VIDEO OF THE COUNCIL MEETING AVAILABLE
As anticipated, Dane Bora and Brad Long of CMTV have managed to get the streaming video of Tuesday's City Council meeting up and available for viewing. You can view it HERE.
MENSINGER'S COMMENT...
In my previous post I mentioned a comment that non-elected City Councilman Steve Mensinger made at the end of the meeting. I had failed to tape the meeting so didn't have the ability to quote him directly, but paraphrased him. Now that the streaming video is available I have gone back and reviewed his comment. I've also isolated his comment from the rest of the video and present it below my transcription of his comment, so you can read the text or simply listen to him, in his own, unedited, words.
THE TEXT
"I hear clearly a lotta people out there, some people that are employees and some people that are not employees , some are residents and some are folks just from our town. The people that live here, your opinion matters to me, clearly. OK, I wanna make that clear. The people that don't live here, your opinion is important but it really is noise, because this is our community, and I want to make that clear to the folks from the unions, and the folks that are friends of the unions and the folks that come in here and parade their ideas on the microphone, it's noise. You can speak every single meeting. You have a perfect right to do it, but your opinion does not really matter as much as a person that lives in our community. So, while I appreciate it, a lot of the people in my community are beginning to complain a lot about this particular issue. And that is outside interference in our internal city politics."THE VIDEOIf you choose to view Mensinger actually articulating these words go to the video (above) and drag the scroll bar over to just before the 2:12:00 point.
MY QUESTIONS FOR MENSINGERSo, let me g

et this right, Steve. If you live in the city your opinion counts, but if you
DON'T live in the city - but work in the city, or for the city - your comments are just "noise". If you're in a union or are "friends of unions" your opinion doesn't really matter, right? What about business owners in the city, Steve? Do their opinions count? What about your former boss at Arnel? He doesn't live in the community - does his opinion count?
"OUTSIDE INTERFERENCE"?
About that "outside interference", Steve. Do you mean those employees who live elsewhere? Are those the people that folks "in my community" are complaining about? Or, are they complaining about the interference in our internal city politics by the leadership of the Orange County Republican Party, who have decided that Costa Mesa should be - as Wendy Leece stated last night - a Petri dish for pension reform? Is that the "outside interference" the members of "your community" are concerned about? Nah, I didn't think so.
YOU DON'T LIKE TO BE CHALLENGED - BY ANYONE!
I actually think what you're concerned about is
ANYONE who challenges your authority, which is truly ironic, since
ONLY THREE residents of this city voted for you to sit up there on the dais. You
WERE NOT ELECTED to your office, Steve. You were appointed by your pal, who anointed you with the right to sit there, smirking at the speakers before you while you text away with your buddies.
SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR MENSINGERHere's a suggestion for you. How about acting like you are actually worthy of the

job you've been appointed to. How about trying to go through a meeting without any of your not-very-subtle zingers aimed at Wendy Leece and those who speak before you? Think you can do that? How about learning the rules of the game and following them instead of trying to reinvent our city into some kind of fantasy world with you as the king. Think you can do that? I sure hope so.
Labels: Jim Righeimer, Steve Mensinger