I’ve been reading an obscure book I picked up from a cousin. The author describes the pitfalls of Democracy. He opines that a decision made by simple majority – only 50%+1 of the voters – is tyranny.
I’ll agree, but what are you going to do about tyranny when you live in tyranny? Over the last 10 years, our liberal state government has quickly and decisively chipped away at our voters’ rights, allowing simple majority decisions on tax measures. When California voters put a measure on the ballot seeking to restore the 2/3’s requirement for tax measures, our governor and his friends in the legislature went to un-precedented lengths to make sure that the voters could not stop tax increases, declaring our citizen’s initiative to be illegal and taking it off the ballot before we were allowed to vote on it.
So here we are in Tyranny, what to do, what to do. People are leaving – to those people, I say, thanks for nothing, you cowards. If all I can do is mau-mau the flak catchers, well, that’s what I’m going to do. Let’s start with the bi-weekly idiot show known as Chico City Council. The problem with Democracy, is who runs it.
The public has been kept out of this conversation for years. Just now we’re hearing that our city legal advisors have been incompetent. The incompetent leading the stupid (council). Just now they’re asking themselves questions like, was the settlement about the eight people named in the suit, or is every unhoused individual that shows up in town part of the “protected class” of litigants? They never asked that question in the beginning? Our $200,000+/year attorneys never asked that question?
We’ve been stuck in this mire since 2018, when Andrew Coolidge went with the liberals on council to sign the Shelter Crisis Designation. That agreement came with over $4 million, but it set us on a path that has led to millions more lost down the rabbit hole. Or let’s say, the mole hole. Council, including Coolidge and current mayor Kasey Reynolds, hired the attorneys who have misled them, and then none of them thought the logical thought – “shouldn’t I check with my own attorney to see if any of this shit is legal or makes sense? What is a ‘class’, anyway?” Even if any of them have had doubts about what any of our city attorney’s have told them, they didn’t have the balls to check into it, or even express their doubt.
The last person on council who asked the pointy questions was Kami Denlay.
Nowadays, it’s common for people to ignore court orders, even defy the orders of the President of the United States. Why didn’t our council refuse to go along with Judge England’s insanity? Because they were afraid, afraid in their little panties – Sean Morgan admitted that on his radio show. Afraid what the consequences would be for them personally. They didn’t give a shit what happened to our town.
While they diddled millions away on the lawsuit, and the not-so-clever game of Whack A Mole they’ve engaged in, they’ve left our streets and other infrastructure to go to rot. They’ve approved subdivisions in every directions, failing to address major infrastructural issues around the existing parts of town. Like the 150 year old sewer lines running under Downtown Chico, into the surrounding neighborhoods, and in one case, directly into Little Chico Creek.
Yes, the sewer line from Tin Roof Bakery was found to be dumping human waste into Little Chico Creek. That story came out because the breach was found by a Chico State class on a field trip. The city has known the sewer lines were a disaster for over 50 years, but nobody has had the guts to do anything about it. They went along spending money on jolly projects Downtown: a $4 million-plus plaza remodel that nobody wanted; lateral parking/no let’s make it parallel again/no let’s make it lateral again; Studebaker strips on the sidewalks, then tore them out to bulb the corners; most recently, “parklet” seating for bars and restaurants, along the very streets that will have to be torn completely out over the next 10 years. All paid for by the taxpayers, many of whom are still waiting for sidewalks, drainage and new sewer lines in their neighborhoods.
Why has the sewer job taken so long? Because instead of directly addressing the problem and applying for state and federal funding to help with the cost, city “stakeholders” have been engaging in a circular argument about turning the sewer job into a total remodel of Downtown Chico. Here, just a year ago, Addison Winslow addresses his happy-wanderer fantasy for a Downtown remodel.
Meanwhile, city revenues are flat, two years into a full cent sales tax increase that was supposed to be the end-all of our problems. We’ve heard about businesses closing Downtown – look around the rest of town. Look at the city reports – sales tax revenues are DOWN, not up. How do sales tax revenues go down after a full cent increase?
City policies are driving shoppers away, that’s how. They keep telling us we don’t pay enough to have the kind of services that used to be what cities exist to do. How has this happened? Ask yourself – how have you voted? Have you voted?
Chico Taxpayers Association 