EZ Policy Blog

Last July I posted a video of a meeting of the Oakland City Council where there was a passionate appeal to expand Oakland’s Enterprise Zone into part of the City of Berkeley in order to prevent Bayer Health Care from relocating a major facility out of the country.  In September word came that Bayer had decided not only to stay, but to expand its Berkeley operations.

The State has really made this effort a priority, and as of December 1, that expansion was made official by HCD.  Here is a video of the Berkeley City Council meeting of  12/8/09 where the City manager announces the approval to a round of applause:

Berkeley City Council Meeting 12/8/2009 from Max Shenker on Vimeo.

KQED’s John Myers, in his Capital Notes Blog, discusses the background and implications of a new study released this week, “Cost of State Regulations on California Small Business Study.” The 85 page study is posted on the State’s Small Business Advocacy page here:

Cost of State Regulations on California Small Business Study –

The Executive Summary is pretty chilling:

This study measures and reports the cost of regulation to small business in the State of California. It uses original analyses and a general equilibrium framework to identify and measure the cost of regulation as measured by the loss of economic output to the State’s gross product, after controlling for variables known to influence output. It also measures second order costs resulting from regulatory activity by studying the total impact – direct, indirect, and induced. The study finds that the total cost of regulation to the State of California is $492.994 billion which is almost five times the State’s general fund budget, and almost a third of the State’s gross product. The cost of regulation results in an employment loss of 3.8 million jobs which is a tenth of the State’s population. Since small business constitute 99.2% of all employer businesses in California, and all of non-employer business, the regulatory cost is borne almost completely by small business. The total cost of regulation was $134,122.48 per small business in California in 2007, labor income not created or lost was $4,359.55 per small business, indirect business taxes not generated or lost were $57,260.15 per small business, and finally roughly one job lost per small business. This study provides the most comprehensive and complete analysis of the total regulatory burden in California.

This reminds me of language used to describe the purpose of the Enterprise Zone Program in the Government Code: “The health, safety, and welfare of the people of California depend upon the development, stability, and expansion of private business, industry, and commerce, and there are certain areas within the state that are economically depressed due to a lack of investment in the private sector. Therefore, it is declared to be the purpose of this chapter to stimulate business and industrial growth in the depressed areas of the state by relaxing regulatory controls that impede private investment.”

Breaking news from the Contra Costa Times:

BERKELEY — Bayer HealthCare announced Wednesday it will invest more than $100 million to upgrade and improve its manufacturing capabilities here, a decision that dispels fears the pharmaceutical giant would exit this city.

The decision by Bayer HealthCare to manufacture future versions of its hemophilia drug Kogenate isn’t just about the patients.

It’s also a major relief for Berkeley and Oakland. Earlier this year, Bayer hinted it was considering a move out of Berkeley.

This is the largest investment ever made by Bayer on the Berkeley site, said Joerg Heidrich, head of Bayer HealthCare’s product supply biotech organization.
“I’m very pleased and excited to invest more than $100 million in the Berkeley site to manufacture a new process for hemophiliacs,” Heidrich said.

Berkeley’s largest private employer will seek to expand its facility, giving a boost to both the Bay Area and the East Bay. With 1,300 employees on the 43-acre campus, Bayer is the second-largest biotech employer in the Bay Area behind Roche/Genentech.

Officials in Berkeley’s economic development department said Bayer will have to spend $100 million to retool its labs to start making the new drug.

If the Berkeley City Council and the state of California approve the expansion of an enterprise zone that includes Oakland and Berkeley, Bayer will benefit from $13.6 million in tax credits.

The city council is due to take up the enterprise zone issue next Tuesday.

Here is an editorial by CAEZ President Craig Johnson in Capitol Weekly:

n the wake of the overwhelming rejection of the package of budget-related ballot measures crafted by the Governor’s Office and the Legislature, and the seriously flawed budget deal that really nobody is happy with, now is a good time to examine exactly what the problem is with the budget and the state’s finances in general.

Governor Schwarzenegger arrived in Sacramento amid great fanfare and promises to “blow up the boxes” in California governance and return California to it’s former glory as a business friendly state. Unfortunately, those “boxes” are still intact and California ranks near the bottom of national business destinations.

The question of, “how did we get into this mess?”, has been asked many times during the past few years, yet the answer is painfully obvious. Early in this new century the state’s coffers were overflowing with revenue. The dot com and real estate booms were in full swing, new businesses were opening their doors at a record pace and overnight millionaires were popping up with regularity.

The state leadership, instead of recognizing this monetary windfall for what it was, a generous, but temporary spike in revenue due to unique economic circumstances, used it to justify ongoing and increased levels of spending that were revealed to be unsustainable.

The solution to this revenue/spending dilemma is to create a business climate in California that stimulates and promotes business growth, job creation and entrepreneurship. We must return the Golden State to a place where those who are willing to risk, innovate, build and employ are provided with the tools to make that happen.

California is besieged by neighboring states and others, tempting California companies with incentives to pack up and take their businesses and their employees elsewhere. There is a successful economic development program that the Governor and Legislature can rely upon to stem the flow of companies exiting the state. That program is the California State Enterprise Zone Program.

The Enterprise Zone program is an essential tool for economic growth in California. The program delivers measurable benefits to our state by creating jobs and business growth opportunities, while reducing unemployment, increasing household income and lowering poverty rates. The state’s 42 Enterprise Zones are located in economically distressed communities across California, from Eureka to Calexico and points in between. The Enterprise Zone program has played a pivotal role in statewide job expansion, while creating job opportunities for those with barriers to employment.

Since it’s creation in 1984, the Enterprise Zone program has been vital to hundreds of businesses, spurring job creation, retention and attraction and making California a more attractive place to do business. Combined with the Enterprise Zone program, lowering taxes and fees, especially on California businesses, will increase revenues, so that fewer budget cuts will be required.

California does have a budget problem, but we can grow ourselves out of this dilemma, by providing businesses with reasons to stay, grow and expand. Small and medium-sized businesses have always been the backbone of California’s economy, yet the state faces an uncertain financial future unless we provide them with the tools necessary to promote business growth in California. Without it, the future will be bleak indeed.

From the Las Vegas Sun:

The Nevada Development Authority’s newest advertising campaign to lure Southern California businesses to Las Vegas says if they stay there they can “kiss their assets goodbye.”

The $1 million campaign, which breaks Friday in Southern California on television, radio and print, is the NDA’s latest attempt at enticing businesses to relocate.

Similar previous campaigns have drawn heated responses from California government officials and business organizations and the new campaign, which is edgier than those produced in the past, is expected to get under the skin of loyal Californians.

Los Angeles’ ABC affiliate, KABC, already has told the NDA that it would not run the new spots.

The campaign, developed by Las Vegas-based Shonkwiler Partners, incorporates two basic themes, an apple-to-apple comparison of California and Nevada business climate in which the California apple shrivels and rots and another that compares the effects of California legislation on businesses to the shenanigans of a monkey. The ads incorporate the tagline “Kiss your assets goodbye.”

The NDA sells Southern Nevada for its lower personal and business income taxes, reduced workers’ compensation rates and decreased operational expenses, including its friendlier regulatory environment.

The campaign hits at a time when California faces a $26.3 billion budget deficit projected to reach more than $42 billion next year. The state began issuing IOUs for a variety of payments it owes, but several banks stopped accepting them in mid-July. To lampoon the IOU development, the NDA is issuing IOUs promising a better business environment in Nevada whenever a company makes an inquiry.

The ads were debuted to the media and NDA guests at Town Square’s Rave Theaters on Thursday. Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman was in the crowd and gave the campaign a thumbs-up for creativity and he said he believes they will stir things up when they’re aired.

“They’re really great,” Goodman said after the screening. “They’re going to drive them (Californians) bonkers. This campaign is very Las Vegas.”

You can see the videos of all the ads here. They’re entertaining. Scary, but entertaining.

From the Tax Foundation’s Tax Policy Blog:

California is Not a Low-Tax State, Despite Proposition 13

by Joseph Henchman

Joel Kotkin at Forbes wonders what killed California’s economy:

It took some amazing incompetence to toss this best-endowed of places down into the dustbin of history. Yet conventional wisdom views the crisis largely as a legacy of Proposition 13, which in effect capped only taxes.

This lets too many malefactors off the hook.[...] To the surprise of many prognosticators, the state government did not go out of business. It has continued to expand faster than either its income or population. Between 2003 and 2007, spending grew 31%, compared with a 5% population increase. Today the overall tax burden as percent of state income, according to the Tax Foundation, has risen to the sixth-highest in the nation.

See our State-Local Tax Burdens rankings here. That California remains one of the highest-tax states in the country is a crucial point undermining the “Proposition 13 caused it all” thesis. That and a time lag of several decades. Other than property taxes, essentially every other California tax is among the highest of the states.

As we noted last month:

California is a high tax state. They are sixth highest in state-local tax burden as a percentage of state income. The sales tax is the highest state rate in the country even before the recent 1% increase, and numerous county rates keep them in the top 5 of state-local combined rates. Their individual income tax top rate is the second highest in the country, eclipsed only recently by Hawaii, and is sixth highest in the country in terms of collections. The corporate income tax is one of the highest in the country and sixth highest per capita in collections. Even the gas tax is the third highest in the country and the state Lottery has the fifth highest implicit tax rate in the country. Only on property taxes is California “low”: 28th highest in collections per capita.

The Tax Foundation’s annual State Business Tax Climate Index evaluates tax structures for business-friendliness, and the 2009 edition ranked California 48th, or third worst. The individual income tax ranked second to last, corporate income tax ranked 45th, and sales tax ranked 43rd. (Property tax structure was a bright spot, ranking 15th in the country.)

With these comparisons, and the enormous growth in state spending, it’s hard to say that California’s problem is insufficient taxation. Ultimately, California voters need to decide whether they are willing to pay the taxes to fund the programs they want. The tax system prevents this from happening now, due to the state’s overreliance on taxing capital gains, corporations, and high-income earners. Most Californians rightly think additional spending is a free lunch that they won’t have to pay for.

Read more Tax Foundation research and analysis on California here.

Read the rest of the Forbes piece here.

This is despite the California Budget Project regularly telling us that California is a “moderate” tax state.

Dan Walters at the Sacramento Bee alerts us to California’s new rank in business friendliness:

California has dropped from 34th to 40th place in Forbes magazine’s annual rankings of states’ business climates – just in time to help Republican legislators make their pitch for adopting business-friendly policies as part of any deal on the overdue state budget.

Here is the Forbes article, and here is the full rankings chart. It’s particularly interesting to note that California ranked dead last in the business cost category but ranked 12th in economic climate. Perhaps there is so much inherent opportunity in California that it continues to thrive despite the legislature’s attempts to stop it.

An Enterprise Zone story has just hit the national media via a link on the Drudge Report, “California may sue to block water-bottling plant over global warming impact…“  Nestle has been struggling for years to build a new water bottling plant in the Siskiyou Enterprise Zone, but environmentalists have presented steady opposition against the project.  The latest development is the Attorney General’s threat to sue Nestle:

Attorney General Jerry Brown on Tuesday said he will sue to block a proposed water-bottling operation in Northern California unless its effects on global warming are evaluated.

Nestle Waters North America wants to pump about 200 million gallons of water a year from three natural springs that supply McCloud, about 280 miles north of San Francisco. Brown’s office said that’s enough to fill 3.1 billion 8-ounce plastic water bottles.

The water would be bottled at a 350,000-square-foot facility on the outskirts of the former lumber town.

The Swiss-based company scaled back its plans in May after years of opposition from environmentalists and a group of McCloud residents. It originally sought to pump more than double the amount of water.

An official from Siskiyou County expressed dismay over the difficulties Nestle has had and pointed out that the McCloud area is in desperate need of those potential jobs.

Will limiting the kinds of businesses that can locate in an area encourage economic development?

LOS ANGELES (AP) – City officials are putting South Los Angeles on a diet.

The City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to place a moratorium on new fast food restaurants in an impoverished swath of the city with a proliferation of such eateries and above average rates of obesity.

The Los Angeles Times reports on a new kind of zone that largely corresponds to the city’s Enterprise Zone:

In the wake of a Times report that illegal trash dumping is plaguing some of Los Angeles’ poorest neighborhoods, state officials announced Tuesday that they would give the city a $500,000 grant to help crack down on violators in the hardest-hit areas.

The grant, from the California Integrated Waste Management Board, will help fund a special enforcement zone in South Los Angeles, where about half of the illegally dumped refuse in the city is discarded.

Here is their interactive map showing the locations of illegal trash dumping:

View Larger Map

In the category of “it’s not easy to run an Enterprise Zone under these conditions,” the Los Angeles Times reports:

Gang investigators with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department have arrested a Lynwood city official on suspicion of felonies, including being an accessory to robbery and possessing a stolen handgun, a department spokesman said.

Autra Adams, the special assistant to the Lynwood city manager, was arrested at her home Thursday morning in connection with the sheriff’s investigation, said department spokesman Steve Whitmore.

The new Siskiyou County Enterprise Zone seems to be taking the lead in efforts to fight off challenges to the program arising from the budget crisis. From the Mt. Shasta News:

A recent recommendation to cancel Enterprise Zones throughout the state as a budget cutting effort has prompted local officials to take action.

“We are working to maintain our designation and are drafting a letter to send to the state to protest the proposed move,” said Siskiyou County Economic Development Council executive director Tonya Dowse during a presentation at last week’s Mount Shasta Chamber of Commerce meeting. “We need to be proactive in this matter. The city of Mount Shasta has already sent a letter in opposition.”

Dowse said the county and its cities and towns recently received an economic boost with a new 15 year California State Enterprise Zone designation.

“There are only 42 Enterprise Zones statewide, and it’s very competitive to achieve the designation because of the benefits that come with it. Fortunately we were one of the top applicants,” Dowse said during the meeting at Lalo’s Restaurant Thursday.

She said, “Siskiyou County is the most rural applicant and as such really needs the tax credits to sustain current businesses as well as to bring in more business and light industry. Since we are primarily a county of small businesses we have to take everything into account. What may seem like a relatively small benefit can be significant to a ‘Mom and Pop’ type of business.”

Siskiyou County Economic Development Council executive director Tonya Dowse, standing right, and Monique Dixon of Great Northern Corporation updated members and guests on the area’s Enterprise Zone status during the Mount Shasta Chamber of Commerce meeting at Lalo’s Restaurant Thursday.

Siskiyou County is one of eight areas

View Larger Map

that recently received conditional designations for new Enterprise Zones. Based on this article in the Siskiyou Daily News, it sounds like some local officials are not too pleased with the LAO’s budget recommendations:

A recommendation from the state’s legislative office has put the board of supervisors on the offensive.

According to District 4 Supervisor and Board Chair Bill Overman, the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) has – in order to cut the state’s budget – recommended that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger cancel the recently designated enterprise zones throughout California.

If that happens, Overman said during Tuesday’s brief board meeting, it ’will have dire consequences.’

The LAO is the state’s nonpartisan fiscal and policy advisor. Its Web site states that it serves as the legislature’s ’eyes and ears,’ a job it has done for more than 65 years.

The 2008 LAO budget analysis proposed to phase out enterprise zone programs.

The report states, ’Cancel the recent redesignations of enterprise zones and deny future extensions for all other EZs.’

The LAO offers the following rationale in the report:

’Many studies of EZs question whether they are efficient or cost-effective tools for improving the economic conditions of the targeted areas.

’A December 2003 report, ’An Overview of California’s Enterprise Zone Hiring Credit,’ concluded that EZ incentives have little, if any, impact on the creation of new economic activity or employment, but that they can be effective in shifting activity into the EZ that otherwise would have occurred elsewhere in the same geographic region.

’As noted above, many EZs have already been in effect for many years. It is not clear what additional benefits will be gained by extending the same incentives that have already been in place for as many as 20 years. Rather, other redevelopment policy tools could be more effective than extended use of EZ tax incentives.’

Last month, Siskiyou County was awarded countywide enterprise zone status.

Overman drafted a letter to the governor, urging Schwarzenegger to reject the LAO’s recommendation.

Supervisors Marcia Armstrong, Jim Cook, LaVada Erickson and Michael Kobseff read the letter and gave their approval of it. Copies of the letter will also be sent to Assemblyman Doug LaMalfa and Senator Sam Aanestad.

Overman said that the county’s lobbyists will carry a similar message to other legislators.

Tonya Dowse, who oversees the Siskiyou County Economic Development Council, said that some of the nine incorporated cities are also taking ’preemptive measures.’

’A number of city councils are drawing up letters of support,’ she said.

She noted that Yreka Mayor Rory McNeil wrote a letter which will be sent to Sacramento legislators.

’Our part of the state has been hard hit by economic stagnation. However, other parts of the state haven’t experienced similar problems,’ Dowse said. ’It’s easy to have a misperception that enterprise zones aren’t needed.’

She hopes that the governor continues his support of the zones.

’The governor has been a big supporter of the zones,’ she said, ’and I feel that his support will continue.’

The Las Vegas Review-Journal describes a significant new advertising campaign being launched by the Nevada Development Authority which targets California businesses by specifically ridiculing the state’s tax burden:

The authority last week began unveiling a series of 40 political cartoons it’s placing as advertisements in business journals and daily newspapers across the Golden State. The ads center on the famed grizzly that graces California’s flag; one tells businesses tired of carrying “the un-Bear-able load” to consider moving to Nevada, while another asks Californians, “More bad news, bear?”

The ads are the latest salvo in a years-long battle for businesses from California. Prior campaigns, with their cheeky tones, have received attention from news media including Time magazine, the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post, and in 2004, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger came to town with a moving truck to issue some witty rejoinders to the authority’s efforts in person.

However, the article also cites Jack Kyser, chief economist of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation:

But Jack Kyser, chief economist of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp., said shaky economic times don’t typically make for successful business-recruiting efforts. That’s because uncertainty makes company owners nervous, and they tend to stay put while they wait out a struggling economy.

Here is the press release from the Nevada Development Corporation, and here is an article from Cal-Taxletter.

The Field Poll released Jan. 1 finds that the majority of Californians feel that the State is in economic trouble:

California is in bad economic times and it is expected to stay that way for the next twelve months, so say a majority of the state’s voters. More than one-half (52%) describe the state as being in bad economic times, while just one in five (20%) feel the state is in good economic times. In addition, when asked about next year, 70% expect things to either stay the same or get worse. However, Californians have a more mixed view of their personal financial situation. In appraising their own finances, a slightly larger proportion (37%) say they are better off, while 33% believe they are worse off than they were a year ago. Another 30% say there has been no change in how they stand financially over the past year.

A pair of articles in the Los Angeles Times highlight the looming problems some Enterprise Zone areas may be facing as the State’s foreclosure woes progress. In Palmdale, one resident sees the entire economic development health of the area tied to mortgages:

Another vacant house sits at the end of the block, with an eviction notice in its window and a “substandard property” poster stuck to the door. The surrounding streets are peppered with “for sale” signs. Ghitkammanee fears many of those will wind up vacant too if their cash-strapped owners don’t find buyers soon.

“It’s starting to degrade,” Ghitkammanee, 37, said of his community. As adjustable-rate home loans reset to higher levels, more of his neighbors will be pushed into foreclosure. “As those rear their head, it’s just going to be more difficult to keep the neighborhood progressing,” he said.

The story is similar in Stockton.

Some ominous news from Sacramento:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s finance officials are projecting a California budget deficit of roughly $14 billion, significantly larger than the $9.8 billion gap previously forecast by a state budget analyst, according to two sources who spoke to the governor.

The growing estimate increases pressure on Schwarzenegger and lawmakers to cut state spending and consider tax increases to close the budget hole. Schwarzenegger last month ordered all departments to prepare spending plans 10 percent below than what they had anticipated, and GOP lawmakers are calling for immediate midyear cuts in spending.

Schwarzenegger is meeting with legislative leaders to brief them on the budget problem after Department of Finance officials revised their estimates Monday. They based their calculations on new economic and revenue indicators that took into account the sluggish housing market, drops in property tax revenues and increased expenditures from Southern California wildfires, among other factors, said spokesman H.D. Palmer.

Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill last month estimated the budget gap at $9.8 billion, larger than the $6 billion Schwarzenegger’s office originally projected. But the governor’s Department of Finance now believes the deficit is beyond $10 billion.

Of course, the Los Angeles Times includes an additional detail that’s on everyone’s minds:

A $14-billion budget gap would translate to more than 12% of the state’s budget if spending continues to rise as projected. Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill last month urged legislators to consider getting rid of state programs created in recent years, abolishing tax breaks, raising taxes and reducing benefits for the recipients of government programs.

The Lodi News-Sentinel discusses some of the harsh realities of economic development in the San Joaquin Valley.

Nearly every morning, Chip Herman hoses off pools of urine and human feces from the side of his auto detailing shop on South Cherokee Lane.

No matter how hard he tries, however, the longtime Lodi businessman can’t rinse away the root cause of his frustrations: the widespread access to alcohol on the Eastside corridor.

There are roughly 30 places you can buy a drink on Cherokee Lane, from the restaurants and bars to the liquor, grocery and convenience stores.

As the article mentions later, Lodi is part of San Joaquin Valley’s new Enterprise Zone application which includes the City of Stockton as well.

City leaders, including new Mayor JoAnne Mounce, and those who work or live near Cherokee Lane do want changes. They want closer scrutiny of liquor license applications, and a spruced up avenue that serves as a gateway to the city.

The corridor, now a busy but hardly picturesque collection of motels, gas stations and retail shops, is the first place many see when entering Lodi.

“People get a bad impression — they think the whole town is like that,” said Sunil Yadav, owner of the Modern Motor Lodge on South Cherokee, and a member of the Lodi Improvement Committee.

…

Upcoming plans would also allow for taller hotels and offices on the strip. (The city limit would jump from two stories to four). City leaders also want to include Cherokee Lane in the county’s Enterprise Zone, which would make businesses eligible for numerous low-cost loans and tax rebates.

It’s quite an extensive article and worth reading for those interested in what is at stake for California communities waiting to hear about the fate of their Enterprise Zone applications.

The Sacramento Bee’s “Capitol Alert” provided the following television advertisement for Toyota Prius that picks on one of our Enterprise Zones, Fresno.

In the commercial, which aims to depict an ideal future, the narrator intones, “Gas stations will become nothing more than low budget tourist stops, like ghost towns – or Fresno.”

That jab didn’t sit well with politicos representing the Central Valley city.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein wrote a letter to the automaker expressing “profound disappointment with the current Toyota Prius advertising campaign which gratuitously insults the city of Fresno.”

The Fresno Bee report on the “incident” indicates that there is a lot of sensitivity on the issue:

The commercial, which implies that you would only stop here if you were low on gas, is sparking rebukes from Central Valley residents, city officials and even U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

And now Toyota is issuing a recall for the TV spot, which the company admits was ill conceived.

“I did not like it one bit,” said Fresno Mayor Alan Autry, who complained to Feinstein’s office, prompting a “scathing” missive from the senator to Toyota officials.

The ad, created by Atlanta-based 22Squared for Toyota dealers in the Southeast U.S., could be viewed Friday on the Internet Web site YouTube.

It depicts two people in a Prius “in the future,” where “gas stations will become nothing more than low-budget tourist stops. Like ghost towns … or Fresno.”

Feinstein’s letter to Shige Hayakawa, president of Toyota North America, expresses “profound disappointment with the current Toyota Prius advertising campaign which gratuitously insults the city of Fresno.”

That prompted Irving A. Miller, group vice president for Toyota corporate communications, to issue an apology Friday “to the great city of Fresno for this commercial.”

He said the commercial was “edited overnight to remove any reference to Fresno and we have implemented a series of controls that will allow us to monitor future local advertising to prevent this type of error from occurring.”

Autry has his view of why the ad agency would pick on Fresno.

“These folks really don’t have a lot of creativity,” he said. Singling out the city is something that “just rears up every now and then.

“We may not have a bay or a beach, but if you’re looking for a place to raise a family, Fresno doesn’t have a peer.”

City Council Member Mike Dages thinks taking shots at Fresno goes all the way back to the early 1980s, when then-Mayor Dan Whitehurst went on a late-night television show and made a number of self-deprecating remarks about the city.

“Perception is a tough thing to get rid of,” he said.

“But I don’t know how many people from Fresno are going to buy a Prius. Agencies should know better than that.”

Council Member Jerry Duncan also sent a letter of complaint to the Toyota chief.

“Enough,” he said. “We’re tired of it.”

Council Member Henry T. Perea joked that perhaps the whole thing was a geographical error.

“Maybe they’re talking about Fresno, Texas,” he said.

He added: “It’s important for Fresno to push a progressive agenda and those types of things will be a thing of the past.

“I will forgive Toyota if they locate a Prius factory here.”

From the Los Angeles Wave newspaper August 22 edition:

LYNWOOD — Hundreds of people turned out Tuesday night for a march from Marco Firebaugh High School to City Hall calling on the City Council to save their homes from the proposed Angeles Fields, a development that could displace about 1,000 families for a super shopping center and a sports stadium.

Led by community activists Ramon Rodriguez, Tony Martinez and Aide Castro, three candidates running in the Sept. 25 recall election seeking to oust Mayor Louis Byrd, Mayor Pro Tem Fernando Pedroza and Council members Leticia Vasquez and Alfreddie Johnson, the marchers carried signs that read “Say no to the NFL,” “Save Our Homes,” and “Say Yes to the Recall.”