by Mark McDermott Legislation crafted to pave the way for the County of Los Angeles to return land in Manhattan Beach that belonged to Willa and Charles Bruce…
by Mark McDermott Legislation crafted to pave the way for the County of Los Angeles to return land in Manhattan Beach that belonged to Willa and Charles Bruce…
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FAIRFIELD-SUISUN, CALIFORNIA
LASD wanted a helipad near Villanueva’s home. They started building even after owner said no [Los Angeles Times]
One day last summer, workers for the Southern California Gas Co. were on a plot of land the utility owns that sits above the home of Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva in La Habra Heights. Some sheriff’s officials approached and asked about the possibility of the department building a helicopter landing pad on the property.
The utility declined the request.
Despite the rejection, construction of a helicopter pad began, with a crew grading an area and hauling in dirt in recent weeks, according to the La Habra Heights city manager and a letter the gas company sent to L.A. County. In the cease-and-desist letter, an attorney for the gas company demanded that the work on the helipad stop and that the county undo what was done to the land.
If we don’t trust one another to elect a good sheriff, and we don’t trust anyone else to appoint a good sheriff, and we don’t trust anyone to oversee or remove the sheriff, what’s left?
There was an answer, of sorts, just about a year ago, with the brief tenure of (made for TV) Los Angeles County Sheriff Bill Hollister, a part Dirty Harry, part Lone Ranger deputy’s deputy for the thin sliver of 2020 that preceded lockdowns, anti-police-brutality protests and bogus claims of election fraud. In the Fox series “Deputy,” the elected sheriff dies, triggering an obscure passage in the 170-year-old Los Angeles County charter that hands the office to “the longest-serving member of his mounted posse” until the next election. Hollister suddenly and unexpectedly is granted the top job not by the voters, because that would involve politics, and not by the Board of Supervisors, because that would make him beholden to politicians, but by act of God. He’s sheriff by immaculate