Haluza’s BID Bid Bites Dust

Haluza

On Tuesday night our esteemed City Council, a clan that can never say no to a bad idea, reviewed Community Development Director Karen Haluza’s Big Plan to begin the process to create a downtown BID. For the uninitiated, BID stands for Business Improvement District. FFFF already gave the Friends a heads up, here.

To remind you, a BID means a new property lax levy. In downtown the lion’s share of any tax is going to go to the cops, whose performance shutting down the booze culture gives zero confidence that more money in their direction is money well spent. The rest of the loot would probably be wasted on stupid, footling projects that give work to Haluza’s crack staff. Here’s an example of the sort of nonsense that gave our planners the warm and fuzzies before Redevelopment was abolished.

Anyway, the Council got an earful from a few property owners – including one who vehemently denied being notified of the hearing. FFFF will soon be highlighting the comments of this gentleman who poignantly observed that his property income is his retirement income, and, pointing to the uniformed Heroes in the back of the room trenchantly noted that nobody was talking about taking their retirement away.

Our lobbyist-councilperson Jennifer Fitzgerald, who no doubt oversaw this wretched swindle in the first place as a way to keep her bar-owner pals from having to pay to clean up their own mess, moved to continue the item indefinitely. The others didn’t have a whole lot to say, which is typical.

My belief is that we have not seen the last of this obnoxious dodge, a way for the city to get somebody else to pay for their disastrous bar-on-every corner policy.

41 Replies to “Haluza’s BID Bid Bites Dust”

  1. You talk about irony? You all want no taxes to be raised or increased? We still get paid and the overtime will keep coming. We get paid first. It is because of the likes of FFFF that we will never be fully staffed and will always have plenty of OT to go around. Any of you like the sights at Jeremy’s? Crunch goes that pickle.

      1. I saw the video of that skinheaded Anaheim idiot. Absolutely unbelievable. One dumb-ass neo-Nazi cop almost shot a kid and started a riot all by himself, FPD needs to hire that guy ASAP. That’s MCKinley material right there, LOL.

    1. I’d like to know why the cops are incapable of keeping order in DTF. We pay a lot for our Heroes and yet they seem to be afraid of the 909ers that show up. Like to kill homeless people instead.

      Burp. Jeremy the Douchebag? Birds of a feather, I guess.

      1. Word is Slimebar is finally going to have to get a Conditional Use Permit to legitimize all Popoff’s illegal activities. Good luck with that.

        Popoff goes the weasel.

  2. You will always get OT because you don’t do anything during straight time and your unions have the ability to use funds to take out your bosses (city council). That’s the end of “democracy”.

    1. That’s like the guy in San Francisco who clocked in with 17 hours daily, 7 days a week; turns out he took 2 and 3 hour naps in a broom closet without clocking out

  3. The thing about some FPD cops is that they suck at ordinary things. They will issue many dubious traffic tickets , sometimes needing two patrol cars for a simple single alleged traffic offense. They do not excel at solving real crime incidents either (corroborated when my acquaintances and friends have needed their services) . They are very good at marketing and glorifying the extraordinary event; the event that occurs once every two or three years and emotionally shapes the minds of the narrow-minded individual in order to elevate them to the heights of American heroes.

      1. Thanks for that!. Now I have an article to write for Behind the Badge: Fullerton Heroes Grossly Underpaid; Serve Loyally and Bravely Anyhow!

  4. I suspect that few, if any, of you commenting would be affected by the tax. As a property owner and landlord of non-alcohol/nightclub businesses downtown, as well as a close-to-downtown homeowner, I would be. No, I did not receive notice of the hearing and only became aware of this after reading it here, so thank you for bringing attention to it (wish I had read it sooner). And, yeah, I’m also a police officer (in another city).

    The idea of the tax and the issue of FPD enforcement issues downtown are two separate issues.

    I completely agree that the tax would primarily benefit the business owners peddling alcohol, unfairly requiring non-alcohol related businesses/property owners to subsidize those already raking it in and who are the root cause of the nighttime crime problems downtown. It is a RIDICULOUS proposal.

    Our property is regularly vandalized, pissed upon, vomited upon, used by homeless and the drunk (frequently both) to sleep upon, littered upon, etc. These problems are the direct result of alcohol, which also creates the enforcement problem. Our non-alcohol related property should not be forced to pay for alcohol-related problems.

    As a police officer I know how difficult it is to catch people in the act, and without that, arrests/citations/prosecutions for misdemeanors are fairly impossible. Witnesses usually don’t want to cooperate or perform a private persons arrest (I’m guessing that most of the commenters here fall into that category, if for nothing else, because they don’t like the police). The police are forced to let people they KNOW are guilty to walk away without penalty. This is *usually* not the fault of the police (yes, sometimes it is, some cops are lazy). And if an arrest is made or a citation is issued in an “iffy” set of circumstances, which is what frequently results from directions to officers for increased directed enforcement (what many here seem to be expecting), then you’d all instead be screaming about a violation of civil rights and the resulting lawsuit payout. So let’s not blame FPD for the alleged lack of enforcement downtown. The problem is the alcohol.

    I don’t know of any departments in the county that aren’t hiring right now. Like any profession, salaries for cops are dictated by supply and demand. Cry all you want about police salaries, every department in the county has $100,000 per year jobs with admittedly generous retirements that can’t be filled. So salaries must go up if you want to fill those jobs. And police officers are a critical part of public safety, especially post AB109, Prop 47 and Prop 57. Crime is getting much worse and at a rapidly increasing rate. I look forward to my salary and retirement increasing accordingly. But let’s not fund my salary increase with an unfair tax on people not responsible for the need for increased police services.

    As much as I love my firefighter buddies, it’s much harder to justify increases for a profession for which there is a huge surplus of people wanting to do the job.

    I’m prattling on and losing focus (damn you, Benedryl!).

    Finally, in closing…..where are we on Joe Felz and whether any preliminary alcohol screening tests were administered at the scene of the hit and run? I know there is one commenter here who likes to give a clear impression that he is on FPD and in the know regularly implies that a PAS was administered. I have it on very good authority that it absolutely, positively was NOT. As much as I will defend police and offer insight to defend their actions…..this whole thing is indefensible, and whatever happened needs to be thoroughly investigated and heads need to roll. Incidents like this tarnish the badge for all of us and should not be tolerated.

    1. “I know there is one commenter here who likes to give a clear impression that he is on FPD and in the know regularly implies that a PAS was administered.”

      That was O’Malley. He works for Pomona PD. He doesn’t know anything about Fullerton. Just makes it all up. I wonder what happened to him?

    2. “Like any profession, salaries for cops are dictated by supply and demand.”
      It is only weakly and relatively about supply and demand. Dismantle the police union and elect at all levels of government public officials who are even willing to “uberized”(as it has happened to other areas of economic activity) part of the police force; then you will see what the demand and supply does for you. So let’s not be naive, and call it the way it is: is about given and acquired power. You know it, and you know it too well!

      1. Ah, the naivete of youth.

        OK, I’ll bite.

        So all police officers and government officials should be elected? My ballot already seems too long.

        And you propose supply and demand pricing Uber-style for police services? I’d be summoned by an app and have the discretion of whether I would respond based upon where it was, what it was and how much the call paid? I could chose my own hours?

        1. No. You would keep a very basic and streamlined on payroll staff and a trained labor reserve competing among themselves keeping prices down. There are services which required a very quick-an almost to the second-response which are currently operating very well in this manner. Sheer supply and demand for you! By the way, if is about supply and demand, why a police union so eager to lobby on compensation?

          1. “a trained labor reserve competing among themselves keeping prices down”. Oh, like supply and demand. Isn’t that what we have right now? The more people competing for law enforcement jobs the less they pay. The less competing, like we have right now, the more they pay.

            And when a big incident (hostage situation, riot, terrorist attack, etc.) we would simply call people in? We’d wait for them to drive to work, suit up, get to the scene? The “very basic and streamlined on payroll staff” would be just fine on their own until everyone else showed up?

          2. I can’t wait to see the Surge Pricing that will be in effect for the next Pulse Nightclub incident.

              1. So if it’s so overly generous, why not put in an application and get your share of it? Nothing stopping you….except for maybe background or ethical problems.

                1. Ethical problems? I sincerely hope that is meant as some sort of joke. Ramos, Wolfe, Hampton, Power, Siliceo, Mejia, Baughman, Tong, Wren, Alby Al Rincon, Goodrich…

                  Do I have to gone on?

                  Or maybe the ethical issues just start AFTER Chief “Patdown” Pat “I Hired Them All” McPension puts you on the payroll.

                2. Chillin’ Blue balls,
                  You are not very brilliant. Allow it politically and there won’t be lack of app developers .

  5. Lisa CSUF – you are nothing but a helpless Snowflake. You scream CONSPIRACY! at everything police related and probably couldn’t find your ass in the dark if anything remotely “scary” happened to you. Go huddle in the corner, suck your thumb and cuddle with your puppy until you feel better. When you’re doing that…do it again.

    1. Something scary? I’ll take my chances with my own resources. Waiting for some FPD slug to put down his Slimebar Mac N’ Cheese plate to show up could get you hurt.

  6. To Mr. Wide Blue Balls,
    Good. And BTW, crying and cowering isn’t really a resource. Good luck to you sir. You should really do something bout those blue balls.

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