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I read in the May 22 Times that Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa will fight to obtain funding from the state for a Valley secession feasibility study (“Showdown Looms Over Study Tab”).
I am anti-secession, and I feel that a study is premature and potentially very costly. Valley VOTE [Voters Organized Toward Empowerment] should be specific and announce to the public now just how they plan to replace or improve all existing services that the Valley now receives from Los Angeles. Valley VOTE’s generality about “we don’t get our fair share” is meaningless. I request accurate, current statistics. “Local control” is meaningless. Specifically, how will the Valley be an appreciably better place to live and how will it affect us financially?
If Valley VOTE doesn’t know how they’re going to make a new city, they shouldn’t be pushing it. The Legislature wisely required a feasibility study. However, who will conduct the study? Will it be objective and accurate? The Times said the study would have to prove that the rest of the city would not be hurt economically. Shouldn’t it also require that the Valley not be hurt economically?
Valley secession “fever” is not entertaining like “Saturday Night Fever.” I request facts, not fever.
PATRICIA ALCORN, Studio City
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