City Council Preview for March 5

On Tuesday the City Council starts its fourth month. Last week I covered their performance (Click Here and Here) in the prior three months. The bottom line is that evaluation is that

• The city is doing an adequate job maintaining the services, projects and programs already in motion.
• On all but one of the two dozen plus projects that were at various stages of completion last year, there has been no discernible progress, even though hundreds of thousands of dollars of savings could be realized.
• Not a single new project or program has been suggested.
• Civility is near an all-time low with Council members being charged with assault, Council members attacking residents and making false accusations, and investigations underway concerning FPPC violations as well as bribery.

Watching the City Council in action is a bit like watching paint dry. If it wasn’t for the temper tantrums and outbursts by Councilwoman Neeki “Dumb it Down” Moatazedi, it would be no fun at all.

There isn’t much to draw your attention this week, but here it is -

MID-YEAR BUDGET REVIEW

It’s standard to review the budget at mid-year and make adjustments. Here are the highlights of the staff’s report –

• Revenues are expected to come in $1.2 million additional and expenses are expected to increase by $1 million. That’s good news.
• Two new people will be hired beginning in May to prepare for the opening of the Civic Center, that has been pushed back from Summer to Fall. This will require $33,000 extra.
• Staff is considering a “summer recreation program” for children. SVUSD and the Boys and Girls Club offered programs and staff is recommending SVUSD. An extra $14,750 is needed this fiscal year and $37,000 in the next fiscal year.

As far as I can see, there is no information about what the “summer recreation program” is or why SVUSD was chosen over the Boys and Girls Club.

As far as I can tell, the City is making no efforts to rent out the Civic Center and earn what could be millions of dollars a year in fees for meetings, conferences, weddings, etc. The addition of two people in May will certainly not be adequate since most bookings are scheduled 6 or more months in advance.

Last year, when Councilwoman Basile and I argued for adding a person, at least part-time, to start getting bookings, staff argued back that we were engaged in so many activities that filling this position might detract from these other more important projects. Now that absolutely nothing new has been initiated in 4 months, staff’s argument seems unsupportable. Without hiring a person right now, we are going to be missing out of optimizing our rental income for the new Civic Center.

COMMUNITY CHOICE AGGREGATION (CCA)

Councilman Dwight Robinson and former Councilman Andrew Hamilton were pushing this project for years. The idea is for cities to privately contact with power suppliers to be the exclusive power provider for the city. IOW – instead of having to use Southern California Edison or Southern California Gas, CCA allows the City to designate someone else as the power provider.

One of the reasons to support such an idea is that the companies seeking to gain the city contract are another supply of campaign contributions for corrupt politicians who rely on special interests to fund their campaigns. Over the years, companies seeking city contracts have contributed thousands of dollars to politicians without the moral backbone to turn down these funds. Here are a few examples of the companies –

• Athens Services (street sweeping)
• CR&R (waste management)
• Nieves Landscape (landscape)
• Griffin Structures (building)
• Farino Construction (building)
• LSA Associates (building)

Putting aside the new sources for campaign contributions, there are no compelling reasons to proceed with this project. There are no guarantees that the new service will be cheaper, nor is there any guarantee that even if the new provider is initially cheaper, events may cause them to raise rates or even go out of business. It is only a few years ago that the entire State of California has an energy crisis by choosing Enron, and the extra costs to the State from this bad decision were in excess of $40 billion.

CCA should be defeated, but with four people on the Council who accept money from companies seeking city contracts, the chances of defeat are slim.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Jim Gardner was on the Lake Forest City Council from 2014 to 2018 and Mayor in 2018. Under his leadership the City became the first debt free city in the U.S. with a population over 25,000 people and the first city to live broadcast City Council meetings that allowed residents to participate online (Click Here). Dr. Gardner is one of the organizing members of Lake Forest Community Action Network. You can check him out on LinkedIn and/or Facebook and you can share your thoughts about the City at Lake Forest Town Square on Facebook