Let’s Put The Ackermans’ Selfishness in a Fullerton Context

We have been making  fun of Mrs. Ackerman’s carpetbagging run for the 72nd Assembly seat – up for grabs in November after the Ackerman’s pal Mike Duvall got caught with his pants down and his microphone open.

We're really not as close to the Duvalls as we used to be...
We're really not as close to the Duvalls as we used to be...

We have recounted Mrs. Ackerman’s bogus Hawaiian vacation “non-profit” corporation, noted the out-of-town fundraising attempt with Sacto lobbyists; and of course we have had some fun with the phony residency – in which they want people to believe they are moving in with another Fullerton family.

What all this really adds up to is a breathtaking arrogance, a sense of self-entitlement that the rest of us have trouble grasping. Just how these OC Repuglican stalwarts grab hold of and hang on to government power to promote and enrich themselves is something that most regular people just can’t quite fathom. Who in the 72nd Assembly District asked Mrs. Ackerman (who has lived in Irvine for ten years) to represent them? Nobody, that’s who! It was the Ackermans’ idea.  

pigs

And so, ever helpful, we have decided to put the inherent selfishness of these people into a local perspective, personified by our old pal, Fullerton Councilman Dick Jones. Over the years Jones has remained on the City Council with the staunch support of the Ackermans, who endorse this loud-mouthed, ignorant blowhard term after repugnant term. Why? It can’t be because they care about good government in Fullerton. No, it is because Jones fills their bill just perfectly.

But Dick told me I gotta run again...
But Dick told me I gotta run again...

First, Jones is getting on in years and has no political ambition; second, he mostly does what he is told by the people who put him in office – when they deign to care about something in Fullerton at all, that is. At this point his assignment is principally to stay in office – to avoid a Godless Democrat from getting in, a Democrat whose voting record would be essentially the same as Jones, but who might pose a threat to the Repuglican elite. So what if Jones is really just a RINO? So what if he shoots his mouth off with incoherent tirades? So what if he knows nothing about what he’s blathering about? His job is to keep the seat warm until the next cipher with more ambition than brains can be unearthed, and to avoid soiling himself in public. 

What? That guy's nuts!
What? That guy's nuts!

And so you see, the Ackermans get the prize they like to gloat over – political control – and we get – well you’ve seen the video clips. You know what we get.

Oops! Is it Really All That Difficult?

Quirk2
Sharon Quirk-Silva
Pam-Keller
Pam Keller

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hey who is in charge over there at City Hall? Doesn’t anybody have a clue?

At their September 15, 2009 meeting, the Fullerton City Council deliberated over whether or not the Fullerton School District could get a two-year pass making annual payments on a $1,320,000 loan the District had received from the Redevelopment Agency for the renovation of Maple School nine years ago.

Without debating the merits of the proposal, we note that the suspension of payments was approved 5-0 by the City Council.

But wait! Both Sharon Quirk-Silva and Pam Keller are employees of the School District, and have no business voting on issues, especially financial issues, in which their employer is involved. If ever there were a case for recusal, this was it. At the meeting Mitch Hovey the Superintendent of the Fullerton School District was in the audience. Imagine that! You’re voting to defer over $50K in loan payments to the operation you work for and your boss is sitting in the front row! Hmmm. No bueno!

 We can’t imagine why it didn’t occur to either Keller or Quirk-Silva that there was an evident conflict of interest involved. Perhaps it never occurred to them because they see the District as some sort of charity, and doing favors for charities can’t possibly undermine the fiduciary responsibility that they have to the City of Fullerton. It’s all about the children, after all. But we merely speculate. Who really knows why they voted?

And even more baffling is why Richard Jones, the City Attorney failed to bring up this problem. Attorney Jones is paid, and paid a lot, to keep these meetings on the up and up, and keep his charges out of trouble, in loco parentis, as it were. Hmmm.

And finally we reserve a separate post for the performance by Mayor Don Bankhead, who really outdid himself on this item

The Observer Swings…and Misses!

No bottom in sight...
No bottom in sight...

Our old pal Sharon Kennedy just couldn’t help taking a shot at the Friends in her latest edition of the Observer. In a story [it’s on page 8] about the City’s settlement with the County over the bogus Redevelopment expansion she takes her swing: “Chris Norby and his supporters in the FACT and FFF (sic) groups (both groups widely discredited by shameful campaign ads and tactics in past elections)…”

Shameful? Well, hell, we don’t feel the least bit of shame – let alone any sort of discredit, except perhaps from people whose opinion means almost nothing to us. Excuse us, Ms. Kennedy, for pointing out what a loud-mouthed, ignorant blowhard Dick Jones really is – and using his own words to do it!

Much more shameful was the Observer’s slavish endorsement of Jones, an undeniable corn pone numbskull, simply because he is a reliable City staff stooge. That endorsement may have cost Karen Haluza the election. Nice work for a “progressive” operation.

If you go down far enough you might reach China...
If you go down far enough you might reach China...

And speaking of shameful, will the Observer continue to support council members who have voted to approve massive corporate subsidized housing projects with deficient CEQA findings? Just asking.

Being called shameful by Sharon Kennedy and her yellowing Observer is like being called ugly by a toad. 

Yes I am extremely unattractive, but you are even more so...
Yes I am extremely unattractive, but you are even more so...

A Tsunami of Slime Is Coming

Lest anyone believes the special election to replace scummer Mike Duvall in the 72nd Assembly seat will be a model of decorum, we will disabuse them of that misconception right now.

Chris Norby can run on his political record – because at least he has one. His principal opponent in the GOP primary, Linda Ackerman, has no record other than being married to the once-powerful, and still venomous Dick Ackerman, and she doesn’t even live in our district. But the Ackermans have an ally.

Roski

That ally is named Ed Roski. Never heard of him? Roski is a hyper-wealthy LA real estate guy (Majestic Realty) and virtually controls the City of Industry as his personal fiefdom. The City of Industry is the single biggest Redevelopment scam in the history of California, and Roski’s latest big idea is to steal a professional football team – the San Diego Chargers were a likely target for a move northward – to a new stadium at the confluence of the 57 an 60 freeways. Since Norby has openly attacked the phony City of Industry and the NFL theft,  he has incurred the wrath of Roski, so the story goes, who is supposedly as vindictive as he is rich. In other words a perfect playmate for Dick Ackerman.

According to local political theorists, the plan is laid. The Ackermans keep their South County hands clean vis-a-vis Norby, and continue to show up at Central Committee meetings with smirks and innocent shrugs; and Roski does the dirty work on Norby. Nice folks, huh?

Well, get ready, Friends. Absentee ballots are mailed out in a couple weeks. A tidal wave of slime is on its way.

Dick Ackerman’s Legacy: a Hideous Monster

Oh my God! Kill it!
Oh my God! Kill it before it reproduces!

UPDATE: SINCE THIS POST WAS FIRST PUBLISHED ON JUNE 11, A LOT HAS HAPPENED. AS AN ONGOING PUBLIC SERVICE TO HIGHLIGHT THE BEHAVIOR AND HABITS OF THE ACKERMAN FAMILY WE RE-POST THIS ITEM. WE NOTE THAT IT PRESCIENTLY DESCRIBES THE ACKERMAN FAMILIES EXODUS TO IRVINE.

Some observant folks might inquire as to why a map of the 33rd State Senate District is such an ungainly looking thing. Why is Fullerton attached to the rest of it by the narrowest of territorial filaments?  Who thinks that the constituents of Fullerton should or want to be represented in the State Senate by the same person representing people who live in Laguna Niguel and Ladera; or vice versa, for that matter? Our old friend Dick Ackerman, that’s who.

Wikipedia diplomatically describes the cause of the 33rd’s odd shape as redistricting – driven by “population growth” in South Orange County. Frankly, this description is just too idiotic to contemplate. The entry omits the key member of that southward population growth – Dick Ackerman – former Fullerton Councilman and State Assemblyman, who ran for the old 33rd senate seat in 2000 after he had already moved out of Fullerton. Can anybody believe the inclusion of Ackerman’s old Fullerton stomping grounds in what is otherwise an eastern and southern county district, is the result of an objective redistricting? Or could it be that a lot of deal making was going on in the cut and paste creation of AB632 that established the new senate districts?

He looks a little better with soft lighting...
Dick's district looks a little better with soft lighting...

Also of note is that upside down wedge of the 34th District that intrudes north of the 91 with an odd little projection that stretches up to Raymond and Chapman. A coincidence? Maybe, if you believe in such fantasies as tooth fairies and political coincidences. Here’s a map you Friends can zoom in on:

Live and learn.

Interestingly enough, if Dick A sought to warn off challengers through these district boundaries, he needn’t have bothered. He won election in 2000 with about 65% of the vote; in 2004 he got 69%. We got fellow district denizens in the Capistrano Valley. Well, maybe Dick just liked visiting his old pals in Fullerton while toting an impressive job title. Who knows? The upshot is that we are now represented by one Mimi Walters who hails from South County.

By the way, Loyal Friends, here’s how the pros did it in the old days:

The original gerry.mander
The original gerrymander. Are you our daddy?

Moby Dick Writ Anew?

I wonder what Chris Norby is doing right now...
I wonder what Chris Norby is doing right now...

We have been wondering of late just what kind of personality engages in the sort of obsessive, seemingly pathological hatred one politico demonstrates to another. Specifically we have in mind the abysmal, enduring, and apparently limitless abhorrence that former State Senator and Irvine resident Dick Ackerman holds for County Supervisor (and Fullerton resident) Chris Norby.

This bottomless well of antipathy even seems to extend so deep as the promotion of Dick’s wife, Linda to run against Norby for the 72nd State Assembly seat, an assembly district that the Ackermans don’t even live in, having fled nine years ago for the greener fields of a “secret gated community” in Irvine.

We’re sort of baffled by this bitter bile and animus Ackerman holds for Norby, and so we called upon the expert opinion of Dr. Reinhold Ott of the Schwabian Institut fur Psychologie in Tubingen, Germany, and FFFF on-call staff analyst.

Dr. Ott
The penetrating gaze of Dr. Reinhold Ott

The case study that you have suggested is most interesting to me as both a psychiatrist and a student of American literature. Of course I may only speak in generalities based upon the facts that you have presented, not having met the principals in the case.

It seems clear to me that there is an obvious case of obsessive compulsive hatred involved on the part of Mr. Ackerman. The source of this animosity may be related to a variety of causes including early rejection and power fixation; there is certainly an element of uncontrolled paranoid megalomania involved and, perhaps a love-hate relationship between himself and the object of his apparent hatred. Dr. Freud identified this “Cain and Abel” syndrome early on in certain cases; and clinical studies in the United States involving Rhesus monkeys and Bonoabo chimps have demonstrated similar tendencies.

I would draw your attention to the great pyschological novel by Herman Melville, Moby Dick, to demonstrate a classical example of  this obsessive lust for hatred, revenge, and of course, eventual disaster. 

Well, call me Ishmael!

Ackerman Phone Call Intercepted!

Gee it looks just like an ordinary van!
Gee it looks just like an ordinary van!

Our field operatives have just recently intercepted a phone conversation between former State Senator Dick Ackerman and GOP PR flack Jon Fleischman, the producer of the now infamous “2007 Holiday Greeting” in which Fleischman identifies Ackerman’s house as located in a “secret, gated community” in Irvine.

As our Friends are aware, this video came at a sensitive time, as Ackerman’s wife is attempting to offer her services to the residents of an assembly district (ours) in which she does not live – yet. Fleischman pulled the video off Youtube – but too late! It had already been snagged by video enthusiasts the world over.

The quality of the phone conversation recording is poor, perhaps due to the multitude of wires in the Ackerman’s topiary gardens; so poor in fact, that it is not effective to reproduce it; however our audio reconstruction department staff have analyzed it at length and have produced the nearly believable transcript below:

(phone ringing)

Fleischman: Hello?

Ackerman: Yeah, (grunting sound) Fleischman, this is Dick Ackerman!

F: Senator, how are you? How is your lovely –

A: Cut the crap, you donkey. That lame-ass movie you made is still on the internet. That bastard Norby got Bushala and Pedroza to do blog whaddyacallits. Now everybody in the 72nd knows we live in Irvine. I never should have let you through the gate.

F: Gee, I sure feel bad about that, Senator. I wish there was something –

A: And another thing what was all that fat-mouth bullshit about a “secret gated community” and “doing pretty well as a legislator?”

F: Um, well…um…

A: Now get off your fat ass and pull that video (snorting and grunting sounds).

F: Gee, Senator I’m not a lawyer, but it’s on Youtube, you know, in the public domain. It’s gonna be hard, you know, to –

A: You’re goddam right you’re not a lawyer. So shut up and do it. Get rid of it. Now.

F: Well, okay Senator, I sure am sorry about all this, you know how I feel about you and um, Linda.

A:  (more grunting sounds) That bastard Norby’s behind this. Well, his days are numbered.

F: Yes, sir. He’s not a real conservative, like us, and he’ll do anything to get elected.

A: (snarling sounds) There’s a strange van out behind the tennis court. Now get off the phone you jackass and make that goddam thing go away (static).

Dick Ackerman For 4th District Supervisor?

 

What a guy...
What a guy...

Lost in the brouhaha over his wife’s sudden carpetbagging political ambitions in the 72nd State Assembly special election is the curious fact that Dick Ackerman is very likely going to be a resident soon of the 4th Supervisorial District.

We’re not real sure yet where the Ackermans have decided to take up their faux residence, but chances are pretty good it will be back in Dick’s old happy hunting grounds, surrounded by the love of all his old Fullerton Rotarian pals. And if he does “move” to Fullerton he would be able to throw his hat in the ring for termed-out Supervisor Chris Noby’s job.

Far-fetched? Well, maybe. But the Ackermans seem to be the type of folks who avoid leaving anything on the table, so Shawn Nelson would be well-advised to watch his back…

Chamber Star Speaks Out: Our Leaders Deserve Our Respect

We recently received an e-mail from our Loyal Commenter Chamber Star, who takes us over his/her knee for undermining the respect due to political officeholders. He/she suggests an alternative approach in a short essay that we reproduce below:

gold-star

The Friends of Fullerton’s Future has brought up a lot of issues over the last few months and can take satisfaction that many people in town visit the FFFF blog. But I cannot help but think some real damage is being done. Why? Because the blog continually criticizes our elected leaders and does so in a manner that is really just disrespectful. Humor has its place in life but the business of leading government, especially for the betterment of business, is not one of them.

Our elected City Council and School Boards were chosen for their experience and their wisdom, and that is Democracy in Action. Just because you don’t like someone that the majority has chosen, or you disagree with their policies doesn’t mean that they are fair game for ridicule and insult. Why not? because that undermines the very confidence that everyone must have in a system that is so important to maintaining our way of life.

Our leaders have shown their mettle first in getting elected and then at every meeting dealing with issues that would just baffle the rest of us. Their broad experience and wisdom should not be subjected to the rude slapstick of a blog “sound bite” or attempts at witticisms by those who only see the small picture – not the broad and deep policy implications. They deserve our respect, not ridicule.

I am not saying that our leaders are perfect. But they are among the best and the brightest, that’s for sure. Rather than being attacked from the safety of a blog, they deserve a private phone call, or an e-mail, or even a cup of coffee at Starbuck’s as you explain what you think about this or that decision, or upcoming agenda item. They will always meet with you and will always refer you to the appropriate staff member who can explain things satisfactorily.

The City of Fullerton is comprised of a lot of Positive People who want to pull in the same direction to get things done. That is why our Chamber of Commerce is so effective in working with the City for the betterment of the business environment. The Chamber leadership knows that without the City’s help there will be no advancement of the conditions necessary for the very success of businesses throughout Fullerton. With business success comes the sales and property tax revenue we desperately need to hire the very best staff in the State of California.

So it’s time to rethink the negativity and the satire. In the end it will only hamper people from coming together for the common good. I believe we all love our town. Let’s get on the same team, and let’s move forward!

Oh No, Brick Veneer Again!

ParStruck

UPDATE: THE CITY COUNCIL IS SCHEDULED TO TAKE UP THE MATTER OF THE PARKING STRUCTURE AND ITS DESIGN AT TODAY’S MEETING. SINCE WE REPORTED ON THIS ISSUE CITY STAFF HAS REFUSED TO CHANGE ITS LUDICROUS POSTION THAT THE FAKE BRICK SOMEHOW SATISFIES SOME SORT OF CEQA REQUIREMENT – EVEN THOUGH WE HAVE COMPLETELY DEMOLISHED THE MYTH OF BRICK AND REALITY OF BRICK VENEER IN DOWNTOWN FULLERTON.

SUCH A LAME APPROACH INSULTS NOT ONLY OUR AESTHETIC SENSIBILITIES, BUT IT ALSO TURNS THE WHOLE ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW PROCESS INTO A CHARADE THAT JUST SECURES FOR STAFF WHAT THEY WANT: BRICK VENEER.

 CONSIDER THIS: THE MONEY SAVED BY ELIMINATING THE USELESS BRICK COULD GO TO ESTABLISHING SOLAR PANELS ON THE BUILDING AND ENHANCING ITS SUSTAINABILITY QUOTIENT.

They just can’t seem to help themselves. Not long ago the City held a “stake holder” gathering that was supposed to display three alternative plans for the proposed new parking structure on Santa Fe Avenue.  No sooner had the meeting begun than it became apparent it was going to be one of those typical  “here’s what we’re doing so sit down and shut up” meetings.

The image above shows what the City wants the building to look like. The architectural elements look okay except for the hideous brick veneer – that tomato soup colored stuff you see on the building. Brick veneer. The lazy Redevelopment bureaucrat’s material of choice. We recently wrote about it in a pithy post here.

Why would anybody put a brick veneer on a concrete parking structure? Who would put lipstick on a pig? Brick panels spanning impossibly long spaces look simply idiotic – even to the layman who could sense intuitively that brick has little tensile strength; but unfortunately this type of masquerade is par for Fullerton’s aesthetic course – displaying once again the curious parochialism of Fullerton’s taste makers.

But brick veneer is not only stupid architecturally, but is a big waste of money, to boot. And it contradicts the General Plan Advisory Committee’s adopted “sustainability” policy in the General Plan Update, since it serves no function and will have to be replaced when it falls off.

Fortunately it’s not too late to make the right choice here. But we’re not holding our breath.