Vice-mayor Robert Garcia loves Long Beach—and I mean loves it, as in, “If you love it so much, why don’t you marry it?”—and so it was no surprise to see “A Good Year for Long Beach” as the subject line of one of his recent mass e-mails.
Garcia provides a long list of why he feels this way: new concourse and renovated terminal at Long Beach Airport, nine new parks and the start of work on 10 more, Long Beach’s being named among the top cities for LGBT inclusion and digital & social media, etc. And he doesn’t even mention all the farmers markets that sprung up around town (which is probably more of an unmitigated good than the 12,300 Code Enforcement cases he says were “resolved”).
What’s not on the list, of course, are all the things that took place this year that weren’t so good. There was the budget crisis, which led to major cuts in police and a related spike in violent crime. We lost some of city’s best businesses (e.g., {open}, Aroma di Roma). The RDA is RIP. LBPD officers were caught on camera destroying property and stepping on the neck of a compliant suspect. So you tell me: Was it really a good year for Long Beach? Was the passage of Measure N for good or ill? Are you happy about the PBID? Does the phrase “Congressmember Lowenthal” fill you with cheer or dismay?
And even if 2012 was a good year on balance, what constructive criticism should Garcia and his council cohorts take to heart for 2013? Did they spend the Uplands Oil Fund surplus in the best possible ways? Should they have banned all medpot dispensaries? Should they allow money allocated for one purpose to be used for something else?
Let ’em hear it. Because don’t forget: Long Beach is your city, too.
Click here to view our policies covering Robert Garcia and the Long Beach city council.