Full Disclosure Network®
DATE:
June 3, 2004
CONTACT: TJJohnston@FullDisclosure.net or
310-822-4449
LAUSD BELMONT STRATEGY: “KNOCK DOWN BARRIERS”
Los
Angeles, CA—David Cartwright, Senior Partner with the politically powerful
law firm of O’Melveny & Myers was a major force in planning strategy
for the Belmont Learning Center development as the "Chief outside real
estate counsel" to the Los Angeles Unified School District. In part one
of a two-part interview on the Emmy Award winning Full Disclosure Network® public affairs
cable television program. Mr. Cartwright describes his role as being a "part
of a project team that was specifically created to start knocking down the
barriers to school construction." He further emphasized, "And when
I say 'knocking down,' I'm very serious about that. It was not to get around
them or to go under them. It was to KNOCK THEM DOWN..."
The Cartwright interview will be featured on 40 cable systems throughout California and is set to air world-wide on the Internet 24 hours a day, 7 days a week starting on Thursday, June 3, 2004 on the STREAMING PAGE at http://www.fulldisclosure.net/StreamingMedia.htm. For the first 30 days the program will be provided to viewers FREE as a public service and thereafter available online in the program catalog.
In fact, Cartwright says they wrote new state legislation known as the Joint Ventures Act, which allowed for combining private and retail developments with public school construction projects. Critics and prosecutors have blamed the Joint Ventures method of financing school construction for contributing to the $175 million fraud known as Belmont.
Full Disclosure Network® host Leslie Dutton has been conducting a series of interviews entitled “BELMONT: The World's Most Expensive High School". Costs to date for the development are $175 million, which was financed in 1997 with non-voter approved, tax-exempt bonds known as Certificates of Participation (COPs). The Los Angeles Unified School Board has already approved an additional $110 million for remediation of environment hazards on the Belmont campus, which was built on top of one thousand closed oil wells and is plagued with methane gas and other toxic substances. The LAUSD Facilities and Safety committees are holding hearings on Belmont in preparation to complete the controversial development. .
You can view this program
and other Belmont programs our website at www.fulldisclosure.net via media
streaming media. A cable channel guide with airtimes is available on the website.