Cal Water is not being honest with ratepayers regarding new rate increase – write to your county supervisor!

14 Aug

NOTE: If you received your Cal Water bill this week, it says there’s a insert enclosed explaining the new water rate increase application. There was no insert in my bill. This could be a problem for Cal Water, there is a legal noticing process with time limits. If you didn’t receive the insert, please send an e-mail to the Public Advisor’s office – that’s Claudia.Portillo@cpuc.ca.gov  Please tell her the bill said you were supposed to receive the notice, but it’s not included. Please cc Third District Supervisor Maureen Kirk at MKirk@buttecounty.net

There is good news on the water rate increase – Third District Supervisor Maureen Kirk has contacted the California Public Utilities Commission and is investigating the process by which a person “becomes a party” to a rate increase case. A “party” will received e-mail notices from the CPUC whenever any motion is filed or anything else happens on that rate case. That’s really nice, compared to what I tried to do – call them up and ask them for the information. They acted as though I’d called the White House to order a pizza.

One of these days I will post the list of “actions” ratepayers can take regarding a rate increase and the series of chutes and ladders by which we are required to file the action.  Watch out for the slide! I really appreciate Supervisor Kirk going to the trouble to do this. 

The bad news is, the process is not much easier for a county supervisor than it is for a regular citizen. The paperwork they’ve been sending Supervisor Kirk is nothing short of onerous. When I asked the CPUC rep if we needed a lawyer to fill this stuff out, he denied that, but suggested we get our county council to do it.  

I suspect like this man who was sent to “help” us is just another flakcatcher, but I’m going to study all the stuff he sent us. By the same process we can file a formal protest, but  that’s another pile of onerous paperwork. 

What I know about this rate increase case is that they are proposing to merge our district with Oroville and Marysville, where the rates are already so onerous, Cal Water has had trouble raising them further. They want to spread them out across a larger district, make us pay for long-needed improvements to those city’s infrastructure. That might be nice for Oroville and Marysville ratepayers, but most of them are protesting this hike anyway.

But this morning Supervisor Maureen Kirk sent me some really good news – the Office of Ratepayer Advocates has already filed a protest on this latest rate increase. It includes “Requests not included in the Proposed Application”.  

II. ISSUES

ORA is still reviewing Cal Water’s Application, but has identified several issues that it intends to review and potentially address during this proceeding.

A. Requests not Included in the Proposed Application Should be Stricken

The application includes multiple requests that were not included in the proposed application. The Rate Case Plan states “[t]he application shall conform to the content of the PA (Proposed Application), as approved by ORA.”1 Pages 16-17 of the General

Report of California Water Service (dated July 2015) include the following new requests not included in the Proposed Application:

o Special Request: Eliminating 10% Cap on WRAM Amortization

o Special Request: Continued Authorization for Balanced Payment Plan

o Special Request: Permanent Credit Card Program

o Special Request: Temporary Metered Service Tariff

o Special Request: Public and Private Fire Protection Tariffs

o Special Request: Rule 15 Main Extensions Clarifications

o Eight Additional items were added to the Special Request regarding Memorandum and Balancing Accounts

As ORA was not given opportunity to perform a deficiency review on these requests, and these requests do not conform to the content of the Proposed Application as approved by ORA, they are outside of the scope of this application and should be stricken.

Furthermore, I just received my Cal Water bill yesterday. On my bill it says, “Please review the enclosed bill insert about Cal Water’s required General Rate Case filing…”  But hey, there’s no such insert in my bill. And, I’m assuming, if there had been, it wouldn’t  say anything about that list above. I’ll have to call them today and also drop a line to the CPUC advisor and anybody else I can cc. 

Please write a note to Third District Supervisor Maureen Kirk, thank her for her efforts on our behalf, and ask her what you can do to help. That’s MKirk@buttecounty.net

If Kirk is not your supervisor, you might also write to your own supervisor and ask them  to give Maureen any help they can.

Tags: , ,

Norman Elarth: “they will speak of uncontrollable external cost increases, rather than overcompensated and underfunded employees”

8 Aug

From the Chico Enterprise Record:

Policies help conceal false allocation of resources

Aquatic centers, solar power, new sports arenas around Sacramento, etc. Many are seeking the notoriety, above-market compensation, or even the cheap entertainment that becomes available by taxing the workingman. The question is why our politicians want to destroy our wealth by investing in entertainment and doubly expensive electricity, particularly since businessmen will not increase production and employment until workers are capable of paying down debt and increasing expenditures.

Unfortunately, while democracy and capitalism are both succumbing to government overspending, public greed, and the faulty allocation of financial resources, the problem is amplified by the leaders of government and its related entities. In order to maintain their power, they must increasingly provide a free lunch even more grandiose than the public can stomach, and hence we often find that their policies are shrouded in falsehood and deceit.

Thus, while our school board obscures the cash bonus and cumulative 9.2 percent raise given to our teachers, they completely hide the additional 4.3 percent of their salary that we will be paying into their pension fund for the years 2014 and 2015 combined. Another 4.3 percent will be added next year under Assembly Bill No. 1469. Their poorly managed total compensation for 10-months work will be about $60 per hour.

When cities and water and power companies help bankrupt our workers and the elderly with increased fees and rates, they speak of uncontrollable external cost increases, rather than overcompensated and underfunded employees.

— Norman Elarth, Chico

Tags: , ,

Why does it take two months to get a simple report out of CARD?

7 Aug

I was looking at the CARD website when I saw a notice of an “Intergovernmental Committee” meeting. I could not attend – it’s not a regular committee meeting, and was only noticed on the website 24 hours ahead – so I asked CARD manager Steve Visconti to send me a report, and to place me on the notice list for upcoming meetings.

From: juanita sumner
Sent: Saturday, June 13, 2015 5:23 AM
To: Steve Visconti
Subject: intergovernmental committee

 Hi Mr. Visconti,

I notice the intergovernmental committee meetings are held on a very irregular basis and not noticed on the website until 24 hours ahead. That makes it difficult to the public to know when these meetings are going  to be held. I notice the last meeting was  a joint session with some members of city council or staff? The agenda is not clear. 

I would like to be notified ahead of these meetings and sent a copy of the agenda. I also wonder – how do I get reports of these meetings? I’d also like to get a report of the last AFAC meeting – it started late, and I had to leave before any discussion or action was taken. 

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation in this matter, Juanita Sumner

It took him more than a week to respond:

Steve Visconti
6/22/15
To: juanita sumner
Ms. Sumner, you are correct. The Intergovernmental meetings are generally on an as needed basis. The most recent meeting was with the City Manager to discuss a few issues related to the City budget and certain fees they collect that CARD has utilized in the past to construct new park improvements. I will notify our new General Manager Ann Willmann that you would like to be noticed on future Intergovernmental Meetings. She will be starting on July 6th.

 As far as meeting reports, I will notify Ms. Marciales as soon as she returns to the office the week of July 6th.

 Thank you for your inquiry.

 Steve Visconti

Interim General Manager

And that was the end of it, Visconti retired, July 6 came and went, but neither Marciales nor Willmann contacted me. Three weeks later I met Willmann when I attended the July 30 budget meeting at Lakeside Pavillion. At that time I asked her again about the report, which they are supposed to be able to provide on demand, but I didn’t press it at that time because the meeting was about to start and I did not have time to hang around afterward. She gave  me her card with e-mail address and first thing next morning I made  my request again. 

From: juanita sumner  
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2015 5:26 AM
To: Ann Willmann <annw@chicorec.com>
Cc: Jennifer Marciales <jmarciales@chicorec.com>
Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee

 Hi Ms. Willmann,

 I’m glad you gave me your e-mail – as you know, most card e-mail address are first initial, last name. I see where that would be confusing to people trying to get ahold of you.

 As I asked Mr. Visconti below, I’d like to get the report of the last Intergovernmental meeting, which Mr. Visconti had told me Ms. Marciales would contact me about.

 I’d also like to get on the notice list for the Intergovernmental meetings, as I had asked.

 Thanks for your anticipated cooperation, Juanita Sumner

She responded as though it was the first she had heard of my request. 

From: annw@chicorec.com
To: Juanita Sumner
CC: jmarciales@chicorec.com
Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 2015 16:50:13 +0000

Dear Juanita, thank you for your email. I will follow up on your requests and also ensure you are on the requested notification lists. Have a lovely weekend. Ann

I am busy you know, I have a lot of irons in the fire, both personal and this, my “hobby” – so I let that go, telling myself, “she’ll get back to me next week.” 

Well, silly me. God I hate being dicked around. About a week later, I sent another request. I try to be nice, cause you’ve seen the way the city clerk treated me just for wise-assing her. 

From: juanita sumner
Sent: Thursday, August 06, 2015 7:31 AM
To: Ann Willmann <annw@chicorec.com>

Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee

 Ms. Willman,

 should I just come down to the office to get that report (most recent Intergovernmental meeting)? 

 Juanita Sumner

And she responded the way she should have responded to the mail I sent Visconti:

From: annw@chicorec.com
To: juanita sumner
CC: jmarciales@chicorec.com
Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee
Date: Thu, 6 Aug 2015 22:26:33 +0000

Hi Juanita, I have attached a copy of the minutes. If you would like to pick up a printed copy, I am happy to leave that for you at the front desk. If email is sufficient, please let me know.

Once we have the next meeting scheduled, we will email you with the information.

 Thank you, Ann

Why did that take two months?  To attach a one-page report to an e-mail.  For that matter, Visconti could have sent it to me in the first place. Did he think “interim” meant, “half-assed“?  He’s retired at 70 percent of $112,000/year CARD salary, they ask him to fill in for six months or so, and he acts as though he’s being put out when asked to actually do something. 

Well, excuse me – this is really Jennifer Marciales job, but that woman is impossible, at a salary of over $50,000/year plus benefits. She needs to go.

I know you’re all wondering – what’s this all about anyway Juanita? Just another chicken fight? I’m sorry I let myself get distracted, but I would like everybody to see how these overpaid public employees treat a person who asks a pointy question. Here’s the report – you  read it, and you tell me why they dragged their feet giving it to me.

To: Board of Directors

From: Intergovernmental Committee

Re: Report on Intergovernmental Committee held on June 8, 2015

Committee Members Present Tom Lando

Committee Members Absent

Jan Sneed

CARD Staff Present

Steve Visconti, Interim General Manager

Jennifer Marciales, Executive Assistant

City Staff Present Mark Orme, City Manager

A. Call to Order/ Roll Call

The meeting was called to order at 9:30 a.m., and roll call was taken as noted above.

B. Public Comments

There were no public comments.

C. City of Chico/CARD Discussion of Potential Future Partnerships

Director Lando discussed the need for another dog park in Chico, and asked Mr. Orme if the City has any property available for a potential future dog park. Mr. Orme stated that City staff is currently conducting a review of properties in Chico, and will provide information once the review is complete. Director Lando asked Mr. Orme to review the green space along Humboldt Avenue for a potential dog park and/or bocce ball courts.

MY EMPHASIS HERE: Director Lando asked Mr. Orme if he could provide the total funds available in the Community Park Fund and the Neighborhood Park Fund, and the criteria for utilizing those funds. Mr. Orme stated that he would review these accounts and provide more specific information.

Director Lando asked about the potential for a sales tax measure, and Mr. Orme stated that a community group would need to present it to the City Council.

Director Lando discussed concerns pertaining to the increase in homeless at CARD facilities. Mr. Orme stated that the City is working on a new platform with the police department that will hopefully assist in preserving the quality of life for the citizens of our community.

D. Adjournment

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 10:04 a.m. to the next Intergovernmental Committee Meeting of the Chico Area Recreation and Park District.

I also think that last bit about the homeless problem at the CARD center is very interesting – this is the unstated reason they moved the board meetings to Cal Park Lakeside Pavilion. Lando’s outrage over “quality of life for our citizens” only seems to extend to himself and the other board members and employees of CARD. The board just picked up and moved to Lakeside Pavilion. Abandoning the CARD center was the worst thing they could do. 

This is why they want to do the fancy rose garden – which will be locked to the public and only available to paying customers. They will remove trees right down to the creek, but I’m not sure how far they will encroach on the creek with the wrought iron fence. That’s another reason to attend the month CARD board meetings, hope to see you there sometime.

Tags: ,

Jim Matthews: change management positions to elected offices, vote out $taffers who show arrogance toward the public

5 Aug

From yesterday’s Enterprise Record:

Make city department heads elected positions

I am very concerned about the recent behavior of Chico City Clerk Debbie Presson by hiding important documents and information from the public. It is her job to protect and serve the voters in Chico, and she isn’t doing it. As taxpayers we deserve better of our highly paid city officials.

Perhaps we need to change all of the management positions at the city to elected offices. That way we can vote out people who show such arrogance toward the public.

— Jim Matthews, Chico

Tags: ,

Latest proposal by Cal Water will merge Chico district with Marysville – where water rates are 300 – 400% higher than surrounding communities

5 Aug

I guess you all heard Chico surpassed the water reduction target imposed by Cal Water and The Moonbeam. 

Well nobody cares, get ready for another rate increase. 

Here’s something I know you’ve all seen – my family went a few ccf’s over budget – what a bunch of soooooouuuuiiiieeeeee pigs! But you know what’s funny? We still paid a WRAM charge of about $4. “Water Rate Adjustment Mechanism” – they didn’t make enough money to cover “operating expenses” (their pensions) so they just cut up the deficit and tacked a portion onto everybody’s bill. Isn’t that kind of crazy – they say I went over my allowance, but they still stick me for not using enough? 

Welcome to California!

We have to fight this new proposal, write those letters to your county board of supervisors in care of clerk Kathleen Sweeney:

KaSweeney@ButteCounty.net

Ask the supers to write a letter to the CPUC protesting this merger. Here’s why:

From Lou Binninger in the Territorial Dispatch:

Marysville residents are already in shock over the region’s highest water rates, 300-400% higher than the surrounding communities of Linda, Olivehurst and Yuba City. By moving 10-minutes away Marysville people could save enough on their water bills over a year to make a month’s payment on a house.

With water rates scheduled to go up another 26% by 2016 council members may face some gnarly voters if another tax measure shows up on the ballot.

Read more at 

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Marysville-For-Reasonable-Water-Rates/176321489194208?fref=nf

Tags: ,

No, Debbie Presson is not going to post the 460’s – is she doing it on purpose? or just incompetent?

4 Aug

Here’s the original post from October 2014 –

Juanita Sumner's avatarChico Taxpayers Association

RE: CPOA 460 late, no reports available online

Debbie Presson
Attachment
10/23/14

Documents

To: Chris Constantin, Mark Sorensen, Mark Orme, dlittle@chicoer.com
Cc: juanita sumner
1 attachment (1484.4 KB)
Download 2014_Political Reform Act.pdf (1484.4 KB)
2014_Political Reform Act.pdf
View online
Download as zip

I would like to respond to Ms. Sumner’s latest email regarding a process that is regulated by the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC).   While I don’t expect Ms. Sumner to print my response nor include the documents that are attached (which have been OCR’d in order for the reader to copy and paste from the documents), I feel it is important to respond so that accurate information (with documentation) can be presented to the public instead of being provided with vitriol that is not meant to inform our citizenry but instead to disparage those individuals Ms. Sumner writes about.   I also recognize by trying to provide this information that I only open myself up to…

View original post 1,004 more words

Presson responds

3 Aug

I posted city councilman Randall Stones efforts to get city clerk Debbie Presson to return the campaign contribution reports to the website.

https://chicotaxpayers.com/2015/07/29/thanks-to-councilman-randall-stone-for-taking-city-clerk-debbie-presson-to-task-over-her-refusal-to-post-the-campaign-reports/

Here’s the link to his Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/ElectStone/posts/732600713534996?comment_id=733024570159277&offset=0&total_comments=22&notif_t=feed_c

Last week Presson responded to his accusations as though he was out of line for bringing this to the attention of the public. 

From the Enterprise Record, last week:

“I think it’s very unfortunate in light of what this organization has been trying to do for the last few years, which is to rebuild public trust, to have one of the elected officials go out there and imply wrongdoing has occurred without talking to me,” Presson said.

Now,  remember, this woman is the one who is supposed to be bringing things to the attention of the public. Tsk tsk. She has not been working on rebuilding public trust, she’s used the public trust like a Depends.

Debbie Presson has created a hostile environment for the citizens Downtown, and if you complain, she tries to throw it on you. When I complained about the campaign reports disappearing from the website last year I got this response (the red ink is hers, I just cut and paste it exactly as she sent it):

https://chicotaxpayers.com/2014/10/24/yeah-debbie-presson-is-a-bitch-and-shes-not-going-to-post-the-460s-is-she-doing-it-on-purpose-or-just-incompetent/

Yes, I call names. I can’t afford to buy a mouthpiece so I have to use my own. I have to browbeat these (excuse me) assholes into doing their job. Sorry, but whatever works. You got a better idea, get your ass in there and show me up. Randall Stone isn’t getting any Brownie points for doing it without obscenities, that’s for sure. 

But, he has apparently got Ms. Presson to return some of the reports to the website. She’s only posted 2005 – 2012, with 2007 left curiously out. No reports for the 2014. In fact, they are supposed to file those reports on a regular basis between elections. Why aren’t they posted?

In that previous post, I asked, does she do this on purpose, or is she incompetent? Several folks are having a conversation on Stone’s Facebook to the effect that the city of Chico is behind in the technology. I think that’s true, and I think one man is right – Presson keeps it that way on purpose. She does everything she can to block the public from getting public information.

What’s maddening is, Presson makes no apologies for being incompetent, she uses it as an excuse. 

Tags:

New ordinance, new salaries – same old problems – how do we get Chico PD to do their job?

3 Aug
When I went to the Airport Commission meeting last week I noticed somebody had taken up residence outside the front door of City Hall.

When I went to the Airport Commission meeting last week I noticed somebody had taken up residence outside the front door of City Hall.

Anybody who frequents Downtown, Midtown, and Lower Bidwell Park has noticed more homeless, or “street” people than ever. They have firm encampments at City Hall, City Plaza, the Vallombrosa post office annex, and throughout Bidwell Park. They mill up and down Mangrove and Vallombrosa Avenues around the Safeway shopping center.   As you get away from the city center and the park,  you see them alone or in pairs, moving along the main corridors of town, congregating wherever they can get cash for recyclables, or be out of the sight of passing cops, like the parking lot behind Raley’s on East Avenue.

The problem being, most of us have a hard time separating the truly needy from the hardpan criminals. Having observed the little mob that congregates at the recycling facility behind East Avenue Raleys, I was shocked to hear a report that a couple of them had got in a fight in broad daylight and one man had produced some sort of blade and stabbed the other.  That got my attention – I’ve parked my car on that side of the store since I had toddlers in hand.  

We see them regularly in our old midtown neighborhood now, they seem to be following the freeway across town. Our immediate neighbors, including a large church, noticed a brief upswing in crime, with some cars broken into and reports of bicycles stolen from garages. A car was broken into across the street from our house, again in broad daylight.  One afternoon not long after that, my husband and I encountered a woman out in front of our house who had just caught a couple of men in her garage with their hands on her son’s bike. She had chased them out and then got into her car to see which direction they’d headed. She said they had one bike of their own, and both jumped on it fleeing her garage. She was unable to follow them.  

This is a pattern I recognize all over town, don’t you?  Watch the local news – people have caught daytime break-ins on their security cameras. Full faces are shown. No arrests have been made that I’ve heard of, not since they got  the kid who was breaking into schools months ago. I haven’t heard of anybody getting their stolen property back either. 

The authorities have always acted as though a car break-in is the victim’s fault, especially in the park. Sometimes valuables have been left in plain sight, sometimes cars are smashed and rifled and nothing noticeable is taken. It’s as though you are stupid to leave your car unattended anywhere, including your own driveway. 

I’ve been shopping for mosquito netting – the other day I saw a screen that is specially made for your big garage door, with zipper openings big enough to get your car in and out. Great idea – airing your garage will cool down your house. But who would leave their garage open and untended around here?

 Did you know, local policeman Peter Durfee is the president not only of the Chico Police Officers’ Association (which is also a political PAC) but also the Chico Realtors Association? Durfee is a realtor? Wow, where does he find the time?  

Durfee is the officer who occasionally gets sick of the criticism of Chico PD and goes on a tear Downtown harassing street people. Not that I mind – he’s supposed to harass people for breaking the law. Anytime he’s felt like it, he’s managed to find about a violation every six feet – the sit and lie ordinance the cops screamed for is very specific. I see violations every time I go out. 

The picture above I took last week at City Hall at about 6:30 pm Wednesday.  There’s almost always a bed  laying in this spot. It still lay there when we exited the Airport Commission meeting, so my husband  snapped a picture of it. As we were leaving the little portico, a bedraggled man came round to see what we were doing. He smiled his drunken smile and greeted us with a tinge of fear – were we going to give him a bad time?   No, that’s not our job. At least one cop and more than a half dozen staffers, including city manager Mark Orme, had passed that bedding on their way into the chamber. He had been smoking in the non-smoking area when we arrived, and was still smoking when we came out. 

I get such a kick out of City Council, I’d really like to return the favor sometime, right in the seat of Mark Sorensen’s pants. They wasted hours of $taff time and passed that stupid sit and lie ordinance despite the fact they’d passed a similar ordinance years before that wasn’t being enforced. Now we see the same with sit and lie. Council also gave the cops very generous raises in exchange for paying three percent more of their pension – 12 percent. Out of salaries in excess of $100,000, they pay 12 percent of  pensions comprising 90 percent of  their highest year’s salary, available at age 50.

I predict Durfee will retire at 50, and then I predict he will make a run for city council. I predict he will be our mayor someday.

Just about the time our town is poised to go straight  down the shitter. Good luck Pete! 

 

 

Tags: , ,

CARD continues to run aquatic center committee behind closed doors

1 Aug

I attended a 3pm Chico Recreation District meeting at California Park Pavilion Thursday to find out that a committee selected at a  closed meeting had interviewed consultants to do a “feasibility study” on behalf of the proposed aquatic center. Their findings – nobody would do it for the $30,000 offered, so they had to up the ante to $50,000.

What this “feasibility study” will include is a guess because they won’t include me in the meetings where they actually discuss it. When I asked staffer Rob Hinderer why I wasn’t noticed for the interviews he replied,

Juanita, good morning!

 There was no AFAC Meeting. There were interviews with the RFP respondents. An interview panel was formed. They were the only persons present at the interviews other than myself and CARD GM, Ann Willmann.

 When the RFP decision is made, I will send out invites to all AFAC members, yourself included, to share the outcome of the RFP.

 Thank you,

 Rob

The last AFAC meeting I was noticed about started late because many of the members didn’t show up. When the meeting started, there was confusion – several of the members wanted to talk about the deplorable condition of Sharpiro and Pleasant Valley pools, and when they would be repaired. They were told those options would be included in the “feasibility study”, but of course, we haven’t seen the study.  The conversation was all over the place, I had to leave about 40 minutes into the meeting. They were supposed to discuss the Request for Proposals that had been sent out to consultants, but Rob Hinderer was still trying to pull the meeting together when I left. 

This 3pm Wednesday  meeting was called to discuss the annual budget. The AFAC matter was part of it because they had to agree on how much to budget for this “feasibility study.” The three consultants who showed up to be interviewed said they couldn’t do a good study for less than $50,000. An ad-hoc committee had talked about $75,000, but agreed on $60,000,  because they wanted to be sure they would have plenty of money to cover it, without having to ask for budget allocations. I don’t think that was the right tack – now they will not have to discuss cost overruns before the public, they just have the money there in a pot to spend it. Oh well. 

That’s why they had this meeting at 3pm on a Thursday at the Cal Park clubhouse, Lakeside Pavillion, instead of at a regularly scheduled meeting at the CARD center. Board president Jan Sneed has taken CARD behind closed doors because she knows they’re playing fast and loose with taxpayer money. 

Sneed tried to act the fiscal conservative. When a board member moved to approve the $75,000 expenditure, she held out for $60,000, just to show us what a penny pincher she is.

Well, she’s skeletized CARD with layoffs because they can’t afford to pay benefits for their workers. New CARD director Ann Willman, an ex-CARD employee who left a couple of years ago to take the helm at Feather River Rec in O’ville, is back in Chico at just over $100,000, according to the Enterprise Record. Her replacement in Oroville gets $70,000, and refused the benefits package because she said her husband already has one on his job. I think they were offering her a $5,000 benefits package. Willman’s predecessor Steve Visconti and most CARD management get packages that cost around  $25 – 30,000/year. 

I don’t know what Willman really makes because new state controller Betty Yee has taken down John Chiang’s  salary database. Now we have to believe what these public employees tell us, and well, you know they will lie to us.  They’re ashamed.

And I’m back on the same merry-go-round with Willmann that I rode with her predecessor Visconti. Here’s the last e-mail I received from outgoing Visconti:

From: svisconti@chicorec.com
To: juanita sumner
Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee
Date: Mon, 22 Jun 2015 16:17:41 +0000

Ms. Sumner, you are correct. The Intergovernmental meetings are generally on an as needed basis. The most recent meeting was with the City Manager to discuss a few issues related to the City budget and certain fees they collect that CARD has utilized in the past to construct new park improvements. I will notify our new General Manager Ann Willmann that you would like to be noticed on future Intergovernmental Meetings. She will be starting on July 6th.

 As far as meeting reports, I will notify Ms. Marciales as soon as she returns to the office the week of July 6th.

 Thank you for your inquiry.

 Steve Visconti

Interim General Manager

July 6 came and went, I got no response from either Willman or Marciales. Jennifer Marciales seems to think she’s paid to do her fingernails.  So, when I went to the meeting Thursday, I was surprised when a human potato walked up to greet me in my chair – “Are you Juanita?” It was Willmann, who had put on a bigger rearend since I had seen her last. I know the Oroville job was rough – Feather River Rec has been in financial arrears for some time, and then there was the incident involving a teenage boy, a camera, and a girl’s toilet. That didn’t play well for Willman, I’m guessing she ran back to Chico crying for Mama.

I repeated my request to Willmann and she gave me her business card, telling me to e-mail her. By law, she’s supposed to have these reports on hand for anybody who requests them, but I played along because the room was full of unfriendly people by that time. I e-mailed her promptly the next morning. 

From: juanita sumner
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2015 5:26 AM
To: Ann Willmann <annw@chicorec.com>
Cc: Jennifer Marciales <jmarciales@chicorec.com>
Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee

 Hi Ms. Willmann,

 I’m glad you gave me your e-mail – as you know, most card e-mail address are first initial, last name. I see where that would be confusing to people trying to get ahold of you.

 As I asked Mr. Visconti below, I’d like to get the report of the last Intergovernmental meeting, which Mr. Visconti had told me Ms. Marciales would contact me about.

 I’d also like to get on the notice list for the Intergovernmental meetings, as I had asked.

 Thanks for your anticipated cooperation, Juanita Sumner

And here’s what I got back – sounds like the same bullshit runaround to me.

From: annw@chicorec.com
To: juanita sumner
CC: jmarciales@chicorec.com; 
Subject: RE: intergovernmental committee
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 2015 16:50:13 +0000

Dear Juanita, thank you for your email. I will follow up on your requests and also ensure you are on the requested notification lists. Have a lovely weekend. Ann

In my past experience, this is a brush off, and I won’t hear from this woman again unless I put a hornet up her ass. We’ll see. 

Tags: ,

Airport consultant just looking for a meal ticket

30 Jul

I went to the Airport Commission meeting the other night to hear a couple of reports and frankly, my head is swimming so full of bullshit I have a hard time putting it into words. 

Excuse me – Frank Fields’ budget report was no bullshit, just straight facts. Frank was detailing the actions that led to essential bankruptcy out at the airport – the airport fund has been completely in the red the last few years, despite a million dollar infusion from the feds every year. Frank explained that the airport fund has been pilfered by way of an initiative passed by council – “cost allocation.”

“cost allocation” is the system by which you steal money from one fund to pay salaries from another department. I sat through that meeting – Chris Constantin explained that every time they have a meeting, they pay staff out of the fund they’re talking about at the meeting, get it? So if they discuss the sewer at an Internal Affairs meeting, the staffers present at that meeting get paid out of the sewer fund. And the electricity for the room, the coffee, Dani Brinkley’s foot wear, the whole nine yards, comes out of the sewer fund. That, by the way, is also how the sewer fund, and the development fund,  ended up in the red to the tune of a million dollars or so a piece.

Then Fields explained another measure passed by council – when a fund is in the red, staff now takes money out of the General Fund to cover it.  And the books are good! 

I think we missed all this. I’m guessing they were threatened with some sort of punishment if they didn’t come up with a better set of books, so here we are. They had too much red ink in their books, and you know what that looks like.  On Perry Mason it’s called embezzlement.

Despite the fact that the city gets about a million dollars a year in federal grants to keep it open for the fire fighting planes, the airport fund is still in the red every year because of the cost allocation bullshit. They haven’t been putting any money into the airport. If you listened really carefully to Tom, the $190,000 consultant from AVPorts consulting firm, you find the real reason we don’t have commercial air service is we have no terminal, and our runway is inadequate. He really slid those by, talking instead about how we need to give him a contract to attract the airlines. He didn’t want to give us too much bad news at once.  He wants us to hire him to do a job he admittedly can’t do. 

We don’t have commercial air service because we haven’t been keeping our airport up to modern standards. We’ll need a new tower, a longer runway, and a brand new fancy terminal. We’ll also need to guarantee them a certain amount of profit – or pay them an “incentive” charge of hundreds of thousands a year. 

But Tom went on and on, getting really excited toward the end of his presentation. While he admitted our chances of getting commercial service were really poor, he kept saying we have to try. 

The major obstacle being – Redding has already done all the stuff above. He expects us to steal customers from Redding, that’s the only way his scheme will work. 

I’ve got pages of notes on this guy – I’ll boil it down for you. Watch “Music Man.” 

And I’ll tell you what else – the feds are going to walk away with their million a year if we don’t make major infrastructural improvements out there. We won’t even have the fire fighting planes if $taff doesn’t quit embezzling that fund to pay their pensions off. 

Orme isn’t telling us everything. He’s sitting on a pile of trouble, I hope it goes right up his ass.

Here’s what I think – why pander after the airlines? Why not wait until they are knocking on our door? 

Tags: , ,

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →