Will He or Won’t He?
Rumors keep flying that state Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa is going to take his hat out of the ring for L.A. mayor and instead run for the seat being vacated by Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg.
The word is that Villaraigosa’s camp did some polling and found that he did not have enough name recognition in L.A. to win the race for mayor in 2001. That speculation heated up after the speaker endorsed Goldberg in her run for his Assembly seat.
Some Villaraigosa supporters attribute the rumors to possible rivals in the mayoral race who would love to snatch endorsements and campaign funds away from him.
Officially, Villaraigosa spokeswoman Elena Stern says it’s way too early for him to decide what to do after he’s termed out of office next year.
“Right now, he’s just focused on doing a good job as speaker,” Stern said. “When the time comes, he’ll make the decision on whether to run for mayor.”
Environmental Web
Environmentalists who have spent the last several years criticizing the Playa Vista development, the planned home of DreamWorks SKG, have a new place to turn to find fuel for their fire: the World Wide Web.
Playa Capital LLC this month launched its new Web site, www.playavista.com. In addition to news releases, maps, construction progress updates and answers to frequently asked questions, the site devotes numerous pages to Playa Vista’s “environmental commitment.”
“The Ballona Wetlands are dying,” reads one page of the Web site. “Without funds to restore the wetlands they will continue to decline. Playa Vista offers the best hope to save the wetlands.”
For those environmentalists who may not be satisfied with Playa Capital’s take on the situation, yes, Playa Vista officials can be sent e-mail angry or otherwise from the site.
Call a Plumber
The folks at the Getty Center Research Institute learned the hard way that they had a plumbing problem.
Earlier this month, a smoke alarm was accidentally set off at the institute. Sources said the pipes that feed the overhead sprinklers filled with water but burst before the sprinklers activated.
Thousands of gallons of water poured into the basement, where a vault houses the institute’s valuable archives. Fortunately, damage was limited to walls and carpeting, with only minimal humidity problems for books and photographs.
Since then the problem has been fixed. But employees wondered what might have happened if there had actually been a fire.
Y2K Getaway
While some L.A. hotels are booking big-name entertainers to attract guests for New Year’s Eve, the Sheraton Cerritos is taking a more offbeat tack by billing itself as a safe place to avoid the Y2K bug.
In the past year, officials at the 203-room hotel have spent $500,000 to update software, replace computers and make other changes to avert disaster when the clock strikes 2000.
Now they’re trying to get all the mileage they can out of the work.
“Sure, it’s not the $20 million suite or the chauffeured limousine or the Hope diamond, but we wanted to bill ourselves differently since this is a top-of-the-mind issue,” said General Manager Bruce McNish.
