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March 15, 2021March 15, 2021Ahmad Zahra

Fix The Streets Damn It!

20. AMERICAN RESCUE PLAN ACT UPDATE
On March 11, 2021, President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act which
programs over $1.9 trillion in relief funding related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Councilmember Jung requested, with concurrence from Mayor Whitaker, to hold an initial
discussion of local funding opportunities.
Recommendation:
Provide direction as appropriate

On tomorrow night’s council agenda we see that Item #20 is a discussion about what to do with the Democrat’s Federal relief dough, estimated to be in the neighborhood of $35,000,000. That’s a nice neighborhood, especially if you’re a stumblebum city manager like Ken Domer who is hanging on to quarter mil per year job by the skin of his teeth.

This pile o’ cash is undoubtedly already attracted the attention of the Hero unions who will be clamoring for equity, parity, and any other ity they can think up. And of course Domer has been complaining about his poor, overworked skeleton staff crew, too, so there’s that.

Measure S Covid Lie

I know that the bureaucrats will be applying pressure to use the money for payroll and pensions. How do we know this? Because that’s what they were pushing hard with the late and not lamented Measure S tax. We can be sure that staff will be doing the usual song and dance about what the Biden Bucks can and cannot be spent on.

Well, here’s what I say: $35,000,000 will pay for a whole lot of paving and a whole lot of sidewalk.

Dunlap-Jung — Can these two help bring some accountability to Fullerton?

It’s painfully obvious that Councilpersons Zahra and Silva will do whatever they’re told by the City Manager. Fortunately, Councilmen Dunlap and Jung know who they work for. And it isn’t the public employee unions. That leaves Mayor Bruce Whitaker who actually helped Jung get this item on the agenda for public discussion.

March 1, 2021Ahmad Zahra

Fullerton Dems to Light $68k on Fire

by Joshua14 Comments

This Tuesday, at the request of the Fire Heroes Union, the Fullerton City Council will vote (likely 3-2) to light $68,000 dollars on fire to get a bid from the Orange County Fire Authority (OCFA).

This is a scam and just a waste of your tax dollars.

Don’t believe the fiscal lies being told here, none of the disingenuous liars who will vote for this care about your tax dollars and they’re certainly not going to get rid of Fullerton’s Fire Department to jump to OCFA.

The entire point of this bullshit bid is leverage to justify a raise for the Fire Department. Nothing more, nothing less.

I’ll prove it by using Council’s own agenda from the exact same meeting this coming Tuesday:

When you join OCFA you typically lease all of your equipment to them at no cost and all of your fire facilities for $1/year (as Garden Grove did a few years ago).

To take this bid seriously, you would have to believe that council is SERIOUSLY considering a bid to change to OCFA and is simultaneously spending $1,546,683.30 to buy Fullerton Fire a new ladder truck that they’ll just gift to OCFA to use as they see fit.

If we went to OCFA, it is them and not us who would decide where trucks (apparatus) would be stationed in order to best serve the cities under their jurisdiction. Thus it makes zero sense for Fullerton to buy a new truck when it might not even stay in Fullerton.

These conflicting agenda items would make no logical sense if this bullshit OCFA bid was serious. But it’s not serious.

This is just the council Dems lighting your tax dollars on fire, well, because screw you, they need to help a union argue for more of your money later during negotiations. Silva, Jung and Zahra refuse to take their role as representatives of the residents seriously any time a union rears it’s ugly head and this is just another gross example.

If the Fire Heroes Union wants this bid so bad they can pay for it their damn selves considering they have no issues spending their own money to try and raise your taxes (Measure S campaigning) or to pick your City Council (campaign contributions).

Your roads suck, your services are getting more expensive and you’re constantly being asked to do more with less by City Hall and City Council. Hell, the City asked you to donate Christmas decorations this last season because they’re so broke.

But not broke enough to avoid spending $65k of your money to help a union at the negotiating table.

If this bid was serious then the council would be getting bids from LA Fire and Placentia as well as OCFA. That’s how you find out the best services with the most benefits fort he residents at the best price – by shopping around. So of course they don’t want to do any of that.

Later this year when the City is selling everything not nailed down, and a few things that are, remember this moment when these disingenuous liars spent your money on political theater to help out the unions who will always put their interests above your safety.

February 13, 2021About Us

The LA Times Only Cares About Women When it Helps Their Team

by Joshua13 Comments

The hacks over at the Los Angeles Times are super concerned that Adan Ortega was removed from his non-paying gig as Fullerton’s representative to the Metropolitan Water District (MWD) because he’s a champion of the working classes or some shit. I don’t know, I lost interest in their most recent #MeToo story when I remembered that Fullerton City Council member Ahmad Zahra has been charged with battery against a woman of color and the LA Times has said precisely ZERO about the story.

Their interest in such topics tend to have a very partisan flavor and it’s both predictable and boring.

Because of course they did, the LAT omitted that Ortega is a racist because he’s the fashionable type of racist that the LAT employs and endorses. They also omitted that he’s a grifter who quite literally is a lobbyist in the municipal water industry and therefore is logically conflicted out of putting the residents of Fullerton first in his now former position on the MWD.

Gee, it’s almost like there were good reasons to replace Mr. Ortega outside of the claims being made by the local union hacks. I could point to his $5000/mo consulting gig over in 29 Palms (Page 70) or perhaps that MWD was even a client of his but that would be journalism.

Adan Ortega Conflicts — The list of conflicts goes on and on and on…

Sadly the press was too busy reprinting the talking points of Ortega’s allies to get into the details of a basic google search.

Because of their tedious brand of hackery, the press, largely, should not be taken seriously or at face value until they either admit their biases or start acting like honest reporters. A good place to start would be to report about the news as it relates to ALL elected officials as opposed to just those accused of wrongthink.

By way of example they could avoid talking, relentlessly, about Tito Ortiz not wearing a mask because of the dangers of Covid-19 while simultaneously ignoring that Ahmad Zahra violated social distancing guidelines in order to, allegedly, batter a women of color. Unless of course he allegedly battered her from 6 feet away.

But of course this won’t happen because journalism is thinly veiled activism and almost nobody wants to agitate against their own allies. They don’t want to lose out on an invite to the socially distanced soirees.

This isn’t an issue isolated to the wasteland of Los Angeles either.

ALL of the other major outlets, both in print and on Tv, who couldn’t get enough of Tito are guilty of the same partisan hackery. The OC Register, to their credit, ran a puff piece talking about how stunning and brave and bravely stunning Zahra is in reference to his being charged with battery but the rest of the gang have been nowhere to be seen. I expected better from the Voice of OC but alas they too have fallen victim to this consensus of reporting conformity.

While City Hall continues to attack us in the courts and pretend we’re not journalists, I’d like you to remember that we’re the ONLY local source willing to upset the status quo to tell you the truth whether you want to hear it or not.

January 20, 2021A Step in the Right Direction

Whitaker Re-elected to OC Water Board

by Mr. Peabody15 Comments

Last night the City Council voted to appoint Bruce Whitaker To the OC Water District Board of Directors. The term of the previous incumbent, Ahmad Zahra had expired at the end of 2020.

The vote was 3-1-1, with Whitaker, Jung and Dunlap voting for Whitaker; Zahra nominated and voted for himself; Jesus Silva decided that discretion was the better part of valor, and abstained.

It was not for lack of trying to keep this paying gig that Zahra relinquished his job. No, Indeed, for a line of scripted commenters tried valiantly to praise Zahra to the Heavens, why, Good God! The man practically invented water!

The funniest commenter was none other than Fullerton’s Mistress of Disaster, Jan Flory, who joined in to share in the hosannas for Zahra. She read her script okay, but it included her statement that Zahra had actually authored articles about water,,,for the Fullerton Observer.

Whitaker was clearly the better choice. The water board has jurisdiction over the aquafer on which we sit. The district has massive financial reserves paid by us in ad valorem taxes. And in the past decade the OCWD has been at the center of a massive rip-off called Poseidon, a desalinization scam meant to provide more water to OC county for the purposes of south county development.

Unlike Zahra, Whitaker will not posture on the board for publicity and to be able to pretend some imagined expertise. He won’t use the agency to promote his own agenda and his own political prospects. And Whitaker is not currently charged with crimes by his own police department; nor is he under threat of recall by his district constituents.

December 30, 2020Church and State?

Fullerton’s “Father” Dennis Casts the First Stone

by Joshua13 Comments

A few days ago I broke the story of Fullerton Council member Ahmad Zahra being charged by the OC District Attorney for battery & vandalism. The Fullerton Observer picked up on it and quoted/cited us as the source. Fullerton’s “Father” Dennis then shared the Observer’s Facebook post on the issue and in doing so decided to besmirch my character and call me a fascist and Klansmen.

Father Dennis KKK Dickbag — How to be a dickbag in one easy post…

I was going to let this go with a snarky Facebook post but the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to lay waste to the idea that somebody can get away with being such a total dickbag without response simply by virtue of a fancy title.

First let us put aside the robes that shield him from much criticism because clearly he has ignored their meaning and supposed importance. Despite being a member of the Order of the Servants of Mary (OSM), he forgot that he’s supposed to, and I quote (emphasis added);

“be at the service of God and all people, drawing inspiration from Mary, Mother and Servant of the Lord”

I’m sure Mary, mother of Jesus and Servant of the Lord, would absolutely twist a local blog’s name (It’s FFFF not FFF or Tri-F) to impugn them as fascists and members of the KKK. Right? I’m positive that passage is in a missing chapter of the Bible which is still locked in the Vatican archives. Maybe not.

Hey “Father” Dennis, on what grounds do you compare me to the KKK? Because I’m white and you don’t like my politics? You offer no other substance so let’s just go with self-loathing racism. It’s all the rage these days with commies and crybullies online so it would track with your politics. Is that the same basis for likening me to a fascist?

Like I said, total dickbag.

The stupidity here is that I’m called these things by intellectual cowards because I think the law shouldn’t favor one group of people over any others and that the State shouldn’t dictate how you live your life. I want you to keep what you earn and for private charity (like, *gasp*, the tax exempt Church) to pick up the slack instead of a useless government that fails on every level. My political ideology is directly opposite of fascism but alas Father Dennis knows as much – or he would if he bothered to get to know the people he insults.

When *I* insult somebody at least I get the insults and facts on which I base them correct.

But no, not “Father” Dennis. Not the savior of the poor who’s so piously busy saving Orange County’s downtrodden by demanding the State steal from you to give to them and attempting to turn a city sidewalk into a third world shantytown.

Father Dennis Shanytown — Photo from the Fullerton Observer

“Father” Dennis looks to be taking his cues from Communist China and just rewriting biblical theology to suit his personal desires and petty grievances while hoping he can cloak his ugliness in the robes of faux piety.

You cast the first stone here “Father” and unlike so many others around town I’m willing to catch it and throw it back at your smug, sanctimonious, self-righteous ass.

December 30, 2020December 30, 2020Ahmad Zahra

OC Register Emphasizes Stunning and Brave Aspect of Battery

by Joshua24 Comments

Zahra OC Register Battery

Fullerton City Council member Ahmad Zahra has landed in the OC Register for his battery & vandalism charges. While I was busy getting the court records to break this story, the Register has opted to… give you little by way of new details and a lot by way of telling you how stunning and brave and bravely stunning Ahmad Zahra is in their puff piece downplaying the alleged battery.

Looks at this sentence:

Fullerton Councilman Ahmad Zahra faces two misdemeanor charges of vandalism and battery stemming from a September altercation in which he allegedly damaged a woman’s cellphone.

“In which he allegedly damaged a women’s cellphone” isn’t exactly the big takeaway when battery is on the list of charges. This is a suck up piece if ever I read one. Even the sub-head of “Misdemeanor charges stem from a damaged cell phone” downplays the charges.

In the article, and again I quote, “Details of the alleged crimes were not available.”. You can’t admit you know nothing and then claim with any confidence that you know from where the charges stem.

Cite your sources and give details. Otherwise stop pushing narrative as if it’s news. Saavedra has been around too long to be this sloppy.

But hey at least he managed to give us Zahra’s life story full of as much puffery as is possible in under 250 words.

If the charges are real then none of the petty details of Zahra’s upbringing, life, religion and sexual orientation are relevant to the story.

If the charges aren’t real then, you guessed it, none of that matters either.

You see, his personal backstory isn’t relevant to his pending charges unless he is being targeted because of any one or a collection of the things in said story and there is no evidence or even an accusation that such is the case.

Why Tony Saavedra would spend more words worrying about identitarian nonsense than the charges in question speaks volumes to the usefulness of the OC Register as a reliable news source. Maybe, per Zahra’s not-so-clever barbs at us, they’re “aspiring to be fake news”.

December 11, 2020December 11, 2020Dick Jones

Fullerton City Attorney Lies by Omission, Weed Lawsuits Likely Inbound

by Joshua8 Comments

dick-jones

It’s high time the Fullerton City Council fired City Manager Ken Domer and the City’s resident law firm Jones & Mayer. They have opened the city up to too much litigation (including a public records lawsuit I have against the City) and frankly are incapable of doing their jobs in an honest and professional way.

Allow me to explain by way of legal weed in Fullerton. (more…)

December 7, 2020December 7, 2020Fullerton City Council

14 Years on Council and Jan Flory Still Couldn’t Figure Out Her Job

by Joshua9 Comments

JanFlory-Official

Jan Flory’s last full meeting on council sums up pretty much everything I hate about hack politicians. When the Marijuana map and ordinance came up for a vote she expressed dismay that the ordinance had been “turned upside down” at the second reading which she’d never seen in her 14 millennia on council for all the good it did.

The issues mostly related to zoning and where legal weed shops would and wouldn’t be allowed in Fullerton. Many people didn’t want the council to change our zoning laws to allow weed into neighborhoods, requesting a farther “buffer” between homes and pot.

Before voting, Flory lamented that she understood why voters might not like having pot shops in their neighborhoods and that the council should “amend the ordinance as soon as possible”.

SureJan

She then, of course, voted for the ordinance with Jesus Silva & Ahmad Zahra giving it the third vote needed to become the law of the land.

Let’s go to the video evidence:

What the ever loving hell Jan. That was literally your job – to make sure the ordinance was good & respected the wishes of citizens BEFORE voting for it. That’s how this whole “representative democracy” thing is supposed to work. Oh. Wait. I forgot. She only represented Fitzgerald, Silva and Zahra this time around as they’re the only ones who actually voted to put her on council.

As for her bluster about the ordinance being turned “upside down”, it clearly wasn’t turned upside down enough in the second reading or it would have addressed the VERY citizen concerns that Flory herself thought needed to be addressed. I can’t decide if this was stupidity or just arrogant preening. Both. Both is probably it.

Why not just vote no? Or vote to leave it to the next council? Clearly by her own words, Jan Flory thought that the new council was capable of fixing her mistake but she just had to vote because… why?

The best part is that her vote actually changes zoning and therefore adds a vested property right in the properties that she voted to allow to sell weed. It’s not an easy fix to now take away that vested right and in fact opens the city of Fullerton up to possible litigation should somebody be able to show a loss (or taking) from the government action of removing their new right to sell weed in the future.

Not only does the new council have to vote to fix Flory’s arrogant/ignorant mistake, per her own wishes, they have to do it quickly before somebody can build a strong enough case to sue.

Way to go Jan, despite all of your years bragging about your law practice you managed to open the city up to yet another potential set of lawsuits because you just had to get the last vote in before leaving council once again. After 14 years on council I would expect you’d have learned a thing or two but alas I suppose not.

It should be noted that at no time did the City Manager, City Staff or City Attorney’s Office correct Mrs. Flory in order to let her know the complications of overturning her vote. That, of course, would have required them to proactively do their jobs and that’s just not how we do things in Fullerton.

December 3, 2020Fred Jung

I’d Like to Welcome Jung & Dunlap to Council

by Joshua20 Comments

On Tuesday two brand spanking new council members were sworn into office and I’d like to welcome them to the reindeer games of local politics. So far I like these two men even if I was put off by many of Jung’s endorsements in the lead up to the election. Money in politics is money in politics so his voting record will ultimately be the stick by which to measure him.

My personal opinions aside I want to be fair and transparent here – I will call you out on unprincipled or ridiculous votes & actions. Bruce Whitaker is my favorite local politician and I’ve throw an axe or two dozen his way when we disagreed on items. I’m not a party person so I don’t look the other way for political expedience or make exceptions for bad behavior. I don’t care about team sports – I care about what is and isn’t just and right for the people being represented. Be good stewards of your office and don’t suckle at the teat of party or local corruption and we’ll get along famously.

I’ve already seen Jung & Dunlap take some flak online for how the Mayor Pro-Tem vote went down but that’s partisan nonsense. (D)s can’t claim the moral high ground and whine that Zahra didn’t get a largely ceremonial title when he himself denied that title to Whitaker just this past year. You reap what you sow and we here at the Friend’s for Fullerton’s Future take a certain joy in pointing these karmic events out.

Therefore, Council members Dunlap & Jung, welcome to Fullerton’s political arena from one of the city’s most [choose your own pejorative] chronic malcontents. Cheers.

I look forward, optimistically, to your tenure.

November 30, 2020Setting The Bar Low

Fullerton is Pan-Handling for Decorations

by Joshua14 Comments

Welcome to Fullerton. Instead of working for solid solutions to tough financial problems the city is pan-handling for Holiday Decorations to make sure YOU see/feel the pain for their malfeasance now that their Hail Mary Pass of Measure S got blocked and blocked hard.

I’d feel remiss if I didn’t point out that the city is asking YOU to donate to the government so they can decorate in the most politically neutered and poll-tested way possible. We all know they won’t be putting up any religious icons for fear of offending people around religious holidays.

Holiday Pan-Handling — Of course they want YOU to be more giving…

Good luck friends, here’s hoping our new council isn’t as ridiculously and cartoonishly incompetent as councils past that led us to this point. Well, except Zahra and Silva. There’s no saving those two corrupt clowns.

Because nothing says “holidays in the time of Covid” like your city government begging you for decorations to keep the empty locked down streets… festive.