Neon Tommy sat down with former City Councilwoman Jan Perry in her new, Downtown L.A. office. Before taking her new position, as Interim General Manager of the Department of Economic and Workforce Development, Perry represented the 9th Council District, which includes the University of Southern California, on the Los Angeles City Council.

Mayor Garcetti appointed Perry - a mayoral primary election opponent - to her new position. Perry said she plans to be in the position on July 1.

What did you not have the opportunity to complete in the 9th District?

I completed every project that I started. And I planned it that way because I knew we had term limits and so in my strategic planning I started projects that I knew that I would be able to finish within the time frame that I was given.

What projects - given that you knew you had term limits - did you not set into your time frame that you wanted to complete?

Oh, there's so much more I could have done without term limits - build more wetlands, develop a park system that was connected, a green corridor in South Los Angeles, build more mixed use, mixed income opportunities in South L.A. Things like that, but, again, term limits. It takes about five years from door to door to start any project.

What do you believe you did to make community members enthusiastic about the 9th District and the fact you were their Councilwoman?

I spent an enormous amount of time building relationships with people and even though I am out of office, I still socialize with folks in the community. If somebody calls me from the 9th and they want me to just come over and spend time with them and their family, nine times out of 10 I'll do it because I enjoy doing it. I love the folks very much and miss them very much. I miss our team. I miss the constituents. And I miss being a part of their lives.

Most of the community members my colleagues and I spoke with did not know Curren Price was their Councilman. Do you feel that you spent a good amount of time in the District and made yourself visible?

Well, it wasn't about the visibility. For me, the reason that I ran for office in the first place is because I had a curiosity and a genuine love for people. Otherwise, I would not have pursued this as a career option. But, I actually enjoy sitting down and talking to people and hearing what they have to say and trying to work with them to solve their problems and their issues, so for me, it's not a job, it's a calling for me.

What does being the Interim General Manager of the Department of Economic and Workforce Development for the City of Los Angeles entail?

Well, we do a number of things here. We administer the 18 work source centers across the city to take people who are disadvantaged or out of work and help them find positions. Projects come into our department and we also administer federal programs - federal grant programs, federal loan programs - and when a project has public money invested in it we create an agreement, an understanding, that the developer would be required to hire people either from the immediate area, geographic community or a targeted demographic, like veterans or formerly homeless people or young people between the ages of 16 and 24. Again, our focus is to build projects to bring in new business, retain businesses here and help them grow, expand and get technical assistance, but the deliverable at the end of this process is to put people back to work.

What are you going to do to spur job training and job development, specifically in South Los Angeles?

Well, what we are doing is issuing a new request for proposal. It will be going out probably in the next week or so and it will be targeted or looking for groups, organizations that have the ability to bring technology to the table, prepare people from the community for those jobs of higher worth, higher wage and to prepare them for the more technology driven jobs, so they can make a better wage. We're going to make sure the outreach is extensive, so that people can participate in areas like South Los Angeles.

Is there a specific plan?

When you put out a request for a proposal (RP), it has all the elements of what you what you want in there. I can't talk too much about the RP because I haven't seen it because I'm on the appeals board, so I can only tell you this in the broadest of brush strokes because I have to make it clear that I have a fire wall between me and the RP. So, I can't talk too much about it.

How does your department work with the individual City Council members?

We have projects in here from various council districts and we interface with them, interface with them and their deputies.

Is there anything else you would like people to know about what you do or your department?

We're consolidating economic development activities under one roof. We administer funds, grants like the community development block grant; that's a federal program. It's a $270 million portfolio, loan portfolio, backed up by section 108 loan authority of about $50 million, so we have that as part of our work portfolio. We bring funding to projects. By the end of the year we will have the business improvement districts in here and the administration thereof and the FilmL.A. activities in this department and everything's focused on revenue generation. The work source centers are going to go through a transition, pursuant to this new request for proposal and I think you'll see a greater focus coming out of this department that lends itself much more to bringing the work force up to seep with the market place, so there is no gap between job readiness and job placement, as there has been in the past and in particular in those areas that are highly disadvantaged, so as people's communities continue to be left behind it gets compounded with every turn of the wheel. I think we intend to close that gap.

John Perez is going to be termed out as Speaker of the Assembly. Do you believe it will hurt the City of Los Angeles that the Speaker may not be from a district within the city limits?

I think it's human nature when you have someone in a leadership position and they're from you home base that they know their own area like the back of their hand and so you might enjoy some home court advantage, but when you have a responsibility as broad as being the speaker, obviously he's representing the entire state. It bounces back and forth all the time. It has historically always bounced back and forth, tended to skew more in favor of Northern California.

 

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