Pacific Strategies: Ventriloquism For Uncle Bill and The Little Kids

There's a little stick in back that makes my head swivel.

Sometimes its hard to tell whether certain people are stupid or lazy. Or maybe a little of both. Take, for instance, County Supervisor Bill Campbell who is currently the Chairman of the OC Children and Families Commission.

As a commissioner he has approved big PR contracts to his political pal Matthew J. Cunningham whom he also appointed to the County Parks Commission. And I mean really big contracts. And apparently free of either competition or real scrutiny.

Part of Cunningham’s job is to ghost write pro-commission “op-ed” pieces for politicians across the political spectrum who either can’t be bothered, or who are too illiterate to do it themselves. The topic of these scribblings is always the same: protect the tax revenue!

Here’s an invoice where Mr. Conservative Republican Wordsmith is wordsmithing hard for – Bill Campbell!

And looky here, we’ve uncovered the fruits of Mr. Cunningham’s labors in the OC Register.

There are some fun quotes about rigorous  audits and Grand Jury approbation that come a-tumblin’ out of the old mannequin’s mouth, but these are my faves:

“I can say unequivocally that if state government emulated the prudent, sensible and farsighted operations and budgeting practices of the Children and Families Commission, there would be no state budget crisis.”

Uh, yeah, like handing out a $200K per year PR contract that enables your pal to put semi-intelligent words in your mouth for $200 an hour.

“…while our commission contracts out as many functions as possible so more dollars go toward funding services rather than bureaucracy.”

See comment above. Contracting out unnecessary PR crap for $200 an hour services like facebook updates, going to lunch with Steve Greenhut, and passing out toothbrushes. Newsflash Bill – that robs funding. Contracting out for unnecessary services is incompetent. Directing that largess to a political crony is despicable.

“Taxpayers should cast a critical eye on the idea of abolishing such county Children and Families commissions, which are locally accountable and manage their budgets responsibly…”

Uh huh. Yeah. Sure, Bill.  You pass out hundreds of thousands annually for lobbying and PR most of which seems to be mysteriously directed outside Orange County. Well, Campbell also seems to be one of the masterminds behind the unintentionally hilarious Harry Sidhu for Supervisor campaign. And that, in a nutshell, really tells you all you need to know about that sawdust head.

And finally a free wordsmithing tip to the Wordsmith: when you’re going to put words in the mouth of numbskull try to avoid words like “panoply” and “unequivocally.”

More on Pacific Strategies and The Greenhut Lunch

Lunch is my favorite meal of the day.

In the comments thread to our post this morning on Matthew Cunningham billing the taxpayers $200 an hour to have lunch with former Register editorialist Steve Greenhut in September, 2008, an observant Friend “nobody” drew our attention to a July 2008 blog article written by Greenhut. In the article Greenhut calls for getting rid of the Children and families Commission altogether.

Well that wouldn’t do! So what does the Commission do? It sends its Ambassador to Conservatives, Matthew J. Cunningham and its Executive Director, Michael Ruane to lunch with Greenhut. Did Greenhut learn the errors of his ways? I wonder. Steve?

What I don’t wonder about is how much this lunch cost the taxpayers.

Oh, and for extra fun, read the one and only comment on Greenhut’s post. It’s by a guy named “Michael” and he’s he’s defending the Commission from State budget raids, calling that a new tax. Here’s the money quote from “Michael’s” comment:

“Granted, there are always imperfection and waste when government doing anything, but at least with Prop 10 the money returned to the counties where anybody could see if there is a misappropriation and fix it.”

Ho, ho! Imperfection and waste? Hoo boy, he nailed that one! But anybody could see if there is a “misappropriation?!” If by anybody, “Michael,” you really meant almost nobody, then we are agreed. How many people know the Commission has a $195,00 a year contract for PR with Pacific Strategies? How many people knew the Commission was paying Cunningham $200 an hour to read blogs, Facebook, recycle the same “op-ed” piece over and over again, and do all those lunches? For the love of God, Michael, please tell us you were only joking!

Hmm. Come to think of it now I wonder if Pacific Strategies didn’t write that comment for “Michael.”

Pacific Strategies – My Lunch With Greenhut

This tidbit harvested from the Pacific Strategies billings to Rob Reiner’s OC Children and Families Commission was way too good to pass up.

Here we see Mr. Conservative Pundit Matthew Cunningham hard at work setting up and then eating lunch with former OC Register editorial writer Steve Greenhut back in 2008. Looks like Executive Director Micahel Ruane went along. Maybe Cunningham acted as interpreter between the libertarian Greenhut and the social services bureaucrat Ruane. I guess that’s what they call a business lunch.

I wonder if the suffocating welfare statists persuaded Greenhut of the need for their commission.

NICK – WHY NOT SEND A MAILER TELLING VOTERS ABOUT FREE-SPENDING, INCOMPETENT CAREER POLITICIAN CLERK-RECORDER TOM DALY?

Last week Nick Berardino and his goons at OCEA sent out mailers alleging that 4th District Supervisor candidate Shawn Nelson voted in his own business interest to and that he did something for the campaign contributor who owned the Fox Theatre in Fullerton. All nonsense, of course.

These were really lame pieces and probably got Nelson a lot more votes than they cost him. But this effort was quite revealing in that it demonstrates the utter hypocrisy and self-interest of “Bullhorn” Bernardino and his crew.

What? I can't hear you, Bullhorn.

While this guy is making up stories about Nelson, he has turned a blind eye to a real government miscreant, County Clerk, Tom Daly whom we have busted giving jobs and no-bid contracts to friends and relatives of contributors, as well as pitching over two million bucks into the worthless property at 433 West Civic Center Drive. Oh yeah, and then there was that $48,000 contract given to another campaign contributor to “study” a sports hall of fame.

The OCEA has watered Tom Daly campaigns with more than $4000 over the years, no doubt hoping the investment would some day flower into something that looked like a county supervisor. Instead it helped create an incompetent little emperor that has no accountability, no oversight, and whose fiefdom is rife with cronyism and kickbackery and wasted millions.

I guess he's talking about me.

I would love to believe that Berardino meant to put Tom Daly’s name on those mailers because I would love to believe that Berardino was venting his righteous anger at the wrong candidate.  Yeah, right! The County’s public employee unions are going after Nelson because they are terrified of a real Board majority that will institute permanent and meaningful pension reform and conduct responsible contract negotiations.

But who knows? Someday maybe the OCEA will stand up to real corruption – even on the part of a Democrat. If they ever do they know where to come to get all the info they need. But I’m not holding my breath.

Water District Appears to Be Stonewalling For Disgraceful Director

Round round get around...

On April 14, I made a public records request of the Municipal Water District of Orange County to get the travel related expenses of Director Brett Barbre. You remember this fine fellow, don’t you? He’s the guy who was paid $48,000 by Tom Daly to “study” the idea of a sports hall of fame. He also kicked back $1000 into Daly’s campaign kitty. Now that doesn’t look very good does it? Especially for a Republican. Or for any honest man, really.

Part of Barbre’s supposed labors for Daly included a trip to Boston to visit some sports museum there (he never even bothered contacting the folks who started the first one right here in OC!). In his ‘report” he documented a side trip to Fenway Park. Barbre’s later plaint to Jennifer Muir that he paid for that Boston trip himself seems to have made an impression on the lassitudinous journalistic curiosity of Ms Muir, but not on mine. I wanted to find out if maybe the Boston junket itself wasn’t some sort of side trip already paid for by the Water District. I’ve just become so darn cynical when it comes to repuglicans.

And so I asked for Barbre’s travel expenses for the district.

Two week later on April, 28th (four days late) I got the District’s response from someone called Darcy M. Burke, Director of Public Affairs. I received no documents at all. What I got was an e-mail that attached a simple spreadsheet tallying Barbre’s expenses into periodic totals, presumably assembled by Burke. Not a single bit of specific information did I receive although I did get an unsolicited commercial about how much Director Barbre’s junketeering brings home to the Water District. Hmm.

Okay. So now I was really really curious about why they’re not releasing documents – just regurgitated, masticated, and useless pabulum.

Since April 28th I have left several messages and sent several e-mails following up with a demand for the specifics that should have been provided in the first place. All my efforts to communicate with the Water District’s Director of Public Affairs were met with a stony silence, until yesterday when Burke informed me that these things take time. And that only makes me more curious than ever about why she might be stonewalling.

Think they’re trying to hide something?

John and Ken, Meet Matthew Cunningham

Last Friday afternoon KFI’s John and Ken got hold of our post on the subject, and shared with their listeners the amusing notion that Matthew J. Cunningham of Red County fame actually got paid $200 an hour to listen to their show one day last year.

Here’s what they had to say.

More publicity for the OC Children and Families Commission. Well done!

Pacific Strategies – Propagandist for Suffocating Statism

I would humbly like to thank the Academy for this recognition...

The other day Orange County’s Most Hypocritical Repuglican (yes, that is one Hell of an achievement) Matthew J. Cunningham coughed up this Red County hairball in criticism of Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez:

How very congressional. And also ironic to listen to Loretta Sanchez speaking to a crowd of immigrants who came here seeking the American Dream,, even as she has been voting to make American more suffocatingly statist like the countries they left.

Is he really that breathtakingly unaware of the irony of the mouthpiece for the OC Children and Families Commission dumping on “statism.” Or could it be that he figures that whoever reads his post won’t know about his real day job; and if they do any comments revealing that fact will be deleted.

Aw c’mon Mr. C from Suite C, ‘fess up. You really, really dig suffocating statism; you profit from it and you shill for it. In fact, it’s just about your only real source of income.

Own it.

P.S. Wordsmiths “at the top of their profession” proofread their copy for embarrassing typos.

CSUF Going Way Out On Limb

We just received an e-mail from a young Friend, directing our attention to a story in the CSUF Daily Titan about the university trying to go ahead with the acquisition of the Hope University campus across Nutwood Avenue. We’ve been documenting the damage already done to mid-century architecture in the area and of course noting that the buildings on the Hope campus are architecturally significant – and would be demolished by CSUF.

According to the article funding would come from the sale of bonds. $30 million will be needed to close the deal. But of course the university employee cited says nothing about how the bonds are to be paid for. It seems that the school’s debt service ratio is already crappy – they’ve been spending like drunken sailors over there and their credit card is maxed out. Can anybody forget the debacle of the “University Heights” housing fiasco, here, and here? That didn’t help, either.

With the State budget cuts they’ve had to cut enrollment, and so student fee revenue is down.

And speaking of fees, it also seems as if the recent increases in fees and tuition have a lot of students pissed off, and using their dough to help swing future expansion that’s years off is going to rub a lot of people the wrong way.

So will the CS Chancellor’s office nix this massive added liability? Let’s hope so. CSUF President Milton is on clueless cruise control. Somebody needs to behave responsibly – and soon.

Pacific Strategies and the Big Toothbrush Caper

Flossing demonstrations are extra...

Apparently part of Matthew Cunningham’s deal as wordsmith to the OC Children and Families Commission  is to fill other functions from time to time – such as Ambassador to the Diocese of Orange with Dental Portfolio.

Here, in October and November 2007 we find Mr. Conservative Republican billing the taxpayers $200 an hour as coordinator of toothbrush distribution:

It seems as if the Commission was eager to insinuate itself into Catholic schools, too.

But did it not occur to anybody auditing these invoices at the Commission that it was a wee bit inappropriate to pay somebody that exorbitant rate to talk to somebody at the Diocese about handing out toothbrushes? Was anybody at the Commission even reviewing these invoices at all?

By the way, anybody out there know how many toothbrushes you can get wholesale for $200? Oy vey! Just more lax or non-existing oversight by our friends on the Commission.

Ironically, in the fall of 2007 Mr. Cunningham was hard at work in the trenches as a loyal foot soldier for the Diocese. But that’s a whole other matter.

MORE MONKEY BUSINESS AT THE CLERK-RECORDER’S OFFICE; TOM DALY AND HIS THREE AMIGOS.

Need a job?

It appears that Clerk-Recorder Tom Daly has mastered two skills in his eight years as head of the Clerk-Recorder Department. First, he has become a top-notch spender and waster of our dough. Second, he has mastered the art of creating jobs at tax-payer’s expense while receiving campaign contributions from the relatives of people he has employed.

Last week Daly hired Bruce Matthias, here. We learned from his campaign financial statements that Matthias’s wife Sonja Matthias had contributed to Daly’s now defunct campaign for Supervisor 2010.

Well, we looked deeper into his statements and found even more good old jobs for the boys (and girls) featherbedding. Look at this list.

In 2006, The Oftelie Company, run by former transportation bureaucrat Stan Oftelie, contributed to Tom Daly’s campaign. Could it be a coincidence that Stan’s son was hired shortly after this contribution and while the County was losing jobs. Stan’s son works in the Archives and was brought in as an “extra-help” employee which means that no competitive hiring process was conducted to bring him on board. I wonder what qualifies Stan’s son to work in the Archives.

The Walt Disney Company has been quite generous in its giving to Tom Daly’s campaigns. Since 2002, Disney and people connected to Disney have contributed more than $4000 to Tom. That’s just as much as the OCEA. Chris Lowe is the Government Affairs Manager for Disney in Anaheim. Well, Lo and Behold, Daly hired Chris Lowe’s wife to work in the Archives as an extra-help employee which, again, means that no competitive hiring process was conducted. And again the hiring was done when the County could least afford it.

In 2003 and 2005, James A. Liberio Realty made contributions to Tom Daly. Not surprisingly, Mr. Liberio’s daughter was also hired as an extra-help employee. So no competitive process was conducted to hire her. I’m unsure of her duties or qualifications.

Even during these tough times at the County, Daly has been budgeting at least $200,000 per year for extra-help hires. Despite revenues and workloads being at their lowest levels ever, Daly feels it is more important to keep his friends employed than to protect the interests of the public. Extra-help employees are basically at-will-employees and can be let go at anytime. I think that time has come now!

And I’d like to know why these these campaign contributors don’t hire their own relatives. Perhaps these people are not employable. Who knows?

Somebody needs to flush out this swamp of cronyism. Isn’t that why we have County Supervisors?