Category: Home Town Hero

Posted onBoohooism

We Get Mail: A Most Unhappy Neighbor

by 109 Comments on We Get Mail: A Most Unhappy Neighbor

Friends, here is a letter sent to Mayor Bruce Whitaker and thoughtfully provided to us from a citizen who live in the Chapman Park neighborhood across the street from the proposed site of a County homeless shelter.

I omit this individual’s name and number to spare them annoying calls from the bureaucrats but it was included in the letter to Whitaker:

Subject: proposed homeless shelter

Mr Mayor,
This is in regards to the proposed homeless shelter to be opened in the old Linder’s Furniture building on State College in Fullerton.  I am a long time Fullerton home owner (almost 30 years) and live in the Chapman Park tract directly across State College from the proposed site.  I would like to voice my adamant opposition to this project!  If the shelter goes in at this site you are opening us up to security and safety issues, property value drops & outright living in fear.  We have a park in our tract that will potentially become the hangout for the people of the shelter, all they have to do is walk across State College Blvd and they are at the pedestrian entrance to our housing tract.  This park is a little league park full of kids on the weekends, and homeowners including myself walk the park frequently in the mornings and evenings. A great many of the homeowners in this tract are older single women like myself who live alone and the thought of our community/tract being opened up to this kind of influx of homeless and mentally ills is frightening.  I have already had my house broken into and robbed in the recent past and what is being proposed will bery likely increase the chance of this happening again.  It’s bad enough that our neightborhood has been turned into a parking lot by the students from Cal State Fullerton and the city won’t help us with that issue, now we are going to be asked to have the residents of this shelter desend on us also.  I know this seems like the old “not in my backyard” standard but truthfully this is a very disconcerting and potentially dangerous situation for us. It seems like there must be an available building in a more industrial location rather than this one so close to homes, little league fields and schools. And what happens when the over/under pass project reaches State College?
 
I know my voice probably doesn’t matter and nothing will change as it appears deals have already been made and this is being railroaded through but I hope at the very least that the pedestrian entrance at the corner of  State College and Fender will be completely sealed up.  And when our houses get broken into or tagged and the mentally ill and homeless accost us at the park I hope you will personally come visit us to see what you have allowed.
 
Sign me
A very unhappy Fullerton resident
Hopefully this tax-payer’s voice will matter, although the odds seem against it.
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Posted onAbout Us

Good Samaritans Needed To Help A Good Man

by 33 Comments on Good Samaritans Needed To Help A Good Man

Save Mike Atta Flyer
From Steve Baxter:

Our dear friend Mike Atta, is a founding member of the iconic OC punk band  The Middle Class and the owner of downtown Fullerton’s coolest store, Out of Vogue and he needs our help. Hibbleton Gallery at the Magoski Arts Colony will be hosting a benefit art and music exhibit to raise money for Mike’s treatment and for his family. Mike has been an integral part of Fullerton’s art and music scene for many years and Mike and Pam are generous and kind to everyone that walks into their store. All proceeds will go directly to the Atta Family.

We are accepting art and music memorabilia donations up until 7pm tonight, but most of all we want you to be part of something positive and come to the Arts Colony at 223 W. Santa Fe anytime between 6 and 10 pm. You will have fun, see wonderful artist space and you will know that you started 2013 out by helping a wonderful family.

More info can be found at http://www.artwithanagenda.org/save-mike-atta.html

Art for this exhibit has been being donated by:
John M. Sollom
Valerie Lewis
William Zdan
Mike Myers
Roxanna Mostatabi
Ryan Ward
Bongo
Katherine England
Michael Magoski
Hagop Najarian
Christie Yuri Noh
Jonathan St. Amant
Shannon Le Clair
Rene Cardona
Jeñifer Míller Hernández
Alan De Herrera
Katie Perdue
Dave Castr
and more!

Music & More (autographed LPs, t-shirts, posters, etc) by
Signed skateboard by Christian Hosoi
The Adolescents
DEVO
45 Grave
The Middle Class
Sons of Anarchy
Agent Orange
Social Distortion
Jon Doe
Love & Rockets
Manic Hispanic
Rikk Agnew
LIT (J-100 Gibson Guitar)
Stuffed Animal Baby

Stephan Baxter | Organizer/Co-Currator
Art With An Agenda
Mail:    917 N. Ford Ave
Fullerton, CA 92832
Cell:      714/342-3052
email:  sbaxter65@gmail.com

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Posted onA Step in the Right Direction

Hail to the Chief!

by 136 Comments on Hail to the Chief!

Fullerton has a new mayor, Bruce Whitaker.

Bruce is the obvious choice to lead Fullerton – he is calm, intelligent and principled. After a year of rambling, southern fried idiocy that was completely MIA, and then another year of pea-brained, pedagogic scolding we are now set for a strong, responsive, and responsible mayor.

We all know that during the past eighteen months Whitaker has stood up for accountability from an out-of-control FPD Culture of Corruption, and justice for Kelly Thomas, a homeless man murdered by members of a police department that subsequently tried to hide the whole mess. I also did a little background check on Bruce’s history of activism in Fullerton. It is impressive.

Whitaker became involved in Fullerton politics in 1993 when the newly minted City Manager, Jim Armstrong tried to strong arm an unnecessary utility tax. Naturally, the antiquated liberals, RINOs and former public employees on the City Council went for it. Bruce and a handful of compadres organized to recall Bankhead, Catlin and McClanahan, and, ultimately get the tax repealed. Fullerton did just fine without it.

After the County bankruptcy in 1994, Whitaker plated an important role in organizing resistance to the usual “break it and tax you” model of government. The big government crowd tried to get a new sales tax to pay for their own disaster. That too, failed.

Subsequently Bruce has had a distinguished record as a appointed office holder in Fullerton, a conservative watch dog, and a determined foe of abusive Redevelopment. He was elected to the Council in 2010.

From what I’ve seen Bruce is the real deal – a man for whom the concept of “freedom friendly” has nothing to do with the Curt Pringle-like crony capitalism that passes for conservatism in Republican Orange County.

Congratulations, Bruce. We’re counting on you to look out for the interests of the citizens and taxpayers over the interests of the public employee unions.

 

 

 

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Posted onA Step in the Right Direction

We Get Mail

by 118 Comments on We Get Mail

Dear Madam Mayor & Council Members,

We cannot pretend that Fullerton is serious about reform when those involved in the murder of Kelly Thomas, the illegal arrest and imprisonment of Veth Mam, and the many other documented cases of police misconduct, are still employed by FPD. We contend that you as our representatives at city hall, now being fully aware of the extent of misconduct by certain officers, that it is your duty above all else to protect the citizens of Fullerton, including those that may now feel targeted because of their public involvement in seeking justice for Kelly Thomas. There will be members of the community who will not comply to the orders of Officer Kenton Hampton, Sgt. Kevin Craig and Cpl. James Blatney, as they feel that these officers do not hold any moral authority over them. This reality puts all residents and peace officers in danger, and makes any contact by these men with the general public unwise. The adoption of the attached resolution by you, and the eventually firing of any officer who cannot live up to the ideals of a post Kelly Thomas Fullerton Police Department, will not only benefit all residents of Fullerton, but it shall restore public faith in the department itself. In doing so you will stimulate public trust to the benefit to those  other officers who have always conducted themselves professionally. Professional officers with good intentions deserve to work in an environment which is free of the stigma that the continued employment of these accomplices in a taped public execution places on the entire department.

Only by publically setting standards for peace officers which embody excellence in public service and respect for all Fullerton citizens, and by demanding the termination of all those who represent the worst of FPD’s past, can we move forward with confidently that reform and change has resulted from the tragic murder of Fullerton resident Kelly Thomas on July 5th, 2011. The city attorney, while perhaps well intentioned, has an established propensity to filter his advise through the fear that one of these subpar officers may litigate on grounds of wrongful termination. We advise this council to also consider what may result if any of the officers in question, who have now returned to active duty, are again involved the death or injury of one of our citizens.  Prudence dictates that they must be removed before they are given another opportunity to harm the public and burden the city with additional million dollar settlements.

Civility and healing will come to Fullerton when our leaders are responsive to the public and  we are not required to pry  every hint of justice that this case has brought forth over the last 14 month from the clinched fists of a stubborn leadership at city hall, the DA’s office or  FPD. Today we  present you with yet another opportunity to partner with us in seeking justice. We urge you to take advantage of this opportunity.

Respectfully submitted by

Stephan Baxter, Fullerton CA

www.ArtWithAnAgenda.org

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Posted onA Step in the Right Direction

Sooner or Later, Social Justice For Kelly Thomas

by 116 Comments on Sooner or Later, Social Justice For Kelly Thomas

It’s funny, in a sick sort of way, but the very types who used to bray the loudest about the need for “social justice” have been virtually silent in Fullerton in the wake of the Kelly Thomas murder at the hands of members of an out-of-control police department.

The graying establishment Democrats had been hiding behind their drawn chintz curtains, curled up in an intellectual fetal position on their plastic slip-covered Naugahyde sofas. It was just too scary and, well, controversial to say anything, let alone actually do anything.

Fortunately, others, such as Stephan Baxter, Marlena Carrillo and Lauren Becker are willing to keep up the pressure.

Here is a link to Becker’s website that reminds us exactly what a Culture of Corruption can do, and try to get away with, when left to its own devices. It also reminds us what we can do to push back against an entrenched system.

The bars stayed open and the bands played on…

Democrats like Jan Flory, and Molly McClanahan and Pam Keller didn’t say a word in the aftermath of the murder. No, they only got outraged when people outside their cozy little circle took the reins of government out of the hands of three incompetent old fools.

These people are a lot more worried about the fate of the bureaucracy than they are about the people of Fullerton. All of them.

 

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Posted onA Step in the Right Direction

We Get Mail

by 36 Comments on We Get Mail

Here’s an e-mail we got from a chap calling himself Michael Corleone. He hit the nail right on head. When the Godfather talks reform, the FPD should listen.

Name: Michael Corleone
Privacy: You may publish this under my name

Subject: FPD Reform

I was wondering if you could forward this to The Desert Fox:

Thanks for responding to my post I left under Michael Corleone.  I would like to write a post on the FPD leadership issue as well.  I don’t think John Q. Public understands the finer points of this issue.

1.  Officer Schoen dropped the gauntlet at the last City Council meeting, the message was, “You’ve had  your dissent, now get out of our way.”  Judging by his poor performance at the meeting, he was put up to it.  

2.  Anybody who thinks Hughes should be Chief, and even worse, that the Chief should come from the FPD rank and file, has a fundamental lack of understanding of the state of affairs in the City of Fullerton.  A search needs to commence for a Chief as well as a professional Internal Affairs leader.

3.  Non-resident FPD addressing the Council in their bar-b-q shirts?  They need to be in uniform.  Extremely unprofessional.

4.  Why is Law Enforcement one of the few professions where leaders don’t generally get smoked for the actions of their subordinates?  It’s crazy.  Look at Lee Baca, Eric Holder, etc.  There’s no incentive to lead, they don’t have to.

5.  Remember the “Social Contract” we learned about in high school civics class?  In order for a contract to be valid there needs to be “adequate consideration.”  Simply put, both parties put up something of value in exchange for something of value.  POBOR, the “circle the wagons” mentality of City Government and Public Safety Officials, along with public indifference, have turned the “Social Contract” into a worthless platitude.

Next Week:  Deconstructing/reconstructing the FPD.

Good job MC. Michael, please write up your post. We look forward to publishing it!

P.S. I am a rat, not a fox.

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