L.A. Mayor Villaraigosa Hires Two Former Journos Onto His Huge PR Team

By Simone Wilson Wed., Feb. 22 2012 at 3:00 PM

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As if Mayor V needed more flack.

We just lost two soldiers to L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's bulging press office.

Whoever predicted that L.A.'s best journalists might all soon be working for the enemy, tempted by a secure job and cush benefits amid this Great Recession and death o' journalism: You were right.

"Two new communications staffers joined Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's press office this week" ...

... reports City News Service. Their names are Amanda Parsons, a ~~current~~ former entertainment ~~reporter~~ blurbist for the OC Weekly (the LA Weekly's sister paper in our bordering county of Kristin Cavalaris and racist politicians), and, more surprisingly, Vicki Curry, a longtime producer for "SoCal Connected," our favorite local show on government accountability.

Which makes Villaraigosa an unlikely new employer -- because when it comes to accountability, Mayor Vanishing Veracity has proven to be one of the worst.

City News reports that Curry "won four Emmy Awards and six Golden Mike Awards for her reporting." Now, she's either going to be every newspaper's best friend -- telling us all what's really going on at City Hall -- or her award-winning talent will be wasted on more, uh, mayoral YouTube responses to Conan O'Brien.

The mayor's communications office already has about 10 staffers, says someone who works in the office, but who later tells us that he cannot be quoted on the record. And that doesn't include the mayor's "new media" office, which handles Twitter, Facebook and other social-media stuff.

[Update: Peter Sanders, the mayor's senior press secretary, says via email, "We have six people in the press office and two in the 'new media' office." Back in May 2011, LA Weekly reporter Patrick Range McDonald found that of almost 200 mayoral staffers (no joke), "nine employees work in his press office, three on 'new media.']

The ultimate irony in all of this: Due to insufficient funding, SoCal Connected had its shortest run ever this season, despite heaps of accolades for an expose on corruption at the L.A. housing authority. (Part of which Mayor Villaraigosa knew about.)

WTF! Pretty soon, the only news blogs of records will be taxpayer-funded, politically lilted ones that belong to our elected officials, a la Zev's Blog. Because even though there's allegedly negative money in city/county/state coffers, there's somehow still enough to keep the damage-control room fully staffed.

[@simone_electra / swilson@laweekly.com / @LAWeeklyNews]

Tags:

Amanda Parsons, Mayor Antonio Villlariagosa, press office, Vicki Curry

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CarolineSF

And Ms. WIlson, we can see that you're going for even more swanky career digs in continuing to suck up to the billionaire-funded, ultra-right corporate-education-reform sector. It has already lured numerous once-idealistic journalists into its cushy clutches, and undoubtedly a corner view suite, six-figure salary and obsequious support staff eager to cater to your every whim await you when you earn your reward for all that puffery of the Parent Trigger scam. Very savvy goal-setting.

Teainla

Outrageous! Just how is it that the Mayor gets to hire a new contingent of PR folks when other City departments are directed to reduce services and still have staff on furloughs with the threat of layoffs??!! Really! What are his priorities?

Christopher Neal

Here's the way I see it: when doing PR, you have to write good shit about losers. Journalists, however, uncover uncomfortable truths that lead to making the world a better place--the City of Bell scandal is a perfect example. I don't know how PR people can live with themselves.

Joe Sackett

Are these "journalists" like the news lady who was his "horizontal adviser?" The mayor has the chief of police giving illegals amnesty. He must have big plans for his future... Obama made him the convention leader. heck, compared to Obama, Villaragosa is a success. Obama is doing to the USA what Villaragosa has done to LA.