch O'Farrell's campaign for City Council.
Development Group, LLC, donates $250 to Mitch O'Farrell's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Mitch O'Farrell's campaign for City Council.
November 18, 2013 FIRST BACKROOM MEETING between Los Angeles City Council member Mitch O'Farrell, Morton La Kretz, and Linda Duttenhaver of Crossroads Management.
November 22, 2013 Bradley Woomer of Harridge Development Groups donates $250 to Mitch O'Farrell's Officeholder Account.
Harridge Development Group, donates $500 to Mitch O'Farrell's Officeholder Account.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Marqueece Harris-Dawson's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Gloria Molina's campaign for City Council.
January 27, 2015 Marc Annotti of Harridge Development Group donates $700 to Mitch Englander's campaign for City Council.
February 12, 2015 Marc Annotti of Harridge Development Group donates $700 to Nury Martinez's campaign for City Council.
March 26, 2015 Yuri Gurevich, a consultant at Harridge Development Group, donates $250 to Carolyn Ramsay's campaign for City Council.
March 26, 2015 James D. Hearn, an attorney at Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Carolyn Ramsay's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Carolyn Ramsay's campaign for City Council.
March 26, 2015 Bradley Woomer of Harridge Development Groups donates $700 to Carolyn Ramsay's campaign for City Council.
April 20, 2015 SECOND BACKROOM MEETING with Council member Mitch O'Farrell, O'Farrell deputy Christine Peters, O'Farrell deputy Gary Benjamin and Crossroads attorney Jerry Neuman and Crossroads executive Linda Duttenhaver.
May 20, 2015 David Schwartzman, CEO of Harridge Development Group, donates $500 to Gil Cedillo's campaign for City Council.
The money flowing from developers Harridge and La Kretz to City Hall elected leaders, and the BACKROOM MEETINGS with Council member Mitch O'Farrell, ratchet up.
June 30, 2015: Marc Annotti of Harridge Development Group donates $700 to Jose Huizar's Officeholder Account.
October 2015: Initial Environmental Impact Report (EIR) is released.
BACKROOM MEETING, November 2, 2015: Private meeting with O'Farrell Staff Christine Peters, O'Farrell deputy Chris Robertson, O'Farrell deputy Dan Halden with attorney Jerry Neuman.
BACKROOM MEETING November 10, 2015: Private meeting with O'Farrell Staff Chris Robertson, O'Farrell deputy Christine Peters, O'Farrell deputy Dan Halden with attorney Jerry Neuman.
November 12, 2015 David Schwartzman, CEO of Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Bob Blumenfield's campaign for City Council.
November 14, 2015 Public scoping meeting held, finally ALLOWING THE PUBLIC to see the skyscraper multi-tower plan.
December 23, 2015 James Hearn, an attorney at Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Mike Bonin's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Mike Bonin's campaign for City Council.
December 30, 2015 James Hearn, an attorney at Harridge Development Group, donates $250 to Herb Wesson's Officeholder Account.
December 30, 2015 Bradley Woomer of Harridge Development Groups donates $700 to Curren Price's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Curren Price's campaign for City Council.
December 31, 2015 James D. Hearn, general counsel at Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Gil Cedillo's campaign for City Council.
December 31, 2015 Bradley Woomer of Harridge Development Groups donates $700 to Gil Cedillo's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Gil Cedillo's campaign for City Council.
August 5, 2016 James Hearn, an attorney at Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Mike Bonin's campaign for City Council.
Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Herb Wesson's campaign for City Council.
August 5, 2016 Bradley Woomer of Harridge Development Groups donates $250 to Herb Wesson's campaign for City Council.
August 16, 2016 Harridge applies for "CEQA streamlining" to avoid complying with California Environmental Quality Act. Harridge also seeks Zone Change and Height District Change exemptions from the City Council to override the Community Plan and zoning in Hollywood.
August 26, 2016 David Schwartzman, CEO of Harridge Development Group, donates $700 to Joe Buscaino's campaign for City Council.
August 26, 2016 Bradley Woomer of Harridge Development Groups donates $500 to Joe Buscaino's campaign for City Council.
September 28, 2016 Marc Annotti of Harridge Development Group donates $100 to Karo Torossian's campaign for City Council.
December 31, 2016 Gil Cedillo's campaign returns $700 donation to David Schwartzman.
What Did the Crossroads Developers Get?
In 2018, in comments tinged with racial overtones, Mayor Garcetti's appointees on the Planning Commission slam the mostly Latino community standing in the way of the skyscrapers. Garcetti Planning Commission appointee David Ambrose outrageously describes the beloved garden apartments as "rough," and "not worth preserving," and Garcetti appointee Marc Mitchell dismisses this vibrant community as "dormant." The Planning Commission approves razing the community for three skyscrapers.
The developer is awarded 22 liquor licenses, to turn a quiet community of working families and two schools into a Vegas-like scene of super-graphics, penthouses and bars. The project will destroy a community of 84 rent-protected homes, razing a core neighborhood of diversity and history in Hollywood.
The project was approved by the Los Angeles City Council on January 22, 2018 which is awash in donations from Harridge and La Kretz.
Please contact us at Coalition to Preserve LA as soon as possible at (916) 595 9033, as we can provide witness testimony, documents and further help. Thank you for your public service.


Rise Against, Social Distortion and Bring Me the Horizon are among the bands leading the lineup at the 2014 Riot Fest and Expo that's taking place in Toronto this September.
Organizers have revealed the bill for the Sept. 6 and 7 concerts. This year's event takes place at Toronto's Downsview Park and will feature Rise Against and Social Distortion toward the top of the bill alongside Canadian favorites Billy Talent, City and Colour and Metric.
Other harder rock acts on the bill include Dropkick Murphys, AWOLNATION, Taking Back Sunday, Alkaline Trio, Glassjaw, Clutch, Circa Survive, New Found Glory and Brand New.
Fans can also look for alt-rockers like The National, The Flaming Lips, Death Cab for Cutie, The Afghan Whigs and Manchester Orchestra as part of the bill. To see the full lineup, check out the tour poster above or visit the festival's website here.
The Toronto-based Riot Fest is the first of three such events taking place, with the lineups for the Chicago and Denver dates still to be revealed. All three festivals will take place over successive weekends in September. Tickets for the Toronto Riot Fest go on sale this Saturday at 10AM ET at this location.


text:
Q: Solve the PDE $xu_x-2yu_y+u=e^x,$ with the side condition $u(1,y)=y^2$ 1b. $xu_x-2yu_y+u=e^x,$ side condition $u(1,y)=y^2$
My attempt: This has been a super endurance and I hope I got the whole thing right. So anyway, here it goes ...oh and one more thing... can someone please show me how to solve the side condition step by step please. I know I'm kind of slow at the side condition part, but I really want to fully understand it...so far I can go up into have the $F(w)$ part isolated and then it has something to do with a dummy variable and afterwards substitute back, but where exactly? It would be greatly appreciated :).
$\frac{dy}{dx}=\frac{2y}{x}$
$\frac{-1dy}{2y}=\frac{1dx}{x}$
$\frac{-1}{2} \ln y = \ln x +C$
$\ln y^{\frac{-1}{2}} = \ln x +C$
$e^{\ln y^{\frac{-1}{2}}} = e^{\ln x +C}$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}=xe^C$
$\frac{y^{\frac{-1}{2}}}{x}=e^C$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}x^{-1}=e^C$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}x^{-1} = w \rightarrow x = \frac{w}{\sqrt{z}}$
$ z = y \rightarrow y =z$
$ W_x = -x^{-2}y^{\frac{-1}{2}}$
$W_y = \frac{-1}{2}x^{-1}y^{\frac{-3}{2}}$
$Z_y = 1$
$Z_x = 0$
$x[V_wW_x+V_zZ_x]-2y[V_wW_y+V_zZ_y]+v=e^{\frac{1}{w\sqrt{z}}}$
$-2yV_z+v=e^{\frac{1}{w\sqrt{z}}}$
$V_z+\frac{1}{-2y}v=\frac{1}{-2y}e^{\frac{1}{w\sqrt{z}}}$
$v(a) = e^{\int \frac{-1}{2y}} \rightarrow e^{-\frac{1}{2} \ln y} \rightarrow y^{\frac{-1}{2}}$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}V_z+y^{\frac{-1}{2}}\frac{1}{-2y}v=y^{\frac{-1}{2}}\frac{1}{-2y}e^{\frac{1}{w\sqrt{z}}}$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}V_z+y^{\frac{-3}{2}}\frac{1}{-2}v=y^{\frac{-3}{2}}\frac{1}{-2}e^{\frac{1}{w\sqrt{z}}}$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}V_z-y^{\frac{-3}{2}}\frac{1}{2}v=-y^{\frac{3}{2}}\frac{1}{2}e^{\frac{1}{w\sqrt{z}}}$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}v=\int \frac{-1}{2} y^{\frac{-3}{2}}e^{w^{-1}}e^{z^\frac{-1}{2}}$
$y^{\frac{-1}{2}}v=- y^{\frac{-3}{2}}e^{w^{-1}}e^{z^\frac{1}{2}} +F(w)$
$v=-y^{\frac{-1}{2}}e^{w^{-1}}e^{z^\frac{1}{2}}+F(w)y^{\frac{1}{2}}$
$u=-y^{\frac{-1}{2}}e^{{y^{(\frac{-1}{2}}x^{-1} )}^{-1}}e^{y^\frac{1}{2}}+F(y^{\frac{-1}{2}}x^{-1} )y^{\frac{1}{2}}$
Now for the side condition
$u(1,y)=y^2$
Recall that our solution is
$u=-y^{\frac{-1}{2}}e^{{y^{(\frac{-1}{2}}x^{-1} )}^{-1}}e^{y^\frac{1}{2}}+F(y^{\frac{-1}{2}}x^{-1} )y^{\frac{1}{2}}$
Under the side condition, $u(1,y)=y^2$, we have
$-y^{\frac{-1}{2}}e^{{y^{(\frac{-1}{2}} )}^{-1}}e^{y^\frac{1}{2}}+F(y^{\frac{-1}{2}} )y^{\frac{1}{2}}=y^2$
$F(y^{\frac{-1}{2}})=y^{\frac{3}{2}}+e^{{y^{(\frac{-1}{2}} )}^{-1}}e^{y^\frac{1}{2}}$
So if I let $ y^{\frac{-1}{2}} =r$ Would it be $y=r^2$ because I am multiplying by $-2$ to get rid of the negative.
Edit: maybe not.. more like $y = r^{-2}$

A: Without looking at your attempt in details, a method of solving is shown below, so that you could compare with your calculus :

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Reference 1 preamplifier: Tubed line stage with remote control. Inputs: Tape, Tuner, Phono, CD, Video, Aux 1, Aux 2, Aux 3 (XLR and RCA connections). Outputs: 2 main, 1 tape (XLR and RCA connections). Tube complement: eight 6922/E88CC dual-triode (vacuum tube audio circuit, solid-state power supply). Frequency response: 1Hz–200kHz, ±0.5dB. Distortion: <0.015% @ 4V RMS, balanced output. Gain: 12.3dB balanced, 6.3dB single-ended at main output; 0dB at tape output. Input impedance: 220k ohms balanced, 110k ohms single-ended. Maximum input: 7.0V RMS balanced, 3.5V RMS single-ended. Output impedance: 400 ohms balanced, 200 ohms single-ended, 20k ohms minimum load recommended, 200pF maximum capacitance. Rated outputs: 4V RMS, 2V RMS single-ended into 100k ohm balanced load. (Maximum balanced capability is 30V RMS @ <0.5% THD @ 1kHz.) Noise: 13µV RMS residual noise (IHF-weighted), balanced output with gain minimum (110dB below 4V RMS output, 93dB below 2V RMS single-ended output). Power requirements: 100-135VAC, 60Hz (200–270VAC, 50/60Hz); 90W maximum.
Dimensions: 19" (480mm) W by 7" (178mm) H by 15.5" (394mm) D. Handles extend 1.5" (38mm) forward of front panel. Weight: 30 lbs (13.6kg).
Serial number of unit reviewed: 08289001.
VT200 power amplifier: dual-mono tubed power amplifier with ultralinear output stage. Tube complement: eight 6550C in matched pairs, ten 6922 (six driver, four input). Output power: 200Wpc continuous into 8 ohms (23dBW), 20Hz-20kHz. THD @ 1kHz: typically 1% @ 200W, <0.01% @ 1W. Power bandwidth: 12Hz–120kHz, -3dB. Frequency response: 0.5Hz–200kHz, -3dB @ 1W. Input sensitivity: 2.5V RMS, balanced or single-ended (27dB gain into 16 ohms). Input impedance: 200k ohms balanced, 100k ohms single-ended. Output taps: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 ohms. Output regulation: approximately 0.8dB with 16 ohm load to open circuit (damping factor approximately 11). Overall negative feedback: 10dB. Slew rate: 25V/µs. Rise time: 1.5µs. Hum & noise: <0.2mV RMS, 109dB below rated output (IHF weighted, input shorted, 16 ohm output). Power-supply energy storage: approximately 674 joules. Power requirements: 105–125VAC, 60Hz (210–250VAC, 50Hz); 990W at rated output; 1200W maximum; 680W at idle.
Dimensions: 19" (483mm) W by 10.5" (267mm) H by 23.6" (600mm) D. Handles extend 1.5" (38mm) forward of front panel. Weight: 118 lbs (46.5kg).
Serial number of unit reviewed: 68097002.
Both: Approximate number of dealers: 65.


He should be a Popstar, Painters, collaged, but after a wild youth and a gave away high school is first of all the big failure, the "Coming of Age" disaster.
Then Udo Eberl composed music for dance theater successfully. He was editor who discovered far too late the camera itself. Over three decades, he scans for feature articles and magazines, the stars from pop to jazz on the stages of the world, trying to compress emotions to make music visible and freeze. He creates twice the program of the International Danube festival with more than 300,000 visitors. Writing and directing plays, lost in poetry finds its way back to the camera as a means of expression of his deepest feelings.
Shooting digital, analog thinking is his way. Udo Eberl dispensed with Photoshop, is alone on the focusing, sharpness, the cut of his artistic reality. The approach take place with the eye, not through the viewfinder. Where is the pulse? The image must be created in the head. When he takes his camera in hand, cutting and sharpness are already selected. A shot, a maximum of three, the subject does not get more chances, then the composition must work their magic. Still life, object photography, macro are created in that way.
Three years ago, with a intensive preparation is the outing. Udo Eberl´s work - "Approximations to a museum guard chair" (Annäherungen an einem Museumswärterstuhl) can be seen at the Triennale Art Ulmer in the Ulmer Museum. The head of the ZKM Museum of Contemporary Art in Karlsruhe, buys this work. This is followed by solo exhibitions at Zehnstadel Leipheim (2013) and at the City Gallery Laupheim (2014). The end of 2015 he will exhibit at the Künstlerhaus Ulm. Also planned is an exhibition in Turin and his performance / photography project "Under the Bridge" is publicly funded and currently being built.
From the "Coming of Age"-disaster has long been a "Coming of Art" - fever grow up. Incurable and contagious.


Oxygen Books: Are these the 10 best city novels?
Are these the 10 best city novels?
We so agree with the Observer's Elizabeth Day that Teju Cole's Open City is one of the best city novels - in his case about his adopted city of New York.
Spoiler alert but his description of his protagonist being stuck on a fire escape high above Carnegie Hall and in a storm is probably not one to read if you have trouble with heights.
And we love her other choice for New York: Tom Wolfe's eighties nightmare Bonfire of the Vanities. Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser, which tells Chicago's story, is a book we're now determined to read too.
Then there's London: Bleak House of course and Capital by John Lanchester as well as our favourite NW by Zadie Smith. It's lovely when a less feted part of a city - in this case Willesden - is evoked so brilliantly. Who can ever forget the church between two busy main roads where her two main characters take their children one hot and dusty summer's afternoon. It's writing of the highest degree. There's also a wonderful chapter set at a summertime party on the top of a block of flats in Soho. The character Smith depicts here is drunk and drugged and being jilted and her malaise somehow parallels the world below.
Elizabeth Day also includes Dublin (Ulysses of course), Moscow (The Master and the Margarita), Bombay (A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry) and the biggest surprise, The Dog by Joseph O'Neil set in Dubai. One wonders how many other books have been set in this high-rise desert city.
Guilty admission: we're the publishers of the city-pick urban anthology series featuring some of the (we hope) best writing on favourite world cities. It's why we wanted to see Berlin there (Paul Verhaeghen Omega Minor, read it and be dazzled), Paris of course (where do you start?), Amsterdam (H M van den Brink On the Water for the city's gentler pleasures), Joseph Brodsky for his description of the melting ice on St Petersburg's Neva.
And there are more cities. Lots more. Each with their own amazing writers to evoke the real souls of each of them in their own quirky and idiosyncratic ways.
Thank you Elizabeth Day for starting us on this journey - of seeing how city novels can take us to the very heart of a metropolis.
On Do travel guides have a future asks Guardian Travel.


Along hwy 95, we came to a farm stand, selling among other things, fresh dates!!! We love fresh dates, at home i always buy the fresh dates from BAM, they come from Iran and are so good, but these dates, growing here in the desert, were just awesome, they cost $6.00 per pound, should have bought several pounds………The fields were full of cabbages, big ones!!! Inside the farm stand, some interesting antiques and old kitchen stuff was sold, also trinkets made from old kitchen utensils. Recycle!!!!!
Ineke ,admiring some garden ornaments.
Cabbages, as far as the eye can see!!


Mixing up the magic with Petits filous.
There is quite a big age gap between James and Evelyn (over 5 years!) so we are always trying to find ways to keep play time fun and mix up what we are doing to keep everyone happy and everyone entertained. I am a big believer in children learning through play and discovery and that's why we try and mix up our play times.
James loves a bit of arts and crafts and we try and keep it interesting by changing the tools he uses to paint and draw. We have used potatos and other veg to make paint stamps, we have used ice paint and even used leaves to create pretty autumn pictures. One of James favourite activities is drawing on a huge roll of left over wall paper! He created his very own super hero picture and loved being able to crate a big, bold picture. Now James is at school he has started asking for friends to come play, I think this would make a great activity for him and his friends to do out in the garden on a sunny day. With a massive roll of wall paper there is plenty of room for everyone's imagination to run wild and be creative!
Another favourite activity for us is random walks in the woods, they are cheap and can be done in large groups or on your own with your child! You cant quite beat the magic and excitement of a child exploring a new place, hearing new sounds, seeing new things and gaining new experiences through a simple walk in the woods. We often take along a picnic and enjoy our lunch in our new magical surroundings. We spot flowers and bugs and James is always full of so many questions and facts when we leave its great!
Sometimes at the end of a busy day we totally mix up bath time and both James and Evelyn enjoy a magical glow bath which they love! Their eyes light up when they peek through the bathroom door and see the colourful glow beaming from the bath tub.
time or totally mix it up and enjoy both flavours together!
The yogurts are fruity flavour yet not too overpowering and are a thick creamy texture. Both Evelyn and James enjoyed both flavours and James enjoyed trying to each one square at a time too. These will definitely be making an appearance in our fridge and our picnic basket this summer!
You can check out the new Petits filous magic square yoghurts here - www.petitsfilous.co.uk.
How do you mix up the magic with your children?
This post is an entry for BritMums #MagicSquaresPlaydates Linky Challenge, sponsored by Petits Filous.
I love woodland walks too. It teaches kids about science, whilst spending quality time together as a family.
Oh what a different looking yoghurt I didn't know Petits Filous dids ones like it.
Wow, how do you make a magical glow bath? It looks fantastic!
I adore the LARGE art. Going supersize is a wonderful way to go.
Rolls of wallpaper are fab for kids art! They also make wonderfully huge murals!
We love walks too, but we have never done glow baths. That looks fantastic - really magical. What a fab idea.
My children have a ten year age gap, but love to spend time together, so I definitely relate to that aspect! Arts and crafts are always a winner for us!
We love painting in the garden and the woodland walks are great too!
Aww that photo of them together sat on the log is adorable.Rolls of wallpaper for drawing is a great idea!
we have age gaps to. There iis 6 years between the youngest two.
My three year old loves a glow bath, and needs one after we have got messy with the paints!


text:
namespace TravelShare.Web.Controllers.Tests.NewsManagementTests
{
    using Moq;
    using NUnit.Framework;
    using TestStack.FluentMVCTesting;
    using TravelShare.Services.Data.Common.Contracts;
    using TravelShare.Web.Areas.Administration.Controllers;
    using TravelShare.Web.Mappings;
    using TravelShareMvc.Providers.Contracts;

    [TestFixture]
    public class DeleteNews_Should
    {
        [Test]
        public void RenderDefaultView()
        {
            // Arrange
            var mockedNewsService = new Mock<INewsService>();
            var mockedCacheProvider = new Mock<ICachingProvider>();
            var mockedMapperProvider = new Mock<IMapperProvider>();
            var newsManagementController = new NewsManagementController(mockedNewsService.Object, mockedCacheProvider.Object, mockedMapperProvider.Object);

            // Act & Assert
            newsManagementController.WithCallTo(x => x.DeleteNews()).ShouldRenderDefaultView();
        }
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Open since June 2006 and located in the heart of Eastchester, Mickey Spillane's is a neighborhood favorite bar and restaurant where you will find the best food, drink, and fun in town seven nights a week. Mickey Spillane's menu features traditional Irish pub entrées along with a wonderful mixture of seafood, steak, pasta, and so much more. For all your celebration needs, Mickey Spillane's also has its own private party room for up to 60 guests with numerous menu options. With outdoor summer dining, a welcoming staff and relaxed atmosphere, come join us at Mickey Spillane's for a great time!
Request Caesar dressing on the side (not included in analysis).
Grilled tender chicken with tomato, romaine lettuce with Caesar dressing in a tomato wrap. Analysis includes House Salad as choice of side (choice of dressing not included in analysis).
Request less avocado (1/3 avocado).
Marinated chicken breast, grilled and served over mixed greens with tomato, avocado and fresh fruit. Carribean Mango Vinaigrette dressing served on the side; not included in analysis (1 Tbsp. = 55 calories, 5 g fat, 100 mg sodium). *Remember to request no added salt.
Mixed greens with tomato, cucumber, shredded carrots and onion. Choice of dressing not included in analysis.
Turkey burger served with lettuce, tomato, onion, and a slice of American cheese. Analysis includes House Salad as choice of side (choice of dressing not included in analysis). Pickles served on the side (not included in analysis).


I did impress you to buy my book, "The Dharma Bums" this evening. Thank you for listening to your guidance.
What you don't see is that I was trying to get to something new and different. In the conformist mood of the Cold War, I felt that an alternative was necessary, a message that was simultaneously spiritual and inserted in the reality of that time.
I understand your displeasure with my book On the Road, but there too, I was reaching beyond the times to a new arrangement. It's not the first time a "loser" is presented in a novel - you know that from your study of French literature.
As you explore the spiritual presence in American culture and literature, be aware that writers like me did seek for something higher. If we didn't fully succeed, it's only because we were mortals. But the important thing is that we did seek and as you know, when we seek, we eventually find.
I had to go through a great deal, which I knew even before I died, but I did have a soul hungry for spiritual truth. If I erred, that did not deny this spiritual hunger. And so, my yearnings were satisfied, even as I had to work hard on myself.
I thank you for taking this message. I wanted to alter your perception of me and my work. I also wanted to help you integrate your life by making a connection to San Francisco, which is your future home, and the literary scene this city is famous for.
It was I who guided you to the Beat Museum tonight. It was my way of welcoming you to San Francisco. I also inspired its owner to give you a free pass to the museum, so that you would be encouraged to revisit it. I see my guidance worked!
So you see, I have made progress on my spiritual journey, because I really wanted to.
I see this channeling has helped you to think better of me. That was my intention.
Jack Kerouac (March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969) was an American novelist, writer, poet, and artist from Lowell, Massachusetts. Along with William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, he is amongst the best known of the writers (and friends) known as the Beat Generation.


Ohio Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor has been asked by a coalition of consumer groups and unions concerned with two proposed mergers in the health insurance industry to hold hearings on the matter. Taylor, who serves as the head of the Ohio Department of Insurance and could call for hearings, has refused.
Gov. John Kasich's Lt. Governor Mary Taylor, a former state auditor, has shown her dislike for the Affordable Care Act [ACA]. Both she and Gov. Kasich have done as much as they could to not cooperate with the ACA.
Ohio's leadership duo decided not to set up a state-run healthcare exchange after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled it constitutional, claiming at the time it was too expensive. Ohioans who shopped for affordable coverage did so on an Ohio exchange set up and run by the Federal Department of Health and Human Services.
Rob Nichols, Gov. Kasich's Press Secretary, said in November of 2012 that Ohio would have no flexibility to shape an exchange to its needs, and that the costs associated with doing so would be so high that it doesn't make fiscal sense for the state to operate a health exchange under Obamacare.
The Kasich Administration calculated that a state-run exchange would cost about $43 million annually, versus about $1.6 million to participate in the federal exchange.
Mrs. Taylor has long complained that the ACA forced healthcare providers to raise their rates, while not acknowledging that federal subsidies to those who qualified reduced those rising premiums to more affordable levels, a fundamental design of the nation's evolving healthcare law Gov. Kasich has vowed to eliminate should be find himself in the White House next year.
At issue are the proposed mergers between dominant industry insurers Anthem-Cigna and Aetna-Humana. "We write to ask that the Ohio Department of Insurance utilize all of its powers, including conducting public hearings, to thoroughly evaluate the impact of these possible mergers under Ohio law." As the director of the state insurance agency, Lt. Gov. Taylor is empowered to review health insurance mergers and acquisitions within the state. Hearings would inform Ohio consumers about the effect of the merger or other acquisition of control would be substantially to lessen competition in insurance in this state or tend to create a monopoly, a media release said.
In previous reports, an anti-trust attorney working with some of the groups who signed onto the letter said he expects this merger to play out like previous one. "Past mergers have led to significant premium increases and less consumer choice," said David Balto, the anti-trust attorney.
If the merger proceeds, the letter sent to Director Taylor says the new company could control about 60 percent of the portion of the Ohio market that's predominantly made up of large employers that pay for their own workers' health care costs and purchase administrative services through an insurer.
A further concern is that choices for Medicare Advantage in some Ohio counties would be worse than now.
Meanwhile, the Department of Justice is currently reviewing the proposed mergers for anti-trust purposes. The Ohio Department of Insurance is not required to but is allowed to hold hearings on the mergers, the groups note. "ODI as the regulator has a formal role in this process," the letter says.
ODI under Mary Taylor, who is widely expected to run for governor once Kasich leaves office in 2018, is saying publicly it will not be holding public hearings.
Erin Trish, a researcher at the University of Southern California's Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics, said that what usually happens when there's less competition is that consumers seldom benefit, according to reports.
When the ACA became operational, Gov. Kasich and Lt. Gov. Taylor saidy they want every Ohioan to have health care coverage and believe the route to achieving that is a market-based system that encourages both high quality and low costs.


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I wonder how many "Windhoekers" would know where this chapel is? Our St Paul's College chapel was called Church of the Holy Ghost, and the fresco on the wall behind the altar depicts the descent of the Holy Spirit. It was built in 1957 as a semi parish church for the mostly German speaking Catholic community of that time. The architect Mr Flemming also painted the frescos. Fr Willibald Ballmeier was the first parish priest (while also being the St Paul's hostel master and the leader of the Catholic scouts – the fleur-de-lis emblem in the marble floor is a reminder of the St George scouts). Regular Sunday masses, baptisms and weddings were held here. In 1977 after the departure of the parish priest, Fr Windelschmidt, there was no regular priest appointed to the chapel so Br. Herminigildus, the principal of St Paul's College was then allowed to use it as a school chapel.
Our chapel today plays an important role in the spiritual and moral development of our students. We hold chapel services once a week for the primary school and twice weekly for the high school. Pastors and speakers from different denominations are invited to speak to our students. Regular prayer sessions and Holy Masses are held. Together with the chapel services, Religious Education classes help the students learn more about their college patron and about world religions and works towards developing the whole child. During the great flood that affected many schools and students in the northern part of Namibia in 2011, our students supported the efforts of the Red Cross Society of Namibia through collections of food and clothing.
Two groups of parents have formed a "School's Prayer Network" and meet weekly in the primary and high school to pray for the direction of the school, staff and leadership, and most importantly, for the children. Specific prayer requests from staff are sent through every week.
Past Scholars still use the chapel for weddings and baptisms, and the developing indigenous garden, designed by Christine and Anna Marais, provides a lush setting for this. We encourage you to contact the school if you are a present or past member of the St Paul's community and would like to use our chapel for a family event.
Fr Davis Vadakkumpadan

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Dihydroergotamine (DHE)as an injection is used to treat migraine and cluster headaches. It acts by activating certain receptors in the brain that makes the brain vessels narrow, thus relieving the migraine symptoms.
Domperidone is a less expensive alternative which is well tolerated in headache. It is a peripherally acting dopamine antagonist which is widely used for decades to treat gastric motility disorders and nausea. An audit was conducted to determine the safety of domperidone in the treatment of nausea associated the DHE infusion and headache. While auditing, the use of domperidone for the inpatient management of nausea, safety concerns, specially of potential cardiac arrhythmias were focused.
In this analysis, 103 consecutive admissions of 90 patients admitted for IV DHE by infusion were done. Most of patients with chronic migraine were treated domperidone. Out of 103, 85 patients were encountered and DHE was found to be well-tolerated at doses up to 80 mg/day. However, a significant side effect, akathisia was observed in one patient. Further, baseline ECG was corrected and electrocardiograph (ECG) was repeated after administering domperidone in 21 patients. Electrocardiograph was interpreted blindly by a cardiac electrophysiologist. It was observed that, QTc did not differ before and after the administration of domperidone. Although, in combination with the other antiemetics, domperidone was effective in treating the nausea and no patients had severe refractory nausea that demands restricting the DHE dose.
To summarize, domperidone has proven to be a safe in the treatment of nausea associated with inpatient DHE infusion and headache. While the larger prospective trials were necessary to confirm these results, and assessed efficacy.


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Create support groups and mentor survivors to become ambassadors in their communities to eliminate stigma, discrimination and the associated stereotypes.
We spearheaded the first ever survivor-led organization, where survivors were put at the forefront to advocate for zero tolerance to acid attack violence. We pioneered the formation of survivor support groups to promote psychosocial support, survivor empowerment and community reintegration of survivors as proactive independent citizens.
We pioneered the first ever skills development training to promote economic sustainability, made links and connections to support the sustainability of survivors through promotion, marketing and participating in exhibitions.
We championed a survivor-led model and worked to bring different actors like CERESAV-USA, (now RISEcoalition) on board to work in the area of addressing acid attack violence in Uganda. This was done through lobbying, awareness visits and presentations which attracted especially the founders of RISE to engage in supporting acid attack violence survivors, not just in Uganda but globally.
We developed a lobbying strategy through awareness initiatives using media, workshops and conferences, public lectures and presentations to attract different actors to strengthen the voices against acid attack violence both nationally and internationally.
We have promoted global recognition from UK to Canada to USA and worldwide.
We are proud to say that our survivor empowerment approach has led to the formation of survivor ambassadors who are now forming different groups in Uganda, increasing awareness of the problem and changing the face of acid attack violence in Uganda.
We started the first ever survivor-led evidenced-based petition to the president of Uganda and the parliament, which resulted in the passing of the Toxic Chemical Prohibition Bill into law (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3553582/I-ll-make-scars-stars-Brave-women-survived-acid-attacks-Uganda-reveal-injuries-bid-prevent-attacks.html). Still a lot needs to be done, thanks to the emerging groups by our past support group ambassadors who are raising more voices, and increasing pressure where it will be effective.
We have set the ground standards for accountability and transparency, so that all work done in this area is evidence-based. We have mentored our past support group ambassadors who are doing the same in the field.
We championed the Asset-Based Community Driven (ABCD) model upon which all other emerging groups spearheaded by our ambassadors in the field are operating. This has strengthened the empowerment of survivors to live more proactive independent lives.


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Jug in the form of a Head, Self-portrait (usually referred to as the Jug Self-portrait) was produced in glazed stoneware early in 1889 by the French Post-Impressionist artist Paul Gauguin. This self-portrayal is especially stark and brutal, and was created in the aftermath of two traumatic events in the artist's life. In December 1888 Gauguin was visiting Vincent van Gogh in Arles when Van Gogh hacked off his left ear (or part of it, accounts vary) before leaving it at a brothel frequented by them both. A few days later in Paris, Gauguin witnessed the beheading of the notorious murderer Prado. Gauguin shows his severed head, dripping with rivulets of blood, his ear cut off, his eyes closed as if in denial.

Gauguin portrays himself with closed eyes and a severed ear. Glaze is used to suggest blood which runs down the side of his face to congeal at his neck. As with many of his self-portraits the object is infused with self-pity. The head resembles a death mask, and the way it is modelled strongly suggests that it has been decapitated, reminiscent of Prado. The portrait evokes Van Gogh in a number of ways, most obviously with the removed ear and its dominant red colouring which gives it, according to writer Naomi Margolis Maurer, "a strong fictitious resemblance to the suffering van Gogh."

The stoneware contains subtle green, grey and olive tones that are often not apparent in reproduction, while its brutal physicality is in part achieved by its three-dimensionality. It has been noted by a number of art critics that photographic reproductions of the object largely fail to convey the impact it makes when viewed firsthand. In 1989 the critic Laurel Gasque wrote, "This macabre image, fired at a very high temperature literally and figuratively, fuses life, myth, and history into an unforgettable emblem of a ravaged man."

Background

A number of events in Gauguin's life led to the object's creation. During the November and December of the previous year he had lived with van Gogh in Arles. The objective had been to found an artists' commune. Van Gogh greatly admired Gauguin, and desperately wanted to be treated as his equal. But Gauguin was arrogant and domineering, a fact that often frustrated the Dutchman. Relations between the two deteriorated and eventually Gauguin, alarmed by Van Gogh's drunkenness and temperament, told him he was leaving. Later that day, on a possibly self-serving account supplied by Gauguin fifteen years later, Van Gogh confronted Gauguin with the same razor-blade he used hours later to mutilate himself, cutting off his left ear (or part of it), an injury sufficiently serious to induce arterial bleeding. Accounts differ as to what happened next, not least because van Gogh himself had no subsequent recollection of the events, but it is certain that van Gogh, after staunching the bleeding, bandaged his injury and left the severed ear at a maison de tolérance on Rue du Bout d'Aeles that van Gogh and Gauguin frequented. Van Gogh at this time was extolling the virtue of sexual continence in the pursuit of Art (he was in any case impotent by then), but nevertheless used prostitutes for "hygienic reasons". The story that he left the ear with a prostitute called Rachel asking her to "guard it like a treasure" that immediately gained currency, appears to originate from a local news report of the time. Gauguin's own account was that he left it with the bouncer with the message "Remember me" (the implication being that it was meant for Gauguin), before staggering back to the house he shared with Gauguin. Gauguin was amongst the first to find the Dutch artist the morning after, lying unconscious with his head covered in blood.

According to art critic Martin Gayford,  prostitutes were to van Gogh Sisters of Mercy, providing "a little taste of paradise at 2 francs a time", and representing his single emotional and sensuous point of contact with other people. He was around this time reading about Christ's agony in the garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prayed with his disciples the night before his crucifixion. The story struck a deep chord, in particular the words "If thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done". He and Gauguin had been discussing a recent series of murders of prostitutes (those of Prado and Jack the Ripper). He had recently read Émile Zola's novel "The Sin of Father Mouret", in which a character "as Father Mournet was finishing his prayers...calmly pulled a knife from his pocket, opened it, and chopped off the friar's ears."

There is no conclusive evidence that the unpredictable Gauguin attacked his equally temperamental friend that day.

When Vincent's brother Theo arrived at the Arles hospital a few days later—after being informed of the event by Gauguin—he spoke of Vincent's irrationality, high fever and apparent "madness" in the days before the mutilation.
From his hospital bed, Van Gogh asked for Gauguin continually over the next number of days, but the Frenchman stayed away. He had told one of the policeman attending the case when van Gogh was discovered unconscious, "Be kind enough, Monsieur, to awaken this man with great care, and if he asks for me tell him I have left for Paris; the sight of me might prove fatal for him." From accounts related by Gauguin to friends on his arrival back in Paris a few days later, it has been suggested that he also associated the amputation with Gethsemane.

On December 28, two days after his return to Paris, Gauguin went to the dawn execution of the criminal Prado. Van Gogh and Gauguin had talked about Prado's high profile trial. Prado had murdered a prostitute and Gauguin thought his trial unjust, a view he shared with Friedrich Nietzsche who refers to him in his last "madness letter". Both Prado and the equally infamous murderer Pranzini were at one time patrons at the Parisian café Le Tambourin where Van Gogh had exhibited Japanese prints. The execution left a deep mark on the artist and soured the artist's view of humanity. According to Gauguin's account the execution was botched; the first strike of the guillotine's blade missed Prado's neck and carved off a portion of his face. The man rose from the head-board in agony and shock and had to be forced back into position before the second attempt removed his head. However contemporary news reports of the execution make no mention of this.

Gauguin's attendance at the execution was as a result of the deep shock left by Van Gogh's self-mutilation. Writer Jerome Winer suggests that Gauguin may have felt guilty over his treatment of Van Gogh to identify with Prado. According to Bradley Collins, "There is no question that Gauguin would have strongly associated Vincent with the execution".  Collins continues, "If Gauguin had been terrified by the sight of the near-dead Vincent curled up in his bloody sheets, he may have had the counterphobic desire to reassure himself of his courage by taking an unflinching look at Prado's execution. He may also have wanted to glory in his own innocence and another's guilt."

Iconography

The work is informed by Romantic and Symbolist iconography, as well as motifs from Christian and classical sources; it evokes Christ, John the Baptist and Orpheus, all of whom were martyred for their passion and beliefs. During this period, Gauguin often portrayed himself in a manner similar to representations of Christ, in an attempt to evoke martyrdom. Gauguin was disillusioned with the materialism he saw around him, and at the time felt alienated by the art-buying public, and from members of the art scene who reacted against his domineering and self-aggrandising personality. Younger artists who had been his disciples rebelled, and to an extent he was sidelined. Of another similar self-portrait, Christ in the Garden of Olives, Gauguin wrote

The technique used to create the object was borrowed in part from the Far East, especially in the use of dripped paint on glazed stoneware which was influenced by Japanese craftsmen of the Takatori region. The idea of merging the form of a head and a jug was taken from Peruvian pottery, likely from pieces his mother had collected when he was a child.

Notes

Sources
Collins, Bradley. Van Gogh and Gauguin: Electric Arguments and Utopian Dreams. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2001.
Cachin, Francoise. Gauguin. Flammarion, 1990.
 Druick, Douglas; Druick, Peter; Salvesen, Britt; Lister; Kristin. Van Gogh and Gauguin: the studio of the south. Art Institute of Chicago with Rijksmuseum Vincent van Gogh, 2001.
Galbally, Ann. A Remarkable Friendship: Vincent van Gogh and John Peter Russell. Miegunyah Press, 2008.
Gasque, Laurel. "Gauguin: Sight and Sound". ThirdWay, Volume 12, No 4, April 1989.
Gayford, Martin. The Yellow House: Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Nine Turbulent Weeks in Provence. New York: Mariner Books, 2008.
Margolis Maurer, Naomi. The Pursuit of Spiritual Wisdom: Thought and Art of Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1998.
 Naifeh, Steven; Smith, Gregory White. Van Gogh: The Life. Profile Books, 2011.
Winer, Jerome. The Annual of Psychoanalysis, Volume 22 New York: Routledge, 1995.

1889 sculptures
French pottery
Drinkware
Self-portraits
Paul Gauguin
Individual pieces of pottery
Ceramic sculptures in Copenhagen
Sculptures in Copenhagen
Individual vases

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Does your company recognize employees for their hard work with an annual awards ceremony? Or maybe you work at a school and need to order custom trophies for academic and athletic competitions? These days, your options are no longer limited to the standard metal trophies, wooden plaques, or lifeless paper certificates that have been around for ages. With 3D printing, you can embrace your creativity and design unexpected, totally custom trophies that truly could not be fabricated using traditional materials or manufacturing methods.
Check out this roundup of some of the most impressive custom trophies we've made here at Voodoo.
When global food importer Atalanta needed help creating custom trophies to honor their top salespeople, they requested something that looked similar to an Emmy, but featured their namesake, the Greek goddess Atalanta.
Atalanta's 2D graphic logo was the perfect jumping off point for creating a 3D printed trophy.
Whipping up a 3D design from scratch can be resource intensive, but Atalanta shaved time off of the project by providing some brand assets to use as a visual reference. Starting with their original 2D monochrome graphic, our 3D artists translated Atalanta's logo into a dynamic 3D model. Then, they digitally sliced the model into multiple parts—two for the trophy base and six for the goddess figure. The final product was a unique, high-quality trophy with a smooth, faux metal surface.
VH1 reached out to us with only three weeks to go until the 2016 Hip Hop Honors, where they would present trophies to six Pioneering Women in Hip Hop: Queen Latifah, Missy Elliott, Salt-N-Pepa, DJ Spinderella, and Lil' Kim.
We modified the design and 3D printed the trophies in just five days and then sent them off to be chromed. The chroming process involves hand-sanding each trophy, applying a few layers of primer, and then coating the 3D prints with a paper thin layer of reflective metal. The result was an impressively sturdy trophy that looked like solid metal, weighing in at over five pounds per VH1's request.
FIRST New York City, a nonprofit organization that inspires youth to pursue careers in STEM, asked for our help to design, print, and assemble trophies that would be awarded to outstanding members of their community. FIRST provided some initial reference images, which our design team translated into a 3D model featuring meticulous detail and a color-separated design.
We ended up with a friendly little robot that showcases an unexpected level of detail for a desktop 3D print, from the various colors to the texture adorning the robot's eyes and limbs. Each trophy was personalized with the winners' name and title – and has no doubt found a home as permanent feature on the recipients' desks.
The Bronx High School of Science is no stranger to innovative trophies. We previously collaborated with them to create New York skyline-inspired trophies for their debate team. Because that project was such a hit with students, the school reached out to us again to design and print trophies to honor their senior class members at graduation.
Voodoo's design team translated The Bronx High School of Science logo into a memorable interactive trophy for the Class of 2017.
This time their inventive trophy idea was to express an intangible object, the school's 2D atom logo, in 3D printed form. Our design team took the concept and ran with it, ultimately reimagining the atom as a six-layered spinner that functioned just like a gyro coin ― an epically oversized one. Appropriately, the trophies were presented to students in 2017 at the height of the fidget spinner craze.
We've teamed up with Technical.ly Brooklyn for two years in a row to design and print trophies for their annual Technical.ly Brooklyn Awards, which honor Brooklyn-based tech startups in categories like Indie Video Game of the Year and Tech Mission Org of the year.
For the 2017 awards, we printed fifteen highly detailed trophies, all featuring a personalized nameplate, and an eye-catching (and semi-functional) light bulb made with glow-in-the-dark filament. One of our more detailed trophy projects to date, this sculptural and intricately color-separated design was made possible with 3D printing.
All of these projects take trophy design to the next level, demonstrating the versatility and ingenuity of digital manufacturing. Unlike traditional manufacturing, material, design concept, and timeframe are virtually no object with 3D printing, especially when working with our design experts at Voodoo. Whether you're a corporate CEO gearing up for a major awards ceremony or the manager of a small team just looking to boost morale, feel free to contact us if you think Voodoo can help you create memorable custom trophies.


China's top two cities have banned electric scooters from roads amid safety concerns, despite the growing popularity of the new modes of transportation, for which there are no national safety standards.
Beijing's traffic authorities said that, starting on Monday, people riding electric scooters on public roads will be fined 10 yuan ($1.50) and told to stay off the road. The ban applies to one- and two-wheeled self-balancing scooters as well.
The announcement was made after traffic police in Shanghai launched a campaign to get electric scooters off public roads, with police officers stopping riders because the scooters endangered traffic safety.
The Beijing Consumer Association said it tested more than 20 electric scooters of different brands recently and found that most had substandard brakes. The braking distance of some was as much as 9.9 meters, and only one could come to a full stop in less than 4 meters.
Sixteen of the tested scooters could go faster than the maximum 20 km/h set for electric bikes.
"They (electric scooters) don't fall in the category of either motor vehicles or non-motorized ones (according to Chinese law)," said Dong Dehai, a spokesman for Shanghai's Huangpu district police.
Despite the safety hazard and lack of safety standards, the scooters are nonetheless gaining popularity. On taobao.com, China's leading e-commerce website, several thousand sellers of self-balancing scooters can be found. Many of them sold more than 4,000 each in the past month.
BaiHe, a 27-year-old hair-dresser in Beijing who bought a two-wheeled self-balancing scooter early this month for work transportation, said he will ignore the ban, considering the scooter's convenience.
"I live 10 kilometers away from my barbershop," he said. "The scooter can travel 25 kilometers on one charge. It's cheap, convenient and easy to control. It can also avoid traffic jams."
He also said it's easy to stop the scooter. "What you have to do is to lean your body backward a little bit and it can be stopped easily, since its speed is low."
Ding Zhilei, assistant president of Ninebot Inc, a Beijing-based maker of personal electric vehicles, said his company is cooperating with the government to draft safety standards for electric self-balancing scooters and to promote legislation.
The company is now making self-balancing scooters according to national speed standards for electric bikes, he said.
China is not the only country where electric scooters are restricted. According to media reports, such scooters are not allowed on main roads in Japan, and drivers must have a special license. Their use has also been restricted in the United States and United Kingdom.


As an example, in the event that the creator wrote "the sky is white," you'd need to compose a little something alongside the traces of "the author's declaration with regards to the sky simply being white is baseless and unsustainable.." So, exactly what is a management essay? Its a entire body of work which could outline or describe: Initial, you will need to go through the textual content critically. Then, clarify every one of the phrases that you're going to mention on your essay.
The abstract has to address the rationale, topicality, fundamental results, and generic brief summary; it shouldn't exceed 300 words and phrases, often. It generates guys be more conscious of the author instead of the tasks by itself. The only method to take up a examine is to produce an introduction.


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Fittleworth at the National Championships
By fittleworthrifleclub September 17, 2019
Fittleworth members excel at National Championships
Fittleworth Rifle Club were well represented at the National Smallbore Rifle Championships at Bisley this year and the quality of their performances did the club proud. The week's events include individual competitions in different classes, team competitions and culminate with the Final of the British Championship. The club entered 4 team competitions and started the week by winning the Queen Alexandra Team competition. This is a very different format to the rest of the week's shooting being shot at 25 metres and in three different styles, 20 shots deliberate, 20 shots time limit and as many shots as possible in 60 seconds at a skirmisher target. Rob Dowling's 397 was one of the best scores in this competition and with team mates, Sara Carr (393) and Adam Cornbill (382), the team finished comfortable winners with a score of 1172, ten points clear of second placed Ruislip (1162), with Tunbridge Wells finishing in 3rd place.
Moving on to the more traditional style of shooting the next team shoot for the club was shot at 100 yards for the City of London Corporation Cup. The team's shooting in this competition was exceptionally good leaving the many other teams competing in their wake to give them another convincing win. Fittleworth's Rob Dowling (395), Sara Carr (392) and Nick Mullins (390) gave the team a score of 1177, 21 points ahead of second placed Bookham (1156) with third placed Bedford (1155). Dowling's 395 also provided the top individual score in the competition winning him the Leicestershire & Rutland Challenge Trophy and gold medal. The next team shoot brought further success, this time at 50 metres in the Spooner Cup, but other club teams were in no mood to allow Fittleworth another runaway win. However, Fittleworth were building on their success and despite the close scores, they managed to secure the trophy by one point with the three team members shooting consistently well with Sara Carr (390), Adam Cornbill (390) and Rob Dowling (389) giving a team score of 1169, narrowly beating 2nd placed Romford (1168) and 3rd placed Bookham (1166).
The next team competition was based on the aggregate of team members in four days of competition. Despite a valiant effort by the team the attempt to secure a grand slam narrowly failed with the team finishing in third place with a score of 8060 ex. 8400, ten points behind second placed Appleton with Bookham (8086) winning the trophy.
There was one last chance for another team success, the Astor County Championship. Fittleworth had already qualified for the right to represent Sussex and, with teams of six, was to provide a challenge to the strength in depth of the club. Shot on the last day of the week long competition it was to provide a stern challenge and, the team put on a competitive and very consistent effort, with Sara Carr (383) top scoring followed by Rob Dowling (382), Nick Mullins (379), Hamish Matheson (377), Pete Terry (376) and Adam Cornbill (375) giving the team 2272 ex. 2400. Their efforts saw them finish a commendable 4th place behind winners Appleton (2292), 2nd placed Ruislip (2292) and 3rd placed Bedford (2284).
Only one competition remained and that was the Final of the British Championship. Fittleworth's Rob Dowling was the only Sussex competitor in the Final and, after a challenging afternoon's shooting at the end of a long week in which the wet and windy weather had taken its toll on many, Dowling finished in 6th place in the British Championship, with Welshman Theo Dodds the winner. Dowling's efforts did, however, earn him 3rd place in the English Championship. Altogether a very successful week for Fittleworth Rifle Club and its' members. The future looks very bright!
Submitted by Peter Terry
Photo showing left to right Nick Mullins, Sara Carr and Rob Dowling with the City of London Corporation Cup.
Posted in Fittleworth Rifle Club, It's about shooting!