Claire Flynn Bids Costa Mesa A Very Fond Adieu

A LIFE-CHANGE AWAITS
Early last week I got some news that I received with very strong mixed emotions... Costa Mesa's Assistant Director of Development Services, Claire Flynn, is moving on.  Her last day with the city she's served for more than fifteen years will be next Friday, July 8th.  I'm happy for her, but sad for the loss it means to our city.

CANNOT LET HER GO WITHOUT COMMENT
Claire is a very private person and didn't what any kind of hoopla to be made as she leaves.  So, I waited as long as I could, but cannot let her departure go without comment - she's been too important to my city to just watch her fade into the sunset.

A LOCAL STAR
A Costa Mesa High School graduate, Claire came to the City of Costa Mesa from Mission Viejo's Community Development Department in 2001.  During the decade and a half with the City she's held five progressively more responsible roles in planning and development and has been in her current role since 2011.

STRONG GUIDANCE AND SUPPORT
She worked under some excellent leaders - Don Lamm and Kimberly Brandt were among her most influential mentors.  Lamm moved to the City of Westminster as City Manager and currently has his own consulting firm.  Brandt is presently Community Development Director for the City of Newport Beach.  And, of course, during most of her career at Costa Mesa she worked under the guidance and leadership of City Manager Allan Roeder.

WILL LEAVE A VOID
Many of us who follow city issues recognize the huge hole this leaves in the Development Services Department.  Claire has been the rock - the consummate professional who could always be depended upon to provide the right answers at the right time to those decision makers she served.

A REAL PRO
Personally, I've always found Claire to be patient, approachable and professional - always ready, willing and able to provide information on development issues to even the most dense of us.  I'm going to miss her.

BALANCING LIFE AND CAREER
Claire will join a private sector organization where her planning education - she has a Master's Degree in Urban and Regional Planning - and more than twenty-two years experience can be fully utilized and also provide her some time flexibility.  Her goal starting this new chapter of her life is to achieve better balance in her planning profession and family life.

 GOOD LUCK, CLAIRE - AND THANKS
So, as she moves off into the sunset of her Costa Mesa career I want to thank Claire Flynn for her service to our city and wish her all the best.  Her talents will be well-utilized in her new assignment and her young daughter will certainly benefit from more quality "Mom time".

Dispatches From The War Zone

FEELIN' LIKE OLD ANDY
You know, sometimes trying to provide accurate, timely information on the activities in Costa Mesa feels a lot like being a war reporter - like that old curmudgeon, Andy Rooney, was in World War II. You know - "We sent 230 bombers to take out Hamburg today, but those darn Hun shot down 50 of them! Better luck next time, fellas!"

NUMBERS VS. "FACTS"
I constantly find myself trying to sort out the "real news" from the propaganda, with both sides doing their best to skew the news to their advantage. Most of the time it's pretty darn obvious, since we're dealing mostly with numbers and they are available for everyone to read and interpret. Sometimes, though, the parties engaged in this epic battle provide us with only one half of the equation and expect us to take it as gospel.

MUIR'S "WASTE WATCHER"
It has gotten almost comical lately. Last Friday the lovely Jennifer Muir of the OCEA fired off the first of her "Waste Watchers" pieces criticizing the "jewel-encrusted" badges provided to Jim Righeimer and Steve Mensinger - $175.00 a piece plus case and tax - as another example of wasteful spending. She also mentioned Bill Lobdell, the city's official mouthpiece, was making more than the Governor's mouthpiece.

"FACTCHECKS"
Over the weekend Lobdell fired back a volley in the form of a "Factcheck", explaining the "badges" and the mischaracterization of them. He didn't mention his pay.

MORE OCEA "WASTE"
Yesterday we get another waste-watcher submission from Muir, this time griping about "$7.8 million on planned cosmetic repairs at City Hall." I've not seen any reply from Lobdell yet.

SPINNING CONTINUES
In the meantime, the OCEA-sponsored Repair Costa Mesa ads continue to run on cable TV and continue to infest virtually every web page I open up with misleading and inaccurate "facts" and the OC GOP-guided (or misguided if you choose) minions of Righeimer - Colin McCarthy and Ethan Temianka - continue to spew their own version of faulty "facts" at their meetings of the Costa Mesa Taxpayer's Association meetings.

INVEST A HALF HOUR
You can view a 33 minute video clip of the last such meeting, HERE, hearing McCarthy and Temianka as they toss red meat to the rabid few - maybe 20 people - who attended. You'll have to bear with it because the quality of the video is pretty terrible, not to mention the "facts" presented. You'll hear "some of the usual suspects" on the tape - Mike and Judi Berry and Jeff Mathews, for example, as they gobble-up the slop being tossed in the trough.

THE "SILLY STUFF"
At 29:00 on the counter you'll hear McCarthy say, "The real issue on the outsourcing, just so that everybody knows, that what gets my neighbors so fired up about it isn't outsourcing fire or police or any of that stuff, it's outsourcing just some of the silly stuff that we don't even know that we have at City Hall. The Print Shop. The guy that gets the pension, benefits and great salary for photocopying when Kinkos could do that. Or the oil change. The guy that maintains the vehicles and changes the oil that gets a salary and benefits and a pension. Couldn't Jiffy Lube do that for a fraction of the price?"

MARKING TIME FOR THE REAL BATTLE
At 31:20 you'll hear Temianka, Righeimer's young associate, get to the nut of the issue when he says, " Outsourcing a few of these departments isn't the end all be all. But, what it's going to do, hopefully, in the next few years is get come of these ridiculous pensions off our backs basically. And if we can even do that and save maybe a million or two a year an get by until those other contracts expire then we have a lot more negotiation power when they come up."

STUDY SESSION TODAY
So, this afternoon when I attend the most recent City Council Study Session in council chambers beginning at 4:30, I'll continue to try to sort the wheat from the chaff and try to decide whether Jennifer Muir is actually our "Tokyo Rose" and if Jim Righeimer and his OC GOP buddies view Costa Mesa as the Sudetenland - to be taken over in the first strike of this war.

FOUR TOPICS OF DISCUSSION
Today we will learn about 1) The Budget Update - plans are for the draft budget to be presented to the council on the 17th.
2) Retiree Medical Benefit Program.
3) Marketing and Communication Initiatives Update - we assume this is the Lobdell/Dan Joyce arena.
4) Consultants updates - could be a long presentation since we have so many of them these days.

KHANH NGUYEN REPLACES BRANDT, MAYBE
Also, this week it was announced that Khanh Nguyen, formerly the Building Official will act as the Interim Development Services Director, replacing Kimberly Brandt who departs on May 13th and moves on to greener pastures in Newport Beach as of May 23rd.