"Notes From Cancerous and Chaotic LA City Hall" by Daniel Guss

I'll also be on "The John and Ken Show" at 3pm on KFI-AM 640.

@TheGussReport - You asked, so I explored.

Where is Nury Martinez's city-issued car?

According to the General Services Department, one day after resigning in disgrace earlier this month, LA City Council President Nury Martinez handed over the keys to her city-issued car, a 2018 Honda Clarity Plug-In, Modern Steel color, purchased for her for $41,551.30, including tax. The taxpayers also covered her insurance, maintenance and gas up until then.

The LA City Clerk has not responded to an inquiry on the status of Martinez's city-issued electronic devices.

Does Nury Martinez have another source of income?

Yes, but as is often the case with LA politicians, there is vagueness and puzzlement.

According to her latest Form 700, Martinez - who never recused herself from landlord-tenant issues - gets rental income from a house in San Fernando, which is outside the city of Los Angeles. It generates between $10,001 and $100,000 per year in rental income for her and her husband, Gerry Guzman.

What does Gerry Guzman do for a living?

That’s a ponderous one, my friends.

On her latest Form 700, Martinez lists an interest in Guzman's business, G7 Strategy Group, Inc., which has an active business license listed with the California Secretary of State, but with an address that traces to the UPS Store pictured below.

But two things make me wonder...

First, G7 Strategy Group has just a two-page website, not including its contact page, containing only a vaguely worded description of a telemarketing company.

Second, this "full-service firm dedicated to delivering precise messaging to a targeted audience while using only time-tested and cost-effective methods," was valued at just $2,000 to $10,000, according to Martinez's most recent form.

Since an annual UPS mailbox fee would chew up a huge portion of that value, and the website contains not a single client name or endorsement after a decade in business with a high-profile co-owner, Led Zeppelin lyrics apply best:

Ooh, it makes me wonder

Ooh, really makes me wonder

Is this the same Gerardo Guzman who was fired from another politically connected job?

The same, indeed.  

According to the LA Times in 2018, "...Gerardo Guzman, who worked as a district director to (Felipe) Fuentes and (Raul) Bocanegra, also engaged in improper conduct, including discussing sex toys with female staffers. Guzman, who is married to Los Angeles City Councilwoman Nury Martinez, was fired from his Assembly job last week as a result of the investigation.”

(NOTE: This was before the Times went all woke, all the time by referring to Martinez as "Councilwoman" rather than Councilmember.)

“Guzman,” the Times continued, “said the incidents happened before he quit drinking in 2015."

Has anyone connected to the three disgraced Councilmembers, Martinez, Gil Cedillo and Kevin de León left?

This column sent a general inquiry to the chiefs of staff to the three embroiled lawmakers and the other person who participated in the notorious and racist call, LA County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera, who was the first to resign.

While none of them responded, here is what can be gleaned.

• Alexis Marin Wesson and Jennifer Barraza, chiefs of staff to Martinez and de León, respectively, still have active city email addresses.

• Email to Cedillo's chief of staff, Debby Kim, bounces back "because the address couldn't be found, or is unable to receive mail."  Since she was on her way out with Cedillo losing his office in the spring primary, one might reasonably conclude that Kim has already exited the building.

• Over at the labor union, while Justin Wesson is still listed as chief of staff, his email address was deleted from the website. In recent media reports, Wesson was listed as "spokesperson," but now the only address listed on the page redirects inquiries to a public relations agency.

Still, the union managed to post its mid-term endorsements, i.e., never losing an opportunity to support the rigged, corrupt relationship that created the shameful, filthy, deadly and retaliatory system destroying LA.

So vote for the candidates who the union thinks will keep giving it the deals it wants, right?

In case you missed it, Alexis Marin Wesson and Justin Wesson are married; he is the son of former City Council President Herb Wesson, a Napoleonic dictator who goaded colleagues into choosing Martinez to succeed him as council president after previously retaliating against those who didn’t vote for him in that role years earlier. Namely, that’s former Councilmember Jan Perry, though Wesson retaliated big-time against former Councilmember and LAPD Chief Bernie Parks, two of the few elected officials in memory to think for themselves and ask questions.

Justin and Alexis are also the couple who misused LAPD resources for security at their wedding but who have refused to provide proof they reimbursed the taxpayers after the scam was exposed. Also, as this column exclusively reported, Justin allegedly repeatedly voted illegally by using his parents' home address on his voter registration while his pregnant wife was registered to vote at an address outside of the city. The plan at the time was to establish a false “residency” for the son so he could replace his dad after terming out.

The LA Times’ David Zahniser refused to deny that the LAPD / Wesson story was handed to him by Vanessa Rodriguez, Herb Wesson’s spokesperson, after this column asked about it first. Rodriguez later approached me to have coffee and for her to apologize and “press the reset button,” but I declined since she refused to state why she was apologizing.

Lastly, as this column also reported exclusively, the family's matriarch, Fabian Wesson, provided false educational qualifications to land a $264,403.09 job at the South Coast Air Quality Management District, AQMD, replacing a UCLA professor with a Ph.D. The connection? She was hired by its head honcho, Bill Burke, husband of one of Herb Wesson’s first bosses, former U.S. Representative Yvonne Brathwaite Burke.

JUST NOW: City Council has unanimously elected Curren Price as its new Interim President Pro Tem, meaning he runs the show when Krekorian is away. He is this column’s pick for the likeliest to be indicted next.

More to come, but I'll be on "The John and Ken Show" at 3pm on KFI-AM 640. Join us there and I'll get to the rest of this in due time.

Peace out.

Follow me on The Twitters @TheGussReport.

(Daniel Guss, MBA, was nominated for three 2022 LA Press Club awards and was a runner-up in 2021 and 2020. He has contributed to Mayor Sam, CityWatchLA, KFI AM-640, iHeartMedia, 790-KABC, Cumulus Media, KCRW, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Daily News, Los Angeles Magazine, Movieline Magazine, Emmy Magazine, Los Angeles Business Journal, Pasadena Star-News, Los Angeles Downtown News and the Los Angeles Times in its sports, opinion, entertainment and Sunday Magazine sections among other publishers.)