Dude, Where’s My Carport?

Imagine there’s no parking, it isn’t hard to do.

Parking in Cal State Fullerton is a mess, and it seems that even efforts to alleviate it (like the opening of two parking garages) only makes the situation  worse.

Back in 2016, when the City was busy pushing College Town, the promise of addressing the parking problem was the method the city used to try to overcome local resistance (even if their plan amounted to nothing more than the creation of a “Parking Management Plan”, that is, a plan to plan to deal with the problem). Even in the fall of 2021, with reduced attendance on campus due to COVID 19, the campus is offering free parking as an incentive for people to get vaccinated. And when the pandemic finally ends, we will likely see the return of off campus student parking as far south as Orangethorpe and as far East as Raymond.

With the massive parking shortfall, the idea of approving a high density development with almost no parking would be an absolute non-starter. Or, at least, it would be in a sane world.

On September 29, 2021, the Fullerton Planning Commission approved, on a 3-2 vote, the application of Core Spaces to re-zone the property at 2601-2751 East Chapman Avenue (the portion of Chapman running East of Commonwealth to the 57 Freeway) and a allow for the development of a mixed use 420 unit, apartment complex consisting of studio and one through four bedroom units.

All told, there will be an anticipated 1,251 new residents in the City of Fullerton once approved and built. The total number of parking spaces for those new residents is just 273 (with additional spaces for guest parking and the ground floor mixed use). And, no, I did not forget to add a zero.

This isn’t even remotely close to the parking requirements set forth in Table 15.17.070.H of the Fullerton Municipal Code, which requires 1 ¾ spaces for each studio apartment, 2 for each one bedroom, 2 ½ for each two bedroom and 3 for each 3 bedroom apartment. The total required parking spaces should be in excess of one thousand, and its not even a third of that.

Given the absolutely massive shortfall in available spaces, the Planning Commission should have had an extremely solid rationale for their decision. Unfortunately, the decision amounts to little more than the claim that caring about parking spaces is “boomer” thinking, and totally, like, not with it, man:

The notion that the driving a car is a thing of the past will come as a surprise to most of the residents of Fullerton near the Cal State Fullerton campus (myself included), not to mention the students at Cal State Fullerton themselves, who are still clogging up the streets near campus even with the temporary reduction in in-person attendance due to COVID protocols


Pictured: The cars that today’s College Students totally don’t drive.

Currently, over 70% of college age Americans hold a driver’s license and, while that number is lower than in decades past, it still amounts to far more students who will want to drive than parking spaces being offered. In fact, if just half of the licensed students in the Core Communities project choose to drive on campus (a generously low assumption), the proposed parking structure is still about 250 parking spaces below what would be needed, and that’s just for the residents; the available space for the lower level commercial development is grossly underutilized and pretty much destined to failure, as the number of spaces are less than the property across the street owned by Cameron Irons. Incidentally, Mr. Irons was present at the Planning Commission meeting and he insisted the number of parking spaces was perfectly adequate for this development even while acknowledging the same amount of commercial spaces for his own venture doomed the restaurants in his building to failure.

Core Communities insists that they would not be proposing such a low number of spaces if they didn’t believe it would work, but their optimistic appraisals are contradicted by their own prior developments. For example, their facebook page for the Hub at Tuscon basically advises students to not even bother asking for a lease for a parking space as they are all booked and have been for years. Students at the Hub at East Lansing have also complained about the lack of parking (among other issues). And both of those complexes were built in neighborhoods with very high walkability scores. East Fullerton is still highly car dependent, there’s no bars, minimal shopping options, and not nearly enough restaurants to accommodate the students during meal hours.

The Planning Commissioners seem to be aware of this but insist that this is fine, the creation of this development without adequate spaces is a good thing because it will force kids to leave their cars at home.

And there you have it. This Hub project is nothing more than enforced social engineering masquerading as free enterprise. Creation of this development without adequate parking isn’t fair to the students who need the spaces, nor is it fair to the resident who will be forced to deal with the additional vehicles. And it is contrary to the law, meaning the exception being created is not fair to every other apartment complex builder in this City (hell, even Red Oak, which itself had fewer spaces than required by law, is a virtual parking lot compared to this development). This project benefits nobody except the people who intend to build it and it should be rejected by the City Council on November 2.

Looking Out for the Little Guy (who makes more than $200,000 a year)

A few weeks ago the Fullerton Rag posted City Council-member Ahmad Zahra’s comments to the Black Lives Matter protest in Fullerton on June 6. It is interesting snapshot on an elected Democrat’s efforts to appease the party activists while keeping that sweet PE union cash flowing. It went about as well as you would expect (fast forward to 2:35 to hear the crowd turn):

The latest attempt to thread that needle comes courtesy of Faisal Qazi, a first time candidate who appears to be the Democrats de facto candidate for the Second District City Council race.  His facebook page currently advertises a pro-BLM tilt, which one would presume would mean he opposes the longstanding practice of covering up for problem officers. However, this (since deleted) post shows a pretty strong blind spot where public employees in general are concerned, which should call that assumption into question: 

Translated: “Lets go after all the waste in the system, except for all the waste in the system.”

Apologies to longtime readers (for whom this will sound like a broken record) but, according to Transparent California, there are almost 200 City employees making at least $100,000 per year. And that is not counting benefits (the $100,000 club has over 600 members in our fair City when benefits are included). On what universe would this be considered “already low wages?”

Oh, and for extra irony, try guess which department most of the public employees in the $100,000+ club belong to?



The problem in our local government, as friend of the blog Dave Zenger put it recently, is that too many people believe “the myth that (civil servants) are underpaid and hence deserve civil service pensions and protections. That may have been more or less true until the employees unionized, but it hasn’t been true for 50 years.” 

And the result? Generations of “fiscal conservatives” on the City Council who voted for every pay increase that crossed their desk, followed, apparently, by generations of BLM supporters with a see-no-evil approach in their own backyard to the core issue that gave rise to the movement in the first place. And who will probably also vote for every pay increase that crosses their desk. This is why we can’t have nice things.

Encouraging Children to Break the Law – That’s the Troy Difference!

Let’s start with Exhibit A.

California Education Code, Section 7054(a) which states in pertinent part:

No school district or community college district funds, services, supplies, or equipment shall be used for the purpose of urging the support or defeat of any ballot measure or candidate, including, but not limited to, any candidate for election to the governing board of the district.

And now Exhibit “B”. This little enticement by The Troy Difference to break that very law.

High School Graduation tickets are generally limited to six tickets per student, which limits how much of one’s extended family can attend (and immediate family, if it is large enough). Giving out tickets based on their political beliefs is utterly repugnant, in addition to a violation of the law.

Now, there is one important caveat here: the Troy Difference is a PTSA organization and not, strictly speaking, the school district itself. Therefore the District could potentially claim that they had no knowledge of the offer when it was made and took appropriate steps to shut down the PTSA’s action and prevent them from following through.

Did they? Nope, not even close. The Precinct walk and the illegal promise proceeded as planned. Here’s the precinct captain at 9:00 am on February 22, 2020, well after the blowup over their campaign tactics (Exhibit “C”):

It gets better, as the volunteer states that “Ms. Gates” is more involved in the offer (Renee Gates is the Current Assistant Principle). Also, this does not appear to be the only Troy organization which has been making this pitch.

This is not the conduct of a campaign that is secure in their position. This is a campaign that is afraid it is losing and is willing to break the rules to prevent that from happening.

Vote No on Measure J and especially on Measure K.

The Maxwell Smart Strategy for Approving School Bonds

One of the regular go to jokes on the old Get Smart show was when Don Adams, after being caught redhanded in a baldfaced lie, would follow up with “Would you believe…” while trying to walk back the lie to something the listener might accept.

Well, it turns out that this is exactly how school bond measures get drafted and, ultimately, passed.

The Fullerton School District has recently commissioned a Baseline Bond feasibility survey from True North Research (available here) and they have been calling residents to feel out their receptiveness to a $198 milion bond measure that, by their own admission, will increase property taxes by at least another $93 per year. What is interesting about the survey is not that the School District wants more money and isn’t shy about raising taxes to do it (they wouldn’t be a government agency otherwise) but that it is designed to determine what promises need to be made to get it. Hence the reason why the question about removing “dangerous asbestos” was included, even though A) asbestos is generally more dangerous when it is removed and B) the City of Fullerton supposedly removed the asbestos from their classrooms thirty five years ago according to this article in the LA Times archive.

The results of the Baseline Survey will be presented to the Fullerton School Board at their next meeting on Tuesday, August 13, 2019. The bond measure, if when it is ultimately approved by the School Board to go on the ballot will likely be drafted based on which spending priorities polled best, and for an amount that does not exceed the comfort level the polled residents expressed.

Of course the problem arises when the promises needed to pass a bond measure conflict with the what the school district wants to actually use the money in question for. And if the Fullerton School District is anything like the North Orange County Community College District or most other school districts, the solution is simple – spend it on what you wanted to anyway, and to hell with your promises.

Would you believe $500 million for a brand new state of the art Veteran’s Center? How about a couple busted laptops and a new football stadium?

I take no joy in calling out the Fullerton School District here. Unlike the City’s roads (which are a pothole strewn laughingstock), our schools are among the best in Orange County and a key reason many of us chose to live here (myself included). But well run or not, our schools suffer the same problems endemic to government – excess allocation to pay and benefits at the expense of infrastructure, administrative bloat and employee protections that make it too costly to fire bad employees – and until these problems are addressed bond measures designed to paper over the financial shortfalls will be a steady fixture at the ballot box. Along with a steady stream of promises nobody intends to fulfill.

 

Did Jennifer Fitzgerald Just Admit to Illegal Lobbying on Behalf of Jamboree Housing?

Recently Jennifer Fitzgerald circulated to her closest supporters- via her Curt Pringle & Associates  email account – her opening salvo in the 2020 election, an email entitled “2019 – A Year of Resolution and Re-commitment”.

Plus a few people she thinks are her closest supporters. Whoops.

There’s a lot to digest here, and the amount of mendacity, outright falsehoods and terrible policy proposals would take multiple posts to unpack.

But one particular boast stands out above the others:

No, not the one about the budget (although it is absolutely galling how she can still claim she balanced the budget two years after the City admitted we have a serious structural deficit and four years after members of the public started noticing). Instead, look at her claim that “Looking back over my six years of service on the Fullerton City Council, I’m proud of newly constructed affordable housing communities with… Jamboree Housing.”

So what’s the problem? Well, as Curt Pringle & Associates admit on their facebook page,  Jamboree Housing is one of their clients. Which means that Councilmember Fitzgerald just bragged about breaking the law.

That’s the one.

Two important caveats. First, I know from attending most council meetings over the last four years that Fitzgerald has avoided voting on any agenda item involving Jamboree Housing’s low income housing development since obtaining residence at CP&A. However, Government Code Section 87100 doesn’t just prohibit an elected official from making or participating in making a decision in which he or she has a financial interest – any attempt by an elected official “to use his official position to influence a governmental decision” is also illegal.

Second, and probably more important, this is could be yet another example of Fitzgerald misleading her voters about her accomplishments (and possibly CP&A clients, given that this email was sent via jennifer@curtpringle.com)  and taking credit for something she had no role in, or claiming she accomplished something she did not.

“Hey, it was balanced for a few seconds!” – Jennifer Fitzgerald, probably

So which is it? Did she break the law and influence a decision that she had a clear financial interest in or does she just have a chronic aversion to telling the truth and chose to brag about her influence and effectiveness to Fullerton voters as well as potentially CP&A’s clients?

A quick poll of FFFF staff seems to indicate that “both” is not entirely out of the question as a possible answer, but maliciousness is in the eye of the beholder.

Meet the Candidates – Nickolas Wildstar

While we suspect there’s at least one candidate on the ballot on November who will not be responding to our candidate questionnaire under any circumstances, we did receive our second response, from Libertarian Nickolas Wildstar. Wildstar is running in the Third Council district where I live and the only non-incumbent in the race.

To reiterate: all City Council candidates for the 2018 election are strongly encouraged to respond to the questionnaire and their responses will be reprinted in full at our earliest opportunity. All candidates have received the questionnaires already and we hope to hear what the other candidates have to say soon.

Our original questions, and Mr. Wildstar’s responses, are as follows: (more…)

Will Mayor Chaffee Do the Right Thing?

Over the weekend the rumors have been swirling as to the fate of Paulette Marshall Chaffee City Council campaign after having apparently been caught on camera removing No Paulette – Carpetbagger signs. We will probably have a clearer picture of the truth of that rumor at tomorrow’s City Council candidate form, but even if she does drop out of the race, this does not end the story.

Her husband, Doug Chaffee, is currently the Mayor of Fullerton and a candidate for Board of Supervisors. While he was not involved in either recorded sign theft, his title as Mayor creates a conflict for the City to investigate the crime. Also, as an active candidate for the Board of Supervisors race, he has an obligation to speak out on this matter and do what he can to make things right. especially since he was the direct beneficiary of an almost identical anti-carpetbagger campaign against his Democratic opponent in June (one Joe Kerr, aka Cotto Joe).

Tony Bushala (one of the founders of this very blog, although he divested his interest two years ago), though Residents for Reform and his brother George Bushala, paid for the political signs that were stolen and he wants them back. He has penned a written request to Mayor Chaffee requesting return of the signs in his residence and has authorized publication here. As an initial good faith gesture, Mayor Chaffee should be strongly encouraged to return the signs on his property forthwith.

The text of the letter is provided below, (more…)

Meet the Candidates – Johnny Ybarra

Taking a brief break from the non-stop coverage of (mostly) bad news from the Fullerton Police Department, we have received our first candidate response to the FFFF Candidate questionnaire, and it is realtor Johnny Ybarra, who is running in District Five.

To reiterate: all City Council candidates for the 2018 election are strongly encouraged to respond to the questionnaire and their responses will be reprinted in full at our earliest opportunity. All candidates have received the questionnaires already and we hope to hear what the other candidates have to say soon.

Our original questions, and Mr. Ybarra’s responses, are as follows:

(more…)

The Friends for Fullerton’s Future candidate questionnaire

With the filing period now closed, the election season is in full swing for the first district election on Fullerton City Council history (the full list of candidates who have qualified and their candidate statements can be found here).

The transition to District elections is proceeding smoothly.

As someone who has run for office before, I know that the single biggest challenge for any candidate is raising enough money to get your message out so that voters even know who you are. Nobody likes the direct mail pieces that inundate our mail box during election season but the candidates who pay for mail are the ones most likely to win, like it or not. And as a voter who has cast a ballot in every election since his 18th birthday, my biggest challenge for every election cycle is sorting through all that BS to find out which candidates have an actual plan, and are sincere about and committed to that plan.

So as a service to both candidates and the electorate, we have prepared the official Friends for Fullerton’s Future City Council candidate questionnaire, which we will email it to all candidates who qualify for the ballot. Unlike most questionnaires, ours has no word limit. Brevity is always recommended, but if you think your position takes three or more paragraphs to explain, then that’s what it takes. Whatever you write, we will publish it, in full, and let other residents know where you stand and why. The first one to turn in their questionnaire will be the first article we will publish.

The complete questionnaire is below the cut.

(more…)

The Wheels are Coming off Rolling Hills Park

A little over a year ago, we ran an article about the deteriorating condition of Rolling Hills Park (right around the time Parks and Recreation were gearing up for the premier of the so-called “fitness stairs”). We even made a little joke about the condition of a certain fire engine play set:

 

Hey, kids! This is what our City Manager’s car looked like after he totaled it!

Flash forward a year and the joke is a lot less funny, because this is what the foundation of this children’s toy looks like now:

But don’t worry! According to a July 25 email from the City to a concerned resident, this equipment is a “solid piece of play equipment” that “offers “safe play for the time being”

And it will provide many more years of play time for personal injury lawyers after that.

This denial does seem to be a pattern at Parks and Recreation – we also have the fitness stairs disaster (documented by Mr. Peabody here), which they continue to ignore, and the Laguna Lake fiasco, which was ignored until the statute of limitations on the architect ran out. At least in this case, the City allows that its current plan is to remove and replace all the existing play equipment as part of its upcoming renovation. To that end, our sources tell us the City has placed yellow tape around the dangerous equipment, which has proven to be an extremely effect deterrent in the past.

You shall not pass!

A community meeting concerning renovations to Rolling Hills Park is scheduled for August 15, 2018, at 6:30 pm, at E.V. Free Church, located at 2801 N. Brea Blvd., Commons Building, Room C-212. If you utilize Rolling Hills Park, or you are a taxpayer who would like to prevent another avoidable personal injury lawsuit, you may want to attend and make sure the City follows through on its promises. And if your neighborhood park is in similar levels of disrepair (or worse) remember: the squeaky wheel gets the grease. Complain loudly and often, and be sure to cc someone at FFFF when you do.