One Final Acosta Point...

ONE LAST POINT...
Before we put the Benito Acosta issue to bed for once and for all, here's a little bit of information for you to chew on.

MY POSITION HASN'T CHANGED
My position has always been that Mansoor treated Acosta differently than he treated his Minuteman pal, Jim Gilchrist, that evening. He permitted Gilchrist to speak longer than the three minutes permitted to each speaker and he allowed Gilchrist to have his 5 dozen or so sycophants in the audience that night stand to be recognize. Despite what our municipal court jester, Eric Bever, says, those folks were permitted to stand to show support.

BIAS ON THE DAIS
Thirty minutes later he refused to permit Acosta to do the same thing, cut his speaking time by thirty seconds and had him dragged from the court in a headlock. That clearly demonstrated a bias against Acosta. Now, even though Mansoor has told the press that his actions that night were not personal, I really find that hard to believe. One month earlier Acosta stood at the speaker's podium and called Mansoor a "f***ing racist pig" - an epithet that was unacceptable and should have resulted in him being escorted from the auditorium at THAT time. Had I been Mansoor on the night of January 3, 2006, that event certainly would have been on my mind as Acosta once again stepped to the podium. I do not believe it wasn't on Mansoor's.

DUANE ROBERTS ON THE ORANGE JUICE BLOG
Today, over at the Orange Juice blog, occasional writer Duane Roberts provided us with yet another bit of perspective on this whole subject. Roberts had been a frequent speaker before the Costa Mesa City Council during those tumultuous times. He was one of many folks who stood and told the council they were wrong for closing the Job Center and for what appeared to be a program of making life miserable for the Latino population in our city.

SAME ACTION, NO REACTION - WHY?
One month after the Acosta incident - three hours into the council meeting of February 7th, 2006 - Roberts stood before the council and, after a short commentary on the First Amendment to the Constitution, asked those who supported the right of free speech to stand and be recognized, which they did. Mansoor did nothing at all to stop him, only admonishing him to speak to the council. If Mansoor's behavior a month earlier with Acosta was appropriate - and the jury this week apparently thought it was - then Roberts should have been ousted from the speaker's podium and dragged from the audience. You can read Roberts' essay on the Orange Juice Blog HERE.

MIXED FEELINGS
As I've said before, I have mixed feelings about this issue. I didn't like the disrespect Acosta showed our city council in the later days of 2005 and early in 2006. I thought his behavior in December was atrocious. I was concerned that if a jury found in his favor - I actually thought they would - it could cost our city a pile of money. On the other hand, if the result came out in favor of Mansoor and The City, it would - in my opinion - send a very unnerving message to those who may wish to exercise their free speech rights before our city council in the future. Time will tell...

WHAT IS THE DOLLAR COST?
The only remaining question I have now is just what did this whole thing cost the city in attorney fees and related costs. Perhaps Kim Barlow will inform us soon.



SOMETHING SPECIAL TONIGHT
Tonight I've chosen a special Christmas clip for your pleasure. I'm sure you'll understand...

JOSE FELICIANO - FELIZ NAVIDAD

NEWPORT-MESA 2009?

I'M BACK...
Well, I'm back. After enjoying a wonderful holiday hiatus I just couldn't stay away. And you thought you wouldn't hear from me until after the New Year!

...AND BUMMED OUT!
While gone I did stay abreast of things here in the Newport-Mesa, including reading the rambling rants of Costa Mesa's racist laureate - The Mouth From Mesa North. I'm trying to figure out whether he has the hots for Katrina Foley or Wendy Leece - or both. The poor, deluded guy just can't seem to get those two blond ladies out of his head! Even when he fabricates issues - like his inference that the miscreants who attacked the homeless fellow with paint ball guns earlier this week were Latinos simply because the crime occurred in an area of town where some Latinos live, even though there has been no evidence or official speculation to that effect - he still finds a way to insert Katrina Foley into the story. Ain't love grand? Yeah, I know he's "married with children", but he's also a big fan of plural marriage, so....

WHAT'S AHEAD?
As the New Year arrives I've been thinking a little bit about what stands ahead for Costa Mesa and Newport Beach in 2009. In both cities there will be difficult issues, many of them controversial, that will face their elected leaders and their city staff.

CITY HALL AND REHAB HOMES
In Newport Beach, the new City Hall is a biggie, as is the ongoing discussion about the proliferation of Rehabilitation Homes in that city.

MUNICIPAL FISCAL TRAUMA
Both cities face the uncertainty of the economy and it's impact on municipal budgets. Even though our state bureaucrats have dragged their feet for six months on a budget, both are already making adjustments and planning for more within the next couple months.

CHOPPING COPS TO BALANCE BUDGET
Our anonymous friend over at the CM TRUTH blog recently broke the story that the Costa Mesa Police Department folded it's Narcotics Unit into the Special Enforcement Detail (SED), delayed some promotions and reassigned officers into existing vacancies in an attempt to reduce costs. We hope that's all that will be necessary right now, but we won't know until we see the post-holiday sales tax numbers. Predictions are bleak. Automobile dealerships along our Harbor Boulevard of Cars are suffering the worst downturn in memory.

CAR DEALERSHIPS IN PERIL
Some dealerships have already disappeared and others consolidated operations to reduce costs. Of course, the elephant in the room is the future, or lack thereof, of the Big Three American automobile manufacturers. If GM, Ford and Chrysler are, in fact, forced into bankruptcy, the "ripple" that will go through all phases of our economy will be more like a tsunami. Predictions of millions of workers facing lay-off as a result is very unnerving. Locally, it could mean the demise of several dealerships in our town, which will result in a major punch in the gut to our municipal budget.

WHITHER SOUTH COAST PLAZA?
Our big sales tax generator, South Coast Plaza, seems to be doing OK this holiday season, if packed parking lots are any indication. We'll know in January.


ACOSTA DRAMA CONTINUES
Other shoes waiting to drop in Costa Mesa include the on-going drama of the Benito Acosta affair. The criminal case filed by the city has, once again, been rejected by an appeals court. The civil suit filed by the ACLU on behalf of Acosta against the city is pending, with the trial scheduled to start in February. In my opinion, the city should instruct Jones & Mayer, our contract legal counsel, to stop any further action on the criminal case and find a way to settle the civil case before goes to trial. If we don't, it's very likely that the ego of Mayor Allan Mansoor will cost our city dollars in seven figures - something we certainly cannot tolerate in these difficult financial times.

SR-55 WIDENING TO BEGIN
In January the widening of SR 55, Newport Blvd. as it passes through the Downtown section of Costa Mesa, will commence. This construction will be a short-term solution to a growing traffic congestion problem. Unfortunately, even though most of the work will be done at night, cut-through traffic adjacent to the construction area will almost certainly increase.

WENDY'S WITCH HUNT
Councilwoman Wendy Leece's on-going interference in the operations of the Senior Center is sure to get much ink in the press as she continues to let the unfounded gripes of a couple seniors drive her own personal agenda and keep the center in a state of turmoil. She has recently complained about being "out of the loop" on issues, yet conveniently didn't mention that she has not attended six of the last seven meetings of the Senior Center Board.

TROIKA BECOMES A JUNTA
As mentioned above, the budget will be a huge concern for the "new" City Council. Of course, none of the members are actually "new" - they've all got at least 2 years experience under their collective belts. That doesn't necessarily mean they're smarter. They just have a lot of tenure between them. We'll see how the new majority will use the power they have as a group, and how much they try to marginalize Katrina Foley's contributions.

PLAYING FIELDS
The condition and use of school playing fields will also be a big issue to be tackled by the Costa Mesa City Council. We'll find out whether our current council plans to take a constructive, conciliatory role in this issue, or if they will attempt to bully the school board into following their requirements.

ANNEXATION
Annexation will also be another big issue. We'll find out, for example, whether Gary Monahan has moderated his position on this subject from his last term on the council, when he exhorted his peers to "play hardball" with Newport Beach on this issue. I thought at the time, and still do, that it was a strange position to take, since Newport Beach held all the cards.

STRETCHING MONAHAN
Regarding Monahan specifically, we'll also find out if a faltering business - he told us he had to lay off a few people this summer - and participation on both the Sanitary District Board (where among his first acts a couple years ago was to vote himself a raise) and as a city council member will stretch his limited skills too far.

BANNING RANCH
The future of Banning Ranch continues to churn. Will it be developed? How much of it? By whom? What will the impact be on Costa Mesa?

DAILY PILOTS FUTURE?
What does the future hold for the Daily Pilot, our local newspaper of record for a century? The bankruptcy chaos continues at the Tribune Company, owner of the Los Angeles Times who, in turn, owns the Daily Pilot and her sister community newspapers. Staff cuts over the past year have severely impacted the news gathering and dissemination by the Pilot. Chops at the top - publisher Tom Johnson and Director of New and Online Tony Dodero - are two very significant losses. Will the Pilot survive? I sure hope so.

NEW COMPETITION?
And, will Tom Johnson and former Daily Pilot editor Bill Lobdell succeed in their recently-announced plans - a story broken here first - to launch an online newspaper to compete with (or replace) the Daily Pilot? According to their web site, HERE, they plan to use the VoiceOfSanDiego publication as their model. As I've said before, my preference would be for them to acquire the Daily Pilot and morph it into the model they have in mind - online first, with a once-a-week print edition. Time will tell.

INSIDIOUS INFLUENCE BY "YOUR NEIGHBOR"
It's going to be very interesting to watch to see just how much influence the guy mentioned in the second paragraph above will continue to have on the policies and actions of the "improver" council majority. His warped agenda has been a driving force for the past decade and has resulted in a definite anti-immigrant slant on many things proposed by the majority.

IT'S GOING TO BE INTERESTING
Right from the get-go 2009 is going to be a very interesting year here in the land of Newport-Mesa. The very first Costa Mesa City Council meeting on January 6th promises to launch the new year with controversy if rumors about pending agenda items are true.

THANKS FOR READING
Thanks for reading my take on these issues. I hope you'll find your way back to these pages in the coming months.

We wish you all a safe, prosperous and Happy New Year!

Appeal, Stats, Fluoride, Tradition & More

UNAPPEALING APPEAL PENDING
Ah, the joy never stops. Today, both the Orange County Register and the Daily Pilot had articles regarding the appeal filed by the City of Costa Mesa in the case of the dismissed charges on Benito Acosta.

According to the Register report, Costa Mesa City Attorney Kim Barlow doesn't expect a ruling by the three-judge panel until next week. The Daily Pilot article quotes Acosta's attorney as stating the appeal "meritless". I guess we'll find out some time next week. In the meantime, that old meter is spinnin' as legal charges continue to rack up on this case.

INTERESTING IMMIGRATION STATISTICS
In a kind of related issue, the Orange County Register Immigration Blog provided us with a brief story and link to a very interesting bit of information provided by something called the Migration Information Source. For those of you interested in such things, I've linked to it here.

FLUORIDATION - OH, NO!
Another issue causing angst in our little neck of the woods these days is the fluoridation of our water supply, which some folks apparently think is tantamount to poisoning all of us. The debate on the Daily Pilot blog has been, er, spirited - to say the least. You can read the relevant articles and their comment threads in the Daily Pilot. There are four separate articles for your consideration here, here, here and here.

FAIRVIEW PARK VS. TRADITION
Also, for us Costa Mesans, the fate of Fairview Park continues to raise the collective blood pressure around town. Mike Scheafer, former councilman, former Parks and Recreation Commissioner and active member of the Lion's Club among many others, wrote to the Daily Pilot suggesting the skate park being proposed for Lion's Park be shifted to Fairview Park because it would displace the Lion's Club-sponsored Fish Fry - a six decade tradition in Costa Mesa. As I type this more than 100 comments have been posted on that article. You can read it here.

COUNCIL TO CONSIDER THE SKATE PARK NEXT WEEK
The issue of Fairview Park and the skate park are apparently going to be on the City Council agenda for next Tuesday evening. I suspect folks representing many views will appear to present their case.

PLENTY OF ROOM
After having driven past Fairview Park a couple of times this week, it seems to me that there is plenty of room on the eastside of Placentia, near the model trains that get used one weekend a month, for the city's second skate park and the parking and restrooms necessary for such a facility. Placement at that location certainly would not interfere with the more passive uses on the west side of Placentia - reachable by the big, ugly bridge.

NOT-SO HIDDEN AGENDA
There are those in our town who devote a lot of energy and blog inches trying to convince us that Fairview Park should remain "pristine" - not a word I associate with that park. Those folks apparently think that any active uses in the park will detract from their plan to bulldoze what they refer to as "slums" - apartments that are occupied by Latinos - to make space for more parks. How pathetic and transparent!

POCKET SKATE PARKS?
Nowhere in the discussion did I see mention of the possibility of utilizing small pieces of several neighborhood parks to place small, single skate elements so the younger children could practice their skills close to home. A simple small bowl or pad with a grind rail would only take up 400 -500 square feet in parks that are infrequently used now.

With only a couple of council meetings left this year, it's going to be very interesting to see how these issues shake out.

The Orange Coast Voice - Costly Legal Action and Day Laborer Harassment

As we all begin to breathe a little easier - both literally and figuratively - because most of the horrendous fires here in southern California are either contained or look to be contained within the next couple days, our attention turns to more mundane things - like the Benito Acosta fiasco.

THE ORANGE COAST VOICE REPORTS
Over at the Orange Coast Voice, published by activists Duane Roberts and John Earl, the current issue presents some interesting statistics about the trials involving Benito Acosta. The current issue may be found at this link. According to that publication, the City of Costa Mesa has already spent more than $130,000 on the two trials involving Acosta, with no end in sight.

LAW FIRM BILLING RECORDS
Please take the time to read this fascinating account and to review the PDF files linked within the story reflecting the bills from the two law firms involved. It looks to me as though the meter continues to spin, racking up significant charges in both the criminal trial - presently dismissed, but perhaps to be appealed - and the pending civil rights law suit filed on behalf of Acosta by the ACLU.

"CHILLING EFFECT"
In the same issue there's an interesting article entitled "Chilling Effect", which addresses the current condition of day laborers in Costa Mesa and their relationship with the Costa Mesa Police. I'm not going to attempt to interpret Earl's words - please read them for yourselves. I will say, though, that the closure of the Job Center has exacerbated tensions between the police and day laborers. This has been compounded by the anti-immigrant attitude of our current City Council majority and their band of "improver" buddies. When you read Earl's account of this situation you will come to realize that relationships between the city government and the Latino community will continue to be strained until there is a change in attitude at the top in our city government. Right now, that seems highly unlikely.

Looking For Answers From Kim Barlow

In the midst of trying to figure out how much of Southern California remains unburned, I submitted a letter to the editor to the Daily Pilot addressing the subject of Costa Mesa City Attorney Kimberly Hall Barlow's recent letter published on those pages. You can read her letter here.

The Pilot published a version of my letter this morning. It was edited for space and to correct what they thought were errors. Unfortunately, their "fixes" only further complicated things. For example, I misspelled the judge's name in the last sentence of my submission. They "fixed" that problem by misspelling it another way!

So, in what may be a feeble attempt at clarity, the following is my submission to them - with the judge's name spelled correctly. I've highlighted items deleted in the Daily Pilot in italics:

***

Letter to the Editor, Daily Pilot

I read Costa Mesa City Attorney Kimberly Hall Barlow's "Sounding Off" commentary, (Peelman's missed oath doesn't negate his principles), published on these pages October 20, 2007 with great interest. Her attempt to clarify the role of Peelman as "our prosecutor", while thorough, left me with a few questions.

When she says, "The City Council does not determine who gets prosecuted, nor does it direct what charges may be pursued, when and under what circumstances charges will be filed, whether a case should be dismissed at some point in time during its course, or whether to appeal a decision adverse to the people.", I find myself wondering just who works for whom? In the dismissed Acosta case the City Council held numerous closed session meetings over many months in which the case was discussed. Are we to believe that these sessions were "one way streets", with Barlow telling the council what is happening without the opportunity for the council - her boss - to "provide direction"?

If that's the case, what happens in the pending federal case filed by Acosta against Mayor Mansoor, Chief Hensley and The City if the defendants wish to try to find common ground for a settlement? Will the attorney ignore that direction if he feels his case is strong?

I certainly don't pretend to have legal training and I'm not being critical here, I just want to know how this "system of justice" is supposed to work. I want to know just how much authority, responsibility and influence our elected officials have in this kind of a situation. It sounds like Ms. Barlow is saying, "none, none and none."

When Ms. Barlow tells us that Mr. Peelman, her associate from Jones & Mayer, should not be taken to task for failing to meet a legal requirement for a prosecutor - which caused the Acosta case to be dismissed - I become concerned. If Mr. Peelman is not responsible for this gaffe, who is? Is the judge responsible because she enforced the rule? Is the defense attorney responsible because she brought it up? Who do we, the people, look to as the party responsible? Even though I hold Ms. Barlow in high regard, this sounds just a teeny bit self-serving.

Ever since Jones & Mayer was contracted to perform the job of Costa Mesa City Attorney, represented primarily by Ms. Barlow, it appeared to me that we were getting good return on that investment. We, the residents of Costa Mesa, really can't judge that, though, since much of what happens occurs behind closed doors. We are not privy to the legal advice she provides, nor the council's questions of her. We don't know whether she frequently has to rein them in to avoid costly legal problems or not. We are left only to judge by the outcome - as in the Acosta case.

Despite Ms. Barlow's excellent account, based on letters and postings on the Daily Pilot blog, there are many people in this community who still find it curious that charges were filed by the prosecutor for the city after the District Attorney's office chose not to do so, and that those charges were filed only after Acosta filed his federal case. Whether it is or is not the case, it looks like we, the city, chose to try to teach Mr. Acosta a lesson - to show him his proper place - for acting in a disrespectful manner towards the mayor at the earlier meeting in December of 2005. It looks like we were willing to spend thousands of taxpayers dollars on a case that would generate $1,000 in fines. None of that, in my opinion, makes our city look very good.

Ms. Barlow ends her commentary with the following statement: "Whether you agree with the decision to prosecute Acosta or with the judge's order dismissing the case, the guiding principle for every prosecutor remains the same. Swearing one more oath does not and cannot change that." Well, apparently Judge Kelly MacEachern felt differently, so who are we to believe?

***

That it - the way I submitted it to the Pilot which was sliced and diced to fit their pages and, apparently, to tone it down a little bit.

I don't know about you, but I'm not very comfortable with the way this situation has evolved. In my opinion, Kim Barlow shouldn't have published her letter. It only served to rip a scab off a festering wound and ended up generating more questions than answers.