On the 26th of July, Councilman Bill Rosendahl’s office released a PowerPoint presentation on the “Streets to Homes” program summarizing how it was developed and highlighting some of its key elements.
Typically, presentations like this are “feel good” “rah-rah-rah” documents for people to gloss over and say “ok great, it costs a lot of money but I see you are helping”. Unfortunately for the Councilman, it was not possible to gloss over the fact that the presentation used a highly manipulative picture taken of a family in Oregon sitting outside of a 5th wheel trailer. Manipulation of pictures and their intent is pretty easy, like naming this one “Venice” when it is actually a block away at Costco in Culver City. There is an implicit trust that a reader gives an author, and that trust should not be broken.
When dealing with an emotionally charged issue and spending a lot of money, it is best not to sugar coat it. Reality (from what we can tell) is that there aren’t any cute little families living in their RV’s in Venice that are down on their luck and need a little assistance.
