Howard Blume

Photo by Slobodan Dimitrov Read LA Weekly's Web-exclusive report for an authoritative look at the Belmont Learning Complex, the most troubled building project in the city school district’s history - with articles, photos, maps and commentaries. Those who follow the news know at least this much: Construction of the Belmont......

Photos by Slobodan Dimitrov A worker tapes a woven, fabric skin - filled with gravel - around a venting pipe that will sit in a trench beneath a new house in a Riverside County subdivision. This is your basic methane burrito. The trenches snake under where the living room, the......

No mistaking that the Emerald Bay Room at the Westin Bonaventure Hotel was headquarters of Hahn for Mayor. The only confusion was over which Hahn was running. The first two people I interviewed referred to Jim Hahn as Kenny Hahn before quickly correcting themselves -- an understandable slip of the......

Mayor Riordan’s candidates for school board share a curious set of attributes: They are in their early 30s, have no children and have little or no experience in the field of education. And it‘s not a coincidence. Sources close to the mayor assert that inexperience counts when looking for the......

Mayor Richard J. Riordan is good at this: He’s on a bus, hamming it up with a group of elementary school students. “What‘s the name of the best school in the world?” he prompts the kids, who are initially discombobulated by his directness. “I can’t hear you!” he goads them......

My name is Joe Lucente. My first committee meeting was at 7 a.m. -- pretty typical. I better dust off the brown tweed because later I‘ll have my regular lunch with the boys at the Valley Industry and Commerce Association. The afternoon often brings partner and investor meetings. Let’s see,......

ABOUT THE SERIES: California‘s charter schools have won the unqualified and often uncritical endorsement of forces all across the political spectrum. The Weekly’s three-part series examines this new wave of school reform. Articles and letters to the editor can be found at www.laweekly.com. November 10: California‘s controversial innovation: The home-school......

Photo by Noel NeubergerThis article is part one of a three-part series. BELINDA ROLOFF WAS WORRIED ABOUT HER SON. It wasn't that his Sacramento-area public junior high school was bad, it was a question more of attitudes and values. She respected his teachers' abilities, but the school's cultural perspective bothered......

Photo by Debra DiPaolo If you never heard of last year’s internal school-district probe of consulting attorney Barry Groveman, you’re in good company. Neither did Ruben Zacarias, who was the superintendent of L.A.’s schools at the time. Nor did six of the seven school-board members. Nor were they told when......

It was an overheard comment, not intended for public consumption, but it very clearly spelled the end of a short but intense career. Howard Miller, said new L.A. schools chief Roy Romer to a district insider he considered an ally, was someone “who had a thousand ideas but has trouble......