Costa Mesa Budget Home Stretch

THE CLOCK IS TICKING...
That noise you hear in the background is the clock ticking on our budget process. City Manager Allan Roeder recently promised, in no uncertain terms, that the city will have a balanced budget by the July 1st deadline... tick-tock, tick-tock...

BUDGET TIMETABLE
At their meeting on Tuesday, June 2nd, the Costa Mesa City Council will meet in closed session to discuss negotiations with the employee unions. Later that evening the staff will present to the council their proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2009/2010. On Tuesday, June 9th, the council will hold a study session to review the budget and, if history holds true, there will be a public workshop on the budget, probably on Thursday, June 11th. Final approval of the budget will likely occur at their meeting on June 16th. If there are problems the staff will still have a couple weeks to sort it out before the July 1st deadline. It wouldn't surprise me to see a special council meeting called in the last few days of the month.

DOES ANYONE CARE?
In recent years attendance at that public workshop has been sparse, to say the very least. By that I mean that there have been 3 of us there for the entire program, with a couple other people wandering through from time to time. It always amazes me how little interest there has been by the public when it comes to the budget even though every element of our municipal government depends on how those numbers are crunched.

AWARD-WINNING STAFF
The Finance staff for the City of Costa Mesa has won awards year after year for the past three decades for their budget presentation. Typically, it provides information for every level of interest, beginning with a Budget-At-A-Glance booklet and progressing through a couple documents that provide greater detail and on to the actual budget itself for those nit-pickers and would-be budget analysts among us who actually try to devour the information line item by line item.

CITIES ARE IN TROUBLE
Our city, and every other one in this state, is in big trouble budget-wise this year. Sales and Property taxes are down and the Governor is threatening to "borrow" 8% of our already-diminished property tax dollars to try to balance the state budget. Heck, the City of Vallejo even filed for bankruptcy so it could resolve the crushing burden of employee labor contracts.

"FUND BALANCE" USE NOT AN OPTION THIS TIME
We here in Costa Mesa have managed to get by for the past few years by the creative use of what is known as the "fund balance" - applying left over dollars to the next budget. That pool of money is just about tapped out because it has been used to balance the current budget - to the tune of around $15 million. As a result it's very likely that, for our leaders to balance the new budget there, will be very wide and deep personnel cuts - that's where the money is, after all. Almost 75% of our municipal expenditures are for wages and benefits.

IF YOU CARE, BE THERE...
I encourage anyone who is interested in the fiscal well-being of our city, and the budget process in particular, to attend the council study session on June 9th or, even better, the public workshop on June 11th. My personal experience at those workshops over the past few years has been totally positive - no question went unanswered. Typically they are conducted by Roeder, Marc Puckett, Bobby Young and others of the Finance Department staff. In years past members of the City Council have not attended the workshop. It's the time to get the real scoop on the budget and help dispel any myths you might have about where the money comes from and where it goes, and why.

...OR BE SQUARE
I'll see you at the workshop on June 11th, Conference Room 1A at City Hall. Bring your questions.

FISH FRY TIME!

What are you doing this weekend? I'm spending part of mine at the 62nd annual Costa Mesa - Newport Harbor Lions Fish Fry at Lions Park in Costa Mesa. This is a wonderful community event, the proceeds from which provide funding for many community organizations under the auspices of the Costa Mesa-Newport Harbor Lions Club.

The rides are up and running today and the festivities stretch through Sunday. You'll have a chance to visit with your neighbors, see local politicians cooking up fish and fries and have a great time. Heck, you might even see Mike Scheafer in his fish fry hat! Come one, come all.

Here's a link to the Lions Club web site that will tell you all about it.

People In The News

COMMUNITY VOLUNTEERS AND ACTIVISTS TO BE HONORED
As some of you may have read in Jim DeBoom's Daily Pilot column, on Friday, May 29th, some of our outstanding friends and neighbors are being honored at the Daily Pilot Community and Clubs Hall of Fame Luncheon at the American Legion Post in Newport Beach.

THE "MAGNIFICENT SEVEN"
According to DeBoom's column and the invitation provided, the following individuals are being honored: Christina Holiday of the Rotary Club of Newport Beach Sunrise; Richard Freeman of the Exchange Club of Newport Harbor; Carol Van Holt of the Harbor Mesa Lions Club; Mike Scheafer of the Costa Mesa Newport Harbor Lions Club; Fran Ursini of the Costa Mesa Kiwanis Club; Tim Shields of the Rotary Club of Newport Irvine and Jim De Boom himself, of the Rotary Club of Newport Balboa.

HURRY FOR TICKETS!
The event begins at 11:45 a.m. with a reception and noon luncheon. Tickets are available, but time's a wastin' because I didn't post this earlier this week. Here's the link to DeBoom's column with the information.

KUDOS ALL AROUND
Congrats to all who will receive this very appropriate recognition for their contributions to making our communities such wonderful places to live, work and play.

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INTERESTING INTERVIEW WITH ALLAN ROEDER
Last week I came across a very interesting interview with Costa Mesa City Manager, Allan Roeder, by writer Debbie L. Sklar in PublicCEO.com. This fascinating interview, in which Roeder addresses many of the current challenges facing our city, may be found HERE. This interview only reinforces my opinion that our city continues to be in good hands and that, with Roeder at the helm, we will find our way out of the current financial turmoil.

Just a little note... the city needs to update Roeder's file photo!

Is The Parks & Recreation Commission Bigoted?

LAKERS VS. PARKS COMMISSION?
I completely forgot the Costa Mesa Parks & Recreation Commission was meeting today, so immersed myself in what would be a Lakers win. 3 down, 1 to go - Friday in Denver.

AZTEC BASKETBALL PROPOSAL
Anyhow, I remembered the commission was meeting and flipped over to see what was going on just as they were discussing the agenda item that dealt with the staff's recommendation to permit Aztec Basketball, an organized league of primarily Hispanic players from throughout Orange County, to use the Downtown Recreation Center court on Sundays for seven hours each day for a six month period.

ADDITIONAL $40,000 INCOME FOR THE CITY
Apparently Aztec Basketball is being displaced by facilities in Santa Ana that are being renovated, hence their request to use ours. The owners of the league have gone so far as to acquire a Costa Mesa business license. The proposal would generate nearly $40,000 in additional income for the city. It would also displace drop-in players who currently occasionally use the facility - approximately 22 on average per day.

SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA
The proposal by the staff seemed well conceived and made some sense. It certainly made better use of our facility and would generate some additional income to the city in these trying times. According to Jana Ransom, Recreation Director for the city, they come highly recommended by previous landlords.

THE MOUTH TORPEDOES THE PLAN
Then The Mouth From Mesa North stood to address the issue. During his three minutes he conjured up images of marauding ex-convicts storming into town every Sunday and endangering the children who use our park areas adjacent to the Downtown Recreation Facility. He planted that seed of intolerance that he carries on his hip like a loaded gun and it worked!

A SLOW, PAINFUL DEATH
Yep, at the end of the discussion Chairman Kurt Galitski paused and waited for another commissioner to make a motion - none did. So, treading carefully, he moved to approve the contract with Aztec Basketball as proposed and waited.... and waited.... and waited... for his motion to receive a second. He made the motion again and waited... None of his fellow commissioners seconded his motion, so it died a slow, painful death.

I WONDER WHY...?
I'd like to think that the commissioners actually had good reasons for denying this request, but there was no discussion whatsoever on this issue, so we'll never know. It's easy - and maybe accurate - to assume that The Mouth's presentation had an impact on the other four members of the commission - that it pulled off the scab of intolerance and caused the commissioners to show their true colors by their silence.

COMMISSIONERS SILENCE SPEAKS VOLUMES!
I rejoined the Laker game to watch their victory over the Nuggets, but found myself thinking about this decision - or lack of decision. Since none of the commissioners chose to let us know their views on this issue, I guess we're left to our own assumptions. It's another sad day for our city...

More Mansoor Money & Reunion Musings

I'M BAACK!
I returned home from the long Memorial Day holiday, having celebrated my 50th high school reunion with a bunch of old people (more on that later), and spent part of the day Tuesday plowing through accumulated emails.

FILLING MANSOOR'S COFFERS
Among the other things I did was check some of the local blogs, to see what they thought was important during my four-day absence. Today I found this entry in the Red County/OC Blog, authored by Matt Cunningham, which announced the very first fund raiser for our young jailer(or is he?)mayor, Allan Mansoor in his bid for Van Tran's seat in the California Assembly. You can view the invitation by clicking on the link in that article to see the players involved.

POLITICAL WHO'S WHO
As some might expect, this was a real test of my gag reflex, and became even more so as I read down the list of members of the Host Committee and Honorary Co-Hosts. Among the former are two of Mansoor's appointees - Planning Commission Chairman Jim Righeimer and his pal, Commissioner Steve Mensinger. Another familiar name on the Host Committee list was local businessman Surat Singh. You may recall the dust-up about campaign finances between Singh and Monahan earlier this year.

AND OTHER FAMILIAR NAMES
In the latter category we find mostly politician's names, including Mansoor's barnacle in his last election, Mayor Pro Tem Wendy Leece, Councilman Gary Monahan and a couple more of their appointees - Planning Commissioner Colin McCarthy and Parks & Recreation Commissioner Jeff Matthews, who was Monahan's campaign manager.

TROLLING FOR BUCKS
For a hundred bucks a head you, too, can help fill Mansoor's campaign piggy bank so he can take his "prodigious intellect and razor-like wit" (he says, tongue in cheek) off to Sacramento. I'd send them a check if I thought it would get Mansoor out of town where he couldn't continue to screw up our city.

MANSOOR VS. THE VIETNAMESE COMMUNITY
This promises to be one very interesting race, as mentioned in Cunningham's post on the Red County blog. Mansoor is going to have to go against some very well-connected and financed Republicans from the Vietnamese community - not an easy task.

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REUNION MUSINGS
Back to my reunion. The four-day event was a rousing success, with activities planned throughout the weekend. Fortunately, we all wore name tags with our high school photographs on them - otherwise we'd have spent much of those four days bouncing off each other without a clue of our identities.

CLOSE TO HOME
It was held in Pasadena, not too far from where I grew up. There are no hotels in the part of the northeast Los Angeles barrio where I spent my youth. There were trips to museums, Gold Line rides to downtown with lunch at Filippi's and a little walk through Olvera Street. Some of my classmates drove over to the original Bob's Big Boy restaurant in Burbank to let their taste buds enjoy a trip down Memory Lane, too. There was even a tour of our old school, although it has been completely rebuilt since we attended.

WHO'S LEFT?
I've recently joked to some that the 50th reunion is the one where you show up to see who's still vertical. Well, that was pretty funny until this event actually arrived. While it was fun to see many old friends, it was very sad to read down the list of those who have passed on and realize that, before the next reunion, many of these friends we were sharing fond memories with would not be around for that event.

LIFE-LONG FRIENDS
I've known some of the attendees since kindergarten. Some seem not to have changed a bit since the day we graduated, while others seem like complete strangers - at least appearance-wise. Some of the guys who were star athletes look like they could still measure up today. Others, like your humble correspondent, seem to be built more for comfort than speed these days. Some of the lovely ladies of my youth remain beautiful women to this day. Others look every bit like the grandmothers they are - having dealt with the tribulations of life for a half century since I last saw them.

A GOOD TIME WAS HAD BY ALL
Regardless, everyone had a great time. There were no frowns, only four days and nights of perpetual joy and fellowship. Lots of guys huddled together, sharing stories punctuated by roaring guffaws. Small groups of women smiling and jabbering - seeming all at one time - with the occasional high-pitched giggle at a punchline. There were formal and informal memory tests to re-connect those synapses that seem to have short-circuited a little in recent years. Go ahead - you try to remember the name of your senior class vice president! Can you name the homecoming queen and her court? What was the name of that favorite ice cream store?

MEMORY JOGGERS ON DISPLAY
There was a series of long tables stretching almost the length of the room on which memorabilia from bygone years was placed for viewing and fondling. Bound copies of our award-winning high school newspaper provided us with memory-joggers and many smiles. Copies of old yearbooks made us chuckle as we flipped the pages full of familiar faces from a half-century ago.

AH, THE MUSIC
The DJ played some great tunes of our era. Numbers like "Duke of Earl" by Gene Chandler, "Come Softly To Me" by The Fleetwoods and everyone's "our song", "The Theme From A Summer Place" by Henry Mancini.

PUT YOUR LEFT FOOT OUT....
It was fun to watch as many of my classmates re-lived their youth by doing the Bunny Hop, The Stroll and The Chicken Dance. That old saw about the spirit being willing but the body is not sure came into play. And, it showed once again that not all God's children have rhythm.

STAYING TOGETHER
It was fun to see my prom date again after all these years, and to recall those magic moments with the couple with whom we double-dated that evening. They've been married for nearly 50 years. In fact, an amazing number of couples from my class who married within a few months of graduation are still happily together after all these years.

THE VALUE OF FRIENDS
This weekend only reinforced for me the value of friends - new and old. I'm grateful for having had the chance to tell a few of my old friends how much our relationships way back then have meant to me. Some have remained strong to this day, while others kind of faded away, only to be re-kindled this weekend. And, it makes you realize and appreciate the fragility of life itself.

FRAILTY IS HARD TO HANDLE
It's painful when I sit and talk to a former football star who, today, is dealing with the early stages of Parkinson's Disease, or when I chat with a former vivacious and perky cheerleader who has developed a tremor in one arm. It's tough to sit and visit with a former drill team member who has had both knees and one hip replaced and is dealing with a lot of pain - but still with a great smile on her face.

JOY OF RENEWED FRIENDSHIP
And through all this there was the joy of re-acquaintance - of hearing the stories of kids, grandkids and great grandkids - and of careers successfully played out to the point of retirement. It was inspirational to hear the stories of friends who now trek to far off lands to volunteer their professional services to undeveloped countries instead of playing 5 rounds of golf a week.

VALUE YOUR FRIENDS AND TREASURE EACH MOMENT WITH THEM
So, you young people out there - take if from a happy geezer. Re-connect with the friends of your youth. Go to the reunions. Hug your friends and let them know you care about them. That old clock is ticking....

Memorial Day Musings

ANOTHER MEANDER DOWN MEMORY LANE...
I thought I'd reprise something I wrote three years ago, on May 26th, 2006 - when I was using my previous blog host. Most of you current readers - both of you - have probably not seen this, so I thought I'd share it with you for some nice Memorial Day reading while I spend the weekend celebrating my 50th high school reunion with a bunch of geezers I may not even remember. Yikes! Fortunately, my sweet, patient and much younger wife will join me for this milestone event, to wipe the drool from my chin and keep me from falling asleep face-first in my mashed potatoes. I'll be back next week. Enjoy...

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May 26, 2006

TOTTERING ALONG

As the clock continues to tick I found myself at a major milestone in my life earlier this week. Following a much-needed nice, little vacation that took my sweet wife and myself to our favorite California city, San Diego, and included a few days at another favorite place on the Central California coast, we returned home in time for my scheduled appointment Monday at - ta da! - the Social Security office!

EFFICIENTLY SIGNED-UP
After a brief, efficiently-conducted interview with a helpful young woman, I was out of there in fifteen minutes flat and am now poised to join tens of millions of other American geezers bellied up to the trough of Social Security and Medicare. I confess that I haven't yet untangled the ball of snakes that is Medicare Part D - the prescription drug program. That will come soon.

SURE SIGNS OF MY AGE
As I head on into this summer, which brings with it a major milestone birthday, I find myself having some very strange urges. Meandering through the aisles of my local drug store I find myself slowing as I pass the Ensure display, checking out the flavor choices. I feel my pace quicken as I approach the aisle where the Depends are stacked neatly on the shelves, unwilling to even consider that particular requirement for the time being.

PASS THE DEFOLIANT, PLEASE
Is it my imagination, or are my ears getting bigger? And what's with those hairs? Nobody told me I'd eventually have foliage sprouting from almost every orifice in my head! I used to joke about those nose hair trimmers from The Sharper Image but today, if I didn't tend to my ears and nostrils, you'd think I was wearing earmuffs and growing a mustache!

LOOK OUT! HERE THEY COME!
I find myself glancing over my shoulder from time to time for fear of being trampled by the hoard of baby boomers who begin turning 60 this year and thunder into geezerdom, demanding more and more services and spending money like drunken sailors - just as they've done throughout their lives.

SAME GUY, ONLY MORE OF HIM
All this is very disconcerting. When I look in the mirror as I shave each morning I still see that "kid" who has smirked back at me more than five decades, when I first began scraping off the stubble with a Gillette double-edged safety razor, applied styptic stick and toilet paper to the nicks and slathered on the Old Spice. He has gotten a little more pudgy and his hair has gone from blond to brown and back to blond again. Well, not really blond - more like silver, but I tell myself it looks kinda blond in the right light.

MIXED BLESSING
Even though I love the senior discounts at the movies and restaurants and carry a Golden Age Passport to national parks, I still have a tough time when someone in their forties or fifties calls me "sir'.

WANTS AND NEEDS
All this has given me a little mid-life crisis (don't I wish!) and I find myself wanting to run out and buy a sports car. The only problem is, something in my aging cranium keeps whispering "Buick"! Arrgghh!

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REMEMBER THE REASON FOR THIS HOLIDAY

Have a very safe Memorial Day Weekend and try to carve out some time to remember what it's really about. Maybe this link will help. The photo above is of the American Military Cemetery just south of Florence, Italy. It's a wonderful, peaceful place where the remains of over 4,000 American soldiers who died during World War II are buried.

"The Mouth" Revisited

"THE MOUTH" MORPHS
We've not mentioned our old buddy, The Mouth From Mesa North, lately - with good reason. Seems our pal has decided he's going to become a kind of low rent Matt Drudge. Rather than dazzle us with the product of his prodigious intellect with his blog posts on the CM Press, recently he's become an aggregator - a guy who only links to the works of others.

BEGGING FOR COMMENTS
And, recently he's added the ability to comment on his blog. The only problem with that is that no one noticed, so he's begun begging for comments. I know from personal experience that he doesn't post all comments sent to him. I guess he'll only post comments that agree with his racist world view of things.

LAZY POSTS
And, rather than post a new entry when newsworthy events occur during the day, he simply crams another entry or entries onto the original post for the day.

EARLY ONSET DEMENTIA?
And, I think he may be suffering from early-onset dementia or else he's developed a fixation on the number 670. Why would I say that? Well, twice within the past few weeks he's numbered entries with that number, which had been used in sequence weeks earlier. The most recent occurrence was with his number 700 this week. He initially numbered it 670, but changed it later in the day. For an alleged Mensa guy, simple number sequences of his own creation shouldn't be that hard to follow...

SCREWED-UP LINKS
Today, between 5 a.m. and 11 a.m. he's posted twice on the same entry. The most recent one discusses items on the recently-announced Parks and Recreation Commission agenda for their meeting next Wednesday. He attempted to provide hot links to a couple of agenda items, but managed to screw that up, too.

MORE ANTI-BROWN SKIN BIAS
One of the items, the proposed contract between Aztec Basketball Leagues to rent the facility at the Downtown Recreation Center on Sunday mornings for organized basketball competition, raised his ire. Wonder if the ethnic orientation of the name had anything to do with it? Of course it did!

A NEW REVENUE SOURCE
According to the staff report, by permitting Aztec Basketball League to use the facility on Sunday mornings pick-up volleyball and basketball games would be excluded for those hours, costing the city roughly $3400 in annual revenue. In return, Aztec would provide more than $43,000 in revenue to the city. Seems like a good deal, especially when you realize that only a half dozen people would be displaced on Sunday mornings and that alternative playing times are available to them later in the day.

WATCH HIM IMPLODE!
Our old buddy, The Mouth, has recently taken the entire City Council to task - standing at the speaker's podium and using his three minutes to vent his spleen at them for any number of transgressions - mainly their lack of performance on budget issues. As I watch him rant and rave, flailing his arms and turning beet red, I fear for his health. I'd hate to seem him suffer some kind of seizure while berating the council.

TAKE PITY ON HIM AND POST COMMENTS
So, to make him feel better, I suggest you submit comments to his blog from time to time so the poor man no longer has to beg for comments. I'm not sure what it will take to get them posted - perhaps some obtuse reference to DNA or the wisdom of selective breeding will do it.


IRRELEVANT CARTOON
This poor fellow has become a caricature of himself and is becoming progressively more irrelevant in our community as his predictable, inane rants become even more difficult for people to take seriously.

The Other Side Heard From On Senior Center

FINALLY!
Last night at the Costa Mesa City Council meeting we finally heard from "the other side" on the whole Senior Center issue.

POSITIVE VIEWS PREVAILED
During Public Comments a dozen people stood to speak directly to the conditions at the Costa Mesa Senior Center and only two spoke in negative terms. The remainder (83.33%) spoke with passion in glowing terms about the programs, management and staff.

CHILL OUT, DARLENE
One of the two who spoke negatively, Darlene Letnes, has been a frequent and vocal critic of the center and it's Executive Director, Aviva Goelman, both in person and in writing in the Daily Pilot. Last night Ms. Letnes used much more than her alloted 3 minutes and spoke with such anger that I thought she was going to blow a gasket! Clearly, the Senior Center is not a place where she finds peace and harmony. My suggestion to her is to simply find another place for her recreation and fellowship - perhaps Huntington Beach.

GOELMAN OFFERS OLIVE BRANCH
At the end of public comments Goelman stood and addressed Wendy Leece - the lightning rod for all the turmoil at the Senior Center for more than a year - suggesting that the two of them get together to discuss their differences. Leece later agreed to meet with her.

LEECE OVERSTEPS THE BOUNDARIES
Leece, in her role as city council liaison to the Senior Center, has overstepped the boundaries of her assignment many times. She's taken it upon herself to change the rules and give staff direction - something well beyond the purview of her job.

WITH FINGERS CROSSED...
Let's hope this new spirit of collegiality will facilitate the restoration of calm at the center and that our seniors will, once again, find it to be a haven of companionship, recreation and good will.