Tag Archives: Ann Schwab Chico CA

Ask a simple question.

3 Dec

We had another great meeting over at the library yesterday, and I was so happy to see, despite the ominous weather, a cheerful group showed up for a lively discussion. 

We crowed momentarily over the defeat of Measure J. Casey Aplanalp pointed out that we should consider it an important victory, and proof that a small group can make a difference.  Sue said we should remind other people, even if our voices are a little drowned out on the national level, we can make a more noticeable difference on the local level – it’s a matter of getting involved. We talked for awhile – what’s the best way to get people to be more involved in their local government? 

We could ask Stephanie Taber what motivates her to be so involved – attending meetings several times a week, writing notes back and forth to staffers, asking questions that get kicked all over the city building for as long as Stephanie is persistent in getting the answers. Stephanie combs over the reports and find the discrepancies, and asks the questions that need to be asked. We need more people willing to go to the meetings, morning, afternoon and evening, and ask the same kind of questions. And, go back time and time again, e-mail again and again, and get the answers. 

I’m just too easy – when I asked Jennifer Hennessy about the annual amount the city pays out in pension premiums, she told me about $7 million, and I swallowed it hook, line and sinker. Stephanie was not able to attend, or she probably would have caught it. Mark Sorensen caught it, and asked Hennessy about it later. He had some other figures that added up to more like $11 million. Hennessy sent me a note today – her figure is $10.1 million! 

Whoa. And here I was, thinking $7 million was a lot of samolians! What a dupe I am!

$1.9 million of that total is the “employer paid member contributions” – there’s that confusing terminology again – they mean, the “employee’s share” of the premium that is paid by the employer. 

Stephanie Taber pointed out, that $1.9 million would pay for a lot of police officers. 

Here’s the breakdown of how much the city currently spends annually paying the employee share of pension premiums:

Bargaining Unit  FY10-11 Amount  # of Members FY10-11 EPMC% Current EPMC %
Chico Employees Association  $      128,340.54 79 4% 2%
SEIU – Trades & Craft  $      179,805.62 68 5% 5%
Confidentials  $        12,295.11 10 4% 0%
Management  $      216,952.12 56 4% 4%
Public Safety Management  $      119,193.35 9 9% 9%
CPSA  $      175,646.81 44 8% 8%
CPOA  $      727,452.38 91 9% 9%
IAFF  $      425,517.02 69 7% 7%
 $    1,985,202.95 426

The police and fire employees  complain that safety is at jeopardy due to budget cuts, but read the chart. You see,  if they’d pay the “employee share” of their pension premium, we could save those officers and that 2/3’s of a fire station that Nakamura is threatening because of the failure of Measure J. The police department alone gets well beyond the $900,000 that Nakamura is claiming the city will lose if they can’t tax our cell phones.

Look at their salaries – it would certainly be no skin off their nose to pay their own damned pensions. And, it would leave the city the revenues to hire the extra personnel they’ve been screaming for. And then we could stop paying overtime, and there would be money to hire almost as many more.

I got these figures because I rode my bicycle to an 8am meeting and asked a simple question.  

 

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Oh NO! We’re in the same boat with the Twinkie and Ding Dong eaters

25 Nov

I saw an interesting letter in the ER today – “Mismanagement doomed Hostess”.

I know, why would we care, those cakes are horrible. Studies have shown the high-fructose corn syrup they build those things out of literally tricks your mind into thinking you’re still hungry – off to Obesity!

But, as usual, we find, this enterprise was a giant pillar of the economy – go figure. To think, something that is unhealthy for human beings is good for the economy – you know, like cigarettes and alcohol!

Apparently there were almost 20,000 jobs lost. According to letter writer Paul Ellcessor,  “19,000 good jobs that pay a liveable wage have been eliminated because of mismanagement and vulture capitalism.”

I would challenge Mr. Ellcessor’s idea of a “good job” and a “liveable wage.” I don’t have the specifics on the wages or benefits or working conditions offered by Hostess, but I do know they operate in states where the unemployment level is such that most people aren’t going to question anything resembling a job.  They’re unionized, which means, some guy in a suit makes more than any of the actual workers, driving around from one shop to the other, telling employees to take it or leave it.

But yes, what Ellcessor describes in his letter is all too common in America today.  He calls it “corporate vulture capitalism,” but I would say it’s alive and well in the public sector too. 

A bunch of suits come around and buy a company, whether or not it’s doing well, doesn’t seem to matter.  They can use the company to leverage themselves some outrageous salaries, and as Michael Scott would remind us, “perks!” 

Ellcessor describes how they did it at Hostess: “In September 2004, Hostess filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. They demanded and got over $100 million in concessions from their workers’ unions, claiming they could not compete under their labor contracts, even though their competitors operated under nearly identical contracts and were profitable.

At the city of Chico, management used the threat of bankruptcy to eliminate most lower-wage workers, leaving more money to pay management salaries, benefits, and pensions. 

When they emerged from bankruptcy in 2009 they somehow had nearly $670 million in debt, almost double the $450 million owed entering bankruptcy. Most companies shed debt, not increase it, when they seek Chapter 11 protection.

In Chico, finance director Jennifer Hennessy has made one report after another showing we are in deficit, but the city keeps signing contracts that offer pay raises and allow employees to get away without paying their full “share” of their own benefits and pensions. 

What did they do after emerging from Chapter 11? They continued the same business model and products. Plus, like all good corporate leaders, they gave themselves a raise — the CEO to $2.25 million and other top executives got raises of 35-80 percent.

Chico City Council are currently signing contracts that still offer raises and payment of the employees’ share of benefits and pensions. 

Guess what happened, in January? Now loaded down with over $1 billion in debt, from hedge funds Monarch Alternative Capital and Silver Point Capital, they filed bankruptcy again. Incredibly, CEO Brian Driscoll asked the bankruptcy judge to approve a salary increase and severance pay guaranteeing his compensation if liquidation occurred.

Despite Mayor Ann Schwab’s dire warnings that the city would fall into ruin unless voters approved the cell phone tax, she went ahead and hired a new city manager at a $50,000 pay raise over the previous city manager.   I don’t know what kind of severance package Brian Nakamura was promised, but I’m guessing it’s there in his contract, which you can see by appointment and at 10 cents a page. 

Nakamura is no different than the fly-by-night suits that buy and sell these big companies into the gutter. He has worked in cities all over California, staying for an average of just over a year, then moving along to the next town that promises him more money. He’s made his way up to a salary of $217,000 a year, of which he will be eligible for 70 percent a year in pension, on his 50th birthday, which I believe, is less than one year from now. My bet is, he will not make it in Chico more than 18 months, and he’ll leave us in the same quandary he left Hemet.  

How is this different from Ellcessor’s scenario? Well, the Twinkie and Ding Dong eaters pay the suits over at Hostess – Brian Nakamura is paid out of our property taxes. 

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Council to discuss Section 908 – Hennessy offers monthly reports online as well as to council

16 Nov

Well I’ve been lame lately – I have not been attending the morning meetings. You can withhold that from my paycheck, okay? But I do see, on the agenda for next Tuesday’s council meeting, there is the item we’ve been waiting for  – a recommendation that Finance Mis-director Jennifer Hennessy give a monthly finance report, as per city code section 908. 

Since I wasn’t at the meeting, I don’t know exactly what she will be asked to report – here’s the agenda item, take a look: 

4.2. CONSIDERATION OF FINANCE COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE 8/28/12, 9/25/12 

and 10/23/12 MEETINGS REGARDING MONTHLY FINANCIAL REPORTS

A. The Finance Committee considered the matter of development of a Monthly Financial Report at its
meetings of 8/28/12 and 9/25/12:
Recommendation: Accept the Finance Committee recommendation (3-0) to approve the monthly
report package to be distributed each month to the City Council and posted to the City’s website.
B. The Finance Committee considered the matter of development of Monthly Department Expenditure
Reports at its meeting of 10/23/12.
Recommendation: Accept the Finance Committee recommendation (3-0) to approve the Monthly
Department Expenditure Report to be distributed each month to the City Council and posted to the
City’s website.

It looks all well and good on paper, but having missed the meeting, where the conversation goes all over town, I won’t know exactly what she’s going to give until I hear her giving it. And of course, that’s not going to happen unless the full council approves this recommendation. It would probably be good to write letters to council – send them through dpresson@ci.chico.ca.us

Right now I’m interested in hearing a report about exactly which phone companies are still collecting the phone tax, a draft of Hennessy’s letter to these companies telling them they no longer need to do so, and a report as to exactly how long Ms. Hennessy thinks she will need to complete this task.  This is what we will take up at our next Chico Taxpayers Meeting, we will be drafting a letter to Hennessy and her bosses, asking exactly these questions. I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, I’ll be tuned in Tuesday night, hope you will be too. 

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We need to remind Jennifer Hennessy and Ann Schwab to get cracking on getting that phone tax off our bills

12 Nov

I’m still poking Measure J with a stick. It lays there as if dead, but we’ll see.   Not that I’m so worried about those 14,000 uncounted ballots, but, will the city stop taking the tax now that we’ve sent it to the boneyard?

And according to an article in the Enterprise Record the other day, “it’s unclear what the city’s next step will be.” Finance Director Jennifer Hennessy says the city will “likely have to proactively inform” the phone companies they no longer need to collect the tax. Well, let’s write those letters folks – that’s jhenness@ci.chico.ca.us  – no, that’s not a typo, that is her correct city of Chico contact.  Remind Ms. Hennessy she needs to contact those phone companies NOW. Tell her you’d like to get copies of those notices. 

And, ask her for a list of those companies that DO collect the tax – as far as I know, it’s only AT&T, even though the ER article says there’s only one carrier that doesn’t collect. 

In Chula Vista, ratepayers are still awaiting the outcome of a trial, set for this coming January, to determine if they will be REFUNDED of money that was collected by way of the old tax. This old tax was in effect all over California, and all over California people are throwing it off. The original law allowed for taxing of land lines, NOT cell phones. The City of Chula Vista brought forward their own version of Measure J, to “modernize” the tax for their own use. Their voters rejected it soundly. But, the city continued to collect the tax.  They said the law was too vague.

Your vivacious Mayor, Ann Schwab, admitted in her “argument in favor” of Measure J, that the old law  needed to be “modernized,” or the city was “at risk” of losing this revenue. What does she mean, “at risk” ? Is she going to pull the same kind of bullshit they pulled in Chula Vista? Ask her at aschwab@ci.chico.ca.us

In Chula Vista, the city claims that ” municipalities all over the state collect a similar tax under similar ordinances.  The original ordinance never intended to exempt from taxation the usage of mobile communication devices that are in common use today.”

See that article at 

http://www.thestarnews.com/latest-news/judge-oks-pursuit-of-lawsuit/

Be ready to hear the same bull from Schwab and Barker. And be ready to go right back on the warpath. If they don’t stop collecting the phone tax, we should go after a reduction in the Utility Tax rate, to 1 percent or less, and then go after an exemption for ALL citizens who qualify for the rate assistance programs offered by the utility companies.  

When the ER reporter asked me for a comment, I told her The Chico Taxpayers Association would follow this thing, and I’m ready to do that. That’s what it takes. The CTA isn’t going to go away. 

 My grandma had a little poem hanging on the wall of our bedroom when we were kids. “Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn! The sheep are in the meadow, the cow is in the corn! “  For those of you who didn’t grow up on a farm, those are bad things – the sheep are scattering, and the cow is wrecking your corn patch.  “But where is the boy who’s to look after the sheep? Why, he’s under the hay mow, fast asleep!” Hey, is that you? Are you sleeping while the cow is eating your good sweet corn, and your sheep are about to be hit by some drunk on his way home from The Four Corners?   At the bottom of the frame, there were the words, “Go After the Cow!” Yes, wake up, write those e-mails, tell those cows, “get your hooves out of my phone bill!” 

HERE’S THE ER ARTICLE FOR REFERENCE

With Measure J failure, City of Chico waits to understand impact

By ASHLEY GEBB-Chico Enterprise Record, Staff Writer
Posted:   11/08/2012 12:05:48 AM PST

CHICO — While Chico voters appear to have defeated a change to the city’s telephone users tax Tuesday, it’s unclear what the city’s next step will be.

Measure J asked voters whether to amend wording to the city’s telephone users tax to encompass modern technology such as cellphones while decreasing the tax rate from 5 percent to 4.5 percent.

With all precincts reporting early Wednesday, the tax measure was failing, with 53 percent opposed.

The tally to date is 12,451 no votes and 10,973 yes votes, with still about 14,000 ballots left to be counted in all of Butte County.

If the measure fails, the city will likely sustain a major hit in revenue that supports the general fund, said Finance Director Jennifer Hennessy.

The city currently receives about $1.4 million annually in telephone user tax revenue, of which $900,000 to $1 million comes from wireless telecommunications providers. That may not be the extent of the loss, Hennessy said.

“Over time as more people transfer from having landlines to having cellphones or other types of voice communication that’s not covered under our current ordinance, our tax base will continue to decrease,” she said.

City Attorney Lori Barker declined to state impacts until Measure J’s outcome is finalized, but she said she will prepare a report for the City Council once all the votes are tabulated.

Measure proponents said its passage was critical to protect tax revenue, while opponents argued it was a regressive tax that unfairly targeted students.If the measure does fail, Hennessy predicts the revenue loss will begin this fiscal year.

The time frame also depends on phone companies, she said, and the city will likely have to proactively inform them they no longer need to collect the tax.

All but one company currently collect the tax. Metro PCS stopped paying the tax in March 2011, causing a loss of nearly $80,000.

“We will be working with the new council as for what priorities are, where we cut the funds, where we cut the expenditures,” she said. “There will be some tough decisions.”

Juanita Sumner of the Chico Taxpayers, a group that worked to raise public awareness about Measure J, said members now will wait to see if the city stops collecting the tax. She noted that in Chula Vista, where a similar measure failed but the tax continued to be collected, the city is being sued.

“Chico Taxpayers are ready to follow this issue to its end,” she wrote in an email.

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We are not alone! NO on Measure J! NO on Schwab! NO on Stone!

5 Nov

Some citizen placed these colorful fliers on cars along the perimeter of Chico State the other day.

Sue received this picture from a friend who spotted these fliers over near Chico State campus last week.  We can only guess who put these out, and be really thankful that there are some other people out there who aren’t afraid to act.

We had our regular First Sunday meeting yesterday, library, 9am.  We have a core of diehards, willing to come down to the library on a Sunday morning when they could be snuggling up to a plate of blueberry pancakes!  We have people who have spent time reading and yakking over documents and boiling them down to half-size bullet point sheets, people who have literally stood out on street corners to hand them to fellow citizens, and taken time to explain this measure to people who were hearing about it for the first time.  

We have a group who was willing to put up their own dough to print signs, and then move out in unison to get those signs placed around town.  We have Toby Schindelbeck, who not only set us up with a printer but went about putting out ‘NO on J’  signs right alongside his own.  He and Andrew Coolidge are the only candidates in this race who have taken on Measure J – where’s Bob Evans? Was his signature on the ‘argument against’ just a one-night-stand?  And,  I sure haven’t seen Ann Schwab speaking on behalf of this measure that she brought forward herself. Where are the ‘YES on J’ signs Ann? 

At times I fear ‘Democracy’ is just a pipe dream.  It’s really hard work, and a lot of people don’t seem to be willing to put into it what they expect to get out of it. It’s frustrating talking to people about issues, and then hear what one of our members heard in a door-to-door conversation – “I vote however the newspaper tells me…” 

The Chico media has said there’s “no organized opposition” to Measure J. School Administrator Magazine defines “organized opposition” as “two or more individuals banded together to fight a local school bond or operating levy proposal…”  Well, gee, that would be, The Chico Taxpayers Association. There’s at least four of us at every meeting, with seven regular members on the mailing list. Our meetings are wide open to the public and noticed here, where anybody who can string together an intelligible sentence on topic is allowed to join the conversation. You can also spy on us via the library website – the meeting room schedule is there for everybody to see. It’s as if the proponents of Measure J are just wishing us away – David Little edited “Chico Taxpayers Association” off the letter I sent to the paper, I thought that was kind of weird. 

Meanwhile, here’s the website for the Chico Democrats:

http://www.chicodemocrats.org/index.html

Or you might approach them at their HQ over on Mangrove, but don’t ask any pokey questions or Bob Mulhullond will show you some Chicago style politics.

And here’s Guzzetti’s joint, Chico Conservation Voters:

http://www.chicoconservationvoters.org/index.html

it says, there’s three members – Kelly Meagher, who pays for everything, Dave Guzzetti, who issues all the orders, and little Jessica Knothead, who does the bidding of Guzzetti. 

Where’s their public meetings? Where’s their public discussion? 

And then there’s the Democratic Action Club of Chico – that’s Mark Stemen and Maria Phillips – they have a Facebook page which you can only look at if you have Facebook. When Stemen had a meeting at the library, he got in trouble for trying to kick out a woman who was not a member of his club – he’s not allowed to do that at the library. I guess that’s why I haven’ t seen them schedule another meeting there. 

Isn’t that funny – the “Democrats” don’t seem to believe in Democracy!

Thanks whoever you are, anonymous stranger. I hope you will continue to spread the alarm. Wow, Paul Revere could have used a good copy machine. 

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Are you tired of this? Me too.

22 Oct

I’m looking for a caption for this picture – something imaginative, not the same old cranky drunk potshot. There’s more to this picture than a snarling bitch holding on to a sixpack. Think about it. The winner gets a $5 gift certificate from Shuberts and a free ‘NO on J’ sign.

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Thanks Toby and Sue for getting those ‘NO on J’ signs out there!

22 Oct

Wow, at last, a change in the weather. Kris Kuyper reported single digit humidity last week – my hair was standing on end, my nose was bleeding, my skin was itchy, I had about enough “drought season” for this year. I can’t wait to go outside after this downpour and take in all the fall colors. 

Our little plastic ‘NO on J’ signs are holding up well. I want to thank Toby Schindelbeck and Sue Hubbard for helping me get these signs out. My husband and I have taken little forays, and we’ll be out there again today and tomorrow, but it’s so gratifying to see signs we have not posted, out there waving in the wind like little red warning flags.

Cause I got a sign, and I’ll wave in the morning, I’ll wave it in the evening, all over this land – it spells out D-A-N-G-E-R, it spells out W-A-R-N-I-N-G, it spells GET YOUR HAND OUT OF MY PURSE, ANN SCHWAB!

 

 

 

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A real “grass roots” endeavor

20 Oct

I remember way back when Casey Aplanalp contacted me via my “Ad Hoc” blog in the Enterprise Record, asking me if I would like to form some kind of group to oppose Tom Lando’s proposed sales tax increase.  We talked it over and came up with the name “Chico Taxpayers Association,” and an “organization” was born.  I started this blog on word press, and yakked it up, and before you know it, we had a group of the “usual suspects” – people who had very little in common except their compulsive curiosity about government spending and intuitive suspicion toward tax increases. We’ve carried on with regular First Sunday meetings, same place, various times, trying to get the public to pay attention what we consider to be EVERYBODY’S BUSINESS.  

We found no support in this community for a sales tax increase, in fact, we heard from many people who were angry about it.  I think we added to the pressure that forced Lando to take a “break” from his tax-raising activities, obviously hoping that public sentiment will change significantly by next year, when I believe he intends to ask council for a special election. 

But we couldn’t let up at that point, because Ann Schwab had already introduced her cell phone tax, eventually Measure J, and it seemed like a “no-brainer” to re-tool our little weed-whacker to oppose this obvious G-snatch. 

We have no registered PAC, no officers, we collect no money, and we have no manifesto. We have a word press site, and a regular standing date at the library. 

According to wikipedia,  “A grassroots movement (often referenced in the context of a political movement) is one driven by the politics of a community. The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous, highlighting the differences between this and a movement that is orchestrated by traditional power structures.”

Well, I’d say, we’re about as “grassroots” as it gets. 

And then there’s the opposition – led by our mayor, Ann Schwab. I’d say, a woman who’s been sitting on council since 2004, mayor since 2008, is pretty clearly a “power structure.” Of course, city council is supposed to be a non-partisan body, but try telling that to Bob Mulhullond, the guy who kept his own wife in a “non-partisan” office for 30 years! There’s nothing “spontaneous” about these people  – you can always expect an ugly letter from Steve Troester regarding whoever the conservative front runner is. This morning he unleashed his pen on Toby Schindelbeck – how telling! And you can expect the same last-minute hit-mailer from Michael Worley, even though he got fined by the FPPC for the mailer he sent out in the last election because he put a fake name in the return address – tried to rip off Mothers Against Drunk Drivers – how low will “Miguel” sink this time? It’s anybody’s guess. 

Somebody has already trashed one of the signs I gave a neighbor, along with a Bob Evans sign. Somebody!  Welcome to Chico Elections! 

Oh well, I will say, it has no effect on my enthusiasm. Today I spent an hour at the library, sitting in the lobby with some signs and my sample ballot. The library was busy as usual, I’d say, two or three people came in that door every ten minutes. I had a couple of good conversations – the usual reaction – people are surprised to find out about the tax. It’s not like anybody’s advertising it. You don’t see any “Yes on J” signs around town, do you? The sample ballot was only delivered Tuesday, I wonder, has anybody read it? This morning my husband and I drove out around town, covering the east-south corridor from mid-town out toward Doe Mill and then over to Chapmantown. Most of the people we spoke to had not heard of Measure J, had not had a chance to look over their sample ballot. I worry that people will not have a  chance to look at the text of this measure until they are standing in the voting booth, so I’m out there, and I’m saying something. 

I’m telling people, read your sample ballot, you’re likely to find all kinds of outrageous stuff! 

 

 

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The new buzz phrase – “budget neutral…”

16 Oct

I am really disappointed in the Chico Enterprise Record lately. I don’t know why – it’s not like the ER has ever been a great newspaper, but at least, it has  been more of a real newspaper in the past.

I don’t know where they got the gal that wrote the story on Measure J, but she needs to take a math class.

According to Miss Ashley Gebb of the Enterprise Record, “The rate change, if applied to an average cellphone bill of $50 per month would change the tax from $2.50 a month to $2.25.”

There she says, “an average cellphone bill of $50 per month…” She’s saying the average Chico cell phone bill is only $50. When I asked her about this, she said it was “an issue of semantics.  I wrote “an average phone bill” not “the average phone bill.” No, Ashley, there’s no “semantics” involved here – according to the dictionary, “average” means “constituting the result obtained by adding together several quantities and then dividing this total by the number of quantities.”  

Furthermore, she took the exact words out of Ann Schwab’s argument in favor, changing the word “the” for “an”, like she said, as if that makes some kind of difference.

She  insinuates that everybody already pays this tax. She says some carriers haven’t collected the tax – she means, only AT&T has and that’s been illegal for 30 years! 

Sorry Ashley, you wrote a propaganda piece. You didn’t bother to contact anybody in opposition of this measure. All she had to do was google “no on measure j chico ca” and the first thing that pops up is this blog.  Our blog was on the news the other night – seems like the tv news reporter went a little farther in her efforts to get the real story. Gebb’s piece comes off in favor of Measure J. I’ve run it below, pretty sloppy, but you can read it for yourself – it’s a propaganda piece, not news. 

That’s because, Dave Little wants it to pass. He believes “most” people do not pay enough taxes. He’s just bitter because his house is upside down.

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/13-Stratford-Way-Chico-CA-95973/52456465_zpid/

The house he bought in 2007 is worth over $100,000 less than he paid for it. Of course, look at the tax history – he’s managed to get the assessor to cut his taxes by almost $1,000 over the last four years. Wow, I wish he’d shake down with that information – the “average” person would be afraid to go to the assessor – he can also assess your house for MORE! But I doubt he’d pull that kind of shit with the editor of the local “newspaper.” Gee, how nice for Dave! But still, his house is overtaxed, and he’s pissed about it. He wants a baseball stadium and all these bells and whistles for his public charter school kids, so he’s allowed Tom Lando to talk him into this Measure J bullshit – yes, you know Tom Lando is behind this, Ann Schwab is too stupid to come up with it herself. 

Little sent his brand new reporter out to do a little story about Measure J – why not a more seasoned reporter? Somebody who knows what’s going on in our local politics?  Because he doesn’t want a real story, he wants Measure J to pass. 

GEBB’S STORY FROM THE ER

Telephone users tax put before Chico voters

By ASHLEY GEBB – Staff Writer
Posted: 10/15/2012 12:35:27 AM PDT
CHICO — The jumble of taxes tacked on to phone bills may go unnoticed by
many, but one that provides revenue to the city of Chico may garner a little
more attention come Nov. 6.
Measure J is asking voters whether to amend wording to the city’s telephone
users tax to encompass modern technology, while decreasing the tax rate
from 5 percent to 4.5 percent. Revenue from the telephone users tax
supports the general fund.
Since implementation of a telephone users tax in 1970, the city’s existing
ordinance, like similar ordinances statewide, defines services subject to the
tax by referencing a federal telephone tax.
As phone technology has modernized, the outdated definition is being
challenged in many cities and some phone carriers have quit collecting the
tax.
To protect against losing revenues, many cities are updating their
telecommunications user taxes through voters. Nearly all the measures
have been approved, such as one in Oroville in 2010.
“It’s not a new tax, it’s just paying attention to the fact we have different technology than we had 30 years ago,” said
Councilman Jim Walker. “It’s not like we are trying to find a windfall for the city. The way our current tax law is written,
the city stands to lose $800,000 or $900,000 in revenue because we have antiquated verbiage.”
If Chico’s measure succeeds, the tax would apply to all users of telephone communication services, including
cellphones, voice over Internet, paging, text messaging and landline
services. The tax would not apply to Internet service,
pay phones and low-income residents.
The rate change, if applied to an average cellphone
bill of $50 per month would change the tax from
$2.50 a month to $2.25.
Council members Ann Schwab, and Andy
Holcombe and Mary Goloff also support the
measure, saying it is critical to prevent loss of tax
revenue that ultimately supports police and fire
services, road maintenance and park funds.
Rejecting it, they say, could keep Chico from
remaining solvent.
The city currently receives about $1.4 million in
telephone user tax revenue a year. It is estimated
$900,000 of that comes from wireless
telecommunications providers — revenue that could
be at risk if the ordinance is not updated.
In March 2011, Metro PCS stopped paying the tax,
causing a loss of nearly $80,000.
Measure opponents state the tax is one more opportunity for the “bloated Chico bureaucracy” to get more revenue
out of its residents.
“(City) taxes on water, electricity, natural gas and phone service are bleeding Chico’s citizens and businesses dry

12 Telephone users tax put before Chico voters – Chico Enterprise Record
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“City government must tighten its belt by cutting back on nonessential programs and services.”
As for arguments the measure’s failure will cause cuts to critical city services, “isn’t that what they always say?”
Sorensen said. “It’s up to us what we cut.”
“Another problem is it’s regressive, so it hits lower-income folks harder than it does higher income because it’s a
bigger portion of their allegedly disposable income,” he added.
It also remains to be seen whether the city would lose any revenue, said Sorensen, who predicts there could be a
gain.
Councilman Scott Gruendl disagrees.
“There is a lot of misinformation out there,” he said. “Part of the argument in opposition to the tax measure is it’s
more taxation on the people, when in reality, the existing tax ordinance is out of date … Something that never gets
said is the fact we will be taxing cellphones — we already tax cellphones now.”
Gruendl has also heard criticism the city lowered the rate to deceptively encourage voters to support the measure.
Yes, the city wanted to incentivize people, he said, but it lowered the rate to not boost city revenue when more people
begin to be taxed.
“We wanted to be as budget neutral as possible,” he said.
Connect with Ashley Gebb at 896-7768, agebb@chicoer.com, or on Twitter @AshleyGebb

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Ann Schwab sold the airport to Northgate Aviation for $250

10 Oct

Last spring I did a couple of posts about the airport lawsuit – still in progress – and the other day I got a comment from a person who seems to be in the know about the situation. I don’t know who this person is, or if their information is reliable, but it is interesting, I’ll say that.

From “frequent flyer”:

Just a few facts as I understand them to augment your story:

1. Jay’s budget is hardly unlimited, and apparently the city can outspend him. I don’t personally know his finances, but this really stings. He also is paying one lawyer; the city has many fighting him.

2. Northgate Aviation used to reside in his building and left suddenly. However, that’s just business. It’s what happened after they left that went off the rails.

3. When Northgate moved into the hangar next door, I heard they did so without any permits. They eventually received permits I believe, although I heard it took two years.

4. When the city gave Northgate the lease on the hangar, they included the ramp space in front of Jay’s (privately owned) building, a building which according to the city can only be used for aviation-related business. Mr. Jay cannot park a plane in front of his aviation-only building, and to make sure no one else does, Northgate parks their fuel trucks in front of his building. This is like buying a house and finding out that the city gave the driveway access to your neighbor. BTW, Mr. Jay’s primary business is selling airplanes. Ever see a used car lot without any cars? Totally weird. Anyway, the lease should have been rewritten IMO, but has not been. It is a 30 year lease I believe.

5. Tycoons and small business folks alike visit FBOs, and I stand side by side with these guys when buying fuel. Some of us need 80 gallons, some need 2000, but we’re all treated like royalty. To give you an idea of the service differential between Chico and the rest of the world , Sacramento International’s Jet Center is like Nordstroms, Northgate Aviation is like buying a Gyro at the Thursday Night Market. Not swank. It’s embarrassing and frankly, if I were a corporate exec, I’d tell my pilots to get some fuel in Oroville at $1/gallon savings, fly to Sac and have a nap, and pick me up at 4pm. The worse part is not knowing is someone is going to show up. I’ve called for fuel at 6pm (they’re open 7am-7pm) and have been arbitrarily told that fuel stops at 6pm. Seriously? Then there was the guy who found out he couldn’t buy fuel on Thanksgiving. That’s not how pilots roll. We land, we need fuel, as we often carry just enough to get from point a to point b….weight considerations and all.

6. Apparently the City/Airport manager told Mrs. Maria Rock in a private email that was accidentally CC’d to someone else involved with the case that an exclusive deal to run the FBO could not be assured, but he did assure that no one else would be able to have an FBO. That’s actually illegal, since the city has accepted federal funding which specifically states that the city cannot limit competition. In other words it is not up to the city to determine who operates an FBO, as it is meant to be a capitalist, Darwinian Free-For-All. Could Chico support 2, 3, or 4 FBOs? Who knows, but it’s not up to the city to determine the fate of the service providers. Let me be perfectly clear: The city has no jurisdiction over who can open and run an FBO. If they don’t pay rent, that’s another story, but insofar as the application and approval process is concerned, it’s winner take all, may the best man win, and all that rut.

7. Finally, and this is just plain annoying, Mr. Jay registered the name Chico Jet Center on 11/19/2007, and the Rock’s did so on 1/7/2008 4 times: One for Chris, one for Maria, and twice for Northgate Aviation Inc as Northgate Aviation Chico Jet Center. Part of the lawsuit I believe (really I’m not sure but I’ve heard this come up) is a cease and desist order barring the use of the name. The problem is that Dan Jay was denied a “Jet Center” and the name will eventually wind up with whomever uses it the most.

Wow, what an earful of mismanagement.  I’ve talked to other people who fly fairly often out of Chico airport, and they tell me the same thing about the fueling station – Gomer and Goober could do a better job, apparently.

A friend of mine told me even the commercial commuter jet has problems with the fueling station – a  commute flight he was on was held up because the employee at the fueling station had fueled the plane incorrectly, dangerously so. The pilot had to get out of the plane and wander the FBO area, looking for the attendant. When the employee couldn’t fix it, the pilot had to sit on the tarmac running the engines until half the fuel was “burned off,” then re-fuel correctly. That’s absolutely unacceptable as far as I’m concerned.

In past the airport has been managed by Dave Burkland, city mangler. Now we have a new city mangler, with a new contract. I’m not sure what’s going on at the airport these days, but I bet Ann Schwab knows.

See, Maria and Chris Rock, the owners of Northgate Aviation, are Big Dicks in the Democratic party. When I did a casual google search, besides contributions to the Democratic party and  Democrats like John Edwards, I came up with a $250 contribution from Maria Rock to Ann Schwab’s 2008 campaign. That may sound like peanuts, but it was one of Schwab’s biggest individual contributions. And, as I scanned the contributions reports, I found there are many ways to contribute to various organizations and keep your name completely out of it. I’m guessing the Rocks are heavy hitters among the local liberals.

But here’s the real reason. Money might get you some attention, but you better be ready for the push and shove of politics too. People like the Rocks who open their checkbooks for politicians always expect something in return. And Maria Rock apparently gets what she wants, not so much with her checkbook as her nasty temperament.  I talked to two different people who don’t know each other, but know Maria and Chris Rock, and both used the same word to describe Maria Rock – “bitch.” One said, “horrible bitch,” and the other one used “awful bitch.” I was shocked, neither of these people use profanity with me, but wow, they sure called Maria Rock a bitch. All I did was ask them what they know about it, and that’s what they said, Maria Rock is a bitch. She makes phone calls that could skin a cat, and will confront people and humiliate them right in front of others.

So that’s why Ann Schwab is allowing this lawsuit to parole along – she’s afraid of Maria Rock. Our mayor, toothless hound dog, lackey to the rich. Thanks for nothing, Ann.

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