Final Thoughts on Recalling Hamilton - Part 1

It was my sincere intention to take a break over the Holiday season and avoid any comments on the recall of Andrew Hamilton. After all, since August 2017 I wrote over 100 articles for The Patch, and 5 of them have been about Hamilton -

Life After Hamilton

Is Hamilton “AWOL”?

Toll Brothers Sets New Record

Councilman Hamilton – Still M.I.A

Recall of Andrew Hamilton Succeeds

Surely that was enough. But three events sucked me back in and cause me to once more address the issue – Claims of dishonesty levied by Hamilton’s supporters and Hamilton’s flyer and his Patch article.

Hamilton’s supporters are constantly claiming that I am dishonest and use false facts. So I went up to their lair and posted a complete copy of my article that was summarized in 40 Reasons to Recall Andrew Hamilton. That article contained 40+ reasons but when broken down there were actually 102 separate discernible and provable facts. For example, here’s one of the reasons -

“Hamilton voted against the City creating our own local no-kill animal shelter. (4/19/16). Putting aside the humanitarian concerns, this vote cost the City $600,000+ in payments to the County for us to pay our share of the new shelter in which we have no equity. In addition, our ongoing fees have gone up more than 40%. Hamilton voted this way even though there was a local animal hospital that was willing to be used as the local shelter, and costs would have been significantly less and we would have had the benefits of local service and extra revenues for the City. Instead Hamilton wanted to please the County Supervisors who wanted all the cities to remain with the County. In return, they endorse him and his Gang of 3 (Voigts-Robinson-Hamilton). Along with San Juan Capistrano we are the only City in South Orange County to stay with the County.”

But that one reason had embedded within it 9 different facts that were subject to being proved false (or not).

1. Hamilton voted against the City creating our own local no-kill animal shelter. (4/19/16).
2. Putting aside the humanitarian concerns, this vote cost the City $600,000+ in payments to the County for us to pay our share of the new shelter in which we have no equity.
3. In addition, our ongoing fees have gone up more than 40%.
4. Hamilton voted this way even though there was a local animal hospital that was willing to be used as the local shelter,
5. and costs would have been significantly less and
6. we would have had the benefits of local service
7. and extra revenues for the City.
8. Instead Hamilton wanted to please the County Supervisors who wanted all the cities to remain with the County. In return, they endorsed him and his Gang of 3 (Voigts-Robinson-Hamilton).
9. Along with San Juan Capistrano we are the only City in South Orange County to stay with the County.

I posted the entire list of 102 facts on Hamilton’s FB support page and asked Hamilton’s supporters to go over the list and point out the mistakes. Several supporters complained, others asked for clarification, and some simply refused to do it. One of them spent as much time saying why he wouldn’t respond as it took me to write the article in the first place! But after a few days only one person pointed out that one of the dates I listed was wrong.

Hey – I make mistakes. And when you write as many articles as I do with as many facts as I often refer to, it’s probable that I am going to make a few mistakes now and then. But “dishonest”? Surely if I were “dishonest” one of Hamilton’s acolytes would have discovered this.

It’s one thing to disagree about opinions, but we should get our facts straight, and if you have the nerve to accuse someone of lying or being “dishonest”, at the very least provide a couple of examples. The facts stand – there are 40+ reasons to recall Hamilton and these 40 reasons have embedded within them 100+ facts about his behavior and his voting record. These facts are true, with the exception of a date I got wrong. You might conclude after reviewing all these facts that you still want Hamilton representing you on the Council. That’s your right, even if 9,155 registered voters disagree with you. But let’s not distort the truth by claiming these facts are not true.

Tomorrow I want to turn the page and look at Hamilton’s honesty, or lack of it, brought to light in his recent flyer and Patch article.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Jim Gardner is on the City Council for Lake Forest. 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. His twitter handle is @DrJimGardner. His comments are not meant to reflect official City Policy.

Dr. Gardner has office hours every Tuesday from 4 pm to 6 pm at the City Hall. In addition, he holds a town hall meeting every quarter. The next meeting will be Thursday Feb 15 at 7 pm at the Beach and Tennis Club on Ridge Rte.