Fullerton 2010 Archives - Page 4 of 9 - Friends For Fullerton's Future

October 19, 2010October 27, 2010Dead heads

Sunday Afternoon Pilfery

So what do you do on Sunday afternoon after church and you don’t give a damn about pro football?

I know! Let’s go steal some campaign signs!

Let’s hope this was not the message of Sunday’s sermon!

An alert Friend snapped this image of a respectable-looking, necktied gentleman who was taking down “Bad Chi” signs on Euclid and Malvern. Here’s what our Friend told us:

“This Chi supporter was removing Bad Chi signs Sunday afternoon.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with Nextel Direct Connect”

Yikes! White collar, solid shirt! That 80s look ain’t workin’ for ya, brotha’.

Can anybody identify this lawbreaker? We are now giving odds that this guy is not related to Roland Chi in some way. And the odds are starting at 100-1.

October 18, 2010October 27, 2010Dead heads

Roland Chi: Thief

by admin68 Comments

When you’ve already been busted for poisoning folks, ignoring what you did, and then, finally having to give the DA a sample of your DNA to plea away your problems, what do you do for an encore?

roland-chi-079-200x300 — The cops support me. Of course I'm law abiding...

Roland Chi seems to have decided to resort to petty theft.

A helpful Friend just sent in the photos below, which were accompanied with testimony that he saw an individual stealing “No McKinley” signs at the intersection of Rosecrans and Bastanchury on Saturday. Well, guess who that van belongs to. It belongs to AR Market, the same business owned by Roland Chi that was the site of the repeated health code violations we reported here!

Why would Roland Chi’s crew steal “No McKinley” signs? Good question. Could it be because Chi and McKinley are both endorsed by the “public safety” unions and it’s just a case of one union stooge looking out for another?

McKinley2 — Roland's got my back. In fact we're writing a screenplay for a buddy cop movie.

We’ll be doing some sleuthing to see if can identify the idiot in these pictures in our ample image library.

And by the way, we’ve noticed a lot of “Bad Chi” signs missing. We’ll be looking into that thievery, too.

Sign-Theft-39 — Man walking over to No McKinley sign.

Sign-Theft-40 — Man taking No McKinley sign and stashing in van.

Sign-Theft-42 — Gotta cover those tags, genius!

It’s starting to look like Roland Chi can’t do a single thing honestly. I’ve filed a police report and have sent these images to the Fullerton Police Department. Let the wheels of justice turn (or spin, as the case may be)!

Take a bow, Roland.

October 14, 2010October 15, 2010Don Bankhead

Yep, Chi’s Non-Profit Was Used to Promote His Campaign

by Travis Kiger16 Comments

An unmarked compact disc was anonymously placed in our drop box the other day by someone who we presume is close to the Chi campaign. It was loaded with photos taken from Chi’s event last week, confirming earlier suspicions that Chi would be using his tax-exempt non-profit to promote his political campaign, in defiance of IRS tax rules.

Perhaps a more interesting observation: It looks like hardly anybody showed up.

The boring photos reveal a very small audience comprised mostly of political candidates, including Janny Meyer, Bev Berryman, Don Bankhead, and a few of their family members.

The whole event appears to be a lot of wasted effort for an unsuccessful attempt at self-promotion.

Of course, we couldn’t help but notice that the event was catered. For the health and safety of Chi’s guests, let’s hope the food didn’t come from his own supermarket.

Chi-Party-07-crop — Did you try the shrimp?

www.rolandchifullerton.com

October 12, 2010October 13, 2010Behind Closed Doors

CalPERS Delays Scary Pension Reports Until After the Election

by Travis Kiger15 Comments

A senior CalPERS attorney just told me that the annual pension liability reports for local agencies, which are normally distributed every October, have now been delayed until after the November elections. The delays are allegedly due to furloughs, but conveniently prevent local pension watchdogs from using the data to promote fiscally conservative candidates and pension reform leading up to the November 2nd.

This year’s reports would be the first to calculate pension liabilities after the disastrous market crash of 2008/2009 which caused CalPERS to loose a large portion of its holdings, which in turn has caused cities’ unfunded liability and annual contributions to skyrocket. But the damage to each city is unknown until the individual reports are released.

How bad will it be? Here’s one example: rough calculations show Fullerton’s “non-smoothed” unfunded liability for itspublic safety plan will soar past $100,000,000 this year, nearly three times the amount presented last year. Throughout the state, the debts shown in these report are likely to be shocking compared to previous filings.

The data would have undoubtedly been used to draw more attention to the dire pension situation in cities throughout California. The reports would have come just in time for local elections, which makes CalPERS’ stated cause for the delay extremely suspect.

The annual “Actuarial Valuation” reports are prepared by CalPERS actuaries for each participating agency to justify annual increases in required contributions. Here is a example of Fullerton’s public safety report for 2008, which is the most recent year available.

October 12, 2010October 12, 2010Fullerton 2010

It’s Time for Shawn Nelson to Rescind His Endorsement of Roland Chi

by The Fullerton Savage10 Comments

We’ve all heard the story….Shawn Nelson endorsed two candidates for Fullerton City Council, Bruce Whitaker and Roland Chi, before both decided to run for the same seat vacated by him when he was elected to the Board of Supervisors earlier this year. Fair enough, Mr. Nelson. There were three seats open on the Fullerton City Council, two four year seats and one two year seat, and you had no way of knowing when you gave your endorsements that Whitaker and Chi would run against one another for the single two year seat. But that was then, and now you have to make a choice about who you are supporting. Will it be Bruce Whitaker or Roland Chi?

Here are your choices…

Roland Chi:

As reported on this blog,

————-

Bruce Whitaker:

Serves on the Fullerton Planning Commission (appointed by Shawn Nelson)
Has lived in Fullerton for 22 years
Founded Fullerton Association for Concerned Taxpayers (FACT) and repealed an unjust utility tax
Statewide Coordinator for Municipal Officials for Redevelopment Reform (MORR), an organization dedicated to reforming out of control Redevelopment in California

Shawn Nelson, you can’t vote for both candidates. Do the right thing for your hometown and put your support behind Bruce Whitaker for City Council today.

October 11, 2010August 27, 2012Food and Drink

That’s Not Funny, Roland. That’s Sick.

by Travis Kiger43 Comments

Anyone who’s ever suffered from severe food poisoning understands how painful and dangerous it can be. It’s typically twelve to eighteen hours of intense vomiting with excruciating pain that can only be relieved by a morphine drip at the E.R. The symptoms are so intense that food borne illness causes an estimated 5,000 deaths per year in the United States.

Last year Fullerton City Council candidate Roland Chi was charged with multiple misdemeanor health code violations when eleven people got sick (source) after allegedly eating food prepared at the Arirang Supermarket in Garden Grove. The DA wrote that Roland holds the position of Director for the troubled Korean market.

Chi_Roland — Me? I don’t eat there anymore.

When county health inspectors showed up at the market to investigate the reported illnesses, they described conditions there as “filthy” and “contaminated”. The violations they listed include no hot water for hand washing in the restrooms, unacceptable sanitation practices, raw beef and seafood sitting at room temperature, filthy utensils being washed too close to meat, raw beef being washed with a garden hose, and raw beef water splashing all over the kitchen. And that’s only part of the first report, which also included these graphic photos:

The incident led to a meeting with the District Attorney and a few more health inspectors. The meeting minutes show that while interviewing with the DA, Roland Chi admitted to understanding all of the violations and promised that they would be corrected. Chi was warned with an exact date and time for another inspection one week later.

the-shrimps — Make sure you try the shrimp

When the health inspectors arrived for the follow-up, they found major uncorrected violations and a few brand new ones. And so after promising the DA that he would clean up his act, the market failed inspection for a second time.

wash-bucket — The hose water marinade adds something special.

That second report described an employee cutting squid while raw seafood juices were splashing on the nearby sesame oil and spices, along with a bunch of meat and seafood sitting out at room temperature.

But it gets worse. Two weeks later the inspectors came back and found even more violations, listed in a third report.

Just in case you think we are exaggerating, here are some of the health inspector’s own words:

Observed an employee scooping salt with a metal bowl (without handles) from the large pull-up container. The salt and the bowl were observed contaminated with a crusted build-up of meat blood. The sugar in the pull-up container was also observed contaminated with blood.
Observed a meat handling employee with a meat label in his mouth, then picking it up with his gloves and putting it on the meat packaging then resumes to meat serving/packaging process.
Observed an electrical fly catcher stored above uncovered rice bags in the produce department. Discontinue storing food beneath the fly catcher.
Observed an open sewer line between two walk-in coolers in the warehouse.

Workers — Table. Floor. Would you like some more?

If you’ve been counting, that’s three consecutive sets of violations, 11 sick customers and one smarmy owner. The DA decided to charge Roland and his business partner with five health code violations.

leakage — A seepage of unknown origin. Care to look closer?

Six months later the DA dropped the charges against Roland, presumably in exchange for his business partner’s guilty plea. Still, the damage to the victims had already been done. The DA’s charges against Roland Chi for persistent neglect for the health and safety of his customers would be quite disturbing even if he wasn’t running for city council. But since he is, we have to ask: Should someone this irresponsible be elected to run our city?

October 9, 2010October 9, 2010Fullerton 2010

Barry Speaks: Redevelopment Loans and the Lack of Public Input

by Travis Kiger13 Comments

This just came in from council candidate Barry Levinson:

Last Tuesday night was the vote on the issuance of housing bonds by the RDA in the amount not to exceed $29 million. The Mayor spoke and indicated that there will be no public comments on this issue.

The city attorney right before the vote was to begin, rightly reminded Mayor Bankhead that since the people cannot vote on whether or not to approve the bond issue, we should at least be allowed to voice our non-binding opinions.

Here are some of my comments I presented to the council:

Mayor and council shame on all of you for almost forfeiting our right as Fullertonians to speak out on this housing bond issuance.

We need better oversight over the RDA projects. The city council and the rest of the RDA should not be the ones policing themselves.

The RDA is the only taxing authority that requires no voter approval. We as taxpayers, S/B given more information and more time to review these bond measures before it comes to a vote by council.

Since there will be 2 possibly 3 new council members as of November 2, I suggested that this item be postponed to after the next election.

The council’s answers largely were defensive. No one touched on the third rail issue of no voter participation! Mayor Bankhead remained conspicuously quiet throughout the council’s responses to our objections.

And there you go; another council meeting where our rights as citizens were eroded and $29 million was obligated by the city council without a single vote cast by the people!

October 8, 2010October 8, 2010Fullerton 2010

Another Chi No-No: Using a Non-profit to Promote a Political Candidacy

by Travis Kiger27 Comments

Tomorrow the Roland Chi campaign is inviting supporters to an event hosted by his non-profit. Unfortunately for Chi, using a 501(c)3 non-profit organization to promote a political candidacy is illegal according to federal tax law.

Here is is in the IRS’s own words: “All 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office. Violations of this prohibition may result in denial or revocation of tax-exempt status and the imposition of certain excise taxes.”

If Chi is using his non-profit to pump up his campaign, he could indeed have another run-in with the law. Read this press release and decide for yourself if Roland Chi’s tax-exempt status should be called into question by the IRS:

————————-

NON-PROFIT FOUNDER ROLAND CHI TO AWARD SCHOLARSHIPS TO FULLERTON STUDENTS*Former Fullerton Mayor Buck Catlin and School Board Member Minard Duncan are attending the Fullerton Museum event this Saturday

FULLERTON – Roland Chi, City Council Candidate and Founder of The Sustainable Foundation of Orange County (SFOC), will award $1,500 in scholarship grants this Saturday, October 9, 2010, to the winners of the non-profit’s scholarship program. Chi will be joined by special guest community leaders, former Fullerton Mayor Buck Catlin and School Board Trustee Member Minard Duncan at the Fullerton Museum Center, located at 301 North Pomona Avenue in Fullerton. The event will begin at 9:30 a.m. and is open to the public, offering a free continental breakfast for guests in attendance. For further information and to view the event invitation, please visit www.rolandchi.com/events.

SFOC is a 501(c)3, non-profit organization dedicated to community development and supporting public service minded youth. SFOC Scholarships are available each year during the academic spring semester, inviting all southern California high school seniors to apply. Application and scholarship information can be found at www.scf-oc.org.

The Scholarship Review Committee evaluates candidates by their leadership and involvement in community activities, academic achievement, difficulty of coursework, letters of recommendation, and statement of purpose articulating the student’s future goals.

“We received many qualified applications, and it was very encouraging to see so many young students who had such high ambitions and passion to serve the community. The recipients of these awards all overcame unique hardships, achieved high scholastic marks, and showed exceptional promise for future success in public sector.”

This year, Michelle Cho, a Sunny Hills High School Valedictorian, will be awarded the highest scholarship of $1000. Cho is attending University of California Los Angeles and majoring in Anthropology. A scholarship of $500 will also be awarded to Fullerton High School graduate Ana Coria, who is attending University of California Riverside.

Candidate Chi, on behalf of SFOC, would like to thank all scholarship applicants and the Fullerton community for their support. For further information about Fullerton City Council candidate Roland Chi’s platform, additional endorsements, and upcoming events please visit www.rolandchi.com.

###

October 8, 2010October 8, 2010Fullerton 2010

Marty’s Commercial

by Travis Kiger11 Comments

Here’s the ad that Marty Burbank has been running on local cable channels:

Getting government out of the way so businesses can flourish seems to be a popular message this year. Local business owners love to share their city hall horror stories, providing ample fodder for candidates willing to speak out against the bureaucratic nightmare that Don Bankhead has excused for decades.

It’s just too bad guys like Marty can’t extend that “get government out of the way” concept to the redevelopment agency, which harms the local economy in much the same way through economic interference, crony capitalism and the diversion of tax dollars from core services.

Oh well. Getting it half-right is better than nothing.

October 7, 2010October 7, 2010Fullerton 2010

Not From Around Here: 96% of Chi Donations Come from Outside of Fullerton

by Travis Kiger10 Comments

People usually donate to local campaigns because they have a vested interest in the future of that city. Most would say that they are hoping to contribute to good governance. A few of them might have a monetary gain in mind. Either way, the majority of funding for Fullerton campaigns comes from Fullerton residents and businesses themselves.

Roland Chi is the exception. His first campaign statement was turned in yesterday, and it shows that 96.5% of his campaign donations came from businesses and residents who don’t have much to do with Fullerton at all. Here’s the breakout:

Of course, every candidate has a few friends living elsewhere who are eager to help out, but the disparity of Chi’s campaign funding should raise a few eyebrows.

Why are these donors suddenly interested in what happens to Fullerton? Do they really care about our city? Probably not.