Chula Vista City Councilman Steve Castaneda goes on trial today in the second politically-motivated prosecution out of a total of two prosecutions by the secretive "Public Integrity Unit" formed by San Diego District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis and the recently low-profile Patrick O'Toole.
Prosecutor Patrick O'Toole was unable to find any crime committed by Castaneda, so he charged him with lying during the investigation about whether or not he intended to buy a condo.
In April 2007, the Public Integrity Unit began prosecuting political opponents of Cheryl Cox. Patrick O'Toole, who had previously been appointed as US Attorney for San Diego by Attorney General John Ashcroft, headed the unit.
O'Toole prosecuted a staffer for mayor Steven Padilla who had taken two hours off work in an effort to get a photograph of Cheryl Cox with her disgraced family friend David Malcolm at a twilight yacht party fundraiser for Cox. The staffer was charged with five felony counts of perjury for telling a grand jury that he filled out his leave slip from work before rather than after he took off from his job at the City of Chula Vista. He pled guilty to lesser charges as part of a plea deal.
The now-dormant unit ended its active phase with a second and final prosecution, that of Steve Castaneda, who had run against Cheryl Cox for mayor.
Castaneda was prosecuted for allegedly lying about whether he planned to buy a condo, even though he never bought the condo in question.
According to the San Diego Union Tribune, "Castaneda was a tenant at the complex and was accused of seeking favors, such as free rent, from Sunbow owner Ash Israni, according to the 1,200-page grand jury transcript. The investigation found that Castaneda paid his rent and didn't ask for special treatment. O'Toole told the grand jury the perjury charges are warranted because Castaneda should be held accountable for 'lying about the facts'; even if no crime was uncovered...Castaneda has been vocal about O'Toole's investigations, saying they are politically motivated. He contended that Dumanis conspired with Chula Vista Mayor Cheryl Cox, his political rival in the 2006 mayoral primary."
"DA unit works as quietly as it began"
"Trial and Re-election bid could coincide"
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Note to Bonnie Dumanis: This is how you conduct an investigation
Today in Finance for April 8, 2008
SEC Charges Five Ex-Officials in San Diego Muni Fraud
Commission Chairman Christopher Cox has cited the city government's scandal as a reason to expand the SEC's regulatory powers over municipal bonds.
http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/11002450/c_10999584?f=home_todayinfinance&x=1
Stephen Taub
CFO.com | US
April 8, 2008
The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed civil fraud charges against five former San Diego city officials—mostly finance professionals—for their roles in the city’s financial crisis in 2002 and 2003.
The SEC charged the individuals for failing to disclose to investors buying the city’s municipal bonds that there were funding problems with San Diego's pension and retiree health care obligations and those liabilities had put the city in financial peril.
advertisement The five named were former city manager Michael Uberuaga, former city treasurer Mary Vattimo, former auditor an comptroller Edward Ryan, former deputy city manager of finance Patricia Frazier, and former assistant auditor & comptroller Teresa Webster.
"The facts will clearly demonstrate that all city officials and staff members acted with good faith and honest intention with regard to the bond offerings by the city of San Diego," stated Webster's attorney, Frank Vecchione. "At no time did Terri Webster act inappropriately or with intent to deceive any potential investor. The time has come to put the misperceptions and misrepresentations regarding Ms. Webster and these bonds to rest. We intend to do so."
Frazier's attorney could not be reached at presstime. Lawyers for the remaining three former officials did not return phone calls from CFO.com.
In the fraud complaint filed by the SEC on Monday, the commission charges that the five former San Diego officials knew that the city had been intentionally underfunding its pension obligations so that it could increase pension benefits while deferring the costs. The officials were allegedly aware that the city would face severe difficulty funding its future pension and retiree health care obligations unless it raised new revenues or pension and health care benefits or city services were cut.
The SEC alleges the ex-officials knew that the city’s unfunded pension liability was projected to grow dramatically from $284 million at the beginning of fiscal year 2002 to an estimated $2 billion by 2009 and that the city’s liability for retiree health care was another estimated $1.1 billion. But the officials failed to disclose those and other material facts in bond-offering documents and continuing disclosures, it added.
In a speech, SEC Chairman Christopher Cox has cited securities fraud within San Diego's city government in those years as a rationale for extending the commission's regulatory powers over municipal bonds. "While the SEC has anti-fraud authority -- allowing us to come in and clean up messes like [San Diego] after the fact," he said in a July 2007 speech, neither the SEC nor any other federal regulator can compel the municipal bond market to make the same sorts of disclosures that the SEC requires in the corporate securities market. "It's a basic common-sense consumer protection that is way overdue," Cox said at the time, calling for legislation giving the SEC "limited powers" to assure transparency in muni offering.
In its current complaint, the SEC alleges that Uberuaga signed the closing letter for one of the bond offerings, falsely certifying that it was accurate and did not contain any misleading statements. Ryan signed letters falsely representing that the city’s audited financials included in the securities offerings were accurate, the regulator alleged.
The commission also charged that Frazier regularly reviewed and revised the false and misleading disclosure documents and signed the closing letter for two out of a total five bond offerings relevant to the case. She falsely certified the disclosures as accurate and did not contain any misleading statements reviewed and made presentations to the rating agencies, the SEC alleged.
Webster reviewed city financials that contained some of the false and misleading disclosures, the commission charged, alleging that Vattimo took part in drafting the city’s false and misleading disclosures. Vattimo and Webster both allegedly knew that in 2003, the rating agencies had concerns about the city’s growing pension burdens and that those obligations could hurt the city’s credit rating. "Nevertheless, they withheld material facts from the rating agencies," the SEC added.
The SEC previously issued a sanction against San Diego for committing securities fraud by failing to disclose to investors important information about its pension and retiree health care obligations in the sale of its municipal bonds in 2002 and 2003. To settle the action, the city agreed to cease and desist from future securities fraud and to retain an independent consultant for three years to foster compliance with its disclosure obligations under the federal securities laws.
In December 2007, the SEC and the outside auditors for the city and its pension system, Thomas J. Saiz and Calderon, Jaham & Osborn, settled charges against the firm. Without admitting or denying the allegations in the complaint, the audit firm consented to the entry of a final judgment permanently enjoining them from violating the antifraud provisions of federal securities laws. The firm, which acted as the auditor of the city and the benefits plan, also paid a civil penalty of $15,000.
SEC Charges Five Ex-Officials in San Diego Muni Fraud
Commission Chairman Christopher Cox has cited the city government's scandal as a reason to expand the SEC's regulatory powers over municipal bonds.
http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/11002450/c_10999584?f=home_todayinfinance&x=1
Stephen Taub
CFO.com | US
April 8, 2008
The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed civil fraud charges against five former San Diego city officials—mostly finance professionals—for their roles in the city’s financial crisis in 2002 and 2003.
The SEC charged the individuals for failing to disclose to investors buying the city’s municipal bonds that there were funding problems with San Diego's pension and retiree health care obligations and those liabilities had put the city in financial peril.
advertisement The five named were former city manager Michael Uberuaga, former city treasurer Mary Vattimo, former auditor an comptroller Edward Ryan, former deputy city manager of finance Patricia Frazier, and former assistant auditor & comptroller Teresa Webster.
"The facts will clearly demonstrate that all city officials and staff members acted with good faith and honest intention with regard to the bond offerings by the city of San Diego," stated Webster's attorney, Frank Vecchione. "At no time did Terri Webster act inappropriately or with intent to deceive any potential investor. The time has come to put the misperceptions and misrepresentations regarding Ms. Webster and these bonds to rest. We intend to do so."
Frazier's attorney could not be reached at presstime. Lawyers for the remaining three former officials did not return phone calls from CFO.com.
In the fraud complaint filed by the SEC on Monday, the commission charges that the five former San Diego officials knew that the city had been intentionally underfunding its pension obligations so that it could increase pension benefits while deferring the costs. The officials were allegedly aware that the city would face severe difficulty funding its future pension and retiree health care obligations unless it raised new revenues or pension and health care benefits or city services were cut.
The SEC alleges the ex-officials knew that the city’s unfunded pension liability was projected to grow dramatically from $284 million at the beginning of fiscal year 2002 to an estimated $2 billion by 2009 and that the city’s liability for retiree health care was another estimated $1.1 billion. But the officials failed to disclose those and other material facts in bond-offering documents and continuing disclosures, it added.
In a speech, SEC Chairman Christopher Cox has cited securities fraud within San Diego's city government in those years as a rationale for extending the commission's regulatory powers over municipal bonds. "While the SEC has anti-fraud authority -- allowing us to come in and clean up messes like [San Diego] after the fact," he said in a July 2007 speech, neither the SEC nor any other federal regulator can compel the municipal bond market to make the same sorts of disclosures that the SEC requires in the corporate securities market. "It's a basic common-sense consumer protection that is way overdue," Cox said at the time, calling for legislation giving the SEC "limited powers" to assure transparency in muni offering.
In its current complaint, the SEC alleges that Uberuaga signed the closing letter for one of the bond offerings, falsely certifying that it was accurate and did not contain any misleading statements. Ryan signed letters falsely representing that the city’s audited financials included in the securities offerings were accurate, the regulator alleged.
The commission also charged that Frazier regularly reviewed and revised the false and misleading disclosure documents and signed the closing letter for two out of a total five bond offerings relevant to the case. She falsely certified the disclosures as accurate and did not contain any misleading statements reviewed and made presentations to the rating agencies, the SEC alleged.
Webster reviewed city financials that contained some of the false and misleading disclosures, the commission charged, alleging that Vattimo took part in drafting the city’s false and misleading disclosures. Vattimo and Webster both allegedly knew that in 2003, the rating agencies had concerns about the city’s growing pension burdens and that those obligations could hurt the city’s credit rating. "Nevertheless, they withheld material facts from the rating agencies," the SEC added.
The SEC previously issued a sanction against San Diego for committing securities fraud by failing to disclose to investors important information about its pension and retiree health care obligations in the sale of its municipal bonds in 2002 and 2003. To settle the action, the city agreed to cease and desist from future securities fraud and to retain an independent consultant for three years to foster compliance with its disclosure obligations under the federal securities laws.
In December 2007, the SEC and the outside auditors for the city and its pension system, Thomas J. Saiz and Calderon, Jaham & Osborn, settled charges against the firm. Without admitting or denying the allegations in the complaint, the audit firm consented to the entry of a final judgment permanently enjoining them from violating the antifraud provisions of federal securities laws. The firm, which acted as the auditor of the city and the benefits plan, also paid a civil penalty of $15,000.
Monday, March 31, 2008
SEC says mayor should not appoint his own auditor
I agree with the SEC and Frances O'Neill Zimmerman: San Diego mayor Jerry Sanders should not appoint his own auditor.
Zimmerman wrote the following in a letter to Voice of San Diego:
Auditing Mess
By Frances O'Neill Zimmerman, La Jolla
March 31, 2008
"...Voters need to realize that what the SEC calls for will be explicitly undone if voters fall for Proposition C that will appear on our June primary ballot with Mayor Sanders' stamp of approval. The SEC calls for "independent oversight" from an Audit Committee, "an independent and professional internal audit function" and "significant additional staff" to accomplish future on-time reporting to taxpayers and to credit-granting agencies...
"I'd say we can't afford not to have an independent Auditor and Audit Committee and more auditing staff. Nor can we can afford the fox-in-henhouse Proposition C."
Zimmerman wrote the following in a letter to Voice of San Diego:
Auditing Mess
By Frances O'Neill Zimmerman, La Jolla
March 31, 2008
"...Voters need to realize that what the SEC calls for will be explicitly undone if voters fall for Proposition C that will appear on our June primary ballot with Mayor Sanders' stamp of approval. The SEC calls for "independent oversight" from an Audit Committee, "an independent and professional internal audit function" and "significant additional staff" to accomplish future on-time reporting to taxpayers and to credit-granting agencies...
"I'd say we can't afford not to have an independent Auditor and Audit Committee and more auditing staff. Nor can we can afford the fox-in-henhouse Proposition C."
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Files and McCain Letter Show Effort to Keep Loophole
Files and McCain Letter Show Effort to Keep Loophole
The New York Times
By STEPHEN LABATON
February 23, 2008
In late 1998, Senator John McCain sent an unusually blunt letter to the head of the Federal Communications Commission, warning that he would try to overhaul the agency if it closed a broadcast ownership loophole.
The letter, and two later ones signed by Mr. McCain, then chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, urged the commission to abandon plans to close a loophole vitally important to Glencairn Ltd., a client of Vicki Iseman, a lobbyist. The provision enabled one of the nation’s largest broadcasting companies, Sinclair, to use a marketing agreement with Glencairn, a far smaller broadcaster, to get around a restriction barring single ownership of two television stations in the same city.
At a news conference on Thursday, Mr. McCain denounced an article in The New York Times that described concerns by top advisers a decade ago about his ties to Ms. Iseman, a partner at the firm Alcalde & Fay. He said he never had any discussions with his advisers about Ms. Iseman and never did any favors for any lobbyist.
One of the McCain campaign’s statements about his dealings with Ms. Iseman was challenged by news accounts on Friday. In discussing letters he wrote regulators about a deal involving another of Ms. Iseman’s clients, Lowell W. Paxson, the campaign had said the senator had never spoken to her or anyone from the company. But Mr. McCain acknowledged in a 2002 deposition that he had sent the letters after meeting with Mr. Paxson.
On Glencairn, the campaign said Mr. McCain’s efforts to retain the loophole were not done at Ms. Iseman’s request. It said Mr. McCain was merely directing the commission to “not act in a manner contradictory to Congressional intent.” Mr. McCain wrote in the letters that a 1996 law, the telecommunications act, required the loophole; a legal opinion by the staff of the commission took the opposite view.
A review of the record, including agency records now at the National Archives and interviews with participants, shows that Mr. McCain, Republican of Arizona, played a significant role in killing the plan to eliminate the loophole. His actions followed requests by Ms. Iseman and lobbyists at other broadcasting companies, according to lobbying records and Congressional aides.
Over the years, Mr. McCain has taken varying positions on broadcast ownership issues. He has supported the relaxation of the ownership rules, but he has also been sharply critical of rules that permit too much concentration of ownership in a single market.
By November 1998, the F.C.C. was planning to strike down broadcasting marketing agreements, a potentially ruinous development for Glencairn. But after receiving Mr. McCain’s Dec. 1 letter, it put off consideration of the issue.
“To the extent the F.C.C. shows itself incapable of following Congressional intent,” the letter said, “these issues will become part of our overall review of the commission’s functions and structure during the next session of Congress.”
The letter, sent from Mr. McCain’s office by his staff at the commerce committee, was also signed by Senator Conrad Burns, Republican of Montana and chairman of a communications subcommittee. It was uncharacteristic of Mr. McCain, according to a review of dozens of letters sent by him to the commission during the same period.
It was the only letter that contained a suggestion that a failure to act would result in the possible overhaul of the agency.
The letter said that “as a leading participant in the passage of the 1996 Act, I have a very clear understanding” of the law’s intent and why it required the ownership loophole to be preserved. Mr. McCain was one of five senators — and the only Republican — to vote against the act. He has also been an outspoken critic of it.
While other companies also complained to Congress about the plan to close the loophole, the issue was particularly important to Sinclair because it had more marketing agreements than any in the nation. For its part, Glencairn appeared to have been getting little support in Congress until it retained Ms. Iseman in 1998.
Edwin Edwards, who was the president of the company at the time, said in a recent interview that after retaining Ms. Iseman, he was able to get heard by Mr. McCain.
“We were pounding the pavement in Washington,” Mr. Edwards said. “We recruited help from as many people as we could. We knocked on every door just trying to get support.”
The campaign said that Mr. McCain never spoke with Ms. Iseman about the issue, but that she did speak to his staff about it. Mr. Edwards and Mr. McCain met on July 20, 1999, according to the campaign.
After the commission postponed consideration of the issue, Mr. McCain signed a second letter to the agency on Dec. 7, 1998, in support of local marketing agreements, and a third one on Feb. 11, 1999. The third letter was signed by four other lawmakers. Ultimately, the F.C.C. loosened the rules to permit a company to own two television stations in some markets.
The letters Mr. McCain wrote to the commission in the Paxson matter were sent in late 1999 and prompted the agency’s chairman to chastise him for interfering in a licensing matter. The incident embarrassed Mr. McCain, then making his first presidential run, because Mr. Paxson was a campaign contributor and fund-raiser.
While the campaign said Thursday that Mr. McCain never spoke to anyone from Paxson or Ms. Iseman’s lobbying firm before sending those letters to the commission, an article posted Friday on Newsweek’s Web site said Mr. McCain had previously acknowledged first speaking to Mr. Paxson. Recounting that conversation, Mr. McCain testified in the deposition, “I said I would be glad to write a letter asking them to act.”
The Washington Post reported Friday on its Web site that Mr. Paxson acknowledged in an interview that he had met with Mr. McCain to discuss the letters before they were sent and that Ms. Iseman was probably at the meeting.
In three interviews with The Times since December, Mr. Paxson has provided varying accounts about the letters. In the first, he said Ms. Iseman was involved in the drafting of them and had lobbied Mr. McCain. He later said he could not recall who had been involved.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/23/us/politics/23lobby.html?bl&ex=1204002000&en=ae0d714ce3b8d3ae&ei=5087%0A
The New York Times
By STEPHEN LABATON
February 23, 2008
In late 1998, Senator John McCain sent an unusually blunt letter to the head of the Federal Communications Commission, warning that he would try to overhaul the agency if it closed a broadcast ownership loophole.
The letter, and two later ones signed by Mr. McCain, then chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, urged the commission to abandon plans to close a loophole vitally important to Glencairn Ltd., a client of Vicki Iseman, a lobbyist. The provision enabled one of the nation’s largest broadcasting companies, Sinclair, to use a marketing agreement with Glencairn, a far smaller broadcaster, to get around a restriction barring single ownership of two television stations in the same city.
At a news conference on Thursday, Mr. McCain denounced an article in The New York Times that described concerns by top advisers a decade ago about his ties to Ms. Iseman, a partner at the firm Alcalde & Fay. He said he never had any discussions with his advisers about Ms. Iseman and never did any favors for any lobbyist.
One of the McCain campaign’s statements about his dealings with Ms. Iseman was challenged by news accounts on Friday. In discussing letters he wrote regulators about a deal involving another of Ms. Iseman’s clients, Lowell W. Paxson, the campaign had said the senator had never spoken to her or anyone from the company. But Mr. McCain acknowledged in a 2002 deposition that he had sent the letters after meeting with Mr. Paxson.
On Glencairn, the campaign said Mr. McCain’s efforts to retain the loophole were not done at Ms. Iseman’s request. It said Mr. McCain was merely directing the commission to “not act in a manner contradictory to Congressional intent.” Mr. McCain wrote in the letters that a 1996 law, the telecommunications act, required the loophole; a legal opinion by the staff of the commission took the opposite view.
A review of the record, including agency records now at the National Archives and interviews with participants, shows that Mr. McCain, Republican of Arizona, played a significant role in killing the plan to eliminate the loophole. His actions followed requests by Ms. Iseman and lobbyists at other broadcasting companies, according to lobbying records and Congressional aides.
Over the years, Mr. McCain has taken varying positions on broadcast ownership issues. He has supported the relaxation of the ownership rules, but he has also been sharply critical of rules that permit too much concentration of ownership in a single market.
By November 1998, the F.C.C. was planning to strike down broadcasting marketing agreements, a potentially ruinous development for Glencairn. But after receiving Mr. McCain’s Dec. 1 letter, it put off consideration of the issue.
“To the extent the F.C.C. shows itself incapable of following Congressional intent,” the letter said, “these issues will become part of our overall review of the commission’s functions and structure during the next session of Congress.”
The letter, sent from Mr. McCain’s office by his staff at the commerce committee, was also signed by Senator Conrad Burns, Republican of Montana and chairman of a communications subcommittee. It was uncharacteristic of Mr. McCain, according to a review of dozens of letters sent by him to the commission during the same period.
It was the only letter that contained a suggestion that a failure to act would result in the possible overhaul of the agency.
The letter said that “as a leading participant in the passage of the 1996 Act, I have a very clear understanding” of the law’s intent and why it required the ownership loophole to be preserved. Mr. McCain was one of five senators — and the only Republican — to vote against the act. He has also been an outspoken critic of it.
While other companies also complained to Congress about the plan to close the loophole, the issue was particularly important to Sinclair because it had more marketing agreements than any in the nation. For its part, Glencairn appeared to have been getting little support in Congress until it retained Ms. Iseman in 1998.
Edwin Edwards, who was the president of the company at the time, said in a recent interview that after retaining Ms. Iseman, he was able to get heard by Mr. McCain.
“We were pounding the pavement in Washington,” Mr. Edwards said. “We recruited help from as many people as we could. We knocked on every door just trying to get support.”
The campaign said that Mr. McCain never spoke with Ms. Iseman about the issue, but that she did speak to his staff about it. Mr. Edwards and Mr. McCain met on July 20, 1999, according to the campaign.
After the commission postponed consideration of the issue, Mr. McCain signed a second letter to the agency on Dec. 7, 1998, in support of local marketing agreements, and a third one on Feb. 11, 1999. The third letter was signed by four other lawmakers. Ultimately, the F.C.C. loosened the rules to permit a company to own two television stations in some markets.
The letters Mr. McCain wrote to the commission in the Paxson matter were sent in late 1999 and prompted the agency’s chairman to chastise him for interfering in a licensing matter. The incident embarrassed Mr. McCain, then making his first presidential run, because Mr. Paxson was a campaign contributor and fund-raiser.
While the campaign said Thursday that Mr. McCain never spoke to anyone from Paxson or Ms. Iseman’s lobbying firm before sending those letters to the commission, an article posted Friday on Newsweek’s Web site said Mr. McCain had previously acknowledged first speaking to Mr. Paxson. Recounting that conversation, Mr. McCain testified in the deposition, “I said I would be glad to write a letter asking them to act.”
The Washington Post reported Friday on its Web site that Mr. Paxson acknowledged in an interview that he had met with Mr. McCain to discuss the letters before they were sent and that Ms. Iseman was probably at the meeting.
In three interviews with The Times since December, Mr. Paxson has provided varying accounts about the letters. In the first, he said Ms. Iseman was involved in the drafting of them and had lobbied Mr. McCain. He later said he could not recall who had been involved.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/23/us/politics/23lobby.html?bl&ex=1204002000&en=ae0d714ce3b8d3ae&ei=5087%0A
Jerry Sanders wants to appoint the person who will audit his books
From Pat Flannery's Bog of San Diego:
"Sanders' power-grab at appointing the City's Internal Auditor (the very person who will audit his books) will be decided by the City Council on Monday...
"Peters and Sanders want option (2): "appointed by the City Manager [now the Mayor], in consultation with the Audit Committee, and confirmed by the Council". Donna Frye will continue to oppose the Mayor having any role in appointing the City Auditor. She has consistently pointed out that it is wrong both in substance and appearance and a giant step backwards for this wayward City..."
http://www.blogofsandiego.com/
"Sanders' power-grab at appointing the City's Internal Auditor (the very person who will audit his books) will be decided by the City Council on Monday...
"Peters and Sanders want option (2): "appointed by the City Manager [now the Mayor], in consultation with the Audit Committee, and confirmed by the Council". Donna Frye will continue to oppose the Mayor having any role in appointing the City Auditor. She has consistently pointed out that it is wrong both in substance and appearance and a giant step backwards for this wayward City..."
http://www.blogofsandiego.com/
Friday, February 22, 2008
Dysfunction follows city council killings in Kirkwood, Missouri
I don't know if dysfunction preceded the city council killings in Kirkwood, Missouri, but it certainly is occurring in the wake of those killings. I have to agree with citizens who want more than one name on their ballots for the upcoming mayoral election. A candidate who died was removed from the ballot, but her supporters want to be able to indicate their dissatisfaction with the one person named on the ballot.
The city attorney says the election can't be delayed. Okay, let me get this straight. Having one name on the ballot is okay, even though it eliminates democracy, but delaying an election isn't okay?
The spirit of the law is to bring about democracy. That's what the rules are for. When the rules start bringing about the opposite of democracy, it's time to come up with an equitable solution to the problem.
It appears that this city council doesn't know how to come up with equitable solutions. And it certainly shouldn't be blaming the dead woman's husband for it's decision. There's no law that says you have to do what surviving spouses want. I wonder if the bereaved man was pressured to agree to taking his wife's name off the ballot.
Here's an Associated Press article:
First City Meeting Since Killings Gets Ugly
By CHRISTOPHER LEONARD
Associated Press
2008-02-22
KIRKWOOD, Mo.
The first City Council meeting since a gunman stormed City Hall and killed five people began with a sense of togetherness that didn't last long.
Residents and elected officials of Kirkwood, Mo., came together Thursday for the first City Council meeting since a gunman stormed City Hall two weeks ago, killing five people and wounding two others. Here, locals Lorraine Brown and Franklin McCallie greet each other with a hug before the meeting, which did not continue as amicably.
After opening with a moment of silence to remember the rampage two weeks ago, the meeting turned into a bitter fight over the how the St. Louis suburb will move on now that three city officials are dead and the mayor is incapacitated.
Police say 52-year-old Charles Lee "Cookie" Thornton entered the council chambers on Feb. 7 and killed two police officers, two council members and the city's public works director before police shot him to death. Mayor Mike Swoboda was shot twice in the head and remains hospitalized.
Among the dead was Connie Karr, an alderwoman who was running for mayor. Last week the city had her name removed from the ballot, leaving only alderman Arthur McDonnell listed.
Dozens attended Thursday's meeting to criticize the move, saying it undercut the voters' right to choose their mayor in the April election.
"I feel that with only one candidate, you're not going to have any discussion or debate," Kirkwood resident Karl Unsworth said.
Spectators booed and groaned during a long and disorderly public comment period; some yelled at city officials as they spoke.
State Senate President Pro Tem Michael Gibbons, a Republican from Kirkwood, took his turn at the microphone to hold a moment of silence after particularly heated comments. He then led a prayer.
"God, I would ask that the people of Kirkwood learn how to address the struggles and challenges that we face," he said.
City Attorney John Hessel explained repeatedly that Karr's name was removed from the ballot at her husband's request. He said it was impossible under city and state law to delay the vote, except if a disaster occurred on the day of the election.
Hessel criticized many of the speakers who questioned his legal rationale and suggested he wasn't honoring Karr's legacy. He survived the shooting attack only after throwing chairs at Thornton to fend him off before police arrived.
"Connie Karr's death is all of our worst nightmare," Hessel said. "It is something that I live over and over."
Besides Karr, killed in the rampage were Officer William Biggs Jr., Officer Tom Ballman, Public Works Director Ken Yost and Councilman Michael H.T. Lynch.
Thornton had a long history of fighting with city officials over a litany of code violations, fines and citations.
http://news.aol.com/story/_a/first-city-meeting-since-killings-gets/20080222085109990001?ncid=NWS0001000000000
The city attorney says the election can't be delayed. Okay, let me get this straight. Having one name on the ballot is okay, even though it eliminates democracy, but delaying an election isn't okay?
The spirit of the law is to bring about democracy. That's what the rules are for. When the rules start bringing about the opposite of democracy, it's time to come up with an equitable solution to the problem.
It appears that this city council doesn't know how to come up with equitable solutions. And it certainly shouldn't be blaming the dead woman's husband for it's decision. There's no law that says you have to do what surviving spouses want. I wonder if the bereaved man was pressured to agree to taking his wife's name off the ballot.
Here's an Associated Press article:
First City Meeting Since Killings Gets Ugly
By CHRISTOPHER LEONARD
Associated Press
2008-02-22
KIRKWOOD, Mo.
The first City Council meeting since a gunman stormed City Hall and killed five people began with a sense of togetherness that didn't last long.
Residents and elected officials of Kirkwood, Mo., came together Thursday for the first City Council meeting since a gunman stormed City Hall two weeks ago, killing five people and wounding two others. Here, locals Lorraine Brown and Franklin McCallie greet each other with a hug before the meeting, which did not continue as amicably.
After opening with a moment of silence to remember the rampage two weeks ago, the meeting turned into a bitter fight over the how the St. Louis suburb will move on now that three city officials are dead and the mayor is incapacitated.
Police say 52-year-old Charles Lee "Cookie" Thornton entered the council chambers on Feb. 7 and killed two police officers, two council members and the city's public works director before police shot him to death. Mayor Mike Swoboda was shot twice in the head and remains hospitalized.
Among the dead was Connie Karr, an alderwoman who was running for mayor. Last week the city had her name removed from the ballot, leaving only alderman Arthur McDonnell listed.
Dozens attended Thursday's meeting to criticize the move, saying it undercut the voters' right to choose their mayor in the April election.
"I feel that with only one candidate, you're not going to have any discussion or debate," Kirkwood resident Karl Unsworth said.
Spectators booed and groaned during a long and disorderly public comment period; some yelled at city officials as they spoke.
State Senate President Pro Tem Michael Gibbons, a Republican from Kirkwood, took his turn at the microphone to hold a moment of silence after particularly heated comments. He then led a prayer.
"God, I would ask that the people of Kirkwood learn how to address the struggles and challenges that we face," he said.
City Attorney John Hessel explained repeatedly that Karr's name was removed from the ballot at her husband's request. He said it was impossible under city and state law to delay the vote, except if a disaster occurred on the day of the election.
Hessel criticized many of the speakers who questioned his legal rationale and suggested he wasn't honoring Karr's legacy. He survived the shooting attack only after throwing chairs at Thornton to fend him off before police arrived.
"Connie Karr's death is all of our worst nightmare," Hessel said. "It is something that I live over and over."
Besides Karr, killed in the rampage were Officer William Biggs Jr., Officer Tom Ballman, Public Works Director Ken Yost and Councilman Michael H.T. Lynch.
Thornton had a long history of fighting with city officials over a litany of code violations, fines and citations.
http://news.aol.com/story/_a/first-city-meeting-since-killings-gets/20080222085109990001?ncid=NWS0001000000000
It isn't just San Diego; Arizona Congressman took kickbacks
Feds Indict Congressman in Land Deal
By LARA JAKES JORDAN
Associated Press
Feb. 22, 2008
Republican Rep. Rick Renzi was indicted Friday on charges of extortion, wire fraud, money laundering and other matters in an Arizona land swap scam that allegedly helped him collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in payoffs.
Rep. Rick Renzi, a three-term member of the House, also served as Arizona chairman for GOP presidential front-runner John McCain's campaign.
A 26-page federal indictment unsealed in Tucson, Ariz., accuses Renzi and two former business partners of embezzlement and conspiring to promote the sale of land that buyers could swap for property owned by the federal government.
Renzi is a three-term member of the House. He announced in August that he would not seek re-election. Attempts to reach Renzi by phone on Friday through his congressional office in Flagstaff and his lawyer were unsuccessful.
The indictment accuses Renzi of using his position as a member of the House Natural Resources Committee to push the land swaps for business partner James W. Sandlin, a real estate investor from Sherman, Texas. It comes after a lengthy federal investigation into the land development and insurance businesses owned by Renzi's family.
As part of the alleged scam, Renzi and Sandlin concealed at least $733,000 that the congressman took for helping seal the land deals, the indictment says. They are each charged with 27 counts of wire fraud, extortion and money laundering, and conspiracy connected to the scam in Cochise County, Ariz.
"Renzi was having financial difficulty throughout 2005 and needed a substantial infusion of funds to keep his insurance business solvent and to maintain his personal lifestyle," the indictment says.
Additionally, Renzi and his second business partner, Andrew Beardall of Rockville, Md., allegedly embezzled more than $400,000 in insurance premiums in 2001 and 2002 to fund his first congressional campaign, according to the indictment.
All three men are scheduled to appear in federal court in Tucson on March 6.
"Public corruption creates a cynicism for government and unfairly stains legions of honest public servants," Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher said in a statement. "These charges represent allegations that Congressman Renzi defrauded the public of his unbiased, honest services as an elected official."
Renzi is the Arizona chairman for GOP presidential front-runner Sen. John McCain's campaign. McCain seemed surprised when asked in Indianapolis for his reaction to the indictment, choosing his words carefully, shaking his head and speaking slowly.
"I'm sorry. I feel for the family; as you know, he has 12 children," McCain told reporters on the presidential campaign trail. "But I don't know enough of the details to make a judgment. These kinds of things are always very unfortunate.... I rely on our Department of Justice and system of justice to make the right outcome."
The land swap deal has dogged Renzi more than a year.
The indictment says Renzi refused in 2005 and 2006 to secure congressional approval for land swaps by two unnamed businesses if they did not agree to buy Sandlin's property as a part of the deal.
One of the businesses, seeking congressional approval for surface rights for a copper mining project in Renzi's district, failed to buy the land in early 2005. As a result, Renzi allegedly told the business, "No Sandlin property, no bill."
Renzi had previously owned some of Sandlin's property, and concealed his relationship with the real estate investor from the mining company even when expressly asked. At the time, Sandlin owed $700,000 of the $800,000 price tag on property Renzi sold him in Kingman, Ariz.
Meanwhile, Renzi allegedly pushed the land on a second firm, an unnamed investment group, that was trying to secure a federal land swap. If the firm accepted Sandlin's property as part of the transaction, Renzi allegedly said investors would receive a "free pass" through the House Natural Resources Committee, according to the indictment.
In April 2005, the investors reluctantly agreed to the deal.
"Please be sensitive to the fact that we are going way out on a limb at the request of Congressman Renzi," one of the investors wrote in an April 17, 2005 e-mail to a Renzi aide. "I am putting my complete faith in Congressman Renzi and you that this is the correct decision."
The investment group agreed to pay $4.6 million for Sandlin's land, the indictment says. Sandlin then paid Renzi $733,000 for his help in securing the land swap from the second business.
Renzi failed to report the income on financial disclosure reports to Congress, as is required.
Government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington applauded the Justice Department for holding Renzi "accountable given that his House colleagues refused to do so." The group has had Renzi on its "Most Corrupt Members of Congress" list for the last three years.
"Bluster aside, this latest in a string of congressional indictments demonstrates that Congress simply will not police itself," said CREW executive director Melanie Sloan.
http://news.aol.com/story/_a/feds-indict-congressman-in-land-deal/20080222104609990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001
By LARA JAKES JORDAN
Associated Press
Feb. 22, 2008
Republican Rep. Rick Renzi was indicted Friday on charges of extortion, wire fraud, money laundering and other matters in an Arizona land swap scam that allegedly helped him collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in payoffs.
Rep. Rick Renzi, a three-term member of the House, also served as Arizona chairman for GOP presidential front-runner John McCain's campaign.
A 26-page federal indictment unsealed in Tucson, Ariz., accuses Renzi and two former business partners of embezzlement and conspiring to promote the sale of land that buyers could swap for property owned by the federal government.
Renzi is a three-term member of the House. He announced in August that he would not seek re-election. Attempts to reach Renzi by phone on Friday through his congressional office in Flagstaff and his lawyer were unsuccessful.
The indictment accuses Renzi of using his position as a member of the House Natural Resources Committee to push the land swaps for business partner James W. Sandlin, a real estate investor from Sherman, Texas. It comes after a lengthy federal investigation into the land development and insurance businesses owned by Renzi's family.
As part of the alleged scam, Renzi and Sandlin concealed at least $733,000 that the congressman took for helping seal the land deals, the indictment says. They are each charged with 27 counts of wire fraud, extortion and money laundering, and conspiracy connected to the scam in Cochise County, Ariz.
"Renzi was having financial difficulty throughout 2005 and needed a substantial infusion of funds to keep his insurance business solvent and to maintain his personal lifestyle," the indictment says.
Additionally, Renzi and his second business partner, Andrew Beardall of Rockville, Md., allegedly embezzled more than $400,000 in insurance premiums in 2001 and 2002 to fund his first congressional campaign, according to the indictment.
All three men are scheduled to appear in federal court in Tucson on March 6.
"Public corruption creates a cynicism for government and unfairly stains legions of honest public servants," Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher said in a statement. "These charges represent allegations that Congressman Renzi defrauded the public of his unbiased, honest services as an elected official."
Renzi is the Arizona chairman for GOP presidential front-runner Sen. John McCain's campaign. McCain seemed surprised when asked in Indianapolis for his reaction to the indictment, choosing his words carefully, shaking his head and speaking slowly.
"I'm sorry. I feel for the family; as you know, he has 12 children," McCain told reporters on the presidential campaign trail. "But I don't know enough of the details to make a judgment. These kinds of things are always very unfortunate.... I rely on our Department of Justice and system of justice to make the right outcome."
The land swap deal has dogged Renzi more than a year.
The indictment says Renzi refused in 2005 and 2006 to secure congressional approval for land swaps by two unnamed businesses if they did not agree to buy Sandlin's property as a part of the deal.
One of the businesses, seeking congressional approval for surface rights for a copper mining project in Renzi's district, failed to buy the land in early 2005. As a result, Renzi allegedly told the business, "No Sandlin property, no bill."
Renzi had previously owned some of Sandlin's property, and concealed his relationship with the real estate investor from the mining company even when expressly asked. At the time, Sandlin owed $700,000 of the $800,000 price tag on property Renzi sold him in Kingman, Ariz.
Meanwhile, Renzi allegedly pushed the land on a second firm, an unnamed investment group, that was trying to secure a federal land swap. If the firm accepted Sandlin's property as part of the transaction, Renzi allegedly said investors would receive a "free pass" through the House Natural Resources Committee, according to the indictment.
In April 2005, the investors reluctantly agreed to the deal.
"Please be sensitive to the fact that we are going way out on a limb at the request of Congressman Renzi," one of the investors wrote in an April 17, 2005 e-mail to a Renzi aide. "I am putting my complete faith in Congressman Renzi and you that this is the correct decision."
The investment group agreed to pay $4.6 million for Sandlin's land, the indictment says. Sandlin then paid Renzi $733,000 for his help in securing the land swap from the second business.
Renzi failed to report the income on financial disclosure reports to Congress, as is required.
Government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington applauded the Justice Department for holding Renzi "accountable given that his House colleagues refused to do so." The group has had Renzi on its "Most Corrupt Members of Congress" list for the last three years.
"Bluster aside, this latest in a string of congressional indictments demonstrates that Congress simply will not police itself," said CREW executive director Melanie Sloan.
http://news.aol.com/story/_a/feds-indict-congressman-in-land-deal/20080222104609990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Scott Lewis explains the Mike Aguirre-City Council-pension lawsuit connection
From Voice of San Diego
by Scott Lewis
Having It Both Ways
http://voiceofsandiego.org/opinion/slop/
A reader, who is an attorney, wrote me an e-mail about the revived ambiguity surrounding the 2005 vote (or non-vote) the City Council supposedly took to authorize City Attorney Mike Aguirre's legacy lawsuit to roll back city employee pension benefits.
Remember yesterday's reminder of what Council President Scott Peters argues: that Aguirre only received authorization to sue in his own name.
Here's the attorney:
I too have always been confused on how that went down. I'm not sure what it means to authorize Aguirre to sue in his own name? He's the City Attorney for crying out loud! Did they mean he could sue as an individual? In that case, he really didn't need their permission.
What also always irritated was that if the Council felt like their position on this was misunderstood and they really did not want him to file the suit, why did they not revote and clarify their position at the next Council meeting or anytime thereafter??? Don't get me wrong I absolutely believe the City Attorney can not file this type of lawsuit without Council approval. I just thought they left him an out with their ambiguity and never clarified as they most certainly could have.
This is a vitally important point. If the City Council never authorized Aguirre to sue to roll back what he claimed were illegal pension benefits, why in the world did they never do a single thing about it?
This may be why the issue is coming up now. One of the big arguments Peters and the gang looking to throw Aguirre out of office will undoubtedly use is the meme that Aguirre has been a reckless litigator.
If he has been a reckless litigator, his most reckless litigation is the pension lawsuit. But how can Peters (and his colleague Brian Maienschein) possibly argue that this was as reckless as they say if they authorized him to file the lawsuit?
The State Bar, by investigating this, is enabling Peters and Maienschein to float the idea that they never did authorize the litigation.
It should be remembered, of course, that they never did anything to stop it either.
But regardless, this can all be cleared up if the City Council would release the transcript of what really happened at that meeting. But they decided only to give the transcript to the State Bar.
How convenient.
-- SCOTT LEWIS
Wednesday, February 20 -- 3:02 pm
Click here to post comments (3 posted so far)
The Meeting in Question
E-MAIL POST
In light of today's U-T report on the State Bar investigation into City Attorney Mike Aguirre, I'm having flashbacks of a series of columns I did in 2005 about the meeting that is apparently at the center of the Bar's probe.
Flashback with me: Watching a City Council meeting in August of that year, I was shocked to see then Assistant City Attorney Les Girard quietly announce that the City Council had authorized City Attorney Mike Aguirre to sue to get rid of pension benefits he thought city employees had illegally secured.
It was a stunner. I rewound the tape a couple of times to make sure I understood him because the City Council had, until that point, never been too enthusiastic about Aguirre's expressed desire to completely roll back benefit enhancements city employees had secured in the 90s and in 2002.
So I called Aguirre to confirm and wrote up what I thought was big news.
Don "The Rat" McGrath today tries to explain the city attorney's side.
It suddenly got the attention of both union leaders and a blogger named Pat Flannery neither of whom completely believed me until they too saw the tapes. When Ann Smith, the lawyer for the city's Municipal Employee Association heard about it, she wanted to know what was going on as well and sent a letter to the City Council asking.
I wrote up a followup after asking a couple of City Council members.
On Aug. 9 just before the City Council broke its meeting to go to lunch (at 1 hour, 43 minutes into the archived video on the city's Web site -- for the really interested), Assistant City Attorney Les Girard made this announcement:
"Last week in closed session, by a unanimous vote, the City Council authorized the city attorney to pursue a modified cross complaint in the action of SDCERS v. the city of San Diego and City Attorney Michael Aguirre."
Heck, it's my blog, I'm just going to reprint the best part of the column here:
In an interview Aug. 12, Aguirre said that the council had "joined the city attorney" in his legal pursuits against the pension board on the condition that he drop his contention that individuals named in the suit be held personally liable for their actions. That was how the complaint was "modified," Aguirre said.
"This is an area where the City Council has chosen to support the city attorney," he said.
He reaffirmed his statements last week.
But relations among the city leaders have apparently deteriorated so badly that they can't even agree on what official actions they have taken.
Deputy Mayor Toni Atkins released a one-line reaction.
"The Council took no action nor a position on benefits being legal or illegal nor allowing the City Attorney to be counsel for the [San Diego City Employees' Retirement System] board," Atkins said.
Since it's the only statement we have from her on this, we have to take each word for what its worth.
Let's see that again: "The Council took no action nor a position on benefits being legal or illegal."
So what did they do? Why did Les Girard announce in an open council session that "the City Council authorized the city attorney to pursue a modified cross complaint ..."
Is that not an "action"?
Atkins' colleague, Councilman Scott Peters, acknowledges that the council took an action, just not an action with the impact Aguirre describes.
Here's Peters' take.
"...the City Council has authorized the city attorney to allege illegality in his name only," Peters wrote (emphasis added) in a memorandum to Aguirre disputing language Aguirre uses in court documents.
Peters made his case to Voice of San Diego Thursday.
"No one has signed on to his view that the benefits are illegal. He has been authorized to make that argument in his own name but not on behalf of the City Council or the City of San Diego," Peters said. "I would never have voted to authorize him to litigate this illegality issue if the retirement board hadn't brought it up."
Peters said the authorization the council granted Aguirre "in no way" signifies official City Council support for Aguirre's legal maneuver.
Isn't it, however, a bit more supportive than, say, not authorizing him?
Peters explained that, in this instance, it's the retirement board's fault. The pension system, in July, filed a complaint asking a judge to determine if -- in light of Aguirre's blistering investigative reports -- benefits it was paying out were illegal or not.
The pension board had also filed a lawsuit against Aguirre after he tried to take over the attorney chair at the agency.
Now, fast forward two-and-a-half years and the state bar apparently is suspicious of whether the City Council actually did give Aguirre authorization to do the lawsuit or not. And that, we're all assuming, must be something the Bar has a serious problem with. The Bar, according to the U-T's Alex Roth, has asked for a transcript of the secret meeting Girard had referred.
Let's just say that if the City Council does waive the right to keep that transcript private, I will be the first in line to get a copy. It never was entirely clear what the City Council authorized and didn’t.
But I'll repeat this one point I've been making for a couple of years now: Aguirre always argued that he didn't need the City Council to approve his litigious actions yet in times like this, he sought and trumpeted their approval. If he didn't need their approval and really believed that, he probably would never have sought it.
-- SCOTT LEWIS
Tuesday, February 19 -- 1:07 pm
by Scott Lewis
Having It Both Ways
http://voiceofsandiego.org/opinion/slop/
A reader, who is an attorney, wrote me an e-mail about the revived ambiguity surrounding the 2005 vote (or non-vote) the City Council supposedly took to authorize City Attorney Mike Aguirre's legacy lawsuit to roll back city employee pension benefits.
Remember yesterday's reminder of what Council President Scott Peters argues: that Aguirre only received authorization to sue in his own name.
Here's the attorney:
I too have always been confused on how that went down. I'm not sure what it means to authorize Aguirre to sue in his own name? He's the City Attorney for crying out loud! Did they mean he could sue as an individual? In that case, he really didn't need their permission.
What also always irritated was that if the Council felt like their position on this was misunderstood and they really did not want him to file the suit, why did they not revote and clarify their position at the next Council meeting or anytime thereafter??? Don't get me wrong I absolutely believe the City Attorney can not file this type of lawsuit without Council approval. I just thought they left him an out with their ambiguity and never clarified as they most certainly could have.
This is a vitally important point. If the City Council never authorized Aguirre to sue to roll back what he claimed were illegal pension benefits, why in the world did they never do a single thing about it?
This may be why the issue is coming up now. One of the big arguments Peters and the gang looking to throw Aguirre out of office will undoubtedly use is the meme that Aguirre has been a reckless litigator.
If he has been a reckless litigator, his most reckless litigation is the pension lawsuit. But how can Peters (and his colleague Brian Maienschein) possibly argue that this was as reckless as they say if they authorized him to file the lawsuit?
The State Bar, by investigating this, is enabling Peters and Maienschein to float the idea that they never did authorize the litigation.
It should be remembered, of course, that they never did anything to stop it either.
But regardless, this can all be cleared up if the City Council would release the transcript of what really happened at that meeting. But they decided only to give the transcript to the State Bar.
How convenient.
-- SCOTT LEWIS
Wednesday, February 20 -- 3:02 pm
Click here to post comments (3 posted so far)
The Meeting in Question
E-MAIL POST
In light of today's U-T report on the State Bar investigation into City Attorney Mike Aguirre, I'm having flashbacks of a series of columns I did in 2005 about the meeting that is apparently at the center of the Bar's probe.
Flashback with me: Watching a City Council meeting in August of that year, I was shocked to see then Assistant City Attorney Les Girard quietly announce that the City Council had authorized City Attorney Mike Aguirre to sue to get rid of pension benefits he thought city employees had illegally secured.
It was a stunner. I rewound the tape a couple of times to make sure I understood him because the City Council had, until that point, never been too enthusiastic about Aguirre's expressed desire to completely roll back benefit enhancements city employees had secured in the 90s and in 2002.
So I called Aguirre to confirm and wrote up what I thought was big news.
Don "The Rat" McGrath today tries to explain the city attorney's side.
It suddenly got the attention of both union leaders and a blogger named Pat Flannery neither of whom completely believed me until they too saw the tapes. When Ann Smith, the lawyer for the city's Municipal Employee Association heard about it, she wanted to know what was going on as well and sent a letter to the City Council asking.
I wrote up a followup after asking a couple of City Council members.
On Aug. 9 just before the City Council broke its meeting to go to lunch (at 1 hour, 43 minutes into the archived video on the city's Web site -- for the really interested), Assistant City Attorney Les Girard made this announcement:
"Last week in closed session, by a unanimous vote, the City Council authorized the city attorney to pursue a modified cross complaint in the action of SDCERS v. the city of San Diego and City Attorney Michael Aguirre."
Heck, it's my blog, I'm just going to reprint the best part of the column here:
In an interview Aug. 12, Aguirre said that the council had "joined the city attorney" in his legal pursuits against the pension board on the condition that he drop his contention that individuals named in the suit be held personally liable for their actions. That was how the complaint was "modified," Aguirre said.
"This is an area where the City Council has chosen to support the city attorney," he said.
He reaffirmed his statements last week.
But relations among the city leaders have apparently deteriorated so badly that they can't even agree on what official actions they have taken.
Deputy Mayor Toni Atkins released a one-line reaction.
"The Council took no action nor a position on benefits being legal or illegal nor allowing the City Attorney to be counsel for the [San Diego City Employees' Retirement System] board," Atkins said.
Since it's the only statement we have from her on this, we have to take each word for what its worth.
Let's see that again: "The Council took no action nor a position on benefits being legal or illegal."
So what did they do? Why did Les Girard announce in an open council session that "the City Council authorized the city attorney to pursue a modified cross complaint ..."
Is that not an "action"?
Atkins' colleague, Councilman Scott Peters, acknowledges that the council took an action, just not an action with the impact Aguirre describes.
Here's Peters' take.
"...the City Council has authorized the city attorney to allege illegality in his name only," Peters wrote (emphasis added) in a memorandum to Aguirre disputing language Aguirre uses in court documents.
Peters made his case to Voice of San Diego Thursday.
"No one has signed on to his view that the benefits are illegal. He has been authorized to make that argument in his own name but not on behalf of the City Council or the City of San Diego," Peters said. "I would never have voted to authorize him to litigate this illegality issue if the retirement board hadn't brought it up."
Peters said the authorization the council granted Aguirre "in no way" signifies official City Council support for Aguirre's legal maneuver.
Isn't it, however, a bit more supportive than, say, not authorizing him?
Peters explained that, in this instance, it's the retirement board's fault. The pension system, in July, filed a complaint asking a judge to determine if -- in light of Aguirre's blistering investigative reports -- benefits it was paying out were illegal or not.
The pension board had also filed a lawsuit against Aguirre after he tried to take over the attorney chair at the agency.
Now, fast forward two-and-a-half years and the state bar apparently is suspicious of whether the City Council actually did give Aguirre authorization to do the lawsuit or not. And that, we're all assuming, must be something the Bar has a serious problem with. The Bar, according to the U-T's Alex Roth, has asked for a transcript of the secret meeting Girard had referred.
Let's just say that if the City Council does waive the right to keep that transcript private, I will be the first in line to get a copy. It never was entirely clear what the City Council authorized and didn’t.
But I'll repeat this one point I've been making for a couple of years now: Aguirre always argued that he didn't need the City Council to approve his litigious actions yet in times like this, he sought and trumpeted their approval. If he didn't need their approval and really believed that, he probably would never have sought it.
-- SCOTT LEWIS
Tuesday, February 19 -- 1:07 pm
Monday, February 04, 2008
Ann Smith said San Diego had to pay when it was a billion in debt, now she says city has to pay even more
After Metropolitan Employees Association (MEA) lawyer Ann Smith helped finagle a deal (that the SEC says was illegal) with the City of San Diego, she insisted that San Diego had to stick with the deal even though it put the city a billion dollars into the red and was illegal.
Now she says that the city's health care payments have gone down, so the city should pass on the savings.
Pass on the savings, but not the losses, eh, Ann?
Ann Smith clearly doesn't care if her union bankrupts the city.
Now she says that the city's health care payments have gone down, so the city should pass on the savings.
Pass on the savings, but not the losses, eh, Ann?
Ann Smith clearly doesn't care if her union bankrupts the city.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Jan Goldsmith, conspiracy theorist and City Attorney candidate
Deferring to the Conspiracy
By Scott Lewis
Voice of San Diego
Jan. 31, 2008
Click HERE for original article.
Of the complaints that San Diego City Attorney Mike Aguirre must parry or absorb in coming months if he is to keep his job, the most damaging is clearly that the man has no motor control of his accusation muscle...
So it was with a bit of surprise last week that I learned that Aguirre's most prominent declared rival to his seat might have a similar proclivity toward the unsubstantiated accusation.
Former Poway Mayor Jan Goldsmith, the chosen one of the local Republican Party, got himself all fired up about the surprising news that City Councilman Brian Maienschein, a fellow Republican with much the same base of support, was entering the race...
It was really Maienschein's money that so upset Goldsmith.
The city councilman had the good fortune to run for re-election to his post in 2004 against no one in particular. People like giving money to politicians and so, like most incumbents, he was able to raise a ton of money for the non-existent race. That money -- $250,000 -- sits now waiting for Maienschein's call.
The city had, in 2004, passed a law that prohibited people from raising money to run for office more than a year before the election for the office they aspired to occupy.
...the director of the Ethics Commission responded to my inquiry about it with a statement that the law seemed pretty clear that money from previous campaigns could be transferred into new ones.
That Maienschein could use that money in the race for city attorney infuriated Goldsmith. And with that came the conspiracy theory and the accusation.
"I would request that the Ethics Commission be fair and impartial in addressing this issue. The appearance is that the Commission is stretching to find ways to allow an incumbent Councilman to do something that is unavailable to other candidates," Goldsmith wrote to Fulhorst and then sent to me.
I had a chance to ask Goldsmith about this.
He was accusing the Ethics Commission of working in collusion with Maienschein to further his political goals. Is this a window into the future? Would he, as city attorney, also defer to the conspiracy theory to make his points?
He said he never wrote that it was an actual conspiracy.
It just looked that way...
And then he got to the other angle about this that bothered him. How had this potential wrinkle in the election law not been ironed out before? This offered Goldsmith another justification for his candidacy -- he could spot things like this.
The City Council didn't know what it was doing passing the law... about the 12-month limit for raising funds.
"Why didn't anyone, in 2004 when this was passed, not ask the question that this doesn't provide an exception or clarity about transfers for money from previous campaigns? There were three lawyers on the council and they couldn't see this?" Goldsmith asked.
He said had he been city attorney, he would have made sure to tie that loose end.
What he didn't realize is that the issue had in fact been brought up. Not by a lawyer on the council, but by the only person who at times seems to be able to ask questions like one: City Councilwoman Donna Frye.
Former City Attorney Casey Gwinn actually issued an opinion about the matter.
Could the city keep people like Maienschein from transferring money from a previous campaign to a new one?
Nope, Gwinn's deputy determined...
By Scott Lewis
Voice of San Diego
Jan. 31, 2008
Click HERE for original article.
Of the complaints that San Diego City Attorney Mike Aguirre must parry or absorb in coming months if he is to keep his job, the most damaging is clearly that the man has no motor control of his accusation muscle...
So it was with a bit of surprise last week that I learned that Aguirre's most prominent declared rival to his seat might have a similar proclivity toward the unsubstantiated accusation.
Former Poway Mayor Jan Goldsmith, the chosen one of the local Republican Party, got himself all fired up about the surprising news that City Councilman Brian Maienschein, a fellow Republican with much the same base of support, was entering the race...
It was really Maienschein's money that so upset Goldsmith.
The city councilman had the good fortune to run for re-election to his post in 2004 against no one in particular. People like giving money to politicians and so, like most incumbents, he was able to raise a ton of money for the non-existent race. That money -- $250,000 -- sits now waiting for Maienschein's call.
The city had, in 2004, passed a law that prohibited people from raising money to run for office more than a year before the election for the office they aspired to occupy.
...the director of the Ethics Commission responded to my inquiry about it with a statement that the law seemed pretty clear that money from previous campaigns could be transferred into new ones.
That Maienschein could use that money in the race for city attorney infuriated Goldsmith. And with that came the conspiracy theory and the accusation.
"I would request that the Ethics Commission be fair and impartial in addressing this issue. The appearance is that the Commission is stretching to find ways to allow an incumbent Councilman to do something that is unavailable to other candidates," Goldsmith wrote to Fulhorst and then sent to me.
I had a chance to ask Goldsmith about this.
He was accusing the Ethics Commission of working in collusion with Maienschein to further his political goals. Is this a window into the future? Would he, as city attorney, also defer to the conspiracy theory to make his points?
He said he never wrote that it was an actual conspiracy.
It just looked that way...
And then he got to the other angle about this that bothered him. How had this potential wrinkle in the election law not been ironed out before? This offered Goldsmith another justification for his candidacy -- he could spot things like this.
The City Council didn't know what it was doing passing the law... about the 12-month limit for raising funds.
"Why didn't anyone, in 2004 when this was passed, not ask the question that this doesn't provide an exception or clarity about transfers for money from previous campaigns? There were three lawyers on the council and they couldn't see this?" Goldsmith asked.
He said had he been city attorney, he would have made sure to tie that loose end.
What he didn't realize is that the issue had in fact been brought up. Not by a lawyer on the council, but by the only person who at times seems to be able to ask questions like one: City Councilwoman Donna Frye.
Former City Attorney Casey Gwinn actually issued an opinion about the matter.
Could the city keep people like Maienschein from transferring money from a previous campaign to a new one?
Nope, Gwinn's deputy determined...
Monday, January 28, 2008
Lobbyists and lawmakers party in D.C.
From The Times-Picayune
D.C. Mardi Gras puts a mask on ethics codes
Lawmakers, lobbyists celebrate Louisiana traditions together
January 24, 2008
By Bill Walsh
http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1201155718191680.xml&coll=1
WASHINGTON -- New ethics rules were supposed to have "broken the link" between special interests and Congress, but the changes won't stop lobbyists and lawmakers from donning masks and celebrating together as they have for decades at the Washington Mardi Gras.
The parties, meals and receptions starting today are arguably the most intimate gatherings of businesspeople, politicians and lobbyists left in Washington, where a spate of influence-peddling scandals has put a damper on corporate-sponsored schmoozing.
But Washington Mardi Gras, which is in many ways a throwback to the days when politicians and lobbyists socialized regularly outside the glare of the public spotlight, appears largely immune to the new ethics standards.
"I don't think there will be much difference at all," said Ted Jones, a recently retired lobbyist who, as a longtime organizer of the three-day celebration, bears the title of senior lieutenant in the Mystick Krewe of Louisianians.
Jones says the Mardi Gras has survived periodic attempts to clamp down on congressional ethics because it is less business than pleasure. Each year, about 2,000 Louisianians trek to the nation's capital and turn the Washington Hilton into a bustling party headquarters. The bar at the hotel is so thick with Louisiana politicos, especially in an election year, that it has been dubbed the state's 65th parish.
"For most of these people, it's their one trip to Washington a year," said former Louisiana Sen. John Breaux, a one-time captain of the Mystick Krewe. Breaux retired from the Senate in 2005 to become a lobbyist and now carries the title of senior lieutenant emeritus.
Jones puts it this way: "There is no big deal about this. It's just like you'd invite people to your house for a party and you bring your own bottle."
For the first night anyway, the bottles -- and food and music -- are free. They are paid for by the corporations, labor unions and lobbying firms sponsoring the "Louisiana Alive!" party that kicks off the Mardi Gras.
Be there or be square
The event is one of the most sought-after tickets in any season in Washington. Dixieland and zydeco bands are flown up from Louisiana along with a seemingly endless supply of fresh shrimp and gumbo. The bars are open. Contortionists in spandex outfits entertain on pedestals throughout the ballroom, and members of Louisiana's congressional delegation mix freely with the other guests. One year, Breaux was carried into the party in a coffin held aloft by revelers...
D.C. Mardi Gras puts a mask on ethics codes
Lawmakers, lobbyists celebrate Louisiana traditions together
January 24, 2008
By Bill Walsh
http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1201155718191680.xml&coll=1
WASHINGTON -- New ethics rules were supposed to have "broken the link" between special interests and Congress, but the changes won't stop lobbyists and lawmakers from donning masks and celebrating together as they have for decades at the Washington Mardi Gras.
The parties, meals and receptions starting today are arguably the most intimate gatherings of businesspeople, politicians and lobbyists left in Washington, where a spate of influence-peddling scandals has put a damper on corporate-sponsored schmoozing.
But Washington Mardi Gras, which is in many ways a throwback to the days when politicians and lobbyists socialized regularly outside the glare of the public spotlight, appears largely immune to the new ethics standards.
"I don't think there will be much difference at all," said Ted Jones, a recently retired lobbyist who, as a longtime organizer of the three-day celebration, bears the title of senior lieutenant in the Mystick Krewe of Louisianians.
Jones says the Mardi Gras has survived periodic attempts to clamp down on congressional ethics because it is less business than pleasure. Each year, about 2,000 Louisianians trek to the nation's capital and turn the Washington Hilton into a bustling party headquarters. The bar at the hotel is so thick with Louisiana politicos, especially in an election year, that it has been dubbed the state's 65th parish.
"For most of these people, it's their one trip to Washington a year," said former Louisiana Sen. John Breaux, a one-time captain of the Mystick Krewe. Breaux retired from the Senate in 2005 to become a lobbyist and now carries the title of senior lieutenant emeritus.
Jones puts it this way: "There is no big deal about this. It's just like you'd invite people to your house for a party and you bring your own bottle."
For the first night anyway, the bottles -- and food and music -- are free. They are paid for by the corporations, labor unions and lobbying firms sponsoring the "Louisiana Alive!" party that kicks off the Mardi Gras.
Be there or be square
The event is one of the most sought-after tickets in any season in Washington. Dixieland and zydeco bands are flown up from Louisiana along with a seemingly endless supply of fresh shrimp and gumbo. The bars are open. Contortionists in spandex outfits entertain on pedestals throughout the ballroom, and members of Louisiana's congressional delegation mix freely with the other guests. One year, Breaux was carried into the party in a coffin held aloft by revelers...
Monday, January 21, 2008
Cox Communications really means it when it says it cares
Found at http://www.coxcares.com:
"Cox cares...Cox Communications is constantly striving to improve our customer experience. Your ideas and opinions are very important to us..."
"Cox cares...Cox Communications is constantly striving to improve our customer experience. Your ideas and opinions are very important to us..."
Is Cox Communications too cheap to follow government regulations?
Before the
Federal Communications Commission
Washington, D.C. 20554
In the Matter of. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .)
Cox Communications, Inc. . . . . . . . . . .) File No. EB-04-SD-051
Facility ID #s 002295 & 004818 . . . . .)
Community Unit ID #s AZ0109 . . . . . . )
AZ0110, AZ0148, AZ0176, . . . . . . . . . .)
AZ0273 and AZ0878 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .) NOV No. V20043294001
Maricopa County, Arizona . . . . . . . . . . .)
NOTICE OF VIOLATION
Released: September
13, 2004
By the District Director, San Diego Office, Western Region,
Enforcement Bureau:
1. This is a Notice of Violation ("Notice") issued
pursuant to Section 1.89 of the Commission's Rules,1 to Cox
Communications, Inc., the operator of a cable television
system in Maricopa County, Arizona.
2. From February 10 through 13, 2004, an agent from the
Commission's San Diego Office inspected the Emergency Alert
System (``EAS'') equipment and logs at the following cable
system headend locations operated by Cox Communications,
Inc.:
Site Address
Bell 1550 W. Deer Valley Rd.,
Phoenix, AZ
East Mesa 4437 E. Holmes Ave., Mesa, AZ
Fowler 6610 Van Buren St., Phoenix,
AZ
McDowell 3008 E. McDowell Rd., Phoenix,
AZ
Peoria 9534 W. Peoria Ave., Peoria,
AZ
Scottsdale North 28213 N. 64th St., Scottsdale,
AZ
The agent observed the following violation:
47 C.F.R. § 11.52(d): ``Broadcast stations and
cable systems and wireless cable systems must
monitor two EAS sources. The monitoring
assignments of each broadcast station, cable system
and wireless cable system are specified in the State
EAS Plan and FCC Mapbook. They are developed in
accordance with FCC monitoring priorities.'' Cox
Communications, Inc. had the capability to monitor
two EAS sources but failed to monitor the local LP-1
station. According to the local EAS plan for the
Phoenix, AZ area (Maricopa County, Arizona), the
designated LP-1 station is KTAR(AM), Phoenix,
Arizona.
3. Pursuant to Section 308(b) of the Communications Act of
1934, as amended,2 and Section 1.89 of the Commission's
Rules, Cox Communications, Inc., must submit a written
statement concerning this matter within 20 days of release
of this Notice. The response must fully explain each
violation, must contain a statement of the specific
action(s) taken to correct each violation and preclude
recurrence, and should include a time line for completion of
pending corrective action(s). The response must be complete
in itself and signed by a principal or officer of the
licensee. All replies and documentation sent in response to
this Notice should be marked with the File No. and NOV No.
specified above, and mailed to the following address:
Federal Communications Commission
San Diego Office
4542 Ruffner Street, Suite 370
San Diego, California 92111
4. This Notice shall be sent to Cox Communications, Inc.,
1550 Deer Valley Road, Phoenix, Arizona 85027.
5. The Privacy Act of 19743 requires that we advise you
that the Commission will use all relevant material
information before it, including any information disclosed
in your reply, to determine what, if any, enforcement action
is required to ensure compliance. Any false statement made
knowingly and willfully in reply to this Notice is
punishable by fine or imprisonment under Title 18 of the
U.S. Code.4
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS
COMMISSION
William R. Zears Jr.
District Director
San Diego Office
Western Region
Enforcement Bureau
_________________________
147 C.F.R. § 1.89.
247 U.S.C. § 308(b).
3P.L. 93-579, 5 U.S.C. § 552a(e)(3).
418 U.S.C. § 1001 et seq.
Federal Communications Commission
Washington, D.C. 20554
In the Matter of. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .)
Cox Communications, Inc. . . . . . . . . . .) File No. EB-04-SD-051
Facility ID #s 002295 & 004818 . . . . .)
Community Unit ID #s AZ0109 . . . . . . )
AZ0110, AZ0148, AZ0176, . . . . . . . . . .)
AZ0273 and AZ0878 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .) NOV No. V20043294001
Maricopa County, Arizona . . . . . . . . . . .)
NOTICE OF VIOLATION
Released: September
13, 2004
By the District Director, San Diego Office, Western Region,
Enforcement Bureau:
1. This is a Notice of Violation ("Notice") issued
pursuant to Section 1.89 of the Commission's Rules,1 to Cox
Communications, Inc., the operator of a cable television
system in Maricopa County, Arizona.
2. From February 10 through 13, 2004, an agent from the
Commission's San Diego Office inspected the Emergency Alert
System (``EAS'') equipment and logs at the following cable
system headend locations operated by Cox Communications,
Inc.:
Site Address
Bell 1550 W. Deer Valley Rd.,
Phoenix, AZ
East Mesa 4437 E. Holmes Ave., Mesa, AZ
Fowler 6610 Van Buren St., Phoenix,
AZ
McDowell 3008 E. McDowell Rd., Phoenix,
AZ
Peoria 9534 W. Peoria Ave., Peoria,
AZ
Scottsdale North 28213 N. 64th St., Scottsdale,
AZ
The agent observed the following violation:
47 C.F.R. § 11.52(d): ``Broadcast stations and
cable systems and wireless cable systems must
monitor two EAS sources. The monitoring
assignments of each broadcast station, cable system
and wireless cable system are specified in the State
EAS Plan and FCC Mapbook. They are developed in
accordance with FCC monitoring priorities.'' Cox
Communications, Inc. had the capability to monitor
two EAS sources but failed to monitor the local LP-1
station. According to the local EAS plan for the
Phoenix, AZ area (Maricopa County, Arizona), the
designated LP-1 station is KTAR(AM), Phoenix,
Arizona.
3. Pursuant to Section 308(b) of the Communications Act of
1934, as amended,2 and Section 1.89 of the Commission's
Rules, Cox Communications, Inc., must submit a written
statement concerning this matter within 20 days of release
of this Notice. The response must fully explain each
violation, must contain a statement of the specific
action(s) taken to correct each violation and preclude
recurrence, and should include a time line for completion of
pending corrective action(s). The response must be complete
in itself and signed by a principal or officer of the
licensee. All replies and documentation sent in response to
this Notice should be marked with the File No. and NOV No.
specified above, and mailed to the following address:
Federal Communications Commission
San Diego Office
4542 Ruffner Street, Suite 370
San Diego, California 92111
4. This Notice shall be sent to Cox Communications, Inc.,
1550 Deer Valley Road, Phoenix, Arizona 85027.
5. The Privacy Act of 19743 requires that we advise you
that the Commission will use all relevant material
information before it, including any information disclosed
in your reply, to determine what, if any, enforcement action
is required to ensure compliance. Any false statement made
knowingly and willfully in reply to this Notice is
punishable by fine or imprisonment under Title 18 of the
U.S. Code.4
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS
COMMISSION
William R. Zears Jr.
District Director
San Diego Office
Western Region
Enforcement Bureau
_________________________
147 C.F.R. § 1.89.
247 U.S.C. § 308(b).
3P.L. 93-579, 5 U.S.C. § 552a(e)(3).
418 U.S.C. § 1001 et seq.
Cox Communications FCC violation--poaching on government wavelengths
http://www.fcc.gov/eb/FieldNotices/2003/DOC-259163A1.html
Before the
Federal Communications Commission
Washington, D.C. 20554
In the Matter of )
)
Cox Communications, Inc. ) File No. EB-05-SD-
101
)
Physical System ID # 006623 )
)
Casa Grande, Arizona ) NOV No.
V20053294005
)
)
NOTICE OF VIOLATION
Released: June 2,
2005
By the District Director, San Diego Office, Western Region,
Enforcement Bureau:
1. This is a Notice of Violation ("Notice") issued
pursuant to Section 1.89 of the Commission's Rules,1 to Cox
Communications, Inc., the operator of a cable television
system in Casa Grande, Arizona.
2. On May 12, 2005, an agent from the Commission's San
Diego Office inspected the cable system operated by Cox
Communications, Inc. in Casa Grande, Arizona, and observed
the following violation:
a. 47 C.F.R. § 76.612(a): ``All cable television
systems which operate in
the frequency bands 108-137 and 225-400 MHz ...
must operate at frequencies offset from certain
frequencies which may be used by aeronautical
radio services operated by Commission licensees or
by the United States Government.'' In this
instance, the visual carrier frequency of cable
channel 45 measured 349.2971 MHz. The nearest
permitted offset channel is 349.2875 MHz. This
cable channel was measured with a difference of
9.6 kHz from the nearest permitted offset channel,
which exceeds the allowable tolerance by 4.6 kHz.
Also, the visual carrier frequency of cable
channel 51 measured 385.3008 MHz. The nearest
permitted offset channel is 385.3125 MHz. This
cable channel was measured with a difference of
11.7 kHz from the nearest permitted offset
channel, which exceeds the allowable tolerance by
6.7 kHz.
3. Pursuant to Section 308(b) of the Communications Act of
1934, as amended,2 and Section 1.89 of the Commission's
Rules, Cox Communications, Inc., must submit a written
statement concerning this matter within 20 days of release
of this Notice. The response must fully explain each
violation, must contain a statement of the specific
action(s) taken to correct each violation and preclude
recurrence, and should include a time line for completion of
pending corrective action(s). The response must be complete
in itself and signed by a principal or officer of Cox
Communications, Inc. All replies and documentation sent in
response to this Notice should be marked with the File No.
and NOV No. specified above, and mailed to the following
address:
Federal Communications Commission
San Diego Office
4542 Ruffner Street, Suite 370
San Diego, California 92111
4. This Notice shall be sent to Cox Communications, Inc.
of Casa Grande, Arizona at its address of record.
5. The Privacy Act of 19743 requires that we advise you
that the Commission will use all relevant material
information before it, including any information disclosed
in your reply, to determine what, if any, enforcement action
is required to ensure compliance. Any false statement made
knowingly and willfully in reply to this Notice is
punishable by fine or imprisonment under Title 18 of the
U.S. Code.4
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS
COMMISSION
William R. Zears Jr.
District Director
San Diego Office
Western Region
Enforcement Bureau
_________________________
147 C.F.R. § 1.89.
247 U.S.C. § 308(b).
3P.L. 93-579, 5 U.S.C. § 552a(e)(3).
418 U.S.C. § 1001 et seq.
Before the
Federal Communications Commission
Washington, D.C. 20554
In the Matter of )
)
Cox Communications, Inc. ) File No. EB-05-SD-
101
)
Physical System ID # 006623 )
)
Casa Grande, Arizona ) NOV No.
V20053294005
)
)
NOTICE OF VIOLATION
Released: June 2,
2005
By the District Director, San Diego Office, Western Region,
Enforcement Bureau:
1. This is a Notice of Violation ("Notice") issued
pursuant to Section 1.89 of the Commission's Rules,1 to Cox
Communications, Inc., the operator of a cable television
system in Casa Grande, Arizona.
2. On May 12, 2005, an agent from the Commission's San
Diego Office inspected the cable system operated by Cox
Communications, Inc. in Casa Grande, Arizona, and observed
the following violation:
a. 47 C.F.R. § 76.612(a): ``All cable television
systems which operate in
the frequency bands 108-137 and 225-400 MHz ...
must operate at frequencies offset from certain
frequencies which may be used by aeronautical
radio services operated by Commission licensees or
by the United States Government.'' In this
instance, the visual carrier frequency of cable
channel 45 measured 349.2971 MHz. The nearest
permitted offset channel is 349.2875 MHz. This
cable channel was measured with a difference of
9.6 kHz from the nearest permitted offset channel,
which exceeds the allowable tolerance by 4.6 kHz.
Also, the visual carrier frequency of cable
channel 51 measured 385.3008 MHz. The nearest
permitted offset channel is 385.3125 MHz. This
cable channel was measured with a difference of
11.7 kHz from the nearest permitted offset
channel, which exceeds the allowable tolerance by
6.7 kHz.
3. Pursuant to Section 308(b) of the Communications Act of
1934, as amended,2 and Section 1.89 of the Commission's
Rules, Cox Communications, Inc., must submit a written
statement concerning this matter within 20 days of release
of this Notice. The response must fully explain each
violation, must contain a statement of the specific
action(s) taken to correct each violation and preclude
recurrence, and should include a time line for completion of
pending corrective action(s). The response must be complete
in itself and signed by a principal or officer of Cox
Communications, Inc. All replies and documentation sent in
response to this Notice should be marked with the File No.
and NOV No. specified above, and mailed to the following
address:
Federal Communications Commission
San Diego Office
4542 Ruffner Street, Suite 370
San Diego, California 92111
4. This Notice shall be sent to Cox Communications, Inc.
of Casa Grande, Arizona at its address of record.
5. The Privacy Act of 19743 requires that we advise you
that the Commission will use all relevant material
information before it, including any information disclosed
in your reply, to determine what, if any, enforcement action
is required to ensure compliance. Any false statement made
knowingly and willfully in reply to this Notice is
punishable by fine or imprisonment under Title 18 of the
U.S. Code.4
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS
COMMISSION
William R. Zears Jr.
District Director
San Diego Office
Western Region
Enforcement Bureau
_________________________
147 C.F.R. § 1.89.
247 U.S.C. § 308(b).
3P.L. 93-579, 5 U.S.C. § 552a(e)(3).
418 U.S.C. § 1001 et seq.
Who is Cox Communications, Inc.?
To read the information about Cox Communications provided by San Diego Source, the online version of the Daily Transcript, you really only need to know one thing:
"wnd" means "would not disclose."
Cox Communications Inc.
Contact Information Business Information
Executives
William K. Geppert, VP/General Manager
Lindsay Burroughs, VP, Cox Business Services
5159 Federal Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92105
Phone
(619) 262-1122 or (619) 269-2000
Fax
(619) 266-5313 or (619) 269-2496
E-mail
customerinquiries@cox.com
Parent Company
n/a
Year Established
1961
Headquarters
San Diego, CA
Number of Offices Companywide
n/a
Number of Local Offices
n/a
Number of Employees Local
2,300
Number of Employees Companywide
23,000
Number of Subscribers
534,000
Local Gross Revenue 2004 YTD
wnd
Gross Revenue 2004 YTD
wnd
Annual Operating Budget
n/a
Capital Budget
n/a
Number of Offices Nationwide
n/a
Number of Part-Time Employees
n/a
Number of San Diego Locations
8
Number of Full-Time Employees
n/a
Partial Client List
n/a
Other Products
Pay per view services, digital video recorder, high-speed definition
Authorized Dealer For
n/a
Number of Systems Installations Local
wnd
Gross Sales 2004
wnd
Local Gross Revenue 2004
wnd
Local Gross Revenue 2005
wnd
Gross Sales 2005, Local
wnd
Gross Sales 2005 Companywide
wnd
Gross Revenue, Companywide
wnd
Assets
wnd
Mission Statement
To be the premier telecommunications provider in San Diego County.
http://sourcebook.sddt.com/source/company.cfm?BusinessCategory_ID=64&Company_ID=6921
"wnd" means "would not disclose."
Cox Communications Inc.
Contact Information Business Information
Executives
William K. Geppert, VP/General Manager
Lindsay Burroughs, VP, Cox Business Services
5159 Federal Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92105
Phone
(619) 262-1122 or (619) 269-2000
Fax
(619) 266-5313 or (619) 269-2496
customerinquiries@cox.com
Parent Company
n/a
Year Established
1961
Headquarters
San Diego, CA
Number of Offices Companywide
n/a
Number of Local Offices
n/a
Number of Employees Local
2,300
Number of Employees Companywide
23,000
Number of Subscribers
534,000
Local Gross Revenue 2004 YTD
wnd
Gross Revenue 2004 YTD
wnd
Annual Operating Budget
n/a
Capital Budget
n/a
Number of Offices Nationwide
n/a
Number of Part-Time Employees
n/a
Number of San Diego Locations
8
Number of Full-Time Employees
n/a
Partial Client List
n/a
Other Products
Pay per view services, digital video recorder, high-speed definition
Authorized Dealer For
n/a
Number of Systems Installations Local
wnd
Gross Sales 2004
wnd
Local Gross Revenue 2004
wnd
Local Gross Revenue 2005
wnd
Gross Sales 2005, Local
wnd
Gross Sales 2005 Companywide
wnd
Gross Revenue, Companywide
wnd
Assets
wnd
Mission Statement
To be the premier telecommunications provider in San Diego County.
http://sourcebook.sddt.com/source/company.cfm?BusinessCategory_ID=64&Company_ID=6921
Thursday, January 17, 2008
What fools these Democrats be
By NICK GILLESPIE
Published: September 2, 2007
With the possible exception of the Republicans, is there a major political party more stupefyingly brain-dead than the Democrats? That’s the ultimate takeaway from “The Argument,” Matt Bai’s sharply written, exhaustively reported and thoroughly depressing account of “billionaires, bloggers, and the battle to remake Democratic politics” along unabashedly “progressive” (read: New Deal and Great Society) lines. Well-financed and influential groups ranging from the Democracy Alliance to the New Democrat Network to MoveOn.org may be taking over the Democratic Party, he says, but they are not doing the heavy thinking that will fundamentally transform politics — unlike the free-market, small-government groups formed in the wake of Barry Goldwater’s historic loss in the 1964 presidential race.
THE ARGUMENT
Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics.
By Matt Bai.
316 pp. The Penguin Press. $25.95.
Bai has the grim job of covering national politics for The New York Times Magazine, which means his livelihood depends on following closely whether the Tennessee actor-turned-politician-turned-actor-again Fred Thompson will actually run for president (a decision reportedly put off until after Labor Day, allowing an anxious nation to savor the last days of summer) and taking seriously the White House fantasies of Senator Joseph Biden (at least in Biden’s presence). While sympathetic to the new progressives, Bai describes a movement long on anger and short on thought.
In detailing the machinations of superrich Democratic activists like George Soros, who blew through close to $30 million of his wealth in an unsuccessful attempt to unelect George W. Bush in 2004, and barricade-bashing cyberpunks like Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, founder of the popular Daily Kos Web site, whose participant-readers attack all things Republican with the same fervor they showed when championing the already forgotten Ned Lamont in his unsuccessful attempt to unseat Senator Joseph Lieberman in 2006, Bai reluctantly and repeatedly owns up to a hard truth: “There’s not much reason to think that the Democratic Party has suddenly overcome its confusion about the passing of the industrial economy and the cold war, events that left the party, over the last few decades, groping for some new philosophical framework.”
To be sure, these are giddy times for the Dems. Since last year’s elections, they’re back in control of the Congress they’ve dominated most of the time since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first term. According to a July 27-30 poll conducted for NBC News and The Wall Street Journal, the general public thinks Democrats will do a much better job than Republicans not just on global warming, health care and education but also on traditional Republican bailiwicks like controlling federal spending, dealing with taxes and protecting America’s interest in trade. The front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, Hillary Rodham Clinton, continues to lead her Republican counterpart, Rudy Giuliani, in most polls, and a generic Democrat beats a generic Republican in 2008 too.
But as John Kerry might tell you, never write off the Democrats’ ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. The recent farm bill passed by the House — and pushed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi — maintains subsidies to already prospering farmers, angering not just conservative budget cutters but liberal environmentalists. House and Senate Democrats allowed a revision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that broadens the scope of warrantless wiretaps just after holding hearings denouncing the man who would issue them, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, for routinely abusing his power. Although the misconceived and misprosecuted war in Iraq was the issue most responsible for their return to power, Congressional Democrats have yet to put forth a coherent or convincing program to end American military involvement there.
Little wonder, then, that the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that only 24 percent of American adults approve of the job the Democratic Congress is doing. That’s a decline of seven points from March. There are longer-lived trends that should worry the Democrats. In 1970, according to the Harris Poll, 49 percent of Americans considered themselves Democrats (31 percent considered themselves Republicans). In 2006, the last year for which full data are available, affiliation with the Democrats stood at 36 percent (the silver lining is that the Republicans pulled just 27 percent). If the Democrats are in fact the party of Great Society liberals, the problems run even deeper. The percentage of Americans who define their political philosophy as “liberal” has been consistently stuck around 18 percent since the 1970s, and the Democratic presidential candidate has failed to crack 50 percent of the popular vote in each of the past seven elections.
“The Argument” provides plenty of reasons to think that the Democrats, owing to an off-putting mix of elitism toward the little people and glibness toward actual policy ideas, are unlikely to go over the top anytime soon. Or, almost the same thing, to make the most of any majority they hold. The book describes Soros, after Bush’s victory in 2004, coming to the realization that (in Bai’s words) “it was the American people, and not their figurehead, who were misguided. ... Decadence ... had led to a society that seemed incapable of conjuring up any outrage at deceptive policies that made the rich richer and the world less safe.” Rob Reiner, the Hollywood heavyweight who has contributed significantly to progressive causes and who pushed a hugely expensive universal preschool ballot initiative in California that lost by a resounding 3-to-2 ratio, interrupts a discussion by announcing: “I’ve got to take a leak. Talk amongst yourselves.” Bai never stints on such telling and unattractive details, whether describing a poorly attended and heavily scripted MoveOn.org house party or a celebrity-soaked soiree in which the host, the billionaire Lynda Resnick, declared from the top of her Sunset Boulevard mansion’s spiral staircase, “We are so tired of being disenfranchised!”
Moulitsas, the Prince Hal of the left-liberal blogosphere, comes off as an intellectual lightweight, boasting to Bai that his next book will be called “The Libertarian Democrat” but admitting that he has never read Friedrich Hayek, the Nobel Prize-winning economist and social theorist, who is arguably most responsible for the contemporary libertarian movement. Moulitsas’ co-author (of “Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics”), Jerome Armstrong, talks a grand game about revolutionary change, but signed on as a paid consultant to former Gov. Mark Warner of Virginia, an archetypal centrist Democrat whose vapid presidential campaign ended almost as quickly as it began. When MoveOn — the Web-based “colossus” whose e-mail appeals, Bai says, have always centered on the same message: “Republicans were evil, arrogant and corrupt” — devised its member-generated agenda, it came up with a low-calorie three-point plan: “health care for all”; “energy independence through clean, renewable sources”; and “democracy restored.”
Recalling a meeting of leading progressives — including Armstrong, Representative Adam Smith of Washington and Simon Rosenberg of the New Democrat Network — just after the 2006 midterm elections, Bai writes: “Seventy years ago ... visionary Democrats had distinguished their party with the force of their intellect. Now the inheritors of that party stood on the threshold of a new economic moment, when the nation seemed likely to rise or fall on the strength of its intellectual capital, and the only thing that seemed to interest them was the machinery of politics.” The argument at the heart of “The Argument” is less about vision and more about strategy.
That’s bad news, even or especially for those of us who don’t see large differences between Republicans and Democrats. Our political system works best — or is at least more interesting — when big ideas are being bandied about, both within parties and between them. The lack of depth among the Democrats may not hurt them in the 2008 elections — the Republicans, whose would-be presidential candidates have mostly publicly rejected evolution, are not exactly bursting with new ideas either. But it remains profoundly disappointing.
Nick Gillespie is the editor in chief of Reason magazine.
More Articles in Books »
Published: September 2, 2007
With the possible exception of the Republicans, is there a major political party more stupefyingly brain-dead than the Democrats? That’s the ultimate takeaway from “The Argument,” Matt Bai’s sharply written, exhaustively reported and thoroughly depressing account of “billionaires, bloggers, and the battle to remake Democratic politics” along unabashedly “progressive” (read: New Deal and Great Society) lines. Well-financed and influential groups ranging from the Democracy Alliance to the New Democrat Network to MoveOn.org may be taking over the Democratic Party, he says, but they are not doing the heavy thinking that will fundamentally transform politics — unlike the free-market, small-government groups formed in the wake of Barry Goldwater’s historic loss in the 1964 presidential race.
THE ARGUMENT
Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics.
By Matt Bai.
316 pp. The Penguin Press. $25.95.
Bai has the grim job of covering national politics for The New York Times Magazine, which means his livelihood depends on following closely whether the Tennessee actor-turned-politician-turned-actor-again Fred Thompson will actually run for president (a decision reportedly put off until after Labor Day, allowing an anxious nation to savor the last days of summer) and taking seriously the White House fantasies of Senator Joseph Biden (at least in Biden’s presence). While sympathetic to the new progressives, Bai describes a movement long on anger and short on thought.
In detailing the machinations of superrich Democratic activists like George Soros, who blew through close to $30 million of his wealth in an unsuccessful attempt to unelect George W. Bush in 2004, and barricade-bashing cyberpunks like Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, founder of the popular Daily Kos Web site, whose participant-readers attack all things Republican with the same fervor they showed when championing the already forgotten Ned Lamont in his unsuccessful attempt to unseat Senator Joseph Lieberman in 2006, Bai reluctantly and repeatedly owns up to a hard truth: “There’s not much reason to think that the Democratic Party has suddenly overcome its confusion about the passing of the industrial economy and the cold war, events that left the party, over the last few decades, groping for some new philosophical framework.”
To be sure, these are giddy times for the Dems. Since last year’s elections, they’re back in control of the Congress they’ve dominated most of the time since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first term. According to a July 27-30 poll conducted for NBC News and The Wall Street Journal, the general public thinks Democrats will do a much better job than Republicans not just on global warming, health care and education but also on traditional Republican bailiwicks like controlling federal spending, dealing with taxes and protecting America’s interest in trade. The front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, Hillary Rodham Clinton, continues to lead her Republican counterpart, Rudy Giuliani, in most polls, and a generic Democrat beats a generic Republican in 2008 too.
But as John Kerry might tell you, never write off the Democrats’ ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. The recent farm bill passed by the House — and pushed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi — maintains subsidies to already prospering farmers, angering not just conservative budget cutters but liberal environmentalists. House and Senate Democrats allowed a revision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that broadens the scope of warrantless wiretaps just after holding hearings denouncing the man who would issue them, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, for routinely abusing his power. Although the misconceived and misprosecuted war in Iraq was the issue most responsible for their return to power, Congressional Democrats have yet to put forth a coherent or convincing program to end American military involvement there.
Little wonder, then, that the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that only 24 percent of American adults approve of the job the Democratic Congress is doing. That’s a decline of seven points from March. There are longer-lived trends that should worry the Democrats. In 1970, according to the Harris Poll, 49 percent of Americans considered themselves Democrats (31 percent considered themselves Republicans). In 2006, the last year for which full data are available, affiliation with the Democrats stood at 36 percent (the silver lining is that the Republicans pulled just 27 percent). If the Democrats are in fact the party of Great Society liberals, the problems run even deeper. The percentage of Americans who define their political philosophy as “liberal” has been consistently stuck around 18 percent since the 1970s, and the Democratic presidential candidate has failed to crack 50 percent of the popular vote in each of the past seven elections.
“The Argument” provides plenty of reasons to think that the Democrats, owing to an off-putting mix of elitism toward the little people and glibness toward actual policy ideas, are unlikely to go over the top anytime soon. Or, almost the same thing, to make the most of any majority they hold. The book describes Soros, after Bush’s victory in 2004, coming to the realization that (in Bai’s words) “it was the American people, and not their figurehead, who were misguided. ... Decadence ... had led to a society that seemed incapable of conjuring up any outrage at deceptive policies that made the rich richer and the world less safe.” Rob Reiner, the Hollywood heavyweight who has contributed significantly to progressive causes and who pushed a hugely expensive universal preschool ballot initiative in California that lost by a resounding 3-to-2 ratio, interrupts a discussion by announcing: “I’ve got to take a leak. Talk amongst yourselves.” Bai never stints on such telling and unattractive details, whether describing a poorly attended and heavily scripted MoveOn.org house party or a celebrity-soaked soiree in which the host, the billionaire Lynda Resnick, declared from the top of her Sunset Boulevard mansion’s spiral staircase, “We are so tired of being disenfranchised!”
Moulitsas, the Prince Hal of the left-liberal blogosphere, comes off as an intellectual lightweight, boasting to Bai that his next book will be called “The Libertarian Democrat” but admitting that he has never read Friedrich Hayek, the Nobel Prize-winning economist and social theorist, who is arguably most responsible for the contemporary libertarian movement. Moulitsas’ co-author (of “Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics”), Jerome Armstrong, talks a grand game about revolutionary change, but signed on as a paid consultant to former Gov. Mark Warner of Virginia, an archetypal centrist Democrat whose vapid presidential campaign ended almost as quickly as it began. When MoveOn — the Web-based “colossus” whose e-mail appeals, Bai says, have always centered on the same message: “Republicans were evil, arrogant and corrupt” — devised its member-generated agenda, it came up with a low-calorie three-point plan: “health care for all”; “energy independence through clean, renewable sources”; and “democracy restored.”
Recalling a meeting of leading progressives — including Armstrong, Representative Adam Smith of Washington and Simon Rosenberg of the New Democrat Network — just after the 2006 midterm elections, Bai writes: “Seventy years ago ... visionary Democrats had distinguished their party with the force of their intellect. Now the inheritors of that party stood on the threshold of a new economic moment, when the nation seemed likely to rise or fall on the strength of its intellectual capital, and the only thing that seemed to interest them was the machinery of politics.” The argument at the heart of “The Argument” is less about vision and more about strategy.
That’s bad news, even or especially for those of us who don’t see large differences between Republicans and Democrats. Our political system works best — or is at least more interesting — when big ideas are being bandied about, both within parties and between them. The lack of depth among the Democrats may not hurt them in the 2008 elections — the Republicans, whose would-be presidential candidates have mostly publicly rejected evolution, are not exactly bursting with new ideas either. But it remains profoundly disappointing.
Nick Gillespie is the editor in chief of Reason magazine.
More Articles in Books »
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
It appears SDG&E is largely to blame for fires
Click here to see the original article.
Probe of Calif. Fires Lays Most Blame on Power Lines
Downing of Poles by Santa Ana Winds Renews Debate Over Costly Option of Burying Electrical Cables
By Karl Vick
Washington Post Staff Writer
December 24, 2007
LOS ANGELES -- When the firestorms of October were finally extinguished and hundreds of thousands of Southern Californians returned to their homes, officials set out to understand how 21 fires erupted in the span of just three days.
Searching high and low, they found the easiest explanations at ground level: A 10-year-old boy confessed to starting one fire while playing with matches. That blaze blackened 38,000 acres north of Los Angeles, though authorities opted not to press charges against the youth, who has been described as distraught.
Two other fires were attributed to arson, something officials said happens routinely when fires erupt elsewhere. "The arsonists jump in because they have cover; there's other fires already," said Bill Peters, spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
In an odd twist, a convicted arsonist was discovered among the volunteers fighting fires in San Diego County. Paroled after setting seven blazes 10 years ago, the man was not implicated in the October fires.
The leading cause of ignition appeared to be power lines.
As many as eight fires were blamed on sparks from lines blown down by the high, hot Santa Ana winds that sweep across Southern California each autumn. The Witch fire, which burned 200,000 acres and killed two people, was ignited by a power line, as was the smaller Guejito blaze with which it merged.
The findings have renewed calls for improving the safety of the power lines, either by reinforcing poles and line fasteners or, in some cases, placing cables underground in rural areas that experience the worst winds.
"We're certainly all looking at undergrounding in fire-prone rural areas -- even though that hasn't been the norm -- given the number of fires that have broken out over the last several years," said Christy Heiser, a spokeswoman for San Diego Gas & Electric. She noted that 60 percent of the utility's lines are already underground, twice the national average.
The problem is expense. Burying power lines can cost $1 million a mile. It also makes any repair a matter of digging.
"People don't understand the consequences of it," said James A. Kelly, vice president for engineering and technical services at Southern California Edison, which is less eager to bury the lines. "It's like using a 20-pound sledgehammer to kill an ant."
Edison is experimenting with less costly options, including poles made from composite materials designed to withstand winds that "are sufficient in some instances to snap wooden poles," Kelly said.
Indeed, the Santa Ana winds remain the primary reason for October's fires. The gusty, dry gales exceeded 100 mph, and blew steadily for so long that they drove fires over terrain that had been thoroughly burned four years earlier.
"As a general rule, the younger the stand, the less fuel there is," said Jon Keeley, an ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey. "But if you overlay what burned in October 2007 against earlier fire histories, what you can see is a huge portion of what burned in 2003 got re-burned. If you include the 2002 fires, it's like 100,000 acres."
Keeley said that suggests that controlled burns are relatively ineffective on Southern California's scrubby landscape. In testimony to a Senate panel last month, he urged restricting new residential development in fire-prone areas, tightening building codes on the houses that are built, and exploring the burial of power lines in the corridors that Santa Ana winds sweep through.
"Power companies aren't eager to do it because it's expensive," he said. "But given the cost of these fires, I can't believe it's not cost-effective."
And after all that, Keeley said, the public must understand that fires in Southern California are like earthquakes: inevitable.
"The thing is, everything is going to re-burn: Southern California is a fire-based ecology," said Peters. "The intangible here is, as long as people want to live on that interface between nature and man, we have to deal with that. And so that's why -- well, this happens all the time. Because that's where we live!"
Probe of Calif. Fires Lays Most Blame on Power Lines
Downing of Poles by Santa Ana Winds Renews Debate Over Costly Option of Burying Electrical Cables
By Karl Vick
Washington Post Staff Writer
December 24, 2007
LOS ANGELES -- When the firestorms of October were finally extinguished and hundreds of thousands of Southern Californians returned to their homes, officials set out to understand how 21 fires erupted in the span of just three days.
Searching high and low, they found the easiest explanations at ground level: A 10-year-old boy confessed to starting one fire while playing with matches. That blaze blackened 38,000 acres north of Los Angeles, though authorities opted not to press charges against the youth, who has been described as distraught.
Two other fires were attributed to arson, something officials said happens routinely when fires erupt elsewhere. "The arsonists jump in because they have cover; there's other fires already," said Bill Peters, spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
In an odd twist, a convicted arsonist was discovered among the volunteers fighting fires in San Diego County. Paroled after setting seven blazes 10 years ago, the man was not implicated in the October fires.
The leading cause of ignition appeared to be power lines.
As many as eight fires were blamed on sparks from lines blown down by the high, hot Santa Ana winds that sweep across Southern California each autumn. The Witch fire, which burned 200,000 acres and killed two people, was ignited by a power line, as was the smaller Guejito blaze with which it merged.
The findings have renewed calls for improving the safety of the power lines, either by reinforcing poles and line fasteners or, in some cases, placing cables underground in rural areas that experience the worst winds.
"We're certainly all looking at undergrounding in fire-prone rural areas -- even though that hasn't been the norm -- given the number of fires that have broken out over the last several years," said Christy Heiser, a spokeswoman for San Diego Gas & Electric. She noted that 60 percent of the utility's lines are already underground, twice the national average.
The problem is expense. Burying power lines can cost $1 million a mile. It also makes any repair a matter of digging.
"People don't understand the consequences of it," said James A. Kelly, vice president for engineering and technical services at Southern California Edison, which is less eager to bury the lines. "It's like using a 20-pound sledgehammer to kill an ant."
Edison is experimenting with less costly options, including poles made from composite materials designed to withstand winds that "are sufficient in some instances to snap wooden poles," Kelly said.
Indeed, the Santa Ana winds remain the primary reason for October's fires. The gusty, dry gales exceeded 100 mph, and blew steadily for so long that they drove fires over terrain that had been thoroughly burned four years earlier.
"As a general rule, the younger the stand, the less fuel there is," said Jon Keeley, an ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey. "But if you overlay what burned in October 2007 against earlier fire histories, what you can see is a huge portion of what burned in 2003 got re-burned. If you include the 2002 fires, it's like 100,000 acres."
Keeley said that suggests that controlled burns are relatively ineffective on Southern California's scrubby landscape. In testimony to a Senate panel last month, he urged restricting new residential development in fire-prone areas, tightening building codes on the houses that are built, and exploring the burial of power lines in the corridors that Santa Ana winds sweep through.
"Power companies aren't eager to do it because it's expensive," he said. "But given the cost of these fires, I can't believe it's not cost-effective."
And after all that, Keeley said, the public must understand that fires in Southern California are like earthquakes: inevitable.
"The thing is, everything is going to re-burn: Southern California is a fire-based ecology," said Peters. "The intangible here is, as long as people want to live on that interface between nature and man, we have to deal with that. And so that's why -- well, this happens all the time. Because that's where we live!"
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Whistleblowers out of luck in San Diego
The following article is from Voice of San Diego:
Despite Advice, Mayor Still Controls Whistleblower Hotline
By EVAN McLAUGHLIN Voice Staff Writer
Dec. 17, 2007 | Employees at the city of San Diego still do not have an outlet for anonymously reporting financial misconduct to the City Council's Audit Committee, even though a rule requiring the panel to field the concerns of whistleblowers was put in place seven months ago.
Instead, officials for Mayor Jerry Sanders are still in charge of the hotline. It keeps in place an arrangement in which City Hall's boss oversees the very forum where potentially embarrassing complaints about his administration are registered, while also having the power to fire the thousands of city employees prone to use the hotline.
Dailing Out
The Issue: The whistleblower hotline is overseen by the Mayor’s Office even though city law says a City Council committee should field the complaints.
What It Means: That puts the mayor in the position of supervising the very hotline that could field embarrassing complaints about his administration.
The Bigger Picture: Along with the auditor and appointments to the Audit Committee, it’s recommended the hotline is also made independent of the mayor.
It's a dynamic that concerns some officials who want to ensure the whistleblower process is an effective fix for a city that has suffered the scrutiny federal investigators and the loss of the its credit rating because of past breakdowns in financial controls.
"Any employees that might want to blow the whistle on something and it's a particularly sensitive issue to the mayor's administration, that might cause them to pause," said Jeff Kawar, a fiscal and policy analyst at the council's Office of the Independent Budget Analyst.
The hotline is among the several remedies recommended by outside consultants at Kroll Inc. and Vinson & Elkins. Together, the city paid more than $25 million to for the firms' expert opinions.
The two firms were hired after the discovery of errors and omission in the city's financial statements, in which the magnitude of the city's looming multibillion-dollar pension and retiree health care liabilities were downplayed.
Related Links
Both Mayor and Council Seek Majority Power for Committee (Aug. 9, 2007)
Hired to Reform, Former Auditor Left Unhappy with Mayor's Control (Feb. 26, 2007)
The inaccurate financial statements attracted the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which has since sanctioned the city for securities fraud and fined its former auditor. Audit firms the city hired subsequent to the 2002 and 2003 disclosure problems have withheld their blessings of the city's financial statements, which has in turn barred the city from Wall Street.
Vinson & Elkins and Kroll concluded that weak internal controls -- the checks and balances of ensuring financial statements accurately reflect the city's financial health -- contributed to the city's reporting errors in 2002 and 2003.
Objections to the city's disclosures were first aired by pension trustee Diann Shipione, who didn't have the luxury of a confidential hotline. Instead, when Shipione sounded the alarms on the reporting errors and the controversial deal forged between the city and its retirement board, she was derided as crazy and vindictive. Pension officials tried to embarrass her by taking out an advertisement in a local newspaper that compared her to Chicken Little and sought to have police arrest her at a meeting.
Kroll and Vinson & Elkins recommended setting up an employee hotline, where employees could report concerns of misconduct anonymously and confidentially. Both firms saw it as a way to bring to light the city's financial reporting problems before they reach the desks of potential bond investors.
Each consultant advised the city to have a panel independent of the Mayor's Office handle calls. In May, the council followed the path laid out by Kroll, who recommended that the Audit Committee review the complaints that were cataloged on the hotline.
However, establishing the hotline has become one of several growing pains for the new committee, which was created in January. Many of Kroll's recommendations for the committee depend on the decisions of voters, who will need to change the city's bylaws in order to remove many auditing powers from the mayor's supervision as the firm recommended.
The Audit Committee expects to hear a presentation next month from outside consultants at Jefferson Wells about the best way to handle the hotline, said Councilman Kevin Faulconer, the panel's chairman. Faulconer said he wants to know how other cities arrange their hotlines so that the city can follow the best practices of government.
One city where the mayor is not involved in overseeing the hotline is Los Angeles. Employee complaints are routed either through the controller, who is elected, or the Ethics Commission, which is appointed by various city officials.
Lee Ann Pelham, the executive director of the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission, said employees would be more reluctant to complain about misconduct at work if they knew their calls were being handled by someone who worked for their boss.
"The hallmark of a workable ethics system is the ability to refer something to an office independently and confidentially," Pelham said.
Jo Anne SawyerKnoll, who heads Sanders' Office of Ethics & Integrity, said concerns that the mayor is too close to the hotline are unfounded. Sanders and his staff don't meddle in the complaints and because safeguards are in place, such as how the calls are fielded by a company outside the city.
"In theory, there is nothing wrong with the whistleblower line and program to be under the mayor as long as you have certain things in place that allow it to be confidential and anonymous," SawyerKnoll said.
SawyerKnoll said that an overwhelming number of complaints don't deal with misconduct. Her office doesn't investigate the alleged malfeasance. Rather, it refers complaints to the city auditor, who also reports to the mayor. She said she welcomes the council committee's involvement when it gets a process for reviewing complaints in place.
Until the Audit Committee takes over, the hotline rests with Sanders, who has gained more and more control of the complaint forum -- both by his designs and others' -- since he took office.
Former City Auditor John Torell created the hotline in 2005 before the city switched to the voter-approved strong-mayor form of government, when his office was removed from the city manager's administration and was instead controlled by the mayor and eight City Council members.
But once Sanders was put in charge of the entire city workforce, including the city auditor, in 2006, the hotline became the purview of the mayor. Torell bristled at the idea of reporting to Sanders, saying he didn't have enough independence from the administration he was tasked with inspecting. The hotline became one of the many new internal controls that would be compromised if it remained in the custody of mayoral officials, he said.
Several months into the strong-mayor structure, Sanders plucked the hotline from Torell and handed it to the Office of Ethics & Integrity. Torell then became one of four officials to serve on a committee that heard the complaints that were left on the hotline before he departed City Hall in a huff because of his diminished independence nearly one year ago.
Please contact Evan McLaughlin directly with your thoughts, ideas, personal stories or tips. Or send a letter to the editor.
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2007/12/18/government/614hotline121707.txt
Despite Advice, Mayor Still Controls Whistleblower Hotline
By EVAN McLAUGHLIN Voice Staff Writer
Dec. 17, 2007 | Employees at the city of San Diego still do not have an outlet for anonymously reporting financial misconduct to the City Council's Audit Committee, even though a rule requiring the panel to field the concerns of whistleblowers was put in place seven months ago.
Instead, officials for Mayor Jerry Sanders are still in charge of the hotline. It keeps in place an arrangement in which City Hall's boss oversees the very forum where potentially embarrassing complaints about his administration are registered, while also having the power to fire the thousands of city employees prone to use the hotline.
Dailing Out
The Issue: The whistleblower hotline is overseen by the Mayor’s Office even though city law says a City Council committee should field the complaints.
What It Means: That puts the mayor in the position of supervising the very hotline that could field embarrassing complaints about his administration.
The Bigger Picture: Along with the auditor and appointments to the Audit Committee, it’s recommended the hotline is also made independent of the mayor.
It's a dynamic that concerns some officials who want to ensure the whistleblower process is an effective fix for a city that has suffered the scrutiny federal investigators and the loss of the its credit rating because of past breakdowns in financial controls.
"Any employees that might want to blow the whistle on something and it's a particularly sensitive issue to the mayor's administration, that might cause them to pause," said Jeff Kawar, a fiscal and policy analyst at the council's Office of the Independent Budget Analyst.
The hotline is among the several remedies recommended by outside consultants at Kroll Inc. and Vinson & Elkins. Together, the city paid more than $25 million to for the firms' expert opinions.
The two firms were hired after the discovery of errors and omission in the city's financial statements, in which the magnitude of the city's looming multibillion-dollar pension and retiree health care liabilities were downplayed.
Related Links
Both Mayor and Council Seek Majority Power for Committee (Aug. 9, 2007)
Hired to Reform, Former Auditor Left Unhappy with Mayor's Control (Feb. 26, 2007)
The inaccurate financial statements attracted the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which has since sanctioned the city for securities fraud and fined its former auditor. Audit firms the city hired subsequent to the 2002 and 2003 disclosure problems have withheld their blessings of the city's financial statements, which has in turn barred the city from Wall Street.
Vinson & Elkins and Kroll concluded that weak internal controls -- the checks and balances of ensuring financial statements accurately reflect the city's financial health -- contributed to the city's reporting errors in 2002 and 2003.
Objections to the city's disclosures were first aired by pension trustee Diann Shipione, who didn't have the luxury of a confidential hotline. Instead, when Shipione sounded the alarms on the reporting errors and the controversial deal forged between the city and its retirement board, she was derided as crazy and vindictive. Pension officials tried to embarrass her by taking out an advertisement in a local newspaper that compared her to Chicken Little and sought to have police arrest her at a meeting.
Kroll and Vinson & Elkins recommended setting up an employee hotline, where employees could report concerns of misconduct anonymously and confidentially. Both firms saw it as a way to bring to light the city's financial reporting problems before they reach the desks of potential bond investors.
Each consultant advised the city to have a panel independent of the Mayor's Office handle calls. In May, the council followed the path laid out by Kroll, who recommended that the Audit Committee review the complaints that were cataloged on the hotline.
However, establishing the hotline has become one of several growing pains for the new committee, which was created in January. Many of Kroll's recommendations for the committee depend on the decisions of voters, who will need to change the city's bylaws in order to remove many auditing powers from the mayor's supervision as the firm recommended.
The Audit Committee expects to hear a presentation next month from outside consultants at Jefferson Wells about the best way to handle the hotline, said Councilman Kevin Faulconer, the panel's chairman. Faulconer said he wants to know how other cities arrange their hotlines so that the city can follow the best practices of government.
One city where the mayor is not involved in overseeing the hotline is Los Angeles. Employee complaints are routed either through the controller, who is elected, or the Ethics Commission, which is appointed by various city officials.
Lee Ann Pelham, the executive director of the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission, said employees would be more reluctant to complain about misconduct at work if they knew their calls were being handled by someone who worked for their boss.
"The hallmark of a workable ethics system is the ability to refer something to an office independently and confidentially," Pelham said.
Jo Anne SawyerKnoll, who heads Sanders' Office of Ethics & Integrity, said concerns that the mayor is too close to the hotline are unfounded. Sanders and his staff don't meddle in the complaints and because safeguards are in place, such as how the calls are fielded by a company outside the city.
"In theory, there is nothing wrong with the whistleblower line and program to be under the mayor as long as you have certain things in place that allow it to be confidential and anonymous," SawyerKnoll said.
SawyerKnoll said that an overwhelming number of complaints don't deal with misconduct. Her office doesn't investigate the alleged malfeasance. Rather, it refers complaints to the city auditor, who also reports to the mayor. She said she welcomes the council committee's involvement when it gets a process for reviewing complaints in place.
Until the Audit Committee takes over, the hotline rests with Sanders, who has gained more and more control of the complaint forum -- both by his designs and others' -- since he took office.
Former City Auditor John Torell created the hotline in 2005 before the city switched to the voter-approved strong-mayor form of government, when his office was removed from the city manager's administration and was instead controlled by the mayor and eight City Council members.
But once Sanders was put in charge of the entire city workforce, including the city auditor, in 2006, the hotline became the purview of the mayor. Torell bristled at the idea of reporting to Sanders, saying he didn't have enough independence from the administration he was tasked with inspecting. The hotline became one of the many new internal controls that would be compromised if it remained in the custody of mayoral officials, he said.
Several months into the strong-mayor structure, Sanders plucked the hotline from Torell and handed it to the Office of Ethics & Integrity. Torell then became one of four officials to serve on a committee that heard the complaints that were left on the hotline before he departed City Hall in a huff because of his diminished independence nearly one year ago.
Please contact Evan McLaughlin directly with your thoughts, ideas, personal stories or tips. Or send a letter to the editor.
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2007/12/18/government/614hotline121707.txt
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
The SEC says the pension deal included fraud
City's Former Auditor Charged With Fraud
December 11, 2007
SAN DIEGO -- The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged San Diego's former auditor with fraud for making false and misleading statements on city bond offerings.
The agency said Thomas Saiz and his former firm -- Calderon, James & Osborn -- signed off on incorrect statements about the health of the city's pension fund. The statements came in five city bond offerings in 2002 and 2003. Those bond sales raised $260 million.
Saiz agreed to pay a $15,000 fine as part of a settlement in the case filed Monday. Neither he nor the firm admitted wrongdoing.
The city's failure to disclose its pension woes became known in 2004, leading to the mayor's resignation and severely hampering San Diego's ability to borrow money.
Last year, the SEC charged the city of San Diego with securities fraud in connection with the bond sales in 2002 and 2003. It ordered the city to hire an independent financial consultant for three years but stopped short of levying fines for failing to disclose bad news about the pension fund.
The city employee's pension put San Diego $1.4 billion in debt, according to officials.
The Commission's investigation is ongoing, according to its Web site, "as to other individuals and entities that may have violated federal securities laws."
NBCSandiego.com. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
December 11, 2007
SAN DIEGO -- The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged San Diego's former auditor with fraud for making false and misleading statements on city bond offerings.
The agency said Thomas Saiz and his former firm -- Calderon, James & Osborn -- signed off on incorrect statements about the health of the city's pension fund. The statements came in five city bond offerings in 2002 and 2003. Those bond sales raised $260 million.
Saiz agreed to pay a $15,000 fine as part of a settlement in the case filed Monday. Neither he nor the firm admitted wrongdoing.
The city's failure to disclose its pension woes became known in 2004, leading to the mayor's resignation and severely hampering San Diego's ability to borrow money.
Last year, the SEC charged the city of San Diego with securities fraud in connection with the bond sales in 2002 and 2003. It ordered the city to hire an independent financial consultant for three years but stopped short of levying fines for failing to disclose bad news about the pension fund.
The city employee's pension put San Diego $1.4 billion in debt, according to officials.
The Commission's investigation is ongoing, according to its Web site, "as to other individuals and entities that may have violated federal securities laws."
NBCSandiego.com. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Sunday, December 09, 2007
What is the real purpose of the Lincoln Club? It doesn't seem to be education.
The Mayor’s Backroom Buddies: Who is Cox Really Looking Out For?
By Jen Badgley
Anyone who’s been following the bayfront development knows that Mayor Cox has been on Gaylord’s side since day one. Even when Gaylord got caught lying to the Port Commission , she was quick to jump to the company’s defense. Why has the Mayor been such a devoted cheerleader for a disreputable, out-of-state developer whose shaky finances earned it an “F” grade from one financial rating service?
Mayor Cox claims that she supports Gaylord because its plan is the best for Chula Vista, but if you take a look at the facts—especially the money trail—it’s obvious whom she’s really looking out for.
Most Chula Vistans probably aren’t familiar with the Lincoln Club, an elite group of corporate executives and real estate moguls who fund campaigns for business-friendly politicians, but this group pumped almost $80,000 into Cox’s mayoral bid. The director of the Lincoln Club, Gordon Carrier, is also a principle at the architectural firm Carrier Johnson, which was retained by the City to work on the bayfront redevelopment, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Another Lincoln Club contributor is Phelps Development, which formed the Gaylord Phelps Development LLC partnership last year for the “sole purpose” of winning a contract to oversee the bayfront development, according to Gaylord spokesman Brain Abrahamson. The port district was about to hire Phelps to oversee the budget, development and environmental guidelines on the bayfront project until the Voice of San Diego exposed this classic “wolf guarding the henhouse” set-up.
This embarrassing stunt hasn’t stopped Cox and her real estate cronies from stacking the deck in Gaylord’s favor. How do you think Gaylord’s local representative got a seat on Chula Vista’s Real Estate Advisory Committee? And as long as we’re asking questions, here are a few more questions that the Mayor won’t answer:
After years of public meetings, why is she ignoring the Citizens' Advisory Committee and giving free reign to Gaylord to build a development considered an eyesore and environmental disaster by many Chula Vistans?
Considering Chula Vista’s burgeoning debt, why is she giving away $300 million to Gaylord, a company that is already carrying a debt load of more than half a billion dollars? And what about the hidden infrastructure expenses that will cost Chula Vista even more?
Besides Gaylord’s convention center, what else do the Mayor and her Lincoln Club buddies have planned for the bayfront area? Why won’t she talk about the big picture for the future of Chula Vista?
Mayor Cox is supposed to represent the interests of all Chula Vistans, not just the wealthy developers who bankrolled her political career. But it’s clear whom she’s working for in City Hall. The Lincoln Club got its money’s worth when they helped elect Cheryl Cox.
Posted by LJF Team on September 26, 2007
http://www.localjobsfirst.org/blog/the_mayors_backroom_buddies_wh.html
By Jen Badgley
Anyone who’s been following the bayfront development knows that Mayor Cox has been on Gaylord’s side since day one. Even when Gaylord got caught lying to the Port Commission , she was quick to jump to the company’s defense. Why has the Mayor been such a devoted cheerleader for a disreputable, out-of-state developer whose shaky finances earned it an “F” grade from one financial rating service?
Mayor Cox claims that she supports Gaylord because its plan is the best for Chula Vista, but if you take a look at the facts—especially the money trail—it’s obvious whom she’s really looking out for.
Most Chula Vistans probably aren’t familiar with the Lincoln Club, an elite group of corporate executives and real estate moguls who fund campaigns for business-friendly politicians, but this group pumped almost $80,000 into Cox’s mayoral bid. The director of the Lincoln Club, Gordon Carrier, is also a principle at the architectural firm Carrier Johnson, which was retained by the City to work on the bayfront redevelopment, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Another Lincoln Club contributor is Phelps Development, which formed the Gaylord Phelps Development LLC partnership last year for the “sole purpose” of winning a contract to oversee the bayfront development, according to Gaylord spokesman Brain Abrahamson. The port district was about to hire Phelps to oversee the budget, development and environmental guidelines on the bayfront project until the Voice of San Diego exposed this classic “wolf guarding the henhouse” set-up.
This embarrassing stunt hasn’t stopped Cox and her real estate cronies from stacking the deck in Gaylord’s favor. How do you think Gaylord’s local representative got a seat on Chula Vista’s Real Estate Advisory Committee? And as long as we’re asking questions, here are a few more questions that the Mayor won’t answer:
After years of public meetings, why is she ignoring the Citizens' Advisory Committee and giving free reign to Gaylord to build a development considered an eyesore and environmental disaster by many Chula Vistans?
Considering Chula Vista’s burgeoning debt, why is she giving away $300 million to Gaylord, a company that is already carrying a debt load of more than half a billion dollars? And what about the hidden infrastructure expenses that will cost Chula Vista even more?
Besides Gaylord’s convention center, what else do the Mayor and her Lincoln Club buddies have planned for the bayfront area? Why won’t she talk about the big picture for the future of Chula Vista?
Mayor Cox is supposed to represent the interests of all Chula Vistans, not just the wealthy developers who bankrolled her political career. But it’s clear whom she’s working for in City Hall. The Lincoln Club got its money’s worth when they helped elect Cheryl Cox.
Posted by LJF Team on September 26, 2007
http://www.localjobsfirst.org/blog/the_mayors_backroom_buddies_wh.html
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Was Vencent Donlan pushed into crime?
UPDATE (link): Email from Vencent Donlan?
Links:
Robin Donlan deposition
Robin Donlan's $7.7 million fraud
Did someone push Vence Donlan into committing stock options fraud?
How did so many people who were close to Robin Donlan become involved in criminal activities?
These individuals include Donlan's brother, Michael Carlson; her PTA friend, Kimberlee Simmons; her fellow teachers at Castle Park Elementary School; her union, California Teachers Association; her school district, Chula Vista Elementary School District; her brother's boss, Commander Sam Gross of Santa Barbara Sheriff's department; her lawyers; and finally, and most distressingly,
her husband, a former navy pilot and school teacher who is now serving an almost-4-year federal prison sentence.
Robin's husband Vence Donlan was never in trouble before he married Robin.
What caused him to begin to commit stock option theft a few months after he married Robin?
Could it have been pressure from his wife?
That was certainly the reason that CTA, CVESD, teachers at Robin's school, and law enforcement and lawyers became involved in criminal activities. Robin Donlan put them in a position where they had to violate the law or push back against pressure. Sadly, they all decided to break the law.
I suspect that Robin was fearful in March 2002, when she learned that her school district and her fellow teachers had been sued, that her involvement in the wrongdoing would eventually be exposed.
Robin Doig Colls married Vence Donlan in early 2002, perhaps in part because she feared that her role in the wrongdoing would be exposed, and she wanted the support of a husband. Possibly she expressed fear to her husband that she would have to pay a lot of money in a lawsuit, and he felt the need to provide her with a lot of money.
One thing is for certain: Robin committed crimes, encouraged crimes, and covered up crimes. And a lot of people suffered the consequences.
It's time for Robin to come forward and tell the truth, and try to repair some of the damage she's done. The same is true of Chula Vista Elementary School District, California Teachers Association, and the San Diego County Office of Education-Joint Powers Authority.
How about a return to the rule of law, Robin and friends?
Links:
Robin Donlan deposition
Robin Donlan's $7.7 million fraud
Did someone push Vence Donlan into committing stock options fraud?
How did so many people who were close to Robin Donlan become involved in criminal activities?
These individuals include Donlan's brother, Michael Carlson; her PTA friend, Kimberlee Simmons; her fellow teachers at Castle Park Elementary School; her union, California Teachers Association; her school district, Chula Vista Elementary School District; her brother's boss, Commander Sam Gross of Santa Barbara Sheriff's department; her lawyers; and finally, and most distressingly,
her husband, a former navy pilot and school teacher who is now serving an almost-4-year federal prison sentence.
Robin's husband Vence Donlan was never in trouble before he married Robin.
What caused him to begin to commit stock option theft a few months after he married Robin?
Could it have been pressure from his wife?
That was certainly the reason that CTA, CVESD, teachers at Robin's school, and law enforcement and lawyers became involved in criminal activities. Robin Donlan put them in a position where they had to violate the law or push back against pressure. Sadly, they all decided to break the law.
I suspect that Robin was fearful in March 2002, when she learned that her school district and her fellow teachers had been sued, that her involvement in the wrongdoing would eventually be exposed.
Robin Doig Colls married Vence Donlan in early 2002, perhaps in part because she feared that her role in the wrongdoing would be exposed, and she wanted the support of a husband. Possibly she expressed fear to her husband that she would have to pay a lot of money in a lawsuit, and he felt the need to provide her with a lot of money.
One thing is for certain: Robin committed crimes, encouraged crimes, and covered up crimes. And a lot of people suffered the consequences.
It's time for Robin to come forward and tell the truth, and try to repair some of the damage she's done. The same is true of Chula Vista Elementary School District, California Teachers Association, and the San Diego County Office of Education-Joint Powers Authority.
How about a return to the rule of law, Robin and friends?
Saturday, December 01, 2007
It's so sweet of Kaiser Permanente to give charity to Keenan and Associates
Keenan & Associates Presents Fourth Annual Summit
Torrance, Calif.
Keenan & Associates, the largest privately held brokerage and consulting firm in California, presented their fourth annual Keenan Summit, featuring notable California thought leaders addressing topics critical to employers such as health care reform legislation and public employer liabilities for retiree health care costs...
The Keenan Summit was made possible by the generous contributions of these sponsors: Blue Shield of California, Health Net, Valley Oak Systems, MuniFinancial, United Healthcare PacificCare, Blue Cross of California, Express Scripts, Bay Actuarial Consultants, Aetna, Unum, Delta Dental,
Kaiser Permanente,
Wachovia Securities, Vision Service Plan, Maximus, and Johnson Rooney Welch.
About Keenan & Associates
Keenan & Associates, headquartered in Torrance, CA, was founded in 1972. Keenan has grown to the 17th largest insurance brokerage and consulting firm in the United States. With a network of offices located throughout California and a staff of more than 650 insurance specialists, Keenan is a full service Broker and consultant, dedicated to providing superior insurance products and services for public agencies and health care organizations. The company?s exceptional growth is directly related to its concentration on meeting the risk management, employee benefits, workers' compensation and property & liability consulting and brokerage objectives of public entities, health care systems and high-tech firms.
http://www.ad-hoc-news.de/CorporateNews/en/14185733/Keenan-&-Associates-Presents-Fourth-Annual-Summit
Torrance, Calif.
Keenan & Associates, the largest privately held brokerage and consulting firm in California, presented their fourth annual Keenan Summit, featuring notable California thought leaders addressing topics critical to employers such as health care reform legislation and public employer liabilities for retiree health care costs...
The Keenan Summit was made possible by the generous contributions of these sponsors: Blue Shield of California, Health Net, Valley Oak Systems, MuniFinancial, United Healthcare PacificCare, Blue Cross of California, Express Scripts, Bay Actuarial Consultants, Aetna, Unum, Delta Dental,
Kaiser Permanente,
Wachovia Securities, Vision Service Plan, Maximus, and Johnson Rooney Welch.
About Keenan & Associates
Keenan & Associates, headquartered in Torrance, CA, was founded in 1972. Keenan has grown to the 17th largest insurance brokerage and consulting firm in the United States. With a network of offices located throughout California and a staff of more than 650 insurance specialists, Keenan is a full service Broker and consultant, dedicated to providing superior insurance products and services for public agencies and health care organizations. The company?s exceptional growth is directly related to its concentration on meeting the risk management, employee benefits, workers' compensation and property & liability consulting and brokerage objectives of public entities, health care systems and high-tech firms.
http://www.ad-hoc-news.de/CorporateNews/en/14185733/Keenan-&-Associates-Presents-Fourth-Annual-Summit
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Encinitas councilwoman abstains from closed session in protest
Good for Teresa Barth! Secrecy and wrongdoing go hand in hand.
San Diego Union Tribune published this story by Angela Lau on October 17, 2007:
Frustrated that Encinitas City Council's closed sessions are not transparent enough, Councilwoman Teresa Barth abstained from Wednesday night's closed session in protest.
Closed sessions are scheduled to discuss sensitive items, such as litigation strategy. Wednesday night's meeting discussed litigation against F Street bookstore and labor negotiations.
Barth said Wednesday night she will not attend any more closed-session meetings until the city switches its 24-hour notification policy for closed-session agendas to 72-hour notification. She said she wants citizens to have time to prepare to testify before the council begins discussions.
She said her action was prompted by repeated pleas from the public to open closed sessions. She sought outside legal opinion and concluded that the city should give the public 72 hours' notice.
She said she does not consider closed sessions to be special meetings, but regular council meetings. City Attorney Glenn Sabine said in a previous council meeting that closed sessions are special meetings.
Under the Brown Act, special meetings only require 24 hours' notice, whereas regular council meetings require 72 hours' notice.
“The city is meeting the minimum requirements (of the law), but I don't think we are doing this in full disclosure and transparency,” she said, adding that she wants an opinion from the state's attorney general.
Barth's action was consistent with her campaign promise when she ran for office last year. She had said she would try to make city government more transparent.
Shortly after she was installed, Barth said she got the city to notify the public that they can speak on closed-session agenda items before the council commences discussions.
But that was not enough, she said.
Barth's ally, Councilwoman Maggie Houlihan, said she attended Wednesday night's closed session, but she wants to do more research to make sure the city is complying with the law.
Encinitas resident Russell Marr, who has been pressuring the council to give more notice on closed-session agenda items and disclose closed-session votes, said the council is violating the Brown Act.
“I told you 10 times about 72-hour notice. It's time you wake up,” he said.
Angela Lau: (760) 476-8240; angela.lau@uniontrib.com
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/northcounty/20071017-1951-bn17barth.html
San Diego Union Tribune published this story by Angela Lau on October 17, 2007:
Frustrated that Encinitas City Council's closed sessions are not transparent enough, Councilwoman Teresa Barth abstained from Wednesday night's closed session in protest.
Closed sessions are scheduled to discuss sensitive items, such as litigation strategy. Wednesday night's meeting discussed litigation against F Street bookstore and labor negotiations.
Barth said Wednesday night she will not attend any more closed-session meetings until the city switches its 24-hour notification policy for closed-session agendas to 72-hour notification. She said she wants citizens to have time to prepare to testify before the council begins discussions.
She said her action was prompted by repeated pleas from the public to open closed sessions. She sought outside legal opinion and concluded that the city should give the public 72 hours' notice.
She said she does not consider closed sessions to be special meetings, but regular council meetings. City Attorney Glenn Sabine said in a previous council meeting that closed sessions are special meetings.
Under the Brown Act, special meetings only require 24 hours' notice, whereas regular council meetings require 72 hours' notice.
“The city is meeting the minimum requirements (of the law), but I don't think we are doing this in full disclosure and transparency,” she said, adding that she wants an opinion from the state's attorney general.
Barth's action was consistent with her campaign promise when she ran for office last year. She had said she would try to make city government more transparent.
Shortly after she was installed, Barth said she got the city to notify the public that they can speak on closed-session agenda items before the council commences discussions.
But that was not enough, she said.
Barth's ally, Councilwoman Maggie Houlihan, said she attended Wednesday night's closed session, but she wants to do more research to make sure the city is complying with the law.
Encinitas resident Russell Marr, who has been pressuring the council to give more notice on closed-session agenda items and disclose closed-session votes, said the council is violating the Brown Act.
“I told you 10 times about 72-hour notice. It's time you wake up,” he said.
Angela Lau: (760) 476-8240; angela.lau@uniontrib.com
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/northcounty/20071017-1951-bn17barth.html
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Was Davis Recalled for Cheney's Wrongdoing?
UCAN
Utility Consumers' Action Network
Consumer Advocates
http://ucan.org/blog/energy/electricity/energy_deregulation_crisis/vice_president_cheney_suppressed_evidence_of_price_manipulation_during_ca_ene
Vice President Cheney suppressed evidence of price manipulation during CA energy crisis
Posted July 20th, 2007
A recent story by Jason Leopold on Truthout.org reports that Vice President Dick Cheney was aware of price manipulation and artificial powerplant shutdowns during the 2000-2001 California energy crisis, but kept the information from the public. According to the story, just before Cheney's National Energy Policy was to be announced, the Vice President ordered the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to seal documents related to settlements with two energy companies that had been investigated for wrongdoing. Leopold writes:
So in May 2001, just days before Cheney unveiled his long-awaited National Energy Policy, FERC entered into confidential settlements with Williams in which the company forfeited $8 million it was owed by California's grid operator for power Williams sold into the marketplace at inflated prices. Williams did not admit any guilt for the power plant shutdown and, on orders from Cheney, FERC agreed to keep details of the settlement sealed. FERC later entered into a similar settlement with Reliant. The company agreed to forfeit $13.8 million it was owed by California's grid operator, did not admit to any wrongdoing, and FERC kept the details of the settlement confidential.
Williams and Reliant never admited guilt. But do you remember the audio tapes with Enron employees laughing about all the money they had stolen from poor "Grandma Millie" in California? That's who these guys are. They don't have to admit their guilt because there are tapes and transcripts that have recorded it for us. One Reliant employee is quoted in the report as having said, "we decided as a group that we were going to make [the money we lost] back up, so we turned like about almost every power plant off. It worked." A Williams employee is quoted as having told a powerplant operator that it wouldn't hurt the companies' feelings, "if the power plant that was down for repairs was kept offline for an extended period of time so the company could continue to be paid the 'premium' for its emergency energy supplies from the ISO."
Dick Cheney's decision to keep such blatant wrong-doing from the public is part noble, and part sickening. Cheney was protecting a friend. After all, the man who had hand-picked Dick to succed him as the top man at Halliburton sat on Williams' board of directors. And that man, Thomas Cruikshank, had told Cheney that FERC, "was in possession of incriminating audio tapes in which a Williams official and an AES power plant operator discussed keeping a Southern California power plant offline so Williams could continue to receive the $750 per megawatt hour premium for emergency power..."...
Utility Consumers' Action Network
Consumer Advocates
http://ucan.org/blog/energy/electricity/energy_deregulation_crisis/vice_president_cheney_suppressed_evidence_of_price_manipulation_during_ca_ene
Vice President Cheney suppressed evidence of price manipulation during CA energy crisis
Posted July 20th, 2007
A recent story by Jason Leopold on Truthout.org reports that Vice President Dick Cheney was aware of price manipulation and artificial powerplant shutdowns during the 2000-2001 California energy crisis, but kept the information from the public. According to the story, just before Cheney's National Energy Policy was to be announced, the Vice President ordered the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to seal documents related to settlements with two energy companies that had been investigated for wrongdoing. Leopold writes:
So in May 2001, just days before Cheney unveiled his long-awaited National Energy Policy, FERC entered into confidential settlements with Williams in which the company forfeited $8 million it was owed by California's grid operator for power Williams sold into the marketplace at inflated prices. Williams did not admit any guilt for the power plant shutdown and, on orders from Cheney, FERC agreed to keep details of the settlement sealed. FERC later entered into a similar settlement with Reliant. The company agreed to forfeit $13.8 million it was owed by California's grid operator, did not admit to any wrongdoing, and FERC kept the details of the settlement confidential.
Williams and Reliant never admited guilt. But do you remember the audio tapes with Enron employees laughing about all the money they had stolen from poor "Grandma Millie" in California? That's who these guys are. They don't have to admit their guilt because there are tapes and transcripts that have recorded it for us. One Reliant employee is quoted in the report as having said, "we decided as a group that we were going to make [the money we lost] back up, so we turned like about almost every power plant off. It worked." A Williams employee is quoted as having told a powerplant operator that it wouldn't hurt the companies' feelings, "if the power plant that was down for repairs was kept offline for an extended period of time so the company could continue to be paid the 'premium' for its emergency energy supplies from the ISO."
Dick Cheney's decision to keep such blatant wrong-doing from the public is part noble, and part sickening. Cheney was protecting a friend. After all, the man who had hand-picked Dick to succed him as the top man at Halliburton sat on Williams' board of directors. And that man, Thomas Cruikshank, had told Cheney that FERC, "was in possession of incriminating audio tapes in which a Williams official and an AES power plant operator discussed keeping a Southern California power plant offline so Williams could continue to receive the $750 per megawatt hour premium for emergency power..."...
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Pat Flannery isn't wanted at April Boling's interview
Council Candidate April Boling got a free ride at the Realtors
08/09/07
by Pat Flannery http://www.blogofsandiego.com/
As a 30 year veteran of the San Diego Association of Realtors I went along this morning to the monthly meeting of its Government Affairs Committee. I am not a member of that Committee (you can't just apply, you have to be asked). But I have made a habit of turning up as a guest during the political season, going all the way back to when Maureen O'Connor (Mayor Mo) first ran for Mayor against Roger Hedgecock in 1983.
You can imagine my surprise and dismay this morning when I was asked to leave while they interviewed April Boling. I had turned up in May when they interviewed Carl DeMaio with no problem. What was different with Boling? I was looking forward to asking her about the prospect of amortizing the $1.2 billion pension deficit. She was on Murphy's Blue Ribbon Committee that reported on the pension problem. She knows it well.
I know she is friends with Mike Mercurio, the Realtors' Director of Government Affairs. They are fellow directors of the San Diego Taxpayers Association. Did Mercurio contrive to keep me out in order to ensure a friendly interview for Boling? If she needs that level of protection, Marti Emerald will chew her up in the election debates. Or will she only go to friendly debates, like those arranged by the Lincoln Club or the Chamber of Commerce?
08/09/07
by Pat Flannery http://www.blogofsandiego.com/
As a 30 year veteran of the San Diego Association of Realtors I went along this morning to the monthly meeting of its Government Affairs Committee. I am not a member of that Committee (you can't just apply, you have to be asked). But I have made a habit of turning up as a guest during the political season, going all the way back to when Maureen O'Connor (Mayor Mo) first ran for Mayor against Roger Hedgecock in 1983.
You can imagine my surprise and dismay this morning when I was asked to leave while they interviewed April Boling. I had turned up in May when they interviewed Carl DeMaio with no problem. What was different with Boling? I was looking forward to asking her about the prospect of amortizing the $1.2 billion pension deficit. She was on Murphy's Blue Ribbon Committee that reported on the pension problem. She knows it well.
I know she is friends with Mike Mercurio, the Realtors' Director of Government Affairs. They are fellow directors of the San Diego Taxpayers Association. Did Mercurio contrive to keep me out in order to ensure a friendly interview for Boling? If she needs that level of protection, Marti Emerald will chew her up in the election debates. Or will she only go to friendly debates, like those arranged by the Lincoln Club or the Chamber of Commerce?
The state prison miasma
from San Diego City Beat's "Last Blog on Earth"
August 9th, 2007 — Kelly Davis
http://lastblogonearth.com/2007/08/09/more-on-the-state-prison-miasma/
"Our sister paper, L.A. CityBeat, published a series of stories this week on prison reform issues, following up on the story we ran last week. Here are some interesting facts from the lead story by L.A.’s Mindy Farabee:
" In the last 30 years, California’s passed 1,000 new laws lengthening jail sentences.
"UC Berkeley professor Jonathan Simon has found that “almost all offenders are not likely to commit a crime” after they reach their mid 40s. Roughly one-fifth of the prison population is 45 or older.
" Legislative bill AB 900 authorizes Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger to spend $7.7 billion to build more prison facilities. That money comes from general obligation and lease-revenue bonds. By the time the bond money’s paid back, the real cost could be closer to $15 billion."
August 9th, 2007 — Kelly Davis
http://lastblogonearth.com/2007/08/09/more-on-the-state-prison-miasma/
"Our sister paper, L.A. CityBeat, published a series of stories this week on prison reform issues, following up on the story we ran last week. Here are some interesting facts from the lead story by L.A.’s Mindy Farabee:
" In the last 30 years, California’s passed 1,000 new laws lengthening jail sentences.
"UC Berkeley professor Jonathan Simon has found that “almost all offenders are not likely to commit a crime” after they reach their mid 40s. Roughly one-fifth of the prison population is 45 or older.
" Legislative bill AB 900 authorizes Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger to spend $7.7 billion to build more prison facilities. That money comes from general obligation and lease-revenue bonds. By the time the bond money’s paid back, the real cost could be closer to $15 billion."
Sunday, July 08, 2007
An Open Letter to Cheryl Cox about Gaylord--and Blackmail
Dear Cheryl:
It was odd that you accused the unions of blackmail regarding the Gaylord project that failed in Chula Vista. Whatever did you mean when you talked about blackmail on TV on January 6, 2007?
Here's how Merriam-Webster defines blackmail:
"Extortion or coercion by threats especially of public exposure or criminal prosecution."
Now Cheryl, did the unions do that? Does Gaylord (or you?) have a dirty secret that the unions threatened to expose? Isn't it really that you are blackmailing the unions by blaming them for the deal gone sour, when the true reasons have to do with envirmonmental problems?
Let me assure you, Cheryl, that if anyone is trying to blackmail you, the perfect defense against blackmail is to come clean in public, apologize, repair the harm you’ve done.
You know what I suspect? I suspect you were thinking about me and my pending lawsuit against you when the word “blackmail” popped out of your mouth so awkwardly. It’s your guilt that is talking, and your contempt for the law. You won’t give an inch, you won’t say you’re sorry, you just point the finger at someone else.
Instead of admitting you broke the law, you charge that someone who talks about your violations of law in public is “blackmailing” you. But if someone talks about your secrets PUBLICLY, Cheryl, that means they’re NOT blackmailing you. Me, for example. I believe that someone as dishonest and contemptuous of the law as you should not have control over public policy and public dollars. Of course, you have the option of becoming an honest person who respects the law. I urge you to do so. Right now you’re not making a wise choice, Cheryl.
Let’s see, who could really blackmail you? The press! Bonnie Dumanis! They are keeping your secrets. It sure isn’t me. Why don’t you do the right thing, and apologize, and come clean about what you and your lawyers did to Chula Vista Elementary School District and Castle Park Elementary. It would help taxpayers all over San Diego county. Your lawyer Dan Shinoff has gone on to cause even more trouble at MiraCosta College than he did at CVESD. The price tag for his folly was $3 million at MiraCosta.
It was a shame that you couldn’t tell the truth in the "Castle Park Five" case at CVESD. You wasted tax dollars once again. You forced Superintendent Lowell Billings to hide the truth about Robin Donlan and her friends, so you lost. Shame on you for wasting so many hundreds of thousands tax dollars on multiple criminal cover-ups.
It was odd that you accused the unions of blackmail regarding the Gaylord project that failed in Chula Vista. Whatever did you mean when you talked about blackmail on TV on January 6, 2007?
Here's how Merriam-Webster defines blackmail:
"Extortion or coercion by threats especially of public exposure or criminal prosecution."
Now Cheryl, did the unions do that? Does Gaylord (or you?) have a dirty secret that the unions threatened to expose? Isn't it really that you are blackmailing the unions by blaming them for the deal gone sour, when the true reasons have to do with envirmonmental problems?
Let me assure you, Cheryl, that if anyone is trying to blackmail you, the perfect defense against blackmail is to come clean in public, apologize, repair the harm you’ve done.
You know what I suspect? I suspect you were thinking about me and my pending lawsuit against you when the word “blackmail” popped out of your mouth so awkwardly. It’s your guilt that is talking, and your contempt for the law. You won’t give an inch, you won’t say you’re sorry, you just point the finger at someone else.
Instead of admitting you broke the law, you charge that someone who talks about your violations of law in public is “blackmailing” you. But if someone talks about your secrets PUBLICLY, Cheryl, that means they’re NOT blackmailing you. Me, for example. I believe that someone as dishonest and contemptuous of the law as you should not have control over public policy and public dollars. Of course, you have the option of becoming an honest person who respects the law. I urge you to do so. Right now you’re not making a wise choice, Cheryl.
Let’s see, who could really blackmail you? The press! Bonnie Dumanis! They are keeping your secrets. It sure isn’t me. Why don’t you do the right thing, and apologize, and come clean about what you and your lawyers did to Chula Vista Elementary School District and Castle Park Elementary. It would help taxpayers all over San Diego county. Your lawyer Dan Shinoff has gone on to cause even more trouble at MiraCosta College than he did at CVESD. The price tag for his folly was $3 million at MiraCosta.
It was a shame that you couldn’t tell the truth in the "Castle Park Five" case at CVESD. You wasted tax dollars once again. You forced Superintendent Lowell Billings to hide the truth about Robin Donlan and her friends, so you lost. Shame on you for wasting so many hundreds of thousands tax dollars on multiple criminal cover-ups.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Good Riddance, Gaylord
Below is a letter I found in Voice of San Diego about the Gaylord Entertainment project that fizzled in Chula Vista yesterday. Gaylord (and mayor Cheryl Cox) blamed the unions, but many believe that it was environmental problems on the sensitve bayfront that discouraged the developer. It's interesting that mayor Cheryl Cox, a longtime trustee of the nature preserve next to the planned development, never made a peep about environmental problems.
Ted Kennedy, Chula Vista
Thursday, July 5, 2007
My suspicion is that Gaylord actually read the environmental-impact report and isn't about to try to ameliorate the impacts and was looking for a dignified backdoor escape hatch. Too bad none of our local politicians read those pesky things or they wouldn't be so enamored of the good old boys from Tennessee. I am also concerned that it took our local environmental watchdogs quite a while to not be lapdogs instead. Now if we can just scare the Chargers away...
Ted Kennedy, Chula Vista
Thursday, July 5, 2007
My suspicion is that Gaylord actually read the environmental-impact report and isn't about to try to ameliorate the impacts and was looking for a dignified backdoor escape hatch. Too bad none of our local politicians read those pesky things or they wouldn't be so enamored of the good old boys from Tennessee. I am also concerned that it took our local environmental watchdogs quite a while to not be lapdogs instead. Now if we can just scare the Chargers away...
Monday, June 25, 2007
Who are attorneys supposed to represent when they're paid by a city?
You might think that Cheryl Cox, former CVESD trustee and now mayor of Chula Vista, would somehow be in charge of what the City of Chula Vista does. Cheryl says it isn't so.
She might have had something to do with the choice of John Witt, former San Diego city attorney, as a special counsel for Chula Vista. But she has nothing to do with the fact that he is suing city council candidate Patty Chavez for $100,000 because she lent herself $11,000 for her campaign and didn't report it to her opponent, Rudy Ramirez.
You might think Rudy Ramirez has something to do with this draconian attack on a housewife who ran for office. After all, he might want to strike some fear into her so she won't dare run against him again. Rudy himself is under investigation, he says. He claims he will be vindicated. Somehow, I think he's right. I don't imagine John Witt feels the same way about Ramirez that he does about Chavez. Ramirez is a Republican and Chavez is a Democrat.
Cheryl Cox says she's formed a committee to look at the rules.
How about a committee to look at how the rules are enforced, Cheryl? You've made it clear that you believe attorneys who work for cities should represent the interests of the elected officials. Somehow, I don't think you've changed your mind about that.
Jon Osborn of La Mesa disagrees with Cheryl Cox regarding the proper recipient of a public lawyer's loyalty.
On June 22, 2007 he wrote to the San Diego Union-Tribune:
"Judith Wenker (Letters, June 20) asked "How can [City Attorney Mike Aguirre] expect his city official clients, to whom he owes the duty of confidentiality and competent legal advice, to confide in him...? The client to which Mike Aguirre owes those duties is the city of San Diego."
Why do so many public officials depend so much on secrecy? Why can't public business be carried out in the open?
She might have had something to do with the choice of John Witt, former San Diego city attorney, as a special counsel for Chula Vista. But she has nothing to do with the fact that he is suing city council candidate Patty Chavez for $100,000 because she lent herself $11,000 for her campaign and didn't report it to her opponent, Rudy Ramirez.
You might think Rudy Ramirez has something to do with this draconian attack on a housewife who ran for office. After all, he might want to strike some fear into her so she won't dare run against him again. Rudy himself is under investigation, he says. He claims he will be vindicated. Somehow, I think he's right. I don't imagine John Witt feels the same way about Ramirez that he does about Chavez. Ramirez is a Republican and Chavez is a Democrat.
Cheryl Cox says she's formed a committee to look at the rules.
How about a committee to look at how the rules are enforced, Cheryl? You've made it clear that you believe attorneys who work for cities should represent the interests of the elected officials. Somehow, I don't think you've changed your mind about that.
Jon Osborn of La Mesa disagrees with Cheryl Cox regarding the proper recipient of a public lawyer's loyalty.
On June 22, 2007 he wrote to the San Diego Union-Tribune:
"Judith Wenker (Letters, June 20) asked "How can [City Attorney Mike Aguirre] expect his city official clients, to whom he owes the duty of confidentiality and competent legal advice, to confide in him...? The client to which Mike Aguirre owes those duties is the city of San Diego."
Why do so many public officials depend so much on secrecy? Why can't public business be carried out in the open?
Legalized bribery
Am I missing something, or is our campaign finance system simply legalized bribery?
I don't see that giving huge sums of money to candidates is freedom of speech. It's freedom to drown out the speecch of others.
And fat cats who throw around large sums are making an implied threat: do what I want, or I'll drown you out. I'll give my money to your opponent, and blast you off the airwaves.
I don't see that giving huge sums of money to candidates is freedom of speech. It's freedom to drown out the speecch of others.
And fat cats who throw around large sums are making an implied threat: do what I want, or I'll drown you out. I'll give my money to your opponent, and blast you off the airwaves.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
The People Don't Understand Leslie Devaney
Leslie Devaney, who ran against Mike Aguirre for City Attorney in 2004, says:
"Until the public understands the role of the city attorney, I'm not ready to run for the position again."*
Translation: As long as people think the City Attorney is supposed to represent ALL the people, and not merely protect the people in office, she won't be a part of it.
* from Voice of San Diego, "Aguirre's Foes Search for Champion," by EVAN McLAUGHLIN Monday, June 11, 2007
"Until the public understands the role of the city attorney, I'm not ready to run for the position again."*
Translation: As long as people think the City Attorney is supposed to represent ALL the people, and not merely protect the people in office, she won't be a part of it.
* from Voice of San Diego, "Aguirre's Foes Search for Champion," by EVAN McLAUGHLIN Monday, June 11, 2007
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Sunroad-like deals happen all the time, but it appears that no one notices unless the FAA intervenes
Yesterday Murtaza Baxamusa wrote in Voice of San Diego about "The Sweet Deal for Developers."
"The witch-hunt for nefarious actors on the Sunroad project ignores the reality of the sweet deal developers get every day at the Development Services Department...
"Development Services boasts of efforts to "streamline the permitting process," including over-the-counter permits and "inspectors for hire," demonstrating an apologetic culture in implementing regulations.
"The results are impressive. Development Services continues to get high customer service points in developer surveys...
"Add a developer-friendly streamlined review process to a badly written development agreement, and you have a disaster waiting to happen...In April 2006, FAA started noticing this tall [Sunroad] building, and the rest is history ..."
"The witch-hunt for nefarious actors on the Sunroad project ignores the reality of the sweet deal developers get every day at the Development Services Department...
"Development Services boasts of efforts to "streamline the permitting process," including over-the-counter permits and "inspectors for hire," demonstrating an apologetic culture in implementing regulations.
"The results are impressive. Development Services continues to get high customer service points in developer surveys...
"Add a developer-friendly streamlined review process to a badly written development agreement, and you have a disaster waiting to happen...In April 2006, FAA started noticing this tall [Sunroad] building, and the rest is history ..."
Sunday, June 10, 2007
You know a lawyer is planning to cover up crimes when...
You know a lawyer is planning to cover up crimes when he asks to be indemnified. That's what Bonny Garcia asked--and received--from San Diego County's deeply corrupt Otay Water District a few years ago.
SDCERS, the San Diego City Employee Retirement System, should not have agreed to pay for the defense of its lawyer, Loraine Chapin, in 2005. That case has still not gone to trial. It appears that SDCERS wanted to make sure Chapin continued to help them get away with wrongdoing. But when Chapin's lawyer asked in 2006 to be indemnified, the pension board balked. If he does a good job covering up Chapin's wrongdoing, he won't need to defend himself. Apparently the board wants him to do a really good job.
SDCERS, the San Diego City Employee Retirement System, should not have agreed to pay for the defense of its lawyer, Loraine Chapin, in 2005. That case has still not gone to trial. It appears that SDCERS wanted to make sure Chapin continued to help them get away with wrongdoing. But when Chapin's lawyer asked in 2006 to be indemnified, the pension board balked. If he does a good job covering up Chapin's wrongdoing, he won't need to defend himself. Apparently the board wants him to do a really good job.
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