The Gardena Valley Democratic Club, one of the oldest such groups in the country, held its endorsement meeting Monday to bless favored candidates in the June 8 primary and it delivered a whopper! The club, functioning since 1932, endorsed Peter Mathews, a college professor and perennial South Bay candidate and ballot fixture who “also ran” in several of the area’s previous elections, over incumbent Congresswoman Laura Richardson!! According to the announcement released by endorsement chairman Donald Dear, the club backed all the incumbents seeking re-election except two. Upon garnering a minimum of 60 percent of the members’ votes, the club endorsed progressive Democrat Marcy Winogard to challenge the deeply entrenched Blue Dog Democrat Rep. Jane Harman, who has represented the 36th Congressional District for seven terms. As to the 37th District, where Rep. Richardson has made a mockery of government service, the club’s votes between her and Mathews weren’t even close, with him getting almost 70 percent of them. And to think, all the other times Mathews ran for Congress, he nagged me about interviewing him and I’d always simply shine him on, as I’m not inclined to waste my valuable time talking to candidates who don’t have the proverbial snowball’s chance of winning the race they’re running. I have scheduled an interview with Mathews at 3 p.m. Friday in my office.

AT PLAY ON THE FIELD ETC. — We are becoming so united behind the election of Karen Bass to Congress that I just can’t stand it!! Check this out: Magic Johnson has just endorsed Bass for the 33rd District. Can you believe it? Magic Johnson — the man who endorsed Bernard Parks against Mark Ridley-Thomas, who endorsed Hillary Clinton against Barack Obama — has endorsed Karen Bass! Usually we progressives have elephantine memories, hold grudges and judge people by who they like, but hey, I’m not mad at anybody who sees enough light to come over to my side, if only for a minute. … Holly J. Mitchell will kick off her campaign to replace Bass in the 47th Assembly District seat by holding a gathering of endorsers, supporters, volunteers and friends Friday at 9 a.m. at Akasha Restaurant, 9543 Culver Blvd. in Culver City. Everybody will be there.

THE INGLEWOOD REPORT — In a closed session of the Inglewood City Council Tuesday, a lone White woman convinced two Black men and one Latino man to fire a Black man who was doing a fine job as city administrator and probably replace him with a White man who had already failed at a previous Inglewood financial post and then went on to fail as the head of finances for Culver City. Councilwoman Judy Dunlap got the “men” on the council to join her in firing Timothy Wanamaker, the city administrator Inglewood hired in April 2008 from a similar position in Buffalo, N.Y. Everybody saw his firing coming because Dunlap had been sniping at him for a year and accusing him of problems caused by the people who preceded him in office — most notably Jeff Muir, the person city observers expect Dunlap will force her “men” to hire as Wanamaker’s replacement.

During the five years Muir previously served in the Inglewood administrative office, he completed none of the audits of the city funds, which was the job he was hired to do. During the two years Wanamaker has been in charge, he has completed the audits for 2004, 2005 and 2006 (which Muir ignored) and is currently working on the audits for 2007, 2008 and 2009. Yet, Dunlap has been harping like a crazy woman about Wanamaker’s alleged incompetence, dereliction or whatever.

After Muir abandoned the audits, he left Inglewood and accepted a job as chief financial officer for Culver City, but ran into problems there because of the simple reason that he has no financial background, no financial credentials, no accountant training and relies on “consultants” to fill in the gaps in his own experience. My Culver City sources say Muir’s need to constantly hire consultants to do his job created friction there. He left after two years and returned to Inglewood, becoming the city’s financial officer. During his first appearance before the City Council, he informed the body that he wanted to hire eight consultants! Dunlap hailed that as a wonderful idea. I am sorry that good man Wanamaker has lost his job for no reason of his own, but he now becomes eligible to join three other former high ranking Inglewood officials who can direct me to where all the city’s bodies are buried. Welcome to Soulvine, Mr. Wanamaker.

Oh, and District Attorney Steve Cooley has not responded to written requests that he investigate whether Dunlap lives in Inglewood or San Francisco and the Inglewood City Council has ignored attorney Steven N. Niebow’s demand letter about damages to his client, telecommunicator Felix Washington, caused by an apparent conflict-of-interest involving Dunlap, her ex-husband, Milton Brown, her staff assistant Nannette Marchard and $1,034,479.48 worth of city telecommunications contracts.

CRIME BLOTTER — Former Detroit councilwoman Monica Conyers was sentenced to 37 months in prison last week for bribery after a federal judge refused to set aside her guilty plea during a stormy court hearing dominated by a dispute over evidence of other payoffs. Conyers is the wife of Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and she quit the Detroit City Council in June after she pled guilty to taking bribes to support a city contract worth $47 million a year. She was also accused of collecting $69,500 by shaking down people.

DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN — I got word from a trusted source that Miriam Scott Long, the only Black person even passing as a deputy mayor in the current administration is “being shown the door” out of the mayor’s office. I e-mailed her and she replied that she knew nothing about her rumored pending removal and wanted details as to what I’d heard. I had no details and I am balking at seeking any because this has the same feel as the infamous Gloria Jeff firing by the mayor a couple of years ago, when a source told me Jeff, who was general manager of the Department of Transportation, was going to be fired by the mayor. I dutifully called the mayor’s in-house “Black folks” intermediary and was told no, the mayor loves him some Gloria Jeff and she’s not going anywhere!

Later a mayoral mainstream White person called and told me, in essence, Gloria Jeff’s job was safe in the arms of Jesus! I wrote in Soulvine that rumors about Jeff’s professional demise were unfounded. Then, lo and behold, a month later, the mayor suddenly and summarily fired her! He fired her on-the-spot, with complete disrespect and subjected her to soul-wrenching humiliation from which she is still trying to recover. I have disliked him intensely because of that (and because of that cheating-on-his-wife thing, and the absence of Black people in his administration, and...). Consequently, I am loathe to make an official inquiry of the mayor’s staff as to Scott Long’s future because they will lie. They lied about Jeff. They lied about the mayor’s mistress. I don’t believe a word they say about anything. So, get ready to go to the mattresses against the mayor again.