L.A. Stories
Only Connect
You no longer have to be connected to do business in downtown Long Beach.
A four-block area on Pine Avenue near the city’s convention center now has free wireless Internet access for anyone with a wireless card installed in their laptop computer.
The service, launched last week, is part of Mayor Beverly O’Neill’s push to bring more tourists, trade and technology to the city by the sea.
“A number of cities in the last 12 months have started providing this service,” said Chet Yoshizaki, manager of the city’s Economic Development Bureau.
The city is spending $390 a month to connect to the wireless server being provided by Long Beach-based Color Broadband Inc.
Wireless service will likely expand to Long Beach Airport in the coming months and perhaps later to the Long Beach Convention Center and the city’s two marinas where thousands of sailboats are docked.
However there is one limit to using the wireless Internet in downtown Long Beach. You can only stay online for one hour.
Deborah Belgum
Stormy Weather
Dark clouds are gathering around one local weatherman.
First, Christopher Nance was fired by KNBC-TV (Channel 4) amid allegations of sexual harassment of a station intern, which he denies. Now, Nance will be the subject of scathing profile in the February issue of Los Angeles magazine.
The piece details Nance’s allegedly violent history with women and his abusive behavior towards fellow KNBC employees and takes a critical look at his non-profit, The Christopher Nance Children’s Foundation.
Writer Jesse Katz also discusses Nance’s wife, Nicholette Norma Ortega Nance, who will likely be sentenced to prison next month after pleading guilty to transporting stolen goods and filing a false tax return. The charges stem from fraudulent phone purchases she made at her former employer, Nestle USA.
Nance didn’t take part in the story, but Katz had little trouble finding people willing to take shots at the man who goes by “Weather Dude” on his Web site.
“At it’s deepest level, the story is about media and image and the mask that people in the public eye tend to wear,” Katz said.
Darrell Satzman
Dinner Theater
After a month of private parties fit for its Hollywood locale, CineSpace, L.A.’s first combination restaurant/screening room, opened its doors Jan. 4. Located above the nightclub Ivar, the 8,300-square-foot, 200-seat restaurant and lounge includes an 80-seat screening room with two dinner seating times, as well as a 15-seat room that can be rented out to private parties.
Believed to be the first of its kind in Southern California, co-owner Kimberly Herrmann said screening room orders are taken before the movie starts to minimize obstructions. “We do serve throughout the movie but our servers are learning to stay out of the way,” she said.
The featured films, which change every Thursday, will be either documentaries or independent films that are already familiar to the clientele. The Hughes Brothers documentary “American Pimp” was shown during the first week of business.
“We thought it was an interesting choice, being on Hollywood Boulevard,” said Herrmann.
Danny King
School Shopping
Every quarter, bargain hunters gather to grab deals at an auction held by the Los Angeles Unified School District.
Auctioning hundreds of items refrigerators, hot serving tables, musical instruments, cabinets, air conditioners, wheelchairs, fans, scales, ladders and copiers among them is one way the district disposes of old goods and raises a little bit of cash.
Each auction, where items are sold without warranty and are non-returnable, generates anywhere from $25,000 to $75,000 for the district.
Lately, however, attendance at Hyde Park Elementary School, where the auctions are held, has been on the rise, with 100 people expected at last Saturday’s event. That’s good news for school officials grappling tight budgets, but some regular buyers are a bit perturbed.
“They are a little concerned the deals won’t be as great because there will be more people there competing,” said Susan Cox, an LAUSD spokeswoman. “They kind of had this great little secret.”
Auction dates are posted on the LAUSD Web site.
David Greenberg
The Roving Eye
But Do They Come in Extra Large?
Coolness knows no tax bracket.
The latest retro tee shirt to hit the L.A. fashion world mocks attempts by the rich and famous to be cool in that low-class, grunge way.
Engraved on the front with pseudo rock band label “The Socialites,” the black-and-white tee’s backside lists the 17 world venues of the “Who’s Your Daddy World Tour.” On the list is Bel Air, of course.
The tee shirts have hit the racks at Blancs on Hollywood Boulevard and Tracey Ross in Sunset Plaza for $40 each.
The New York designers of the shirt, Chrissie Miller and Shawn Regruto of “Models Suck” fame, said they came up with the idea after seeing wealthy socialites and others “in the know” for the past year wearing tee shirts of rock bands they’ve probably never heard of.
“Shawn and I were at a nightclub and we were looking at how everybody is wearing their rock tee shirts, including people you don’t normally see wearing them such as the socialite or the wealthier,” Miller said. “That was funny to see that, thinking about the idea of people not knowing what they’re wearing half the time.”
The duo, which began distributing the six-month-old shirts in L.A. a few months ago, even designed “The Socialites” logo in the style of the Stokes, the highly hyped four-year-old rock band whose lead singer, Julian Casablancas, is the son of Elite modeling agency founder John Casablancas.
Karen Zambos, manager of Tracey Ross, said she has almost sold out of the tee shirts in the past month.
Who bought them?
“Just random people,” she said. “People who have a humor and who get it.”
Amanda Bronstad
