MEDIA ADVISORY: Mike Gatto to Host Senior Scam Stopper Event; Prevent Financial Abuse of Senior Citizens

MEDIA ADVISORY                                                                    CONTACT: Justin Hager  818-558-3043
Thursday, May 29, 2014                                                                                       Mobile  415-889-9762

Mike Gatto to Host Senior Scam Stopper Event;

Prevent Financial Abuse of Senior Citizens

What:  Members of the public and local media are invited to attend a FREE Senior Scam Stopper seminar Thursday, June 5, 2014 at the Glendale Adventist Medical Center.  Organized by Assemblyman Gatto in conjunction with the Contractors State License Board and the Live Well Senior program at GAMC, the free seminar will teach senior citizens, their family members, and their caretakers how to protect themselves from fraud related to home repair, finances, identity theft, and Medicare, and will help seniors to identify scams before they become a victim. 

Less than two weeks ago, Glendale police issued a community alert, after residents were scammed out of thousands of dollars by people posing as law enforcement, federal agents, or city employees and pressuring them to pay up or risk being arrested or having their power shut off. 

In a separate incident in March, an 83-year old Glendale woman was scammed out of nearly $52,000 by a man posing as a lottery official.  The elderly woman was told that she had won seven-million dollars but that in order to claim the prize, she must pay fees certain fees and taxes.  The perpetrator was arrested last week and Glendale police have now identified victims of the scam in at least twelve other states.

To educate our community about these and other predatory behaviors, Assemblyman Mike Gatto will introduce a panel of experts from the Glendale Police Department, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Bureau of Automotive Repair, and discuss legislative efforts to protect seniors from fraud and financial scams, including AB 1624 (2012), his legislation to protect senior citizens and others from having their bank accounts drained by a co-signatory.

This educational event is FREE and open to the public.  Photography will be permitted at the event; permission to record video or audio must be cleared in advance by contacting Justin Hager, Communications Director for Assemblyman Gatto.

Thursday June 5, 2014

4:00pm – 5:15pm

Glendale Adventist Medical Center

Community Gym

311 Vallejo Drive

Glendale, CA 91206

Parking is available behind the gym or in the main tower.  Street parking is also available.

Why:  According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, senior citizens are the most likely demographic to have developed solid financial resources, to live alone in homes they own, and to have excellent credit.  Each of these attributes make them prime targets for scam artists seeking to defraud them of money or personal information.   

Unfortunately, misinformation, shame, and fear often make seniors less likely to report when they are the victims of fraud.  Senior Scam Stoppers is a joint effort of Assemblyman Mike Gatto and the Contractors State License Board that seeks to lift the veil of misinformation and equip seniors with the tools they need to protect themselves from fraudulent scams.

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the California State Assembly.  He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, East Hollywood, Franklin Hills, Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake.  www.asm.ca.gov/gatto 

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Crescenta Valley Weekly: American Legion Remodeled

By Robin Goldsworthy | May 8, 2014

The American Legion Post 288 is in the midst of a facelift – a much needed facelift.

For years the building has been struggling with plumbing issues, outdated appliances and carpet that defied cleaning, but all of that is changing thanks to Home Depot.

“Home Depot has a core value of giving back,” said Chuck Messig, community captain for District 26 at Home Depot.

In 2011, Home Depot committed $80 million specifically for veterans organizations. The grant values vary. “The [average] value of a grant is $15,000. In this case, [Post 288] got so lucky. We were granted $20,000 in a materials grant, ” Messig said.

The grant provided materials like kitchen and bathroom appliances and carpeting. The labor for all of this comes from the American Legion and  Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1614 that share the building, community members and volunteers from Home Depot.

“Our volunteers do everything but kitchen cabinets and counter tops and doors. For those, we partner with our service providers,” Messig said. Those partners are paid for by the grant. The idea for this project came from Susanne Dunwell, former senior field representative for Assemblymember Mike Gatto. Dunwell, who recently retired, returned to the American Legion on Friday to kick off the remodeling project at the American Legion. “I had worked with [American Legion] veterans when we did the Two Strike Park memorial,” she said. 

Although there was a memorial wall at Two Strike Park, over the years it had become tattered and there was a very limited amount of space for names of those who had served. Members of the American Legion and VFW, along with community members and organizations, raised funds to replace the memorial with one that could contain names of all Crescenta Valley military personnel that had made the ultimate sacrifice for their country. During this time, Home Depot had been contacted by Gatto’s office and a grant of $5,000 was donated to the project.

“I saw how focused the veterans were on the memorial and how much time they [donated] to the [project], ignoring there own [Post] needs, ” Dunwell said. She approached Shari Caraway, program manager of the Home Depot foundation western division. “Shari was the hero in this,” Dunwell said. “I talked to the veterans, asked them to put a list together of everything they needed and I submitted it to Home Depot.” Shari approved the grant. Dunwell said this goes beyond just a gift for the veterans; it is a gift for the community. Messig agreed. “If you think about it, this is more than just about the veterans. They have families, they live in our community,” he said.

Photo By Dick CLUBB

 

After the remodel, the  American Legion lodge will be a place that local individuals, veterans and non-veterans, as well as organizations, can rent. It is a win-win for the community and the veterans, Messig said. The veterans and members of the community came out in force to help with the remodel. Messig was impressed with the community support.

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This article originally appeared in the CRESCENTA VALLEY WEEKLY. You can read this article and more by visiting the CRESCENTA VALLEY WEEKLY HERE.

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the California State Assembly.  He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, East Hollywood, Franklin Hills, Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake.  www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

VARIETY: Mayors Urge California to Expand Production Tax Credit

Ted Johnson- Senior Editor
May 13, 2014 | 10:29 AM

Seeking to boost prospects for expanding California’s production tax credit, mayors from 10 of the state’s largest cities announced their support for legislation to make the Golden State more competitive with dozens of other states that are luring production away.

Mayors from Sacramento, San Francisco, Fresno, Bakersfield, Oakland, San Jose joined with civic leaders from Los Angeles, Long Beach, Santa Ana and San Diego in an effort to show that support for an expanded credit extends beyond the state’s production centers in Southern California...

...A letter from the mayors was released in advance of an Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee hearing on Tuesday to consider legislation from Assemblymen Mike Gatto and Raul Bocanegra that would make big-budget motion pictures eligible for the credit as well as more categories of one-hour drama series and post production work.

Still to be announced is exactly how much money lawmakers will seek to expand the program, which is currently at $100 million per year. That figure is expected later this month as the legislation moves through the Assembly...

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You can read this entire article and more by visiting VARIETY HERE.

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the California State Assembly.  He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, East Hollywood, Franklin Hills, Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake.  www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

GNP: Gatto's social media bill headed to a vote

By Arin Mikailian, arin.mikailian@latimes.com - April 26, 2014 | 2:05 p.m.

A state bill that sets social media-monitoring standards for schools is now heading to the full State Assembly for a vote.

Introduced by Assemblyman Mike Gatto (D-Silver Lake), AB 1442 passed with a 7-0 vote by the Assembly Education Committee. It would require educators monitoring bullying online to inform parents when their child’s Facebook, Instagram or Twitter account is being viewed.The proposed legislation would also require schools to delete any collected photos or other posts to be deleted within a year of a student turning 18.

“Imagine the harm that could be caused if a hacker, mean-spirited employee or even a careless IT worker were to expose a database of all the things a person said or did as a teenager,” Gatto said in a statement.
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Follow Arin Mikailian on Twitter: @ArinMikailian.

You can read this article and more at the Glendale News Press by clicking HERE

Cal. Newswire: Mike Gatto’s AJR 1 Historic Constitutional Resolution Passes California State Assembly

Campaign finance reform is so important. This weekend, I participated in a panel at UCLA School of Law sponsored by Common Cause (See photo above), on this topic and my AJR 1, which is discussed in the California Newswire article below:

by Christopher Simmons on Thu, 30 Jan 2014

SACRAMENTO, Calif. /California Newswire/ — This week, California Assemblyman Mike Gatto’s (D-Los Angeles) AJR 1, a measure to begin the process to amend the United States Constitution to address the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, took a major step forward, passing the California State Assembly by a vote of 51-20. In Citizens United, a deeply divided Supreme Court held that corporations are due the same free-speech rights enjoyed by natural persons.

The decision spawned “Super PACs,” which have flooded unlimited and largely anonymous corporate money into federal elections. According to the Federal Election Commission, Super PAC spending in 2012 federal elections totaled more than $567 million.

“Most Americans are fed up with the notion that money is speech and that moneyed interests can therefore drown out the speech of average citizens,” said Gatto.

Historically, all amendments to the U.S. Constitution have started in Congress, and been ratified later by 3/4 of the states. AJR 1 takes advantage of the rarely-used Article V process for amending the federal Constitution, which allows states to demand that Congress act. If 2/3 of the states make such a demand, Congress must call a constitutional convention on the topic. Several states and municipalities have already passed informal resolutions condemning the Citizens United decision, but Gatto’s AJR 1 is the first to utilize the Article V process which could compel Congress to act.

The state-initiated process in Article V has been tried several times, with limited success. Although the process has never resulted in a constitutional convention, it has spurred Congress to take action several times. According to a 2007 article in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, at least four different amendments to the U.S. Constitution have been proposed by Congress in part because of Article V actions. For example, the amendments that repealed prohibition and allowed for the direct election of Senators were first demanded by state legislatures under Article V.

AJR 1 calls for a convention that would be expressly limited to campaign-finance and corporate-personhood issues. Now that it has passed the State Assembly, the resolution will next go to the California State Senate, after which other states could similarly act, triggering the convention. Its passage is further significant because it is the first time in recent memory that a Democratic-controlled legislature has passed an Article V demand. Several Republican-controlled statehouses have recently passed Article V resolutions for the Balanced Budget Amendment or simply to establish rules for a future Article V convention. Today’s passage of AJR 1 signifies broad, nationwide, bipartisan action, by the legislators closest to the people, to demand action on Congress on big issues.

“I doubt our Founding Fathers had the free-speech rights of multi-national and foreign corporations in mind when they drafted the First Amendment,” said Gatto. “But the Founding Fathers did anticipate that every once in a while, the states would need to prod Congress to act to amend the Constitution. That’s what we are doing.”

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the California State Assembly. He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, East Hollywood, Franklin Hills, Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake. www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

WATCH IT HERE: KNBC on Safeguarding Students' Social Media and AB 1442

Watch the NBC-Los Angeles story on my AB 1442, which provides safeguards for when governments use tax dollars to store students' social media.

Glendale News-Press: Gatto: New legislation would protect victims of on-campus rapes, other crimes

Mark Kellam- Glendale News-Press
January 6, 2014

If legislation introduced Monday by Assemblyman Mike Gatto (D-Silver Lake) becomes law, college officials across the state would be required to report certain crimes occurring on or near campuses to law enforcement to investigate, if the victim does not request anonymity.

AB 1433 comes after several California colleges have been accused of covering-up on-campus sexual assaults because of concerns that higher crime statistics would lead prospective students to choose elsewhere, Gatto said.

The unwillingness of campus officials to involve proper non-campus law-enforcement professionals greatly diminishes the chance that a perpetrator is arrested and convicted, he added.

 
“Victims of crime should not see their chances of justice hurt, nor should perpetrators be allowed to victimize others, because a school values its public image more than victims' rights,” Gatto said in a statement. “Colleges should focus on teaching, and leave the investigation of crimes to the professionals -- local police and sheriffs.”

Two southern California colleges are currently the subject of a federal investigation for their handling of on-campus sexual assaults and other violent crimes, Gatto said.

 “Crimes that occur on campus should not be treated any differently than those that occur elsewhere in our community,” Gatto said. "California law needs to make sure that college administrators involve law enforcement when appropriate."

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This article originally appeared in the GLENDALE NEWS-PRESS. You can read this article and more by visiting the GLENDALE NEWS-PRESS HERE.

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the California State Assembly.  He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, East Hollywood, Franklin Hills, Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake.  www.asm.ca.gov/gatto