Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Closed Session Meeting to Pick New City Manager

From my inbox:

Go to the city's website and check out the special closed session meeting they are having tomorrow night - city manager - our worst fears are probably coming true - Kerry Miller and Christy Guerin will pick the next city manager and it will be Phil Cotton who was hand picked by Kerry and Christy - would love to know his credentials for this job?

NEW CITY MANAGER MAY BE CHOSEN TOMORROW IN CLOSED SESSION?

click here

Tomorrow, Wednesday, September 6, at 4:30 pm, the city council will hold a closed session meeting on a public employee appointment, the city manager.

If you want to at least protest what the city council is doing tomorrow in a closed session, email and phone the city clerk and the council.

32 comments:

  1. You Bastards,
    You killed Kenny!, er Kerry?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh, so upsetting. I did write Council and the Clerk. I wonder if it will do any good? Doubt it.

    I looked up the agenda, and even looked up the Government Code. There is a state code that allows closed sessions regarding employment or discipline of current employees. The employee can request an open hearing or can have a closed hearing, either way.

    Just because Council can have closed sessions does not mean they should. What they should do is show more trust in the public. They could let the public have some input. We are paying for the new City Manager!

    ReplyDelete
  3. We went to the Candidates' Forum last night at Ada Harris in Cardiff.

    Dan Dalager still keeps spouting off about the need to blight parts of Leucadia to deal with the so-called flooding problem. Guess what folks, that was a hundred year rain we had. We are not expected to have floods like that for another 100 years. What the City did to fix the problem in Leucadia made it worse. Gary, from the audience, mentioned that the contract to Rick Engineering was a no bid contract. They had an open checkbook to make matters worse. Now Hwy. 101 floods worse, whereas before it was more of a problem on Vulcan.

    Dan Dalager has got to go. He was rambling. He would go on and on, not answering the questions. He was the only candidate for which the "time's up" bell rang every time he spoke. His rambling statements made no sense, and he did not answer the questions.

    Teresa Barth was right on point. We are grateful she's a candidate, and feel certain she will gain a seat.

    We are surprised to say so, but the next best was Tom Brown. He does run a construction company, but he is a longtime resident; he made sense, and seems intelligent, concerned. Doug Long was arrogant and would not even address my question about too many closed sessions. Paul Martens doesn't seem like a realistic candidate. He's from NY, and said he was going back there today. He didn't make much sense, but at least he was more coherrent than Dan! Tom Brown is an oldtimer here. I don't know why that roundabout on Santa Fe won't accomodate our firetrucks. My understanding is that Tom Brown's firm executed the project, but did not design it. No one asked him about that. There's always next time. JP, you should come to the Leucadia forum, at least.

    Dan Dalager tried to say they only have closed sessions when they "have to." This is not true. The City does not have to have so many closed sessions. Ask Donna Frye in San Diego.

    Encinitas Council and City Attorney Glenn Sabine choose to operate covertly, behind closed doors because they do not want public input or participation until they have already made up their sneaky minds. They don't trust us and we don't trust them. Simple.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Christy Guerin got so mad at the last Council Meeting because some tried to call her on being a lameduck, making poor decisions. She said she was appalled at our blog. We are appalled with her performance and her accepting $2,000 per month retirement "disability," from the Sheriff's dept., when she is now making an additional $100,000 off of the taxpayers, operating as often as she can manage to, in secret. This amount does not include the $100,000 per year plus her husband, Al, makes working for the Sheriff's dept. She is not transparent; we can see her quite plainly.

    Christy Guerin, the truth hurts, doesn't it? Please go away. Council should vote to choose another mayor until you do.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Christy Guerin got so mad at the last Council Meeting because some tried to call her on being a lameduck, making poor decisions. She said she was appalled at our blog. We are appalled with her performance and her accepting $2,000 per month retirement "disability," from the Sheriff's dept., when she is now making an additional $100,000 off of the taxpayers, operating as often as she can manage to, in secret. This amount does not include the $100,000 per year plus her husband, Al, makes working for the Sheriff's dept. She is not transparent; we can see her quite plainly.

    Christy Guerin, the truth hurts, doesn't it? Please go away. Council should vote to choose another mayor until you do.

    ReplyDelete
  6. The meeting at ADA HARRIS was interesting to say the least. The only prepared candidate was Teresa. Someone told me that if we only vote for her, and no one else,she has a better chance of winning. I will let all of the math people out there tell me if that is correct. Teresa was GREAT. I agree with the other posts. Dalagher was incoherent, and the rest were not people I would want on the Council, especially Long and Martens. I could possibly tolerate Brown, but don't like the idea that his wife is President and CEO of the company he states he owns. This means that they get preferential treatment on government contracts because it is a minority owned business(woman), although he didn't mention it and I asked another question instead of confronting him on it. Someone may want to do this at another meeting. Her name is Sandy Brown. My question to all of them was "what is your position on an independent audit of the City books". Dalagher answered that we already do that. Certainly was news to a lot of us!I really think he is out of touch with what is going on. Nice guy but----. It is worth going to the forums, if nothing else than to see them squirm, except Teresa , who actually had her facts straight. What a concept!

    ReplyDelete
  7. My worst fear is that Paris Hilton will make another album.

    ReplyDelete
  8. say unique new york three times really fast.
    now say unique leucadia three times really fast.
    see...it just doesnt work.

    yes i understand perception is greater that reality and that many don't perceive the meaning of funky. but i love my own perception of reality where funky is fun.

    paris hilton's album was unique but certainly not funky.

    ReplyDelete
  9. dr.lorri, Tom Brown is the President and his wife is the CEO. His website says his is a woman owned company.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I gues the person that answers the phone doesn't know who is who, as she is the one that told me that the president and CEO of Brown's company was Sandy Brown. However, the point is that they still get extra consideration on any government contract, as it is a woman owned company. Since it is woman owned, why does Brown say he owns it. Just a matter of a little truth and commuinication. Brown was big into stressing open comunication at the meeting. By not telling us his company is female owned, it kind of discredits his comments, in my eyes anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  11. They are letting women run companies now? Next thing you know they will be voting and playing sports.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yes, J.P. I know it comes as a surprise to many, but women are actually able to competently run businesses. Now I don't know about sports, but I have seen some fabulous women surfers. Does that count as a sport? In my day, girls went to the beach in their bikinis, looked at their man addoringly as he surfed, and had a cold beer waiting for him when he was through. Now those were the days huh?:) And, even more, they are giving women Ph.D.'s, psychologist licenses, and even letting them practice psychotherapy for men as well as women. Is there no end to it?

    ReplyDelete
  13. Yes, the funding question will be excellent for a future forum. Does anyone know when and where the next one will be? There was some problem with the sound system with this one.

    It seems to us that Dan Dalager should have come out for term limits. By his not doing so, he has one more strike against him.

    Funny, "new in town;" yes having the whole town in on your interview might seem frightening. However, this is exactly what City Council did re the youth commission appointees. Every candidate gave about a five or 10 minute speech. It seemed to go on for hours during a regular Council Meeting. It was all a big PR gimmick. People had to leave, before 11:00 after which time important agenda items were either discussed, or put off.

    Council has its priorities all out of whack. Of all the candidates, Teresa Barth was the only one who did not support Proposition A! No one asked about C.

    Dalager said he was for having a vote on A. He had no choice! When he does have a choice, such as on the $20 million dollar bond, he says he would have supported passing it without a public vote. Of course he was absent, celebrating in St. Thomas. Council could have put off that particular vote until Dalager could be present, too.

    We are disappointed, once again, too, in Maggie, for voting for this Revenue Bond. She should support allowing her constituents to vote. We saw Bruce Ehlers in the audience. We wish he could have run again, as he did in 2004. He had a better chance of winning against Dalager than against Stocks and Bond.

    Yes, I'm not sure about the "bullet voting" either. Basically, we only have one good candidate. I don't hold it against Tom Brown, though, that he considers himself and his wife, Sandy, as a unit, as far as saying he directs his company. He can clear this up, as Dr. Lorri suggests, at future forums. He should explain, a bit, about the roundabout and the $10,000 dollar jacarranda tree planted there. Seems on the high end, to us.

    We were hoping he would be able to cut the costs way down on the fire McMansions if he is elected. Doug Long want to give all the public employees carte blanche. Teresa Barth wisely pointed out that the new design is not energy efficient and that the fire mansions will need to be remodeled within 10 years!

    Donna Westbrook asked a good question about City employees making much better benefits than the average person, which James Bond had openly stated, himself, in times past. Dan Dalager said it's true. I asked why, then, did he vote for a big pay raise for Glenn Sabine, city attorney and Kerry Miller, manager. No answer was forthcoming. I'll ask again, next time, if I can.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Silly Bloggers,
    So long as you keep believing that every level of government is conspiring against you, I suppose you'll all continue being happy and 'Funky'.

    Go 'Funk' yourselves!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Fire Trucks can make the round about just fine, and I love the trophy jacarranda tree. $10k does not seem like much for transplanting and maintaining a signature tree while paying prevailing wages for everything. I would not want the City to put a Charlie Brown Christmas Tree in the round about.

    Tom Brown has nothing to do with the design of the projects, he builds them.

    If you want to look at saving the City some mulla you want to focus on somthing big, like the $20,000,000 Ritz Fire Stations, or the $40,000,000 regional park facility. All those big signature buildings and Recreation Centers require booku operational dollars forever! Huge overhead.

    I am voting for Teresa and Tom, Not Dumb and Dumber. What a good campaign slogan, vote T and T and blow out D and D. Is that good or what?

    ReplyDelete
  16. Tom Brown voted yes on Prop A, he thinks the $20 million bond is just fine and is in favor of redevelopment - these 3 things are important - Dan and Doug and Tom are think the same. Voting for Tom is the same as voting for Doug and Dan.

    ReplyDelete
  17. The bullet vote is really the way to go. Vote only for Teresa. Any additional vote is really a vcte against her. Do the math. It really does work.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Great article in NCTimes about San Marcos redevelopment. Bottomline- Redevelopment brings 30% spending on substidized housing, meaning much more density and lower income, meaning lower quality of life for the existing residents. Let San Marcos, Vista, and Oceanside, and Escondido have the RDA. Not Encinintas. You dont see Del Mar adopting an RDA along HW101. If Encinitas does pursue a RDA it should be in the Sante Fe Avenue east of I5. That area is way more blight than Leucadia.

    Check out the bit from the article about lawyers focusing on RDA and low income housing.

    "Many cities, however, have not always embraced the housing concept attached to redevelopment, said Rodman, the San Diego attorney who closely watches redevelopment.

    She has sued San Marcos, Poway, Escondido, Carlsbad and Solana Beach over the way the cities have spent redevelopment money earmarked for affordable housing.

    She says that many of these cities have tried to use their affordable housing to pay staff members instead of building new projects.

    For example, a grand jury ruled Carlsbad spent too much of its redevelopment housing money on administration, and Rodman claims 70 percent of Escondido's housing money has gone to salaries for staffers.

    "Many times cities spend it all on planning or administrative costs," Rodman said.

    ReplyDelete
  19. No one has mentioned that at the Cardiff Candidates Forum Dan Dalager was pushing Leucadia redevelopment again. This time he is linking it with the trailer parks to cover the low income housing requirement. He suggested converting each trailer space to a condo. David Meyer and his buddies were in the audience applauding everything Dan said. They have that right, of course, and they did the same for Doug Long. Dan and Doug are salivating to get on the redevelopment board.

    I have never understood bullet voting. We have two votes. I will use them both. One will be for Teresa, and the other will be for the person I consider the least worst of the other candidates. That's a real tough decision right now. But we get one of the others regardless. Why not have a choice in it?

    ReplyDelete
  20. Is "bullet voting" the same as voting for one candidate? Sorry, never very good at math. How does it work out that it is better to only vote for one. Bruce Ehlers tried to explain it to me at the meeting, but I guess I am a little dense. I still am not sure I understand. Can someone out there explain it to me? Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Ten people have 2 votes. They vote as follows:

    a votes for Dan & Doug
    b votes for Doug & Tom
    c votes for Teresa & Tom
    d votes for Tom & Dan
    e votes for Teresa & Doug
    f votes for Dan & Doug
    g votes for Teresa
    h votes for Teresa
    i votes for Teresa
    j votes for Teresa

    6 for Teresa
    4 for Doug
    3 for Dan
    3 for Tom

    if all 4 of those bullet votes for Teresa had also voted for Tom, he would have won with a total of 7 votes.

    So a vote for anyone but Teresa is a vote against Teresa.

    ReplyDelete
  22. We can't help but think government is "conspiring" against us when it makes so many of its decisions in closed sessions. Council meets together to decide without our input, such as selecting the new city manager yesterday.

    We are not silly. We are concerned, and we want a change. Vote for Teresa, and get Dalager out of there. He is out of touch and cannot comprehend our desire to be part of local decisions.

    This blog is about a lot more than the word funky. But condescending posters like you will not stop us from using it if we want to.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Again, don't vote for D and D -
    Dumb and Dumber. The knife sharpener and the plumber want to get on the city gravy train and are really an embarrassment representing our city.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Dan Dalager and Doug Long are dumb and dumber. Worse than that, they are overly egotistical.

    Their interests seems to be primarily self interest, that is ego and pumping up their respective businesses, right next to each other on Second St., Dalager's Lawnmower shop and Bert Long's plumbing.

    I liked Bert and his other son, John. Doug has some ego problems in my opinion, and is not willing to challenge the status quo. Neither is Dan Dalager.

    The voters are sick of the "system" of pushing decisions on us without our input. Then the City is challenged in Court, as with Prop. C, and then they lose!

    If the citizens were allowed to vote to begin with, or if Council would listen and consider our input, we could save millions. We want to be involved or we wouldn't be posting here, going to these forums!

    We pray Phil Cotton will listen to us and not only to Council, as Kerry Miller did.

    ReplyDelete
  25. I went to the Candidates' Forum Tuesday night at Ada Harris in Cardiff.

    Dan Dalager continues to spout off about the need to blight parts of Leucadia to deal with the so-called flooding problem. Guess what folks, that was a hundred year rain we had. We are not expected to have floods like that for another 100 years. What the City did to fix the problem in Leucadia made it worse. Gary, from the audience, mentioned that the contract to Rick Engineering was a no bid contract. They had an open checkbook to make matters worse. Now Hwy. 101 floods worse, whereas before it was more of a problem on Vulcan.

    Dan Dalager has got to go. He was rambling. He would go on and on, not answering the questions. He was the only candidate for which the "time's up" bell rang every time he spoke. His rambling statements made no sense.

    Teresa Barth was right on point. We are grateful she's a candidate, and feel certain she will gain a seat.

    Doug Long was arrogant and would not address my question about too many closed sessions. Paul Martens doesn't seem like a realistic candidate. He's from NY, and said he was going back there today. He didn't make much sense, but at least he was more coherrent than Dan!

    Dan Dalager tried to say they only have closed sessions when they "have to." This is not true. The City does not have to have so many closed sessions. Ask Donna Frye in San Diego.

    Encinitas Council and City Attorney Glenn Sabine choose to operate covertly, behind closed doors because they do not want public input or participation until they have already made up their sneaky minds. They don't trust us and we don't trust them. Simple.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Will Phil Cotton keep costs down? Big NO! He recommended that the city spend more than the inflated appraisal price for the Mossy property.

    Egotistical - Dalager, Long, and Cotton.

    ReplyDelete
  27. Teresa Barth did directly answer my question about too many closed sessions. She wants to encourage more public participation and more open hearings, not more closed sessions. Tom Brown did say he wanted to encourage trust, but we are concerned because of what he said in the Coast News about not being an environmentalist, and also, the fact that he said he Voted Yes on A.

    We are weighing whether or not we will bullet vote for Teresa. We are concerned that this might somehow give Dalager a better chance to remain in office. Tom Brown is worlds better than Dan Dalager, Doug Long or Paul Martens, That's for sure.

    Teresa Barth was the star of the forum in our eyes! She did a good job and offers a wonderful alternative to sneaky business as usual, which is all that is promoted by Dalager and Long. David Myers approval of Dan Dalager and Doug Long is a dead giveaway. These guys are for closed sessions and for big developer controlled City Council, which is basically what we have now. Danny, you let us down, big time!

    ReplyDelete
  28. Thank you anonymous. I finally get it! It does make sense to me to just vote for Teresa. It seems to me that it doesn't really matter who else wins. They are all bad choices as far as I am concerned.

    ReplyDelete
  29. We are considering voting only for Teresa. We will have to go to more forums. I am concerned about what Tom Brown said to the Coast News about not being an environmentalist.

    Also, as Dr. Lorri suggested, he wasn't "transparent" about his wife owning and running his business. Dan Dalager, Doug Long and Paul Martens made a terrible showing, without a doubt.

    I can see the logic of bullet voting, too. Tom Brown admitted he voted for Prop. A. No one asked about C.

    I am wondering now about the round-about. Can the fire trucks get through or not? Surely they've tested that by now.

    ReplyDelete
  30. fire trucks and every other type of truck can get by the round abouts. Round abouts beat the hell out of a stop sign.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Not so fast on the bullet voting. There is a flaw in the simple mathematical example. It assumes there is only one winner, but there will be two winners. Check the totals again, and you will see that Teresa still wins, but with a slightly lower total than Brown. Bullet vote only if you are concerned about who gets the highest vote total, and you don't care who the second winner is. That will probably be Dan Dalager again, as he is the incumbent.

    ReplyDelete
  32. The bullet voting example was good but left the door open for your observation. The important example is if Teresa and Tom are in the running for second place. The moral of the story is still relevant here. If you want to make sure that Teresa gets in above all else bullet vote...

    If you vote for one of Ecke's three think of how disappointed and torn up you will feel if Doug and Tom get in and Teresa comes in close to second place. That is not a site any of us can stomach. Yes a vote for one of those three could knock teresa out! I doubt it though. The younger community knows that the PIII generation are not saints. We grew up with them and they aren't PI or even PII. The gig is up (unfortunately they have thier war chest to use).

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for posting on the Leucadia Blog.
There is nothing more powerful on this Earth than an anonymous opinion on the Internet.
Have at it!!!