This Week's Parade Of Boondoggles May Make You Upchuck

When will I learn to stop looking at City contracts? In a bygone era, I'd be pillar of salt.

Let's start this week's boondoggle parade review with a "mere" $5,000 waste of YOUR money by Villaraigosa and the Spring Street Gang. They gave 5k of your hard-earned money to a "non-profit" called "Outpost for Contemporary Art:"

To support the residency of Brazilian composer and theater director Octavio Camargo. During his residency Camargo will conduct workshops with local spoken word artists, storytellers, songwriters and poets to develop a performance based on the "living memories" of the Los Angeles community - term of contract from August 1, 2010 through June 30, 2011 - total amount $5,000

Visit the City's contracts page to see for yourself:  click here.

You know what's fun to do when you come across these "non-profits?" Look up their IRS Form 990's. Here's the website for that:  Form 990's.

I looked at the most recent available Form 990 for Outpost for Contemporary Art, and you know what I found on page 14? They spent nearly $20,000 on "consulting fees."

This illustrates why you should never assume that "non-profit" means "non-profit." Anyone can set up a "non-profit" to qualify for grants, charitable contributions, etc., and the people running the "non-profit" can then turn around and use that money to hire themselves, their other companies, their friends or whoever as for-profit enterprises. 

Hey, Mr. Mayor, I'm writing a book. How about you give me $5,000 while I interview people? Better yet, I'll set up a "non-profit" called "Personas para los Autores," and then give myself a grant.

Anyway, this wasn't by any means the only boondoggle last week.  A few others include:

• $10,000 to Jose Antonion Aguirre "to support Mr. Aguirre's participation in a conference on public art at the Universidad de Guadalajara (UdeG) which will include development of a new public art piece in commeration of Mexico's Bicentennial, which will be done in collaboration with UdeG community - term of contract from August 1, 2010 through June 30, 2011."
• $9,000 to Sara Wookey dba Wookey Works Studio "to support the development of Performing the City, a collaboration between Wookey and Amsterdam-based visual artist Katrin Korfmann that explores the ways in which urban spaces direct human behavior - term of contract from August 1, 2010 through June 30, 2011."
• $17,000 to A. Anne Focke "to provide editorial services and the DCA Master Plan and conduct research on alternative models for structuring departments of cultural affairs - term of contract from January 15, 2010 through September 30, 2010."
• $273,877 to the Mexican American Opportunity Foundation "to provide Spanish multi-lingual information and referral services (seniors and caregivers) to mainly Spanish speaking seniors 60 and over - term of contract from July 1, 2010 through June 30, 2011."

The list, by the way, goes on and on and on.  I'm stopping here because this is all I can bear. I'm starting to feel a little salty.