Posts Tagged BRUCE WHITAKER
Is Linda Whitaker losing her mind? How does she call Bruce Whitaker anti S.C.A.G. when as a council member, he appointed a S.C.A.G. Senior planner as his first choice to the planning commission?
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, sean paden on July 20, 2017
Fullerton’s puppets and their masters Tony Bushala, Jennifer Fitzgerald, Bruce Whitaker, and Greg Sebourn: just another reason why trusting or believing them is a fools errand.
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Barry Levinson, Bruce Whitaker, The DCCSP on July 15, 2017
When your word means almost nothing, it can be repurchased for really cheap. Jennifer Fitzgerald’s sure has and for a measly $850 a month. After publicly proclaiming that she would not take her stipend as a council member back in 2012, with no public announcement she has officially began drawing a paycheck from the city again since March 11, 2017. 
Why this turn of events? Well it sure looks like Pringle might be cutting her loose from her cush gig as VP of Pringle and Associates. So potentially there goes that income stream. Curt Pringle’s plan to have an insider on our council to ram through the DCCSP was thwarted by Barry Levinson and others. Why no public statement with all the pomp and circumstance announcing she is back on the dole like when she declined her stipend as a council member is anyone’s guess but for this Biola grad that has all the people up on the hill and the EV Free crowd hoodwinked, there is meaning in her actions. I guess her free public service is over but then again we always knew it was never free in the first place. Fitzgerald has cost this city dearly with her horrendous voting record on massive raises and expenditures as our roads and infrastructure remains in ruin.
Fitzgerald dropping her head in shame as Barry Levinson exposes the council ‘s unanimous vote that amounted to protecting pedophiles with the repeal of the Fullerton law that Barry helped write.
Well it looks like she won’t be pulling down the $165,000 salary as a county supervisor either with the dagger coming from Ed Royce endorsing the worthless forced vaccinator and forced irradiator Young Kim for supervisor. Looks like Fitzpringle won’t be getting her county benefits, the county pension and it looks like the gig with Pringle is soon to be off the table as well. Not that long ago, she was actually looking at the possibility of making $350,000 to $400,000 a year as both a county supervisor and a VP at Pringle and Associates. Well that was all contingent upon her delivering the goods as a council member involving massive development projects that would have destroyed Fullerton forever.
So no County Supervisor and possibly no more VP at Pringle’s office. Why has all this befallen our council member? Is it because she was unable to put the screws to the residents and get the tens of thousands of high rise apartment units built for her bosses and her developer friends? Is it because she has become a public relations nightmare for Curt Pringle? Is it because she has drawn too much attention with her connections to the biggest influence peddler in Orange County and so much so that the light of day was finally shone on these dastardly plans to turn the area in and around downtown Fullerton into downtown LA? Perhaps.
Fitzpringle up on the dais drinking aspartame, brominated vegetable oil, ester of wood rosen.,…… and all from a BPA lined can that lets some of that aluminum get into the solution
You will remember back in 2012, if you were paying attention, that the free pass given by Tony Bushala and with the assistance and support of Tony Bushala’s close friend Shawn Nelson, she was elected to the Fullerton City Council. Within a few months she was appointed to the Vice President position at Curt Pringle and Associates. Tony Bushala, whose family owns close to 40 million dollars in properties in Fullerton had just finished purchasing the election in 2012 by spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to install his boys Kiger, Whitaker, and Sebourn on the city council.
Tony’s tools he bankrolled to get elected in 2012 along with Fitzgerald who was given a pass.
Adding Fitzgerald gave the developers 4 votes and the entire council stacked the planning commission with stool pigeon plants that passed the DCCSP.
Gambino, Silber, Johnson, Shanfield, Han and Alvarez all voted to pass the DCCSP
Bushala’s handpicked bag man, Bruce Whitaker,
made sure his plant on the planning commission purposely missed the vote.
The insubordination of establishment operative Kevin Pendergraft
With all of Tony Bushala’s plants on the council such as Travis Kiger, Bruce Whitaker, and Greg Sebourn, Fullerton would have been poised for massive development as people were distracted by the attention being diverted to the police department’s misdeeds. It was the perfect cover. Bushala ran his blog for another year NEVER ONCE MENTIONING THE DCCSP. He then shut his blog down in early 2013 and opened back up after the 2016 election and to this day has NEVER MENTIONED THE DCCSP.
Behind the scenes, the DCCSP was passed by the planning commission and being gift wrapped and cooked to order by Bushala’s plants working with City staff and developers to rezone a plethora of commercial properties and turn them into ten story high rise housing buildings on hundreds of acres of arterial street frontage and in and around downtown Fullerton. This would have turned Fullerton into a gestapo run gridlocked version of Manhattan blended with the Bronx.
Well fortunately, it looks like the DCCSP is totally dead now because Bushala is turning on Fitgzerald after 5 long years of sitting and waiting for his development payday that never came. The DCCSP would have made his SOCO walk development earnings look like a box car bet on a 5 dollar crap table. Now after 5 long years after he remained totally silent on everything this woman did to pull Fullerton further down the fiscal drain and try to turn it into a high rise hell hole, Tony has turned his tools and phonies against her. Mind you he never exposed her for what she was before she was elected in 2012, never exposed her during her nearly disastrous 4 year tenure on the council from 2012 to 2016 and then still remained silent protecting her during the entire 2016 election cycle so she could get re elected.
Remember when Fitzgerald vowed publicly not to accept her council member stipend because she stated that there is nothing that says public servants should receive renumeration? Well, as of March 11, 2017, she began drawing her $850 a month for her work on the council. So now she is going to cost the taxpayers of Fullerton around $40,000 over the next four years.
Well at least we saved Fullerton from the developers and we saved $40,000 from 2012 to 2016 but it is too bad she was allowed to give away tens of millions of dollars in police, fire and city employee raises, benefit increases as well the approvals of pork projects while hundreds of miles of streets are in ruin.
Well we know her word means nothing and we also know that Fullerton is safe from the massive development agenda for now because of the light of day people like Barry Levinson shed on the dirty deeds of Fullerton’s political creeps. More to come as we wait for Fitzpringle to finally become Fitzgerald again.
WHY IS IT THAT THOSE CLOSEST TO THE FFFF WEBSITE ONLY KNOW HOW TO DEFAME ANONYMOUSLY USING THE MOST VILE LANGUAGE OF THE GUTTER? IT IS THESE SAME PEOPLE WHO ARE BACKING PHONY WHINING POLITICIAN BRUCE WHITAKER FOR THE 29TH DISTRICT STATE SENATE SEAT. By Barry Levinson
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker on July 12, 2017
Barry Levinson
If a psychiatrist were to review the collective rants of the FFFF hard core anonymous supporters (probably no more than 3 or 4 people maximum and probably named Tony B. and Chris T.) he/she would diagnose them with anti-social and bullying behaviors, uncontrollable tempers and a severe phobia against telling the truth.
In other words if you do not have anything honest or intelligent or even remotely factual to say, then go say it on your own disgusting site.
These FFFFer’s are the main backers of Bruce Whitaker for State Senate. That alone should disqualify Whitaker as a serious candidate. But if you regularly read the FullertonInformer.com you know there are almost endless specific reasons not to vote for this phony politician. This is Whitaker’s backdoor way to try to earn a high six-figure salary on the government dole. First he stated he was interested in running for Orange County Supervisor, now he changes course to run for State Senate. He obviously does not care if he is a county elected official or a state elected official as long as he collects his large six figure check plus benefits, which in each case would be for a part-time job. This is simply his way to finally get a big paycheck. He actually should wave his salary and benefits as the good limited government person he so often claims to be. But he has not and he will not do that of course. How does that tie into his so-called limited small government positions? It doesn’t.
Whitaker’s excuse for getting nothing accomplished except fireworks is his claim that he is only one person out of five Fullerton city council members.
Attention to Mr. Whitaker, the entire time he has been a council member his party, the Republican Party has held the majority of seats, either 3 or 4 members out of five seats. Yet he now wants to be our State Senator where 2/3 of the Senators are now Democrats. Question to Mr. Whitaker. Your continuing excuse for your failures to get anything accomplished was when in fact your party had a majority the entire time you have been in office. How in the heck will you get anything accomplished in the State Senate when you are in the minority? I can hear it now…more whining and excuses by Whitaker if the people in the 29th Senate District would be foolish enough to place him in the State Senate.
This guy wants to shovel even more of it in Sacramento
P.S. Remember it took him 8 months to replace me as his appointee on the Park and Recreation Committee after he dismissed me without giving me any explanation. For eight long months he left that position empty with no explanation for his refusal to fill that position. That was a clear dereliction of duty by Bruce Whitaker. Now he wants to bring his many failures and his phony political message to a bigger stage. What a guy!
Let’s Take A Closer Look At The Friends For Fullerton’s Future Website Part II. By Barry Levinson
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker on July 5, 2017
Barry Levinson
In my opinion, it is very clear that the FFFF blog exists for one and only one purpose. It was to help ensure that Tony Bushala made millions off of his Fullerton commercial properties. The easiest way to make that happen was for the city to come up with a way to get all major high-rise, high-density buildings virtually approved in advanced throughout all the major roads within the city. That vehicle was the Downtown Core and Corridor Special Plan (DCCSP). For the key to the DCCSP was to allow the City Manager who at that time was none other than Joe Felz total approval authority for all DCCSP projects.
ex city manager Felz
Step One is that Bushala does everything in his power to get his people elected to the Fullerton City Council. That explains in my opinion his support for Bruce Whitaker, Greg Sebourn and Travis Kiger. Then he abruptly shuts down the FFFF shortly after the 2012 election. His Tony’s Phonies helps him to continue to lead an effort to misdirect the public with other issues while remaining quiet about the DCCSP.
Kiger, Whitaker, Sebourn, and Fitzpringle are Tony’s tools
Tony’s Phonies were very active in their opposition against College Town but the much bigger nightmare, which would have been the DCCSP they were eerily quiet about. On the surface that dichotomy makes no sense at all. But I believe the answer is very simple Fullertonians.
Tony Bushala was primed to make millions if DCCSP passed but I believe he had little or no financial interest in College Town. Therefore Tony’s Phonies spoke out against College Town often but were quiet as a church mouse as it related to the DCCSP, which would have created high-rise nightmares off all major roads within Fullerton with only Joe Felz, the city manager an unelected bureaucrat needed to approve all of the projects. If the DCCSP passed, there would be No Planning Commission recommendation needed, there would be No City Council vote needed for these very many projects but most importantly the people of Fullerton would have absolutely no say in any of these many major developments in our city going forward.
The crony, phony money would have flowed into city coffers and into the pockets of special interest developers and property owners such as Tony Bushala, all at the great expense of the quality of life for existing Fullerton citizens. All they needed was the one-time passage of the DCCSP. The biggest boondoggle ever created by our Fullerton City Government in its entire history.
Bushala spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for the recall so he could buy the council majority
Now you have a good idea why the FFFF, the City Council and those consultants representing developers hate me so very much. For the time being at least, I spoiled their multi-million dollar scheme for both the developers and the city via the Park and Recreation Dwelling Fees for the tune of $11,700 for building each and every residential unit regardless of their size. This is one of the major reasons why the city has been pushing so darn hard for high-rise high-density development.
In Fullerton Government all you have to do to understand the machinations of the power players is to…FOLLOW THE MONEY!
Once you do follow the money you realize like I have that nobody on the city council, nor their puppeteers have clean hands.
I report, you decide!
Casting pearls before swine: Another night as Joe Imbriano and Barry Levinson address the corrupt Fullerton City Council
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Fullerton politics on June 22, 2017
Please Read The Words Of Long Time Resident Lee About The Motives Of The Friends For Fullerton’s Future Website and Tony Bushala And All His Connections with Fullerton Council Members Past and Present (Bruce Whitaker, Greg Sebourn, Jennifer Fitzgerald, Chris Norby, Shawn Nelson and Travis Kiger) By Barry Levinson
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Fullerton politics, FULLERTON PRAVDA on June 16, 2017
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COMMENTARY BY BARRY LEVINSON BELOW
Barry Levinson
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Lee thank you for your comments above. All I can say is that you my friend have been paying very close attention to the political games being played in Fullerton for decades.
With regard to the District voting that will start in 2018, I would like to clarify what transpired at Fullerton City Council earlier this year. The city was dealing with an agenda item to determine the sequence of district voting starting in 2018. The concept of the district elections as mandated by the courts was to have local council members representing each of the districts (in our case 5 districts) within Fullerton. Mayor Whitaker and the rest of the council got their map approved 5 to 0. This was not one of the many maps worked on by citizen groups for many months as part of the process but rather a late entry by Slide Bar owner Jeremy Popoff, a contributor to past Whitaker campaigns. I like to call this map the downtown developers map because it basically disenfranchised all the voters living in and around downtown by splitting that area into all the other five districts grossly diluting their voice through the ballot box. The first vote by the council approved a schedule that would result in having one representative for each of the five districts starting in 2018. This schedule to have elections in District’s 2 and 5 in 2018 was approved with Whitaker’s yes vote along with Chaffee and Silva. A motion by Fitzgerald seconded by Sebourn to have District 3 instead of District 2 in the 2018 election failed 3 to 2.
The problem for Bruce Whitaker was that Greg Sebourn’s four year term would run out in 2018 and his Third District would not vote again until 2020, while still being represented by Jesus Silva. So ignoring all democratic principles, the rationale for going to district voting in the first place and the will of the majority of the people, so-called limited government Bruce Whitaker decided to totally limit, i.e. disenfranchise the Second District from 2018 to 2020 (the one coincidentally both Joe Imbriano and I live in) in order to help keep his buddy Greg Sebourn on the council.
The problem with this move again was that it was totally undemocratic for it disenfranchised the Second District for 2 years while giving the Third District 2 representatives, Jesus Silva and Greg Sebourn or a challenger.
Bruce Whitaker after the first vote on the 2018 District voting schedule was completed had a choice. He could let the vote stand (as is the case in 99.999% of agenda votes) as the most democratic and most popular choice to handle the district elections; or he could as Mayor attempt to change the just approved voting schedule for what I believe was the dual purpose to please his campaign benefactor Tony Bushala and allow Greg Sebourn (also financially supported by Tony Bushala) to run for reelection in 2018.
What did self-proclaimed statesman and Appointed Mayor Bruce Whitaker do facing this not so tough choice? He chose to throw democracy and the people of the Second District under the bus for the express purpose in my opinion to take care of his fellow council member Greg Sebourn and his campaign benefactor Tony Bushala.
I believe the knowledge of this latest chicanery by Bruce Whitaker is more than enough to prove that this self-proclaimed statesman, is nothing more than a phony and extremely flawed politician.
Protecting Corruption, Malfeasance and Wrongdoing Was Once Again In Full View For Anyone Watching The June 6, 2017 Fullerton City Council!
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, Greg Sebourn on June 7, 2017
The Scandal, Which Is The Hillcrest Stairs, Was Never Mentioned By Anyone On The Fullerton City Council Dais. The City Council has failed to take any action to get monetary damages from the contractor and designer of those stairs and has also failed to start an internal investigation as to who within the City of Fullerton approved that very shoddy and structurally substandard stairway. Therefore we can thank Mayor Bruce Whitaker, Council members Greg Sebourn, Jennifer Fitzgerald, Doug Chaffee and Jesus Silva for another fine example of their total dereliction of duty as our duly elected city representatives. For truly with elected representative like them, we don’t need any more enemies. By Barry Levinson
Fullerton Community activist Barry Levinson
Why won’t the council protect us? Why won’t the council act in our best interest? Could it be that to expose the guilty would expose our council members as well? Joshua Ferguson gave a very good pictorial presentation of the numerous problems but has not asked that our City council take action against those responsible for the many problems with those very expensive stairs.
Joshua cozying up with Bruce Whitaker
Why? He actually spoke again at the June 6th meeting and did not once even refer to those stairs? What he did do was give the city council members another way to extend their ability to continue to not provide the citizens of Fullerton with its basic services from the General Fund.
Seaborn
Instead I would surmise working in tandem with Greg Sebourn and Bruce Whitaker,
Ferguson
Ferguson proposed diverting or siphoning off much need park dwelling fee monies away from the desperately needed expansion of greening up Fullerton with more parks. How is that a good idea?
Sebourn thinks its a good idea
The fact is the neglect of these parks has been covered up for years and now, right on cue Greg Sebourn made a motion to put just that on the agenda.
No explanation as to why for decades are city has not provided adequate funds from our general fund to do routine maintenance for our parks but willing to rob from Paul to give to Peter instead thereby not having to answer to the malfeasance of our city council for decades of neglect of our city parks. This is not acceptable considering Greg promised to do a top down audit of all city departments when he was elected in 2012.
Then there is the scandalous issue of those Hillcrest Park stairs to be received and filed in the dustbin of our city council.
CODE VIOLATIONS GALORE that should have resulted in a lawsuit and pink slips for the inspectors that signed off on them
Fitzgerald loves the shoddy workmanship
Well I heard directly from the mouth of our Appointed Mayor in a recent interview, Bruce Whitaker, who is no stranger to ignoring alleged malfeasance, who without hesitating to the interviewer’s question stated that he would seriously consider running for Josh Newman’s seat if the recall makes the ballot.
TAX AND SPEND DEMOCRAT NEWMAN
I have a loud and strong message for Bruce Whitaker. How about taking care of at least one of our many problems here in Fullerton before you seek higher office?
Whitaker
Because I find it ludicrous and very arrogant on your part to think that you deserve to be elected to higher office when you have accomplished literally nothing after 6.5 years as one of our council members. You have repeatedly cried to the public that you are only one man and therefore do not have the support to get things accomplished. Well here are some hard facts for Whitaker to swallow. The whole time you have been on the city council you have had a REPUBLICAN MAJORITY SIR!
6 YEARS OF FAILURE TO LEAD
In the State Senate the Democrats would outnumber you 2 to 1. If you can’t persuade your fellow Republicans to get anything done having the majority on your side, how in the heck will you possibly get anything done in the State Senate? I have given Fullertonians written detailed supportable example after example after example of how Whitaker has failed his conservative limited government base of support. The latest example is of Whitaker’s failure to take any concrete steps; pun intended to solve the obvious problem of Hillcrest Park steps! As I have pointed out before our Mayor is all talk and no action. In other words a typical slick phony politician out for only number one. I guess that means leaving no room for the good people of Fullerton.
The Evidence Is Piling Up To Conclude That The Fullerton City Government Is Not Capable And/Or Not Willing To Honestly Carry Out Their Fiduciary Duty To Represent The People of Fullerton. The Following People Must Be Held Accountable: Mayor Bruce Whitaker, Council members Jennifer Fitzgerald, Greg Sebourn, Doug Chaffee and Jesus Silva as well as City Attorney Dick Jones, Former Police Chief Dan Hughes and Former City Manager Joe Felz. By Barry Levinson
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Fullerton politics, FULLERTON PRAVDA, Greg Sebourn, Jesus Silva on June 4, 2017
Barry Levinson
There are at least a half dozen major scandals in full view now playing out in Fullerton City Government. Yet our esteemed five-member city council (Mayor Bruce Whitaker and Jennifer Fitzgerald, Greg Sebourn, Doug Chaffee, and Jesus Silva) have all remained silent on each and every one of them. What a City Council?
Silva
Sebourn
Chaffee
Whitaker
Fitzpringle
Why are the City Attorney, Dick Jones,Interim Police Chief David Hinig* and our Interim City Manager Allan Roeder also being totally silent as well? Here is a partial list of the scandals going on right now as follows:
- City Attorney provided blatantly false information about a Fullerton city ordinance 3149, (the Fullerton Child Sex Offender Residency Restriction Act) and then used that to support and argue for its repeal. I disclosed to the city council and to the city attorney their “error” and what does the city attorney and all five council members do, they ignore the facts and me and vote to repeal a very good and sound law. It seems to me that California attorneys’ have been sanctioned or even disbarred for less.
- Then the city via the FPD and the Interim City Manager provides this false information to the Fullerton School District and they in turn send out via recorded phone message and emails to every parent in the district, a false assurance that the kids are still protected as if nothing has changed. Others and I then put them on direct notice of their “error” and yet they too have not corrected their blatantly false statement to the parents. Why not Superintendent Robert Pletka? The Fullerton School District Mission Statement states that safety of our students is a major goal of the FSD.
- Dan Hughes after being contacted by Joe Felz at approximately 2 AM gets a ride home by the FPD instead of following normal police procedure to arrest him for DUI and leaving the scene of an accident with damages. All five council members, new police chief, new city manager, long time City Attorney all have been completely silent on what I believe clearly demonstrates the corruption as well as a criminal conspiracy lead by Dan Hughes.
- The next scandal is the City Council voting to approve a Grant Application that was not yet produced by the City. But that did not stop our former now disgraced City Manager from putting this on the Agenda for approval and then to my astonishment being passed by the City Council. This is the equivalent of Approving a “blank check”. This is a total and complete abandonment of the City Council’s and the former City Manager’s collective fiduciary responsibilities. I came up with a simple and no cost solution going forward and every council member refused to take those steps to make this problem go away permanently. What a City Council.
- Ignoring documented evidence/proof of city council voluntary actions that over 20 years starting in 2010 will waste 4 to 5 million dollars of taxpayer monies relating to the management of the Fullerton Golf Course. I was Bruce Whitaker’ appointee to the Park and Recreation Committee, yet he and all the other council members refused repeatedly to have any discussion about this very important and very costly issue to the Fullerton taxpayers. As of today a portion of that money is gone for good but I have made it abundantly clear that current remedial action by the city council could save upwards of 2 million dollars going forward. Unfortunately they are apparently not interested in discussing taking action to save up to 2 million dollars. However our current Appointed Mayor Bruce Whitaker has chosen to talk instead about one or two $300/$400 dollar employee hotel bills. Which do you believe has the greater financial impact on our city? Question: Why won’t Bruce Whitaker and the rest of the council discuss this issue?
- At the last council meeting we learned that the just completed 1.7 million-dollar Hillcrest Park to Lions Field Stairs has many very serious construction and design issues. Way too many of the concrete foundations are cracking already and in at least one case has a large portion already broken off. In addition, the wooden posts are all too often way to close to the edge of the foundations, a structural defect. Also the poor design had the wood posts sunk into the concrete foundations making it incredibly more expensive to replace and repair any of the wooden posts. Wood as any laymen knows has a much shorter lifespan than concrete so this makes absolutely no sense from a structural design point of view. How much did we pay some design company for this fiasco? We should be asking for our money back and then some for this as well. This is not a complete list of the design, construction and safety issues. But one member of the city council, Greg Sebourn indicated after Joshua Ferguson displayed these major problems via pictures that the council should get a refund from the contractor.
So after SEBOURN made that statement, he of course brought forth a motion to sue the contractor for damages, quickly seconded by another council member. Well that never happened. Well then of course he made a motion to put the possible lawsuit against the contractor on the next city council agenda for consideration. Well that did not happen either. So GREG SEBOURN did absolutely nothing along with so-called self-proclaimed fiscal conservative Mayor BRUCE WHITAKER. Thank you Greg for sounding indignant and then doing absolutely nothing. Yet after all this, Ferguson defended Greg Sebourn’s total lack of action on the FFFF website. Well I guess because they are political buddies you and the FFFF owner and administrator will support them right or wrong. So this begs the question as to what is the real agenda of the FFFF website. Apparently it is not to hold all council members responsible to the people. Certainly not the ones that Tony Bushala went to great lengths to get elected and then reelected, namely Bruce Whitaker and Greg Sebourn. This is only my opinion based on everything I know and I Fullertonians I know a lot about this.
However, we the people do not have to and should not give Sebourn and Whitaker along with the rest of the city council a pass for their dismal failure to do right by the citizens of Fullerton. I guess 1.7 million dollars does not buy us much if you have the unfortunate reality of the Fullerton City Council looking out for us.
What does all these items above have in common? They have several things in common. First, the abdication of the city council’s fiduciary duty to run the city with a modicum of honesty, transparency and decency. Second, when very credible evidence and documentation is provided directly to the city council they refuse to deal with it and bury it like they have in each of the issues/scandals above.
What the city needs is a full time ethicist/historian to keep track and document each scandal fully? Since the City of Fullerton has no one like that on the city payroll, I have taken it upon myself, free of charge to the good people of Fullerton to fulfill this very important role.
What this all proves is that there is no real difference between any of our council members for each and every one of them went along with or failed to deal with each and every scandal mentioned above. For when it really counts, each and every one of them fails us. The next time one of our council members states what a great job they are doing for us, please feel free to provide them a copy of this article and watch them ignore you afterwards. After all ignoring the public is one of the few things our City Council does extremely well. For example, after Barbara Rosen Sunny Hills resident, spoke about the terrible condition of Las Palmas Avenue bringing large chunks of the road, Mayor Whitaker stated that her concern would be addressed at the completion of all the public comments. Yet, neither Mayor Whitaker nor anyone else on the dais addressed her specific concern about Las Palmas Avenue. All you have to do is pay attention at any city council meeting and you learn very quickly that our city council members are anything but good public servants.
* Well I have just learned that Interim Police Chief David Heinig has stepped down and now we have Captain Siko as the Acting Fullerton Police Chief. Based on my recent past experience with FPD Captain Siko, I will do everything I legally can to make sure that the next City Manager and our City Council do not appoint him as our next permanent Chief of Police. I also will strongly request that the contracts for our next Police Chief and next City Manager be no longer than 2 years each. For not to do this shows that the City Council has not learned any lessons from its past mistakes. With that statement, I am making a very generous assumption that the City Council wants to have a city government more answerable to the Fullerton public going forward and we all know that all the evidence does not support that contention.
A PROCLAMATION TO ALL FULLERTON RESIDENTS. MY POSTINGS ARE HAVING THEIR IMPACT AGAINST THE FORCES OF CORRUPTION IN FULLERTON. IT IS PRECISELY BECAUSE I AM INFORMING THE PUBLIC ABOUT THE TRUE NATURE OF OUR CITY GOVERNMENT, OUR FULLERTON POLICE DEPARTMENT AND OUR CITY COUNCIL THAT HAS FORCED A FEW TO CRAWL OUT OF GUTTER AND TO MAKE TOTALLY FALSE AND UNFOUNDED CLAIMS AGAINST ME! BY BARRY LEVINSON
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, Fullerton politics, FULLERTON PRAVDA, Tony Bushala, Who's who in Fullerton politics on May 29, 2017
P.S. THIS MEANS TWO THINGS FULLERTONIANS. FIRST IT MEANS THAT OUR MESSAGE IS GETTING OUT TO MORE AND MORE PEOPLE. SECOND IT MEANS THAT THE CORRUPT FULLERTON GOVERNMENT LEADERSHIP AND THEIR SPECIAL INTEREST SUPPORTERS ARE GETTING VERY WORRIED THAT THEIR PLANS TO DESTROY FULLERTON, AS WE HAVE KNOWN IT MAY NOT COME TO FRUITION.
Here is an excellent example of the depths my enemies will go to try to ruin my reputation straight from the on-line comments of the recently dug up from the ashes Friends for Fullerton’s Future website approved by Travis Kiger
Travis Kiger-administrator FFFF
“The City Attorney explained it to you Barry..remember?
“Barry was let go from P and R due to him repeatedly harassing an employee who was just this side of suing him and the city for not protecting her from Barry. But Barry lies and says he has no clue why.”
The comments quoted above directly from the Friends for Fullerton’s Future website are a total and complete lie. The city attorney explained absolutely nothing to me and I did not harass any city employee or anybody else for that matter.
How very sad and very disgusting at the same time that it was none other than current Appointed Mayor and my former friend Bruce Whitaker who stated this falsehood for the first time in the July 2016 Fullerton Observer approximately 5 weeks after he informed me that he would remove me after stating that he considered doing this for months. For the record , he never gave me an explanation then or did he to this day every contact me with a direct explanation from him. What a guy!
Here is Whitaker’s shameful totally false defamation of me as follows: “The (Fullerton) Observer asked Council member Whitaker for his reason for removing his appointed commissioner. He sent the following response:” ““Faced with an imminent employee action which would have likely generate substantial cost to the City, to avoid that action, I opted to remove the commission member. That member’s term would otherwise have expired in December 2016. As you know there had been an effort by Council members in October 2014 to remove that same appointee from the P&R commission which failed on a 3-2 vote. An involuntary removal required four votes.””
What Whitaker so deceitfully left out was that he voted against removing me and said at the time that there was no evidence to support my removal but that it seemed to be nothing more than a political vendetta against my activism by then Police Chief Dan Hughes and members of the City Government. What a guy you are Bruce. Can you be any more deceptive than with that quoted statement sir from the Fullerton Observer? Here below are your exact words on the City Council dais. You paint a totally different picture on that night of November 4, 2014 as follows:
Now for the readers I can’t tell you how many times in the past after I spoke out on some problem facing Fullerton during a Fullerton Council meeting that Council member Whitaker would call me immediately after the meeting to thank me for my great input and to keep up the good work. I never ever received any criticism for any of my service to the community as a Fullerton resident activist at City Hall or for my service of almost 6 years (well into my second term) as Whitaker’s appointee to the P&R Committee. Funny that he has never mentioned any of this false storyline to me. I guess this would be another example of his failure to do his fiduciary responsibility for the good people of Fullerton. Because if there were any bit of truth to this, if I were his boss, I would have immediately discussed the accusation with him. The first time I hear this total fabrication is indirectly thru the Fullerton Observer article over five weeks after he removed me.
To the anonymous writer of this complete defamation, please give me your full name and address and I will take appropriate action against you. For you are a low life, a coward and a liar all wrapped together in one disgusting human being. (Please note that the only difference between the actions of Bruce Whitaker and the anonymous person commenting on the FFFF website is the fact that Bruce Whitaker gave us his name.) Please also give me the name of the employee that you allege I harassed!
To the administrator of the FFFF website (which was Travis Kiger and I suspect still is), I demand that you give me the IP address of the person who spewed out those defaming comments. I would ask you to do this on your site but you have already seen fit to block any more of my comments. So much for your so-called libertarian beliefs.
Fullertonians please take note that this is all that the phony and corrupt people supporting our corrupt city hall have as a defense. When they can’t handle the truth and when the heat gets too high, they turn to libel, slander and defamation. In other words, they have nothing to defend themselves, for you can’t defend yourself from the truth and the facts. So they make up totally false allegations in an attempt to assassinate someone’s character, namely mine in this case.
Is Bruce Whitaker telling another tall tale or worse?
I seriously doubt you will come out from the shadows because you know you are not being truthful and do not want to get sued. I have asked Bruce Whitaker to provide details to his false character assassination story. He has remained dutifully silent. What does that tell you about our Appointed Mayor?
There are some very morally bankrupt people participating and defending our city government. It it contemptuous that there are allegations given anonymously with the person allegedly harassed by me conveniently not identified, nor the nature of the alleged harassment. It is very simple that you can’t provide a name that does not exist. Your allegations are so, so dishonest, baseless with absolutely no specifics whatsoever. I deal with facts and if you can’t live with the facts I suggest that you change your behavior. I am putting those responsible for the FFFF website on notice that going forward I expect that you either do not post these defamations or respond to the defamations that they are to be ignored without the weight of any evidence.
FFFF’s Travis Kiger eating his …….
Why would these miscreants go to such lengths to defame me, when all I have done is to speak the truth and give the facts? For you see Fullertonians if that were not the case many of these big money special interests would have already filed lawsuits against me. They had nothing before and they have nothing now, but to lower themselves by defaming my character. All I can say when you read or hear these lies….Remember the Source (when they actually give the source, which is very infrequent).
Here’s Bruce Whitaker shovelin’ more …….
It is so very sad that Bruce Whitaker had a golden opportunity to make a difference if only he meant a small portion of the things he told his supporters and constituents. He failed us miserably over the past six and one-half years as a council member and now finds it necessary to defame me without any proof for any of his defaming remarks.
Barry Levinson
WHY ONLY HIGHLIGHTING UNFUNDED PENSION COSTS BUT IGNORING ALL OTHER FULLERTON CITY COUNCIL FAILINGS BY MAYOR BRUCE WHITAKER, COUNCIL MEMBER GREG SEBOURN, JENNIFER FITZGERALD, DOUG CHAFFEE AND JESUS SILVA IS A BIG MISTAKE AND CERTAINLY WILL NOT HAVE THE DESIRED EFFECT OF FULLERTON GOVERNMENT REFORM BY BARRY LEVINSON
Barry Levinson
There is absolutely no doubt that the biggest financial calamity facing California taxpayers created by our elected officials is the public pension unfunded liabilities followed by the public employee retiree health care unfunded liabilities.
Yet I have been making the point for some time now that as citizens we can’t ignore all the other falsehoods, misinformation and out and out lies given to us by our California elected and appointed officials at all levels of the government and expect to make real headway with pensions.
Why do I say this? It is rather simple really. How do you expect to get an honest handle on pension costs, when we allow our elected and appointed officials to mislead us on just about every important issue facing us today. You want objectivity, transparency, and honesty concerning pensions while letting our officials literally skate on almost everything else. Either we hold all of them accountable and that means they start being honest with us on everything or we throw all of them out and get elected officials who finally have our interests at the forefront of if not everything, at least most official actions they take as our duly elected representatives.
The fact that citizens who only address the big money issue of pensions and actually give cover to those who mislead and lie to us on so much else makes those citizens part of the entire problem and not part of the solution. You can not be honest with pensions and dishonest with everything else and expect a better outcome for both the taxpayers and the citizens of this once great state of California. There is nothing good to come out of supporting your crooked politician because he/she throws us a bone once in a blue moon. Unfortunately, the bone usually is hollow as well. It is usually political grandstanding and not real. So highlighting nothing other than skyrocketing pension costs will not get us where we need to be….which is for once getting a more honest, transparent government led by elected officials with equal parts integrity and courage.
So when will you pension writers start to call out the phonies who say they are for pension reform while lying to us on so many other very important issues and at the same time accomplishing little or nothing in the pension arena either.
A good start in the City of Fullerton would be to ask for the resignations of all Fullerton City Council members,
Whitaker,
Sebourn,
Fitzgerald,
Chaffee
and Silva
for their repealing a very good law based on false information and assumptions.
It was Fullerton Ordinance 3149, the Child Sex Offender Residency Restriction Act. Now formerly convicted child rapists, molesters, etc. can live right next door to any school, park, pre-school and day-care center in Fullerton thanks to each and every council member going along with a deceitful false premise provided by none other than Fullerton City Attorney, James Touchstone. That false premise was that the Fullerton ordinance covered all sex offenders when in fact it explicitly stated that it dealt specifically with only child sex offenders. The fact is that in no California court has the residency restriction of just child sex offenders every been adjudicated or challenged. The question then remains why would all five council members take action to benefit pedophiles while at the same time making it less safe for our children?
City attorney Dick Jones
It is a question that we the citizens of Fullerton deserve a complete and honest answer to! But I can guarantee that will never happen and that is precisely why they all need to be thrown out of office.
Unconscionable behavior by our Fullerton City Council, Fullerton City Attorney and the Fullerton Police Chief.
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Are they turning their backs on the children?, Pedophile protectors on the Fullerton City Council on May 19, 2017
BELOW IS THE TRANSCRIPT OF MY REMARKS BEFORE THE FULLERTON CITY COUNCIL (MAYOR BRUCE WHITAKER, COUNCIL MEMBERS GREG SEBOURN, JENNIFER FITZGERALD, JESUS SILVA AND MAYOR PRO TEM DOUG CHAFFEE) ON MAY 15, 2017 AS WELL AS SOME ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS
BY BARRY LEVINSON
Back In February I witnessed unconscionable behavior by our Fullerton City Council, Fullerton City Attorney and the Fullerton Police Chief. The behavior was to provide False And Very Misleading Information about The Fullerton Child Sex Offender Residency Restriction Law To Justify Its Repeal! This False Narrative Lead By City Attorney James Touchstone Demonstrated A Lack Of Character By Him And All Who Played Along With This Charade.
Fullerton City attorney James Touchstone
I Am Here To Proclaim Very Loudly That Character Does Count And Not One Individual On The Dais That Evening Demonstrated Any Character! Months ago they knew the facts but ignored them and went ahead anyway. They were warned. See this video below.
Whether you happen to agree with their votes or not, it is never good for the public to have elected and appointed officials who mislead, misinform and sometimes out and out lie to us. Diane Hickey, Joe Imbriano and myself clearly documented on the record here in this chamber that the erroneous information City Attorney James Touchstone spelled out as part of an official presentation to council recommending the repeal of Ordinance 3149 was indeed false. He stated erroneously that the ordinance impacts all sex offenders when the ordinance clearly defines a sex offender as only a child sex offender for purposes of this law.
Here we are months later and still the Fullerton City Council continues to protect the pedophiles and refuses to acknowledge that the official presentation by our city attorney months back on this issue was based on falsehood. What does that tell you about the integrity, honesty and decency of our city council, police chief and our city attorney?
Council person Doug Chaffee”s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children
Council person Jesus Silva’s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children
Council person Bruce Whitaker’s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children
Police Chief Heinig on the right’s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children
Council person Greg Sebourn’s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children. What a guy who thinks it ok to cancel an agenda item when the presenter is at the podium.
Vice President of Curt Pringle and associates Jennifer Fitzgerald.’s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children. She has had to recuse herself because one of her clients got a big payday from the Fullerton City Council.
Fullerton City Attorney Dick Jones’s actions certainly indicate a desire to help protect pedophiles over the safety of our children. Check him out dozing while making big bucks. Could anybody look more disinterested that he?
After we proved that Mr. Touchstone provided false information to the council in support of his recommendation to repeal Ordinance 3149, every city council member ignored that fact and voted to repeal the ordinance, anyway. They in fact by not acknowledging James Touchstone’s egregious error, chose to be part of the deception. Touchstone’s failure to acknowledge his error after we corrected him strongly suggests that it was not an error at all but an intentional ploy/conspiracy to mislead the public on this very important issue. What has City Attorney Dick Jones done in regard to this misinformation given by his partner in his law firm? As far as I know absolutely nothing! This whole scenario is shameless behavior by our City of Fullerton Government and can’t be tolerated going forward.
I can’t for certain claim that each and every one of those individuals will be held to account by the Fullerton public. But what I can say is that God will in fact judge them for their ethical and moral failings as our elected and appointed Fullerton officials.
The only thing I can add to my prepared remarks that i presented at the public comment section of the Fullerton City Council meeting on May 15, 2017 is the following:
We the good people of Fullerton must stand up to demand form our city council and city government, integrity, honesty and representation that only considers the overall well-being of the citizens of Fullerton.
This must include coming regularly to city council meetings and making your voices heard by those who are supposed to represent us the people.
A VERY NECESSARY AND EXTREMELY IMPORTANT OPEN LETTER TO MAYOR BRUCE WHITAKER’S EMAIL RESPONSE TO JOE IMBRIANO BY JOE IMBRIANO AND BARRY LEVINSON
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, Fullerton politics, FULLERTON PRAVDA, Greg Sebourn, Jesus Silva, Pedophile protectors on the Fullerton City Council on May 18, 2017
| receive and file issue |
Well it is obvious Mayor Whitaker that you should have known that the Milliman actuarial consultant was in attendance at the May 15, 2017 Fullerton City Council meeting because it was highlighted as the first sentence under Agenda Item No. 5 as follows: “John Botsford of Milliman, the City’s consulting actuary, will present the City’s updated actuarial analysis of Other Post-Employment Benefits (OPEB) liabilities.” Your claim that you had no idea that the consultant was present for the council meeting is ludicrous and ridiculous on its face.
You are telling us that you didn’t even read the agenda as Mayor when in fact it is your responsibility along with the City Manager to put out the Agenda itself. What are we the good people of Fullerton to make of your statement that you did not even read the Fullerton City Council Agenda prior to your leading the city council meeting? You are either totally incompetent or not being truthful with us. There are no other legitimate explanations for your behavior and statements. Shouldn’t you, Mr. so-called Fiscal Conservative, be aware of the costs to the taxpayer to bring that high priced consultant back again after you would have probably spent a few thousand taxpayer dollars to bring him down here for the May 15th meeting already?
Greg Sebourn made the motion to send the consultant packing
When Doug Chaffee is the only voice of reason on the council, you know we are in trouble
Why would you vote to postpone an agenda item that had already cost the city possibly thousands of dollars for this May 15th meeting, which required only the council’s action to Receive and File the item? In other words really no substantial action at all! Why would Greg Sebourn make a motion to postpone a Receive and File item to the next meeting and all of you very quickly concur with him?
Jesus Silva pondering the facts
In all cases when a motion to postpone an agenda item is being considered it should be necessary at the absolute minimum for that council member making that motion to explain why it is necessary to postpone the agenda item, especially at the very last moment as was the case here. The way this was handled was totally derelict by all of you. It demonstrated that you did not care about the great inconvenience you were willing to put the consultant and those Fullerton residents that were at the meeting or at home staying up to that late hour to hear this agenda item. We say shame on all of you for trying to avoid an agendized issue that obviously was embarrassing for all of you. Once again your action shows your complete disregard for the public.
Mayor Whitaker, you even added insult to injury by trying to skip public comments on this issue. How many times have you been mayor, Mr. Whitaker? We believe this is at least your third time. You keep on digging a bigger and bigger hole for yourself and it would take a Houdini like effort to now dig yourself out of this in our opinion.
You claim you quickly reversed the decision? No the city employee had to correct you and point out that it would be a great burden for this person to come down from the Bay Area and present at a later date. Not to mention your silence on the increased cost to the taxpayer by the councils original vote to postpone the item. He was there I assume based on your requested date and time. You have embarrassed yourself with this action and people who are paying attention will have plenty to discuss between now and the next election about your failings and we intend to lead those discussions.
The people of Fullerton more and more know the games you play. It is becoming a more and more common event for you and your fellow council members to mislead and or not to provide proper information on the important subjects we are dealing with.
We are also confused why David Curlee, Josh Ferguson and Tony Bushala, all present at the meeting had nothing to say on this item? They are people that highlight financial issues and they were all completely silent on a 35 million dollar unfunded liability. David Curlee and yourself have made it a point to discuss the propriety of $300/$400 a night city employee hotel bills in the recent past, yet now not a peep from either of you on a 35 million dollar unfunded Fullerton liability that will be have to come from us the taxpayers.
Finally, Greg Sebourn states that he will put on the agenda a discussion on having the city attempt to get a refund from the staircase contractor for obvious shoddy and substandard workmanship. Yet Sebourn never actually made a motion to get this on the agenda for the next meeting or for any meeting for that matter. Was this just political grandstanding by Sebourn? Why as Mayor and self proclaimed fiscal conservative, Mayor Whitaker did you not make that motion yourself?
How does it feel to remain silent on false claims about our Ordinance 3149, the Child Sex Offender Residency Restriction Act and then based on those false statements repeal a very good law. When will you or any member on the Fullerton City Council dais acknowledge what we have proved that City Attorney James Touchstone provided false information to justify his recommendation to repeal the Fullerton Ordinance? You stated that your votes are all appropriate. You call basing your vote on a previously proven misstatement of fact appropriate voting? You know with regard to that, you don’t have a leg to stand on. Mayor Whitaker, the guilt and the shame of your facial expressions when Diane and we were discussing this issue was so very telling. You voted along with all of your colleagues to repeal a Fullerton law based on a faulty presentation that helped to keep our children safe from pedophiles. You have repeatedly ignored the proof and evidence we showed all of you that the justification for your actions was based on falsehoods about the status and the language of Ordinance NO; 3149. Once again we say shame on all of you. It is hard to imagine a more damning set of circumstances that you now own concerning your action to intentionally lesson the safety of our children based on information you all knew was false. Shame on all of you.
WHY I BELIEVE THAT SUNRISE VILLAGE CAN ONLY BECOME HIGH-RISE, HIGH-DENSITY HOUSING WITH THE CORRUPT HELP OF OUR CITY COUNCIL? BY BARRYLEVINSON
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, Fullerton politics, FULLERTON PRAVDA, Fullerton's downtown core and corridor, Greg Sebourn on April 27, 2017
Barry Levinson
Barry Levinson calls out the self-serving, disingenuous, deceitful and deplorabe Fullerton City Council
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, Doug Chafee, Fullerton politics, Greg Sebourn, Jesus Silva on March 22, 2017
Fullertonians are simply tired and disgusted with the self-serving, disingenuous political games that are played out at our council meetings. Just since the beginning of this year alone, this council has disgraced itself and shown that all too often your votes do not support the very people that you are charged to represent. Here is a partial list of your recent deceitful and deplorable actions.
- We witnessed the false claims of our Mayor Bruce Whitaker who brought back settled business in the form of changing our election schedule. This will result in allowing Greg Sebourn to run for re-election in 2018 in the third district after serving his full four-year term. Mayor Bruce Whitaker placed this back on the agenda resulting in disenfranchising the second district from 2018 to 2020, while at the very same time giving the third district not one but two representatives, Greg Sebourn or a challenger and Jesus Silva. This action of Mayor Bruce Whitaker results in undermining the whole purpose for the district elections.
- The Council continues to ignore the will of the people by approving Agenda 21 high-density buildings. The city council votes to change zoning requirements and ignore our General Plan to allow developers free rein in our city.
Council member Jennifer Fitzgerald’s actions are the most troubling, as she was heavily involved in creating our latest General Plan. Questions for Council member Fitzgerald: Why do think it is proper to ignore our General Plan and the vast majority of the public? Does it have to do with your VP position with Curt Pringle and Associates?
- Finally the City Attorney’s arguments to repeal Ordinance 3149, our former child sex offender residency restriction law, misrepresented important facts and mislead the public about the legal status of that ordinance. The council’s unanimous decision to turn its backs on our children because a convicted child sex offender not even living in Southern California filed seventeen lawsuits throughout the state is shameful. Our city council did not want to spend the relatively few dollars defending a very good law. The residency restrictions only applied to child sex offenders not all sex offenders, which has not been adjudicated by any California court. There was simply no justifiably good reason to repeal it at this time.
Barry Levinson calls out the self-serving, disingenuous, deceitful and deplorabe Fullerton City Council
Posted by Joe Imbriano in Bruce Whitaker, Doug Chafee, Fullerton politics, Greg Sebourn, Jesus Silva, JOE IMBRIANO 4 FULLERTON CITY COUNCIL on March 22, 2017
Fullertonians are simply tired and disgusted with the self-serving, disingenuous political games that are played out at our council meetings. Just since the beginning of this year alone, this council has disgraced itself and shown that all too often your votes do not support the very people that you are charged to represent. Here is a partial list of your recent deceitful and deplorable actions.
- We witnessed the false claims of our Mayor Bruce Whitaker who brought back settled business in the form of changing our election schedule. This will result in allowing Greg Sebourn to run for re-election in 2018 in the third district after serving his full four-year term. Mayor Bruce Whitaker placed this back on the agenda resulting in disenfranchising the second district from 2018 to 2020, while at the very same time giving the third district not one but two representatives, Greg Sebourn or a challenger and Jesus Silva. This action of Mayor Bruce Whitaker results in undermining the whole purpose for the district elections.
- The Council continues to ignore the will of the people by approving Agenda 21 high-density buildings. The city council votes to change zoning requirements and ignore our General Plan to allow developers free rein in our city.
Council member Jennifer Fitzgerald’s actions are the most troubling, as she was heavily involved in creating our latest General Plan. Questions for Council member Fitzgerald: Why do think it is proper to ignore our General Plan and the vast majority of the public? Does it have to do with your VP position with Curt Pringle and Associates?
- Finally the City Attorney’s arguments to repeal Ordinance 3149, our former child sex offender residency restriction law, misrepresented important facts and mislead the public about the legal status of that ordinance. The council’s unanimous decision to turn its backs on our children because a convicted child sex offender not even living in Southern California filed seventeen lawsuits throughout the state is shameful. Our city council did not want to spend the relatively few dollars defending a very good law. The residency restrictions only applied to child sex offenders not all sex offenders, which has not been adjudicated by any California court. There was simply no justifiably good reason to repeal it at this time.
3 by Lee on June 14, 2017 – 9:39 am
“I have been involved in Fullerton politics for over 2 decades as a lifelong Republican. There is nothing new under the sun and there is nothing going on now that wasn’t going on when downtown was just a bunch of thrift stores. The opportunists back then always used the political process to achieve their goals. The pay to play system was dominated by the redevelopment machine and the rewards it churned out for the players who knew the game were handsome.
The council was always effective at one thing, maintaining a crooked republican majority. This gave rise to the corrupt police department, the disastrous fiscal health of the city and the malfeasance that has left our infrastructure the laughing stock of the State.
This monopoly of power held in place by the centrist right working with the limousine liberals in Fullerton took care of its own and its own exclusively. This became problematic for those who wished to enter the ring and cash in on the looming development bonanza because no one was leaving their seats at the card table. This is where the left leaning libertarian political element on the outside looking in decided to run interference and come up the political sideline. These attempts were unsuccessful for almost a decade.
The tragic death of Kelly Thomas in 2011 presented an unprecedented opportunity to harness the momentum of the masses and redirect all the rage against elected officials whose hands were tied by the judicial process and the police officers bill of rights. The people of Fullerton were livid as they lined the streets demanding justice while looking for leadership.
Tony Bushala, who for years, without success, tried to chip away at the power structure at city hall, had finally found a fan for the flames with his FFFF blog. He immediately bought the picture of the bloody face of Kelly Thomas, posted it and then ponied up $250,000 for a recall election. He hired signature gatherers and orchestrated a successful recall campaign that launched the political careers of our current city council majority, Fitzgerald, Whitaker and Sebourn as well as Kiger’s 6 month failure.
TONY’S TOOLS
Kiger, Whitaker, Sebourn, Fitzgerald
The prior years of taking cheap shots, mud slinging, and chipping away at the establishment paled in comparison to this political firestorm.
Bushala’s connections to people like Chris Norby and Shawn Nelson were crucial in carefully charting the course he would take to orchestrate the payday he had spent decades preparing for. The city’s redevelopment agency was disbanded as a result of his crony Chris Norby’s legislative action in Sacramento.
Meanwhile, he and his brother continued to amass a small fortune in real estate holdings in Fullerton, namely in the downtown area. It was always their intention as developers to develop their properties. The recall of 2012 was the moment they had been waiting for. No longer would their plans remain obscure and dependent upon the help of a handful of connections like Chris Norby or Shawn Nelson. Bushala finally had the control of the council after years of failing to influence the political process through his obscure web site. He now had the power to control the entire city with his hired hands. He personally bankrolled the entire campaigns of Travis Kiger, Bruce Whitaker, and Greg Sebourn and got them elected. They in turn would stack the various commissions to pave the way for the fulfillment of the Bushala brothers’ dream, high rise transit oriented development all over Fullerton and for once, they would dictate how and where these projects would be built instead of the “republigans” that controlled the council and the redevelopment contracts for decades prior. If hatched, this plan would have proven to make the Bushala Brothers upwards of 100 million dollars if the plans were to proceed over the next decade.
In a bizarre turn of events, one of Bushala’s hired hands, Travis Kiger was voted out of office 6 months later in the general election. The strategy of running Kiger for the short term seat may have been the safest short term bet but turned out to be a costly mistake creating long term uncertainty for the brothers.
The wild card in all of this was really somewhat of an enigma. Jennifer Fitzgerald was allowed by Bushala to walk on virtually unchallenged in 2012 as a result of Tony Bushala’s agreeing to let Mr. Nelson’s wishes to do so be honored. Fitzgerald was actually the insurance money in the entire transaction that took place in the recall. An ardent political opportunist, she could be relied upon for a yes vote on every development project imaginable. As it originally stood, Bushala really had four out of the five votes locked up, or so he thought.
While all this political theater was playing out, the ducks were being lined up for the huge payday jackpot. The City of Fullerton, in the vacuum of the redevelopment agency’s dismantling, was in the midst of a massive undertaking in hopes of revamping the entire city turning it into a burgeoning metropolis. The DCCSP was the city’s ambitious forward thinking plan that would transform this once quite bedroom community into a bustling high rise transit oriented oasis in the heart of Orange County with ten story lining the streets.
After the 2012 elections, Bushala pulled the plug on his FFFF website and as expected, would never mention the DCCSP. The DCCSP went before the planning commission that his hired hands appointed and it was passed. Bushala sat quietly waiting in the wings for the most important vote in Fullerton City Council History. 3 years after he had spent upwards of $500,000 and 2 years after the flames of the Kelly Thomas event were doused by the waters of time, the DCCSP vote would finally be before the council. The problem was the council at that time did not have the four votes owned by Bushala as Kiger was defeated 2 years earlier. Jan Flory took Travis out in a major upset narrowly defeating him by a handful of votes. That night, in August of 2014, at a council meeting in the library room with no live video coverage, the 100 million dollar vote would be before 5 council members only to be tabled. The Bushala brothers plans were immediately thwarted and their properties remain in their original condition and subject to the same zoning restriction that were placed on them before the half a million dollar expenditure to liberate them had begun.
Bushala’s so called limited government, libertarian, fiscal conservative types who have run for office like Chris Norby, Chris Thompson, Greg Sebourn, Travis Kiger, and Bruce Whitaker have all been on Tony’s payroll for the most part. They understand the power structure, what they need to say and not say and they will perform when the time comes for them to perform. This is not limited to slandering and threatening anyone who gets in the way.
The only person that I know that would never play ball with this crowd was Barry Levinson. When Barry realized that Tony was playing him, Barry must have realized that there was never any room on that team for Barry. Barry may not have realize Tony’s agenda at that time, but because Barry is financially independent and not beholden to anyone’s ideology, he freely speaks his mind and has done a tremendous service to the residents of Fullerton by staying unbiased, objective and most importantly, involved. As a result, this has thwarted some of the most dastardly of development plans namely the DCCSP. Barry was the ONLY person to fully expose this undemocratic power grab and call it what it was. He also exposed how this would be ripe for graft and bribery if passed. He also continued to fight the cities attempts to bring this item back in different shapes and forms defeating it every time.
Fast forward to four years later and the newbies who recently ran for office either do not understand the power structure that is in place and the games that are being played or simply choose to look the other way. They are just weak-minded people with very limited financial resources and are willing to cozy up to the power structure as they hope to latch on to Tony’s pocketbook and maintain their connections. Their behavior speaks for itself. Listen to their rhetoric, watch their willful ignorance of the issues and of course their refusal to propose, or demand solutions. They do not even realize they don’t have a full grasp on the problems that we face so how in the world could they ever propose solutions? Fortunately those people will never get elected so we don’t have to worry about them. Tony Bushala has effectively co-opted, compromised and controlled the loyal opposition in town.
He has done well in figuring out how to throw them a bone so he can control them to work for his agenda. These people people don’t want to believe what his agenda is because to accept what his agenda is and to understand what his agenda is means that they may not get a couple thousand dollars in campaign contributions if they decide to run for office. The whole agenda is for Tony Bushala to build high-rise apartments all over his slums. That’s what he’s all about because he’s a developer. He plays all these political games and engages in political gamesmanship. It is and always has been Tony’s political chess game, and most of you have been and still are his pawns.
I am grateful for the platform that Mr. Imbriano has provided to put this information out for the people to read and to Mr. Levinson for his steadfast and uncompromising commitment to the good people of Fullerton. “