Below is a piece by former newspaper editor Ron Kaye about a situation in Los Angeles that is remarkably similar to ours here. The first part of the story is reprinted, but you'll have to click on the link at the end of this piece to continue:
The "broken sidewalk" theory of L.A. apathy and alienation
By Ron Kaye
Come with me back in time a decade ago and listen to the story of San Fernando Valley secession and what we learned about the rights of the people who pay the bills.
Quite siimply, we learned that all the streets and sidewalks, all the sewers, water lines, power poles and lines, all the the municipal buildings, all the parks, everything that a private individual or business doesn't hold the deed to belongs to the legal fiction known as the City of Los Angeles, Inc.
None of it belongs in any sense to the people, the people who create the government to serve them -- of, by and for them -- and who pay the taxes, fees and rates that paid for the city and support it with their money. So when breakup was the issue, we were told the Valley as a city -- the nation's sixth largest, richest, safest and most integrated big city -- owned nothing.
Everything public would belong to the City of L.A. even though it was not in L.A. but in the wannabe City of the San Fernando Valley....continued at ronkayela.com/2008/06/who-owns-la-the-city-does-but.html
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1 Comment:
Ya know... the one phrase that stood out to me in the article is "The right to own with no responsibility". That phrase should be pushed by CP. The city owns the sidewalk but the city is not responsible for the maintenance. Am I the only one who finds that rediculous? LOL!
The city essentially owns the sidewalk in front of my townhouse. The Sidewalk Fee--that has essentially been thrown out at this point--would have made me responsible for a piece of land I did not own. It is a piece of land that many, many, many people use yet only I am responsible for the condition. Does anyone not see a problem with that? It just makes no sense.
If the city wishes to make me responsible for the sidewalk in front of my house, then I should also be able to own it.
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