Sounds about right. A “public safety” union is endorsing union boss and massive pension receiver, Coto Joe Kerr for Orange County Supervisor.
What’s really funny is that the union isn’t even from Orange County. It’s actually from Los Angeles County and is hired by the City of La Habra to run around town making paramedic calls and firehouse chili. So I guess it’s appropriate that the out-of-town union is endorsing a candidate who is out-of-town, too.
Who knew “firefighting” paid so well? Well, almost everybody…
As we have amply documented, Joe Kerr lives in a million dollar McMansion in Coto de Caza, a long, long way from our 4th District. In fact it’s just about as far as you can get and still be in The OC. But Joe has concocted a “residence” in Brea and has sworn on his voter registration that that’s where he lives.
Rosie addresses the Boys (and girls) in the Back (of the) Room; Will they hear her?
The 2018 4th District County Supervisor race just got a little more interesting with her announcement that La Habra City Councilwoman Rosie Espinoza is joining the fray.
Espinoza ran against Chris Norby in June, 2006 and did poorly. She ran again in June, 2010 and failed badly once again.
She loves him, alright. But not enough to live in icky Brea…
What gives this story a dash of interest is that Rosie is a Democrat and it is well-known that the public employee unions have made a concerted effort to limit the Dem candidates to one, namely Joe Kerr. The shameless union campaign hustle of Kerr, who actually lives with his family in ritzy Coto de Caza, now has a bit of a problem, to wit: a Democrat candidate who actually lives in the 4th district.
The Village People just called…
The other interesting angle is that Ms. Espinoza will be running against another La Habra councilcreature, Republican Tim Shaw, know best for his underling relationship with Redevelopment prostitute and general scum-sucker Bob Huff (R – Ed Roski). Shaw has probably been counting on being able to carry the northernmost precincts in the district on name recognition – thus making a November runoff and hoping for the best. Oops!
Yes, I am more qualified…
If she’s even paying attention, the news of the Espinoza campaign should be somewhat warmly received by the other repuglican in the race, Young Kim, the utterly unqualified political job-hopper who is looking for another taxpayer-funded gig after having been dethroned by Sharon Quirk-Silva in the 2016 State Assembly election.
Hey, since 2012, we’ve fired 11 cops for cause. That’s about 8% of the average number of uniformed cops in Fullerton in any given year. Who they are and how badly they had to behave to get fired as Fullerton cops is a mystery. But based on past behavior FFFF has documented, it must have been pretty damn bad.
12 were suspended for one reason or another. It is not our privilege to who or why.
166 were “reprimanded,” whatever the hell that means. But it amounts to more than the entire sworn employees in any given year. Obviously many of our fine officers received multiple reprimands. Are they still out there peering through our windows at night? Who knows?
Here’s the site where you can peruse the data, such as it is.
And here’s a snapshot:
While statistics for the other categories actually seemed to get better as Danny “Gallahad” Hughes ended his dubious chiefhood the health of prisoners in the Fullerton jail took a major turn for the worse. This statistic is troubling given reports about behavior in the jail, perhaps the most egregious being that of Vince Mater who was too stupid not to get caught destroying evidence after the “suicide” of Dean Gochenour. It’s charming how jail injuries are written off as possible scraped knees. But of course what really happened to these unfortunates is shrouded in mystery.
Of course these are the published statistic and may bear no relationship whatever with actual events. How many cops were permitted to “retire” rather than face the music is something we shall never know, and will never appear in these tables. How many “Citizen Complaints” disappeared down the proverbial rabbit hole never to be heard of again must remain a mater of speculation; speculation about which is a perfectly justifiable pastime so long as the cops shroud their activities in a veil of secrecy.
Some things in life are perfectly predicable. Things like physics and math. They’re not really that difficult to understand, but some people in our society are a little slower than others.
For example, next week there will be idiots who put a frozen turkey into a vat of hot liquid fat because #Merica. Despite many public service announcements to the contrary, stupidity will have its unavoidable and predicable consequences.
Tonight Fullertonians will miss out on the discussion taking place behind closed doors at City Hall concerning the state of the city’s budget. Voters won’t get to hear about the new contract negotiations designed to help the massive multi-million dollar structural deficit, the $100,000,000 in deferred infrastructure maintenance, or the equally massive unfunded pension debt. Instead, we’ll get a null report from The Other Dick Jones ™, and the facade of all being well will continue into this year’s planned First Night festivities.
Like so many idiots with a tank of propane, recent City Councils had fair warning of the current financial crisis. The math just isn’t that hard to understand. Every year, every single year, since each of their elections, Fullerton has spent more from the general fund than it has taken in. Tens of millions of dollars in reserves have evaporated. *POOF* gone, without a trace.
At the current rate, Fullerton may be bankrupt in two years.
This Thanksgiving, while you’re enjoying your non-idiot prepared bird, I want you to remember tonight’s secret city council meeting. I also want you to remember a meeting held just last year.
Just last year, the council authorized the largest pay raises for staff in a decade.
“The budget is balanced!” — Jennifer Fitzgerald
“Fullerton is in excellent financial shape!’ — Jan Flory
Well, the math simply doesn’t lie. The budget was not balanced and the city was not in excellent financial shape. Jen and Jan dunked their frozen bird and lambasted all the chronic malcontents who protested their fine stewardship.
*POOF*
Like that, Joe Felz hit a tree, and their financial bird exploded, the raging predictable disaster apparent for all to see.
Tonight the Fullerton City Council will likely authorize reducing pay and benefits for city employees, just in time for the holidays. When this is over, some employees will have their salaries reduced or their hours cut. Others will simply lose their jobs. Many of those individuals are good people who do good work. This isn’t their fault, but it will be their house that gets burned down and it will be their life that gets ruined.
Now Jen and Jan, two of those responsible for dunking this turkey? Don’t worry. They’ll be fine. Jen just gave herself a $9000 raise and Jan retired.
A few weeks ago FFFF ran a post on the status on Dino Skokos, the FJC security goon and “disabled” former LA Deputy Sheriff who beat up and handcuffed a kid on campus in October, 2016. Right after the video of the event went viral, the district snapped into defense mode, placing Skokos on administrative leave and putting its lawyer to work on an in-house “investigation.” FJC President, Greg Schulz declared his dedication to reaching a conclusion of the incident.
The Schulz Factor: happy-looking but not credible…
The winter had passed; spring had come and gone. Summer was well along when in July, Schulz was directly confronted on the subject. In Schulz’s long and winding stream of nonsense a shiny pearl accidentally popped out of its oyster in the river bottom sludge: Skokos “was not going to be an employee of the district.”
What that meant was anybody’s guess, and some, like me, were skeptical. Was Skokos still on leave? If so, why? Who knew?
So FFFF followed up on an earlier Public records Act request that had been ignored. When that was intentionally misunderstood we filed yet another one. And finally we finally got this:
According to this list, Skokos was on admin leave – meaning he was getting paid for doing nothing – until the end of September, two full months after Schulz said he was no longer going to be an employee of the district, and almost an entire year after he assaulted that kid. And coincidentally (or not) that date corresponds exactly with the peculiar day projected earlier in the summer that Skokos was to come off administrative leave.
There was confusion on campus…
And here’s the last insult to public transparency on the part of Schulz & Co.: we have no idea whether Skokos is still employed by the district – whether at FJC, Cypress, district HQ, or at some other locale.
So how about it Greg? You promised a conclusion to this incident over a year ago. Did that promise include actually telling us about it?
In the likely event that no answer will be forthcoming from Schulz, you might try broaching the subject by our able and eager Trustee, Molly McClanahan, who has a long history of demanding accountability from her bureaucratic underlings.
Wouldn’t it be nice if every City employee consistently set the bar for professionalism?
Michael Lemmon, of the Fullerton Fire Department, thought it was perfectly okay to purchase these inappropriate mugs using taxpayer money on his City-issued VISA card.
A couple months later, Michael Lemmon decided the Fire Department needed more coffee mugs, so he purchased these — again on the taxpayer’s dime:
Today’s ethical lapse comes to us courtesy of the Fullerton Fire Department. See those shirts pictured above? Fire Captain Brian Seymour ordered nine of them for some kind of “Peer Support”.
Once the use tax is factored in, we paid about $40 per shirt.
Check out the reconciliation report. One can clearly see the purchaser was Brian Seymour.
Below, we see the invoice from the vendor, Linksoul, where the salesperson was Mary Seymour. Wait a minute, that must be a coincidence. No City employee would be foolish enough to use taxpayer money to purchase unnecessary clothing from a relative’s clothing business, right?
Mary Seymour is the Fire Captain’s wife. Linksoul is a clothing company started by her brother. A couple minutes with Google was enough to locate this article from Carlsbad Magazine with a quote about nepotism that couldn’t be more ironic under the circumstances.
Hinman, W. (2014, March & April). The Man Makes The Clothes. Carlsbad Magazine, 38-43.
So while the City of Fullerton prepares to be crushed under the weight of CalPERS pension obligations, we have people like Brian Seymour not just wasting our money — he’s sending cash to his wife’s family business.
Brian Seymour made $294,761 last year in pay and benefits. Why didn’t he pay for these shirts with his own money?
Did anyone make him reimburse the City? Whose idea were these shirts, anyway? Perhaps most important is why didn’t it occur to Brian Seymour that sending money to the family business was improper, and likely a violation of City policy and/or State Law?
Thanks to a certain FFD employee for bringing this to our attention. You know who you are.
Let’s say you are in the market for a realtor – one who may be willing to bring a certain, um, shall we say, pugnacious flavor to your real estate negotiations. FFFF may be able to help!
Here’s the real estate promo for one Bryan Bybee, a Fullerton cop who’s looking to make a little extra cash moonlighting in the real estate business:
We’ll close this deal. Or else.
So who is Mr. Bybee, you may ask? We originally introduced the Friends to this gentleman, after he rammed his police vehicle into a guy on a bike. Bybee’s name also figured prominently in a very expensive lawsuit brought by the Ortiz brothers, Luiz and Antonio, against the City. They alleged (and alleged successfully, it seems) that Bybee and a few of his FPD cohorts beat them up for no apparent reason, threw them in the Fullerton lock-up, and charged them with fictitious crimes – charges that were eventually rejected by a jury and dropped by the DA. That fun-filled episode cost us Fullerton taxpayers a tidy $280,000.
Anyhow, like I said, Bryan’s just looking to make some extra dough on the side, so let’s give a brotha’ a break, right? If you’re looking for “boutique” real estate services and someone to bring a special brand of negotiating talent to the table, Bryan may be just be the fella to meet your needs.
The other day I discovered this notice from the City. It’s a class for citizens to help their fiscal literacy. And unlike the proverbial lunch, it’s free!
Expert advice from the experts…
So let’s get this straight. The City of Fullerton, which has been incapable of balancing its budget for at least four years, and that has dipped into reserved funds to the tune of $45,000,000, and that is a couple years from insolvency, is promoting financial empowerment and estate literacy to the citizenry! How funny and unintentionally ironic.
I wonder if this free class will be promoting the benefits of a new sales or utility tax to pay all the salaries and benefits of those experts in City Hall who have dug us into this hole.
