By Bob Berkowitz – November 9, 2016 –
When Roger Gitlin was re-elected to the board and I was first elected to be your representative on the board of supervisors, (November 8, 2016) I said there were going to be some changes. Here is the first change we are going to make and it starts tomorrow morning, Thursday, November 10th.
We believe you deserve more than three minutes of one way conversation to make your point at a board of supervisors meeting. After making your case, the supervisors sit in silence and you never know if they really listened to you.
Starting tomorrow you will have a chance to make your case to one or two supervisors at a meeting that will be held every weekday morning. It will be like a staff meeting only we will be your staff. After all, as we have said many times before, we work for you, not the other way around.
This staff meeting will be held every weekday morning at 6 am at the Fishermen’s Restaurant at the entrance to the harbor, that’s right 6 am, and will go for an hour. You are welcome to bring up any topic. Nothing will be off limits. We will listen to you and your concerns. We will interact with you along with others who may be at this meeting. By the way the meeting is no host so whatever you order from the restaurant is on you.
We make no guarantees that we can do anything about your concerns, but we will listen and be helpful where we can.
Why 6 am you ask. It’s because it’s the beginning of the day for most of us and usually does not interfere with anything but sleep. And if you want to discuss a problem that is important to you, you will make the time available.
OOPs I was up @ 0600 just didn’t make it out the door. What I would have asked of the new Supervisors is to do an aggressive, if not a forensic audit of all county and city money.
It has been at least 20 years since there have been 3 supervisors working for the people and THEIR money.
Before any more time lapses between the changing of the guards and if any money is missing from solid waste, the library or any special district, Senior Center, Air Port District, Probation Department or ANYWHERE and since I never, ever heard a treasurers report from the county, city, or special district. Please, have an audit done. I think you folks are starting out great and I would like you to handle any problems BEFORE they happen. As you are aware Roger, when Chere and Pete Blancarte bought their dream home from Finigan their nightmares started. See, ” Was David Finigan involved in a swampland scheme?” Crescent City Times, May 29, 2016. Another incident, The People wanted to know about a report on the alleged embezzlement of funds. You, Mrs. Wilson and others voted for the public’s right to see the report. I don’t recall if Martha was at that meeting. The meeting of the solid waste dept. Martha was at became a terrorizing spectacle. She was out for blood from the start. And when she was finished with you, you would have nothing more to do with the Solid Waste Departments. Some how, as I remember it, you were accused of cleaning up a blighted property and I believe feeding an elderly person or elderly people. And this was confirmed by Martha’s associates. And not only were they her associates, they were members of a board for the elderly. They were also committed to making sure you would never have anything else to do with the Senior Citizen’s Board. The only thing I kept thinking was what do the solid waste dept. and Senior Citizen’s Board have in common? Martha is already in charge of the senior board and it looks like she will be in charge of solid waste. Other than they were both embezzled and you are working with both departments, and you are thorough and will probably figure out who embezzled the money??? Wouldn’t that be a good thing? Oh! Maybe not for Martha or David.
Since she exposed you, (hygienic habitat organizer and a multi-generational nutrition provider) and kicked you off of two boards at that meeting,
HER criminal actions on the coastal commission have been revealed. She is so passive aggressive. As she gives you a great big hug she pees down your leg. Only the rats and other bottom dwellers know what has been going on with these career politicians And it scares me to think what they can pin on you while they have been serving the public” for the last TWENTY YEARS! Especially considering they kicked you off of two boards for helping a guy clean up his habitat and what else? OH! YOU FED AN ELDERLY PERSON!
Watch your backs, watch each others backs. You might want to put a security camera inside the light switch.
O. K. One more time: An audit, who had access to money, how much, dates, all financial institutions, all grants for last 6 years, all unspent grant money, all consultants, how much paid to each, then the millions in bonds, low interest business loans, then who is in the Investors Corp. (Jim Barnst’s deals) whats with the new assessors office forms? I am sure other citizens have ideas about where their property taxes are being spent……….PLEASE, EVERYTHING IN WRITING!
Part Two: Complete a financial report since your first day in office.
This is so cool! Before I was afraid to say what I was thinking about to the supervisors, for fear of retaliation. Now, the supervisors work for me/us and want to know what I am thinking! FAR OUT!
Bob, for you I have extra i’s, already dotted and t’s, already crossed…..
i iti tt ii it tt tt iti ii i itt tt it ti itt i i i i it tt i i i i i i tt tt t tt t t
t t t t t i i i i i i i i t t…..Just until the corrupt ones are in prison or peacefully at rest.
Next, I want all public meetings video taped and saved forever! And my answer to the first person that whines, “We’re too poor to video tape meetings, Then we are too poor to have that special district. IF YOUR GROUP GETS TAX DOLLARS THEN SMILE, YOU’RE ON VIDEO.
I’m sick of hearing how poor we are:
We’re so poor we go to Mac Donald’s and have to put our milkshake on layaway.
Our town’s so poor people get married for the rice.
A guy walked into your house, stepped on a cigarette and your mom yelled, “Who turned off the heat?”
When DNSO was called to remove homeless camps, they would often say it is a county codes enforcement problem, unless the property owner can show that a camp on his own property. But on other peoples property, and on COUNTY owned property, Law Enforcement often said it is not their responsibility, and codes should handle it. Codes would say it is a law enforcement problem, and there is nothing codes can do. Finigan didn’t care, and did absolutely nothing when he was asked to help. Coastal Commission did nothing either. Where does the buck stop?
Congratulations and thanks for the invite Bob,
I’ll state my highest priority items right here but will join you when work allows.
1. Blight is out of control in this county and certainly has taken a huge bite out of our number one industry, tourism. We need large fines for blighted property, add the fines to their property tax if they don’t pay! Use the fines for enforcement! Look at Elk Valley Road from 101 to 199 literally dozens of blighted properties in a row. The same entering town on 101 from either end!
2. Having BoS meetings during the working day smacks of elitism of the worst kind! Enough said!
3. Take a look at the chip seal job on Parkway Drive. Is this indicative of the quality of work that this county willingly pays for? Was payment refused for this pathetic work or did somebody get fired for paying it?
4. I guess your 5 years is now running.
Thank you Bob! This is a real ground breaking offer at any level in politics that I did not expect. When I was little my grandfather would get up early and go out for breakfast, then make it back as we were all waking up, just in time for breakfast again. He would fall asleep in his recliner shortly after dessert each night. I’m going to enjoy this!
Congratulations Bob, and great to have you aboard — the BoS is going to get interesting now; See you there. I am an early riser, so zero six-hundred is on my schedule too. What about the outlaw homeless camps in District 5 that Finigan refused to even talk about unless he thought he was gaining PR for his now failed re-election bid. I would be honored to give you a tour and provide photographs. Please read my comments on this site in the Local Election Results article, under the This Week’s News tab. Two great ways to get them out of there is that land is now designated as a bike path down the Union Street power-line, and they are destroying the environment in Coastal Commission zoned land. Drain the swamp!
Look’s like crescent city swamp is being drained too!