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You just can’t beat candor at the public podium.
Here is Anaheim community leader Amin David at Kurt Pringle’s public going away party letting Der Pringle know that not all of the Anaheim Volk are happy Volk. Specifically he slams Pringle for his latest Platinum Triangle do-over and deficient EIR.
Did you enjoy the shot at Sidhu as Pringle’s puppet-monkey and Hernandez as a dim-wit? I did.
A lot of people in Fullerton are wondering why council candidate Doug Chaffee permited himself to be a GOP establishment punching bag. Did his natural inclinations lead him to avoid attacking the out-of-control public employee pension mess as embodied in his two GOP and union backed adversaries? Probably.
If so, it cost him the election.
When he finally reached down and grabbed hold of his huevos he produced this devastating comparison piece between himself and his “public safety” union-backed opponents.
Although effective, it was too little, too late. By the time it came out absentee voting was well underway. The oblique admonition to “bullet vote” was already an effort in vain.
And the rest, as they say, is history.
Justice requires both integrity and diligence, but sometimes that’s just too much to expect. And it goes without saying that nobody deserves to be thrown in jail for a crime they did not commit.
It doesn’t always work out that way. According to a Register story pointed out by some of our favorite commenters, this kid just spent five months in jail awaiting trial after the Fullerton police set him up on charges of armed robbery, even though the victim clearly identified someone else!
Luckily for him, the botched line-up was captured on an audio recording which his attorney later reviewed, causing the DA to drop the charges.
So critical evidence, namely the victim’s actual testimony, was completely ignored by Fullerton’s finest. Laziness? Incompetence? Malice? We’ll never know. But when the justice system is subverted, everybody loses.
The sad narrative includes a priceless comment from FPD/FPOA spokesman Andrew Goodrich: “Mistakes are made sometimes.”
Whew! Responsibility averted. All in a day’s work.
It’s a good thing we don’t give criminals that kind of leeway.
Once again we have a City Council Agenda loaded with waste and stupidity.
The November 16, 2010 agenda starts off with a dear friend of ours, Milton A. Gordon. You may remember him from a recent post by Greg Sebourn – or from Daily Titan, where he caught grief from one of his current students and junior reporters, Ally Bordas. Well, he’s back and this time he is slated as Item 1 of the agenda. I’m sure he’ll be handing out some do-gooder award or similar…And we’ll be paying the staff to sit and endure the waste! Just remember, we pay him $302,000 to live in a mansion RENT FREE and hand out awards at City Council meetings.
Item 2 of the presentations is none other than our other old friends, Rusty Kennedy who will be giving the OC Human Relations Annual Report. I just can’t wait to hear it…
Moving on t o the consent calendar, let’s see what mischief the council would like to sneak in:
Insurance contracts are up and it looks like Blue Cross, CaliforniaCare, Kaiser, Delta Dental, Vision Services Plan, and CIGNA all win with staff approval. I knew I should have bought a few shares!
Item 3 is the water rate study at a cost of $67,500. How many gallons of water will consumers need to purchase to cover the cost?
There is a NO PARKING ban for a portion of Valencia Mesa Drive just west of Harbor Boulevard. Read more under Item 4.
An update on the building and fire codes is worth looking at. I would be willing to bet more than a few of these changes will come back to bite taxpayers. The changes include a green building code and energy code.
Item 6 is an appointment by the Council of the Fire Marshal and an alternate to the Orange County-City Hazardous Materials Emergency Response Authority (OCCHMERA). The City of Fullerton is a subscriber to the Authority since we do not have our own Haz-Mat team.
More NO PARKING/NO STOPPING is slated for Casa Blanca Drive between Fern and Barris during school hours as Item 8.
Item 9 is an amendment to the agreement between the City of Fullerton and the Fullerton Museum Association. In the end, it looks like the Museum Association gives up their “profits” from the gift store and membership from 10% to 25%.
Item 10 is another Fullerton Redevelopment Agency boondoggle in the making. In the back-up documents for this action item you find that the City “purchased” 34 parcels (each with multiple units for low- and very low-income residents) that are being demolished and replaced with 34 moderate-income homes. How does this help the City of Fullerton with the alleged deficiency in low-income housing? It doesn’t. Unfortunately, you voted for more of the same on November 2nd.
Item 11 is a real gem. It is titled “REALLOCATION OF PROCEEDS FROM 2005 TAX ALLOCATION REVENUE BONDS”. It sounds harmless enough; much like pulling money from a savings account to cover a checking account. Ah, but it’s so much more. It is a huge shell game of millions of dollars to hide the fact that we borrowed against certain funds to cover certain pet projects. Unfortunately, it just shows more mismanagement of tax dollars. Read it carefully and keep one of those airplane bags handy when you read the fine print.
And that was just the consent calendar! Now we get into some really good stuff.
Item 12 proposes Council raise parking fines by as much as $3.50 to cover two issues:
So, here we are raising fines because your legislators raised taxes disguised as fees.
Item 13 is the University Heights Development Project wherein the State was supposed to pay the City certain development fees upon the sale of those really nice homes. However, the State decided to lease instead of sell them. Now, we are stuck not getting paid. The State, being the generous body that it is, has proposed making payments. I suggest Council reject the plan (just check the State’s credit!) and order the fees paid immediately – just like they would with any other developer! The total amount being negotiated: $407,202.60!
Let’s look at this in a different light. Taxpayers funded the development so that public employees could get a better deal on a house than non-university employees. Then, when no one wanted to buy them, they come back to the taxpayers and ask us to float the debt a little longer. What a stupid system we have created.
And finally, not last nor least, is the Fullerton Municipal Golf Course under Item 14. Council will be considering a fresh new agreement with American Golf Corporation, the managing company for the golf course, as part of the “Recovery Zone Economic Development Bond” which spends $2,200,000 on new irrigation. The back-up documents indicate that staff thinks “revenue” will increase 200% next year. I’m not sure what they were smoking when the put that thought on paper but Prop 19 didn’t pass. What bothers me about this project is that the agreement should spell out maintenance AND operations for American Golf Corporation. They should collect enough in green fees to cover the irrigation and upkeep of the course. If they aren’t then I suppose they are on par with our council who enjoy passing bonds under the lie of low-income housing only to replace it with moderate income housing. But, you voted for more of the same…
As always, if I missed something important so let me know. If you have anything constructive to add, please do so.
Just when I thought it would be a good idea for me to hang it up from Fullerton politics, this sign showed up in and around Fullerton.
Good grief! Someone really took the time to make and plant these comical things. And that got me to re-thinking my role in Fullerton. Geez, thinks I, if these people believe I’m so powerful that they are willing to give me this sort of free publicity, maybe I should leverage that celebrity in the future.
And so I have decided that I must and will stay involved. There’s too much at stake and my gang and I are having too much fun. I guess it’s a calling!
Oh, and just a reminder: Chris Thompson was the #1 top vote getter in all Fullerton races including city council.
Provide your own caption to this picture snapped in a Newport Beach commercial center.
Although it’s a bit late, I want to add my voice to the chorus congratulating Chris Thompson and Bruce Whitaker for their impressive elections to the Fullerton School District Board and the Fullerton City Council, respectively.
Chris Thompson out-polled every other candidate in Fullerton by a mile, despite his opponents’ support from the teachers union.
The Fullerton School District Board of Trustees has been a sinkhole for years, poulated by liberals and Ed Royce RINOs. And of course the Fullerton City Council…well the less said about that the better, but Whitaker will be running that show in no time.
I expect good things and real, effective change from both of them. I know I won’t be disappointed.
Uh, oh. More bad news for Anaheim’s outgoing Mayor-for-Hire, Curt Pringle. An FPPC investigation into foreign junkets by the California High Speed Rail crew.
Pringle declared all the gifties large and small from Europe’s socialist governments that are hoping to sell the CHSR good jobs that Americans are too stupid to do.
But the rest of Pringle’s gang at CHSR may not have been so diligent, especially the Golden horde of consultants, yes men, and PR tools Pringle & Co. have brought on board their choo-choo.”Record keeping lapses” unintentional? More hilarity to follow.
From the Register, yesterday.
By Kanani Fong
Each November they come, marching on streets from Fullerton to New York City. Some are grizzled and grey, their rows not as straight, and many march arm in arm. To see a veterans day parade is to bear witness to a time line of war and peace: Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea, The Pacific, and Europe. And if you were to imagine, preceding them would be soldiers from Belleau Wood, San Juan Hill, Antietam, Gettysburg, and Valley Forge. If we look around us, we might even imagine all the loved ones they left behind, standing alongside watching the procession go by.
The passing years are gently worn by some of the WWII vets. While there are those still able to make the march, others sit at the staging area. They wear caps emblazoned where and with whom they served. Many have medals pinned to their jackets. Their vision is not as keen, sharp sounds are softer now. Yet, here they are, craning their necks, listening for the familiar sound of boots on the ground. They are waiting for their brothers who are marching for them.
Veterans gather every November 11 not just for the fanfare, hoopla, or flag waving. They come together to feel the bonds of service. For this was a time in their life when brotherhood was never a question and trust meant the difference between life and death. Unlike the camaraderie displayed among actors on a screen, or by athletes on a team, what separates them is the oath they took to protect and serve our country. Often this meant saving the life of their brothers, even if it could cost them their own. What distinguishes them is each has walked the warrior path, embodying a code of ethics and honor. They put aside their own needs, sacrificing everything. They would die for each other, they would die for you, they have died for us.
We know this day stirs old memories of those they have lost. Battle buddies who sat with them in a trench, a hooch, on the deck of a carrier, on a stretch of beach but didn’t make it through. The sounds and smells of war come back, not only today, but late at night when everyone in the house is asleep. For it’s not just the physical harm they risked, what they put on the line was their soul, sacrificing their own sense of peace. What many have worked so hard to get back is the same certainty they had during the war: a cause or person who makes them feel that life matters as much now as it did back then. Hand to hand; face-to-face; eye-to-eye; brother-to-brother; soul-to-soul.
Some have weathered the toll of war better than others. The men and women who have trudged through fields, jungles and urban decay have to regain their balance in fog of war. Today, when the word veteran is greatly shortchanged by stereotypes, when they themselves are politicized, finding their inner peace hasn’t been easy. For some, the search has proven elusive, and others struggle. But many who have reclaimed it, work tirelessly to help those who are still on the march, trying to catch their breath. They are, and always will be warriors.
This is why we gather on Veteran’s Day: to see and honor the brotherhood between those who have served and continue to do so. Because the truth is, love is what keeps the weave of brotherhood strong. And where there is love, there is beauty so awe-inspiring, it overwhelms and can break your heart. All we have to say are five simple words: “Thank you for your service.”
Best Regards,
Kanani
PBS Regarding War
PR Team, Restrepo
Writer, The Kitchen Dispatch
If you’re Anaheim’s outgoing Mayor-for-Hire, Curt Pringle, the answer is: very. We got hold of this flier that advertises a big tribute to Pringle that will undoubtedly tout his Integrity, Leadership, and Vision.
We already know more than we need to about those alleged Pringle attributes as we have vividly and abundantly documented in our pages how Der Pringle has managed to insert his grubby little fingers into just about every pie in OC, most prominently the Platinum Triangle Tragedy, The Great ARTIC Ripoff, the HSR Boondoggle, and even how he’s swung peculiar gigs shilling for Rob Reiner’s Children and Families Commission and even the OC Cemetery District.
———- Forwarded message ———-
From: Bryan Lang <Bryan@curtpringle.com>
Date: Mon, Nov 8, 2010 at 4:24 PM
Subject: Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle Tribute Event
To:****@*****.***
What’s really funny about the upcoming tribute to Pringle is that it is being organized by…Pringle himself! And if you respond to one of Pringle’s flunkies you can join in the party celebrating the Integrity, Leadership, and Vision that Pringle has embodied in his eight year Reign of Profit.
Most of us would feel a little bit awkward celebrating our own Leadership, Integrity, and Vision; apparently the flier left off Pringle’s Humility. Well, we’ll take care of that. And the experience will be humbling.