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Time to write letters

8 Sep

I know some people think I’m just a broken record, that I hate taxes and have no use for any tax.  That couldn’t be farther from the truth. I know our community depends for many services on  a steady revenue of taxes from “users” like me.

But, our entire country is on a dangerous path to insolvency because of the pensions of public  workers. I didn’t make that up – google it, and you’ll find intellectuals across the country voicing the same concern.

I don’t consider myself an intellectual, I consider myself a person with common dog sense. There is nothing sensible about the public pension system. The CalPERS system is consistently underfunded, and we just found out why – the guy who was in charge of investing for the fund was nailed for accepting bribes to buy bad stocks. That’s apparently why CalPERS has lost money for years and depended on one bail-out from the state legislature after another. They’ve also been making demands of their participating agencies – pay up on your pension liabilities now, or face high interest on your debt.

Those agencies – from small agencies like Butte County Vectors to huge agencies like City of Chico always turn to the taxpayer to pick up the slack. This time it’s Chico Unified School District, with Measure K. They say they want money to fix their facilities – they said that with Measure A, and they said  it with the refunding bond, E. And here they are again, hand out for $152 million they predict will be $270 million in pay-off.

It’s been in the newspaper.  The district notices their meetings quite loudly.  But I don’t go – the district is a machine. They have so much money – they’re like blue jays. Blue jays take over your back yard feeder,  because they’re loud and obnoxious. As soon as they get the leg up, they eat all the food, way more than they need. They grow very big, and then they take over your entire back yard. Next thing you know, all you got is blue jays.

That’s why I don’t feed wild animals, and for the same reason  I am suspicious of new taxes. Lately all the public workers seem to be  hands out for us to fund their crazy pensions – for most public workers, it’s 70 – 90 (“public safety workers”) percent of their highest year’s salary, available at age 50 – 55. Teachers must wait til 60 – 62 years.  A paycheck  for life, with cost of living increases, health benefits, even life insurance paid in full. For this teachers pay 9 – 10 percent of their pension contribution.

Non-certified employees pay only 7% for employees hired before 2013 / 6% for employees hired after 2013. What? It went down?

According to assistant superintendent Kevin Bultema, “Administrators with a teaching credential usually participates in STRS and administrators without a teaching credential usually participates in PERS at the same rates.”

The district retirement is handled by both California Teachers Retirement System and CalPERS – obviously the teachers pay into CalSTRS.  CalSTRS did not have a guy accepting bribes to make bad  investments, so they are doing okay. But of course, both are demanding more money all the time. And, the taxpayers still pick up more than twice the employee “share.” 

Am I wasting my time fighting this bond? No, but I know what I’m up against, and I need other people to wade in here. Please write letters to the papers, let other voters know what’s going on. Don’t take my word for it – go to the district website and look for the budget – it’s not there. I had to ask Kevin Bultema for it – that’s kbultema@chicousd.org

Read the  budget, see for yourself, the administrators are lavishly salaried, and pay the same percentage for their pension as the teachers. Hey, teachers don’t do too bad. Full time teachers are making in excess of $65,000/year, some of them tipping in close to $100,000/year, plus benefits. And, if you look  at the publicpay.gov website, you’ll see, they list their overtime pay (which  I have been told includes subbing for another teacher or even playground supervision) separately, anonymously, so you don’t really know how much these teachers are yanking in. 

For their average salary, they figure in everybody – including part time workers making less than  $1,000/ year off the district. Blue jays cheat and play dirty, you can  expect them to bend the facts any way they want. Read it for yourself. 

And then write a letter to the editor of the daily or the weekly, or both if you want. If we fight this thing, inform the other voters, we have a rat’s ass of a chance of beating this bond. 

Do you want to pay $60 for every $100,000 assessed against your house? For what? 

Here’s my first volley:

In 1995, Chico Unified School District placed Measure N on the ballot, a $32 million bond specified “to acquire land and to construct new high school facilities and to construct new and renovate existing facilities on the Pleasant Valley High School Campus.”  The measure failed.  

In 1998,  Measure A specified $48.7 million would be used to “acquire land and to construct new high school facilities.”  This measure barely received two thirds approval.  But, the district reneged on the new high school, instead using  Measure A money for many uses not specified in the original measure. The Grand Jury investigated, but declared the school board was allowed to spend the money however it saw fit. 

In 2012,  complaining about aging facilities in disrepair, Measure E asked another $78 million, promising “local Chico  school  facility improvement.” This bond passed because the threshold had been lowered to 55 percent. 

Four years later,  the district still has the same complaints – schools over 50 years old, failing roofs, sub-par playground equipment, etc. Measure K asks for $152 million, $270 million with interest. 

While they say they will fix facilities, yearly budgets show a pattern of increasing employee costs and decreasing maintenance expenditures. The  district practices “deferred maintenance,” spending less than 8 percent of their total budget on maintenance while spending roughly 90 percent on salaries and benefits. 

If they really care about the students, they would have been maintaining the facilities instead of padding their pensions.

Juanita Sumner, Chico

School district expects us to bail them out of deficit, again

31 Aug

Well, here’s where I been lately.

http://clerk-recorder.buttecounty.net/elections/archives/eln35/35_local_measures.html#k

Measure K is Chico  Unified School  District’s latest bond – $152 million up front, $270 million with interest.  Again they complain the schools are falling apart and they need money for repairs. Here’s the measure:

Click to access 35_measure_k_resolution.pdf

And here’s the breakdown on what it will actually cost:

Click to access 35_measure_k_tax_rate_statement.pdf

They already have bonds totaling over $130 million, plus interest. Passed in 1998, $48.7 Measure A, with which they promised to build a new high school, was “frittered away” with the excuse that enrollment had suddenly tapered down and the third high school was no longer needed. In 2012 they started whining about how old and crappy the schools were,  and needed another  $78 million.  That passed a lot more easily because the legislature had lowered the threshold from 2/3’s to 55 percent.  The general public does not support school district decisions, but CUSD has enough employees and idiot parents to beat the rest of us into a corner.

It was Bob who pointed out to me, nobody ever seems to oppose these tax grabs.  He’s right – nobody formally opposed either of those last two CUSD bonds. No group or individual has been opposing the various sales tax increases put up in towns like Paradise, where less than 200  people even voted on the measure. 

So, I looked at the county clerk’s website, and I found out any individual who is eligible to vote on a measure can submit an “Argument Against” for the ballot. I was given a copy of the measure and I had about a week after the measure was posted to come up with a 300 word argument as to why it should not pass.

Click to access 35_argument_against_measure_k.pdf

Yes, they’ve been spending all the money on themselves, no surprise there. About 90 percent of the budget goes to salaries and benefits, less than 8 percent goes into Capital Outlay, of which maintenance is only a tiny fraction. In some budget years, Capital Outlay is listed as “$0”.   So excuse me if I find their spastic claims of 50 year old rotten buildings just a bit disingenuous. 

Oh but look who’s peddling this turd – your mayor!  

Click to access 35_argument_in_favor_measure_k.pdf

Why do you think Katie Simmons left out her title as director of the Chamber of Commerce?  

Here’s my rebuttal to their “Argument For”

Click to access 35_rebuttal_to_argument_in_favor_of_measure_k.pdf

I think I did a pretty good job of answering their claims, I put a lot of time and research  into it.  Meanwhile, they just resubmitted their “Argument For”, asserting that I “missed the point.” 

Click to access 35_rebuttal_to_argument_in_favor_of_measure_k.pdf

Yes, I see they’ve got themselves a new band. Look at all the public salaries involved in support of this tax measure – makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? 

No, I don’t think I missed the point, I think I hit it pretty good and hard. The district doesn’t care about “the kids,” they care about their paychecks and their retirement bling.  They salaried, benefitted, and pensioned themselves into deficit, and now they expect us to haul their asses out again.

No.

Why hasn’t CARD posted minutes of their board meetings since December 2015?

12 Aug

Digging into various issues, I find myself all over the internet, using a lot of city, county, state, and other public entity websites. Compared to some of the sites I’ve been to, our city, county, and other local agency websites fall pretty short.

It’s not the website’s fault, it’s the way these agencies use them.  They spend hundreds of thousands a year on “IT”, but you can’t find what you want on their websites because they aren’t updated. Each entity is also very subjective in what they think they have to put on their website. A lot of useless information, a lot of out-of-date information, and a lot of button pushing just to find yourself back at the page where you started. 

They aren’t consistent in what they post. For years I bitched at Debbie Presson, why didn’t she have the council minutes posted in  a timely fashion? She whined about staff shortages, work work work. The city of Willows has their minutes posted through July of this year.   

The reason it takes a month is that minutes need to be approved by the agency board, they can question their clerk’s memory of events, ask for the tape, even ask that stuff they actually said be “stricken” from the record. Some  agencies only meet once a month, so it’s not unreasonable for the clerk to take a month or so to post the minutes.  

Debbie Presson suggested I should watch the provided video.  Hours of crap, fast-forward-fast-forward-wait-back-it-up – just to see what they voted on and how they voted? That’s a 2-minute scan of the minutes, why should I have to sit there digging through a video? 

So, when I went to the Chico Area Recreation District website to see what the board has been up to the last few months, I was frustrated to find, they haven’t posted minutes of their monthly meetings on the website since December 2015. 

http://www.chicorec.com/About-Card/CARD-Resources/Board-of-Directors/index.html

The city of Chico council and committees all review their minutes regularly, so does CARD. When city agencies review their minutes, the minutes are posted to the agenda on the city website – a roundabout way of reading the minutes.  But until recently, CARD has not posted the minutes with the agenda, so, up until about May, the only way a taxpayer can  take a look at the minutes for four or five meetings is present themselves at the CARD center and wait while a staffer bumbles around trying to figure out how to comply. I get a kick out of the look on these people’s faces when you ask for something they are supposed to make available anyway.

We shouldn’t have to do that, but as city clerk Debbie Presson and CARD manager Ann Willmann will tell you – they are not legally required to post the minutes on the website. 

And of course, they’re right. It’s not a legal matter, it’s an ethical matter. 

 

Stop the presses! CARD employees to begin paying toward their own benefits! (having paid NOTHING up to now…)

26 Jul

Ooooooo! Chico Area Rec District director Ann Willmann will pay 5 PERCENT out of her $100,000-plus salary toward 70 percent of her highest year’s salary, available at age 55!  

Let me be the first to say, “Big Fucking Deal Mrs. Potato”.  She’s been stealing from us all these years, and she thinks she can just wash her hands and give us that “Who? Me?” look.

According to this morning’s Enterprise Record:

CHICO >> A balanced 2016-17 budget for the Chico Area Recreation and Park District was passed last week, but the financial document for the special district is a little different from the preliminary one.

Guided by a board and staff that wanted to see savings because of long- suspended maintenance costs and other expenses, the budget process has resulted in cutbacks and in changes, that include employees for the first time paying for a portion of their retirement.

While that w ill save CARD revenue, there are other matters that mean more expense, like aging facilities that need work or repairs, and personnel costs from the rising minimum wage. There are also new allocations for long- discussed priorities, according to Chair Bob Malowney during a phone interview. Paying a portion toward their Public Employees Retirement System costs, employees will be looking to contribute from 1 to 4 percent of their pay, depending on the positions, according to CARD business manager Olivia Wilson. The amount of savings was not immediately available.

General Manager Ann Willmann will start to pay a portion as well. The board also approved a 5 percent raise for her that will start in December that was previously discussed by the board. She’ll be making $105,000 a year, according to Wilson.

Excuse me, but that’s crap. Why are we paying benefits and retirement for people who make more than twice the median income?

Just a show for the public because  they are still kicking around the idea of a swimming pool tax. They know it looks bad that they don’t pay anything, so they are making a very petty show. They’ve budgeted $80,000 for a consultant, just to get that on the ballot.  They want us to pay down the rest of their nearly $2 million pension deficit. That’s two million dollars for less than 30 employees who get pensions.   

In the story, they admit they’ve “suspended maintenance costs” to pay down their salaries, benefits and FULL PAID pensions all these years. 

Supervisor Kirk responds to my concerns about Chico Unified bond

25 Jul

I wrote a note to my third district supervisor, Maureen Kirk, about the Chico Unified School District bond that is before the Butte Supes tomorrow, and this is all she had to say:

“I understand your concern. The Board is not recommending the bond. We are putting it on the ballot.”

I had asked her to pull the item from the consent agenda for discussion, but she didn’t get back to me.

Frankly, I’ve been frustrated with Kirk lately. I asked her to protest the Cal Water and PG&E rate increases, and she filed for “party” status. That’s not a protest, that is just a notification list. To the CPUC, it fulfills the legal requirement to notice these rate increases. But neither Kirk nor Butte County, nor the city of Chico, filed formal protests, they all filed as a “party” to the rate increase.

The definition of the term “be a party to something” is “a participant in something; someone who is involved in something.”

In other words, our supervisors and city council and county and city staff just helped these utility companies raise their rates. It’s a boon for the city – as our bills go up, our utility tax payments will go up.

Thanks Maureen and company – with friends like you, who needs enemas?

Chico Unified, Butte College throw down their bond measures at Tuesday’s (7/26) county supes meeting – supes poised to approve both measures for ballot without any discussion

23 Jul

I found the following on the county clerk’s website:

From the Written Ballot Arguments Guide Book – Filing Deadline Based on the time reasonably necessary to prepare and print the arguments, analysis, and sample ballots and to permit the 10-calendar-day public examination, the county elections official shall fix and determine a reasonable date prior to the election after which no arguments for or against any county measure may be submitted. (Elections Code section 9162) Refer to the “Calendar of Events” (separate document) for filing deadline.

There was no “Calendar of Events” posted, so I had to write a note to the clerk.  She sent me the link to which I’d referred, and responded to my other question in blue.  She resent me the link I’d already told her I’d looked at, but no “Schedule of Events.” She simply gave me the information. I am afraid to criticize Grubbs, she’s very vindictive, but she should have that schedule of events posted already.   There should also be something about it in the agenda item on the supervisor’s agenda, but oh well.  It’s our job to stay on top of these people. Grubbs is, of course, supposed to work for the voters – yeah, ha ha ha.

Sent: Friday, July 22, 2016 6:02 AM
To: Elections <elections@buttecounty.net>
Subject: schedule of events for Nov 2016 election

 Hi,

 I have been searching your website for the “Schedule of Events” for the November election, mentioned in the County Ballot Measure Written Argument Guide, but can’t find it. Please direct me.  

http://clerk-recorder.buttecounty.net/elections/pdf/ballot_argument_guidebook.pdf 

I am also interested in being notified when Chico Unified School District brings in their bond measure – is there any such notification list? I know your office will post an ad for arguments, but am afraid I’d miss it – having absolutely no clue as to where or when to look for it –  and I want to be notified so as to be able to write an argument if I choose to do so.  

The district has filed their resolution and request for consolidation with our office.  The request for consolidation will be considered by the Butte County Board of Supervisors at their July 26th Board meeting.  Arguments in favor of and Arguments against must be filed in the Butte County Clerk-Recorder Elections Division Office located at 155 Nelson Avenue no later than 5pm August 19th.  A legal notice will appear in the Chico Enterprise Record with this information as well.

 Thank you for your anticipated cooperation, Juanita Sumner

Anyhoo, I see, the board of supervisors is hearing this item in three days, on the consent agenda! So, the board of supervisors seems to be pushing this thing up our ass?

So I sent the following note to Maureen Kirk, Third District Supervisor:

Hi Maureen,

I see the board will be considering the CUSD bond on the consent agenda Tuesday. 

Here are some things the board should know.

1) the school district has already issued $78 million in bonds – at one time promising a third high school. This bond includes language protecting them if they should fall short – “passage of measure does not guarantee that all financed facilities listed in the measure will be completed….”  They are already wiggling out. 

2) we have teachers making twice the median income and administrators making 4 –  5 times the median income

3) only 15 – 18 percent of CUSD students participate in ACT Testing, and less than 40 percent participate in SAT – these are the standards  by which they measure the district’s collective achievement. There have been charges made that  schools skew their test scores artificially by keeping “dumb” kids from taking the tests – how would we know? 

Please ask them what is their pension deficit, and how much of this money will go toward paying that off?  If they deny that, ask them where this bond will free up other money to pay their pension deficit.

I don’t know if I can attend – we have a fixed schedule, we have to work outside no matter how many digits the thermometer is holding up, we can’t afford to lose tenants right now. So I’m depending on you to push back on this grab. This bond measure shouldn’t even be on the ballot Maureen. Between the utility companies and the school district, Chico is becoming unaffordable.

I’ll have to tell my tenants to look for a rent increase, and I’ll have to tell them why, and who is responsible. 

I just turned over one of my rentals. I noticed, before they even moved in, we got their voter registration/ change of address in the mail box. All my tenants vote.

Thanks, Juanita

The measure is included in this week’s board agenda, item 3.07 ($taff of course recommends approving the measure without any discussion or public notice):

http://buttecounty.granicus.com/GeneratedAgendaViewer.php?view_id=2&event_id=140

http://buttecounty.granicus.com/MetaViewer.php?view_id=2&event_id=140&meta_id=55144

The previous item is a  bond for Butte College.

 First you watch the skies, and then you squeal like a pig. 

Tags:

Why pay public salaries for a job done better for yourself?

5 Jul

DSC00006

I’ll get out early for a pancake breakfast, and I’m not alone. I’ve noticed,  the annual 4th of July pancake breakfast is one of the best attended events in Chico.

DSC00034

Held near Sycamore Field at One Mile, this event brings so many people, I would advise you to get yourself down there by the first flip at 7:30. Or take a folding chair and a snack.

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At about 8:20, this was the line up for the syrup station. You can see the pancake trailer to the right there, where Bob and his flapjack flipping fanatics were flinging them out furiously.

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This is why this event requires a big, open venue. They just kept coming and coming. For every pancake that hit a paper plate, I would estimate, another 5 people got out of their cars and started wandering in.  There’s the line for the pancake wagon snaking out around the baseball field, Bob and the crew are holed up in the trailer. I wonder if any of them are making the “Jaws” joke – “I think we need a bigger griddle…”   My husband took pictures of the line to send around to our procrastinating friends.

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My husband kept leading me toward Sycamore Field, showing me how the line went all the way out to the road.

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As we came over from the Vallombrosa side, we walked with an enthusiastic crowd. They greeted friends they hadn’t seen since last year, talked about driving in from all parts of Butte County and beyond, for an event they wouldn’t miss “for the world,” according to one woman.

The smell of syrup and sausages was just about maddening.

DSC00037

We saw that all the bike racks were full, there’s our old tandem added to the pile. We could see people walking in from the surrounding neighborhoods, some of them extended groups. As we rode our bike home about 8:45, we saw more people headed up through the park, some of whom asked us if we saved them any pancakes.

It occurred to me, I sure hope Bob had plenty of batter!

My family has always lived within an easy bike ride of Bidwell Park, we’ve used it alot over the years, and whenever there’s an event we try to check it out. This is without doubt one of the top five most attended, if not the most attended event. The only one we could think of that compares is the annual Polar Bear Swim on New Year’s Day. We also remember well-attended Endangered Species Fairs at Cedar Grove, but have not noticed the same size crowds at that event in recent years.

These events beat the Bidwell Park Centennial last year, easily. Neither the city nor CARD were very enthusiastic in their presentation of that event, which could easily have been a week long affair complete with a parade, bike fair, maybe even some mention of the 1939 Robin Hood production, scenes for which were filmed at different sites in the park. I was shocked the park department didn’t put more into the centennial of one of our town’s biggest tourist attractions and public treasures.

Meanwhile CARD budgets for two movie nights a year, showing such masterpieces as “Grease” and “Bees.” They actually showed “Robin Hood” a few years, but for some reason fail to make an annual event of it.  They pay for a film association license to be able to rent and show these movies to the public.  The rental is expensive – more for more popular movies – and the rules for fund raising are very strict. I think the licensee is only allowed to charge an attendance fee that covers the cost of the film, and then have to give the film association a cut of any money made.

I’ve attended a few of these, and while I’ve enjoyed the showing, on a screen set up at Sycamore Field, I’ve counted the crowd – there’s never been even 100 people at the movie showings I’ve attended, including a “Robin Hood” showing. I’d question the expenditure for their license and the rental, I don’t think it pays. It’s just a fad, outdoor movies, but there are too many others who do a better job, and get a lot more attendees.

CARD used to sponsor the 4th of July pancake breakfast, putting up the money to pay Bob and provide the services of Work Training Center employees for clean-up – about $3,000. This year they cited a tight budget and announced they did not have the money to sponsor the event, that it would be cancelled. Chico Running Club quickly rushed in to host the event.

I wrote a letter to the Enterprise Record when I heard about it.

Chico Area Recreation District will no longer host the city Fourth of July celebration because they don’t have $3,000?

 

This on the heels of news they will close iconic Shapiro Pool, having neglected maintenance for years. 

 
According to budgets available on their website, CARD will receive about $6.9 million in revenue this year, almost $4 million of that from property taxes and assessments.  Salaries and benefits eat over $5 million.  Of over 300 employees, about 33 management take just over half the salaries, another $700,000-plus going toward their pensions and health insurance.  They pay more toward their pensions every year as they continue to cut programs, even the popular “Junior Giants” baseball, turning children away because they say they can’t afford staff adequate to supervise them.
 

CARD has over $1.7 million in pension liability while management pay nothing toward their pensions. The current director makes  over $100,000 a year and gets a $28,000 benefits package.  The households in the district have median income of about $42,000.

CARD management complain they need more money to fulfill their mission.  Meanwhile, non-profit, mostly volunteer-run agencies, like Westside Little League, Chico Running Club,  North Valley Hockey, and several soccer leagues continue to pick up the slack. 

 

Has CARD failed in it’s mission to provide affordable recreation for Chico? Do we really need CARD anymore?

Yes,  CARD has failed in it’s mission. No we don’t need CARD anymore.

As we rode our bikes off into the park that is paid for with taxpayer dollars, my husband and I listened to the band warming up, strains of “Oh say can you see…”

 

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How will you celebrate “The Fourth”? Try acting like an American

4 Jul

I always wonder, how many Americans have even read the US constitution? How many of you have read the California constitution? The city charter?

Good homework for “The Fourth.”  

I’ve been reading up on the laws regarding tax measures, how they are enacted, and how the public citizen can resist an avaricious government.

First, we must “Watch the skies!”   Actually, we have to watch the agendas. That is where the initial discussion of putting a tax measure on the ballot is supposed to happen.  We all know it actually happens in private meetings, but, legally, it has to pass through a public discussion before it can be handed to the county clerk, so there’s a place for the observer to begin. I’ve been watching agendas not only for council meetings and county supervisor meetings but the smaller committee meetings in between.

I have to admit, I’ve been distracted with Chico Area Recreation District, trying to figure out whether their tax grab will appear on the November ballot or whether they will go the slimy way and deliver assessment ballots by mail.  Assessment elections aren’t the same as regular elections – they are rigged with bigger property owners getting more votes, the “weight” of each property owner’s vote being determined by the very board that is asking for the tax. These shouldn’t be legal – that’s our fault. We need to try to get rid of the entities that can attach us this way, starting with CARD, and including the Butte County Mosquito and Vector District.

I haven’t heard an elected official at either the city of Chico or Butte County mention a sales tax increase, but with municipalities all around us seeking, and in some cases, getting a sales tax increase out of the voters, I’m worried. Ex-city mangler Tom Lando, the guy who came up with the MOU that attached city salaries “to revenue increases but not decreases,” has been stumping for a sales tax increase for a few years now, saying he wants this and that amenity for the public, as well as better paid cops and fire fighters. 

Wow, what’s better than a base pay of $62,000/year with automatic step increases and mandated overtime that can as much as double that base salary? Not to mention paying only 12 percent toward a retirement of 90 percent of your highest year’s pay at age 50? What the helllllll could be better than that? 

Ask Lando, a guy who is in the regular habit of dropping a C-note for lunch.

I don’t believe Lando is worried about the public, I think he is worried about his $12,000/month pension payments.  Can you imagine living on $134,000/year, without having to work? Just getting a check for the rest of your life.  Ask Barbara McEnepsy – how’s life out on Keefer Road Hon? I don’t even know what Barbara McEnepsy did for the city, but she receives an even higher pension than Lando. 

Here’s the real stinker – these two individuals retired before the rules were changed to make employees “pay their own share” – neither Lando nor McEnepsy paid a dime toward their pensions.

If you are not outraged about paying these pensions, I’ll say – you’re not an American.

 

Strap yourselves in, this is complicated

22 Jun

There has been so much to talk about lately, it’s hard to know how to start.

I’ve been having a conversation with Chico Area Recreation District director Ann Willmann about rental policies for CARD facilities. CARD owns a lot of stuff, not just play fields, but buildings that are supposed to be available for public use, with a fee schedule. One such building is the CARD Center, appropriately located near the center of Chico and also near the center of the recreation district’s legal boundaries.  Besides housing CARD operations, the CARD center had been a popular place for private parties, mostly weddings, as well as public events like the “Pancakes for Peace” fundraiser held for many years by the Chico Peace and Justice Center. In fact, for many years, the center parking lot was packed for some or another event every good weather weekend from early Spring to late Fall. I had friends who got married there, it was affordable to working people.

A few years ago I noticed the center wasn’t being used as much.  I also noticed it was a meeting place for the homeless – all along Vallombrosa between Mangrove and Arbutus, every public green space was covered with a little encampment of creepy people, laying filthy and half naked with scroungy dogs, drinking, acting generally scurvy.  Yeah, at the last wedding I attended at the CARD center, there were a bunch of homeless people milling in the crowd, they were really drunk, they went down to the creek and went skinny dipping as the bride’s family tried to usher the guests back into the building.

That whole area got really bad. The post office annex closed between 10pm and 7am, citing “security concerns.”

A year or so ago, CARD board member Tom Lando made a public appeal to Chico PD to help keep the vagrants from camping, crapping and generally carousing around the CARD center.  I don’t know how far that went because quickly thereafter the board made a unanimous decision to move CARD meetings to California Park Lakeside Pavilion. California Park sits at the outermost edge of the district, and the pavilion is located deep within this bastion of private property, loud red “NO TRESPASSING” signs displayed prominently on any patch of grass not directly connected to a private home. I don’t know when exactly the board purchased the pavilion, but I would have loved to be at the meeting to hear how they rationalized the purchase. I’m going to guess somebody made a pitch about how much they could make renting the place out for fancy weddings.

Which would seem to be a breach of the district’s policy and mission, to provide affordable recreation options and facilities for everybody. They have also cited concerns about some projects in past, saying they didn’t want to compete with private businesses. How does the pavilion fit their mission?

“Fancy” just isn’t a word for Chico. Chico has long been an anti-snob town, a place where jeans and work shirts have been considered far more stylish than three piece suits and Ferragamo shirts. But we’ve got a new class of people here in town – public workers who make more than five families put together.  These people have been pushing a “class up this burg” movement. Tom Lando is one of the people behind this push – as retired city manager, he makes one of the biggest pensions that adds up to our city’s 90 million dollar plus pension deficit.

Lando has cried aloud that Chico doesn’t have a fancy sports stadium. He said he ran a survey that said taxpayers would support such a venture, but he wouldn’t publish the results for the rest of us.  Lando wants a tax of some sort to pay for this stadium. He once said, it wouldn’t add up to more than a dollar on the average lunch tab.

Wow, would somebody do that math for me? He’s saying, the tax increase would amount to a dollar on the average lunch tab? How much does he pay for lunch?

People like Lando think Chico needs to grow up and be fancy.  They want richer people to move here, to pay higher property taxes, to support their pensions, is what.

I’d say, they all need to grow up, and pay for their own retirement at age 55 on 70 – 90 percent of their highest year’s income.

Lando was also the guy who brought in the Memo Of Understanding that linked city salaries to “revenue increases but not decreases.”  Then council-member Larry Wahl told me he signed that MOU because he didn’t understand it.  Council proceeded to approve all those subdivisions that are still taking a giant crap all over our local economy. With that late 90’s building boom, Lando’s salary went from around $60,000 to over $100,000 in just a few years. But when things went bust, none of those salaries went down, due to the simple but legally binding wording in that two sentence memo. Today the city manager makes about $200,000/year, and pays only 9 percent toward his own pension.

And that’s what happened when the public  became aware of the MOU during that hot and heavy two or three years that bankruptcy was breathing down our collective neck.  Yes, it was outrageous – I wish people would pay attention more often. But, the public was lulled back to sleep with the following agreement – sure, we’d hold the line on the raises from now on, but the city would pay a whopping share of the “employee share” of pensions and benefits. For many years, it was the entire share for management and public safety workers.

You remember that whole conversation, don’t you? How there was the “employee share” and the “employer share”, and the “EMPC”, or, “employer-paid member contribution”. That means, we paid their share, get that? For those employees we were paying not only “our” share but theirs as well. Only the last couple of years has management and public  safety begun to pay toward their own pensions. At first, only 4 percent, now 9 percent and 12 percent, respectively.

Excuse me – big fucking deal – why aren’t they paying the 50 percent mandated of new hires?  Excuse me again – did I say 50? I say, they pay it all themselves, and if they’re real good, we start picking up a small percentage.  But this practice of getting something you didn’t pay for – ENTITLEMENT – has got to stop.

According to Ann Willmann, her friends are ENTITLED to rent publicly owned facilities under her supervision for less than the public would pay.

Bill Cosby, the comedian, used to tell long, involved stories, and then say, “I told you that story so I could tell you this one…” There is where I will have to leave you for today, I’ll try to get back asap.

 

 

Short Attention Span Theater – we have the government we deserve in Chico

18 Jun

I’ve just been having a frustrating conversation with a friend about public participation. 

Sorry if I have been rude, Friend.

Friend tried to explain to me how overwhelmed most people are in their lives, they can’t pay attention.

That just got my skivvies in a bunch. I pay attention, and let me tell you, I got stuff going on.  I won’t bore you with my epic problems of the past months, but through it all, my close friends have been annoyed with my constant complaining about what the city and county and various local agencies are doing. My husband keeps telling me the government stuff is stressing me out, I should concentrate more on what’s going on at home. At least we can do something about our private problems, he says.

I have a hard time keeping it all under my hat.  Every morning, when I give my dog her insulin shot, I have to mentally prepare – “don’t think bad thoughts, don’t think bad thoughts…” as I skewer that needle into a lump of flesh behind her collar.   She lays on the floor behind me as I read the paper, read e-mails, she can hear me grumbling about stuff. I have to be careful or she’ll slip into the bedroom and stick her head under my husband’s side of the bed. I can feel the tension in her neck, makes it hard to get loose skin, sometimes she lets out a yelp and a half.

What bugs me is how people are so quick to use any excuse to stick their head in the sand, but they still expect to be allowed to complain when something finally gets under their skin.  I won’t mention names, but I’ve watched the local gadflies make big stinks about stuff, after a few months, the stink dies down, and the problem still exists.  All that blab about volunteers for the park – the park still looks like shit. The work they did at the One Mile parking lot last year has become completely overgrown with non-native invasive plants again. An area they did earlier this year is also going back to a mess.   Whole sections of the park are sub-code – if it was your yard, you’d get a notice to clean it up or pay the city to do it. 

And this conversation about keeping public restrooms open has been going on for two years now. Meanwhile, the million dollar One Mile restroom is pretty hit and miss – here’s the conundrum – if it is open, will it be usable? 

Short Attention Span Theater.

I’m going to tell you Esplanade lovers – don’t go back to sleep! Isn’t it pretty obvious, they’ve shelved the roundabouts until after the election? I’m hoping Cheryl King and friends are quietly looking for somebody to run for council, but I’m not going to bank on it.  

I’d like to see somebody run for CARD. Why don’t I do it? I would if I had some support – I ain’t going into those meetings without a posse anymore.  If they pass their bond, it means the people of Chico are completely gone fishing.

Tony St Amant said it in this morning’s paper – we have the government we deserve.

 

 

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