Redevelopment Archives - Page 18 of 24 - Friends For Fullerton's Future

July 29, 2009December 30, 2009About Us

We’ve Got Mail!

Friends, we receive thought-provoking e-mails from time to time, and like the good Friends that we are, we like to share them with you.

We recently received an e-mail from Jeff Oderman, an attorney with the firm of Rutan & Tucker. Mr. Oderman happens to be the Fullerton Redevelopment Agency’s lawyer, and we’ve been pretty diligent about ripping the bandage off this suppurating wound; and one of our more assertive Harpoons even took a poke at him here. We’re not sure if Oderman is complaining about that particular post, or about our whole effort here at FFFF. Clarity of expression doesn’t appear to be a prerequisite for employment at R & T. In either case, Jeff seems none too happy.

Not Jeff Oderman... — Your Honor, I'd like to make one of those legal thingies..

Anyway, from Mr. Oderman:

—– Forwarded Message —-
From:“Oderman, Jeff” <joderman@rutan.com>
To:Fullertons Future <info@friendsforfullertonsfuture.org>
Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 5:41:27 AM
Subject:RE: [Friends For Fullerton’s Future] Jeff Oderman: The High Price of Bad Advice

You should check your facts before you publish. You’re entitled to your own opinions, of course, but there is almost not a single truthful factual statement in the entire blog.

Jeffrey M. Oderman
Rutan & Tucker, LLP
611 Anton Boulevard, 14th Floor
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
714-641-3441 Direct
714-546-9035 Fax
joderman@rutan.com
www.rutan.com

We’re entitled to our own opinions? Well, Hell, Jeff, that’s mighty big of you. And we thank the boys at the Constitutional Convention, too.

But: “Almost not a single truthful factual statement in the entire blog.” Really? Almost everything is either a lie or wrong? Or both? Hoo Boy! Them’s fightin’ words.

As a firmly attached barnacle on the bottom of the SS Fullerton Redevelopment Agency, Oderman has a pretty sweet gig going, with zero accountability, and we’re pretty sure he wants to keep it that way. Good revenue for the firm and not much real work. But c’mon Jeff, you’re not going to protect your little sinecure by riling up the Friends.

Anyway, in the spirit of self-improvement and public information we have invited Mr. Oderman to favor us with “truthful and factual” corrections to any of our posts to which he objects. We promise to publish anything he sends our way. See, unlike the Fullerton Redevelopment Agency and its minions, we want open and unfettered dialogue – a discussion where the truth will out, and the political flacks and self-interested bureaucrats don’t always have the last, incompetent, and irresponsible word.

We also figure that the more they say the more holes they punch into the bottom of their leaky tub.

Preparing for the Redevelopment regatta... — Preparing for the Redevelopment Regatta...

July 28, 2009December 28, 2009Dick Jones

More Redevelopment Befuddlement By Dick Jones

by The Fullerton Harpoon15 Comments

Some people are determined to talk. They just can’t help it. They believe that the more stuff they say the more informed they appear. Even if it’s just babble to the rest of us.

Well, I've got a heap 'o talkin to do... — Well, I've got a heap 'o talkin' to do...

Take our own Councilman Dick Jones. If we didn’t mine so much pure gold out of this bonehead’s blathering we really would beg him just to shut up – if only to soothe our agitated synapses.

synapses — Oh boy, this is gonna hurt in the morning!

One of his favorite reasons for promoting Redevelopment expansion is that the money can be used to satisfy low-income housing mandates, imposed by the evil bastards in Sacramento, or Karakhastan, or Tanganyisha, or whatever mythical countries exist in his febrile imagination.

The fact is that housing objectives come from SCAG – the Southern California Association of Governments – a bureaucratic local government consortium made up of people like Jones and guided by public employees. The housing targets, by income classification, are contained in the RHNA (pronounced “reena”) – the Regional Housing Needs Assessment, and are divvied up among local jurisdictions. These numbers are merely “goals,” not mandates. The whole thing is a bureaucratic paper chase and hardly anybody takes it seriously except far lefties.

We didn't get much done|But the paperwork was fun! — We didn't get much done, but we built a huge stack of paper.

Which brings us to the point of this post. We wonder what Jones’ Republican backers like Ed Royce and Dick Ackerman think about Jones actively promoting the quasi-socialist RHNA objectives in Fullerton. He is sounding more and more like Sharon Kennedy with each passing meeting. So we have to wonder who’s coaching him on housing issues (well, no we really don’t).

Finally, Jones doesn’t talk about the real mandate; it comes from Redevelopment law itself: the 20% property tax increment set-aside for “affordable” housing, a requirement created to help compensate when city planners and pols rip up lower income neighborhoods to gentrify them. The new expansion area includes little if any residential housing, so no housing stock is going to be displaced. But sooner or later that 20% set aside will start to accrue, and it will have to be used somewhere in Fullerton.

Somewhere in Fullerton. But not in Dick’s zero sub-prime neighborhood in the hills, you can bet the family farm on that. The buck will certainly stop there.

July 26, 2009December 28, 2009Dick Jones

Dick Jones Redevelopment Befuddlement Encore

by The Fullerton Harpoon9 Comments

Watch Dick Jones question Redevelopment Director Rob Zur Schmiede about the availability of tax increment monies in the proposed extension area. Zur Schmiede responds that because of the merger with an existing area money would be available “immediately.” And Jones is off to the Camp Town races, perhaps not realizing that his Redevelopment director was only talking about existing funds – not new property tax increment. All he heard was “immediately.” So he sits up, pleased as punch, like he had just discovered radium. Uh–mmediately! Well, Land ‘o Goshen! You cain’t hardly beat uh-mmediate! Instant gratification – a predictable desire in a child; embarrassing in a septuagenarian.

The reality is that even if the Redevelopment extension survives a legal challenge, the depressed real estate market and property tax re-assessments will likely create a flat or even a negative increment for the near to mid-term future within the amendment area. This means that any Redevelopment funded projects here would have to dip into the also diminishing increment in the pre-existing project area. So why doesn’t Jones grasp this? Because the Redevelopment Agency has arrived upon the scene to cure all that ails us. HOT DAMN! IMMEDIATELY!

Is this really the guy we want making this decisions for us?

July 25, 2009July 29, 2009Dick Jones

Did Dick Jones Break the Law? Twice?

by admin12 Comments

Below is an illuminating video clip of our old nemesis City Councilman Dick Jones defending redevelopment expansion in Fullerton.

Dick’s suggestion that blight exists because foreclosed houses are close to “those blighted areas”, makes absolutely no sense, and, in fact directly contradicts the specific legal findings he had to make to support Redevelopment expansion; but then again look who’s talking.

The other important question Dick’s little speech raises is whether or not he discussed this issue with Pam Keller prior to the meeting. Listen to when Dick he says “when this thing passes, I’m going to make a motion to have our attorney and our staff work with the County to….”, it was obvious he already knew it was going to pass. But how could he have known unless of course Dick had already gone over this with Keller, the ultimate third vote? This is not a Brown Act violation, but it sure would be if he had previously discussed this issue with either Don Bankhead or Sharon Quirk, and it’s pretty hard to believe otherwise. These guys habitually play fast and loose with the Brown Act prohibition against “serial meetings” so it’s not inconceivable.

It’s not a far stretch, you decide!

July 20, 2009July 20, 2009Redevelopment

Councilman Shawn Nelson on Redevelopment Expansion

by admin4 Comments

Listen to Councilman Shawn Nelson explain why he voted against the redevelopment expansion in Fullerton, his reasons are rational, logical and legal.

July 19, 2009December 28, 2009Chris Norby

History Repeats Self: Fullerton Observer Soliciting For City Hall Again

by The Fullerton Harpoon13 Comments

A City Job Opening? — Does this job come with benefits?

A few months ago we went after Sharon Kennedy and her Observer’s shameless pandering to City Hall when she passed along a letter from OC Supervisor Chris Norby opposing Redevelopment expansion to her pals in the government. Some Redevelopment flunky put together the “official” response, Don Bankhead affixed his X to it, and the two were printed side by side.

Well she’s at it again. Check out page 8 of the July edition. Same technique, same result.

Now, we have nothing against the City getting out its propaganda, even if it is full of baloney. But this habit on the part of Kennedy of sharing an editorial writer’s submission so that it can be immediately rebutted without counter response is so unfair that, well, we feel justified in accusing Sharon Kennedy of being just a wee bit biased in the stuff she prints.

Why not print the submission and let the City respond if it feels inclined to do so? Why not let the debate go back and forth – fairly, and see who can develop the more compelling argument? Oh, yeah. That’s right:

July 16, 2009January 4, 2010Dick Jones

City Council Left in Dark Over Fate of Park; Say, Who In Hell Elected That Guy, Anyway?

by The Fullerton Harpoon8 Comments

While watching the youtube clip of David Espinosa tee off on the Union Pacific Park and the comment by City Manager Chris Meyer that the park was being shut down, we got to thinking. The Mayor was clearly not told by anybody that the park was being closed down – observe the standard “we’ll fix it, thanks, move along” comment by Bankhead followed by Meyer’s explanation.

Meyer went on to say that the problem of what to do with this “park” was being passed to the Community Services Commission for ponderment.

And we say: who in Hell gave Chris Meyer the authority to shut down a public park? Why wasn’t the Council asked to make this decision and how come they were never even told about it before the apparent revelation at the council meeting? Who gave Meyer the authority to assign this problem to anybody, let alone a lower committee without even informing the Council of his plans? Why wasn’t this issue agendized and discussed, in public, by the City Council?

These are mostly rhetorical questions, of course. The City’s staff wants to sweep this acute embarrassment under the municipal rug and the only way to do that is not to tell anybody. Even their bosses.

It also makes us wonder how much else in Fullerton has being undertaken by the City Manager on his own hook. It’s one thing to execute policy laid down by elected officials; it’s quite another thing to start taking on major policy decisions, and worse still, not tell anybody. Unfortunately this situation is symptomatic of two long-standing problems in Fullerton, two problems that fit together like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.

First is the perfect willingness of our elected city council persons to abdicate their own policy-making responsibility and simply show up for the meetings, the Rotary lunches, the Chamber mixers, and the ribbon cuttings; second is the perfect willingness of the city managers to step into the authority void and run the show any damn way they please. It’s a perverse symbiosis.

This has got to stop. The results have been amply catalogued on the pages of this blog. And they aren’t very pretty.

July 16, 2009December 28, 2009Former Fullerton Councilmembers

Former City Councilman DeWitte Launches Broadside into S.S. Fullerton Redevelopment

by admin8 Comments

Former Fullerton Councilman and tax fighter Conrad DeWitte points out why redevelopment expansion is nothing more than a can of spray paint. We can always count on clarity and comedy from Conrad.

Please note the running dialog between DeWitte and our beloved target Dick Jones at the end of the clip. See if you can determine who came out on top.

July 13, 2009December 28, 2009Downtown Fullerton

Redevelopment Sidewalks: Adding Futility To The Simple Pleasure of Walking

by The Fullerton Harpoon14 Comments

Several Friends have recently asked that we share with you our Loyal Readers some images of the ridiculous Redevelopment sidewalks in downtown Fullerton. The question that comes to mind is: what sort of ninny would design something so impractical and expensive, other than a Redevelopment bureaucrat, of course; and why?

meandering sidewalk — East side of Malden, between Wilshire & Whiting. Slide, step, slide.

meandering sidewalk2 — Sidewalk at Wilshire Promenade - a special mindset revealed

meandering sidewalk3 — Police station, Highland & Amerige. Okay, single file now

Discovering the answers to the questions posited above is actually intriguing if you are the sort of person who is interested in the study of the abandonment of critical thought in homo sapiens. People who like this sort of sidewalk have made the foolish and perhaps even unwitting mistake of jettisoning simplicity in the confused belief that anything that is more complicated – in this case a broken versus a straight line – must be an aesthetic improvement. Others have seen in these pointless meanderings an aesthetic “softening” that comes when you replace the rectilinear with the curvilinear (although please note that ours aren’t even curvilinear) a weird idea that can trace its legacy way back to the anti-grid urban movements of the late Nineteenth Century.

F. Paul Dudley, former Director of Development Services (and prominent member of the $100,000 retirement club) once defended his knee-jerk support for these practical monstrosities by taking a different tack, but one guaranteed to win the hearts and minds of ponder-free tree boohoos. He claimed that these zigzag paths actually increase the area available for landscaping next to buildings downtown. Wrong! As any 10th grader taking geometry knows, a straightline is the shortest distance between two points. If you increase the length of a sidewalk through pointless meandering, you necessarily increase the amount of concrete needed to build it. Increase the concrete and you necessarily decrease the amount of adjacent area available for landscaping! That’s pretty simple. Well, this is Fullerton, after all, but still, you have to wonder how Dudley managed to hang on to his job for so long.

Finally we have to wonder what it’s like for somebody in a wheelchair to have to negotiate these sidewalks.

FFFF’s tip of the day: If you walking somewhere in downtown Fullerton, remember to budget some extra time because it will take you twice as long to get where you are going.

(images thoughtfully provided by Travis Kiger)

July 13, 2009July 13, 2009Arts & Architecture

Lost In The Fun House

by The Fullerton Harpoon7 Comments

Feeling dizzy? We'll hold your wallet for you.

A while back we made reference in a post to a type of architecture called “HAVE FUN DAMMIT Post Modernism.” See comment #13

Several of you Dedicated Friends had questions about our nomenclature, and rather than inch out any farther onto the thin ice of architectural taxonomy, we have decided to turn the task over to an expert. And so, once again, we rely upon the kind offices of Dr. Ralph E. Haldemann, Professor of Art History (Emeritus) at Otterbein College, Ohio, our Adjunct Arts and Architecture Editor.

Ralph E. Haldemann, Ph.D, Speaks... — Ralph E. Haldemann, Ph.D, speaks, we listen...

Writes Dr. Haldemann:

You have astutely identified a stylistic trend in government subsidized commercial architecture. The outward trappings are meant to induce retail sales through the medium of bright colors, unexpected or weird angles, ostensibly playful and upbeat features and signage; all in an effort to promote a festive, even amusement park-like atmosphere. This mood of jollity is meant to help pry loose disposable income from the local proletarians and thus support a city’s sales tax base. Some of the elements are congruent with the coeval deconstructivism of Post-modern architecture, although any disorientation produced by the former is generally intended to foster a suspension in fiscal responsibility.

Cerritos. Didn't they forget the distortion mirrors? — Cerritos. Why did they leave out the distortion mirrors?

This theme sprang up in the 1980s as urban renewal moved into the suburbs; serious students of architectural history have labeled the approach both “Clown” and “Circus” architecture, not so much in disparagement, but as an indicator of a hoped-for carnival mood on the part of the consumer by the financing public agency.

Anaheim. The Anaheim Plaza resembles an inverted circus tent. Send in the clowns. — Anaheim, California. The Anaheim Plaza seems to symbolize an inverted circus tent. We're ready: send in the clowns.

Since the have-fun-at-all-cost approach necessarily requires a “hard sell” many have recognized a cruel irony in the attempt to force feed fun, especially in economically distressed areas.

Fullerton, California. The Soco Arch. Redevelopment Warning! Fun Zone Ahead. Be Prepared to Have a Good Time!

The Have Fun Hard Sell Devours all disposable income — Melbourne, Australia. A real amusement park beckons disposable income to the Zone of Fun.

Since many of these structures and complexes have predictably refused to age with any sort of dignity, critics find solace with the prospect that these buildings will soon be “redeveloped” by the same suburban renewal urges that created them in the first place.

Fullerton, California. A late 1980s watered-down version. This stuff sure gets old in a hurry...

Finally, I note that many of the themes of this style have sloshed over in to other non-commercial municipal enterprises with fairly appalling consequences.

Cerritos, again. Circus tent rigidified. What were they thinking? — Cerritos, again. Circus tent rigidified into a performing arts center. What were they thinking?

Thanks, Dr. Haldemann, for another lucid and enlightening exposition. Your FFFF check is in the mail, but please don’t cash it ’til the end of the month.