Victory Archives - Page 6 of 9 - Friends For Fullerton's Future

April 2, 2012April 2, 2012"Dick" Ackerman

Fullerton Was Sold 20 Years Ago And The Recall Is How We Pay For Her Emancipation

Friends, long time community activist Steve Baxter wrote a must-read letter that was published in one of Fullerton’s up-and-coming blogs, The Fullertonian. Enjoy!

For a period of time I knew the man six Fullerton officers killed last July. His name was Kelly Thomas and I liked him. As I was walking to my car in the Fullerton Ralphs shopping center, a man, when seeing my “Justice for Kelly” button, said to me that if I cared this much about Kelly when he was alive, he would still be alive. I was pretty baffled at that statement, but then I saw the “NO RECALL! FULLERTON IS NOT FOR SALE” sticker on the back of this big boy’s Jazzy Jeff scooter and it all made imperfect sense. “Hey brother,” I yelled, “just because you …..” That’s as far as I got before I knew it was not worth it. Besides, you don’t look very dignified yelling at someone who is relegated to a scooter.

I know that Kelly was loved by his family, and I know that Kelly was welcome to stay at any number of relatives’ homes, and for periods of time, he did. I know what six of our police officers did to him, and I know how Dick Jones, Don Bankhead and Pat McKinley, the three councilmen now facing a recall, reacted publicly to his death. Their lack of urgency, their lack of outrage, and the insensitive treatment to Kelly’s family, after what in my mind may be the most shameful 10 minutes in this city’s history, rises well beyond what even I expected from these three men. I’ve witnessed their disdain for the victim and his supporters firsthand at many council meetings. I witnessed it again watching TV interviews, where their ignorance was broadcast across the county. These old mens’ desperate need for order trumped any need for truth. They lied and tried to spin the story at every opportunity, at times to ridiculous proportions. Dick Jones even tried to diminish Kelly’s injuries by saying he had seen worse in Vietnam. When the DMZ becomes the go-to reference point for downtown Fullerton, we have a serious problem. In light of this, the “NO RECALL! FULLERTON IS NOT FOR SALE” signs mean nothing to me.

Read the rest of “Fullerton Was Sold 20 Years Ago And The Recall Is How We Pay For Her Emancipation” on theFullertonian.com

March 20, 2012March 21, 2012About Us

Big Downtown Developer (Me) Finishes Historic Project

by admin94 Comments

After many years, and many splinters, my brother George and I recently finished our latest project.

For those that bought into the anti-recall propaganda that I’m some sort big-time developer, well here you go: I moved a 375 sq.ft. house about 200 feet and restored it!

To read more about my big downtown development project please read the article by The OC Weekly’s Brandon Ferguson, here.

February 27, 2012Bruce Whitaker

Travis Kiger Gets Key Endorsements

by Grover Cleveland73 Comments

Just days after pulling papers to run in the Recall replacement election, Travis Kiger has received the full support of our County Supervisor Shawn Nelson, our State Assemblyman Chris Norby and Fullerton City Councilman Bruce Whitaker.

Said Chris Norby “Fullerton is very fortunate to have Travis as a candidate. As a resident and taxpayer in Fullerton I know we will be in good hands when Kiger is elected.”

Shawn Nelson echoed Norby’s comments. “Fullerton is in need of strong, conservative leadership. I live in Fullerton and I trust Travis to deliver on the promises of transparency and accountability.”

Travis Kiger represents the new type of Republican for Fullerton: one who believes in civil liberties, freedom, limited government, pension reform, a balanced budget, reasonable taxes and fees; one who opposes the sort of crony capitalism and corporate welfare that has been the hallmark of Fullerton “conservatives” for decades.

Most importantly, Travis stands for accountability to the citizens of Fullerton, without cover-up, condescension, excuses, or incomprehensible double-talk.

February 22, 2012February 22, 2012A Step in the Right Direction

In Search of Leadership, A Floundering Fullerton Finally Finds It

by admin66 Comments

FFFF’s own Travis Kiger, a member of the City’s Planning Commission hit a home run last week in his comments about the proposed high-density government subsidized housing project on W. Santa Fe Avenue in downtown Fullerton.

February 8, 2012"Dick" Ackerman

Note to Larry Bennett: Defrost The Three Tired Turkey Dinners And Bring It on!

by Joe Sipowicz134 Comments

Here’s a fascinating excerpt from the No Recall bozos’ website. It seems that some assclown named Larry Bennett finally responded today to a November, 2011 challenge by Chris Thompson for a debate. What a difference three months makes! Last anybody heard from Bennett, he was waiting for Dick Ackerman to return from Thanksgiving vacation to tell him what to do.

Ackerslime2 — When I get back from Hawaii I'm gonna kick ass. Or not.

Now Bennett and Ackerman seem to think they’re in a position to dictate terms to the Recall campaign. No, dimwits, you’re not going to use the Best Blog in OC to peddle your bullshit. Publish it on your own joke of a website. And invite comments, you sad, pathetic puds. I dare you.

In the meantime, Larry, I’ve been told that the challenge from the Recall is still in place: a live debate between Recall Proponent Chris Thompson and you; or better yet, with one of the Three Dead Tree Stumps – if you can pull one of them out of cold storage long enough to defrost. Do you have the huevos? Do gastropods even have huevos? I doubt it. But pretty soon you’ll have no choice.

02/08/2012

Why Is Bushala Rejecting a Debate on his Blog?

TONY, WHY DID YOU REJECT A DEBATE ON YOUR OWN BLOG???

Dear Tony,

It appears that your $170,000 has bought a recall election in June. It is unfortunate that you have rejected my offer for an on-line debate using your favorite blog – Friends for Fullerton’s Future. Chris Thompson tells me that you are unwilling to modify the blog to remove the anonymity of bloggers and commenters because of the sensitive nature of some of your regular bloggers.

In case you would like to reconsider, this is my proposal:

I proposed that you and I engage in an online debate hosted on the Friends for Fullerton’s Future Blog Site. This online debate would be between you and I and available for viewing by the public. We would alternate posts where each of us is free to make our case and to challenge the opposing post. I’m sure you might want to talk about the death of Kelly Thomas, release of the video over the D.A. and Ron Thomas’ objection, pensions, the water tax, police discipline cases and the responsibility of our elected council members. We would want to explore the political involvement of yourself, how redevelopment has benefited your family, Chris Thompson and your political friends.

Our only conditions for the online debate is that the blog change its operations to provide to the Citizens of Fullerton the same level of transparency they demand of the individuals and institutions they attack. Specifically the bloggers who post to your site would post under their actual name. That way the Citizens of Fullerton would know who is making what charge and the responsibility for their comments would rightly be a matter of public record. Secondly, the commenter’s who wish to post to our debate items would do so using a Facebook profile. That would bring some accountability and civility to the debate. This format is used successfully by the Orange County Register, Times Community News publications, and many other political blogs.

I believe this will be a constructive debate that uses the blog you like to tout. I look forward to your reconsideration.

Regards,

Larry Bennett

Chairman, Protect Fullerton-Recall No

February 6, 2012February 6, 2012"Dick" Ackerman

VALIDATION

by admin101 Comments

According to the OC Registrar of Voters the sampling of the Fullerton Recall signatures has validated the number needed to recall Bankhead, Jones and McKinley.

Here’s what the sampling projects for totals:

McKinley 13,604

Bankhead 13,355

Jones 14,361

The recall needed about 10,500 to qualify. Not even close.

And now it’s time for the Three Dithering Dinosaurs to certify the signatures themselves and call a special election. This will be agendized for February 21, 2012. Will they do it?

January 30, 2012January 30, 2012About Us

Judge Refuses Injunction to Save Redevelopment

by admin56 Comments

State court judge LLoyd Connolly said no to supplicants trying a last ditch effort to save their sacred cash cow known as Redevelopment.

Please note the attorney for the aggrieved cities – including Cerritos, the biggest pirate in the Redevelopment waters – Jeffrey Oderman. Oderman is the City of Fullerton’s Redevelopment lawyer, and, as we have documented on these pages, has legal apologist for all the Redevelopment boondoggles in Fullerton for 20 years.

January 19, 2012January 20, 2012Dick Jones

52,254 Recall Signatures Turned In.

by admin124 Comments

Moments ago the Fullerton Recall team turned in well over 50,000 signatures from Fullerton voters to initiate a recall election of councilmembers Don Bankhead, Dick Jones and Pat McKinley. The reason? Their simple failure to provide competent leadership for our city.

The individual totals are:

Don Bankhead: 17,064 signatures
F. Richard “Dick” Jones: 17,587 signatures
Patrick McKinley: 17,603 signatures

Next, the city clerk will turn over the signatures to be verified by the OC Registrar of Voters. Once the requirement of 10,554 valid signatures for each recallee is met, an election must scheduled by the Fullerton city council.

In that election, which will occur sometime before this summer, Fullerton voters will decide both if they want to recall each of the three officials and which candidates will replace them.

I want to give a special thank you to all of our dedicated signature gatherers who worked so hard to bring in 60% more sigs than are required.

The counting begins in the City Clerk's office.

January 3, 2012January 3, 2012Orange County Government

One Good Vote in 2011

by Mr. Peabody25 Comments

Which is a lot better than none. We would be remiss not to offer a tip ‘o the cap to County Supervisor Shawn Nelson for taking on the obscene pay raises handed out by the County CEO Tom Mauk to a couple of his cronies.

The egregious raises were given out three or four years ago within months of these employees being promoted to new jobs by Mauk. The multiple raises went well into double digit territory, as uncovered during a Performance Audit of the County’s own Human Resources Department.

As an ad hoc subcommittee studying the findings of the audit, Nelson and Supervisor Pat Bates recommended reversing the raises, and were supported by John Moorlach at the December 6th Board meeting. Supervisors Bill Campbell and Janet Nguyen fought hard to keep the astronomical raises in place.

Well, kudos to Nelson, Bates, and Moorlach for calling the CEO on his hypocrisy and for taking a big step in the direction of accountability at the County Hall of Administration.

January 2, 2012"Dick" Ackerman

Never Got Our Day In Court

by admin124 Comments

Now that the Governor’s decision to put the kibosh on Redevelopment in California has been upheld by the State Supreme Court, our lawsuit to stop the illegal expansion of Fullerton’s Redevelopment project area is becoming something of a moot point.

Too bad, because we really wanted the City to try to defend its ridiculous findings of blight in front of a judge.

Well, we’re not going to forget that the bogus attempt was made, and made hard by Fullerton’s Redevelopment junkies – Bankhead, Jones and McKinley. These guys are absolutely hooked on government creating dimwitted master plans, buying into stupid boondoggles and handing out taxpayer subsidies and freebies to their pals and campaign contributors.

In the coming months we will be sure to remind Fullerton citizens of the City’s history of expensive Redevelopment failures and the part played in these disasters by our “esteemed” City Council.