By the end of April, calls for boycotts of Arizona businesses had begun.  On April 26, Darrell Steinberg, the leader of the California State Senate, suggested that the state consider a boycott and asked Governor Schwarzenegger for a list of Arizona firms (and government agencies) that do business with the State of California. ["Steinberg says California should consider boycotting Arizona in protest of immigration law" by Patrick McGreevy, LAT, April 27, 2010]

By the next day, Los Angeles City Council members had weighed in. ["Calls to boycott Arizona grow over new immigration law," by Anna Gorman and Nicholas Ricardi, LAT, April 28, 2010]  On May 12, the Los Angeles City Council passed a law banning most city travel to Arizona and future contracts with Arizona businesses.  San Francisco passed a similar ban the same week. ["L.A. council bans most official travel to Arizona," by Phil Willon, LAT, May 13, 2010]

At the beginning of June, the County of Los Angeles suspended funding for travel to Arizona and initiated a study of how to terminate contracts with Arizona companies and divest of Arizona state and municipal bonds by the country’s pension fund.  Los Angeles Unified School District passed a resolution condemning the law, recommending additional steps to sever economic ties to Arizona, and asking Superintendent Ramon C. Cortines to make the study of the law part of the school curriculum.  ["L.A. County votes to boycott Arizona over immigration law," by Garrett Therolf and Howard Blume, LAT, June 2, 2010]

Many other cities and public agencies, across California and the nation, have proposed boycotts or condemned the law.  The legislation, however controversial, maintains popular support, even in California ["Voters split on Arizona law," by Seema Mahta, LAT, May 31, 2010], and some ‘rule of law’ cities in California and nationally have endorsed the law.  [See “Who is boycotting Arizona?"]  Several states may follow Arizona’s lead. ["Many legislators aim to copy Ariz. immigration law," by John Miller, AP, May 26, 2010]

A number of immigrant rights and civil rights groups, including two based in Los Angeles – the National Immigration Law Center and the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, have mounted legal challenges to the law. [See June 5, 2010 press release, "SB 1070 | ARIZONA: NICL and Civil Rights Groups Ask Court to Block Implementation of Arizona's Racial Profiling Law During Legal Battle."]

This week, Robert K. Ross, MD, president and CEO of The California Endowment, and Ruth Wernig, chief investment officer, sent a letter advising six Arizona companies that the foundation was considering divestment of Arizona assets.

As one of the nation’s largest foundations (and the second largest foundation in Los Angeles, behind the Getty Trust), this news may be expected to send ripples across the nonprofit sector.

According to the Chronicle of Philanthropy (”Calif. Nonprofit Group Rethinks Its Investments in Light of Ariz. Immigration Law,” June 30, 2010), which featured this story yesterday, the California Endowment has $5.2 million invested in Arizona.

The statement – an extended version of the letter on the president’s blog, “Bob’s Blog: Arizona’s Immigration Law is Un-American” – acknowledges the need for immigration reform, but condemns the Arizona law as unjust.  While there is an emphasis on the fiduciary responsibilities to the foundation’s investment portfolio, clearly that is not where the concerns begin.

“The very heart of The California Endowment’s mission requires that we work in the underserved communities in our state and that we do so with respect for the dignity of those communities and the people in them.

Time and again, we find the health of the people in those communities damaged by the lack of the most basic building blocks of health: access to clean drinking water, clean air to breathe, the ability to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, safe places to exercise. Time and again, we find that the lack of those basics cause people in those underserved communities to be sicker and to die sooner. Time and again, we feel called to support those communities when they decide they must work to change the places they live for the better.”

Dr. Ross suggests that law will lead to racial profiling, which stands in opposition to the California Endowment’s “core mission and values.”  That is the principle indictment of the law, which reveals a stark contrast:  “So the question is: how can we work hard every day to help Californians eliminate the inequalities they face…using money we made from supporting inequality?”

The statement suggests that “a wave of divestments” will send a powerful message.  By looking critically at its investment portfolio, the California Endowment offers another way to support underserved communities across the state.  Furthermore, as that wave increases in velocity, and consequently Arizona businesses become increasingly vulnerable, fiduciary considerations offer an additional reason to divest.

It remains to be seen whether other foundations follow the lead of the California Endowment.

The companies that received the foundation’s letter are: PetSmart (pet supplies retailer), Grand Canyon Education Inc. (which owns the for-profit Grand Canyon University), Pinnacle West Capital Corporation (electricity and energy-related products), Republic Services Inc. (waste management and garbage collection), Avnet (electronic products and services) – all of Phoenix – and Microchip Technology (microcontroller and analog semiconductors) of Chandler.

Editor’s note: My thanks to Jeffrey Okey of the California Endowment for information about this issue.

The last question is, “Can we now expect an end to the flood of lawsuits challenging the city’s sign ban?“  And the response:

“Kim Wardlaw, the 9^th Circuit judge who authored the World Wide Rush ruling, departed from the usual legalese in her introduction to make some observations about the signage wars, including the fact that one of the earliest rulings upholding a city’s right to control and regulate billboard advertising was by the Missouri Supreme Court in 1911.  Now, 99 years later, the courts are still hearing challenges to this right.  The moral:  Never underestimate the litigious tenacity of the outdoor advertising industry.”

(Image of Skytag supergraphic on high-rise in Westwood.  Here’s a link at the Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight website to a story about this particular sign.)

“We absolutely will seek the removal of all of those signs that have no permits,” according to a deputy of City Attorney Carmen Trutanich quoted in the article.

No word yet on the ruling (which may be a temporary victory, since the City Council is poised to consider approving as many as 21 billboard districts across the city) from the activists at the Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight.

For the editorial view of LA Philanthropy Watch on the billboards cluttering our landscape, see “Ways of Seeing in a World Dedicated to Sales and Marketing.”  For additional background on CBBB, see “Vision of Nonprofit Advocates: World Without Billboard Blight.”

He was astonished – and elated – at how aggressively the new Los Angeles City Attorney, Carmen Trutanich, has pursued lawbreakers.  This represents a huge change in city policy since the departure of the previous city attorney.

“Our jaw is on the floor,” he said of the activists at CBBB. “We’re just hoping for the best.”

I asked him, based on my perusal of CBBB’s website and its links to other websites, whether the organization’s agenda wasn’t more radical than elimination of illegal billboards and supergraphics.  Wouldn’t he like to be rid of all outdoor advertising?

“Wishful thinking,” he replied, noting the reality that he is up against.  “I started this in 1972.”

That’s a long time to pursue what might be regarded as a quixotic quest.  While there have been victories here and there, the assault of outdoor advertising has been unrelenting over the past four decades.  Putting the brakes on the proliferation of billboards invading our visual landscape is a tall order.  Scaling back on the number of billboards is even more daunting.

“If you went through what I went through –” he mused, “It’s a miracle that we arrived where we are today in 2010.”

Mr. Wu mentioned a Massachusetts court ruling in the ’30s that made reference to the “molestation of drivers” by billboards cluttering the landscape.  That sensibility – which from a 21^st century perspective may seem quaint – is evident in a quotation from the mid-twentieth century by William F. Buckley, who surely recalled an era when bucolic scenes along our nation’s highways were relatively uncluttered with commercial advertising:

“As such the billboards are acts of aggression…against which the public is entitled, as a matter of privacy, to be protected. If a homeowner desires to construct a huge Coca-Cola sign facing his own homestead rather than the public highway, in order to remind him, every time he looks out his window, that the time has come to pause and be refreshed, he certainly should be left free to do so. But if he wants to face the sign toward us, that is something else…”  (“The Politics of Beauty,” Esquire, July 1966.)

The quote is featured at Scenic America, a national organization headquartered in Washington, DC, and an ally of the Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight.

Previous posts:

• Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight Sees Dawn of a New Day (on a surprising victory against illegal supergraphics)
• Nonprofit Battles Out of Control Billboards in Los Angeles (”Insider” video interview with CBBB’s president)
• Q. & A. with Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight (LA Philanthropy Watch featured interview)

(The image is a photo taken at LA Live. )

I recently offered a brief series of questions via email to CBBB’s president, Dennis Hathaway.  The questions and responses appear below:

Q. Where else [apart from the city attorney's actions] has the Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight focused its attention?

A. The fight against illegal billboards and supergraphic signs has been a major effort of ours over the past several years.  But our larger mission is to try to stop the invasion of the city’s public spaces and visual environment by commercial advertising, and that involves legal as well as illegal signage.  In 2006, the city approved a lawsuit settlement that allowed the conversion of 877 conventional billboards to digital, and when the adverse affects of these signs became clear we successfully pushed for a moratorium on those conversions, which in turn led to the adoption of a no-exceptions ban on any new off-site advertising signs in the city.  We have also lobbied against proposals for special sign districts that would allow new commercial advertising, including digital signage, in such places as the L.A. Convention Center and Koreatown, and supported revisions to the city sign ordinance that would protect citizens from an excess of outdoor advertising.

Q. Is the City Council taking any steps in the right direction?

A. While a few city council members have supported our efforts, the council as a whole has a poor record when it comes to controlling both the legal and illegal proliferation of outdoor advertising.  The 2006 lawsuit settlement mentioned previously was an unmitigated disaster for communities where the digital billboards appeared, and was invalidated late last year by a Superior Court judge.  Some city council members appear to view outdoor advertising as a potential source of revenue for the city, while others are supportive of claims by business groups and sign interests that outdoor advertising creates more jobs and economic activity.

Q. Does the Planning Commission have a role?

A. The Planning Commission has played a significant role in the past, by pushing for a moratorium on new billboards and other off-site advertising.  The commission also approved an extensive revision of the city sign ordinance that had provisions controlling the spread of outdoor advertising, and cracking down on illegal signs.  Those revisions have not yet been acted upon by the City Council, and new appointments to the planning commission appear to have tilted it more toward the view that commercial advertising is important to the encouragement of new development in the city.

Q. Is there anyone in city government who has been especially helpful – or who has taken a special interest in advancing this issue?

A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich is the one city official taking an aggressive stand on the issue.  He promised during his election campaign to go after the illegal outdoor advertisements, primarily billboards and supergraphic signs, and he has followed through on that promise by filing lawsuits and even criminal charges against property owners and sign companies that have been used to flouting the law in the past.

Q. Is there anyone, or any group, that has joined forces with Ban Billboard Blight?

A. In addition to individuals, we represent homeowner’s associations, community organizations, and civic groups.  For example, we joined forces with two homeowner’s associations to challenge the legality of permits issued for three digital billboards in the Westwood area on the grounds that they violated local zoning regulations, and the area planning commission upheld our position.  When we organized a volunteer inventory of billboards in two city council districts last year, Councilman Bill Rosendahl and now-Councilman Paul Koretz publicly endorsed our efforts and provided some help from their staffs.  We maintain close contact with other groups involved in the issue in California and other parts of the country, because most of the sign companies have a national presence and the legislative and legal challenges are similar everywhere.  We also have a close working relationship with the national group, Scenic America, which provides information and logistical support.

Q. CBBB is interested in billboard blight (not just illegal billboards).  Can you point to any communities in California or the nation that have enacted legislation that you believe represent a step in the right direction regarding visual blight?

A. There are notable examples right here in Southern California.  Cities like Santa Monica, Burbank, Culver City, and Pasadena, to name a few, do not allow any new billboards or off-site advertising signs, and vigorously enforce regulations against any illegal sign activity.  Houston, Texas, a city very similar to Los Angeles in size and diversity, put strict sign regulations in effect more than a decade ago, and now has less than half as many billboards as L.A.  Kansas City, Missouri, is currently rewriting its sign ordinance to strictly limit digital billboards and new outdoor advertising.  These cities recognize that an excess of commercial advertising in the visual environment degrades that environment, and has a negative effect on the quality of life of its citizens.

As the President has begun to campaign on behalf of health care reform, and the legislation is under threat from both the left and right flanks of Congressional Democrats, a number of progressive commentators have begun to rally ’round the reform flag.

Last Friday at TPM Café Theda Skocpol (Harvard sociologist and political scientist, whose scholarly focus has included the nonprofit and voluntary sector) called on Democrats of all stripes to get on board with health care reform while the window of opportunity to pass it is still open.

“At the risk of irritating people on the left, this is NOT the moment for ‘progressives’ to demand a public option. Nor is it the moment for either pro-choice feminists or pro-life Democrats to derail reform.”

I emphatically agree with her that there is a critical need now to turn attention to getting the job done (and that her abrasive tone will irritate).

At Mother Jones Kevin Drum links to Dr. Skocpol and suggests, “The current bill isn’t perfect, but the combination of community rating at the national level with an individual mandate is likely to be the beginning of the end for private health insurance as we know it.”

At The New Republic Jonathan Chait thinks we’re suffering from myopia about the historical nature of this legislation. He objects to Jane Hamsher on the left, John McCain on the right, and the editorial board of the Washington Post in the middle. “It’s natural to focus on improving a piece of legislation whose details remain in flux. The problem comes when the desire to improve becomes the sole focus for evaluating it. Nearly any of the great political advances in American history, viewed from ground level, looked like a pastiche of grubby compromises and half measures. At some point the imperative is to take the broader view.”  [Editor's note: typo corrected.]

At Think Progress Matt Yglesias notes that (FireDogLake aside) the left is solidly on board with reform: MoveOn.org, SEIU, AFSME, the NAACP, LLUAC, and the liberal columnists at both the New York Times and Washington Post have all endorsed passage of the legislation.

As President Obama campaigns – with an eye on wavering Members of Congress, can Speaker Pelosi round up the votes in the House?  We’ll know soon.

(Image from February rally for health care reform in front of Los Angeles offices of Anthem Blue Cross.)

Fun facts (from video):
Number of billboards in Los Angeles: 11,000
Number of billboards that are illegal: 4,000 of the 11,000 total
Annual revenue from huge billboards: $1.34 billion
Annual municipal fee: $186 per billboard

• “The level of controversy had become a significant distraction for us,” said Schur, who said members raised the idea of forming a new organization at a statewide board meeting in Oakland in October.  (“California ACORN breaks off into new nonprofit group,” Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times, January 13, 2010)

In reading this LA Times’ account of the founding of Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, I was intrigued by the reference to the October 2009 board meeting.  Roughly three months had elapsed between the meeting of the state board of ACORN and the launch of ACCE.  That is not a lot of time to reach a decision to break away, and then do everything required to get a new nonprofit up and running.

Furthermore, I would have expected thorny disagreements about severing ties with the national organization.  Wouldn’t community leaders who had been affiliated with ACORN for many years be resistant to leaving?

When I sat down to interview Amy Schur in February, I anticipated hearing that at least a faction of loyalists had opposed the proposal to split off from ACORN.

Instead, I learned that while these engaged activists had invested much of themselves in California ACORN, they reached consensus about breaking away without protracted disagreement.

Amy Schur advised me that these community leaders (all volunteers – “They don’t get a dime”) put in a huge number of hours every week – in addition to jobs and families and everything else in their lives.  Many, she told me, say that “ACORN is like their second family.”

“It was extremely painful,” she said of the decision to break away. “It took a while to get there.” But the state board, she, and other staff members all came to agree that leaving ACORN and going it alone was best.

When I asked about dissenters, she replied that there was a “united front.”

“The work on the ground,” kept the group the group focused on what was most important: serving ACORN members.

“It speaks well to the principles we’re grounded in,” she said of the unanimity about continuing the organization’s work in low- and moderate-income communities.  “It is a tribute to ACORN.”

“We never strayed from our mission.”  She suggested that Wade Rathke should get some credit for that steadfast focus.  Leaders are in neighborhoods, not in board rooms.  They remain grounded in principles important to them.

“We worked very hard to keep our organization democratic,” she continued.  “I think it helps significantly when it comes to making difficult decisions.”

As it turned out, the decentralization of ACORN – alluded to in September 2009 as a reason California ACORN offices wouldn’t close – ensured a smooth transformation of the organization into the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (much as Illinois ACORN transformed into Action Now).  Those offices (now ACCE offices) stayed open, of course.

Democratic decision-making and autonomy at the chapter level, plus an unwavering focus on neighborhoods, made the break from ACORN – and birth of ACCE – possible.

Next post: ACCE’s Challenges and Its Prospects for Success

(The image is a photograph taken in a small community in San Luis Obispo County by ghindo via Flickr.)

Previous posts in this series (after an interview with Amy Schur):

• Third post: California ACORN’s Choice: Stay with ACORN or Go It Alone
• Second post: Simmering Dissent Within ACORN Preceded Break Up
• First post: The Birth of ACCE: First Post in a New Series

On September 19, 2009 – just over a week after the first of the undercover videos had been released – P.J. Huffstutter and Kate Linthicum reported in the Los Angeles Times (“ACORN scaling back or shutting down in many cities”) that ACORN offices across the country had been shut down; cities without an ACORN presence – where there had been one before – included Chicago, Salt Lake City, Atlanta, and Omaha.

There was no ACORN office in Chicago because Illinois ACORN had broken away from the national organization nearly two years earlier and been transformed into Action Now.  Madeline Talbott, the leader who had initiated this transformation, offered an above the fray perspective on the continuing turmoil roiling ACORN.  While empathizing with ACORN’s leaders (her former colleagues), she expressed a sigh of relief at not being stuck in the mess that ACORN was still mired in.

“I’m so relieved not to be part of the organization anymore, and so sad because they are trying to clean things up.”

At that point California ACORN showed no signs – at least publicly – of bolting from the national organization.  Amy Schur (lead organizer of California ACORN at that time; now executive director of ACCE) expressed confidence that California ACORN’s 12 offices would remain open, remarking for the Times’ report that membership had increased and funding was stable.

Membership and funding were closely linked for ACORN because, as Ms. Schur explained to me when we spoke on February 2, individual membership fees were a primary source of funding.  Active members of California ACORN, including all community leaders serving on city and state boards, paid dues of $10 a month.  Many members, she told me, had their dues deducted automatically.  So this was a reliable source of operating revenue.  (And much more significant than the federal dollars that Congress cut off following the hidden camera controversy; she advised me that in 2008 only 7% of California ACORN’s funding – money for foreclosure prevention – was from the federal government, while the figure for ACORN nationally was roughly 10%.)

During our interview, she noted that at ACORN (a national organization with state chapters) some functions were centralized, while others were left to the states.  She described this division as “an interesting mix,” while noting, “There was tremendous autonomy around program,” for the states.  Each chapter’s elected community leaders set the direction of the organization and its activities.  Every city with an active ACORN chapter had a board; representatives of each board sat on a state board.

In speaking with the Times in September, she had pointed to this decentralized structure as ensuring that turmoil for ACORN in one part of the country would not inevitably lead to trouble elsewhere.

“Our organization is under attack,” she was quoted in the Times’ September 19 report.  “But we’re going to come out of this just fine.”

Whether or not Amy Schur and California ACORN activists had already begun to consider breaking away at that point – they might have noted wistfully that their former colleagues from Chicago were no longer weighted down with ACORN baggage.

This was, in any case, only nine days after release of the first surreptitiously filmed video. By the time of ACORN’s October 2009 state board meeting – as the repercussions from that episode continued to play out – the situation had become “a huge distraction,” Amy Schur told me.  She also mentioned the national organization’s financial crisis and the “brand damage” ACORN had suffered.

Whatever reasons there might have been to stay, the reasons for breaking away had grown more compelling.

Next post: California ACORN Was Unified in Deciding to Break Away

Previous posts in this series (after an interview with Amy Schur):

• Second post: Simmering Dissent Within ACORN Preceded Break Up
• First post: The Birth of ACCE: First Post in a New Series

“As is often the case at nonprofit groups, one act of a wrongdoing can be a symptom of other problems at an organization.
Acorn has been grappling with questions about the role of Wade Rathke, an exceptionally able and charismatic organizer who founded the charity in 1970 and recruited a talented cadre of young and loyal organizers, many of whom, along with Mr. Rathke, have worked for the organization throughout its entire history. That loyalty is impressive — but it also caused big problems when the organization faced serious challenges.”  (Pablo Eisenberg, “After an Embezzlement, an Advocacy Group Seeks to Regain Trust,” Chronicle of Philanthropy, October 2, 2008 [Subscription required])

When I spoke with Amy Schur, I learned that what Pablo Eisenberg referred to as ACORN’s “grappling with questions” about Mr. Rathke’s role actually began a number of years before May 2008, when the first controversy broke into public view.  Ms. Schur, who has spent more than two decades working for ACORN, was for several years one of ten senior organizers on the Management Council (a group that Mr. Rathke established to advise him).

The portrait of Wade Rathke that emerged from our conversation is consistent with other accounts, such as Mr. Eisenberg’s.  While Mr. Rathke was a talented organizer with the vision to build a powerful national organization, he was arrogant and “increasingly” (a word Ms. Schur used repeatedly in discussing Mr. Rathke’s flaws) he embraced with unshakable certainty “a belief that he knew best” – whatever the situation.  Unilateral decisions – without regard for the views of others, including the experienced organizers who comprised ACORN’s Management Council – became more frequent.

By 2006-07, there was “growing unhappiness among a broad swath of senior staff” at ACORN.  Concerns focused on a “shrinking of decision-making” – with a Management Council that lacked authority – and on “a lack of clarity and transparency,” especially regarding finances.

Amy Schur and others within ACORN organized their own conference in San Francisco to discuss their concerns.  Seventeen senior staff members from across the country attended.  Mr. Rathke was apparently not pleased.  Ms. Schur describes him as coming to regard her as “a threat.”

“He accused me –” Amy Schur begins in answer to a question, and then she stops abruptly and begins again.  “I’ve always had a problem with people who abuse their authority.”  She continues, “For whatever reasons, I didn’t hesitate to speak out.”

Pablo Eisenberg picks up the story here: “Questions about who should set the organization’s agenda were not limited just to the role of organizers and the board. Wade Rathke sought to put the national organization in control of operations of the group’s affiliates. For example, the organization’s bylaws gave him the power to appoint the head organizers of both local and state affiliates.
While local boards technically had the authority to overrule his appointments, they rarely did, according to senior staff members. They say Mr. Rathke refused to accept the decision of the board of Acorn’s Los Angeles affiliate to appoint Amy Schur, widely considered by Acorn insiders as one of the organization’s most capable organizers, as its head organizer. As a result, Ms. Schur left the network. Her departure prompted another highly respected organizer, Madeline Talbott, director of Illinois Acorn, to pull her organization out of the network.”

Amy Schur had devoted 21 years of her life to ACORN – stretching from Chicago and Detroit to San Jose and Los Angeles.  She led California ACORN during an era when its presence grew from two cities to the whole state.  She had also served as ACORN’s national campaign director.  At the end of 2007 she left ACORN or, more precisely, as she told me, “I was pushed out.”

In relating her experience with ACORN, Amy Schur mentioned her work in Chicago with well-known community organizer Madeline Talbott.  (I gathered, though this inference may be mistaken – my notes do not confirm my recollection – that Ms. Schur may have regarded Ms. Talbott as a mentor.)  Ms. Schur’s comment, made in passing, suggested that Madeline Talbott was an exceptional organizer.

At any rate, I suggest that Madeline Talbott may have served as role model more recently.  In press reports this week, New York ACORN is characterized as following California ACORN’s lead in breaking away from the national organization to go it alone.  (”ACORN’s powerful New York chapter left to form the NY Communities for Change on Monday, following the lead of the California state chapter, which in January became the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment with 48,000 members.” – Matthew Bigg, Reuters, February 22, 2009) But (as Pablo Eisenberg’s comments suggest) Madeline Talbott was the trailblazer.  The former head of Illinois ACORN, she split off the chapter (”ACORN scaling back or shutting down in many cities, ” P.J. Huffstutter and Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times, September 19, 2009) to found Action Now at the beginning of 2008.  California ACORN followed (under different circumstances) – with the launch of ACCE – two years later.

Editor’s note: Madeline Talbott also has the distinction of being featured in “ACORN,” a scary McCain-Palin campaign video.  “Obama … moved to Chicago, became a community organizer … met Madeline Talbott, part of the Chicago branch of ACORN … was asked to train the ACORN staff …”

Next post: California ACORN’s Choice: Stay with ACORN or Go It Alone

(Image of Action Now protesters in front of Chicago’s National City Bank.)

Previous post in this series: The Birth of ACCE: First Post in a New Series