Private Property

Reporting from Sacramento -- Raves would be outlawed at publicly owned venues in California under a proposal made Wednesday by a lawmaker after the death of a teenager and scores of injuries at rave events in Los Angeles and the Bay Area. Legislation introduced Wednesday by Assemblywoman Fiona Ma (D- San Francisco) would prohibit the dance concerts on public property, including the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, where a June rave sent dozens to hospitals, including a 15-year old girl, who died.

Do you support the death penalty for minor thefts? Of course not. But what about your mayor and police chief? Will they, when the inevitable big earthquake hits Los Angeles or San Francisco, sometime in the next few decades declare open season on thieves? It's happened before. On the morning of the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the city's previously progressive mayor issued a proclamation, printed up as a broadside and plastered throughout the city, authorizing law enforcers to "shoot to kill" looters.

The Supreme Court rejected a property rights claim from some disgruntled owners of beachfront in Florida on Thursday, upholding instead the state's authority to pump new sand onto an eroded shoreline without paying compensation. This extra sand became a new strip of public beach. That in turn prompted a group of property owners along Florida's east coast to sue, contending that the state had taken away their rights to a private beach. What was once oceanfront property had become ocean-view property, they said, demanding compensation for their loss.

A high-speed rail configuration that backers say could save up to $2 billion and greatly reduce demolition of homes and businesses across the heart of Southern California was revived Thursday by project officials. In the 6-1 vote at a meeting in San Jose, the California High-Speed Rail Authority agreed to revisit a plan, discarded in 2008, to share existing rail where feasible with commuter and freight services operating along a 34-mile route between Anaheim and downtown's Union Station.

The Supreme Court justices, hearing a Florida case Wednesday, seemed to agree with property owners who said that their rights to a private beach could not be taken away when the state added new sand to an eroded shoreline. The property owners have argued that their rights include not just the freedom to walk across the sand to the water, but also the right to keep others off the sand. Owners of beachfront land everywhere "would be astounded to learn" that they do not have the right to keep others off the dry sand above the water line, said Justice Antonin Scalia, whose family owns a beach house in North Carolina.

With climatologists predicting an era of rising seas, the Supreme Court today will take up a property rights claim from Florida's Gulf Coast to decide whether private land owners or the public gain the benefits of restoring beaches eroded by hurricanes or high waters. The case is the first property rights dispute before the Roberts court, and it renews the clash between the public's wish for open beaches and the rights of property owners to keep out unwanted guests. The Constitution says private property may not be "taken for public use" without the government paying for it, but it is not entirely clear what is private property when the state is adding new sand to an eroded private beach.

Two Los Angeles politicians said Tuesday that they would embark on a new strategy for fighting graffiti: taking the vandals, and their parents, to civil court and demanding financial damages. City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo and Councilman Dennis Zine said they would pursue passage of an ordinance that would allow private property owners to turn responsibility for graffiti cleanup over to the city. That, in turn, would allow city prosecutors to sue for damages if the property was vandalized.

Re "Power plant and hunters at odds," March 7 The Inyo County Planning Commission permit application by Coso Operating Co. seeking to pump water from an aquifer that is the "lifeblood" of the Little Lake Ranch hunting club is a disaster in the making. Although Little Lake Ranch is private property, the owners are not the only concerned citizens in this matter. Archaeologists and historians are among many stakeholders in the rich past of Little Lake and the fragile ecology of the California desert.

Re "7 alleged L.A. taggers arrested," Jan. 29 Even though graffiti is a major blight on our city, we should not overlook that the embankment tag shown in The Times photo is miles apart from the usual crude scrawls with which gangsters threaten and boast. The tag in the picture is skillfully executed and features a use of shading that is striking. The reason "Smear" has enjoyed some success in the art world is clear: He's quite good. I for one can't agree that the embankment would look any better if the tag were whitewashed, nor that anyone should be fined for the cost of doing so. James van Scoyoc Los Angeles :: Sadly, this article succeeded in glorifying the efforts of gangs and vandals.

There are no horrors like family horrors. The nightmares hidden in the everyday are more frightening than any extreme situation, and the real horror films take place in cozy family kitchens, not deserted motels. Witness the powerful emotional impact of "Private Property," the devastating new film starring Isabelle Huppert.