Managing Editor
Integrating the three primary concerns of his first State of the City address— education, economic development and environmental issues— Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia’s principal call to action Tuesday night was for local employers to offer internships to the students of the city. The 28th mayor of Long Beach reminded those in attendance that, upon taking office six months ago, he had pledged to double the number of internships available to Long Beach students during his first term. At Tuesday’s address, he announced that the City is “well on our way to achieving this goal.”
He credited the Pacific Gateway Workforce Investment Network, the City’s “one-stop career and business-development center,” for its contribution to that goal, as well as the commitments of several other organizations.
“[Pacific Gateway] have made a commitment to double the number of paid internships from 400 to 800 just this year,” Garcia said. “The City and the Port have also pledged to double their internships for students this year. And our educational institutions— Cal State Long Beach, Long Beach City College and Long Beach Unified— are also working to expand opportunities for student internships. Now we need your help. Tonight, I’m issuing a call to every employer in greater Long Beach to partner with us, to support us, and, most importantly, to support our students by providing internships.”
The mayor encouraged employers to sign up for the internship initiative at HireLB.com .
He then cited a local young woman as an example of how internships can facilitate an effective career path for youth in the area. Cabrillo High School student Brenda Martinez worked with Pacific Gateway to acquire a paid internship at a Bixby Knolls law firm. Now a senior at Cabrillo, Martinez plans to attend Drexel University to study to become a patent attorney.
“She’s grown more confident, she’s developed her career goals and built important relationships,” Garcia said. “And Brenda attributes her success, in large part, to her internship.”
Economic development
Garcia’s speech first concentrated on the successes and progress the City has achieved of late.
“I am pleased to report that the state of our city is strong and is getting stronger,” he said. “As we enter the 15th year of this new century, Long Beach is poised to live up to its full potential as a great international city. We will create a Long Beach of the future. Long Beach will take its rightful place as a leading city in the U.S. and around the world. And, while we have a lot of work to do, which I’ll talk about tonight, it’s important that we recognize what we’ve already accomplished.”
Indicating that the city has “come incredibly far” in the last decade, Garcia first pointed out that Long Beach is safer than it has been in two generations, with violent crime down to its lowest level in almost 40 years. He then asked the audience to give a round of applause to the police and fire departments, as well as their respective chiefs, Robert Luna and Mike Duree.
The mayor then recalled the global economic crash of 2008 and the consequential major budget cuts in the city.
“We cut more than 700 positions and trimmed our budget by $134 million,” he said. “Today, Long Beach is in a better place, having balanced our revenues and our expenditures and implemented pension reform, which will save $250 million over the next 10 years. We’ve also established a pension stabilization fund, which has $8.5 million in funds set aside and will continue to grow.”
He characterized the pension challenge as being “far from over” but stated that, thanks to the “hard work and tough choices” of his predecessor, Bob Foster, and previous city council members, the City is in a position to meet the challenge.
“We’ve also seen positive trends in development,” Garcia said. “In the past decade, we’ve built almost 2,000 residential units downtown, including affordable housing for seniors, and more than 500 additional units throughout the city. And we’ve seen more than 2-million square feet of retail and restaurant space either modernized or fully built. This is amazing. Average household income in Long Beach has jumped 33 percent citywide and, in downtown, it has jumped 75 percent since 2000.”
He also said that unemployment, after peaking at 14.6 percent in July of 2010, has shrunk to 8.8 percent and is continuing to decrease each week.
“Our airport provides direct employment to more than 11,000 jobs, and a regional impact of that airport is more than $8 billion. That’s our Long Beach Airport,” he said. “And the Port of Long Beach continues to drive economic growth, with a 3-percent increase in trade for 2014, supporting $180 billion of economic activity and more than 300,000 jobs throughout the region.”
Additionally, he celebrated the sustainable city plan that was adoped in 2010 and the “great progress” achieved in its goals. In the last 15 years, the City has built 37 new parks, increasing park space by 225 acres citywide, including more than 45 acres west of Long Beach Boulevard, Garcia said. More than 2,000 solar panels have been installed around the city and 4,000-plus trees have been planted, he stated in his speech. He also said the beaches have consistently earned A and B ratings from Heal the Bay and the improvements have won the City recognition for having the most improved beaches in the state.
Despite these improvements, significant challenges remain, the mayor said. Looming pension liabilities will strain the City’s budget in the coming years unless action is taken now. He said the City is currently in negotiations with its largest public-employee union and will soon enter negotiations with all of its employee groups.
“Now, I am committed to fair agreements with our employees, but they must be fiscally responsible contracts,” Garcia said. “The days of overspending in Long Beach are over.”
Congestion and escalating tensions from prolonged negotiations between the Pacific Maritime Association and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union pose real risks unless resolved quickly, he said. “I am confident the management team and the Harbor Commission are addressing the systematic challenges that contributed to this congestion,” Garcia said. “And I urge both sides to work with the newly assigned federal mediator to reach an agreement that protects the jobs and goods that flow through our Port.”
The recent drop in oil prices presents immediate challenges to the City’s capital-improvement budget and operating revenues in coming years, Garcia said. However, because the City has been budgeting conservatively in its price estimates, there is time to develop a plan for the future, according to the mayor. He referred to the plan as “critical” since the city is almost 120 years old and has an aging infrastructure.
In his his State of the City address Tuesday night, Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia focused primarily on education, economic development and sustainability for the new year.
The three critical areas he believes the City should focus on are: driving economic growth and development through innovation; expanding educational opportunities for everyone; and creating a “21st Century city” through sustainability, technology and civic engagement.
Education
Garcia has identified education as the top priority of his mayoral tenure.
“I continue to believe the number-one tool to support economic development is education,” he said. “That’s why I’ve made education my top priority as mayor. Now, the city is blessed with three of the best public education institutions in the country: the Long Beach Unified School District, Long Beach City College and Cal State Long Beach. Long Beach Unified is clearly one of the best urban school districts in the entire U.S., having won the Broad Prize once and being named a finalist four times. Long Beach City College is consistently recognized as one of the best community colleges in the nation for programs like the Promise Pathways, which is closing achievement gaps so every student can succeed. And Cal State Long Beach is ranked one of the best universities in the west by The Princeton Review and U.S. News and World Report. And it right now ranks the fifth in the country for the number of undergrad applications and the first of all 23 CSU campuses.”
He said that, while each institution is impressive on its own, the three are even more effective as partners, and the Long Beach College Promise is a great example. Last month, all three institutions were invited to a White House Completion Summit which highlighted the College Promise partnership as a national model. The accomplishments, to date, include: a nearly 50-percent increase in direct enrollment to Cal State Long Beach by Long Beach Unified School District students; more than 4,000 College Promise scholarships given to local graduates who enrolled at Long Beach City College; and increased degree completions and reduced remediation for students across all ethnic groups.
Garcia said he is proud the City has become a full partner in the College Promise, joining the school district, college and university in ensuring that local students have a clear path to success. He said, as part of the White House Commitment to College Opportunity, the College Promise has committed to achieving the following goals by 2025: increasing graduation rates by an additional 10 percent; graduating more than 4,000 additional students with bachelor’s degrees; and increasing college success for students and access for underrepresented students. The mayor said these goals will ensure a well prepared local workforce.
Last October, the Long Beach College Promise was extended to include expansion of pre-school and early-childhood education, which Garcia called a logical extension of the initiative since research shows that a high-quality early education means more high school graduates and college success later on. He said that, in other cities, like Seattle and San Antonio, high-quality pre-school has led to long-term reductions in costly areas like crime, social services and health care.
To those aims, Garcia announced the development of an Educare Center, which will be a year-round, early-childhood education facility—the first of its kind in Southern California— built on the campus of Barton Elementary School.
“I will partner with Superintendent [Christopher] Steinhauser and Long Beach Unified School Board Member Megan Kerr and the rest of the board to raise the additional funds needed to bring this spectacular new pre-school to Long Beach,” Garcia said. “This new pre-school and early-childhood education center will provide high-quality, year-round early education to all children throughout north Long Beach. In addition, we are working with members of the Early Childhood Education Committee to expand access and participation throughout Long Beach so that every student who enrolls in kindergarten is ready for success.”
Sustainability
The mayor stressed that the collaborative approach used in the economy and education should also guide Long Beach in ensuring growth and development to create a sustainable and livable city. He said the city faces what President Barack Obama has called the defining challenge of our generation— climate change. He stated emphatically that climate change is indeed real and it is already here. We can mitigate it and slow it down, but, the reality is, we must adapt to a changing climate, he said. That adaptation means changing the way we produce and use energy, supporting transportation that is not reliant on fossil fuels, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, creating additional green space and looking at every way we can reduce our carbon footprint.
“We’ve already begun, but we have much, much more work to do,” Garcia said. “That’s why I’m calling on our City Council tonight to review the progress of our Sustainable City Action Plan and to update its goals. And I also want to announce tonight that I have a great commitment from the Aquarium of the Pacific, which, we all know, their programs are world-renowned, to work with top scientific experts and develop a Climate Change Action Plan to present it to the City Council.”
The Port will also continue to provide leadership in adapting to climate change, he said. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Green Port Policy. Since 2005, diesel pollution from ships, trucks and trains has been reduced by 82 percent even as cargo activity has increased, and the Port has invested $200 million in electric power for ships and more than $17 million in community grants.
As the City adapts to a changing climate, the mayor said, one of the most vital efforts is water conservation. With the leadership of the Water Department, the City has cut water use significantly— using the same amount of water today that was used in 1958, when the population was considerably smaller. But it’s important to remember the drought continues, and even with the recent rains, we must conserve, Garcia said. He implored everyone to continue thinking about every drop of water they use and to keep water conservation in mind every day.
He said he is also committed to expanding green space in the city, especially in the areas that are lacking. The State water bond, which passed in November, includes $30 million for the River and Mountains Conservancy that will help restore the lower L.A. River. Garcia has been in talks with Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti about ways the two cities can work together to make the L.A. River a place for residents and visitors to enjoy. Several projects along the river are beginning a transformation, such as the Deforest Wetlands, Wrigley Greenbelt, and the Drake and Chavez Park expansions. These projects will add acres of green space and create a natural barrier between the 710 Freeway and neighborhoods, Garcia said.
“We must also continue to explore options for the breakwater,” he said. “I’ve long advocated we study the reconfiguration of the breakwater, not just as a means of keeping our beaches and water clean, but for economic development along our shore. And I’m committed to ensuring that any possible change in the breakwater leaves our coastal homes, our properties and our port completely protected. We must complete the study to finally have answers on what we can or may not be able to do. Completing this study will be high on my agenda when I travel to Washington DC and meet with our congressional delegation and the rest of Congress in the next couple of weeks.”
The City will also continue to expand the use of solar power. In December, the City entered into an agreement to place solar generators at four more sites around Long Beach, and it will continue conversions to LED lighting for street lights, which, Garcia said, are not only more attractive and more sustainable but also save money.
The mayor also commended the City’s bicycle infrastructure for winning national acclaim, which is one reason Long Beach will host its own version of the L.A. bicycling event Ciclavia— called Beachstreets— for the first time. The event will take place this year in Bixby Knolls and north Long Beach.
Garcia also announced that he has asked the Environmental Committee of the City Council to explore ways to strengthen the Urban Agriculture Ordinance. He said that not only does urban agriculture provide healthy food for residents and combat blight, it reduces one’s carbon footprint by adding additional green space to the local urban environment.
“See, the Long Beach of the future will be sustainable and livable, but it will also have a high level of civic engagement,” he said. “It will use technology to support openness, efficiency and accountability.” ÂÂÂÂ
