La Opinion, News Report, Posted: Jun 21, 2011

WASHINGTON D.C. – The United States Conference of Mayors, citing the costly impact on many American cities of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, passed a resolution Tuesday calling for an end to those conflicts.

The organization’s annual conclave of mayors, held this year in Baltimore, Md., released data showing some cities will do better than others. New York is among the cities likely to regain pre-recession employment levels by 2013. But Los Angeles, which has lost 537,100 jobs during the recession Los Angeles, will not be at par until 2018. Other cities with much different profiles, such as Ithaca, N.Y., and Dubuque, Iowa, have already reached levels of employment they had before the 2010 economic crisis. The report predicted that almost 44 cities would not achieve pre-recession employment levels before 2020 at projected rates.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, vice president of the mayors’ association, urged the federal government to consider the costs of national entitlement programs, such as Medicaid and Medicare, as well as reducing funding for war, in order to bring money to cities. The report organization’s report, a study of 363 metropolitan areas in the United States, expressed concern that if Washington cannot agree on measures to control the country’s debt, the financial market may take a considerable hit.