Fullerton Dems to Light $68k on Fire

This Tuesday, at the request of the Fire Heroes Union, the Fullerton City Council will vote (likely 3-2) to light $68,000 dollars on fire to get a bid from the Orange County Fire Authority (OCFA).

What’s $68k between friends?

This is a scam and just a waste of your tax dollars.

Don’t believe the fiscal lies being told here, none of the disingenuous liars who will vote for this care about your tax dollars and they’re certainly not going to get rid of Fullerton’s Fire Department to jump to OCFA.

The entire point of this bullshit bid is leverage to justify a raise for the Fire Department. Nothing more, nothing less.

I’ll prove it by using Council’s own agenda from the exact same meeting this coming Tuesday:

When you join OCFA you typically lease all of your equipment to them at no cost and all of your fire facilities for $1/year (as Garden Grove did a few years ago).

To take this bid seriously, you would have to believe that council is SERIOUSLY considering a bid to change to OCFA and is simultaneously spending $1,546,683.30 to buy Fullerton Fire a new ladder truck that they’ll just gift to OCFA to use as they see fit.

If we went to OCFA, it is them and not us who would decide where trucks (apparatus) would be stationed in order to best serve the cities under their jurisdiction. Thus it makes zero sense for Fullerton to buy a new truck when it might not even stay in Fullerton.

These conflicting agenda items would make no logical sense if this bullshit OCFA bid was serious. But it’s not serious.

This is just the council Dems lighting your tax dollars on fire, well, because screw you, they need to help a union argue for more of your money later during negotiations. Silva, Jung and Zahra refuse to take their role as representatives of the residents seriously any time a union rears it’s ugly head and this is just another gross example.

If the Fire Heroes Union wants this bid so bad they can pay for it their damn selves considering they have no issues spending their own money to try and raise your taxes (Measure S campaigning) or to pick your City Council (campaign contributions).

Your roads suck, your services are getting more expensive and you’re constantly being asked to do more with less by City Hall and City Council. Hell, the City asked you to donate Christmas decorations this last season because they’re so broke.

Domer-Decorations
Hitching to Needles…

But not broke enough to avoid spending $65k of your money to help a union at the negotiating table.

If this bid was serious then the council would be getting bids from LA Fire and Placentia as well as OCFA. That’s how you find out the best services with the most benefits fort he residents at the best price – by shopping around. So of course they don’t want to do any of that.

Later this year when the City is selling everything not nailed down, and a few things that are, remember this moment when these disingenuous liars spent your money on political theater to help out the unions who will always put their interests above your safety.

Fullerton about to lose a Fire Engine

The City is in the process of approving a new labor contract with the Fullerton Firefighter’s Association.  Buried deep in the agreement on page 52 is this nugget — the City will be going from six (6) engines to five (5) engines.  We’ve had six fire engines in Fullerton for many, many years.

At no time has the City come forward with any candor to admit to this change, except when I brought it up during the previous City Council meeting.  Even then, none of our council members seem to care very much.

This change may well result in every property owner in the City paying higher property (fire) insurance rates. One of the factors that insurance companies use to determine rates is the Insurance Services Office (ISO) Public Protection Classification (PPC) score calculated for every fire district around the country.

The ISO score takes into consideration many factors, including the strength of the fire department and the City’s water supply.   More specifically, the fire department score includes calculations for the number of engine and truck companies, their locations around the City, and the number of firefighters on duty.  The fire union agreement, set for final approval on Tuesday, reduces the level of staffing by 1 position per rotating shift, which will further reduce our score.

Fullerton scored 76.71 points out of a possible 100 the last time ISO evaluated the City of Fullerton in 2012.  This equates to an ISO PPC “class” of 3 on a scale of 1 to 10 (with 1 being best).

You can read the full report here.  As much as the City wants to rubber stamp the agreement and forget all about it, this is very much a matter of public policy that warrants further discussion.  We will likely pay more for homeowner’s insurance due to the City having one less fire engine in service.

Do we, as a City, want to:

  • Pay more in homeowner’s insurance premiums in return for less fire department staffing and resources?
    -or-
  • Pay more in taxes to maintain the current level of fire department staffing, and, hopefully, preserve lower insurance premiums?
    -or-
  • Pay the same amount in taxes, for the same, or even improved levels of fire department staffing, by forcing the firefighters to contribute more toward their pensions?

This is a choice that needs to be made now before going any further.  I suggest attending Tuesday’s meeting prepared to speak, and/or send your thoughts to council@cityoffullerton.com.

Lemmon Head

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:

 

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Kaboom. One Hundred and Twenty-Seven Million Dollars

Fullerton’s public safety pension debt just exploded.  Numbers from a new report just released by CalPERS pin the unfunded pension liability for Fullerton’s police and fire at $126,843,150.

Hey little guy. Cash or credit?

The new figures represent a first look at Fullerton’s pension crisis after the market crash of 2007 (yes, CalPERS is that slow.)

Of course these dismal digits are probably optimistic, given that CalPERS is still using the ridiculous rate of return that the unions used to cook up these obscene benefits in the first place. We did, however, take the liberty of removing the absurd “smoothing” calculation that adds a magical $73,000,000 to the fund, even though that money does not exist anywhere.

Warning: 76 pages of boring

$126,843,150.00. Let’s put that number in perspective: it’s enough to fund the entire Parks and Rec department for the next 27 years, re-pave six million square/ft of deteriorating roadway or completely staff Fullerton’s libraries until the year 2058.

Paying that debt (assuming it doesn’t get worse) will require an additional $3,000 from each Fullerton household, above and beyond our current taxes. That’s just for unfunded public safety retirement debt, which allows these public employees to receive 90% of their highest pay at age 50 for the rest of their lives.

Fullerton Unions Pick a Pack of Shameful RINOs

Today the first public employee union campaign signs went up across Fullerton. Predictably, the union is backing all three worthless RINOs: Don Bankhead, Pat McKinley and Roland Chi.

The public safety unions’ motives have always been clear to the observant. They will support the candidates who offer them the biggest return. What do the unions expect? More generous pay raises. More obscene benefits. More unsustainable pensions.  Multi-million dollar retirement packages. And more debt and taxes to pay for it.

Rookie draft complete. Now presenting the 2010 Union Dream Team

The unions have proven that they hold little regard for Fullerton taxpayers, as evidenced by their pension-driven destruction of Fullerton’s financial future for the benefit of a few public servants. They lobby for raises, pray on the emotions of the weak, and lie about future benefit costs all while complaining about their cushy jobs. When it’s time to negotiate with our empty-headed council, all of the union deceit comes together like a finely tuned machine. It’s sole purpose? To line their own pockets in exchange for the least amount of effort and accountability as possible.

What’s at stake? Bloated union paychecks.

How could the unions take so much from Fullerton’s conservative voter base? That’s easy.  For decades, Republican voters have been fooled in to electing spineless cowards who are afraid to stand up for taxpayers at their end of the bargaining table. They shrivel up in fear at the thought of going against the unions and offer nothing but endless excuses when their negligence is exposed.

It’s frightening, but it’s true. The unions are in it for themselves, taxpayers be damned. They won’t quit until we’ve been sucked dry, and they’ve found just the right candidates to do it. In 2010, it really is “us vs. them.”  Let’s bring some sanity back to this city.