Behind Closed Doors Archives - Page 41 of 82 - Friends For Fullerton's Future

December 27, 2016December 27, 2016Behind Closed Doors

Down on the County Farm: The 4th District Embarrassment

A Friend alerted me to a Voice of OC article that has a close tie-in to Fullerton, since it deals directly with our 4th District County Supervisor, Shawn Nelson, and his Number One man.

Apparently, The Voice of OC is running end-of-the year pieces about this and that. The one that was forwarded to FFFF is about how Voice has been holding politicians accountable for their misdeeds, and included the shocking story from last May of Nelson’s Chief-of-Staff, Denis Bilodeau, and how, between his various government salaries, stipends and benefits he rakes in more than $250,000 per year. Yes, you read that right. He makes more, a lot more, than Nelson himself.

This valuable piece of manpower pulls in a generous stipend and benefits as a boardmember of the County Water District, and gets $40,000 per year (via a personal contract) as Nelson’s “technical advisor” at the AQMD. Before that he was also getting paid by being a member of the Orange City Council, Redevelopment Agency and all the other regional commissions he could get himself appointed to. Of course all these agencies had meetings that would have directly conflicted with his $120,000 full-time job at the County.

Bilodeau has also been frequently featured on the pages of the Voice for submitting bogus expense reports and for collecting stipends for meetings in which he barely popped his head in the meeting room door, or didn’t attend at all. Naturally, he blamed his staff for poor record keeping. He was busted for falsifying his time card to engage in political activity and claimed he got his weeks mixed up.

A study of hours logged by County administration personnel in 2012 show Bilodeau in the office 23 hours a week. Thats’ 58% of a work-week.What he did when he was there is anybody’s guess.

So what is Bilodeau’s real value to anybody? Here’s County political watchdog Shirley Grindle, offering an opinion, as quoted in Voice of OC:

She also said she’s gotten indications that the mind behind Nelson’s fundraising machinations has been his chief of staff, Denis Bilodeau, who was an Orange councilman and serves on the Orange County Water District board.

“I’m about ready to tell Shawn Nelson, about the best thing he could do for his career is get rid of Denis Bilodeau,” Grindle said.

What did Nelson have to say on the subject?

“Neither Bilodeau nor Nelson would comment…”

December 26, 2016December 27, 2016Behind Closed Doors

The “Professional Standards Bureau”

by Mr. Peabody15 Comments

The other day FFFF did a post about the letter Travis Kiger received from Fullerton’s Interim PoChief, David Hinig, suggesting that at some point an FPD in-house institution called the “Professional Standards Bureau” might, some day, possibly, if they feel like it, get around to looking into his complaint about the behavior of Fullerton cops at the Joe Felz Memorial Crash Site in the early morning hours of November 9th, 2016. That’s when the former City Manager, after a night of election partying, jumped a Glenwood Avenue curb, ran over a tree, and tried to leave the scene of the accident.

Danny says you are either ignorant or misinformed!!!

Professional Standards Bureau. Okay, stop snickering.

I got to thinking about the long history of the FPD Culture of Corruption that happily existed right along side this supposed “Bureau,” and the recollection of all the embezzlers, thieves, pickpockets, perjurers, kidnappers, thugs, pill-poppers, scammers, liars, sex perverts and yes, killers, gave pause. But not for long, because you know, that’s all ancient history, right? The department was reformed by Danny Hughes, according to our lobbyist-councilwoman, Jennifer Fitzgerald.

But then something struck me. What was it? Think, Peabody.

Aha! A post from a just a few weeks ago.

Fullerton Police from left, Cpl. Eric Song, Patricia Arevalo, Sgt. Dan Castillo, Lt. Andrew Goodrich and Cpl. Donny Blume.
Photo by Steven Georges/Behind the Badge OC & Paid for by Fullerton Taxpayers

It was a ludicrous story dished out by the noisome “Behind the Badge,” all about the FPD’s hardworking crew that makes sure all the cops have got the right training, etc. Remember? The Professional Standards Bureau that takes its job so seriously! And do you remember who was the featured player in that stage production? Right. The adipose Andrew Goodrich, serial story-teller in the Kelly Thomas Affair, explainer of “excessive horning” tickets, etc.

Well, shit, howdy. And who was the Watch Commander on duty on the night of November 8th? The one who was in communication with his boss, Chief Danny Hughes, and who was therefore at the center of the Who Let Joe Go? controversy? That’s right! Goodrich.

So new Chiefie is promising that someday, maybe, the “bureau” run by Goodrich will get around to investigating…Goodrich. Well, isn’t that cute?

December 25, 2016December 27, 2016Behind Closed Doors

Happy Christmas – Complaint #48

by Joe Sipowicz35 Comments

Sometimes the best Christmas presents are the ones you give yourself. In this case that would be Complaint #PSB16-0048.

See, when you submit a complaint to the FPD about an incident that involves their personnel’s abandonment of policy, they do respond in writing. Here’s the response to the complaint filed by Travis Kiger about the behavior of the FPD cops who dealt with the Joe Felz incident in the early hours of November 9, 2016 in which Felz jumped a Glenwood Avenue Tree, ran over a tree, and attempted to leave the scene of the accident; all we know is that the doughty minions of the law confronted him in some as yet unknown manner, smelled alcohol on his person, declined to give him a Breathalyzer test and drove him home. We also know that the watch commander, the egregious Andrew Goodrich, and the former police chief Danno Hughes were in communication, a fact that most certainly never would have happened had you or I been the motorist. In fact, Goodrich would no doubt have our pictures in the next morning’s early editions.

Now, as to the content of the letter, notice how now the FPD has now decided to do nothing until the DA figures out what to do. It’s hard to see how this is anything other than temporizing, given the need to at least pretend to some proactivity on the matter to show the public – in a “timely manner.”

Of course we were also promised some sort of “independent person” report too, by our estimable City Attorney, Dick Jones, that seems to have vanished into the late December air. But a civilian investigation is important too, given what might be an overly charitable adios to Mr. Felz by sympathetic council members.

December 24, 2016December 24, 2016Behind Closed Doors

Felz Navidad!

by Jan Florys Dog4 Comments

December 23, 2016December 23, 2016Behind Closed Doors

Slidebar Rock-N-Roll: The Nexus of Nuisance

by Disillusioned Ex-Hippy31 Comments

We’re getting used to things like a City Manager involved in a crash getting a free ride home and no questions asked; for years downtown bars and night clubs have been masquerading as restaurants; Hell, we even had one club owner build a room addition on a public sidewalk and get away with it. How many FPD crimes large and small have been hushed up, made to go away? Who really knows?

But if ever a Fullerton resident wanted to find an example of how there are two sets of standards that apply to folks in our town, he need look no farther than a greasy institution called The Slidebar Rock-N-Roll Kitchen.

Playing the standards... — Poor misunderstood lad…

When it comes to double standards, no one quite succeeds like Jeremy Popoff, proprietor of the Slidebar.

Even if you are not a boozed up troublemaker from Norco, you may have heard of this place and its owner. This was the establishment from whence came the phony call that eventually cost Kelly Thomas his life five years ago. But this isn’t the story of a bar that wanted to get rid of a “nuisance.” No, this post is about a nuisance. A big one.

See, the Slidebar transforms into an entertainment venue at various times during the day, and every night. But the Slidebar has no Conditional Use Permit to so operate as required by the Fullerton Municipal Code. Why is that? Most likely because such a CUP would formally require noise monitoring. And there’s the problem.

Here’s a noise sampling from just outside this venerable establishment:

The Slidebar has been violating both the City’s noise ordinances and the noise levels established in the Transportation Center Specific Plan for years. The cops won’t do anything about it and neither, apparently, will the people paid to enforce the city’s code.

How come?

Stories have been circulating for years that the Slidebar treated Fullerton cops to free food and drink. Is this true? I don’t know, but it certainly gives pause – for a lot of reasons, maybe the least of which is an FPD lack of appetite for clamping down on this public nuisance.

And consider this: Mr. Popoff has made it his business to grease the political gears in Fullerton via campaign contributions. Big time. And is it any surprise that this fine establishment regularly hosts election night parties for incumbent city councilmembers?

I think I need a shower... — I think I need a shower…

Here’s a fun story from the Orange Juice Blog about our lobbyist-councilperson, Jennifer Fitzgerald, partying it up with the Slidebar proprietor, perhaps star-struck by Mr. Popoff’s low-grade celebrity and other mysterious charms. This was at precisely the same time that Mr. Popoff became such an expert at demographics and cartography that his districting map was chosen at the last minute by our feeble city council – unanimously. The sole purpose of that map was to illegally carve up downtown Fullerton – an indisputable “community of interest” – into five districts, thus ensuring that the downtown residents would never have a say in the governance of the open air saloon where they live. And the completely nonsensical ballot statement in favor of this gerrymandered embarrassment was written by none other than…Fitzgerald.

But back to the CUP and noise issues: would it be too cynical to suppose that Popoff’s connections to Ms. Fitzgerald is one of of the reasons this business continues to break the law with impunity?

December 22, 2016December 21, 2016Behind Closed Doors

The Great Disappearing Mayor’s Assistant

by The Fullerton Shadow17 Comments

Magicians have been making things disappear for a long time. In fact it’s a staple of the repertoire. Making a public employee position come and go is harder. That’s because in a public agency budgeted positions, like money, have to be approved by the governing board in the first place. And once budgeted they never go away.

And yet somehow, during the year of her re-election bid, lobbyist-mayor Jennifer Fitzgerald demanded, and got, a special assistant from Joe Felz to help her with her mayoral chores, without getting any authorization from the city council to create a new position.

The individual in question is called Gladys Blankenship, who is probably a very nice person. Here she describes the scope of her “official” position on Linkedin. Check out the second bullet point. The rest is ginned up bureaucratic nonsense.

Experience

Executive Assistant, Assistant to Mayor of Fullerton, Assistant to Economic Development Manager

City of Fullerton

December 2015 – Present (1 year 1 month)

• Participate in special projects to develop and implement new processes, develop and standardize practices, assist in streamlining methods for improving existing ordinance and procedures
• Schedule and prepare all appointments and meetings for the Mayor of Fullerton
• Provide office support for Mayor, City Manager and Economic Development Manager
• Provide research for ongoing projects being presented to City Council
• Provide knowledge and personal opinions on subject matters being presented in City Council and Economic Development Commission meetings
• Perform clerical duties requiring the application of subject matter knowledge and interpretation of policies, rules and procedures
• Provide assistance in preparation of draft and/or final form of material such as, memoranda, letters, reports, requests, etc., as assigned
• Check, compile and assemble records information in preparation for City Council meetings
• Assist in preparing and distributing agendas and related materials to various committees
• Maintain and update ongoing projects, records and office filing systems for both the Economic Development Department and Commission
• Provide information, including explanation of policies, procedures, rules and regulations, to City personnel and general public
• Copy, file and appropriately dispose of sensitive documents
• Record actions of meetings attended and transcribe taped records into minute format
• Maintain subject matter files and records
• Proficient in Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook

Looks like the deal was supposed to be that once Fitzgerald was safely re-elected, Ms. Blankenship would be quietly moved to another department where, presumably, a vacant budgeted slot existed to receive her tab. And we may safely infer that deal, since that is precisely what has happened; and Ms. Blankenship’s previous job has not been filled, nor will it be under new mayor, Bruce Whitaker.

Ms. Fitzgerald spent a lot of time during the election year lying about Fullerton’s allegedly balanced budget. It isn’t balanced, and hasn’t been for five years – ever since she came on to the city council. And now we discover that while the tide of red ink was rising ever higher, Fitzgerald demanded, and got, an employee all to herself.

December 21, 2016December 22, 2016Behind Closed Doors

How do Fullerton cops know if you’re too high to drive?

by Mr. Peabody24 Comments

Well, the short answer is that if they don’t get a call from the Chief of Police telling you to drive the dude home, they’ve got their man. And if they’re lucky they get to keep his impounded his car.

No, this is not Joe Felz…
Ironic use of photo by Bill Alkofer, OC Register

Seriously, though, the virtually useless OC Register ran another one of its slanted, pro cop pieces yesterday about the evils of mary-j-wanna, and I wouldn’t even bother posting about it except that it featured the images and words of Fullerton’s expert dope detecting cops.

The extreme irony of Fullerton cops being set up as exemplars in the detection of impaired drivers seems to have escaped the writers and editors at the Register, given the department’s behavior in the case of the Missing Maniacal Motorist, former City Manager, Joe Felz, who was apprehended after jumping a Glenwood Avenue curb, uprooting a tree, and trying to drive off. Despite emitting an odor of alcohol strong enough to be detected by a cop on the scene, the boyz in blue gave Joe a pass and a ride home. I’m not sure, but he may have been tucked into bed, and gotten a glass of warm milk and a cookie, too.

December 21, 2016December 21, 2016Behind Closed Doors

Our County Government Attacks 1st Amendment, Fails

by Joe Sipowicz12 Comments

Funny plastic handcuffs graphic borrowed from Voice of OC

Once in a while news from the County is so pregnant with consequences for us in Fullerton that we here at FFFF feel obliged to share it with the Friends.

Yes. I did that. Didn’t think you would remember.

In case you weren’t following the weird story: on Good Friday, 2015 3rd District Supervisor Todd “Super Victim” Spitzer got scared of a Christian proselytizer in a Foothill Ranch Wahoos, went out to his car and returned with handcuffs and a loaded pistol. He “hooked up” this poor sap and waited for the deputies to arrive. Of course nothing came of it. Mr. Bible was released from bondage and everybody went his own way.

Pretty weird, in a “dress up like a cop and play” sort of way. I mean, who drives around with handcuffs in his trunk, right?

Unfortunately for Spitzer, news of the bizarre incident was finally leaked to The OC Register who reported on it in August 2015, much to the merriment of the pistol-packin’ supervisor’s numerous detractors. But the story gets better – or worse – depending on your point of view.

Todd Spitzer gets emotional.
Photo by MINDY SCHAUER, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER –

Apparently Spitzer couldn’t leave the depiction of himself as a nutcase, alone. Sort of like obsessively picking at a scab. So he enlisted the help of Jean Pasco, the County’s press release writer to write some sort of clarifying/absolving press release. Although this document never saw the light of publication, the Voice of OC got wind of it and did a PRA request for all related docs. Hilariously, the County refused, claiming that unfinished documents don’t constitute “records.” The Voice sued the County for release of the relevant material. The County fought back.

It got worse. Under Spitzer’s guidance County Counsel demanded to depose Voice publisher Norberto Santana, ridiculously suggesting that conversations between him and Spitzer were relevant to the matter. Voice objected to the blatant harassment attempt.

On December 12, Judge Walter Schwarm “quashed” the depostion of the journalist . In legalese that means the judge shoved the matter right up Spitzer’s sorry ass. The County’s effort to intimidate a journalist was met with a stinging rebuke by the jurist.

Meantime, the completely unnecessary lawsuit drags on, the costs of which, when the County inevitably fails, will be borne by you and me. And where is our own Supervisor Shawn Nelson during all this? Nowhere to be seen or heard as far as I can tell. Evidently, he, too, believes that we peons are only to know things when he and his pals at the County feel like sharing, and that it is right and proper that we pay the costs of them keeping public information from the public.

December 20, 2016December 20, 2016Behind Closed Doors

OCDA Digs In!

by Joe Sipowicz27 Comments

The investigation was late, but it sure was unconvincing…

An alert Friend sent in this image of a guy recognized as Orange County District Attorney investigator, Abraham Santos, at the scene of the Memorial Joe Felz Crash Site. Well, now we know that the DA is indeed involved in this mess. What sort of crime he might be investigating and how he is investigating it, are far from clear. No one was ever arrested, or charged. We aren’t even sure if anybody got a traffic citation for reckless driving. Could the DA be investigating the behavior of the Fullerton cops? For some reason that idea provides no consolation. But the sooner the deal is whitewashed, the sooner we can get the video recordings made by the cop cams.

Also please note that Sappy McTree has been removed.

December 20, 2016December 20, 2016A Step in the Right Direction

Getting to the Bottom of It

by Joe Sipowicz10 Comments

We may have bid a fond adios to former City Manager, Joe Felz, but the mess he leaves behind still needs to be attended to.

The most timely issue is Fullerton Police Department personnel conduct in the Case of the Missing City Manager. The police on the scene of Joe’s Big Crash drove him home sans Breathalyzer test, and despite the fact that his vehicle had careened out of control and run over a parkway tree; and this after an evening of fun DTF libations and despite the fact that a cop on the scene smelled alcohol emanating from Joe. Did the cops follow their own rules? Or did they help their boss boss get away with a couple of crimes? From here, it looks pretty bad.

It’s been six weeks and nobody knows what’s being investigated. Or even if there’s any investigation at all.

What’s happening now? Certainly there’s no evidence of an internal investigation. Nothing more about the hiring of the mysterious “independent person.” And who really knows if anything got sent to the DA? Our city council (at least certain members) is in the dark, and so are we.

When the perps are about to get away, you gotta do what you gotta do. Filing a personnel complaint initiates an internal investigation, or at least a pretend investigation, into the events of election night, just in case one doesn’t already exist. So one of the Friends decided to do just that.

View compliant

When the investigation is complete, this complaint entitles the filer to a letter from the Chief of Police indicating whether the finding was sustained or not sustained. That’s not much, but something is better than nothing.