THE GHOST OF SUPERVISOR PAST — Yvonne Burke is no longer a county supervisor, but she is still haunting the 2nd District big time. Her deal giving the PXP oil company complete control of the mammoth oil field in Baldwin Hills in total disregard for the health, safety and quality of life of the thousands of residents abutting the field, has generated four lawsuits, angry accusations and charges of conflict of interest.

Just as Burke was leaving office last year, she convinced her board colleagues to approve an environmental impact report on the PXP oil field (now known as the Yvonne Burke Oil Field) that virtually allows the company to erect as many oil derricks and drill as many oil wells as it wants while adhering to whatever safety precautions it chooses. That approval was a stinging rebuke to the residents near the oil field who maintain their health will be further adversely impacted and their property values will continue to erode because of increased drilling in that field.

The board’s approval was quickly followed by lawsuits filed against the county by the city of Culver City, Community Health Councils, National Resources Defense Council and the Concerned Citizens of South Central all of which are seeking to prevent the expansion of drilling in the interest of the health and safety of the residents who have to live with it.

That problem is compounded by this one: The United Homeowners Association, which represents 5,700 Baldwin Hills homes, wants desperately to join the fight against the ghost of Yvonne Burke and support the lawsuits against the county and thus increase their efforts to protect the environmental health and safety of their neighborhoods. But they say their president, Theodore Irving, is standing in their way. They say that Irving, who is employed as a Los Angeles city planner, is seen to be working at cross purposes with the association he heads. They point out that the city of Los Angeles and the City Planning Department have done nothing to mitigate residents’ environmental fears, and neither has the Irving-led homeowners association.

Members complain that Irving, alleged to be a longtime supporter of Burke and Councilman Bernard Parks, “has placed a noose around the necks of citizens struggling to protect our health, safety and homes.”

And here’s another thing: Some United Homeowners Association members are suspicious about the inaction of Los Angeles city officials and entities and ask: Why hasn’t the city of Los Angeles joined in the lawsuit filed by the city of Culver City? Why hasn’t Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa been proactive on this issue? Doesn’t he care as much about the health and safety of the residents of his city as does the mayor of Culver City? Or have city planners (of which Irving is one) been instructed by L.A.’s mayor to ignore the issue? They also asked: “And where did Bernard Parks disappear to? Why has he not taken any action on PXP?”

Gary Gless, president of the Citizens Coalition for a Safe Community and a United Homeowners Association member, wrote a letter to Irving on April 17 in which he stated: “I and many others have issues with the way the UHA board has dealt with this [PXP] issue and it appears as if there is a bias on the side of  PXP’s interests. When the UHA board fails to help educate the membership at large and votes behind closed doors to take the position that the oil field expansion is a non-issue, what are we to think?”
I would think it’s time to send Irving and his board packing.

PREDICTION COMES TRUE — Stanford University released a report Monday on the declining graduation rates of girls and minority students since the implementation of California’s high school exit exam — the exam students must pass before they receive a high school diploma. Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, a longtime opponent of the exit exam, who tried to legislate the exam out of existence, responded to the report thusly: “This study reinforces the concerns that many of us have had about the exit exam from its inception. The dramatically more negative effects of the exam on girls and on students of color, the biased signal it sends to employers, and the lack of promised improvement in student achievement are very troubling and must make us all pause and take stock of whether the exam could be fixed or is fatally flawed.”

POMP AND POLITICS — Tyree Wieder, president emeritus of Los Angeles Valley College and president of the city Library Commission, will be the keynote speaker at the graduation ceremony of the 2009 class of the Los Angeles African-American Women’s Public Policy Institute. The graduation ceremony will be held April 30 at 6 p.m. in the Board of Public Works Hearing Room on the 3rd floor of the City Hall. A reception in the rotunda will follow. Nineteen women comprise next week’s graduates, which will be the institute’s sixth graduating class, from which a total of 97 women have matriculated. Joy Atkinson, executive director, is doing a great job running this important training program. We would have fewer empty suits running for office if a similar institute was available to African-American men.

HALLELUJAH! — Next month’s Black Business Expo will have a gospel component in it as gospel radio announcer Edna Tatum is set to receive the expo’s Mahalia Jackson Gospel Legends Award during a West Coast Gospel Live concert scheduled for May 3. The concert, itself, will pay tribute to gospel icons, the Rev. James Cleveland and Billy Preston. … Oh, and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, President Barack Obama’s former pastor whose “G—damn America!” tirade threatened to derail Obama’s presidential candidacy, is also slated to do something at the Black Business Expo event.

THIS AND THAT — I heard some police officers are grumbling about the fact that the Police Protective League has given more than $200,000 of their dues money to attorney Carmen Trutanich’s campaign for city attorney. The Black police officers’ groups are supporting Councilman Jack Weiss for the job. I still say a pox on both of them.

Council members Janice Hahn and Dennis Zine were rightly steadfast in their opposition to the DWP’s plan to raise water rates to promote conservation. They voted “no” on the matter at a council meeting from which four members were absent. Our water rates will be raised because seven people said so. You see why I’m so irascible?

Assemblyman Curren Price will host Democratic Party convention delegates and supporters at a “Thank You” reception Friday night at Sacramento’s McCormick & Schmick’s seafood restaurant. Price, the presumptive senator-elect in the overwhelmingly Democratic 26th District, is using the gathering “to discuss our party’s goals for the remainder of this year and set our sights on political goals we would like to achieve in 2010,” he said.

Assembly Speaker Bass was honored for her leadership at the Strong, Smart and Bold Awards ceremony in Oakland last week. Sponsored by Girls Incorporated of Alameda County, the event also honored Olympic Gold Medalist Kristi Yamaguchi. …

AND FINALLY — A message to my councilman, Zine: Those DWP spotlights we don’t want are still here. The speed bumps we want are not!