Broad Joins New Coliseum Team
Billionaire Eli Broad has agreed to back developer Ed Roski Jr. in his effort to bring a professional football team to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.
The financial muscle of Broad, one of the nation’s 50 wealthiest people, was seen as a key addition to the so-called New Coliseum proposal.
Broad is one of L.A.’s most prominent business leaders, who last summer sold his financial services company SunAmerica Inc. His support of Roski comes after Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz pulled out of the Coliseum project.
Both Roski and another group led by Michael Ovitz have pitched their respective stadium projects to the National Football League, which could decide as early as next month where to place a new league franchise.
Deal Struck on Charter Reform
L.A.’s two charter reform panels reached a tentative compromise after Mayor Richard Riordan dropped his insistence that the mayor be given unilateral power to fire department heads.
The compromise calls for the creation of advisory neighborhood panels but drops a proposed ballot measure to create elected neighborhood panels.
The agreement was approved last week by the appointed charter reform panel and will be considered by the elected commission on Jan. 25. Erwin Chemerinsky, chairman of the elected commission, believes his colleagues will sign off on the compromise deal, which would then need City Council approval before going on the June ballot.
Though he didn’t get everything he wanted, Riordan said the package would improve the way L.A. is governed.
Record Judgment Against HMO
A San Bernardino jury granted the largest judgment ever against an HMO when it awarded $116 million in punitive damages to the widow of a man who unsuccessfully fought to have Aetna U.S. Health Care of California pay for experimental cancer treatments.
Consumer advocates and legislators called the verdict a sign of public anger at health maintenance organizations and their power over critical medical care.
The punitive award came after the jury upheld allegations of malice, oppression and fraud in the case of David Goodrich, a deputy district attorney in San Bernardino County. Earlier this month, the jury had awarded his widow $4.5 million in damages for medical expenses and loss of companionship, so last week’s award brings the total verdict to more than $120 million.
Lawyers for the plaintiff argued that Goodrich had a rare form of stomach cancer and needed treatment outside the Aetna plan that the company refused to cover. Aetna lawyers faulted Goodrich for seeking unapproved treatment, arguing that their doctors could have dealt with the cancer. Aetna plans to appeal the judgment.
Marriott Grants ‘Living Wage’
Host Marriott Services Corp. became the latest major employer at Los Angeles International Airport to bump up wages as required by L.A.’s living wage ordinance.
Marriott, which operates about 60 percent of the food and beverage concessions at LAX, agreed to boost pay 10 percent, on average, for 700 waiters, bartenders, fast-food cooks and other workers. The Bethesda, Md.-based company also agreed to guarantee full-time jobs to 70 percent of its workers. None of them had previously been assured of 40-hour work weeks.
It was among the biggest victories yet by unions working to secure the living wage of $7.39 an hour with benefits and $8.64 without. Earlier this month, United Airlines agreed to increase wages paid to 400 security and janitorial workers at LAX.
Facing the Music
Seagram Co. reportedly will lay off more than 500 people in the first round of job cuts as it merges its Universal Music Group with PolyGram NV, the former rival it acquired last month.
The layoffs in Los Angeles and New York are expected to begin this month. Eventually, the cuts could range from 3,000 to as many as 15,500 music-division employees, according to the Associated Press. As many as 200 artists also could be cut from the roster.
Seagram hopes to save $300 million in its consolidation of PolyGram with its pre-existing Universal Music operations. Such savings could ease the hit taken by Universal Pictures, also owned by Seagram, on recent box-office disappointments “Meet Joe Black” and “Babe: Pig in the City.”
Candidates File to Replace Alatorre
The race is on to replace embattled L.A. Councilman Richard Alatorre, who will retire this year rather than try to win reelection while being targeted by a federal corruption probe.
Nineteen candidates filed papers before last week’s deadline to run for the Eastside seat being vacated by Alatorre, one of the city’s most influential Latino leaders. The contenders now have until Feb. 8 to submit 500 signatures of registered voters to qualify for the April 13 primary ballot.
After 28 years in elected offices, including 14 years on the council, Alatorre said he wants to spend more time with his family and take better care of his health. He made no mention of ongoing FBI and IRS probes into his financial dealings, or the drug rehabilitation he is undergoing after recently testing positive for cocaine.
A total of eight council seats are up for grabs, including one in the San Fernando Valley held by Richard Alarcon before his election to the state Senate.
Quiet on the Set
The producers of several television series have joined residents near Burbank Airport in complaining about jet noise as the airport pursues a proposed expansion of its passenger terminal.
Michael Klausner, head of CBS Studio Center in Studio City, told the airport board the noise has been interrupting filming there. Producers of the CBS series “Maggie Winters” said their tapings are interrupted so often that they are thinking of writing the disturbances into scripts by saying the fictional setting is a town at the end of an airstrip.
When the jet noise gets on tape, it must be deleted in an editing and mixing room that costs $8,000 an hour to run.
Welfare-to Work Hires
Small businesses in L.A. County are hiring about 4,000 people a month as part of the welfare-to-work program.
But that’s not enough to suit county officials, who want to increase that number by reminding employers that tax credits and other financial incentives are available for hiring former welfare recipients.
The push came as President Clinton proposed in his State of the Union address that the nation spend an additional $1 billion on new welfare-to-work programs. L.A. County’s plan calls for moving 135,000 people from welfare rolls to jobs in the next four yeas.
Compiled by Danny Pollock
