L.A.'s Plan to Send Letters to Those Who Drive Through Prostitution Zones
Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley trekandshoot / Shutterstock.com
Also in our Thanksgiving news roundup: Nebraska is ready for California’s thirsty ‘wolves,’ and Huntsville prepares to dominate Alabama.
Here’s some of what we’ve been reading this extended Thanksgiving weekend …
LOS ANGELES, California: Should the city of Los Angeles use license-plate readers in a plan to send letters to owners of vehicles that drive through known areas of prostitution as a way to discourage them from returning? A member of the Los Angeles City Council, Nury Martinez, has been pushing such a plan and last week, the council voted to have the city attorney investigate ways to implement such a plan, the Los Angeles Daily News reported. “If you aren’t soliciting, you have no reason to worry about finding one of these letters in your mailbox,” Martinez said in a statement. “But if you are, these letters will discourage you from returning. Soliciting for sex in our neighborhoods is not OK.”
Naturally, the use of license-plate readers as a tool to pinpoint drivers who may or may not be driving through the areas of known prostitution is controversial. As Nick Selby, CEO of StreetCred Software, writes in a Medium post:
The City Council and Ms. Martinez seek to “automate” this process of reasonable suspicion (reducing it to mere presence at a certain place), and deploy it on a massive scale. They then seek to take this much further, through a highly irresponsible (and probably illegal) action that could have significant consequences on the recipient of such a letter — and they have absolutely no legal standing to write, let alone send it. There are grave issues of freedom of transportation and freedom of association here.
Selby raises an important point that the letters sent by the city to any vehicle owner, whether they were simply driving through the area or seeking the services of a prostitute, would be subject to Freedom of Information laws. [Los Angeles Daily News; Nick Selby / Medium]
KEARNEY, Nebraska: Water-hungry Californians: You’re on notice. The state of Nebraska is ready for any moves by interests in the Golden State to take control of water from the Rocky Mountains that feeds rivers that lead into the Cornhusker State. The Omaha World-Herald reports on a recent gathering featuring David Cookson, a former Nebraska water litigator, who warns that “water transfer options that were mere dreams or half-baked ideas a generation ago are closer to reality than many realize.”
According to the World-Herald:
Cookson said water managers in Colorado, Wyoming, South Dakota and Montana — source states for Nebraska’s Platte and Missouri Rivers — are discussing what to do about California when it comes in search of water. Although its treasury is cash-strapped, California is flush with people willing to spend a lot of money to ensure that the state has water, he said.
“We can stop the wolves at the door,” Cookson said. “They will come. We need to be prepared.” [Omaha World-Herald]
HUNTSVILLE, Alabama: What’s the largest city in Alabama? Birmingham. But for how much longer? As AL.com notes, Huntsville, currently the Yellowhammer State’s fourth-largest city could outflank Birmingham, Mobile and Montgomery to become the state’s largest city by 2022. Planners in Huntsville are projecting nearly 30,000 new residents—driven by “jobs, baby boomers and millennials”—to live inside the city limits by 2025, boosting the city’s population to around 217,000 residents. [AL.com]
MADISON, Wisconsin: Tougher state restrictions on access to food stamps has resulted in nearly 15,000 Wisconsin residents losing their benefits in recent months. As the Wisconsin State Journal reports, the 2013-15 state budget includes a stipulation that “[i]f you’re an able-bodied adult without children living at home, you must work at least 80 hours a month or look for work to stay in the program,” known as FoodShare. [Wisconsin State Journal]
BOSTON, Massachusetts: The Hub of the Universe has a population where one in 10 residents is a college student. Boston.com asked what would happen to Massachusetts’ largest city if all the students went away. For starters, real estate prices would decrease. Wages would go down. Education would suffer as would public transit. “Imagine a system that’s almost already collapsing, and it relies on students,” Albert Saiz, a professor of urban economics and real estate at MIT, told the news site. [Boston.com]
Michael Grass is Executive Editor of Government Executive's Route Fifty.
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