Sunday, March 13, 2011

Righeimer's Big Lie

RIGHEIMER AND LEECE ON FOX 11 NEWS
Tonight Costa Mesa Mayor Pro Tem Jim Righeimer and Councilwoman Wendy Leece were invited to speak on Fox News at 11 on the Costa Mesa outsourcing issue. In a great stroke of irony, considering the fact that the Righeimer-led majority on the council recently voted to dissolve the ABLE helicopter program, fully half of the hour-long newscast was preempted by their coverage of a pursuit - which included participation of not one but two law enforcement helicopters!

LEECE FIRST, RIGHEIMER SECOND
When the Costa Mesa segment finally began both Righeimer and Leece were
given two chances to respond to questions. Leece went first in both cases, and made her point that the outsourcing plan was unnecessary, and outlined some of the efforts taken in recent months to reduce the budget gap by reducing the size of the city staff, which she referred to now as "bare bones". Righeimer emphasized his view that we had "blown through $30 million in reserves over the past two years."

THE LAST QUESTION TO RIGHEIMER
Anch
or Susan Hirasuna asked Righeimer his final question, "But Jim, do you know how much it's going to cost to outsource all these services? Whether or not it will actually save any money?", to which he said the following:

RIGHEIMER'S ANSWER

"Listen, it will save money simply because the load cost that costs onto an e
mployee. If you've got a 30 or 40% cost addition for a normal employee from the private sector your gonna do it for a lot less. Understand, in this outsourcing process, like with the Fire Department, the Orange County Fire Authority has already offered jobs to all our firemen to take those jobs if they go over. And any other employee that works in our city will be offered jobs in these private companies that's brought in to do the work."

JIM RIGHEIMER IS A LIAR!

That final portion of his answer demonstrates, one more time, just how willing he is to play fast and loose with the truth. In fact, his last sentence is nothing more than a big, fat lie! Righeimer has no way of knowing if ANY current employees will be offered
jobs to successful bidders for city operations or not. There have been NO final decisions about which, if any, current city functions would be outsourced. Even the Fire Department proposal is still far from a done deal. There have been no specifications created against which outsiders would bid. There have been no requirements for any current employees to be offered jobs. The exception, of course, is the proposal by the OCFA, which does include the transition of some, but not all, fire department personnel. And, Righeimer failed to mention that those current firefighters who do transition to the OCFA will all take a pay cut and have to contribute much larger percentages to their medical and pensions. The total hit to the average firefighter has been estimated to be from 15-19% - at least.

KEEP YOUR EYE ON THEM!
I know you're g
etting tired of me telling you this, but you simply cannot take your eyes off these guys for a single second! It's obvious that they will say anything necessary to get their way, including flat-out lies.

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8 Comments:

Blogger Unknown said...

Wendy did a great job. She was well prepared, articulate, and did a great job in using her time effectively.

Riggy, on the other hand, relied on non sequiturs and lies, once again using his bogus forecasts of soaring government costs which are conjured from thin air.

3/14/2011 07:33:00 AM  
Anonymous Wes said...

Recall Leece!

3/14/2011 09:02:00 AM  
Anonymous almostdone said...

Speaking of thin air. I know this blog is about Costa Mesa for the most part but I'd like to comment on the ABLE issue from a Newport Beach perspective.
In Wendy's OC Register column about closing ABLE, NB Police officer Tom Fishbacher tells about ABLEs participation in evacuating the beaches in Newport in preparation for what might happen after this weeks Tsunami.
From a 'what could happen' perspective think about how valuable that resource would be if a life threatening Tsunami was imminent along our coast. It would be a life saver.
As 'wellarmed' commented in that article, for a city like Newport Beach to let this resource fall away without supporting it through what it takes to give a regional reorganization a chance is so near sighted it's amazing.
I'm wondering if the well to do citizens of the Balboa Peninsula, Balboa Island and the ocean front in Newport have anything to say.
Has anybody over there outside of public safety even thought about it?

3/14/2011 09:08:00 AM  
Anonymous ConcerendforCM said...

Wait.....Righeimmer *gasp* lied?! No way! You mean the guy who a few people who post here and those who post on his FB page that he is such a great guy and gonna save Costa Mesa???
Well I'll be.....

Of course he did! He has no clue what he is doing. In my opinion he is nothing but a carpet bagger and a home wrecker. Yes I said home wrecker. Putting pensions aside he has no idea what he is doing to the security of many who work there. He acts like he is not taking this lightly and yet that is exactly what he is doing. Call this an emotional argument all you want. It is the truth though. Also, Monahon said that the council is ready and willing to listen to what the employees have in terms of suggestions but he too is lying. Employees, as a I type this, are reaching out and offering ideas and such and they are turning a deaf ear to it.

Those four guys on that council are just disgusting.

3/14/2011 09:29:00 AM  
Anonymous Wyatt Earp said...

Maybe we should start a running tally of Rig's lies and half truths. Don't forget how Leece caught him and the budget director at the council meeting conjuring up their own PERS numbers to inflame and scare the crowd. The budget director even had to admit those have as much of a chance to go DOWN as they could go up.

3/14/2011 11:13:00 AM  
Anonymous Harry R said...

Hey Wes, What do you think if we include outsourcing the City Council except for Wendy up to this point who atleast is examining everything with out a clear agenda...... She has not lied yet, soory for the unions with the other (4) losers

3/14/2011 02:15:00 PM  
Anonymous Max said...

Recall Riggy!!!

He should have just said, I'm on a drug, and it's called Jim Righeimer!

It doesn't matter if I'm incompetent or have only lived here for a few years and don't know what I'm doing. I'm Jim Righeimer and got lucky at election time that people didn't realize I was for selling the fairgrounds and outsourcing Costa Mesa to lowest bidders that will hire illegal immigrants and do horrible work. I was also behind that commie idea to ban RVs and boats and turn the city into one big HOA. Go figure.

Fight for freedom, fight for Costa Mesa, and recall the worst plague our city has ever faced. Recall Riggy before it's too late.

3/14/2011 04:31:00 PM  
Anonymous pepper23 said...

RECALL? What are we waiting for?

3/16/2011 11:09:00 AM  

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