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May 18, 2010May 18, 2010Harry Sidhu

News From The OC GOP Central Committee

We’ve just received a message from our good Friend and former Red County blogger Allan Bartlet.

Hello FFFF readers. It’s nice to write for a blog that appreciates independent thinking. It’s nice not to be told what they can and can’t write about or what stories they can and can’t link to…but I digress. It’s official. I am no longer going to be contributing anything else to Red County as long as the taint of Matt Cunningham shilling for the ultra liberal bureaucracy Children & Family Commission is still over there.

I come before you today though to report excellent news from OC Republican Central Committee. Last night was Scott Baugh’s finest hour as Chairman of our party. It was a short meeting as Central Committee meetings go, but what it lacked in duration, it made up in substance. Chairman Baugh started by making some remarks about how great it was that the party has been vindicated for
endorsing Shawn Nelson last month. He put up on a projector for all the members to see, the over the top/lying hit pieces paid for by the county employee and sheriff unions on behalf of Harry Sidhu & Lorri Galloway. He then proceeded to have an impromptu fundraiser for Shawn right there during the meeting! Someone from the audience shouted he would match the first 30 $50 donations to get the ball rolling. For the math challenged, that’s $1500. It then started feeding off of all the energy in the room to fight back against the government unions. By the end of the night, Scott told me that we had raised and gotten commitments for almost $100k for Nelson for the party to do member communications on his behalf.

I couldn’t help but notice that he kept looking at Matt Holder during his presentation as if to say…”game, set, match Matt”. I think it’s fair to say that the gloves came off last night. You see as everyone knows, John Lewis & Matt Holder are running interference behind the scenes to help Harry Sidhu. If Harry gets elected, L&H and the unions will have one more friendly vote for all their lobbying business, which BTW is very substantial. The campaigns they work on are more or less “loss leaders” for them. They make their money on the back end. If Nelson gets elected, that’s two solid votes against them for any business they wanna try to get through the BOS. They would have to be perfect with the remaining three votes. We know they have Janet & Bill Campbell in their back pocket, but Pat Bates has endorsed Nelson. You see where all this is going? Like someone once said…”follow the money”.

Anyways, I just wanna thank Chairman Baugh for his efforts last night. It’s not been often that I publicly give him props, but I definitely wanna praise him when he deserves it.

Thanks for that, Allan. We’ve been pretty tough on both Baugh and the GOP Central Committee in the past. But it looks like things are really changing for the better and an expression of appreciation is in order!

April 20, 2010Harry Sidhu

The GOP Central Committee Speaks: Nelson 47, Sidhu 8

by admin19 Comments

Shawn Nelson won the Orange County GOP Central Committee endorsement over Harry Sidhu by 47-8 votes last night at the Irvine Hyatt. That’s 85% for Nelson if you like numbers.

The room was designed to fit 200 people, and was standing room only. Besides Sidhu, who voted for himself (Sidhu got sworn in as an alternative to the OCGOP just prior to the vote), Matt Holder of (John) Lewis Consulting Services and Thomas Gordon went down in flames voting for their own interests instead of the better candidate. knowing that his client was going to lose Holder tried to forestall a vote, avoid a vote, but it was not to be.

To those in attendance it was painfully obvious that the more qualified candidate was Shawn Nelson. As usual Sidhu read his answers from a script prepared for him while Nelson’s answers were direct, forthright, and informed.

Nelson, the OCGOP’s 2009 elected official of the year won the Daily Double. It will be hard for Sidhu’s paid apologists to cast this in any other light than a resounding rejection of their candidate. You can expect the negative Sidhu mail to start coming furiously from here on out – and that won’t endear Sidhu to the party faithful, either.

For Nelson this victory provides important momentum heading into the final seven weeks of the campaign and can be used in mailings to fellow Republicans.

In short: Nelson kicked ass. I’ve got some good video and will be uploading choice nuggets for the benefit and amusement of the Friends.

September 22, 2009December 28, 200972nd Election

Mrs. Ackerman Goes Negative @ GOP Central Committee

by admin5 Comments

Oh yeah. It's gonna get ugly. Real ugly.

Our Friend Allan Bartlett who happens to be an OC GOP Central Committee member reports that an anonymous flier was passed out at last night’s meeting attacking Chris Norby – for the bogus sexual harassment suit (filed by a County employee fired for misfeasance), and for allegedly saying bad things about Mexicans.

Bartlett says Mrs. Dick Ackerman (who is going to run against Norby for the 72nd Assy seat) denied any knowledge of the flier, but he’s not buying that, and neither are we. She already let the cat out of the bag that others will be doing her dirty work for her- most likely her old man who has a natural flair for it. So be it.

As we have said the harassment thing was conjured up out of malice. As far as discriminatory comments about Mexicans is concerned, two thoughts come to mind: first, Norby may have his faults, but he is one of the least prejudiced people on the planet Earth; second that such a charge would be brought up at the forum of the OC GOP Central Committee meeting is just hilarious. How could anybody think that was going to hurt Norby at that venue!

When word of that flier gets out it might actually help Norby win the Raymond Hills GOP Bluehair vote!

Some of my best friends are Mexicans. Like my gardener and my house cleaner.

May 25, 2009December 30, 2009FJC

Did NOCCCD Bond Oversight Committee Overlook Stadium Embarrassment?

by admin5 Comments

It’s a sad truth that government projects just don’t seem to have much accountability. There are always lots of impressive titles handed out, but nobody ever seems to have a grip on what’s going on.

Take the NOCCCD Football field-to-stadium sleight-of-hand that took place at FJC. Somehow a project was altered without any policy review, CEQA documentation, or public notification. It only became a problem when neighbors found out about the deception and loudly protested. Who approved these changes? And who is this person’s boss? We’d like to find out who is responsible for the now very expensive and increasingly embarrassing switcheroo.

And let’s not forget the so-called Oversight Committee – a group of individuals who were either kept in the dark or who had their eyes closed. It’s hard to find anybody who really takes these committees seriously, except perhaps voters who are persuaded by the Bond Salesmen that the committee will actually ensure some sort of accountability for the public’s hundreds of millions of dollars. Nevertheless, there they are, and so they have a responsibility to the public.

In June of 2005, the Chamber of Commerce’s Executive Director, Thresa Harvey was appointed to the North Orange County Community College District Citizens Bond Oversight Committee as a representative of a “taxpayer group.” We’re not sure what a taxpayer group is since we all pay taxes (well most of us, anyway). In any case it was and is her job to comprehend what’s going on with the bond revenue projects. Was she misled? Did she even know what was going on?

Jeez, maybe we need to do this more often...

Things have gotten to the point where even Fullerton’s City Manager Chris Meyer has produced a letter claiming the stadium violates the City’s General Plan, and the City is demanding an EIR. This is doubly ironic, since he routinely attends Chamber of Commerce Board meetings where Harvey can usually be found; and also because the City has been signally deficient when in come to CEQA compliance of its own favored projects.

But, to return to our main story: Who is accountable for this gridiron fiasco? Will we ever know? Probably not. But in the meantime the NOCCCD is facing the increased likelihood of an amended EIR for their stadium and some fancy footwork in the backfield if they want to build it.

Hundreds of Hornet fans disguised as empty seats...

December 2, 2008April 15, 2009Coyote Hills

Fullerton’s General Plan Committee to Focus on Coyote Hills

by admin11 Comments

The City of Fullerton’s General Plan Advisory Committee (GPAC) took a bold step at their meeting last night to include West Coyote Hills as a Focus Area in the City’s new General Plan update. The Coyote Hills area was not included as a focus area in the last General plan update that was done in 1996. In a packed meeting room, a motion was made by Richard Lambros to uphold a prior “gag” order relating to discussing Coyote Hills. The motion failed. After several members of the audience voiced their opinions the Committee voted to create a new Coyote Hills Focus Area.

Coyote Hills

March 20, 2025March 20, 2025Ahmad Zahra

Being Vivian Kitty Jaramillo. Again.

by The Fullerton Harpoon29 Comments

It means you aren’t very smart. You aren’t attractive. You aren’t talented. You aren’t educated. You do have a chip on your shoulder and you do seem to think people owe you something. Mostly because you grossly overestimate yourself, and the Kennedy Sisters think you check all the right boxes.

On Tuesday evening Ms. Jaramillo appeared at the Fullerton City Council to take the council majority to task for rejecting her nomination to the Planning Commission. It was a graceless, rude performance.

She didn’t seem to grasp the irony in her insulting the people who voted against her, just like she did last December in what we wished had been her final goodbye statement. Alas, no. Here is “Cannabis Kitty” showing up again like a bad penny. Some of her comments about the council majority:

Afraid of her, or;

Childish in their rejection of anything Zahra

Disgusting

Idiotic

She whined that voting “no” on an appointment was just never done! And recent appointments by Jamie Valencia are “the usual suspects,” unqualified “bozos” only wanting “personal glory, and who are not “interested in the betterment of the City.” Not like her, of course. Why, one of these appointees, a former Mayor, was even referred to by Fullerton employees as “Mayor Bozo,” Jaramillo recalled.

She failed to mention that object of her denigration, Chris Norby, is also a former County Supervisor and State Assemblyman now willing to serve on a low-grade committee almost nobody knows about because he is simply a good citizen.

Of course Jaramillo got her facts wrong, or more likely, pretended to, omitting that only a few weeks earlier her sponsor, Ahmad Zahra voted no on Valencia’s appointment of Arif Mansuri, a professional engineer, to the Transportation Commission.

Jaramillo essentially identified Valencia a puppet of Jung, who she wrote off completely as a “little dictator.” She was “bummed,” she said because the absent Nick Dunlap wasn’t there to hear her lament of his action. She had hoped better of him. She didn’t remind anybody that in her December letter to her friends at the Fullerton Observer she referred to Dunlap as a knucklehead. Short or selective memory?

The happiness vanished in a political haze…

Now I don’t know about you, but it looks to me like Jaramillo is just prone to insulting people who refuse to acknowledge her superior qualities. Of course she is bitter about losing to some unknown who’s only lived in Fullerton “a hot minute.” I don’t care about that, but I find it surprising that her own sense of entitlement is so immense that it would cause her to expect the targets of her abuse to appoint her to anything.

March 9, 2025March 9, 2025Ahmad Zahra

Charting a New Course?

by The Fullerton Harpoon37 Comments

Fullerton is a General Law city. The question of studying the costs and the benefits of adopting a municipal charter was on the agenda for the last city council meeting.

To charter or not to charter. That became the debate. But it shouldn’t have been.

Rather than accepting the benign idea of beginning to study the pros and cons of Fullerton being a charter city, numerous public speakers, a claque obviously organized by Ahmad Zahra, and Zahra himself, began reciting a litany of reasons to not even study the idea. Of course they didn’t know what they were talking about, and kept spewing nonsense, like ginned up election costs, scary rejection of State paternalism, mandates, and planning control, and all sorts of drummed up stuff leading to the inevitable conclusion that California state government is benevolent, well-run, desirable, and comforting.

The speaker list was comprised of the usual suspects: our old, nattering friend (and Scott Markowitz nominator) Diane Vena; the ever-angry Karen Lloreda; the bitter, avian Anjali Tapadia and others.

Good grief, even the superannuated Molly McClanahan appeared, cluck-clucking her disapproval of the proceedings. And there in the audience sitting next to McClanahan, was none other than Jan Flory, looking pretty worn out. Flory didn’t say anything, mercifully, but perfunctorily clapped when speakers questioned the motives and integrity of the council majority. On McClanahan’s other side sat Ms. Lloreda, which was appropriate: two former city councilwomen recalled by their constituents.

Several school district boardmembers showed up, too, trying, and failing to explain the nexus between the municipal charter topic and the welfare of their districts. That was just pathetic lackeyism for Zahra. Boy, have they backed the wrong horse.

As noted before, Zahra’s indignant, theatrical and lengthy diatribe was even more ridiculous that the dumb speeches of his little entourage. He began a recitation of how a 15 member elected charter-writing committee would become a political springboard for bad people (i.e. those not chosen by him) funded by bad interests – like Fullerton Taxpayers for Reform, presumably. This was amazing since nobody in their right mind would pursue this approach. I don’t know if any city ever has. But Zahra must have thought it was good obfuscation to help confuse the already dimly lit brains of his followers, I guess.

There was a plot afoot said Zahra, with devious manipulators pulling the council’s strings to buy and sell Fullerton, somehow, sometime, somewhere. Don’t believe what they say, said the master of prevarication.

Ferguson speaks. Fullerton Boohoo is not happy…

One speaker, Joshua Ferguson supported the study, pointing out that the process of voting on a charter was actually highly democratic because it gave people a chance to participate in how their city is governed. The Three Old Ladies shook their heads in disapprobation.

The three councilmembers who voted to simply consider the idea – Jung, Dunlap and Valencia – didn’t try to justify some positive end result, reasonably supporting a study, the sort of thing people like Zahra and his friend Shana Charles normally adore.

The idea here is that actually learning things about something relating to city governance is a good thing.

I don’t know anything about the benefits or drawbacks of having a municipal charter; neither do the people of Fullerton;. neither does our City Council, two of whom, Zahra and Charles voted to remain ignorant.

February 25, 2025February 25, 2025Ahmad Zahra

More Observer Self-Serving “News”

by The Fullerton Harpoon8 Comments

A week or so ago the Kennedy Sisters, presumably in the interest of political transparency, posted the 2024 campaign finance activity of Councilmembers Dunlap, Jung, and Valencia. They were also interested in showing the spending of Fullerton Taxpayers for Reform and its opposition to their favored candidate Vivian Jaramillo.

“Follow the Money” is their headline. But wait. Isn’t something missing?

Indeed, yes. They decided to publish information about the three winning candidates whom the really don’t like. And of course Fullerton Taxpayers for Reform has been the bane of big spending bureaucrats and politicians for years. But where is the information on Vivian Jaramillo?

Missing in action, I’d say.

Jaramillo got lots of campaign contributions from local unions, public employees, and lot from Fullerton’s public pension retiree gaggle. Not too much surprise there, so why not publish it? It’s still relevant.

But what really stood out was the omission of the massive Independent Expenditure Committee created to get Jaramillo elected. “Working Families for Kitty Jaramillo” was the recipient of $60,000 up front from the national HQ of the grocery store workers union. The local union “sponsored” the IE, but the dough came from Washington DC and the smart money was on its origin being none other than the Southern California dope dispensary cartel.

The marijuana money would be real hard for the Kennedy Sisters to explain without reminding folks that Jaramillo earned the nickname “Cannabis Kitty” due to her prior staunch support of Ahmad Zahra’s push for the broadest marijuana ordinance – the one he, Silva, and Flory voted on at the end of 2020.

More even handed “reporting,” right? I don’t suppose anything is going to change from these darlings. The sniping, innuendo and criticism of Valencia, Jung, and Dunlap will continue unabated, with the usual conflation of news and editorial – in violation of any journalistic standards.

February 17, 2025February 17, 2025Ahmad Zahra

Zahra Goes Unicorn Hunting With His Pea Shooter

by The Fullerton Harpoon17 Comments

FFFF received a fun email the other day, pecked out by Fullerton 5th District Councilman Ahmad Zahra. It is directed to Fullerton Assistant City Attorney Baron Bettenhausen, a fellow that the Friends met yesterday. Ahmad writes on January 27th, and is obviously still in a grand funk about losing his precious Walk on Wilshire the previous week.

The tone of the letter is pretty unfriendly since Zahra seems to believe Bettenhausen has left out something real important in the discussion of Jamie Valencia returning campaign contributions. Of course, as we have seen, none of this would have been necessary if Bettenhausen knew the law and had known about the FPPC decision in Palo Alto before January 21st.

But let’s let Ahmad speak for himself:

From: Ahmad Zahra <ahmad.zahra@cityoffullerton.com>
Sent: Sunday, January 26, 2025 9:55 PM
To: Baron J. Bettenhausen <bjb@jones-mayer.com>; Richard D. Jones <rdj@jones-mayer.com>; Eric Levitt <Eric.Levitt@cityoffullerton.com>
Subject: Conflict of interest question

Caution: This is an external email and may be malicious. Please take care when clicking links or opening attachments.

Baron, at the last council meeting, you had opined that CM Valencia could vote on the matter of Walk on Wilshire since she had returned the campaign contributions to Tony Bushala and Cigar Shop owner, both of whom have direct economic interests in the decision. Community members have shared with me some concerns regarding your rendered opinion and I’d like clarifications from you.

Was the FPPC consulted on this matter, as has been the practice in the past on complicated issues (example: CM Charles votes on CSUF)? If so, where is their opinion letter and why was it not presented at the time of the meeting?

There’s been a claim that the funds hadn’t been actually returned even if the return check was issued. This is a claim from a resident that raised concerns but no evidence was presented. But it does bring up the question, what evidence did CM Valencia present to you and why was that not made public? This is especially relevant because that reporting period for campaign committees isn’t until Jan 31st, occurring after the meeting itself with no chance for the public to verify any of this.

In your opinion that night, while you addressed the letter of the law, did you factor in the spirit of the law? It seems to easy for anyone to take contributions, use them, then conveniently return the funds before a vote. This is especially important to know as CM Valencia was fully aware of the WoW vote since apparently it was a question asked to her during the campaign.

I would appreciate a clarification on these questions and would request that an FPPC letter confirming your opinion on this matter be made available to the public to prevent any legal issues. Any correspondence to the FPPC should also include the concerns of the public for a comprehensive review.

I am also requesting that any action to execute the reopening of Wilshire be delayed until such legal questions are resolved to avoid any legal challenges to the city.

Note: I am writing this email in the interest of the public and thus deem it and any response to it in the public domain and not under any lawyer confidentiality privilege.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

AHMAD ZAHRA

Council Member, District 5

City of Fullerton – Tel: (714) 738-6311

303 W. Commonwealth Ave., Fullerton, CA 92832

www.cityoffullerton.com / Follow me on Facebook

Oh dear me. Where to start. Naturally, Zahra wants to make up and nurture a scandal where there is none. He’s obviously been stirring up an element of outraged Fullerton Boohoo to keep the red herring going. He even uses the same language as the Kennedy Sisters: “there’s been a claim,” and “This is a claim from a resident that raised concerns but no evidence was presented.”

FFFF first addressed the non-applicability of the law in question way back on January 21st. We know Zahra reads FFFF, but maybe he didn’t catch that post.

Anyway, Zahra wants to know if the FPPC has been consulted about this horror of horrors. We now know that the FPPC previously ruled on the identical issue in a case in Palo Alto. FFFF relayed that information, here on February 10th. The answer is clear as a bell: the law doesn’t apply. Bettenhausen should have known this before January 21, and maybe even before Valencia gave back money she didn’t have to.

Ahmad made me wear this and took a picture.

Then Zahra’s deep sea fishing expedition turns to the completely baseless “actual claim” that although a check may have been written, it wasn’t cashed, challenging Valencia’s integrity and Bettenhausen’s lack of diligence.

Zahra’s final numbered point is really funny. He wonders why the “spirit” of the law is not being upheld. Poor Ahmad should be addressing his lament to the State Legislature instead of his own attorney, but, whatever.

Zahra wants the FPPC findings on the issue to be made public, and he requests that WoW remain open until such time as the FPPC responds. Zahra’s worried about legal challenges? From whom? The Kennedy Sisters and Diane Vena? Man, what a failed Hail Mary. WoW was unceremoniously removed a few days after Zahra’s demand letter. Thousands more laughed than did weep at it.

Poor Ahmad wraps up his missive by letting his own lawyer know that this email and any response are free from attorney-client confidentiality – in the public interest, of course. That’s good ’cause we got it, Ahmad, being members of the public, and all. Was there ever even a response by Bettenhausen in the end? Who cares

January 28, 2025January 28, 2025A Step in the Right Direction

Park Dwelling Fee-asco?

by The Fullerton Harpoon19 Comments

*The story no one wanted to talk about.*

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want the abandoned Union Pacific Park reopened. It was a crime-ridden attractive nuisance from the day it opened even without considering the toxic substances that had to be remediated after the damn thing was built.

But there seems to be an interesting reason the park hasn’t been reopened 18 months after the City Council ordered the fence around the vacant land be taken down. And the reason could be that there isn’t enough money in the Park Dwelling Fee Fund to pay for it. These funds are collected from developers to pay for new park facilities, presumably to reflect the new projected increase in population.

This situation emerged at a Fiscal Sustainability Committee meeting a while back. The Fund has about $800,000 to $900,000, according to Assistant City Manager Daisy Perez, and at least $300,000 of that is already earmarked for the delusional “Trail to Nowhere” plan. It also emerged that the massive eyesore project called “The Hub,” on Commonwealth at the 57 Freeway, has not paid it’s Park Dwelling Fees, a number amounting to $5,000,000, staff said.

It seems that for some reason the City gave the developer of the project a waiver on the required upfront fees, until the project has a certificate of occupancy. That $5 million is burning a hole in somebody’s pocket, and it sure ain’t our pocket. How this happened is another story, and a good one, too, I’ll bet.

In the meantime, we seem to have some sort of Mexican Standoff – UP Park vs. Trail to Nowhere. The Park is assumed to have been given priority, but there’s no money for it. Meantime the Trail to Nowhere waits in the wings, embarrassingly, having missed several entrance cues demanded by the State, the most important of which were submission of plans by 6/24; start of construction by 8/24; and viable plant life by 10/25.

*The idea may have been bad, but it sure was old.*

One of the selling points of the Trail to Nowhere is that it connected to the UP Park (of course that was another lie, too – it ends at Highland Avenue). But what if there is no UP Park at all?