Get a job Prop C, it's almost noon for god's sake!Mayor and Council
I am not here tonight to belabor the issues of proposition C, the votes were cast and the measure was defeated by a significant margin. I am here to ask one or all of you to provide an accounting of the costs associated with the failed proposition.
It has been said that those who ignore the lessons of history are bound to repeat them. I would like to spend just a few minutes to request a dollar figure for the election in the hopes that the understanding of that large figure will make a future council think twice before it attempts to promote another tax as a great sounding fee. Lighting and landscaping did not pass, clean water did not pass. I sincerely hope that a message has been sent and understood
I realize that we could get the figure through the cumbersome freedom of information process, and we will if we have to. What I am hoping is that one of you will help us in this research process as an elected pubic servant. You could access the information easily and would be doing the voters a big favor.
The final number that we are looking for would certainly include the $110,000 of taxpayer money paid to the three consultants that the city chose to convince us that paying twice for the same service would be a good thing. We know about that expense. What we do not know would include;
1. The cost of the survey that was cleverly worded to mislead the council into believing that the measure would pass. The graphics, the printing and the two way postage.
2. The cost of the “informational flyer” that was sent out with the beach scenes. The Photography, the graphics, the printing and the postage.
3. The cost of the legal fees associated with the original vote to pass an illegal tax, the settlement agreement, and the legal advice throughout the mail ballot process.
4. The cost of the mail ballot itself, particularly in light of the fact that we have an election that will occur in early April about 33 days after the March 8 Proposition C mail ballot vote count. The production, the printing and the first class two way postage.
5. The cost of the staff time to work with the paid consultants, administer the mail ballot process and observe the vote count.
I hope that I am wrong in my estimate that the total cost exceeds a quarter of a million dollars of taxpayer’s money from the general fund. I would appreciate your help in getting to a bottom line number. I would love to close my file on this issue and help insure that we do not repeat the mistake. Would one of you volunteer to help?
Submitted for the record
Bill Rodewald, President
Encinitas Taxpayers Association
I watched the Council Meeting.
ReplyDeleteJerome Stocks went straight to adopt the resolution saying that they lost the vote without even discussing or responding to the taxpayers association's request.
Bond was ready to follow Stocks. Neither of them ended up saying anything else.
I don't think Danny said one word. No sign of humility, just disrespect for the public and common sense.
Christy was typical.
Maggie was astonishing. It really doesn't seem like she gets it. Did she get fooled?
In the end no one on the Council addressed the Taxpayer's request.
Dude back off, I'm just resting and waiting until I morph into Prop D
ReplyDeleteAll who read this need to remember at election time who doesn't care about 61% to 66% of the voters in the city and throw the bums out. Put someone in office that will hire a city manager that cares about what the people think. This one certainly d oesn't. I am sure that he has another scheme cooking already.
ReplyDeleteProp A and C and the failed Lighting and Landscaping Ballot will all be on our minds (and our couches, ha ha) until the November election brings some big changes to City Council We need new faces with honest voices, new leaders who will be open and accountable. Are you listening to what's happening with Bill Horn? And are you paying attention to the County trying to sue the State, which was already thrown out of Federal Court and will end up being thrown out of State Court, too? More wasting of taxpayer money. The corrupt City and County Attorneys always make their fees, though, win or lose. And yes, no matter what, we taxpayers lose on these frivolous lawsuits brought "in the name of the people."
ReplyDeleteI watched the Council Meeting from last Wednesday on Thursday night, Cox 19 at 6:00. Dan Dalager never said a single word, that I heard, during the entire meeting.
Good for Bill Rodewald, Chris Kirkowitz, Bob Bonde, Donna Westbrook, all for speaking out. Christy Guerin and Maggie Houlihan would not admit that they had made any mistakes re Prop. C. Oh why, ladies? Can't you see that the tax was illegally put on our EDCO bills to begin with? And the way it was marketed, while addressed by the speakers, asking, why? - was not addressed by you. Maggie and Bossypants Guerin both said "we weren't trying to fool anyone." You know what someone told me? You are either idiots or liars.
Maggie, you said the people chose not to "subsidize the clean water program." We are subsidizing it through the General Fund. Our taxes subsidize it already. This was a new, unnecessary tax, pure and simple, which was to be unfairly applied, and which was really being charged so that the money allocated from the General Fund could be used for the library and other projects. Hence you were not completely honest with us. We all know it.
Christy, you said the election was so that you would know what the people wanted. Well why did you have to do that bogus "survey" then, bought and paid for to convince us to vote yes? Why did you, Christy Guerin and Maggie Houlihan, and Dan Dalager, vote to put this illegal tax on our trash bills to begin with?
We find it sad that after the tax was removed, EDCO was allowed to raise our tax nearly five dollars a month anyway. Is this Quid Pro Quo for having done all that paperwork, all that billing for each address with trash service, which by the way, is completely unrelated to storm drain runoff?
And why couldn't you call it the storm drain initiative? Wasn't that sexy enough for you? We were marketed to and manipulated. We all know it, and we didn't fall for it. Thank God for good folks who helped us all to see the light, like Bill Rodewald, Bob Evermore, JP, Kevin Cummins, Bob Bonde, Dietmar Rothe, Donna Westbrook, and untold more.
Would the Boston Tea Party be considered a riot? Yep. And if Bossypants Guerin and Lawnmower Man Dalager were in power back then, we probably would not have had a revolution. The only true revolution is a revolution of consciousness. Think honesty, transparency. This victory is empowering us all to continue making a positive change. Growth in development is not always good. Growth in understanding, liberty is what makes our very lives more worthwhile.
Originally published on March 24, 2006
J.P.
ReplyDeleteCould you post the S.D. Union comments today (3/26/06)from Chris Reed "Encinitas Mayor's Weak and Deceptive Spin" - re: Prop C.
thanks
And that picture of Christy in todays Union is priceless.
ReplyDeleteWho does she serve anyway.
I couldn't find the picture on-line. I did read Chris Reed's article and sent him a comment. While looking I found this by Angela, our reporter for North County:
ReplyDeleteBy Angela Lau
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
February 3, 2006
ENCINITAS – Mayor Christy Guerin was the front-runner in campaign fundraising in the last six months of 2005, including money from the politically powerful Ecke family.
Guerin accepted $1,750 from the flower-growing family at a Sept. 30 fundraiser at which she collected $6,150 in preparation for her council re-election bid next November, according to her financial disclosure statement filed this week.
The fundraiser was held just weeks before Proposition A, a controversial ballot measure sponsored by the Eckes, went to voters Nov. 8.
No other Encinitas council members received money from the Eckes during the July 1-Dec. 31 reporting period.
Proposition A sought permission to rezone more than half of the Eckes' 68-acre poinsettia farm from permanent agricultural to residential use so Paul Ecke III could subdivide and sell the land to raise money to modernize his farm.
Despite big-money campaigning in support of the measure, voters defeated it by a 2-1 ratio.
****************
I do remember that one citizen stood up at the City Council meeting regarding the Barratt Development and asked each and every Council Member if they had conflicts of interest. No one would answer, as usual. We can ask questions. Council routinely ignores them.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/
ReplyDeleteweblogs/afb/archives/cat_local_
politics.html
Encinitas mayor's weak and deceptive spin
The tactic is one of the oldest in the books: a city council/school board/water district warns that if taxes or "fees" aren't jacked up, services will be cut, so sock it to yourselves, docile voters. It doesn't seem to work as much as it used to -- and now it's both failed and been exposed in Encinitas. This story is on the U-T Web site:
ENCINITAS – The city will not have to cut services despite the recent voters' defeat of a proposed $5-a-month clean-water fee, the city manager said this week.
The revelation drew fire from City Hall critics, who had claimed throughout the clean-water fee campaign that the city was using service cuts to intimidate property owners into supporting the proposed fee.
This is from later in the story:
This week, Mayor Christy Guerin disputed claims that the city threatened to reduce services if Proposition C failed. Guerin said voters only were asked to augment the city's revenue because pollution control is expensive and will become even more so when federal and state regulations tighten in the future.
That's not what she said in pushing the proposition in a Jan. 13 U-T article:
Mayor Christy Guerin said if the measure is defeated, the city will have to cut or delay other projects.
She should be embarrassed at her attempt to spin the matter now.
Posted by Chris Reed through SDUT Blog, 3/22/06
"America's Finest Blog" By Chris Reed March 26, 2006. You can also check it out at opinionblog.uniontrib.com
ReplyDeleteShabby spin job
In January, Encinitas Mayor Christy Guerin said if a proposed $5-a-month “clean-water” fee was rejected by voters, the city would have to cut or delay other projects. Well, it was rejected, and now the city manager says the lack of fee revenue won't have any effect – and Guerin says she never tried to scare voters. Instead, she says they “were asked to augment the city's revenue because pollution control is expensive and will become even more so when federal and state regulations tighten in the future.”
Feel free to groan.
********************
The picutre included in this column must be from Bossypant's more glamorous days. Lately she is letting her hair grow.
We can see through the surface, Christy, to your opportunist, controlling micro-manager ways, one who gets it all wrong, is biased, deceptive, and won't admit your big mistakes.
This is just a theory, but it makes sense if you think it through.
ReplyDeleteThe city was restricted in spending money to pass C as a function of the Jarvis settlement. They had to stop spending on December 18 and could not spend until March 8.
Yes on C, the one man, one wallet show led by Aceti funded the campaign between those dates ... with his credit card as he admitted on this site.
The city through some underhanded deal makes him whole after the election is over.
Lets get Art Bell on this case quickly to figure it out. Creepy.
I think it's creepy too, how Christy Guerin could accept money from Eckes and put her Yes on A arguments in the ballots that were mailed out, and that we voted on last November.
ReplyDeleteI thought Council is supposed to be neutral, particularly when there is a now disclosed conflict of interest.
when do we get our $75 checks?
ReplyDeletei'm broke and my property taxes are due in a couple weeks.
Tortilla, you can go ask for a claim form from the City Clerk. We shouldn't have to wait till City Manager and Council get through scratching their heads and monkey behinds.
ReplyDelete