politics

There is something deeply flawed in politics when those politics supercede human decency.

recall time

From time to time the Oxnard City Attorney places items in closed session because “the public is better served by doing so”;  the decision to place those items in 'closed session' agenda comes from the city attorney, who's belief is that certain types of information is best kept secret and away from the public.

One such example is the "audit" conducted by NBS on the landscape lighting assessment districts, which was reported to the city council in closed session. The reason that the City Attorney appropriated that financial report and cloaked it in secrecy under "attorney client privilege", was to 'protect' the municipal organization from the citizens' litigation that would have resulted if the public found out that the money collected from the annual assessments on the property tax bills had been used for purposes other than the reasons given for charging those fees and that the method of setting the fees was flawed.
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The Mayor and Council have all run on platforms of wanting “open and transparent” government, but when that means telling Oxnard citizens the truth about how our tax dollars were spent that platform is forgotten.

Having attended many closed session’s of city council meetings
I know the closed session portion of the meeting often starts with the City Attorney warning the Mayor, Council members and those in attendance that when he alone decides to put something in closed session
every one in attendance is under his decision and must keep silent about everything they see and hear in those closed sessions.

Sometimes it is necessary to recall the past so that we do not make the same mistake again. So attached is a U.S. Appellate Court decision that addresses the following issues about talks of a financial nature cloaked in closed sessions of the city council:

In the short 4 page decision of the United States 9th Circuit Court of Appeals the Court identified that the city (city attorney) erred in making the following decisions:
1. assuming discussions in closed sessions cannot be protected by the First Amendment.
2. did not recognize that some council members engineered a “sweetheart deal” with developers.
3. forgot that comments made by an employee that are of a financial nature are of public concern and entitled to “special protection” under the law.
4. by wrongfully hoping that the comments made in closed session would change the courts opinion and,
5. even if they took the side of the city attorney, the court still agreed with the employee that the city manager’s belief were not enough to prove disruption.

So We the People have to decide whether it is more important to protect citizens rights to know the truth however uncomfortable that may be, or  allow an appointed employee to shield those truths from us in order to protect the municipal organization from the very citizens who define the City of Oxnard. Now the Mayor and Councilmembers in office are in a tough position, but that is why they ran for office; they too need to decide who do they represent, the City Attorney, who they can overrule, or the citizens who put them in office.





Blogger’s note:

Who does the City Attorney work for? In answer, Councilman Bert Perello stated in open session, “The City Attorney works for the City Council, not the citizens of Oxnard.”

There is a recall petition in play at this moment. The Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and two Council Members are the targets.

It’s this blogger’s opinion that we need to start over with a “clean slate.” To mend the massive problems of this city, all City Council Members and  “self serving” senior staff, who helped bring this city to its financial knees, must go. We can’t allow these officials to continue running this city into the ground.

There is a saying, “You’re either part of the solution or you’re part of the problem.” The above are part of the problem and we, the voters, must be part of the solution.
  
  


                                                             

Beware of Hantavirus

                                                     Deer Mouse, or Peromyscus maniculatus

In a recent e-mail it was reported that there is an infestation of rats and mice in  Oxnard city hall.

Not reported, of course, is the fact that not all are of the four legged variety.





                                                           black rat Rattus rattus

h

city of shame

100-150 parts per million (ppm) - Loss of smell (olfactory fatigue or paralysis)

200-300 ppm - Marked conjunctivitis and respiratory tract irritation after 1 hour. Pulmonary edema may occur from prolonged exposure

 500-700 ppm - Staggering, collapse in 5 minutes. Serious damage to the eyes in 30 minutes. Death after 30-60 minutes


700-1000 ppm - Rapid unconsciousness, "knockdown" or immediate collapse within 1 to 2 breaths, breathing stops, death within minutes.


1000-2000 ppm - Nearly instant death


the saga of the city's sanctioning of  poison in our homes and the ensuing “dog and pony show.”  --
coming soon to this blog

monkey shines at city hall

there is an effort to marginalize and hamper the elected Oxnard City Treasurer from discharging his duties, you need to ask yourself why?
The emails below speak for themselves.

======================================================

HISTORY:

As you know  in February the City Attorney ordered the Elected City Treasurer to disburse city cash for any purpose to any entity based solely on the signatures of a department manager, in this case Mike More, and the city’s Chief Financial Officer. Ever since the Finance Department stopped forwarding the detailed invoices in late February, I have been asking to review the source-document-invoices from Delta Dental, AIMS and Calpers. But since that time I have not received the detailed invoices for these disbursements some of which exceeded $1,000,000. ------------

Respectfully,

Phillip Molina

Oxnard City Treasurer
======================================================

Bert Perello Councilmember

   
Mar 24
Duplicate payments to Delta Dental were made because no detailed source documents were provided with the demand for payment to the City Treasurer
   
to Aaron, Dale, Stephen, Jack, Jackie, Steve, Jim, Joe, Mike, Greg, Phillip, bcc: me
Mr City Manager Nyhoff
I believe this is an example of what Mr Molina the City Treasurer has been warning about . It appears to have come to pass and I feel there will be some that claim this example may be staged . If the information is correct I feel the City Treasurer has been right in the compliant he continues to make that since he is responsible for the accuracy of payments ; but can not do his job if not given information needed to do that job how is the City being protected ? -----------

======================================================

hear no evil

February 2017 investment report.

Molina, Phillip <phillip.molina@oxnard.org>
   
to Dale, bcc: me
Mr. Dean,

Thank you.  The staff works hard and long to get this information out to the public and the council members each month. Unfortunately I've been told by the City Manager that 2 councilmembers have informed him that they do not read my emails and delete them as soon as they receive them.

Since they do not receive monthly financial reports from the CFO as Oxnard ordinance and State law requires and since they don't read my emails, one wonders what do they know about the city' finances before they vote on rate increases, and budgets.

Respectfully,

Phillip S. Molina
Oxnard City Treasurer

Editors note-- it’s not hard to figure out who those 2 are.

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Confidential information about Oxnard police

    Molina, Phillip phillip.molina@oxnard.org  Mar 30
       
to Stephen, Greg, bcc: me
Stephen Fischer, City Attorney
Greg Nyhoff, City Manager

Emails sent to elected officials are sent using Bcc as directed by the City Attorney to avoid violating the Brown Act.

?I read your concerns about issuing the payroll register to the public, specifically you do not want the names of police officers who might be involved in under cover work to have their names released. In conversation with the police management, I am informed that none of the officers are involved in 'deep cover' operations, and if they were assigned to a deep cover operations the officer(s) would be given an entire set of false identification so they could not be traced to their actual identify.

Furthermore, the city has only had 4-5 officers assigned to sensitive operations and once their names were redacted from the payroll register it would be consistent with the Oxnard police policy on releasing information to the public.

Below is a list of Oxnard police officers, which is updated annually with the last published update showing the 15-16 enrollment and it shows all the Oxnard police officers. So, I'm confused why would the payroll list of 1600 Oxnard employees, which includes Oxnard police officers without identifying they work in the police department possibly provide the public with information that isn't already easily available on the internet? (see listing below)

While no one, including myself, likes to see their names, and amount they earn spread over the internet the State law demands that such information be made available to the public, so please explain to me why I'm prohibited from sharing the payroll information with the public since the public already had access to the name and amount paid to every Oxnard employee. You appear to be making law instead of following existing State law.

Respectfully,
Phillip Molina
City Treasurer

Duh!!! This is our city attorney?

 Separating the Wheat from the Chaff