Today the Orange County Register endorsed Fullerton’s Shawn Nelson for 4th District County Supervisor. Here’s the editorial. Enjoy.
short version above, long version below, we’d love to hear your comments.
On another thread Fullerton School Board member and seemingly clueless Ackerwoman supporter, Minard Duncan, popped up like a milk weed to question our apparent dislike of his fellow Ackerwoman cheerleader Mimi Walters.
This jump started an earlier idea to publish the names of all the lackeys, stooges and repuglicans who signed onto Ackerman Inc.’s Big Lie Tour of 2009.
This is a list of the elected officials that decided their best interests lay in the endorsement of Linda Ackerman for the 72nd Assembly District. Enjoy the asinine quotations at the bottom of the page and be sure to pick out your favorites on the list for special attention. We have helpfully highlighted in red the names of politicians in whose elections Fullerton voters will get to participate.
Members of Congress
- Congressman Ed Royce
- Congressman Dana Rohrabacher
- Former Congressman Bill Dannemeyer
Statewide Elected Officials
- BOE Member Bill Leonard
- Former State Secretary of Education and Mayor of Los Angeles Richard Riordan
State Senators
- Senate Republican Leader Dennis Hollingsworth
- Former Senate Republican Leader Jim Brulte
- Former Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman
- Former Senator Marian Bergeson
- Senator Mark Wyland
- Senator Mimi Walters
- Senator Bob Huff
- Senator Bob Dutton
- Senator George Runner
- Senator Sam Aanestad
- Senator John Benoit
- Senator Abel Maldonado
- Senator Dave Cox
State Assemblymembers
- Former Assembly Republican Leader Mike Villines
- Assemblyman Jim Silva
- Assemblyman Joel Anderson
- Assemblyman Ted Gaines
- Assemblyman Nathan Fletcher
- Assemblywoman Diane Harkey
- Former Assemblywoman Lynn Daucher
- Former Assemblywoman Sharon Runner
- Former Assemblyman Tom Bordonaro
- Former Assemblyman Openmike Duval
- Former Assemblywoman Marilyn Brewer
Orange County
- Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchens
- Orange County Supervisor Pat Bates
- Orange County Supervisor Bill Campbell
- Orange County Supervisor Janet Ngyuen
- Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas
- Former Orange County Supervisor Cynthia Coad
Anaheim
- Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle
Fullerton
- Fullerton Mayor Don Bankhead
- Fullerton Councilmember Dick Jones
- Former Mayor of Fullerton Buck Catlin
- Former Mayor Leland Wilson
- Former Mayor Peter Godfry
- Former Mayor of Fullerton Jerry Christie
- Former Mayor of Fullerton Linda LeQuire
- Former Fullerton Police Chief Pat McKinley
Placentia
- Former Placentia Mayor Scott Brady
- Placentia Councilmember Jeremy Yamaguchi
Orange
- City of Orange Mayor Carolyn Cavecche
- City of Orange Councilmember Mark Murphy
- City of Orange Councilmember Jon Dumitru
Yorba Linda
- Yorba Linda Mayor Mark Schwing
- Yorba Linda Councilmember Jim Winder
Villa Park
- Villa Park Mayor Pro Tem Bill Mac Aloney
Brea
- Brea Mayor John Beauman
- Brea Councilmember Roy Moore
La Habra
- La Habra Councilmember James Gomez
- La Habra Councilmember Steve Simonian
- Former La Habra Mayor Juan Garcia
- Former La Habra City Councilmember John Holmberg
Elected Leaders
- Tustin Mayor Doug Davert
- Tustin Mayor Pro Tem Jerry Amante
- Laguna Hills Mayor Joel Lautenschleger
- City of Covina Mayor Walt Allen
- Newport Beach City Councilmember Steven Rosansky
- Capistrano Unified School District Trustee, Anna Bryson
- Fullerton School District Trustees Maynard Duncan, Ellan Ballard, Hilda Sugarman, Lynn Thornly.
“Having called North Orange County her home for over 30 years, Linda is by far the most experienced and effective candidate for Assembly. She is a respected leader who will restore dignity to the office while fighting for Orange County values.”- Former Assemblywoman Lynn Daucher
“Linda has been a steadfast conservative leader in Orange County for many years. She will be ready to lead on the important budget issues facing the region and the state on day one.”- Assemblywoman Diane Harkey
“I am proud to stand by Linda in her campaign to promote conservative leadership and higher standards to the California State Assembly.”
– State Senator Mimi Walters.
“Linda Ackerman is an experienced leader who has proven her dedication to the community time and time again, I am proud to support her campaign for State Assembly because I know she will be ready to lead on the issues our state faces on day one after being elected.”- Senator Bob Huff
“Linda Ackerman has always done what is right for the sake of the community, not political gain. She is a proven leader who will help solve California’s budget crisis and bring Orange County values to the State Assembly.”- City of Orange Mayor Carolyn Cavecche
“Linda Ackerman is an experienced businesswoman and community leader who I trust to help balance the budget and rein in out of control spending in Sacramento. North Orange County needs Linda in the Assembly fighting for real budget reform.” – Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle
“We need an experienced leader who will fight for North Orange County. That’s why I’m supporting Linda Ackerman for State Assembly,” Fullerton Mayor Don Bankhead
“When it comes to the safety of our children, Linda Ackerman will never back down.”- Former Fullerton Police Chief Pat McKinley
“I wholeheartedly endorse Linda in her campaign for Assembly. As a businesswoman and community philanthropist she has been an active leader in North Orange County and is by far the best person to represent us in the Assembly” -Yorba Linda Mayor Mark Schwing
Paid For by Ackerman for Assembly 2009, FPPC ID #1321372
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKm65xLpwIM
Over at the otherwise dreadfully tedious Red County blog, our Friend Allan Bartlett opines on last night’s impressive Norby victory over Ackerwoman in the 72nd Special Election Primary. He almost gets it completely right.
He correctly points out that Norby’s 17% margin of victory over the Ackerman, Inc slime-peddlers is a bad sign for all of the establishment Repuglicans who happily climbed onto the carpetbagging, truth challenged bandwagon, believing (erroneously) that money would trump experience and actual political accomplishment.
But tucked into Allan’s post is this admonition to Ackerman, Inc.:
We’ll give you a few days to lick your wounds and get over the bitterness that you and Dick are probably feeling towards Chris right now, but it’s time to finally end this ugly chapter in OC political history and endorse Chris for the runoff. It’s the right thing to do.
Nice sentiment, perhaps, but a not at all necessaryof gesture of Republican solidarity. In the first place, if they believed half of the trash they peddled against Norby to the voters the Ackermans (if they had any integrity, oops!) would want Norby locked up “e-mmediately” as their flunky Dick Jones would say. But, neither Norby nor the people of the 72nd need anything from the OC Repuglican apparatchicks. On the contrary, Norby’s victory proves that one can win, and win convincingly (although being outspent 2-1) over forces that have treated OC government like their own little plantation.
At the end of his post Allan rightfully chastises all of the Republican elected drones who circled their wagons of self-interest around the Ackermans after hearing Dick’s do-re-mi siren song (with the emphasis on “dough” and “me”). Good for Allan. His was the the only voice on that blog that wasn’t making a full-time job of avoiding Ackerwoman’s deceitful residency and her contemptible smears.
Ah well, victory, as Allan trenchantly observes, is the best admonition to those who are more interested in money and power than they are doing what’s right. If all those folks who endorsed Linda Ackerman because of her “inevitability” (despite the fact that she didn’t live in the district, and completely misrepresented her business experience) think that this craven behavior will be soon forgotton, they may be in for a rude surprise.
And now, the task of this Grover Cleveland, having been completed, and satisfactorily so, we pass on the name to a new (and no doubt improved) Grover. Adios Amigos! And lets hope the times are really are a-changin.’
On Tuesday night, July 7, 2009 the Fullerton City Council finally concluded the issue of Live Outdoor Amplified Noise. With a 4-1 vote (Pam Keller in opposition for some reason), council members decided that our current sound ordinance will suffice, moving forward into the future. Currently, acoustic music is allowed outside and louder live amplified music is not. Jones, Bankhead, Quirk and Nelson all voting that the outdoor use of acoustical instrumentation (without amplification) is A-OK, but the use of louder live amplified noise on downtown private patios on a regular basis is not the best thing for Downtown Fullerton.
It was stated in the sound study that was produced for the city at a cost of $16K that it is very unusual for cities to allow loud live amplified music outdoors on a regular basis. This obviously doesn’t include special events which are permitted under the current city code. It’s so unheard of that only 3 cities in the whole country where cited as allowing some kind of routine outdoor noise, 2 of them out-of-state. The vast majority of cities allow acoustic (non-amplified) music outdoors while the loud music belongs inside. What a great idea!
Cheers for the Council for making a wise decision and preserving the peace in Downtown!
Cheers for the Council for having the foresight to see that over the long run this will encourage positive development in the downtown and promote a healthy business climate for all types of diverse shops and residential dwellings to thrive in downtown.
If you think about it, some types of music just aren’t conducive to being peace and quiet, yet others are. So by sticking with the current ordinance, acoustic music like folk, jazz and blues are encouraged outside while the louder harder stuff is only allowed indoors.
Makes great sense—Good job City Council!
Residents witnessed another rousing victory for FFFF last night as Councilwoman Sharon Quirk wisely reversed direction on Fullerton’s famous $6 million dollar burger deal that would give away a brand new McDonald’s restaurant at taxpayers’ expense. Pam Keller sensed the inevitable failure of this project and also changed course, sending this turkey down in a 4-1 vote. Nelson and Jones had it right from the beginning, but Bankhead rode this one all the way to the grave.
Now that the taxpayer-funded McDonald’s move is dead, there isn’t much hope for the massive Fox Block redevelopment scheme – and that’s fine by us. The Fox Block had little to do with the popular restoration of the historic Fox Theatre and there was plenty of doubt the that the block would be financially viable even with millions in taxpayer subsidies. Throw in a little public deception about the height of the buildings, and it’s clear that this project needed to be flushed.
Even if you don’t approve of our approach here at FFFF, it’s hard to deny positive results. It’s good to see our representatives fix bad decisions and move forward. We know it’s tough to admit when you are wrong, but that’s part of responsible governance. Thank you, Quirk and Keller, for doing the right thing.
Dear Friends, a few weeks back Friends for Fullerton’s Future filed an appeal of the appalling decision by the Fullerton Planning Commission to grant a bogus “special event” permit to Roscoe’s in order to legitimize the ongoing violation of the City ordinance regarding outdoor live amplified music in the C-3 Zone. The appeal was based on the fact that playing live amplified music outdoors is detrimental to the health, safety, peace, comfort and general welfare of persons visiting, residing or working in the neighborhood and is injurious to property or improvements in the area.
We are pleased to inform you that as a result of our appeal, Roscoe’s has withdrawn their application, therefore no public hearing on Roscoe’s appeal will be necessary. 
The room filled with cheers and applause at last night’s Fox Block community meeting when a citizen stood up and pronounced that the Redevelopment Agency should avoid creating more buildings that are meant to look like fake old clones of existing historic buildings.
The developer who was giving the presentation wanted to make sure that he was hearing this right… he asked for a show of hands – who wants Spanish/Mediterranean-style architecture that mimics the current Fox Theater? Two people out of 50+ raised their hands. Judging by the earlier applause, the vast majority of citizens were in support of creating long-lasting buildings in a contemporary style that would one day become historically significant themselves. The developer even went on to openly mock existing redevelopment buildings in Fullerton, at which point Redevelopment Director Rob Zur Schmiede stood up and absolved himself of responsibility, saying that the fake old buildings were created before his tenure.
Where did this sudden hatred of fake old design come from? We can only surmise that the audience was filled with citizens who have been reading this very blog, which has been loudly criticizing these projects for several months.
There are still many serious problems with this development project (we’ll get to that later), but it’s good to see that FFFF is having a positive impact on the future of architecture in downtown Fullerton.
In the spirit of open government, Fullerton Police Chief Mike Sellers made a promise to publicly disclose internal department policies and procedures on the city website.
Even before Chief Sellers joined the Fullerton PD last month, there were musings of his strong stance on community-oriented policing. It sounds nice, doesn’t it? After a month on the job, it was time to put the PD to the test.
I made a quick request for the department’s taser policy in preparation for an item on the council agenda that would allocate $40,000 for new tasers. Chief Sellers’ initial reaction was the best that we could hope for… his command staff even offered to bring the policy by my house so I would have it in time for the meeting!
Unfortunately, we suspect that someone else at the department noticed my FFFF membership card because officer friendly was then told to deny my public records request. Perturbed by this sudden reversal, I informed the chief and city council that the issue would be brought up at the city council meeting that night.
By the time I had spoken at the meeting, Chief Sellers had taken a stand and informed everyone that internal department polices would be available to the public and posted online.
The Chief knows there are loopholes in public record law that allow police departments to shut out the public, but Fullerton can rest easy knowing that FFFF and Chief Sellers have solidified their right to observe the inner workings of our government. And that’s how it should be.