A couple of Sundays ago, we went to the races at the Santa Anita Racetrack. The track was beautiful and fast; the day was cool and overcast. The horses were there, and the jockeys ready in all their bright colors. The only thing missing was the racing fans.
We haven’t been to the track in years and, apparently, we weren’t the only ones. I doubt that the park was barely a quarter- to one-half-full. It’s sad to see racing dying, but perhaps it’s too slow a sport for today’s crowd. Even money, it ends up a real estate development/ shopping mall like Hollywood Park.
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Governor Brown is flying high. A recent poll by the very reputable Public Policy Institute of California says that in this gubernatorial year, with an election in November, currently 60% of the likely voters approve of the way the Governor is doing his job. When you compare that with President Obama’s 46% approval rating among likely voters in California, a very blue state, you get a prospective that this state contest is going to end up looking like the Seattle/Denver game, and the President is in political trouble.
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Locally, our own Congressman Henry Waxman has decided to hang up his gloves after 40 years in the Congressional ring. There is a mad scramble going on for this much-coveted, solidly Democratic seat. I strongly believe that Henry’s retirement is a major loss for the American people. Maybe not corporate America, but certainly for middle-class America.
I will admit to being totally prejudiced about Henry, who I was friends with in law school at UCLA, along with his then co-partner, Howard Berman. Together, the two were referred to as the Waxman/Berman machine. Howard was in my class and Henry the year ahead, and both were very bright and politically ambitious. Both probably succeeded far beyond their expectations and left their stamp on American government. I’m going to stop now because some of my Republican friends, who will remain unnamed, are probably apoplectic by now.
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I was at a seminar on land use recently, filled with an audience of planners, city officials and attorneys. Lawyers have to do a certain number of credit hours to keep their ticket and, although I haven’t officially practiced law in years, Malibu is practically a land-use law laboratory, so it’s helpful to stay up on the latest developments. My mother used to say, “Hang onto your ticket because you never know,” a philosophy she formed in the Depression.
As you would expect with a roomful of lawyers and planners, there wasn’t a great deal of agreement except on one thing: the big issue next year is going to be water. We are in a multiyear drought, and there doesn’t appear to be any relief on the horizon. The snow pack, reservoirs, lakes and all the water levels are at historic lows and we probably are going to have water rationing, unless something changes radically. This isn’t just LA; it’s statewide and regionwide. You can probably say goodbye to your green lawn and start checking out low-water, drought-resistant plants and low-water toilets.
It’s not just that the supply is down. The surrounding states are growing and want and need more of the Colorado River water, which means less for us. The fact is, LA sits on the edge of a desert, or may even be a desert, and much of our water comes from up north. Getting it here is the biggest problem and we’re all competing for a diminishing supply. The cities are competing with the farmers, and they’re all battling the environmentalists. Building and development projects are going to stall, unless developers can show they have access to water. The price of water is going to rise, probably significantly.
The Central Valley farmers, who are already up in arms about limited water supplies, are going to have to learn to do it all differently. Thirty years ago, we were in Israel. I remember fields in Israel and across the Jordan River in Jordan all covered with plastic to cut down evaporation and watered with drip irrigation. At the same time, California farmers had big rain birds to water their fields, and they watered all the time, at all times of the day. Those farmers, despite the signs you see along Route 5 as you go through the Central Valley, are going to have to live with less water, and farm differently, with drip irrigation and covered fields. Many of them learned to farm when the government subsidized cheap and plentiful water.
Those days appear to be gone and the California Central Valley, which is one of the richest agricultural areas in our country, is going to have to change. The battle is already going on and there is a big ballot water bond measure coming to build the infrastructure.
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Along the PCH there are rumors of some changes coming. The old Chart House Restaurant, on the ocean and sort of across from the Getty has, the rumor says, been sold to Mastro’s Ocean Club, and will open in April. There is also some talk that Nikita, the restaurant next to Nobu, which has never been able to equal Nobu’s performance, may be changing format.
And Granita, of course, is still empty, and appears happy to stay that way.