Richard Leib read his careful remarks in favor of Palms quietly and with determination. On the other side, Charles West, a past president of the homeowners' group, gently explained how much time and effort he and other Villagers had put in to help form the Mar Vista Community Council.

Another good sign: The directors of the Civic Assn. distributed a flyer stating that the Village could switch from Mar Vista to Palms "if the neighborhood residents approve the change after being presented with all the facts."

That is exactly what the Palms proponents have been saying all along. In fact, they've called on the city's Human Relations Commission to help set up just such a method to present "all the facts."

And from what we've heard, the leaders of the Westside Village Civic Assn. will be getting together with the folks who call themselves S-U-P-E-R supporters some time in April to lay the groundwork for what promises to be a long-sought exercise in grass-roots democracy. Everybody in West Los Angeles, we think, will applaud this move toward settling the boundary controversy.

So now the effort should be on marshalling the facts — on each side — and presenting them to the stakeholders of the area which is known as Zone 1 to the Mar Vista Civic Assn. and as Northwest Palms to the S-U-P-E-R supporters.

It's time to stop the name-calling and begin to cooperate in moving forward in this great experiment in civic democracy that began with the adoption of our new City Charter back in 1999.

Dear Greg:

Thank you for your letter. It contains a misinterpretation of the BONC's reaction to our petitions and a misinterpretation of the position of the petitioners (which now total more than 260).

First, you state that the BONC "did not agree" with our petitioners' request that the Administrative Code be changed to permit "one part of a Neighborhood Council to 'break away' and join an adjacent Neighborhood Council without both sides agreeing."

Actually, the Board has never taken a vote one way or the other. You might just as well have said that the Board "did not DISagree."

Second, the petitions themselves do not ask for a change in the Administrative Code. They ask the Board to take "whatever steps are necessary" to allow Palms and Westside Village to merge into a joint council. Those steps might range from outright partial decertification of MVCC (very unlikely) on the basis of misrepresentation (which is the simple truth)  to DONE's fostering of a mediation and conciliation process, perhaps through the Human Relations Commission (more likely but one that has never been recommended or even considered by you or the commissioners).

Because you stated a few months ago in your memo to BONC that there was "no provision in the laws" for Westside Villagers to bring about a change, I simply presented a draft ordinance at the September meeting that would provide those provisions -- a way for BONC to rule on whether S-U-P-E-R's petitions have merit or not. The ordinance proposal was not part of the petitions.

At the September 2005 meeting, Mar Vista President Tom Ponton  made the following statement:

"You know, if the stakeholders of Westside Village area . . . came to us and asked for a change, we would certainly want to dig into that deeper, agendize it, maybe come up with some sort of plan to survey the area more, but that really hasn't been an issue with anyone except Mr. Garrigues and" Mr. Leib.

This is an insulting proposition. Not only does it demean the hundreds of adult Villagers (and possibly three or four teenagers) who signed our petitions, but it ignores the very fact that a stakeholders' vote of the entire MVCC area in May 2005 favored the merger of Westside Village with Palms instead of Mar Vista. The vote was 124 yes to 115 no. Does this sound like it "hasn't been an issue"? 

Anyway, I thank you for your suggestions about the 912 Commission and the referral to the other neighborhood councils. 

We shall see what we will do about that, in addition to bringing the matter directly to the Mayor and the City Council, as we have done.

In the meantime, we sincerely hope that the BONC will take an active interest in finding out just how this contretemps was allowed to develop in the first place. It certainly wasn't S-U-P-E-R that brought it about.

This e-mail was sent by Greg Nelson on Feb. 26, 2006

The BONC could not have taken vote on 9-20-05. It wasn't an action item. They was no proposal from staff to be acted upon. It was put on the agenda so that you could have an opportunity to convince the BONC to take enough interest in your suggestion to put it on a future agenda. You were not successful in that attempt.

There has been no proposal from any commissioner to put your suggestion on the agenda and vote it up or down. It's kind of like the Supreme Court not being convinced to consider a case. Beyond that we're splitting hairs over which terms we use to describe BONC's action or lack of it. If you believe that BONC really supports your idea, but just hasn't gotten around to putting it on the agenda, then your work should be easy.

There is no such thing, formally, as a joint council, and no provision in our laws for such a thing.

A decertification must be initiated by me. The BONC cannot do that. So I need to be convinced that I should propose decertification.  What I must see is a violation of the laws the govern us, and my exhaustive efforts to remedy this gross violation(s) must have failed.

This e-mail was sent by George Garrigues on March 5, 2006

I agree that it is complicated; that's why I have called in the Human Relations Commission: To help sort out some of these problems and reach a consensus as to the way to proceed that will fit in with both the law and the desires of ALL the residents of Northwest Palms (Westside Village), not just a handful of homeowners.

If DONE wants to send a representative to the mediation meeting now being organized, that would be just fine.

We don't have to create a new council. The council has already been created: It is now called the Palms Neighborhood Council. It would have to change its name (if that is what is decided in the mediation process) and expand its territory to include Westside Village.

Mar Vista Community Council would have to redraw its boundaries and change its bylaws as well.

Both would have to petition the board, which would make a final decision.

If East and West Germany could figure out a legal way to unite, and if Czechoslovakia could figure out a legal way to separate, certainly wise minds in Los Angeles could figure out a legal way of handling the Westside Village matter to everybody's satisfaction.

This e-mail was sent by Greg Nelson on March 5, 2006

East and West Germany united, and the Czechs separated because there was a desire to do so. That's why I urge you to expand your efforts beyond Westside Village because what you're talking about will require a citywide law.