Last Saturday morning, residents of the Miracle Mile gathered for their 32nd Annual Meeting. CD 4 Council member David Ryu addressed the Miracle Mile Residential Association (MMRA) in a packed auditorium at the Korean Cultural Center on Wilshire Blvd.
“I have been in office now for 130 days,” said Ryu, happy to have the opportunity to check in with neighbors and report his progress on “delivering on the commitments made in the campaign to change the dialogue with City Hall. I will consult with you. I was elected by you. It is my honor and privilege to service you and I promise to be a strong advocate for the neighborhoods.”
Ryu invited neighbors to visit him every Thursday at his district office.  He suggested making an appointment and encouraged everyone to visit his new website and to help him prioritize needs in the neighborhood.  After his remarks, Ryu stayed for an hour taking questions from the audience about traffic, sidewalk repairs, coyotes, potential noise pollution from anticipated construction of the Academy for Motion Pictures museum at Wilshire and Fairfax, and various ways to reduce speeding on residential streets, with assistance from Miracle Mile Residential Association (MMRA) President Jim O’Sullivan.
The impending closure of Wilshire Blvd. for Metro Purple Line Construction was also discussed at length. According to O’Sullivan, MMRA has already voted to oppose Metro’s seven-week closure plan for a variety of reasons including the potential impact on local schools and traffic going through nearby neighborhoods. But most irksome to O’Sullivan is Metro’s failure to provide a traffic mitigation plan for the 7 week closure option (as opposed to a 22-weekend closure plan, which was studied and approved earlier in the planning process).
Ryu said he had taken this issue to the top levels of Metro and was not satisfied with their response. He urged residents to complete his survey and attend the next meeting with Metro to discuss the two closure options that will be held at John Burroughs Middle School this Thursday at 5:30 pm.
Wilshire Division Neighborhood Prosecutor Mehrnoosh “Nooshi” Zahiri followed Ryu on Saturday’s agenda. Ms. Zahiri replaced Capri Maddox, who held the position until last year. She is part of the City Attorney’s office embedded in LAPD’s Wilshire Division to coordinate with local law enforcement and prosecute quality of life cases like property owners failing to keep up their property, violating fire and safety codes.
Scott Epstein, chair of the Mid City West Community Council and a volunteer with the Midtown Los Angeles Homeless Coalition, reported on that group’s efforts to connect homeless in the neighborhood with housing, by training volunteers to speak to homeless people about services that might be available. In the last 100 days, Epstein said his group has assessed 90 people, placed 3 people in housing and helped 25 people to gather the documentation they need to start the housing placement process. Volunteer training is conducted every second Saturday of the month.
A representative of Tree People closed out the meeting with a presentation on combatting stress in trees due to the continuing drought.
A video of the entire meeting is available on the MMRA website at http://miraclemilela.com/
