Search Results for: zahra

Posted onAbout Us

Flory Wins Wheel of Candidates

by 13 Comments on Flory Wins Wheel of Candidates
Accountability? It was never on the agenda.

Well, that was predictable.

In fact, after breaking up the FFFF kitty last night, those betting $1 on Jan Flory only got $0.98 back. Everyone knew it was coming.

Why? Because Fullerton gonna Fullerton and the house always wins. There was never any real chance that anyone was going to do the right thing. Ahmad Zahra of 2018 has clearly been through the establishment sheep dip, emerging as the self-righteous lecturer Ahmad Zahra 2.0 of 2019.

You didn’t know what the NUFF forum was for you to learn about a candidate so you could come speak your piece during last night’s public comment period? Ahmad is offended!

You don’t care about Ahmad’s latest sob story justifying his total lack of conviction to do the right thing by the voter? Ahmad is offended!

You expected Ahmad to abide by his word and not vote for someone lobbying for a position that hadn’t even been announced? Ahmad is offended!

Well, we can see where this is going to go for the next four years. Maybe we’ll start keeping a list of reasons why Ahmad is exempt from being held accountable for his own actions and statements. Excuses seem to be his tool of choice.

As for Jesús Silva, Fullerton’s next liberal lion, he just sold out his wife and the rest of Fullerton’s liberal cabal by granting a third vote to continue enforcement of Chevron’s development agreement for West Coyote Hills. There’s a flip flop that would even make Doug Chaffee envious. Sorry Fullerton, the bulldozer is coming, all thanks to Jesús.

No surprises from Fullerton’s Queen-of-Mean Jennifer Fitzgerald. One has to wonder what all those whispers between her, Ahmad, Jesús, and City Manager Ken Domer were all about.

As the council begins to tackle the problems created by their predecessors, at least they’ll be able to look over to the left and ask Jan Flory directly, “Remind us again, why did you do that?”

We, the collective imbalance that is FFFF, look forward to hearing how Indivisible types attempt to exculpate themselves as they realize their progressive reformers are actually no different from the cronyistic corporatists they despise.

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Posted onAhmad Zahra

My Council Speech from Tonight

by 10 Comments on My Council Speech from Tonight

I really don’t have much to say that I haven’t said at this dais before, or which hasn’t been reported by local media such as the Voice of OC.

It’s my opinion that this whole process has been riddled with malfeasance and corruption since the get-go. Yes Councilmember Zahra, there is plenty of blame to go around and money is an issue but that doesn’t excuse the way the city has handled this issue including changing our municipal code on election day.

Tonight’s issue has been so mired in the muck that even after you directed staff to reach out to the Neighbors United for Fullerton to have them change their meeting agenda and NUFF was gracious enough to accommodate your last minute favor – two of you snubbed them, disrespected the citizens, abdicated your moral authority on even the pretense of openness and transparency and you insulted all of the people who put themselves up for consideration.

I know about the lobbying by power brokers and the behind the scenes closed door meetings on both sides of the aisle as you preen and haggle to get your anointed pick onto the dais.

It was obvious a month ago who was the favorite before we the people even knew how the process would play out legally. That’s how baked into the cake the corruption and dishonesty is in Fullerton.

But I’m here to dare you to be better than you think you can be and better than you have been in the past. I’m here to dare you to be open and honest and to give the people a chance to vote for their own representation with a special election.

Regarding cost, It may have been hard to look at a struggling mother and explain where this $400,000 might be spent but as a struggling father of 3 I ask if you looked her in the face and explained why 70+% of our general fund goes to salaries and pensions to support people to do jobs we then don’t have the funds to complete – such as our aging infrastructure including that dark park?

If the cost is truly too much to bear then I can offer you a compromise. Everybody who tunes into these meetings knows that Whitaker doesn’t like me because I ran in the Newman recall instead of supporting him. Silva doesn’t like me for calling him out both here and on the FFFF blog time and again. Fitzgerald – well that list to too long to recount here but suffice it to say she and I won’t be getting tea anytime soon. And Zahra – he’ll learn if he hasn’t already.

I’m the one guy none of you wants up on that dais. I’m a “chronic malcontent”, I pick on everybody in power, I don’t smile enough and I have this beard. I have it on good authority that this beard alone disqualifies me with half of the city.

And all of that means that I can’t win reelection. I obviously won’t be tightly allied with any of you so you’ll have to compromise and work together to find solutions that aren’t one-sided nonsense and best of all my blogging by virtue of the brown act will all but need to cease and who of you wouldn’t see that as a bonus?

You know I’ve read the budget, you know I’m well versed in city issues and oh who are we kidding here – even if I was the best candidate this was done before it started. I didn’t throw my name in because I wanted the position – I put my name in to highlight the corruption and ridiculousness of this travesty of a process. The process ended up being worse than I anticipated so my goals were on point.

In summation I dare you to be better than yourselves. To actually embrace openness and transparency and to give the people the voice that you’ve been trying so hard to deny them.

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Posted onAbout Us

Funeral for Fullerton’s GOP on Tuesday

by 5 Comments on Funeral for Fullerton’s GOP on Tuesday

GOP-death-feature-image-4

There has been a lot of talk lately about the problems, changing issues and demographic shifts which have basically killed the CA and OC (R) parties. We’re yet to really see anybody do a post-mortem on Fullerton so here I am to explain why Fullerton is going to get higher taxes and no accountability in the days to come using just our recent past.

While Gil Cisneros bought and took a long held (R) Congressional seat and Doug Chaffee bought and flipped a (R) Supervisor’s seat, the shift in parties in Fullerton is more nuanced and problematic.

Fullerton’s (R)s aren’t in demise because Silva beat Sebourn – Fullerton completely lost their (R) bonafides when Jennifer Fitzgerald joined our council.

Fullerton, for the last 6 years, had a 3-2 (R) majority on council. You wouldn’t know it, because despite being a (R) and a darling of the (R) power brokers in OC politics such as Ed Royce, Shawn Nelson and the rest, she spent more time voting to give the 2 (D)s a majority on council than standing behind her own talking points and election material. Cronyism? She’d vote for it. Non-competitive contracts? Yeaup. Huge pay and benefit giveaways to our heroes? Obviously. There rarely seemed to be an issue on the (R) platform she wouldn’t throw to the wolves. While this isn’t new for Fullerton (R)s, per se, Fitzgerald encapsulates everything that has cost the (R)s so dearly. Sure, she made some noise on SB54 that comes out of the quasi-GOP handbook but that wasn’t a policy issue that impacted Fullerton so much as a soapbox to pretend she has some sort of principles.

Over the years Jennifer Fitzgerald was always ready to vote with Doug Chaffee and especially Jan Flory in order to shaft taxpayers and give government employees, employees with no accountability or real oversight, more and more and more while our services dwindled and our city suffered.

I can’t even count the times that fellow (R)s Bruce Whitaker and Greg Sebourn were on the opposite side of the vote from Fitzgerald.

When she ran in 2012 she ran on ending pension spiking and all of the things that (R)s claim to care about and then she spent 4 years betraying her entire campaign website. Yet this isn’t just a post-mortem of Fitzgerald’s current time on council. This is one of the OCGOP and Fullerton (R)s.

Her abysmal record should have sent her packing in 2016 but instead the OC GOP stood strong behind her with Royce, Nelson and the rest handing her endorsements and support which helped her secure more funding and the W. All this in spite of flat out lying about Fullerton’s “Balanced Budget”.

When your party has no ideology and will support cronies for the sake of cronyism you become nearly indistinguishable from the opposition – especially when you vote with them the majority of the time.

It was no surprise that Jesus Silva beat Greg Sebourn in Fullerton’s 3rd District. I like Greg and I think he is a better choice for council but he isn’t on the payroll of a lobbying firm and doesn’t seem to play the crony game and therefore the OC GOP had little use for him and let him twist in the wind. Bruce Whitaker was the obvious choice for LA/OC/SB (R)s to send to Sacramento in the Newman Recall and yet they backed the empty suit that is Ling Ling Chang. All of these problems are the makings of the blind allegiance of (R) voters to their party elders who do nothing but sell them out.

Fullerton has real problems which require real solutions. Our budgets are getting worse and our services are getting sparser. By way of example, we don’t have the staffing to read water meters within the required 60 day window of billing cycles so people are being overcharged for water and there seems to be no recourse. Our parks are falling apart unless we manage to secure state grants to fix them and our roads continue to be in terrible shape. The list of issues that are going to require adult math and belt tightening, especially in regards to Police and Fire, is long. (more…)

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Posted onAhmad Zahra

A New-ish Council This Way Comes

by 4 Comments on A New-ish Council This Way Comes

Backroom-Deal

Tonight Doug Chaffee and Greg Sebourn leave the Fullerton City Council and Ahmad Zahra gets sworn in to be the first to represent District 5 on the dais. This wouldn’t be Fullerton if that’s all that was happening tonight – a simple transition of (some) power – but true to form our current Mayor (for a few more hours), Doug Chaffee, opted to ram a pet project down the council’s throat one last time. An unsolicited bid to turn the parking lot used for Train Days into a “boutique” hotel without the pesky bother of worrying about competition or opening a bid process. He wants this to happen now, NOW, NOW! because… reasons. It’s such a great idea that Chaffee doesn’t trust the council to pick it up without him which means he either thinks they’re too stupid to know a good thing when they see it or it’s not… wait for it… a good thing.

Ah the smell of cronyism.

While we’ll eventually get to say goodbye to a few members and add Ahmad which should be the only focus tonight, first we have to see if Jesus has been bought off and has changed his tune on competition. A tune that he sung only 2 weeks ago, mind you.

After that first crony, I mean agenda, item has been dealt with the council will move on to the actual (partial) transition of power.

For those not keeping track here’s what will happen tonight:

Jesus Silva moves from at-large to the District 3 representative. This will leave his at-large seat open until council decides to fill it or holds a special election.

Bruce Whitaker and Jennifer Fitzgerald will stay status quo.

After tonight we’ll also have a new Mayor (likely Silva) and a new Mayor Pro-Tem (likely Fitzgerald). As for the empty seat – don’t forget to comment on who you think will be the appointed council member in our Wheel of Replacement Candidates thread.

We doubt there will be any surprises tonight but we’ll keep you posted as always friends.

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Posted onBehind Closed Doors

Chaffee’s Last Crony Grasp on Council

by 8 Comments on Chaffee’s Last Crony Grasp on Council

SONY DSC

Just when I was preparing to see a new chapter of shenanigans in Fullerton coming from our new council, instead from the realm of ARE YOU F^&$&ING KIDDING ME comes Doug Chaffee trying to slap Fullerton with one more bit of cronyism before he leaves to play at the county level.

Less than two short weeks ago the council voted, 3-2 (Sebourn, Silva & Whitaker vs Fitzgerald & Chaffee) against an unsolicited bid for a hotel on the parking lot near the train station at Santa Fe and Ponoma. Cooler heads prevailed and a more open, transparent and honest process was suggested.

Now Chaffee, who per the City Manager agendized this item, wants to crush that transparency and openness in his last meeting this coming Tuesday. To make matters more unpalatable the council/staff arranged the agenda to swear in our new council member (Zahra) and say goodbye to the ones leaving (Sebourn & Chaffee) AFTER they vote again on this hotel nonsense. For the uninitiated there is a vendor who wants to build a hotel and Fitzgerald and Chaffee want to hand it off to them without opening a bid process to interested parties. It’s cronyism and backroom dealing 101.

Agenda-NewCouncilHotel

This is truly a slap in the face to both Ahmad Zahra and District 5 as this new development would be in their neighborhood and the first District 5 candidate will have no say on it because the agenda lets Zahra join council mere moments AFTER this hotel’s fate is already decided.

This coming back this quickly means one thing and one thing only – somebody got to Silva* as he’s the likely weak link on this issue.

For reference here’s what Silva said about the ENA at the last meeting at approximately the 3:30:12 mark:

“I think an RFP, or a bidding, would help the city I think, would help us get the best possible product. Competition drives,  brings out the best in you. And I think having that can bring out the best in the current applicant and someone else.”

We’ll see if Silva still believes this on Tuesday or if all of the sudden competition is less important than craven cronyism.  Even if it’s the case that Silva changed his mind, does he really think so little of fellow Democrat Ahmad Zahra that he’ll prevent him from voting on an issue that residents of District 5 have officially elected him to decide on?

This is just dumb, unnecessary, and silly. One can’t help but wonder if this is really Doug Chaffee being that tone deaf or if it’s really retribution for Ahmad Zahra winning a seat his wife coveted in the first place.

Because, and let’s be honest, if Paulette Marshall Chaffee won this election, Doug wouldn’t be preventing her from voting on Tuesday.

cronyism-kills

*it’s possible that Whitaker or Sebourn were flipped but they had stronger arguments than Silva and are more ideologically opposed to cronyism.

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Posted onChronic Failure

City is Still Shilling for Bar Owners

by 15 Comments on City is Still Shilling for Bar Owners

cronyism

For the last, well forever really, the city has been trying to figure out how to change downtown to make it more… something. I can’t quite figure it out. By the looks of it the only goals City Staff have are to pack as many residents into as many high-density apartment complexes as possible and to hand over as much of Downtown to the local “restauranteurs” which is Ted White (Director of Community Development) for “Bar Owners”.

This past Wednesday night one such plan hit our Planning Commission. The plan was 70+ pages of muddled definitions and empty promises. I’ll summarize:

City Staff has been ignoring their jobs and our municipal code for 15+ years because reasons. It’s hard to do the job we pay them to do so they want to do less of it and they want to relax the rules so the rule-breakers have fewer rules they have to break while making piles of money.

Instead of cleaning up bad definitions and attempting to hold businesses responsible for the melees enveloping downtown each weekend, the city would rather permanently legalize downtown getting louder and more rowdy with the promises that this time, with no indication of staffing changes or practical enforcement, they’ll hold bar owners to a standard of behavior, or perhaps a guideline, or at least an amorphous shape resembling a line if you squint really hard.

It reminds me an old UN Peacekeeper joke where whenever they see somebody doing something wrong they yell “Stop! Or I’ll Yell “Stop!” Again!”. This time they mean it for realsies.

Ultimately Wednesday’s item was held until a possible study session in January and a new meeting in February, which is when we’re totally screwed. The bar owners will get everything they want and then some come February because the Planning Commission is changing. A lot. (more…)

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Posted onFullerton City Council

To Do #1: Council Vacancy Appointment

by 33 Comments on To Do #1: Council Vacancy Appointment

Editor’s Note: We, like you, are a little tired of last minute complex topics tossed into an agenda dripping with staff’s obfuscation and drowned in legalese. We’ve recruited a former policy aide to provide FFFF readers with some perspective on current and emerging issues to be placed before the Fullerton City Council over the course of the next year.  Our retired insider published a list of 100 topics for discussion yesterday.

 This is the first post in a series to talk about policy impacting our budget and our lives.  Say what you’d like about FFFF’s motives, but if we don’t break this stuff down to talk about it, who will?

With that, here’s The Fullerton Bagman with Council’s first item to resolve next year.

Hello Fullertonians:

I’ve been involved in government for a long time. Sometimes it’s a great experience, sometimes it’s not. For those of you familiar with this blog’s coverage of The Seven Walls of Government, this is what we’ll be confronting directly.

I don’t expect anyone in Fullerton to actually scale all seven walls and affect change, but I will equip you with a bare minimum necessary to side-step staff reports and speak to the issue at hand.  Council may still ignore you, but at least you won’t be dependent upon drinking from their tainted well to quench the crushing thirst of ignorance.

Going forward, I and other members of the FFFF staff will provide you with a standardized one or two page summary of a critical issue facing Fullerton, free of bureaucratic interference and gobbledygook.

Issue #1: Council Vacancy Appointment

WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?

As a result of Jesus Silva winning election as District 3’s elected representative, he must vacate his current at-large elected seat. This results in four elected officials on a body with five seats.

All decisions require a majority vote (2 of 3, 3 of 4, or 3 of 5) of Council, with some votes requiring three votes specifically. With an empty seat on Council, some issues may not get resolved because of a 2-2 split or a 2-1 split in the case of a recusal for items requiring three votes.

In the case of a split, by law, the Council’s official action is to take no action.

(more…)

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Posted onFullerton City Council

Council’s 2019 To-Do List

by 9 Comments on Council’s 2019 To-Do List

The transition to District elections is proceeding smoothly.

Well, the election is over. Silva won, Sebourn lost.  Zahra won in District 5. The circle of political life turns once more as light falls on a new day in Fullerton.

Now that all the sign waiving, sign stealing, and empty-promise making is done, let’s take a look at the problems these poor fellows signed up to solve.

We’ve listed 100 discussion items in 27 different categories that likely need to be addressed in the next year. Feel free to add your own.

Here’s hoping Fullerton voters elected people who are intelligent, responsible, and accountable.

  1. Council Vacancy Appointment/Special Election
  2. Major Organizational Change at the Police Department
    • Hiring a New Police Chief
    • Hiring Two New Police Captains
  3. Police Department Reputation and Morale Management
    • ex-Sargent Corbett Criminal Trial (on duty)
    • ex-Chief Hendricks Criminal Trial (not on duty)
    • Captain Oliveras Criminal Trial (not on duty)
    • ex-officers Cicinelli and Wolfe Civil Trial (on duty)
    • Open and Anticipated Civil Trials
    • Citizen Oversight of Police Department
  4. Infrastructure Management
    • Roads and Bridges, $100,000,000 shortfall
    • Water Lines
    • Impact of HSR and Transportation Center
  5. Water Rate Hike
  6. Hunt Library Sale/Long Range Plan
  7. Property Rezoning/Higher Density Development
    • Developer Fee Reorganization
    • Form Based Code (Downtown Core and Corridors-Lite)
    • Kimberly Clark Sale/Re-purpose
  8. New Permanent Fire Chief
  9. Labor Negotiations
  10. Lawsuits Not Related to The Police Department
    • City Liability
      • Traffic Accidents (this is most of them)
      • Public Injury (parks, sidewalks, etc.)
      • Employment/Discrimination (we’ve only heard rumors)
    • Land Use/Consent Decree/Compliance
  11. Downtown Gameplan
    • Paid Parking
    • Business Improvement District (BID)
    • Conditional Use Permit (CUP) / Administrative Restaurant Use Permit (ARUP) revisions
    • Code Enforcement
  12. West Coyote Hills
  13. City Attorney Rebid
  14. City Wide Overnight Parking
  15. FJC Football Stadium
  16. CSUF “Collegetown” Expansion
  17. Homelessness
    • Fullerton Shelter
    • Anti-Camping Code Enforcement
    • Church-Run-Shelter Code Revisions
    • County-Wide Permanent Supportive Housing Project
  18. The Budget
    • Sales Tax
    • Parcel Tax
    • Utility Tax
    • Outsourcing
      • Police
        • Jail
        • Patrol
        • Dispatch
        • Other Services (Parking, etc.)
      • Fire
        • North County JPA
        • County Fire
        • Paramedic/Ambulance Contract
      • Library
        • County
        • Private
      • Parks
        • Public-Private Partnership
        • Sale/Joint Use Agreements (i.e. School District)
      • Public Works
      • Water Utility
        • Sale to Private Ownership
        • Contract for management
    • CALPERS Participation
    • Long Term Staffing Plan
  19. Brea Dam Lease
  20. Street Cars
    • Harbor to Disneyland
    • Transportation Center to CSUF
  21. Marijuana
    • Illegal Dispensary Closures
    • Continuing Code Enforcement
    • Municipal Code Revisions to Allow Use
  22. Water and Drought Management
    • OCWD Participation
      • North Basin Plume
      • Poseidon
      • Additional aquifer extraction/recharge
    • MWD Participation
      • Twin Tunnels Participation
      • Long Term Water Rate Purchases
      • Colorado River Curtailment
  23. Hillcrest Park Phase 2 and 3
  24. Address Chronic Leak Culture
  25. Property Sales/Use
    • Basque Yard
    • Others
    • Redevelopment Wrap Up
  26. Fox Theater Parking Structure
    • Periphery Property Sale/Use
    • Parking Structure Building and Funding
  27. Mills Act
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Posted onBad Cops

Campaign Mail – Quirk-Silva’s Irony

by 19 Comments on Campaign Mail – Quirk-Silva’s Irony

It’s junk mail season and time to keep an eye on the nonsense being sent out by and for candidates and issues. One of the best pieces we’ve seen thus far in the cycle is this little nugget from the CADEM’s supporting Sharon Quirk-Silva for Assembly.

SQS Ford Irony
But just her?

They believe HER.

The irony and timing on this is pretty great considering that Quirk-Silva herself is being investigated by the State Assembly for political retaliation against Daniel Fierro, by way of trying to pressure fellow (D) Fullerton council candidate Ahmad Zahra into dropping Fierro as a client.

But they believe HER.

If you make a sexual assault claim against an SQS ally she’ll allegedly retaliate against you, as will her husband Council member Jesus Silva.

And yet they believe HER.

Riiiiight.

This is partisan schtick at it’s worst and I almost expect this to backfire spectacularly.

Where was this #IBelieveHer version of Sharon Quirk-Silva when Fullerton Officer Albert Rincon was being accused of sexually assaulting 7 women and costing the taxpayers of Fullerton $350,000?

Where was this #IBelieveHer Quirk-Silva when a judge said of that case:

“At the end of the day, the city put Rincon back onto the streets to continue arresting women despite a pattern of sexual harassment allegations. A reasonable juror could conclude based on these facts, that the city simply did not care what officers did to women during arrest,”.

For those of you wondering about the timeline on all this regarding Rincon and Quirk-Silva – from that same Oct 2011 article:

The Rincon case began in 2008, when Kari Bode and Gina Nastasi accused Rincon of groping them and exposing their breasts. They sued the department in 2009.

So where was #IBelieveHer Sharon Quirk-Silva when Officer Albert Rincon was allegedly molesting women on our city streets?

Oh. She was Mayor.

SQS Mayor Timeline

She was Mayor again in 2012 AFTER that Judge rebuked Fullerton for doing essentially nothing to an officer accused of at least 7 known alleged accounts of sexual assault under the color of authority.

And she seems to have done nothing. Apparently appeasing the police union was more important than Believing those women.

To make matters worse – Sharon Quirk-Silva just 6 short weeks ago, voted AGAINST SB1421 AND AB748.

After Jerry Brown sided against SQS and signed both of those bills into law, the ACLU stated:

“Together, SB 1421 and AB 748 will shine a much-needed light on police violence and abuse. Specifically, SB 1421 restores the public’s right to know how departments investigate and hold accountable those officers who abuse their power to frame, sexually assault, or kill members of the public. AB 748 will ensure law enforcement agencies throughout the state release police recordings of serious uses of force, including body camera footage, which are valuable tools for civilian oversight at a time of growing concern with police violence.”

SB 1421 is especially problematic for Quirk-Silva’s “#IBelieveHer” narrative in that it will make public some information specific to the powers of police officers, especially regarding sexual assault tied to the abuse of power to coerce a victim into sexual acts.

SB1421 directly addresses the problems with Officer Rincon and how it was handled within FPD and our city. Thus despite her firsthand knowledge of the problems being addressed by these bills from her time as our Mayor she opted to side with those who would abuse their power rather than the victims and the public seeking information about bad actors in uniform.

Yet they believe HER.

This is because Sharon Quirk-Silva apparently only “Believes Her” when the “her” in question can be used as a political cudgel against her opponents or to rally her more rabid base of supporters. When it comes to actually believing victims of sexual assault, in the end Sharon Quirk-Silva’ actions speak louder than her words. She can be counted on to run the gamut of doing nothing to actively, allegedly, trying to silence the victim and ultimately voted to keep information about official misconduct quiet.

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