Friends For Fullerton's Future
FFFF supports causes that promote intelligent, responsible and accountable government in Fullerton and Orange County
Redevelopment is Government removing existing homes, businesses, and other buildings and replacing them with something different. The history of redevelopment in Fullerton has lead to a long string of ugly, deteriorating buildings and outright failure.
A McDonald’s eatery near Fullerton Union High School, where one-third of the ninth-graders in a multiyear study were found to be obese.
Sharon Quirk, we promise you one thing, you will never regret changing your mind on this one.
So far we have chronicled the story of a city park that nobody needed, with a proposed name no one wanted. Once construction was done, what had heretofore been a waste of time and money was soon to take a new twist.
It was discovered that a flume of toxic material contaminated the west half of the park.
Nobody in City Hall had bothered to do an environmental assessment before buying an old piece of industrial zoned property: not Gary Chalupsky the Redevelopment Director; not Susan Hunt the Community Services Director; not Bob Hodson the Engineering Director. All these Directors and nobody was directing anything. Perched atop of this shaky pyramid of incompetence sat Jim Armstrong, just waiting to bug out for the soonest better deal that offered itself. By the time the park was built Armstrong was gone, and his protege Chris Meyers was in charge – and probably damn glad this was Fullerton, where nobody was ever held accountable for anything.
Since 2003 a fence has been set up around the contaminated half of the park. Meanwhile the City has been wrangling with the Gas Company over clean-up costs. This is now 6 years of embarrassing closure, and counting. Half the park has been fenced off.
Meanwhile, too, the few Fullertonians who were actually paying attention found out how little park $1,500,000 in land and $1,900,000 in construction gets you nowadays: a prefabricated toilet building, among other things. And the City continued its tradition of ludicrous design, for instance a monument sign with its own little roof! How precious!
And as predicted, the half-park attracted just the sort of element you don’t want hanging around your parks and your kids – gang taggers, cholos, and neighborhood borrachos. Fortunately few kids seem interested in playing there anyway.
As this park degenerates we wonder how long it will be and how many consultants hired and studies performed to recommend the re-Redevelopment of this park; or to pave it over for Metrolink parking! Since we know that the City doesn’t like to part with territory once they acquire it, we can only speculate about future foibles in the Never Ending Story.
Read the rest of the Paseo Park Chronicles – Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3
This is a story that relates a chain of events that goes back many years, Gentle Readers, so please be patient. For those who don’t think Redevelopment spends half its time fixing mistakes it created with the other half, we promise that you will learn a lot about the way your city has been run – in three bite-size installments.
Way, way back in the 1980s Terry Galvin of the Redevelopment Agency cooked up a deal with the Union Pacific Railroad to acquire their Mission Revival depot on Truslow and Harbor. It was properly seen as a valuable historic resource, but damn the luck! It was on the wrong side of the tracks! Galvin’s plan was to relocate it to its current location on Harbor and Santa Fe, attach a weird-looking wood box addition to it, and present it to his pals at The Spaghetti Factory for $1 a year. The first of Fullerton’s subsidized restaurants offered cheap carbs to the masses, and why not? They weren’t paying any rent!
But how does this narration tie into something called “Paseo Park” you ask? Patience, Friends, patience.
As usual the Redevelopment “experts” created more problems than they solved, for the empty lot created by the relocation was soon to become a permanent dumping ground for trash and junk – right next to Harbor Boulevard in the veritable gateway to Downtown Fullerton! And the painful irony: blight as a by-product of Redevelopment! But it was in the barrio so nobody cared.
But cleaning up junk on railroad property is not nearly so fun as playing Monopoly with other people’s money, and the problem festered for years and years – almost twenty to be exact; until the Union Pacific decided to unburden itself of this section of track and the adjacent depot site. Despite the fact that that the railroad was in negotiations with private citizens to buy the old depot site, the Redevelopment Agency led by Gary Chalupsky intervened, and acquired the property itself – with the ludicrous intention of building a trail and an adjacent park. The “trail” itself was utterly useless since it effectively ended at the Highland Avenue grade separation on one end, and the SoCo Walk project at the other. The park occupied the former depot space between Truslow and the trail. Check out the aerial.
And all the property was removed from the property-tax rolls forever.
Apart from the trail to nowhere, the park project itself was a dubious venture from the start. The location was not auspicious, and nobody from the community really wanted it. Sparsely attended “community” meetings showed that people on Truslow were concerned about on-street parking and getting rid of blight – not creating more. And they weren’t interested in a hang-out for the local gangs and borrachos by creating a “pocket park.” Well the City never let that sort of thing stand in the way of progress.
Skeptical observers noted that vast Richman Park was only a few blocks away, but this did not dampen enthusiasm in City Hall for a land grab: Susan Hunt, the Director of Community Services, was in a facility building mood – and that’s all that counted. Redevelopment money was there to grease the skids.
Read the rest of the Paseo Park Chronicles – Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3
This YouTube clip of a recent Fullerton Redevelopment Agency strategy/workshop session is a must see for anyone who wants to see how their decisions are made. The audio has been artfully overdubbed to protect councilmembers from appearing ridiculous and thus preserving the dignity of their office.
Listen to Councilman Shawn Nelson as he effectively guts the findings of blight necessary to establish the proposed redevelopment expansion. He applies intelligence and common sense to this issue that would, if imposed, negatively effect the future of Fullerton. Undeterred by staff and colleague pressure, he stands on principle instead of prevarication and political expediency.
Folks, this is what a real leader looks and sounds like.
One of our sharp-eyed Friends took a photo of this banner last Tuesday morning. By Tuesday night, it was gone.
During its brief life, it asked the telling questions:
The sign hits McDonald’s hard, though—to be fair—McDonald’s doesn’t want to move at all. Just like the residents who lived in the demolished homes didn’t want to move. Redevelopment hard at work!
After all, that fence is paid for by the taxpayers, just as everything else in this $6 million supersized boondoggle!
And it was covering the eyesore of the vacant lots where vintage homes once stood.
Take pity on your campus, you FHS alums Quirk and Keller! Listen to the District Board members. Superintendent Escalante told City Manager Armstrong back in 2001 that the school does not want a McDonald’s across the street or its drive thru lane accessing already congested Pomona Ave. That information has been covered up for years!
Last night we sat through the horrendous hearing on Redevelopment expansion. It was really a pretty painful thing to have to endure.
City staff and their consultant put on a performance that can only be termed embarrassing. To describe it any farther would do an injury to my synapses, and so I’ll pass. Their presentation was eviscerated by Councilman Shawn Nelson and several speakers from the public – notably former Councilman Conrad Dewitte, former Congressman Bill Dannemeyer, GOP Central Committe member Bruce Whitaker; and perhaps the best of all, Jane Reifer . We note that our lawyer Bob Ferguson showed up too. We can smell a lawsuit coming.
The case boils down to this: you can’t create a Redevelopment project just because you need the money. It’s been done for years, but judges are finally starting to uphold the law. About time.
One of the words that the cheerleaders of the expansion kept using was “tool” and this sure was appropriate since city staff and the Jones/Bankhead team dredged up a number of tools to come to the meeting and add moral support.
There was Theresa Harvey of the Chamber of Commerce who mumbled and stumbled her way through a statement clearly not written by her; a character by the name of Rick (or Dick – can’t remember) Price representing an outfit that goes by the hilarious name “Fullerton Positive” and wears smiley face buttons on their lapels; John Phelps – one of the biggest welfare recipients in Fullerton’s Redevelopment history ; and former councilman Peter Godfrey – who could only be seen from behind. It was nice to see Peter again, if only his backside, to remind us of his vacuous tenure on the council and recall that he was one Linda Lequire whip crack away from voting to keep the obnoxious Utility Tax.
As expected Bankhead and Jones were shilling hard throughout the hearing, Jones giving one of his brilliantly cuckoo rants complete with crazy gesticulations.
Since Pam Keller recused herself, Sharon Quirk became the necessary third vote and she kept noncommittal, sensing no doubt the political pitfalls of either position. She asked a lot of questions that seemed rehearsed with staff, and acted like she wanted more information from the lame consultant. We have to question her sincerity since she’s already had plenty of time to lay out the ground rules before last night – the proverbial 11th hour. And so we got the strong sense of a kabuki performance. The simple fact is that Quirk could have killed the deal last night. The fact that she permitted the monster to live indicates she will be going for this when it comes back on June 18th.
It seems a little strange that an organization that purports to support the interests of business would allow itself to become an impotent pawn in a game run by and for city bureaucrats. And yet that is exactly what has happened.
This afternoon the City Council received an e-mail from Theresa Harvey, Executive Director of the Chamber in support of the proposed Redevelopment expansion on tomorrow night’s City Council agenda. The letter attached to the e-mail would be comical if there weren’t so many dues paying members of the Chamber who will get screwed by Redevelopment.
Harvey starts out by trotting out all the old cliches about infrastructure, housing and business climate. What she utterly fails to mention is how Redevelopment diverts a finite amount of disposable income of consumers from existing businesses to new ones; how it invites bureaucratic interference in business decisions, thus impinging on entrepreneurialism; how it requires business and property owners to endure the idiotic design review process; how it selects favored businesses and “developers” as winners, to the detriment of others. In short: Redevelopment does not work. it is a government ponzi scheme that leverages bonded indebtedness off of property tax revenue; it discriminates against the majority of businesses in favor of a few; and any policy or program that discriminates against the majority of business is, by definition, ANTI-BUSINESS!
Ms. Harvey decorates her tribute to Redevelopment by citing the “charm” of downtown Fullerton. Anyone who has been reading these pages lately knows that whatever charm Fullerton has, it has in spite of Redevelopment, not because of it. Does she support giving away public sidewalks? Does she approve of squandering millions of dollars to move a fast food outlet 200 feet? Does she like giving away free public land to developers? She must. She must like it a lot.
You would think that the businesspeople on the Board of the Chamber of Commerce would have enough sense to grasp these simple notions. But when you reflect on the fact that our old friend Dick Jones, a government educated doctor, used to be the president of the Chamber, the institutional dysfunction of this group can be discerned in much clearer focus. The Fullerton Chamber of Commerce has become nothing but a sissified adjunct of City Hall, confusing their own alleged mission with that of the City apparatchicks.
To the members of the Fullerton Chamber of Commerce: stop paying your dues until your Executive Director and Board start defending business instead of government expansion and bureaucracy!
On May 5th, the Fullerton City Council will once again take up the matter of a vast new Redevelopment land grab in Fullerton. The bureaucrats in City Hall want to appropriate all the property tax that they can by throwing the Redevelopment net over a huge swath of the City. In order to do so they must find “blight” and they must be able to prove it. So far they haven’t. They never will.
What does “redevelopment” mean in practical terms? It means the diversion of property taxes from other government agencies; it means the power of eminent domain over law-abiding property owners; it means more massive developments by favored developers; it means more design mediocrity – or worse.
Devoted Friends of Fullerton, over the past few weeks we have favored you with a litany of loose accountability and lax responsibilty exhibited by Fullerton’s Redevelopment Agency over the years. These sad stories have detailed incompetence, government overreach, bureaucratic usurpation of sovreign authority, the serial uglification of downtown Fullerton; and worse still, our tales have shown the happy compliance and enthusiatic support of the City Councilmembers for all this misfeasance.
Although some of the Redevelopment case studies of mismanagement and boondogglery we have related occurred in the 1990s, nothing has changed. The fact that Don Bankhead and Dick Jones can still cheerlead for this failed – and failing – government entity only goes to show how irresponsible it would be to permit the metastasis of Redevelopment in Fullerton. Harnessed side by side, these two have trudged through the last twelve years approving most of the Redevelopment disasters we have recounted to you Friends.
So now we are at the proverbial eleventh hour; what will happen on Tuesday? Jones and Bankhead(Joneshead?) are on safely board. Nelson is on record as opposing the expansion; Keller seems to be opting out because of a conflict of interest. This leaves Sharon Quirk as the necessary third vote. Although every instinct in her body must be telling her to go with the staff and the good old boys, to just follow on the slip-stream of inertia, we think she may be entertaining some nagging doubts. Even if these doubts are of a political character, we will embrace them as if they were the heartfelt and genuine response to our brilliant posts on the history of Redevelopment disasters in Fullerton.
On Tuesday we will be watching Quirk. She will have the rare opportunity to do the right thing – to refuse the expansion and to say why: Redevelopment does not work. It is a scam. It invests authority in people who are not qualified to exercise such authority and it engenders both incompetent government action and lack of accountability for those who act ineptly or even illegally.
Quirk’s choice is really pretty easy.
Fullerton’s Redevelopment Chairman Don Bankhead, and members Pam Keller and Sharon Quirk led the charge to spend $6 million in tax payer’s money to relocate McDonalds 2oo feet closer to Fullerton High School. As part of the total figure, the Agency previously spent $3 million to buy and demolish four historic California bungalows on the site.
Redevelopment Agency Director Rob Zur Schmiede said “funds for the project had been set aside years ago”. Governments flawed incremental approval process at work again.
The move will pave the way for The Fox Block project– a proposed parking structure type development fronting on Chapman Avenue between Harbor Boulevard and the new McDonald’s which will resemble a McMiniature McSpanish McCastle.
Not everyone favored the deal, longtime Fox critic, Councilman Jones opposed the deal, indicating that he was disappointed a big corporation like McDonald’s was not putting a nickle into the multimillion dollar burger deal.
“This is a huge cost of the citizens’ money,” Jones said.
Councilman Nelson asked if it were possible to postpone the final decision until the Fox Block developer, Arteco Partners, could come up with a plan and a feasibility study.
With nothing at stake and everything to gain, the out of town Developer’s spokesman Jerry Tessier said the new proposed parking structure and project would not work if McDonald’s stayed in its current location. Yet, he could not provide any guarantees for much.
Councilwoman Quirk agreed it was time to move forward. “We have the funds, and we need to get sales tax in.”
As a school teacher, Quirk must know what causes obesity in children; eating too much of the wrong kinds of food and not getting enough exercise. Now the kids wont have to walk as far to get their subsidized happy meal deals.
McDonald’s franchisee Mr. Frisbie reminded the Redevelopment Agency members that the City staff approached him to relocate his business, which was started by his father, James, in 1969 as a family business. A recent study shows the presence of an fastfood outlet within easy walking distance of a high school — about 530 feet or less — resulted in a 5.2% increase in the incidence of student obesity compared with the average for California youths, a correlation deemed “sizable” according to the findings. Great job Quirk, Bankhead and Keller!
“Our business is better suited where we are now,” Frisbie said. Dear Friends but another example that government is part of the problem and not the solution.
