CARD plans to add Nance Canyon to their assessment district – meeting tomorrow – Thursday night – 7pm, CARD Center on Vallombrosa

17 Aug

Here is the most recent article I was able to find regarding assessments on your property by agencies like Chico Area Recreation District. 

Click to access calbudget.pdf

Tomorrow night, CARD will discuss asking the county to add Nance Canyon to their assessment district. They are also discussing their plans to place assessments on us for their planned aquatic center.   That is done by mailed ballot – explained in the above article.

Since 1992, state law has required that local agencies considering implementing any assessment notify affected landowners 45 days in advance and hold a public meeting and a public hearing on the proposal.(9) The notice must include the estimated amount of assessment per parcel, the purpose of the assessment, the dates, times, and locations of the public meeting and public hearing, and instructions for protesting the assessment, if applicable. The notice must either be mailed to all affected landowners or advertised in local newspapers, depending on the number of affected parcels and the use of the proposed assessment.

Write to CARD and ask them when they plan to mail these notices out, or if they are going to try to sneak the notice under the radar in some back-page ad in the ER or N&R? You can contact the board here:

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

You might want to remind them, they’ve paid two consultants so far who’ve told them the public doesn’t back this project and that it will only be used by 15 percent of the population. Ask them why they insist on spending money on consultants to get an assessment instead of maintaining Shapiro Pool, closed permanently earlier this year after years and years of sub-code neglect. Instead they proceeded to spend as much as $400,000 a year on pensions for less than 30 employees. 

 

 

Chico Unified, CARD getting ready to dive into your purse

16 Aug

We will have at least two new taxes coming at us this coming year, including Chico Unified School District Bond Measure K on the November ballot, and a mailed assessment from Chico Area Recreation District.  

CARD will have a speaker from “Every Body, Healthy Body” discussing efforts to include Nance Canyon in the assessment area. That’s Thursday night, 7pm, at the CARD center at 545 Vallombrosa.  

The best way to fight these grabs, is get involved early.  I’ll try to keep you posted, but I wish I could get somebody to attend the school board meetings and report here. 

 

 

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. 

 

Hey Bob! I need a proof reader…

4 Aug

No, dammit, I did not attend that “Local Government Committee” meeting yesterday. I had wanted to find out if the county had come up with a plan to close the poo ponds at the dump yet, but I guess I’ll have to write a note to staff and ask where that discussion has gone.  They’ve already admitted that if they close that facility to enlarge the dump, as planned, septic service companies will have to truck their cargo out of the county. One staffer reported that would double the cost of having a tank pumped.

I don’t know how many people on the committee or staff have septic tanks, but they should know, almost all of unincorporated Butte County is on septic as well as quite a number of homes in Chico. A lot of people already don’t get their tanks pumped often enough – now what? Staff has been working on “alternatives,” including a new facility at Chico Wastewater Treatment Plant and Fly Factory, out there west of town. I don’t know about that, I think that would also prove to be cost prohibitive for homeowners. Given that our sewer fund has been in the red for years, pilfered by “cost allocations” to different funds to pay salaries and benefits, this just sounds like another opportunity for the City of Chico to put their thumb in our pie. Or in this case, our septic tanks.

There were a few interesting items on that agenda, but things pile up on me by 3:30 in the afternoon, it was 105 on my patio, didn’t seem like a good idea to mount the old three-speed and go gallomphing out into the 3-digits.  Oh well, I’ll have to check in with staff and see what they’re up to.

Instead of going to the meeting, I decided to stay home and work on another project. I’m looking for proof readers – Hey Bob!  Can you contact me here, I need you to read something over for me, see what you think.

 

You have to read the agendas

30 Jul

I haven’t been hitting the public meetings lately folks – when I realized this the other day, it was like waking up at the wheel of a moving car.

You know, Butte County public works manager is threatening to close the poo ponds at the dump, he says this will double the cost of having your septic tank pumped (!), and our local government officials are sitting around with their thumbs up their asses cause most of them are on sewer.

I just realized, my supervisor is on sewer. She represents two of the hill-billiest communities around here, Forest Ranch and Cohasset, and a district full  of septic tanks in Chico, and she doesn’t have a clue about septic tanks. Does she think the residents of Cohasset will pay twice as much to pump their tanks? No, when their tanks fail, they will call “Midnight Septic Service” and neither the county nor the city will be the wiser.

I told Maureen about the new soda machine at the Cohasset Store. Within a week somebody had shot it full of holes, leaving a note: “What? No Budweiser?!”  

Maureen is over her head, I don’t think she knew what she was getting into with that district. When the county made their trash franchise deal, County Administrative Officer Paul Hahn said his office’s phones “rang off the hook for two weeks with complaints.” I’d say, he was lucky people used their phones.

Maureen’s constituents had been blind-sided. She’d offered up a little public meeting at the Forest Ranch store, but didn’t notice it properly, and nobody came. When the deal rolled out and rates were increased while service was cut,  they were really pissed. I made a point to make sure they all knew who was responsible – most of my neighbors in Forest Ranch did not even know what district they were in, much less who was their Supe. Now they sure as hell know. 

Did Maureen learn anything? I don’t think so, this poo ponds thing has been kicking around in meetings for the better part of a year, and she has not notified her constituents. She has an office, and a staff, paid for by us, and she could get a list of her district addresses from Candy Grubbs, send regular notices as to what’s happening – especially stuff like, “the cost of pumping your septic tank is about to double…” – but she chooses not to.  She could have a website, but does not. 

So, I will have to attend the “Local Goverments” committee meeting next week, how exciting. I’ll try to keep you awake.

Click to access LGC-8-3-16-AgendawithAttachments.pdf

Actually those meetings are full of interesting topics. At the same time they are discussing screwing septic tank owners all over Chico, they will give us an update about how they are trying to force more people onto city sewer. They will also discuss an accusation made by the Grandiose Jury that Chico does not spend enough “local taxpayer dollars” on the homeless. I’m sure some of you might have something to say about that. 

Of course there’s nothing on this agenda or any other I’ve received about pending rate increases from PG&E and Cal Water.  Nor is there an update on the trash franchise deal.

Does anybody pay attention to this stuff? No, at least half the residents of Chico are butt in air, head in gopher hole. That is a position that leaves a person is prime position for a good screwing.

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. 

Chico a homeless Mecca? Butte County funds the programs that bring them flocking

25 Jul
 
 
See the little orange tent pitched there behind the hotel? I see people camped out here almost every time I go to Walmart.

Look hard, just a little to the right of the dark SUV – see the little orange tent pitched there behind the hotel?

Again, I’m noticing an uptick in the number of “street people” around Chico – including these pictured, camped illegally there behind the Oxford Suites. I often see signs of illegal camping on that lot – an old mattress sat against the back of a dumpster for a couple of weeks,  the usual trash accumulating on the ground nearby.  

As my husband and I drove out to do errands the other morning, we came across Chico PD rousting a camp at the Intersection of Pine and Mulberry, at the tiny green triangle bounded by Little Chico Creek.  There always seem to be camps there, the trash piles grow, until some local feel-good group goes in to clean it out. Then the bums just move back in.

Hey, Brad Montgomery – look at the agenda for the June 28, 2016, Board of Supervisors meeting:

3.03 * Agreement with Chico Community Shelter Partnership – The Chico Community Shelter Partnership is a non-profit organization dedicated to assisting individuals in their efforts to achieve self-sufficiency and a more stable lifestyle. The Chico Community Shelter Partnership has operated the Torres Community Shelter, providing shelter and related social services to those experiencing homelessness in the community for over 13 years.  Approval is requested for an agreement with Chico Community Shelter Partnership to provide peer-based services to homeless individuals through client support and mental health outreach services, and to shelter guests experiencing mental illness. The term of this agreement will be July 1, 2016 through June 30, 2017. The maximum financial obligation under this agreement shall not exceed $108,000 – action requested – APPROVE AGREEMENT AND AUTHORIZE THE CHAIR TO SIGN.

 Care to comment on that Brad? Where’d that money come from? 

Read the rest of the consent agenda here:

http://buttecounty.granicus.com/GeneratedAgendaViewer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=330

One handout for the indigent, mentally ill, badly parented, and filthy after another. Maybe that’s what this lady was talking about in this letter to the Enterprise Record:

POSTED: 07/17/16 Chico Enterprise Record

 It seems city managers, planners, stakeholders and social, nonprofit agencies have found the world of zero redevelopment dollars is like navigating a three-mast schooner without sails.

HUD’s 20 percent of redevelopment’s entitlements for low-income housing and services has introduced a criminal and dysfunctional population that is overtaxing police resources and skewing crime statistics for Chico. The city, having used redevelopment funds for acquiring “blighted” properties for years, is now in the process of using Community Development Block Grants for distributing their debt-imbued booty, including that low-income gift card to the nearest hedge fund.

And this brings us to the greenfield developments in southeast Chico. HUD, preferring to partner with intact redevelopment agencies and planners, is the wild card in this cold deck, with the added risk factor of direct foreign investment as a possible player in this backroom game.

The future of Chico is bleak and dangerous, because the mordant legacy of redevelopment and its partnerships has been a secreted and cynical, as well as delusional, belief in economic devices to promote land use policies for a “clean and safe” Chico that have failed spectacularly.

A trip downtown to coffee shops or walking city streets exposes one to a gauntlet of miscreants and mentally ill individuals, with no apparent boundaries, dumped daily into public domain by their agencies’ betters. Why would anyone believe the City Council, planners, or economic partners of finance schemes care about anything but their spreadsheets and pocket books? I don’t.

— Carolyn Hana, Chico

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:

Get ready to stand up to the tax grabs

16 Jul

Something Bob has reminded me time and time again – nobody is stepping forward to oppose these tax measures that are tossed at the ballot. For example, a general sales tax increase was approved by a squeaking 51.55 percent of the voters (51 percent required!) of Paradise, with absolutely no opposition? Nobody came forward, no local group, no public-minded individual, came forward to oppose that increase. 

Click to access results-1.pdf

That’s on page 8. 

Unbelievable. 192 people force a town of over 26,000 people, not to mention the surrounding residents who bring their business to town, to pay an additional half cent sales tax? 

As is usually the case, the city of Paradise made vague threats to cut services from cops to clerical if they didn’t get the money. But nobody came forward to tell the voters about this?

http://publicpay.ca.gov/Reports/Cities/City.aspx?entityid=82&fiscalyear=2015

http://www.city-data.com/city/Paradise-California.html

First you see 11 management salaries over $100,000, police making $80 – 90,000/year, then you see median residential income at about $39,000.   I hate to be melodramatic, but come on – these public pigs are living on the backs of some of the poorest people in California. 

How did this measure pass? 

First you see – abysmal turnout. Only about 300 people even voted on the measure. 

Second, like Bob said – no opposition. Not even one person willing to provide their name and phone number or a simple argument as to why this measure should not pass.

In November we have at lease one tax measure coming at us – Chico Unified Schools.  The last news I had was in June – the board voted to go to the ballot. I would like to write an opposing argument to this measure, and any others that come up, so will be watching the clerk’s website for the information.

Look at these salaries and benefits – these people are lining their nests with our children’s futures.

http://publicpay.ca.gov/Reports/K-12/K-12Entity.aspx?entityid=6320&fiscalyear=2014

If you are as sick as I am of this dog-in-manger behavior, join me in opposing these tax grabs. 

 

 

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