City Election Update

Twelve city council candidates completed the filing process to run for three open council seats. Several others took out nomination papers but didn’t file by the 5 p.m. deadline on Aug. 6.

Incumbents in the race are Trish Kelley and Dave Leckness. Councilman John Paul Ledesma terms out of office this year. In alphabetical order, the challengers are Bill Barker, Fred Carr, Mark Dobrilovic, Ken Golemo, Neil Lonsinger, Sam Mamola, ex-councilman Lance MacLean, Rhonda Reardon, Rick Sandzimier and Brian Skalsky.

Ballot statements for all but Mamola and Golemo can be found at http://cityofmissionviejo.org/DepartmentPage.aspx?id=11261.

With ballot statements limited to 200 words, candidates had to choose what is important to them. From their own words, here are excerpts:

Bill Barker, registered professional engineer: During these difficult economic times, my Fortune 100 (non bailout corporation) Engineering Project Management experience brings skills in analyzing work scope, making prudent financial decisions, strategic planning and authoring policy decisions.

Fred Carr, local businessman: I have been managing a successful business for over 20 years. Through my experience I have learned what is necessary to be fiscally responsible. I would like to promote favorable business environment through economic development which will in turn provide more jobs in our community.

Mark Dobrilovic, commissioner/financial advisor: As an Investment Advisory Commissioner for Mission Viejo, pension and spending reform are top priorities. I will use my experience to challenge spiraling costs, redirecting savings to vital services, maintenance and public safety!

Trish Kelley, city council member: A public servant rather than a “politician,” Trish volunteers extensively: Saddleback College Foundation, Southern California Army Advisory Council, Relay for Life, Mission Viejo Activities Committee, Capistrano Valley High School PSTA, church. Trish devotes herself full-time to her council position.

Dave Leckness, Mission Viejo councilman/businessman: As a long-time owner of Kwik Kopy Printing in Mission Viejo and a 25-year member and former Director of the Mission Viejo Chamber of Commerce, I know how to balance budgets and use resources wisely.

Neil Lonsinger: Former Chairman of Mission Viejo Planning and Transportation Commission, President and Treasurer of Mission Viejo’s largest Homeowners Association (MVEA), Vice-President of Nationwide Customer Service Business, and Independent Business Owner, proven negotiator, team builder and financial manager.

Lance MacLean, FDIC operations specialist: $513,271 of your hard earned tax dollars was wasted on two unnecessary special elections, forced on residents by a fake grass roots group that fallaciously manufactures issues on a regular basis.

Rhonda Reardon, retired business manager: I consider public office to be a public trust, a responsibility, and most importantly an opportunity to serve fellow citizens. The citizens of our city deserve council members with business and life experiences, who will stand on principle and make decisions with integrity and servant’s hearts.

Rick Sandzimier, Mission Viejo commissioner/businessman: As a Commissioner, my record clearly demonstrates my ability to work effectively with colleagues, staff, and the community. During my tenure the standards of the City have been preserved.

Brian Skalsky, commissioner: Raised in Mission Viejo, Brian attended Barcelona Hills Elementary School, Newhart Middle School, and Capistrano Valley High School. He graduated from UCI-Irvine and was self-employed as an industrial hygienist until attending Loyola Law School.

Politics as Usual
Letter to the Editor

I just looked at the political financial filings – 460 forms – in depth.

Interesting to note, with EMF (a Class-B carcinogen) from the Viejo System Project radiating Flo Jo Park, Councilwoman Trish Kelley has received sizable donations from Southern California Edison. This just reinforces the fact that Kelley is about herself – and NOT our children.

Kelley obviously ignored the Sage Report (warning about the dangers from the power lines that run through our parks). The city paid big bucks for and also ignored the warnings on EMF in the BioInitiative Report http://www.bioinitiative.org/report/index.htm .

Ignoring the warnings while promoting the Relay for Life – fighting cancer – is what you call first-class hypocrisy!

I also saw the candidates’ submissions of their nomination papers with a listing of who signed them. It is worthwhile noting that Dave Leckness has three individuals who were CONVICTED OF VIOLATING The Brown Act: former council members Sherri Butterfield, Susan Withrow and Bill Craycraft. As a local activist stated, “Yes, Dave is the CONVICTS’ choice.”

Joe Holtzman
Mission Viejo

Reform Progress at CUSD
by Larry Christensen, Capistrano Unified School District Trustee

At first glance one might wonder if the reform Board of Trustees at Capistrano Unified School District (CUSD) has affected any change at the troubled district. The original “ABC” slate comprised of Addonizio, Bryson and Christensen was handily elected four years ago come November. One year later a successful recall installed Palazzo and Maddox and in the subsequent year Winston and Brick were elected to posts. Within a two-year span all seven long-termed trustees under the regime of the now-indicted superintendent James Fleming had been removed. Two decades of misappropriation of funding, nepotism, favoritism, creation of “enemy lists” and extravagant deficit spending were too much for the public to bear.

The first year of the “ABC” reformers was mostly a lost year, for they were methodically outvoted on key issues by the remaining four “old guard” trustees.  Still, it was evident to the administration that the winds had turned and that complacent status quo was about to change. The chain of years where staff was never questioned and predictable seven-to-zero voting occurred had been broken. It was clear that an accountable transformation was under way that was unsettling to the least qualified staff whose positions were based upon alliance rather than by merit.

Once the remaining “old guard” trustees were replaced, reforms began to reshape CUSD.  A no-nepotism policy was one of the first resolutions put into place that ended long-standing, no-bid favoritism with companies affiliated with board family members.  A top-heavy administration was weeded out. Out-of-control legal fees were dramatically reduced. A substantial portion of the overbuilt administration building was leased as a revenue source. A mostly dysfunctional (at best) facilities department was cleansed and is about to be restructured. Most importantly, a laborious, often frustrating experience to secure a qualified, pro-education, ethical, long-term superintendent appears to have been culminated in the recent hiring of Dr. Joseph Farley.

In the opinion of this author, “Working to make a change within the confines of the education bureaucracy, long-designed to discourage change, is like swimming in molasses. It takes forever to make headway and you’re often put in sticky situations.” Nevertheless, reforms have and are being initiated. As a result, the current staff is perhaps the most efficient, dedicated and qualified in many years. The outlook for CUSD is quite positive.

Peril Predicted Long Ago
by Voters United

In commemoration of our 4th of July celebration, the following speech made by Abraham Lincoln was printed by a local newspaper. If there was any historical information not necessarily known that should be and could be passed on to our friends and children, then this is it. Please take the time to read it. You will be amazed how applicable this is today. This predicts the potential peril we, as a nation, face today. Read it, think about it, and pass this part of history on to your families.

As published in the July 2, 2010, Orange County Register:

The future 16th president was a member of the Illinois House of Representatives when he gave this address to the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Ill., Jan. 27, 1838:

In the great journal of things happening under the sun, we, the American People, find our account running, under date of the nineteenth century of the Christian era. We find ourselves in the peaceful possession, of the fairest portion of the earth, as regards extent of territory, fertility of soil, and salubrity of climate. We find ourselves under the government of a system of political institutions, conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty, than any of which the history of former times tells us. We, when mounting the stage of existence, found ourselves the legal inheritors of these fundamental blessings. We toiled not in the acquirement or establishment of them – they are a legacy bequeathed us, by a once hardy, brave, and patriotic, but now lamented and departed race of ancestors. Theirs was the task (and nobly they performed it) to possess themselves, and through themselves, us, of this goodly land; and to uprear upon its hills and its valleys, a political edifice of liberty and equal rights; 'tis ours only, to transmit these, the former, unprofaned by the foot of an invader; the latter, undecayed by the lapse of time, and untorn by usurpation – to the latest generation that fate shall permit the world to know. This task of gratitude to our fathers, justice to ourselves, duty to posterity, and love for our species in general, all imperatively require us faithfully to perform.

How, then, shall we perform it? At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a Trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.

To read the rest of the speech, go to http://www.ocregister.com/articles/-256172--.html

The Buzz

Council candidates’ ballot statements can be revealing – perhaps more than they intended. Recalled councilman Lance MacLean’s could have focused on why he should be on the council. Instead, he begins with an angry rant, attacking those who removed him from office. The 51 proponents who initiated the process cited his anger, broken promises, acts of violence, lies to the OC Register to hide his assault on a co-worker, voting to give council members lifetime benefits and more. He had a full year to consider resigning – plenty of time to avoid being recalled – but he wouldn’t step down.

***

Councilwoman Trish Kelley indicates in her ballot statement that she’s making a full-time job of attending two council meetings a month. The events she attends are generally unrelated to city business (e.g., a spelling bee at a school), and she’s making taxpayers pay her mileage. Taxpayers also pay for tens of thousands of her city business cards, which she uses to campaign. Her phrase “full-time job” could be her attempt to claim she’s entitled to lifetime medical benefits at taxpayer expense.

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Given city hall’s image as the laughingstock of the county, is Mission Viejo just unlucky with its elected officials? Here are ways voters can change their luck: 1) don’t elect anyone who is fueled by anger or revenge (MacLean), 2) don’t put someone into office who has never held a real job (Kelley), and 3) don’t elect anyone who has the audacity to give part-time council members lifetime medical benefits (MacLean, Kelley and Leckness).

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In early 2003, the battle over an airport at El Toro ended. It had taken nearly a decade and four voter initiatives to stop it. Ending the argument, voters approved Measure W in 2002 and Bill Campbell was seated in 2003 as the third anti-airport vote on the OC Board of Supervisors. Before long, nearly every political candidate in south OC was claiming to be an anti-airport warrior. Frank Ury fraudulently claimed in 2004 that he was an “anti-airport leader from the beginning” when the real leaders said he had not participated at all. Will the Casta del Sol Golf Course become a similar liar’s contest? Trish Kelley is claiming she “saved” the golf course. The golf course is still for sale, and Kelley took campaign cash from the PR agent of Sunrise, the developer wanting to build housing on the course.

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Who stopped the proposal to develop housing on the Casta golf course? In October 2007, Sunrise Development scheduled two open house events to display its plans for an assisted living facility on the Casta course. Residents’ reaction was so negative during the first one that the second open house (two days later) was scrapped. Despite public outcry, the developer met privately with council members to move forward. Residents reacted by circulating a petition to put such land-use changes up to a majority vote of the people. In August 2008, the developer suddenly withdrew the housing proposal. By November 2008, Sunrise Development was teetering on bankruptcy. In February 2009, the city council created a phony and legally ineffective moratorium, ostensibly to delay any rezoning from recreation and open space to residential. By that time, the developer was broke, the housing market had crashed and the golf course owner (American Golf) had no prospects to sell the course. Is a councilwoman implying she arranged the global recession and collapse of the housing market to save the Casta del Sol Golf Course?