I had a glitch in that last post – wouldn’t accept comments – so I’ve brought Bob’s comments over to a new post. I’ve heard other stories like Bob’s, I think his experience is all too common. 

I have been the victim of crime several times and the police were absolutely useless.

It’s not that they were rude or anything like that, just useless.

The last time I had some valuable property stolen on two separate occasions about a month apart. The police made no effort to recover the property or even apprehend the criminal. Assuming they would have arrested the criminal but not recovered the property (assuming it had been destroyed, lost or was long gone, probably sold to someone else) the criminal justice system would have done nothing to make me whole again, i.e. restitution. I would have had to go to civil court on my dime and of course most of these criminals haven’t a penny to their name so lots of luck with that.

Instead I would be a victim twice: first my property is stolen and then I have to pay taxes to incarcerate the criminal where he/she just becomes more hardened to a life of crime. Is that insane or what? The criminal should be required to make the victim whole again as much as possible while being rehabilitated assuming he/she is not too far gone.

But consider this and the fact that police are under no obligation to protect you from crime according to the Supreme Court. (Like I said before the function of the police is to protect the state, NOT you. Just look at Ferguson where the police were protecting the government buildings and letting private sector buildings and homes get looted and destroyed.) Can you imagine a business in the private sector lasting a month like this if this was how it treated its customers? Yet we are expected to continue paying ever more for police “protection.” We are expected to make police officers multi-millionaires when you factor in their lifetime pensions, other benefits and earnings. The entire system is immoral and should be called the criminal injustice system and we are its victims.

I have a friend who owned a retail and service shop in town for over 20 years, very popular business. Shoplifters would walk in while he was with a customer and walk out with merchandise. It was a small shop, so most times he’d see them run off with the goods, and call the cops immediately. He never got any satisfaction from Chico PD, and one time they were especially annoying – they didn’t come for hours – a quick response very well could have nailed the perps – but by the time these fatasses showed up, forget that. They were just making the rounds, filling out useless reports. These two fat, plain clothes guys came in carrying their fast food – burgers and sodas – and just slopped them right down on my friend’s glass counter top. The one guy kept taking bites as he was asking my friend questions, as if they cared, and left grease all over my friend’s counter. He never heard another word out of them.

Another time it was his bike – they did nothing but take a report. A friend told him, I saw your bike at Mike’s (an old used bike shop where the cops were always finding stolen bikes but did nothing about it), so my friend called the cops and asked them to meet him at Mikes. There was the bike, serial number and everything, and right in front of the cops Mike tried to tell my friend he had to buy the bike back. The cops talked Mike into giving my friend his bike, but they did nothing to Mike for having a stolen bike. My friend’s only proof was that serial number that he had a copy of. They told him they couldn’t have done anything without that serial number – make note of that folks.

Before that it was Del’s Bike Barn – that went on for years, until Del finally folded up his legs and left.

It is obvious we can’t depend on the cops to take care of us. I’ve just about convinced my husband to put up security cameras – hey, I’ve had some weird experiences with Chico PD, I want that on tape too. 

Whew, what a day. Like most of you, I have my routine, and that’s just another word for rut, so this morning I broke out of the house to a 9am  special meeting at Chico Area Recreation District HQ on Vallombrosa.  I have a bunch of time sensitive chores today, but I just decided, somebody has to watch these people. So, I got up early to do my house chores, I bolted my breakfast, and I mounted the old Raleigh Superbe and beat it for the CARD Center.

I was happy to see Rose there, and I’m looking forward to hearing her take on it. 

This meeting was noticed in yesterday’s Enterprise Record. According to Susan Wilson, the lady who spoke at League of Women Voter’s Brown Bag the Brown Act presentation, a special meeting can be called with 24 hours notice of the public, and notice only needs to be, literally, a notice pinned to the door of the building in which the meeting is to be held, 24 or more hours ahead. They noticed the newspaper, and Urseny decided to do a front page story about it. Wonderful! But, still woefully inadequate.

And I’m pretty sure Ms. Wilson said special meant emergency. The emergency nature of this meeting was not explained by anyone on the board. I’m sorry I didn’t ask – they don’t really answer my questions – like when I asked Jennifer Mariciales why the board meetings had been previously switched to Lakeside Pavilion, and she just said, because the board wanted them there. No reason, just, the board wanted them there. I think that’s evasive, but maybe I’m just a turd in the punch bowl.

This meeting was called by General Manager Steve Visconti. Maybe he really thinks there’s an emergency, but I don’t think it’s the kind of emergency, like a leaking pipe, that has to be discussed within 24 hours. This could just have easily been discussed at last months’ general board meeting, or at the meeting scheduled for later this month. They just went over a list of proposed projects, and talked about how they felt about each one, what priority, if any, to give each project. Turns out, this board has been entertaining a list of wants instead of paying attention to the district’s true needs. 

Visconti said, “with day-to-day operations, and all these projects, it’s really hard for staff, they are spread so thin…” He seemed to be trying to get them to come to their senses.  They seemed to be completely oblivious – is this why Jerry Haynes left?

The first wish on the list was the rose garden proposed for some years now by local resident Marilyn Warrens. Mrs. Warrens has put up $100,000 toward the project, and a couple of years ago, I actually thought that was adequate to dress the entire CARD center and half of Downtown Chico in rose bushes, but today the board unanimously approved (Lando absent) a $302,000 budget for 50 less rose bushes than originally planned. I think most of the money will go into the wrought iron fence that will eventually be used to keep the public out. This garden is meant to be a revenue source for CARD – pay to have your wedding or event in what used to be open to the public. I realize, the inside of the center has always been For Rent, but the outside has always been open to the public, who owns it and pays for it’s maintenance. Get ready for this.

If you enlarge the picture you see plans for 6 foot high fencing, with a 20 foot seat wall, enclosing the CARD center lawn, including part of the creek. where the design calls for removing trees.

The board listened to contractor Greg Melton and the unanimously approved this project. 

Next item on the list is a “pump track” – my kids built one in our back yard. It’s a dirt bike track. I was interested in this project, because it seems to have been given the go-ahead by the board, but as they were discussing it, aquatic center proponent and former CARD general manager Jerry Hughes motioned consultant/contractor Greg Melton to the hallway outside, asking him to talk about the aquatic center. I immediately grabbed my stuff and followed. This is the kind of meetings they’ve been having about this center, and I wanted to hear  what was really going on instead of what they were discussing in the board meetings. 

but now I’ve got more chores around the house, I’ll have to get back to you.

I had some healthy questions about the claims being made by consultant Randy Cohen in a presentation to the mayor,

http://www.chicoer.com/general-news/20150330/economic-impact-study-reports-arts-employ-451-people-in-chico

but was unable to attend the presentation. So, I sent Cohen an e-mail:

First Name: Juanita
> Last Name: Sumner
> Email: Juanita Sumner
> Area of Interest/Concern: Meetings & Events
> Subject: presentation for Chico, Monday March 30 2015
> Message:
> Hi,
>
> I can’t make the presentation you are giving the city of Chico on Monday
> (March 30) and have some questions about the survey. Am I to understand that
> this survey was anecdotal, or was data such as financial records made
> available? Where can I see the specific data for Chico?

Cohen answered my inquiry very quickly.  He seemed offended by my use of the word “anecdotal,” which means, “based on personal observation, case study reports, or random investigations rather than systematic scientific evaluation.”

Randy Cohen (rcohen@artsusa.org)3/27/15

To: Juanita Sumner

 

Anecdotal?? I hope that is not the rumor working around town. It’s based totally on data collected from local arts organizations and their audiences which is then pumped into an econometric input-output analysis model done by our economist from Georgia Tech’s School of Economics. 

It will be released next week. The report would be available then I would expect (since I’ll be presenting the findings next week).

Thanks for your inquiry, Juanita, and sorry you can’t attend the presentations.

Best,

Randy 

“data collected from local arts organizations and their audiences which is then pumped into an econometric input-output analysis model done by our economist from Georgia Tech’s School of Economics. ”  Fancy words for “anecdotal”.  

I tried to be nice. This guy claims “the arts” generate hundreds of jobs and bring money into our community, city and county, millions of dollars. That is a claim, so I asked him for numbers to back it up.

Rose reminds me, it’s free, and don’t forget to bring a bag lunch.

League of Women Voters to talk about Brown Act – March 18, Chico Women’s Center

Today I notice, in the stats information provided by Word Press, people have been reading old posts where I bitched about the way Dave Burkland and Jennifer Hennessy were managing business Downtown, and how council was following right along like Hansel, Hansel, Hansel, Hansel, Gretel, Gretel, and Gretel.

For instance, somebody read 

https://chicotaxpayers.com/2012/08/29/hennessy-is-using-city-funds-like-walnut-shells-to-hide-and-move-money/

I bitched about the way they were transferring money from one fund to the other so they could get around spending rules. Some funds were being completely emptied into the General Fund, which has pretty lax rules about how it is spent. Every report Hennessy gave was full of assumptions and allocations – “assumptions” that we would be getting all this money to spend, and then “allocations” to cover when their ASS-umptions fell through.  Most of that money went to salaries, benefits and pensions for “public safety” and management, who paid zero to four percent of their own packages. 

Council went along right up until Burkland’s retirement, and the finger pointing and back stabbing began. All heads turned toward Hennessy, who made a well-timed exit to Temecula. The public turned kind of ugly, asking about criminal prosecution. Council members made veiled comments – AFTER the fact, how corn-venient. I almost felt sorry for Hennessy – council sat there through all of it, the public sat through it, with their fingers in their noses, but as soon as the shit hit the fan everybody was ready to string her up!

So now we have Mark Orme, Chris Constantin and Frank Fields essentially doing the same thing – how is what they are doing any different that what Hennessy was doing?  

Look at current agendas – almost every two weeks, Frank Fields asks for another budget allocation – meaning, the city is over budget, and they need to move  money from one or another “dedicated” fund (rules about spending)  to prop up the General Fund kitty. Chris Contantin’s report on the cop raises is full of assumptions about property tax and sales tax revenues going up. I think we should start calling him Chris “Pollyanna” Constantin. 

They will approve the cop contracts tonight. (NOTE: Excuse me here, I forgot, they have to wait for the two-week sunshine period to be over, so write those e-mails).The cops will get another $2 million added to their budget, which is already more than half the city pie, all based on assumptions. The fire department gets almost as much, I don’t know how much longer Constantin can work his voodoo to  fund everything. When he leaves I predict we will have major problems. 

Did you ever see spit disappear on a hot griddle any faster than that $4.8 million they scraped out of the car seats? That was some slight of hand, Bruddah. 

Well, I wonder if Gandalf is available, because our next city manager is going to have to be a regular wizard.