Who lurks in the shadows of the DWP?

It’s not just H. David Nahai anymore.

At LA Observed, which I read at least a couple of times daily, Kevin mentions Ron Kaye’s blog, RonKayeaLA.com. (Ron is the former editor of Daily News.) This is generous of him, because Ron totally disses Kevin for a suck-up bio on H. David Nahai that Kevin wrote for the July Los Angeles Magazine. Now, I like Kevin a whole lot, but I have to agree with Ron on this – this is definitely not a well-balanced article. (Maybe because most city magazines are rah-rah?) One point of Kevin’s story reads:

His pro-environment ethic, [Nahai says], “came to me as a result of a lot of reading.” [clip]

For Nahai, turning the agency into one of the environmental good guys is the fun part.

I’m glad he’s having fun. But 6 million plastic balls from new HDPE tossed into Ivanhoe and Elysian Reservoirs, HDPE which is only recycled 15% in this country, because it is so expensive to recycle, is called environmentally good?? How the dwp handled the bromate problem was lazy science; they dunked their own beakers in the water, tested them, and then gave up and ordered tons of plastic. Ugh.

Crow eyes Ivanhoe before the black balls of doom ruin it.

I think Ron is a better writer than I! He is clear and cogent. He writes about Kevin’s article:

…amazingly, the name of the man who actually runs the DWP, Brian D’Arcy, never appears.

D’Arcy is the head of the DWP union, the IBEW, and 95 percent of the utility’s workers take their orders from him, including most of the managers — a source of political cash and campaign workers that he uses ruthlessly to further his members’ interests and buy obedience from those who he helps get elected.

That’s why DWP salaries are so outlandish and rise 5 or 6 percent a year and why little happens at the utility without his approval.

That is especially true of the appointment of Nahai — a man without any experience as a manager or expertise in the field — to the $310,000 a year post. He’s pals with the boss, D’Arcy.

Brian, are you the guy behind the untested bird balls? This may still be Oz, but you are not the wizard I expected to see. Game on.