Chico Area Recreation District (CARD) recently hired another consultant to run yet another survey trying to get the voters to tax themselves. As usual, the survey was leading and suggestive – but here’s something new – it didn’t produce the results they were looking for. Instead of a fancy new sports complex, the respondents made it clear they want their existing parks cleaned up and properly maintained and they want the transient camps gone.
I mentioned in a previous post, if you read the comments on various social media sites, or if you happened to read former CARD board member Terry Cleland’s recent letter to the Enterprise Record, you hear complaints of transient camps at soccer fields, transients stealing from snack bars and even personal belongings from the participants.
When my son played travel sports, we found ourselves in towns all over California, like Oakland. The manager at the facility in Oakland told us to park and stay within two blocks of the facility, and to report “anything weird…” Is that what’s happening to Chico?
But Cleland’s letter sounded a little too in line with suggestions the CARD consultants have made – every consultant they’ve had has told them, get members of the public to speak for you. As a former CARD board member and a candidate for the board in the recent election, Cleland would be the perfect dupe to put their tax proposal out there, as if it came from the mouths of babes. Well, here’s my response – let’s talk about a real solution to the transient problem – throw the bums out!
Chico Area Recreation District wants a new tax to provide security at playgrounds. Terry Cleland detailed the problem in his letter, and the Editor has written of families who are moving out of Chico because of this situation. We have a serious criminal transient problem in our city.
Here’s why. 78% of the nearly $74,000,000 Butte County Behavioral Health budget comes from “intergovernmental revenues” – money received from other cities and counties to “provide beds” for their mentally ill and drug addicted transients.
In 2016 BCBH director Dorian Kittrell told me the county received $550 a day for each “client” they took in from cities and counties all over California that do not offer services. He explained in a budget memo that these “intergovernmental transfers” are the main source of funding for BCBH. Transfer patients are held for 45 days, and then released at their own recognizance from either the Chico or Oroville BCBH facility. Many are given prescription medication. They are offered rides to various shelters, but are not required to enroll in any program.
This is a legal form of getting rid of transients – just send them to a mental health facility in another town. Unfortunately, Chico has become that other town.
Our once incredible Bidwell Park, CARD playgrounds, retail areas, the college district, and lower income neighborhoods, are becoming overburdened by this practice of human dumping. We don’t need new taxes or more services, we need to tell our county supervisors loud and clear – stop the transfers.
Chico Taxpayers Association 
Before the city goes on a hiring spree for cops, why don’t they put pressure on the county to stop this nonsense? And the people of this county should not tolerate being a dumping ground for the mentally ill. And having the mentally shipped here does isn’t in the best interest of the mentally ill, either.
The only people who benefit from this are the county bureaucrats with their multi-million dollar pensions.
Thanks Dave, sorry for the delay, I’ve been offline.
This is just for the city, not for the county. Would this include CUSD?
https://www.pensiontracker.org/agencySummary.php?id=1390&selYear=2017&varName=field46&summary=1
Here’s the county
https://www.pensiontracker.org/agencySummary.php?id=1479&selYear=2017&varName=field46&summary=1
So between the city and county the taxpayers are on the hook for over $20,000 per family for city and county pensions.
And that does not include CARD.
Thanks Bob, I have never seen this site before. Sorry to take so long to post your comments, I’ve been taking care of a family emergency, been out of touch of the internet a few days.
I’ll try to post these links in a regular post today.
It seems the crackhead problem is directly the fault of Butte County Behavioral Services.
So how do we hold them accountable and get them to stop taking in the mentally ill from other counties? I work 6 days a week. But I am more than willing to do something about this. I just don’t know what to do. Protest outside Behavioral Services? At this point I am actually having my wife stay on birth control because I don’t want to bring a child into this lawless City. We are saving up to move, but we really don’t want to give up our careers. At this point it is our top priority. We live in a 4th world country in Chico, it pissed me off.
Thanks for commenting Robert, don’t get discouraged, you gotta fight. Complacency is the enemy. Don’t be a lobster sitting in your pot, at least wave those tentacles around a little.
Who is your county supervisor? Write him/her a letter and tell them you know the county is bringing in transients/prisoners/mental patients for “intergovernmental transfers” of funding. Tell them what this means to your family – be specific, but be brief. Don’t get too emotional, and keep it short, cause they have a lot to deal with, if it’s too detailed they won’t read it. Above all – be nice, don’t accuse, just tell them rationally that you know these people are being brought in from cities and counties all over California and you want it to stop.
Be ready for them to tell you, as former Supervisor Maureen Kirk told me – “we don’t bring these people in for the money!” Don’t buy that – BCBH director Dorian Kittrell told me they get all of the funding this way, less than $100,000 comes from other sources.
And please come back and let us know how it’s going.
Oh yeah, here’s the link to contact your supervisor
http://www.buttecounty.net/boardofsupervisors/