Author: Mr. Peabody

I noticed this closed session item on this Tuesday’s Fullerton City Council meeting agenda.

Commonwealth and Harbor LLC, AKA Mario Marovic has been in litigation with the City for a long time now claiming some sort of misfeasance on the City’s part in the ongoing saga of the Florentine stolen sidewalk.

Friends may remember that Marovic turned out to be just as big a scammer as the Florentine Mob. After they walked away from their lease, he took over and planned to open two new bars.

He actually remodeled the so-called pop out without permission as part of his redesign. Oops. The pop-out belonged (and still belongs) to the City.

In the fall of 2023 the City decided it wanted the sidewalk back; Marovic wanted to open his fake Irish pub. Yes it was a clusterfuck courtesy of the boneheadedness of a City bureaucrat named Paul Dudley over twenty years ago. He talked the Council into letting the Florentines put a new building on a public sidewalk, a building addition not owned by the guys who owned the main building to which it is still attached. Oops.

A deal was struck a deal under which Marovic could get opened and the City could finally get its sidewalk back. Marovic could open Mickey’s Irish Pub bars and had until March 2024 to begin demolition of the offending bump out. The remediation work had to be done by July 2024.

March 2024 came and went; March 2025 came and went. There was no work performed. Instead Marovic continued to use the public’s building and sued the City. I hope he was paying rent to us, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t.

Marovic has been in breech of his agreement for over a a year and a half. For some reason the City has been playing a protracted legal game with this individual instead of evicting him from our premises for being in default. Maybe the City-folk were trying to dodge personal embarrassment – just like their predecessors have done for the past two decades. Maybe they were still hoping that Marovic, somehow, would do what he was supposed to do – a hope so incredible as to be absurd.

My hope is that no settlement is made, at least not one where the City is not fully recompensed; that Marovic pays for the City to do the demolition work (he can repair his own building exterior), covers all our legal fees, and kicks back a portion of the profit he has made using our building.

I am not hopeful about my hope. The City can’t even seem to get Les Amis to pay their years late rent. Playing hardball just isn’t in their repertoire. My guess is that the City will vote to give Good Ol’ Mario a second chance. Or maybe they’ll just drop the thing altogether and the sidewalk will remain as is.

Incidentally, I wonder if Ahmad Zahra and his young sprout Elijah Manassero will give the stolen sidewalk item the scrutiny and transparency the public needs. Bet not.

Here’s the text of a recent City of Fullerton press release about upcoming activity at the dismal Union Pacific Park on Truslow Avenue. See if you can read it without gagging.

The City of Fullerton Parks & Recreation Department, Smile Generation®, and KABOOM! are teaming up to bring a new kid-designed, community-built playground to Union Pacific Park—revitalizing a beloved neighborhood space and ensuring local children have a safe, inspiring place to play.

On Saturday, September 13, volunteers come together to construct the playground in a single day, with a ribbon-cutting and photo opportunities at 2:30 pm. The build begins at 8:30 am at Union Pacific Park, 121 W. Truslow Ave., Fullerton, CA 92832. Media and community members are invited to attend and experience the transformation in real time.

“Union Pacific Park’s reopening represents a new chapter for this neighborhood,” says Edgar Rosales, Fullerton Parks & Recreation. “The new playground will be at the heart of the park—where children can play, and families can connect and grow.”

Union Pacific Park, which had been closed due to past soil contamination, has since been fully remediated and declared safe for public use—clearing the way for its exciting rebirth as a vibrant community hub.

This project also advances KABOOM!’s 25 in 5 Initiative to End Playspace Inequity, a nationwide effort to ensure every child—especially those in under-resourced communities—benefits from the physical, social, and mental health advantages of play. Smile Generation joins as a proud partner committed to community wellness.

Let’s just ignore the tsunami of silly bureaucrat-speak about under-resourced neighborhoods, new chapters, vibrant community hubs, families connecting and growing, inspiring places to play, and the like. That’s just the sort of hyped-up rhetorical nonsense you’d expect from any semi-literate municipal scribe. It’s actually pretty funny in an unintended way.

But what’s this nonsense about the park being closed for “remediation” of contaminated soil, but now having been declared safe? That’s just a damned lie. The remediation happened at least 15 long years ago. The fact is that City Hall kept the park closed due its attractive quality to borrachos, drug addicts, Fullerton Toker Towners, and homeless vagrants. It’s been sitting there, a ugly monument to the incompetence of Fullerton’s six-figure pensioners, and two generations of city councils that never bothered ask any questions.

This multi-million dollar disgrace is not a “beloved neighborhood space.” Nobody asked for it. Nobody wanted it outside City Hall employees with other people’s money to waste.

And now the current city council is poised to dump more millions into the beloved space even though there is nothing changed from the societal pathologies that kept it closed in the first place. And nothing has changed about the City’s inability to properly maintain the parks it already has.

Oh well, I guess this makes sense in a certain perverse way. The council just agreed to blow 2.5 million bucks on the Trail to Nowhere without a single backward glance to note the complete failure of the UP Park and the embarrassing “Phase I” of the so-called trail that doesn’t even connect to Phase II. The current council seems no more curious about past failures than their predecessors. In fact, they’re doubling down on the previous Union Park fiasco. The only difference is they seem to want to fail in smaller increments.

It’s really not very hard to submit the necessary campaign finance and statement of economic interest forms required of candidates and elected representatives. But apparently it is for Shana Charles, who has evidently been busy with other stuff over her summer break, social justice warrioring, for one. Even with a kindly nudge from the Fullerton City Clerk.

Form 460s (campaign financial activity) for the first half of 2025 were due by July 31, 2025.

It’s now five weeks later and per the City Clerk’s webpage, Shana Charles still hasn’t submitted the required form, her last submittal being for the second half of last year.

Even more interesting is the fact that the CC’s site shows no annual Form 700 (Statement of Economic Interest) from Charles since February, 2024. She’s over six months late.

To be fair, Dunlap and Jung show being one and two months behind in their annual 700, but Zahra is a whopping seven months late, so there’s something not right in the City Clerk’s office, either in the enforcement or the recording of this stuff.

The irony here is that Charles’s (and Zahra’s) followers are always nattering about transparency this, and transparency that. But the application of the concept is selective, as shown by the Fullerton Observer Sisters and their new Jimmy Olsen, the impressionable, young Elijah Mannasero.

Way back on July 31, a member of the public made a PRA request. This individual got a receipt for the effort, too, with a reference number and everything. I got ahold of this receipt through a third party but I don’t know anything about the whys or the wherefores.

The trouble is, this request was never included in the City Clerk’s PRA request log. I’ve searched by date and reference number. Nada. So what happened? Is this omission an error, or is it deliberate? Who knows?

The request deals with communications between Shana Charles and the the city manager, the mayor, the police chief and staff. Staff likes to protect councilmembers so maybe that has something to do with the absence of the request on the log. Were there controversial or incriminatory communications?

All we know is that somebody wants to find out what Charles was writing to the people listed in the request. The reason for the request is a mystery as it would be if it were included in the log; but there is something going on here the public not only doesn’t know about: we don’t know what the response is, we wouldn’t even know a request was made without the receipt – defeating the purpose of a log altogether.

When this sort of thing happens people start getting curious.

A while back the Fullerton Observer ran an article about supporting businesses and addressing the damned unfairness of rents on City-owned property. The restaurant Les Amis was cited as a particular case. The older Kennedy Sister – Sharon – opined in one of her frequent comments on her younger sister’s posts:

“…I love Les Amis – I thought the Montechristo’s (sic) message at the July 15 council meeting was heartbreaking.” 

Maybe Les Amis should be renamed The House of Blues.

But wait a minute. Before we all start singing boohoo hosannas about how unfairly Les Amis is treated, let’s consider their 15 year record of scofflawry, trespass, and ignoring rent payments. The rap sheet is long and demonstrates bad faith at every turn. Naturally, neither Siskya or Sharon Kennedy bothered to find out if Les Amis has ever been an honest tenant of the taxpayers.

But we’ll take trip down memory lane, courtesy of a Public Records Act request about Les Amis:

Feb 2011         Jinan Montecristo d.b.a. Les Amis Restaurant & Lounge (Jinan) applied for an outdoor dining encroachment agreement.

Aug 2011         After several reviews of the site plan, staff provided a draft encroachment agreement to Jinan for consideration

Sept 2011        Jinan issued a letter to staff challenging the lease rates.  Les Amis installed fencing and started operating within the public right-of-way without executed agreement (south patio).

Dec 2011         Staff send revised encroachment agreement for consideration

June 2012       Jinan was issued an Administrative Restaurant Use Permit (ARUP), which included an ancillary outdoor patio.  Among other things, the conditions of the ARUP required a valid encroachment agreement pursuant to the Outdoor Dining Guidelines established by the City Council. 

July 2012         Staff send revised encroachment agreement for consideration

Dec 2015         Jinan submitted building permit to expand into the north portion of the building.

Feb 2016         Staff inform Jinan that she owed $28,659.60 for use of the public right-of-way of private benefit (9/2011 – 2/2016). 

May 2016        Modification of an Amended ARUP was approved, expanding existing restaurant into adjacent tenant space.  Jinan executed an encroachment agreement for outdoor dining (south patio only; $510/month; $6,120 annually).  The agreement also required payment for 12-month prior occupancy ($6,120; negotiated down from $28,659.60).

Aug 2016         Jinan issues a letter to staff indicated they are “unable to fulfill financial obligations” due to “hardship”.

April 2017        Jinan was issued a letter from the City attorney to pay outstanding balance on account.

May 2017        Encroachment Agreement expired.

Aug 2017         Les Amis expanded into the north patio area without a permit/agreement for outdoor dining.

Nov 2018         Jinan was issued a letter from the City attorney, indicating they are in violation of their ARUP, failed to pay the lease outlined in the executed agreement, and are required to remove encroachments (north and south patio) by Dec. 14, 2018. Jinan subsequently expressed interest in continued use of both patios.  Outstanding balance was $24,643.70 at the time.

Dec 2018         Jinan signed resolution of breach of outdoor dining encroachment agreement and FMC. Resolution waived outstanding balance on Patio 2 (north patio; $5,263.70), resulting in $19,380 of remaining account balance.

Jan 2019         Staff sent two encroachment agreement(s) for consideration.  Jinan expressed interest in removing Patio 1 (south patio) and expanding Patio 2 (north patio)

March 2019     Jinan executed Encroachment Agreement for new north patio only.  New Agreement was for $913.75/month ($510 for north patio; $403.75 for prior occupancy fee ($19,300 amortized over 48 months))

Permit was issued for removal of fencing around south patio and installation for north patio expansion per executed agreement. 

May 2020        City Council paused collecting lease revenue from all outdoor dining encroachments due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Outstanding balance for all outdoor dining agreements was also waived.  Les Amis waived balance was approximately $13,647.50.

June 2022       Council approved new lease rates for outdoor dining on public property. 

Aug 2022         Les Amis reinstalled south patio without permits and/or an agreement.

Sept 2022        Jinan submitted application to reinstall south patio.

Aug 2023         Staff reinitiated collecting lease from all existing agreements.

Oct 2024         Jinan defaulted on payments from August 2023 to October 2024, accumulating a dept of $13,468.71. Jinan signed an agreement for a 12-month payment plan to pay the outstanding debt of $13,468.71. 

NOTE: this did not include prior occupancy for the reinstalled south patio.

Nov 2024         Jinan executed two superseding encroachment agreements for outdoor dining with the new lease areas and rates. 

April 2025        Jinan defaulted on payments, accumulating an outstanding balance of $26,650.96.  Staff terminated the agreements, cancelled the payment plan, issued several notices of violations, and required removal of all encroachments. Jinan expressed financial hardship and requested the City revisit the lease rate.  Jinan also paid $1,200 toward the payment plan and expressed interest in purchasing the property.  The city paused removal to explore options. 

July 2025         Jinan was once again requested to remove all unpermitted encroachments.  Jinan paid $3,900 toward the payment plan.  City Manager agree to extend the time for compliance or a change in the Outdoor Dining policy for 60 days.  To date, Jinan has an outstanding balance of $31,185.10 ($5,494.06 payment plan; $25,691.04 encroachment agreements)

Okay, so what’s the deal? At one point Les Amis went five years ignoring their rent obligation to the City. Remember these were mostly the years that Mayor-for-Hire Jennifer Fitzgerald, who ran cover for almost every misbehaving restaurant and bar owner in Downtown Fullerton. Work without permits? Expansion without approval? City employees dismissing massive amounts of money due to the people of Fullerton? Check.

And these people have the damn nerve to get up in public and harangue the City Council about fairness?

The other day I shared the City Attorney’s response to unfounded allegations and threats the tender, green bud, Elijah Manassero, made about the Santa Fe Depot lease. His mission is to connect Mayor Fred Jung to bad decisions, even when they are not bad decisions. He’s been working hard at it with his friends “Dr.” Ahmad Zahra and the Kennedy Sisterhood Coven.

Some cynical folks are saying sweet Elijah is working on behalf of the Buena Park carpertbagger, Connor Traut, seen above with his close personal mentor, Jordan Brandman.

Therefore it is no surprise that sweet young Elijah refuses to be educated in the ways of municipal legal thinking and submitted a response to the response. In his response he stubbornly refuses to understand that a breech isn’t a default; and something nobody cared about hardly merits his conniption. Moreover, if the City thinks historic plaster restoration is within its purview, it has the latitude to do so.

Dear Mr. Bettenhausen,

Thank you for your response. I appreciate your office’s willingness to engage on this matter.

That said, your reply raises serious concerns that warrant clarification.

Your letter states that “notice and cure” must occur before a default is recognized. However, Section 6(e) of the lease amendment plainly states that “If Tenant is in default (beyond applicable notice and cure periods), the Third Extension Term… shall not commence.” The City was made aware, before approving the amendment, that:

• Mr. Bushala admitted to a sublease on the record,
• Staff publicly acknowledged having no record of any authorized sublease, and
• The City had already incurred costs repairing the tenant’s plaster, repairs that are the tenant’s contractual obligation under both the original lease and the 2025 amendment.

In short, Council knowingly proceeded with lease approval while credible evidence of an uncured default was in plain view. That is a failure of due diligence and, arguably, of the lease itself. Whether or not the lease term technically commences until 2027 is beside the point, the City has bound itself to a long-term extension with a tenant under active investigation for breach. That defeats the purpose of the default clause entirely and undermines the City’s leverage.

I also note that between the prior version of the lease and the final version adopted, Section 8(g) was materially altered. The earlier version allowed the City to terminate the entire lease if the tenant failed to construct agreed improvements within five years. The final version, however, softens that enforcement mechanism, allowing only for loss of the 13-year extension, not lease termination.

The modification to Section 8(g), which weakens the City’s enforcement authority and softens default penalties, represents a material change in the terms of the lease, if not the price. As such, it triggers public disclosure and review requirements under Government Code §54956.8, which applies to leases of public property involving ‘price and terms of payment.’ To my knowledge, this change was not discussed by Council in open session or disclosed to the public prior to final adoption.

You argue the City may fund ADA improvements on its own property. While I agree in principle, the repairs at issue, including the plaster restoration inside the leased premises, are explicitly listed as tenant responsibilities under both the 1992 lease and the 2025 amendment. Public funds should not be used to subsidize private tenant obligations, especially under a lease that explicitly absolves the City of those duties. If the City chooses to assume those costs anyway, it is:

• Waiving a breach of lease without formal Council action or public justification, and
• Potentially engaging in a gift of public funds under Article XVI, Section 6 of the California Constitution.

I had hoped the City would proactively enforce its rights under the lease. Instead, your office appears to be shielding the Council’s actions under the narrowest possible reading of the agreement, despite clear signs of default, fiscal exposure, and procedural irregularity. I intend to proceed with a formal Brown Act “Cure and Correct” demand based on the post-continuance modification of lease terms and other irregularities cited above.

If your office or the City has documentation or a timeline that explains how the Section 8(g) change was reviewed or approved by Council in open session, I welcome it.

Sincerely,
Elijah Manassero
Fullerton Resident

Well there you have it. Like a small, angry child with a drum, delicate Elijah intends to keep banging out the same noise until somebody responds and gives him a cookie. However, there is no default. There is no fiscal exposure. Any irregularities were de minimis, have already been cured, and have nothing to do with a lease extension that won’t occur for another two years.

None of this boy’s accusations mean anything. The City’s own lawyer has said so. Repeating the same thing isn’t going to help. Of course tender Elijah doesn’t care that his buzzing about is actually costing the public he pretends to care so much about. We have to pay Jones and Meyer to deal with fresh Elijah. Think about that for a second.

I hope Jones and Mayer are told by the Council to drop this correspondence with the delicate sprout. He doesn’t deserve a response, not even to tell him to shove it.

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