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 sigsThe counting begins in the City Clerk's office.
After discovering that Fullerton was not biting on their “Bushala Buying Fullerton” fairy tale, the Anti-Recall committee moved on to their pathetic and even hysterical Plan B: maybe Fullerton will believe that both Tony and Chris Thompson were hooked up several times by the Fullerton PD, hauled and away and placed under investigation by the Orange County DA?
Since this story can be factually disproven, they might want to consider going back to their buying Fullerton strategy.
This week, Larry Bennett attached his name to this mailer which can be seen (here) and additionally attached it as a file to an email blast which can be seen (here).
This monolithic mailer must have cost a bundle to send out. Along with a giant pair of handcuffs and the header of “Busted”, it includes three more postage paid opportunities for voters to tell Bankhead, Jones and McKinley what horrific leaders they have actually been.
The Fullerton Recall has had an uninterrupted and remarkably cooperative relationship with now Interim Chief Dan Hughes and the Fullerton PD with regard to our signature gathering activities at retail locations. It is informally understood between our campaign and the FPD that they WILL NOT arrest our people for signature gathering activities. But in California it is legally incumbent upon any police officer to assist any citizen in executing a citizen’s arrest if the accuser claims to witness a crime.
The bottom line is that signature gathering in front of multi-tenant retail centers s is protected by the First Amendment and legal precedent.
But a number of times, supermarket managers upset by the unwillingness of the Fullerton PD to agree that a crime is occurring, have chosen to file a citizens arrest. The process takes 3 minutes. The police take your name, fill out some paperwork describing the citizen’s accusation, issue a “release” to the signature gatherer and submit a copy of the accusation to the DA to review. Chief Hughes has confirmed that in every case, the DA has quickly and formally disregarded the accusations for lack of evidence.
There are NO pending cases against Tony, myself or any of our signature gatherers. Note that we continue to gather signatures during the “arrests” and after the police leave.
Most notable with all of this continues to be the absolute unwillingness of the anti-recall campaign to address or debate the real issues of the recall:
An absence of management over out-of-control Fullerton cops.
The theft of $27 million of taxpayer’s money with an illegal franchise tax.
The planned doubling of our exorbitant water rates.
A multi-million dollar annual city budget deficit.
Bankhead and Jones’ effort to secretly and retroactively spike the pensions of their buddies who run city hall.
Putting every Fullerton voter $1,700 in debt with a $124 million unfunded city employee pension liability.
Absconding with $10 million per year of revenue for schools and public safety through an illegal and massive expansion of the corporate welfare known as Redevelopment.
EXCELLENT UPDATE! NOW THE BOZOS ARE CLAIMING I WANT TO LET PEOPLE GROW OPIUM POPPIES AND COCOA LEAVES IN THEIR BACKYARDS! HOO BOY!!
For instant laughs please go to the anti-recall website, hilariously called Protect Fullerton. Of course the site should really be called Protect Jones, McKinley and Bankhead and Their Culture of Police Corruption, but we can let that go for now.
Apparently greasemeister Dick Ackerman decided to publish the fact I that attended Judge Gray’s August fundraiser for the initiative that would treat cannabis like any other intoxicant – like wine, for instance.
Am I supposed to be ashamed?
I have long advocated for the use and legal dispensation of medical marijuana, a position advocated by a clear majority of Californians back in the 90s. Of course ignorant obstructionists like Dick Jones and Dick Ackerman (see a trend with this Dick thing?) kept the will of the people from being enacted as they deprived sick people of a useful medication in their twisted puritanical self-righteousness.
I also happen believe that government shouldn’t be in the business of regulating stuff folks can grow in their backyard. People like Jones, McKinley and Bankhead on the other hand, are very much interested in what you do in the privacy of your private property, because they are not freedom-loving conservatives; they are freedom-depriving bullies who want to tell everybody else how to live.
Which is funny because I would never dream of telling Doctor HeeHaw what to do with those spiky cucumbers he diligently grows in his backyard.
For no extra charge, have fun watching Doctor Donkey elaborate on something he knows absolutely nothing about.
Word has it that Mayor Pro Tem Don Bankhead was not so happy to see volunteers gathering signatures to recall him from office outside of Ralphs supermarket on Harbor Blvd. earlier this week.
Petition gatherers say that he and the Mrs. suggested that they shouldn’t be there and were then seen to be speaking to a store manager inside. A couple of days later the signature gatherers were told by both the manager of Ralphs and the manager of the shopping center that they were not welcome there, and had to leave. Volunteers collecting signatures in front of Albertsons on Raymond Ave. were told the same thing.
Fortunately Fullerton Recall Coordinator Chris Thompson knew that petitioners have the right to collect signatures on some private property as long as they are not causing a disturbance. The California Supreme Court upheld this right in something called Pruneyard vs. Robins, that basically holds that any place that is normally open to the public, like a mall or shopping center, is covered by free speech rights, even if it is private property.
Thompson called the city of Fullerton and had none other than City Manager Joe Felz and the city attorney confirm that the signature gatherers had a perfect right to collect signatures in front of both Ralph’s and Albertsons. Thompson then met with police officers at Ralphs, who agreed. One of them even gave the signature gatherers his card and told them to call him if they had this problem again.
Don Bankhead, who has no problem giving away millions of dollars in public land to developers is suddenly bothered by a couple of people collecting signatures in front of a busy supermarket. I guess he hasn’t learned much since the last time he was recalled from the Fullerton City Council 17 years ago.
We’ve got it on really good authority that former city councilman, State legislator, and current Irvine resident, Dick Ackerman is going to be heading up the anti-recall effort for Fullerton’s Three Blind Mice: Jones, Bankhead, and McKinley. For those of you who don’t recall the name Ackerman, run through our FFFF archives to discover what sort of moral fiber that this individual is composed of. We busted The Dickster cooking up a fake address in 2009 for his incompetent wife to run in our Assembly district although they actually live in Irvine (note: the Mrs was endorsed by Jones, Bankhead, and McKinley). We caught the old lady operating a fake charity for lobbyists so she and Dick could get free trips to Maui. We also cheered when the Voice of OC finally uncovered the smoking gun that tied Ackerman to illegal lobbying on behalf of the crooked OC Fair Board as we had been reporting all along.
See anything you like?
Only a few days ago we shared a notice for an upcoming country club event in which Ackerman will hold forth on how to manage a lynch-type mob.
That boy's gonna be real good to me...soon!
Well, now you know the sort of character we’re dealing with here. But what you might not know is that Dick Ackerman, who works for The Nossaman law firm was recently gifted with a huge windfall by his old pals Jones, Bankhead, and McKinley. See, on August 16th The Three Blind Miceignored their own professional staff’s recommendation, and instead presented Nossaman’s client, St. Anton Partners a multi-million dollar subsidy on a 60 units per acre low income housing project on Santa Fe Avenue! No wonder Dicky Boy was hanging out at the Council meeting all night and had to endure outraged citizens attacking the incompetence and stoogery of his three puppets on the council for three long hours.
Just for added fun here’s Ackerman’s blurb from the Nossaman website:
He assists companies, individuals, groups, and public agencies in their interactions with governments at the local, county, state, and federal levels. In addition, Mr. Ackerman assists clients in dealing with government and special districts on how to get through the political process.
In layman’s parlance, Ackerman is a political fixer, an influence peddler, and a lobbyist. Just the sort of guy who would spring to the defense of his trio of myopic rodent pals on the Fullerton City Council.
Here’s the page from the staff report listing the scores of the various “developers” seeking official City endorsement that will pave the way for millions in taxpayer subsidies. Check out Ackerman’s crew, St. Anton. Eighth freakin’ place! And yet Jones, Bankhead and McKinley decided to award millions to the guy who will be running their recall campaign. Stink? Much?
The second most ironic thing about this sad but illuminating story is that when he was on the city council in the 1980s, Ackerman was the most steadfast opponent of publicly subsidized housing in Fullerton. Well, that was then and this is now. See, when you’re a ‘puglican and money’s at stake, principles go right down the toilet. The most ironic thing is that in 1994 Ackerman also championed the cause of three incompetent buffoons who were being recalled. He lost that one, too.
As a thoughtful commenter reminds us, below, McKinley, Bankhead, and Jones were so eager to accomodate their pal Ackerman that they pushed through a vote and then had to rescind it because they never held a public hearing. Another example of Three Blind Stooge FAIL.
If you are a Registered Fullerton Voter then YOU are absolutely the KEY to this recall. You are the only people qualified as legal “signature gatherers” who can sign the bottom of our petitions. You will be the team that takes down McKinley, Jones and Bankhead for their lack of leadership and transparency leading to and following the death of Kelly Thomas.
If you are available to do any signature gathering, we would like to ask you to attend a meeting this Wednesday, August 31st, 7:00PM in the church located at 112 E. Walnut Ave., Fullerton, CA 92832. There is plenty of public parking adjacent to the South side of the railroad tracks across from the train station. Walnut Street is accessible via Lemon or Highland, but not Harbor. Food and refreshments will be provided, so feel free to come hungry.
Meet here.
At this meeting, we will be doing the following:
Identifying leadership for signature gathering teams and even for other roles in this campaign
Initial signature gathering training
Summary of all of our excellent reasons for recall which should appeal to the left, right center, libertarian and anyone else who advocates for honest, transparent government.
Showing off our Signature Team Stations
The petitions have been filed with the City of Fullerton and we are awaiting approval. Our best guess is that we are one to two weeks away from receiving the go ahead from the city to begin signature gathering.
