RE: Subdivision of Historic Cultural Neighborhood Council
An application has been submitted to subdivide the HistoricCultural Neighborhood Council (HCNC). The HCNC is made up of six historic communities around the original center of Los Angeles: El Pueblo de Los Angeles (Olvera St.); Little Tokyo; the Arts District; Solano Canyon; Victor Heights; and Chinatown. Originally, we understood that some members of the Chinatown caucus within the HCNC wanted to consider a separate neighborhood council for Chinatown; then we were informed that the subdivision would be taking three adjacent communities, to the detriment of the smaller, adjoining residential communities of Solano Canyon, Victor Heights, and El Pueblo.
The subdivision was done in complete secrecy; HCNC board members were only made aware of the proposal when the neighboring Echo Park Neighborhood Council (EPNC), notified us via email that they wanted our input, since EPNC had already taken action in December to support the subdivision proposal. HCNC board members were not available to answer the emails when the meeting took place. The team from the formation committee presented incomplete and false information to the EPNC, which fraudulently led the EPNC to believe that the HCNC was in full support of the subdivision proposal.
The matter was brought up to the HCNC for the first time at our January 9, 2018 board meeting, a mere six days before the subdivision application was due on January 15th. At that same board meeting, we were notified that the “formation committee” of the new Historic Cultural NORTH Neighborhood Council (HCNNC) in favor of the subdivision chose to be selective of whom on the current HCNC board was to be made aware of the fact that the subdivision would also be taking smaller adjacent communities into the subdivision.
Exhibit A: New HCNNC Map
The board members of the smaller community caucuses see the subdivision proposal as a power grab by the members of the Chinatown subdivision formation committee, which will result in delivering disproportionate political power into the hands of certain Chinatown groups and leaders.
THE APPLICATION
The application was submitted the last day of the deadline, a mere three hours before it was due by a representative from Chinatown Angelica Lopez Moyes and marked ‘Completed’ at 9:17 pm on January 15, 2018. Again, keep in mind the deadline for the Subdivision Application was January 15th, 2018, this will be a relevant point in our email.
Exhibit B: HCNNC Subdivision Application
A California Public Records Act Request (PRR #19842) was submitted to the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (DONE) on January 22, 2018 and answered the next day, January 23, 2018 by Kori Parraga, the custodian of records for DONE. The response to the PRA request included documentation of a total of 128 signatures that were collected between December 19, 2017 and January 14, 2018, 11 of which were board members of the EPNC, who are not stakeholders in the HCNC and were therefore ineligible to sign the subdivision petition. This reduced the number of signatures on the original petition to 117 actual stakeholders, which are yet to be verified.
Exhibit C: PRR #19842
The same day that the above-referenced PRA request was answered — 23 January 2018 — an email was sent to DONE asking, “Is this all there is?” The following day — January 24, 2018 — Ms. Parraga responded, “I have confirmed with staff that everything that was attached to the application was forwarded to you.”
It should be pointed out that the subdivision application included far fewer than the "200-to-500 signatures from community stakeholders" that are required for such an application.
The governing document, "Plan For A Citywide System Of Neighborhood Councils" (known as 'The Plan'), Section 3 NEIGHBORHOOD OUTREACH, #6 states, in part: “... applicant(s) shall collect no less than 200 and no more than 500 signatures from stakeholders that have an interest within the proposed Neighborhood Council boundaries."
Exhibit B: HCNNC Subdivision Application
Despite the lack of the required number of signatures, a letter to the Historic Cultural North Neighborhood Council Formation Committee (HCNNCFC) Dated February 9th from Mike Fong, Director of Policy and Government Relations, DONE, says, in part, “We appreciate the Formation Committee [HCNNCFC] providing the additional signatures we requested, and we now have all the information we need for the application ...” The only conclusion one can draw from the text of this letter and the PRA request #20265 is that DONE was well-aware that the subdivision application as originally submitted was incomplete (because it included at most 117 signatures); but despite that lack, in contravention of existing protocol, additional time was granted to HCNNCFC in order to obtain the missing required signatures.
Mike Fong, in his email to Ms. Moyes dated — January 22, 2018 — states “Would you be able to send over the names/signatures for outreach”
Exhibit D: Formation Committee Letter
Exhibit E: PRA Request #20265 Mike Fong email to Angelica Lopez Moyes
A subsequent PRA request (#20265, referred to above) was submitted to DONE on 10 February 2018, requesting a submission time stamp for the additional signatures that were missing from the original application. DONE replied (Moreno PRA Request #3) on 16 February 2018 that “The additional documents referenced in [your] question were submitted on January 30, 2018 at 5 pm.”
Please note, that the date, January 30, 2018 is a full 15 days after the deadline for submission of the subdivision petition.
The response also states that "The signature date on those documents was January 15th which was the original deadline." Given Ms. Moyes' last minute subdivision application submission on January 15th, why were these documents not included in the original submission? In fact, they were submitted after Mr. Fong made the request to Ms. Moyes on January 22nd. This incomplete, ill-conceived, and fraudulent application was granted special concessions that contravene existing protocol and are blatantly discriminatory to the neighborhood caucuses of the HCNC.
Exhibit E2: PRA Request #20265
The only conclusion that can be drawn, then, is that, due to the extension of time that was improperly granted to HCNNCFC to obtain additional signatures, 148 additional signatures were obtained, for a total of 265 signatures.
Interestingly, the date on the 148 signatures that were submitted on January 30, 2018 was January 15, 2018 in every case but 16; further, 146 of the 148 signatures were Chinese names, and although the addresses had been redacted, in one case, the signatory had written the name ‘Cathay Manor’ on the form. Cathay Manor is a 270-unit Section 8 housing complex for Seniors located at 600 N Broadway in Los Angeles. Despite the fact that the addresses were redacted, it is not unreasonable to conclude that the entire 148 names were obtained solely at Cathay Manor; and four of the signatures listed apartment numbers at Cathay Manor. Chinatown HCNC board members live and work at the senior complex, and have a history of playing loose with the unpredictable DONE and City Clerk rules.
A closer observation at those additional pages shows that
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
The laws that apply to all Neighborhood Councils include all relevant Conflict of Interest laws. In the case of the proposed subdivision of HCNC, there exist at least two major conflicts of interest:
1. The primary signatory of the subdivision application is Angelica Lopez Moyes. Ms. Moyes has had a personal relationship with Mr. Tad Yenewine, the president of the EPNC. This relationship is well-documented by multiple postings on Ms. Lopez Moyes’ Facebook page and has not been denied. EPNC initially endorsed the subdivision application (although the endorsement was subsequently rescinded); it is unconscionable that the president of an adjacent NC should actively participate in this action to subdivide a neighboring NC. Mr. Yenewine chaired the meeting that initially resulted in the above-referenced endorsement, as well as at the subsequent meeting where it was rescinded after HCNC board members presented the facts to the EPNC board.
OUTREACH
Outreach to the communities that are part of an NC is a critical part of the process of formation of a new neighborhood council (or, presumably, the subdivision of an existing one, although the Plan — originally approved in 2001 and amended nine time through 2013 — does not include any procedure for subdivision of an existing NC). Outreach has clearly not been done in the case of the subject subdivision application. A look at the signature pages that have been submitted (whether the original 117 names or the 148 names that were subsequently submitted after the deadline) will show that the names are about 90% Chinese. While the residents of Chinatown are, in fact, overwhelmingly Chinese, there are many residents of El Pueblo (who are primarily Spanish-speakers), Solano Canyon (of mixed cultural backgrounds), and Victor Heights who are not Chinese. It is a clear violation of the intent of the process — let alone in the spirit of community outreach — that the citizens of the aforementioned communities were not contacted in an effort to obtain their signatures. In other words, the subdivision application is an almost unanimous, Chinatown-led exercise and should be rejected on the basis of this obvious non-inclusion alone. It has, in fact, denied any semblance of due process to stakeholders in all but the Chinatown community.
The purported initial outreach, required by the application process, was not conducted:
Exhibit G2: Petition Page
CONCLUSION
The fact is that the deadline for submission of the subdivision application was 15 January 2018. While the application was so submitted, it contained only 117 signatures, verified or otherwise. For reasons beyond understanding, DONE or one or more of its employees apparently granted the HCNNCFC additional time to gather signatures, which resulted in the submission of an additional 148 signatures, for a total of 265.
More than 90% of the signatures came from Chinatown stakeholders. It is clear from the names that the signatures are overwhelmingly from Chinatown but not any of the other neighborhoods of the HCNC; there are virtually no signatures in those additional pages from the HCNC neighborhoods of Solano Canyon, El Pueblo, and Victor Heights.
One can conclude that more that half the signatures came from one building, Cathay Manor; we believe those 148 additional signatures come primarily from one address and were possibly obtained fraudulently. This is the same address that presented more than 400 persons who registered to vote under a single email address in the last HCNC election, an act well-documented by DONE and its election representatives.
Due Process is a citizen entitlement, in place to ensure that everyone is accorded fair treatment under the law, in matters criminal, civil, and administrative. The guarantee of due process is contained explicitly in both the fifth and fourteenth amendments of the United States Constitution to describe a legal obligation of all states. Due process, therefore, both balances the power of law and protects the individual from it.
The application of due process, however, is not automatic; rather, it must be asserted, and it can be subverted, whether intentionally or otherwise. If intentional, then those who deny or subvert due process should be — must be — held to account; and they leave themselves open to sanctions, whether administrative, civil, and criminal. Employees of City-chartered entities are civil servants; their failure to follow due process is a serious offense, and it should be treated as such.
This application demonstrates how a public employee or employees of a City-chartered entiry can provide special treatment in support of a proposal that is favored by a special-interest group by colluding with members of that group and thereby subvert due process for associated stakeholders, which is a clear dereliction of duty on the part of a public servant.
An application has been submitted to subdivide the HistoricCultural Neighborhood Council (HCNC). The HCNC is made up of six historic communities around the original center of Los Angeles: El Pueblo de Los Angeles (Olvera St.); Little Tokyo; the Arts District; Solano Canyon; Victor Heights; and Chinatown. Originally, we understood that some members of the Chinatown caucus within the HCNC wanted to consider a separate neighborhood council for Chinatown; then we were informed that the subdivision would be taking three adjacent communities, to the detriment of the smaller, adjoining residential communities of Solano Canyon, Victor Heights, and El Pueblo.
The subdivision was done in complete secrecy; HCNC board members were only made aware of the proposal when the neighboring Echo Park Neighborhood Council (EPNC), notified us via email that they wanted our input, since EPNC had already taken action in December to support the subdivision proposal. HCNC board members were not available to answer the emails when the meeting took place. The team from the formation committee presented incomplete and false information to the EPNC, which fraudulently led the EPNC to believe that the HCNC was in full support of the subdivision proposal.
The matter was brought up to the HCNC for the first time at our January 9, 2018 board meeting, a mere six days before the subdivision application was due on January 15th. At that same board meeting, we were notified that the “formation committee” of the new Historic Cultural NORTH Neighborhood Council (HCNNC) in favor of the subdivision chose to be selective of whom on the current HCNC board was to be made aware of the fact that the subdivision would also be taking smaller adjacent communities into the subdivision.
Exhibit A: New HCNNC Map
The board members of the smaller community caucuses see the subdivision proposal as a power grab by the members of the Chinatown subdivision formation committee, which will result in delivering disproportionate political power into the hands of certain Chinatown groups and leaders.
THE APPLICATION
The application was submitted the last day of the deadline, a mere three hours before it was due by a representative from Chinatown Angelica Lopez Moyes and marked ‘Completed’ at 9:17 pm on January 15, 2018. Again, keep in mind the deadline for the Subdivision Application was January 15th, 2018, this will be a relevant point in our email.
Exhibit B: HCNNC Subdivision Application
A California Public Records Act Request (PRR #19842) was submitted to the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (DONE) on January 22, 2018 and answered the next day, January 23, 2018 by Kori Parraga, the custodian of records for DONE. The response to the PRA request included documentation of a total of 128 signatures that were collected between December 19, 2017 and January 14, 2018, 11 of which were board members of the EPNC, who are not stakeholders in the HCNC and were therefore ineligible to sign the subdivision petition. This reduced the number of signatures on the original petition to 117 actual stakeholders, which are yet to be verified.
Exhibit C: PRR #19842
The same day that the above-referenced PRA request was answered — 23 January 2018 — an email was sent to DONE asking, “Is this all there is?” The following day — January 24, 2018 — Ms. Parraga responded, “I have confirmed with staff that everything that was attached to the application was forwarded to you.”
It should be pointed out that the subdivision application included far fewer than the "200-to-500 signatures from community stakeholders" that are required for such an application.
The governing document, "Plan For A Citywide System Of Neighborhood Councils" (known as 'The Plan'), Section 3 NEIGHBORHOOD OUTREACH, #6 states, in part: “... applicant(s) shall collect no less than 200 and no more than 500 signatures from stakeholders that have an interest within the proposed Neighborhood Council boundaries."
Exhibit B: HCNNC Subdivision Application
Despite the lack of the required number of signatures, a letter to the Historic Cultural North Neighborhood Council Formation Committee (HCNNCFC) Dated February 9th from Mike Fong, Director of Policy and Government Relations, DONE, says, in part, “We appreciate the Formation Committee [HCNNCFC] providing the additional signatures we requested, and we now have all the information we need for the application ...” The only conclusion one can draw from the text of this letter and the PRA request #20265 is that DONE was well-aware that the subdivision application as originally submitted was incomplete (because it included at most 117 signatures); but despite that lack, in contravention of existing protocol, additional time was granted to HCNNCFC in order to obtain the missing required signatures.
Mike Fong, in his email to Ms. Moyes dated — January 22, 2018 — states “Would you be able to send over the names/signatures for outreach”
Exhibit D: Formation Committee Letter
Exhibit E: PRA Request #20265 Mike Fong email to Angelica Lopez Moyes
A subsequent PRA request (#20265, referred to above) was submitted to DONE on 10 February 2018, requesting a submission time stamp for the additional signatures that were missing from the original application. DONE replied (Moreno PRA Request #3) on 16 February 2018 that “The additional documents referenced in [your] question were submitted on January 30, 2018 at 5 pm.”
Please note, that the date, January 30, 2018 is a full 15 days after the deadline for submission of the subdivision petition.
The response also states that "The signature date on those documents was January 15th which was the original deadline." Given Ms. Moyes' last minute subdivision application submission on January 15th, why were these documents not included in the original submission? In fact, they were submitted after Mr. Fong made the request to Ms. Moyes on January 22nd. This incomplete, ill-conceived, and fraudulent application was granted special concessions that contravene existing protocol and are blatantly discriminatory to the neighborhood caucuses of the HCNC.
Exhibit E2: PRA Request #20265
The only conclusion that can be drawn, then, is that, due to the extension of time that was improperly granted to HCNNCFC to obtain additional signatures, 148 additional signatures were obtained, for a total of 265 signatures.
Interestingly, the date on the 148 signatures that were submitted on January 30, 2018 was January 15, 2018 in every case but 16; further, 146 of the 148 signatures were Chinese names, and although the addresses had been redacted, in one case, the signatory had written the name ‘Cathay Manor’ on the form. Cathay Manor is a 270-unit Section 8 housing complex for Seniors located at 600 N Broadway in Los Angeles. Despite the fact that the addresses were redacted, it is not unreasonable to conclude that the entire 148 names were obtained solely at Cathay Manor; and four of the signatures listed apartment numbers at Cathay Manor. Chinatown HCNC board members live and work at the senior complex, and have a history of playing loose with the unpredictable DONE and City Clerk rules.
A closer observation at those additional pages shows that
- in many of the dates in the ‘Date Signed’ and ‘Stakeholder type’ columns, the same handwriting appears;
- some pages have an arrow down the column, which can only imply that the date was not, in fact, written by the stakeholder, but rather was written FOR the stakeholder, either before or after the fact;
- one page is missing signatures in its entirety in one PRA Request, but that page was not included in a subsequent PRA Request;
- the names associated with the subdivision application, whether submitted initially or subsequently, are primarily Chinese names; yet for a community that claims to require translation services, the subdivision petition was not translated into any other language.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
The laws that apply to all Neighborhood Councils include all relevant Conflict of Interest laws. In the case of the proposed subdivision of HCNC, there exist at least two major conflicts of interest:
1. The primary signatory of the subdivision application is Angelica Lopez Moyes. Ms. Moyes has had a personal relationship with Mr. Tad Yenewine, the president of the EPNC. This relationship is well-documented by multiple postings on Ms. Lopez Moyes’ Facebook page and has not been denied. EPNC initially endorsed the subdivision application (although the endorsement was subsequently rescinded); it is unconscionable that the president of an adjacent NC should actively participate in this action to subdivide a neighboring NC. Mr. Yenewine chaired the meeting that initially resulted in the above-referenced endorsement, as well as at the subsequent meeting where it was rescinded after HCNC board members presented the facts to the EPNC board.
OUTREACH
Outreach to the communities that are part of an NC is a critical part of the process of formation of a new neighborhood council (or, presumably, the subdivision of an existing one, although the Plan — originally approved in 2001 and amended nine time through 2013 — does not include any procedure for subdivision of an existing NC). Outreach has clearly not been done in the case of the subject subdivision application. A look at the signature pages that have been submitted (whether the original 117 names or the 148 names that were subsequently submitted after the deadline) will show that the names are about 90% Chinese. While the residents of Chinatown are, in fact, overwhelmingly Chinese, there are many residents of El Pueblo (who are primarily Spanish-speakers), Solano Canyon (of mixed cultural backgrounds), and Victor Heights who are not Chinese. It is a clear violation of the intent of the process — let alone in the spirit of community outreach — that the citizens of the aforementioned communities were not contacted in an effort to obtain their signatures. In other words, the subdivision application is an almost unanimous, Chinatown-led exercise and should be rejected on the basis of this obvious non-inclusion alone. It has, in fact, denied any semblance of due process to stakeholders in all but the Chinatown community.
The purported initial outreach, required by the application process, was not conducted:
- There are ‘islands’ of signatures that represent stakeholders from multiple businesses, as evidenced by common addresses;
- Community outreach was not conducted, although it was falsely asserted;
- NO sign-in sheets were submitted under the section entitled "attached copies of sign in sheets for any outreach meetings" in the application;
- In the case of Solano Canyon, only two names were submitted, one of which was subsequently rescinded; by no stretch of the imagination is this outreach;
- Most names are in fact Chinatown representatives claiming to have stakeholdership in the adjoining communities, such as the case with the Firecracker Run Organization, which uses an address on Savoy Street;
- Ms. Moyes is a representative of the PTA for the elementary school in Chinatown, yet there are only 3 signatures for Castelar Elementary School;
- No organizational support was submitted with the application;
- There exists an email from a bank manager in Chinatown, stating clearly that she did not sign the petition, which is fraud. Ms Lau further stated in a HCNC public meeting that she did not sign the petition page.
Exhibit G2: Petition Page
- After the applicant stated at a press conference that Cathedral High School supported the subdivision, we received and email form the president of Cathedral that states, in part: "I'm writing to confirm that Cathedral High School does not support the forming of the HCNNC and has not been informed on how this group would serve the community." It is signed, Sincerely, Martin Farfan President, Cathedral High School.
- A total of two town halls were scheduled; the first meeting was held on 03 May 2018 at Maryknoll Japanese Catholic Church in the Arts district. A person who was at the meeting said that there were exactly three persons who attended the meeting, including Ms. Moyes, the primary author of the fraudulent subdivision application. The second meeting was held at Castelar Elementary School in Chinatown, which is friendly territory for the subdivision application. A person who attended that meeting said that there were, at most, perhaps twelve people attending, also including Ms. Moyes. At no time was there any attempt to have a town hall meeting in Victor Heights or Solano Canyon, and no resident of historic Solano Canyon reports that personal, door-to-door contact was made by anyone from the subdivision committee. In other words, the subdivision committee blatantly lied about outreach.
CONCLUSION
The fact is that the deadline for submission of the subdivision application was 15 January 2018. While the application was so submitted, it contained only 117 signatures, verified or otherwise. For reasons beyond understanding, DONE or one or more of its employees apparently granted the HCNNCFC additional time to gather signatures, which resulted in the submission of an additional 148 signatures, for a total of 265.
More than 90% of the signatures came from Chinatown stakeholders. It is clear from the names that the signatures are overwhelmingly from Chinatown but not any of the other neighborhoods of the HCNC; there are virtually no signatures in those additional pages from the HCNC neighborhoods of Solano Canyon, El Pueblo, and Victor Heights.
One can conclude that more that half the signatures came from one building, Cathay Manor; we believe those 148 additional signatures come primarily from one address and were possibly obtained fraudulently. This is the same address that presented more than 400 persons who registered to vote under a single email address in the last HCNC election, an act well-documented by DONE and its election representatives.
Due Process is a citizen entitlement, in place to ensure that everyone is accorded fair treatment under the law, in matters criminal, civil, and administrative. The guarantee of due process is contained explicitly in both the fifth and fourteenth amendments of the United States Constitution to describe a legal obligation of all states. Due process, therefore, both balances the power of law and protects the individual from it.
The application of due process, however, is not automatic; rather, it must be asserted, and it can be subverted, whether intentionally or otherwise. If intentional, then those who deny or subvert due process should be — must be — held to account; and they leave themselves open to sanctions, whether administrative, civil, and criminal. Employees of City-chartered entities are civil servants; their failure to follow due process is a serious offense, and it should be treated as such.
This application demonstrates how a public employee or employees of a City-chartered entiry can provide special treatment in support of a proposal that is favored by a special-interest group by colluding with members of that group and thereby subvert due process for associated stakeholders, which is a clear dereliction of duty on the part of a public servant.
