On last Tuesday’s City Council closed session agenda, an item popped up that surely bears close examination.
This is about an appeal regarding a decision involving “post retirement employment.” That means it involves CalPERS the massive pension program for public employees in California. Obviously CalPERS came down on these four individuals listed for violating terms of retirement, terms meant to make retirement a serious decision. I’m moderately familiar with the rules. The basic ones are that if you are officially retired you can’t go back to work for any CalPERS agency for more than 960 hours a year, and you can’t take on the responsibilities of a full-time employee.
Gone, not quite forgotten…
Friends may remember Jeff Collier, former City Manager of Whittier, who was the “Interim” City Manager after Steve Danley (an OCERS retiree and therefore eligible), for a while in 2021-22. Did Collier work more than 960 hours? Can an “Interim” qualify to get around CalPERS restrictions? I don’t know.
Pfost came to Pfullerton…
I don’t remember a Cindy Collins, but a do recall Gregory Pfost, retired head planner from Laguna Beach who washed up on Fullerton’s shore.
A Manfro all seasons…
Finally, there’s Eddie Manfro, retired City Manager from dysfunctional Westminster who hired on a few years back as an HR consultant, I think, and became the de facto HR Director. He is now the Interim City Manager.
The one thing all these individuals have in common is that they were and are, well-aware of the limitations placed on CalPERS retirees, so whatever the violations are that are being appealed, should have been avoidable.
I would like to know how Fullerton got stuck with this embarrassment and who is paying the legal costs for the waiver process and the appeal. I get the feeling we are paying.
There is a conga line of eccentric bloviators who keep showing up at Fullerton City Council meetings to berate the so-called “council majority.” Some of them are quite abusive and accusatory. Some then try, or pretend to try, to get the objects of their disapprobation to do something for them. Any attaching tissue to reality seems to be non-existent.
That Ahmad Zahra sure puts on a show for his cult followers. During Tuesday’s “council communications” he went on a pathetic 11 minute emotional roller coaster ride, a real self-pity party that was full of his special brand of histrionics – gestures, knowing nods, glances at who knows who, dramatic pauses, pained looks, and near-tears expressions.
I am the light, the truth and the way…
Good Lord, what a valediction! Departing hero, victim, saint, champion of the downtrodden and upholder of truth and justice.
Of course it was a damn waste of everybody’s time. But when you’re a self-aggrandizing narcissist that’s the last thing to worry about. In fact, your speech is just the capper to a long conga line of oddball public commenters you have stirred up to attack your political enemies. And he still has a whole year to keep repeating the performance.
Meantime, the Kennedy Sisters who run the pretend news outlet Fullerton Observer still haven’t mentioned Zahra’s decision not to run for re-election. You would think Sanka and Sharon Kennedy would fall all over themselves to shower sickly sweet encomiums upon the object of their infatuation. But no. The proverbial deafening silence.
Zahra put out his statement over two weeks ago and there has been no mention on the Observer site of Zahra’s departure at the end of 2026. We know that the Observer operation is incompetent and completely biased, but this neglect has got to be deliberate. Why?
It’s been speculated, and with some justification, that the Sisters are waiting until the Democrat Machine can find and endorse a replacement for Zahra; and that once all the endorsements are locked up and any District 5 Dem rivals swept aside, all will be revealed and the anointed one revealed to hallelujahs and hosannas.
The anointing oil was greasy and left fingerprints, and didn’t take…
This doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. What difference does it make to let Fullerton Boohoo know Zahra’s story – even the implications? That might even look like sort of real journalism.
But hey, these are the same dummies who aided and abetted Scott Markowitz in 2024. Maybe they really believe they need to keep the cat in the bag while they find another Cannabis Kitty Jaramillo to roll out.
Back in March 2025 the Fullerton City Council decided to fire the City’s ambulance contractor and take the responsibility in-house. Why? Well, naturally there’s the official story, which is that there will be some sort of saving, which is nonsense, since it means adding 20 new public employees on the payroll, and was all based on wishful thinking. So instead of shopping out the paramedic business like Placentia did, Fullerton did the opposite, requiring acquisition of ambulance rolling stock and the various other appurtenances like gurneys, etc.
On this Tuesday’s Council meeting Agenda Item #10 proposes a payment plan for this nonsense. Guess what? It looks desperate. City staff is still proposing to finance the acquisition of all the ambulance stuff through acquiring debt, via a master agreement with Bank of America to buy City bonds at a coupon rate of 3.5%, and then use the proceeds to lease ambulances.
Well, there she goes. Don’t worry. There’s more where that came from…
Yes, you read that right. We’re paying for Fire Department empire creation with $2,000,000 credit. The capital repayment and interest on the bonds would amount to $2,175,000 by the time the last bond matures in November 2031. And let’s not forget the dough paid to bond counsel and financial consultants (UFI) who are selling this deal. And oh, yeah, let’s consider there’s now insurance, maintenance, fuel, etc., of vehicles owned by the lessor (BofA), which was all glossed over last April 1st, as was the cost of financing which is over $200,000.
The single Agenda Item #10 staff report sentence justifying the financing is laconic, and notable for what it doesn’t say; that the City still plans to finance the purchase orders for this equipment supposedly issued in April. Here’s all we are told:
“Urban Futures, Inc. (UFI), the City financial advisor, and staff determined private placement financing offers the most beneficial and cost-effective solution for the City.
But there is no explanation why. None at all. Zip. Is the City borrowing $2,000,000 at a lower interest rate that it is making in an investment pool? Who knows? The City Council and the public aren’t informed, just as they weren’t informed when financing was proposed back in April.
The fun aspect of this is that the lease of these ambulances would be rent-to-own, a little con – making the credit-risk-uninformed think they are getting something great. I mean, who doesn’t want to own stuff, right? What good is a owning a six year old old ambulance? I don’t know, but my guess is they depreciate really fast. Maybe even faster than rent-to-own toasters.
He’s on it…
I really don’t know what to say about this completely unnecessary move. If the Council had just voted no on the unsolicited plan from the FFD we wouldn’t be looking at having to cover any loan vig at all. Neither the Councilmembers who voted for this – Zahra, Charles, Jung and Valencia had much if anything to say about this bond/lease back in April.
This is how I bought my first car, a 1991 Yugo!
Of course Zahra and Charles don’t give a rat’s ass about wasting money, especially when they script some sort of feel-good performance. Hopefully, Jung and Valencia will change their minds about this resistible offer, but I’m not optimistic. Maybe Dunlap can talk some sense into them.
With Fullerton tottering on the edge of financial meltdown the Council’s behavior towards the fire department (and its union employees) has been highly irresponsible. In October they accepted a one-time FEMA grant to hire a platoon of new “fire fighters” that we will become completely responsible for in 3 three short years, pensions and all.
No, I’m not optimistic at all. The financial leveraging is bound to be used as a pretext to pass a sales tax increase next year. And what if that fails?
At the last Fullerton City Council meeting Councilwoman Shana Charles put the Les Amis as victim narrative on display again. Here’s what she said:
First, Pilgrim Café was not on the now-mercifully defunct Walk on Wilshire. Neither was Les Amis, of course. Those were just a couple of casual lies to remind everyone of her great success – WoW – instead of what it really was: an expensive, stupid, feel good, boohoo urban intervention that impeded traffic and hurt small businesses on Wilshire Avenue.
That led her into the revelation of a “coming soon” restaurant sign on the building where Les Amis is housed! Poor, delicate Shana was devastated – almost near tears at any moment, it seemed – at the likelihood that Les Amis was suddenly going to be something else not run by the Noaccounts of Montecristo because of course “that food was (past tense!) their heart and their culture.” Oh! The humanity!
Destroyer of Worlds…
The unspoken theme of this little speech (and parroted constantly by the Kennedy Sisters) was that Fullerton’s City Council, and especially the evil Mayor Fred Jung, is intent on destroying all good things in Fullerton. No explanation given or needed.
Spinning, spinning…
Of course distraught Shana again felt no moral compulsion to relate the truth: that Les Amis‘ patio on public property was cleared out because they serially refused to pay rent to the City, and kept encroaching without legal permits. Really another lie by omission.
But let’s not not share our pseudo-intellectual windbag councilwoman’s lament. Jinan Montecristo, who owns the building, simply rented out the empty front part to some sort of Italo-something restaurant, and it is now open. If Charles had actually taken the time to trudge herself around the corner she might have learned that Les Amis was indeed, still open; and that a tenant was moving into the heretofore empty front of the building.
Not paying your bills is the best way to become a Sharon Quirk Woman of the Year!
But that would have spoiled the ongoing narrative that demands weeping for a downtrodden victim and a wicked council majority who was somehow personally responsible for the shameful and wanton destruction of the Les Amis rented patio.
You know, looking at that picture above, a couple questions spring to mind.
Is that new restaurant paying rent to the City for the area where their tables and chairs and umbrellas are now located? We know the Noaccounts of Montecristo were using it illegally for free; did poor, downtrodden Jinan relate to her new tenants that they needed a permit and a lease with the City? Hmm. I wonder.
And as a second thought, I wonder if anybody bothered to get construction permits for any new interior remodeling for stuff like plumbing, HVAC and electrical work.
Is it true. When his lips are moving he’s generally lying, as the saying goes.
It was all about “serving,” mostly serving himself, of course. Never forget: his second big decision was to get himself appointed to the lucrative OCWD board in exchange for appointing Jan Flory to the City Council in 2019; his first big decision had been to call for a replacement election.
“Community-driven representation” means stirring up a handful of uninformed people to harangue honest council members and bully them into submission on a useless $2,300,000 trail through a blighted industrial area.
Is this a true statement or only a feint? Is it a mechanism to win sympathy for a mayoral appointment on December 16th? The latter certainly isn’t going to happen any way you slice it. Or is this a realization that his self-serving ego leap is over and that he landed in the sand some time ago?
Right after the City Council votes to ban nitrous oxide in Fullerton, they will discuss the creation of an ad hoc (that’s Latin, darlin’) committee of two councilmembers to work with staff to develop sales tax ballot measure language. It’s item #20 on your scorecard.
Well, there she goes
The tax idea was floated by an earlier ad hoc committee, the so-called Sustainable Budget Committee, or something suchlike. That committee ultimately decided to recommend to limit the parameters of the tax to two different special half-cent sales taxes, one for infrastructure and one for our old friend “public safety.” It was probably reasoned that they would get more support than a general sales tax, but they need a two-thirds vote of approval for a special tax – a tough nut to crack.
Of course, a General Tax increase only needs a 50%+1 threshold to pass. But you need a council super- majority – 4 votes – for that to get on a ballot, and that seems highly unlikely.
You will be taxed…sooner or later!
It’s been painful to watch this drawn out Kabuki and it seems as it if will go on at least until the deadline for getting on next year’s ballot. Fortunately there is little chance that Mayor Fred Jung will let the obnoxious and incompetent spendthrift “doctors” Ahmad Zahra and Shana Charles anywhere near this language-developing process.
We have all seen the way that these government-written ballot measures twist language and logic to try to fool the public to approve them. The examples are so plentiful they hardly need enumerating. Remember the ill-fated Measure S in Fullerton? Hoo Boy was that some seriously misleading bullshit. Hopefully, Jung can require a simple and honest text without the usual treacle.
My cynical side wonders how much of the infrastructure tax language will actually include funding for the cops and financial bailout for the idiotic firefighter-union-members-as-ambulance-drivers decision, or FEMA FFD expansion grant nonsense. Anyway you cut it you want those well-funded unions on board for the inevitable campaign PR campaign.
Cry harder…
Fullerton Boohoo and the Kennedy Sisters will be crying out loudly that the fix is in by their new bogeyman – the evil Bushala Bloc – and that any ballot measure language will be crafted to fail without the steady guidance of our in-house council “intellectuals.” Tender young sprout Elijah will demand TRANSPARENCY. They may even still squawk about the need for a General Sales Tax increase, after all. But I think that Good Ship Lollipop has sailed.
On Tuesday’s Fullerton City Council meeting staff is proposing to spend $1,400,000 million dollars on four vehicles. The items are all on the “consent calendar” meaning they’ll probably be approved unanimously and no questions asked. And that’s a shame.
That shit’s expensive!
The Item #9 is to spend $116,000 to fix a fire engine that was allegedly struck by a careless motorist as it left a station. The front end was damaged. While the staff report is very quick to absolve the FFD of any fault, there is also no mention of an insurance payout from the motorist. Was he or she insured? If there is a payout where will that money go?
One of the key things to understand about these firefighting machines is that they are effectively proprietary. The custom vehicle came turnkey to Fullerton from the Oshkosh Corporation of Appleton WI, who owns the builder – Pierce Manufacturing. But when you need a repair, where ya gonna go? To a Pierce approved repair shop, that’s where. In this case ReNewell Fleet Services, out Ontario way.
Item #10 is purchase of a new Compressed Natural Gas Crew truck from CTEC of Downey. Price tag? $425,000. It seems that poor old CNG Crew Truck Unit No. 551C is at the end of its service life. This truck is used for water system fixit and has a backhoe on the back – which seems like the place you would want to put it. The staff report is pretty odd, requesting the council to forgo a competitive bid process since CTEC was the only “informal” responder with a truck that fit the bill. No mention of a sole source documentation. Zip. The sales tax we pay on this item alone is a rather shocking $30,000. We may console ourselves that $5000 of that tax will go into our own General Fund.
One wonders if this acquisition isn’t akin to buying a custom fire engine in Wisconsin.
Why the Water Fund doesn’t pay for this directly points to an ongoing problem of the City comingling City expenses with those of the Water Fund, a fund that should be independent and transparent and hasn’t been for over 50 years I’m told.
Hey, that debris isn’t going to dump itself…
Item #12 is a whopper – $831,000 to buy a couple of 15′ dump trucks at $415,000 apiece, from the good folks at PB Loader Company in Fresno, via a middleman, Sourcewell, who gets government agencies a discount through a cooperative purchasing contract.
Alas, the two aged dump trucks proposed for replacement, Unit Number 562B and 565C, have also “reached the end of their reliable service life.” Of course these rigs are basically design-build vehicles which is why they are so damned expensive, and one wonders aloud if Fullerton couldn’t get 4 or 5 dump trucks ready-made for less.
Anyway, we are informed that “These trucks are critical to maintaining the City’s infrastructure and supporting rapid response during storm events, road failures, and water or sewer emergencies.” Hmm. And by the way, worry not. The money has already been budgeted in the Equipment Replacement Fund. There is no mention of what happens to the existing vehicles after they are replaced which is always a good question to ask.
Sales tax for our new super dumps? $60,000. So we get to keep about ten grand of that.
A week and a half ago Fullerton councilman Ahmad Zahra agendized an item to dole out $200,000 from the General Fund to immigrants hassled by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He thought it was an excellent opportunity to burnish his own immigrant travails to the full house. He didn’t bother sharing any of the details of his own arduous trail to citizenship, of course – like his marriage fraud – a federal crime.
Fortunately, the distinguished ladies of FFFF’s Fine Arts, Cinema, and Book Club Division have recreated the elevation of the poor, Syrian immigrant to what he is now – a poor (targeted, don’t forget!) American citizen.
Enjoy the histrionics: the wistful smiles, the knowing head bobs, the empathetic tone.
I guess Zahra figures he can get away with telling only a small part of his heroic origin story, even if it changes a little now and then. The whole story, or most of it, was hidden for decades in order to create the Zahra brand he sells to the ignorant.
I guess we’ll see what the 4th District voters have to say.
Sweet flower Elijah Manassero has just lost his temper. Did he miss his midday nap? Does he have a full diaper? Who can say? What I do know is that he has scribbled another of his diatribes for the Fullerton Observer Sisters, piling on their desperate narrative that the owners of Les Amis are victims of some sort of conspiracy in City Hall.
Les Amis sans meubles…
The City finally removed Les Amis stuff from City property a few weeks ago after the aforesaid business spent a decade and a half dodging rent, stalling, trying to weasel out of signed agreements and of course, encroaching onto public space without permit or agreement on several occasions.
The defenders of the indefensible are trying to ignore all the facts of the Les Amis history of scofflawry, and pretend that the substantial 2022 rent increases by the City were insufferable, and hence non-payment justified. And anything that happened before this gossamer pretext is wished into Fullerton Boohoo’s collective cornfield.
Off you go. We’ll hear nothing of the kind…
Tender fleur Elijah calls his article a “history,” but conveniently omits most of Les Amis‘ real histoire, and like a typical Observer reporter shares unsubstantiated conversations related to him by Ms. Jinan Montecristo – the alleged victim in all this – as gospel. Young pup Elijah mentions nothing before 2022, of course, and even Les Amis recent spotty history of non-payment goes unmentioned.
Young Elijah pops up in the garden…
Fragile and fresh Elijah has tried to speak with nobody inside of City Hall to get the true litany of Les Amis bad behavior. That would be uncomfortable. He accepts as true what he has been told by the noaccounts of Montecristo without reservation. Did he get any facts from Mayor Fred Jung about the removal of the Les Amis detritus? Nope. Might he have been told that the upcoming discussion of lease rates in the future has nothing to do with lease obligations in the past and due now? Of course. Did he he inquire about the fact that maybe the removal of the stuff happened at 6:30 am so as not to block the adjacent alleyway during business hours? No. That would interfere with the conspiracy narrative.
Found another victim! Of me!
Since the young fleur Manassero visits and cites this blog all the time, he knows very well that his mentor and manipulator, Ahmad Zahra, voted to implement the 2022 rates; and he knows that the Montecristo clan said nothing about it at the June 21, 2022 public hearing. He has obviously decided that these facts aren’t necessary to convey his nonsensical narrative. Why clutter up your prosaic propaganda with embarrassing information?
And why should Fullerton expect anything resembling honesty, integrity, or basic journalistic ethics from The Fullerton Observers and its proprietors – the Kennedy Sister, Sharon and Sitka.
