BY BARRY LEVINSON
JENNIFER FITZGERALD
‘I think it is both fitting and appropriate that I am penning this article on the 4th of July, Independence Day.
Councilmember Fitzgerald’s June 30, 2014 article entitled “Fullerton Councilmember Responds: New COIN Ordinance Has Teeth” is referring to my last article about C.O.I.N. dated June 25, 2014 without mentioning my name. She states that Supervisor Moorlach’s five components are in the Fullerton ordinance. She conveniently ignores every specific fact comparison I make for each of the 5 components. How is that responding to my very real concerns that the Fullerton ordinance will not make any major improvements to the transparency, timeliness and accountability of Fullerton’s labor negotiation process?
Let us first start out with the keys to a good C.O.I.N. ordinance. The keys are transparency, openness, timeliness and accountability. Let us take up that subject as it may relate to Ms. Fitzgerald. Let us go to her byline entitled ”About the Author”. She tells you “she serves on the Board of Directors for the Association of California Cities-Orange County Chapter and the Orange County Taxpayers Association and is a Past President of the Fullerton Chamber of Commerce.” Yet she leaves out what she does for a living and who is her current employer. Why would she not tell the audience how she earns a living? So I will tell you. She is currently Vice President of Curt Pringle and Associates which describes themselves on their Facebook page as follows:
“About
Curt Pringle & Associates is a full-service public relations, public affairs and government relations firm, providing a wide range of services to both private and public sector clients.
General Information
The Curt Pringle & Associates team works collaboratively to maximize our knowledge, expertise and experience in tailoring a comprehensive strategy to fit the client’s specific goals, resources and abilities.
While we are perhaps best known for our governmental advocacy efforts, employing an extensive breadth of relationships with elected and appointed officials throughout southern California and at the State Capitol*, we are also well versed in the areas of land use entitlement, public outreach, crisis communications and media relations, and have produced substantial benefits in each of these fields for numerous clients.”
I would very much like Councilmember Fitzgerald to tell us why she left out this very important detail in describing herself. I would say what one does for a living could have a direct impact on various public policy positions especially when that is her business as VP of Curt Pringle and Associates as well as her elected obligation and duty as Fullerton Councilmember as well. Could it be that this is the very reason why Ms. Fitzgerald failed to mention her executive position with Curt Pringle and Associates?
I REPORT, YOU DECIDE.
There is an excellent quote whose author I do not know. The quote is as follows:
“You are entitled to your own opinions, but you are not entitled to your own facts.”
It simply means that you are entitled to any opinion without the boundaries of accuracy, factuality, or even sanity. Facts by the very definition of the word, does not allow you to have your own set of facts simply because you are not the arbiter of those facts like you are with your own opinions. I know politicians wish that they could have their own set of facts and many times act like they are entitled to have their own set of facts. However, I am here to tell them unequivocally that they do not have that right if they also want to be honest communicators of the truth.
Therefore, Ms. Fitzgerald certainly is entitled to her opinions but she is certainly not entitled to her own brand of facts.
My earlier article took the five major components of a good C.O.I.N ordinance and found shortcomings in the just passed counterfeit CO.I.N. ordinance thanks to the yes votes by Mayor Chaffee and Councilmembers Fitzgerald and Flory.
It is interesting that for each specific shortcoming that I factually pointed out, Ms. Fitzgerald did not address directly any of them. I would call that rather non-responsive.
For instance, let us give the reader two examples starting with component No. 1 Independent Negotiator. This is part of what I wrote as follows:
“Under Moorlach’s component, an independent negotiator is a requirement for all negotiations. Under Fullerton ordinance Section B.1. Principal Negotiator second paragraph states as follows: “The requirement for an outside negotiator may be waived by a majority vote of City Council.”
Therefore, since the current council put this out clause into the ordinance they must want to be able to waive the independent negotiator requirement at their convenience with a simple majority vote. If a majority of our current council wanted a truly independent process there would be no language in the ordinance to allow for the independent negotiator’s status to be tampered with by this council or for any future council as well.
Ms. Fitzgerald did not address this critical fact in her response.
For Component No. 2., Cost of Contracts, I wrote the following:
“Under Moorlach’s component the independently elected Auditor-Controller reviews the costs of proposed contracts and provides the information to all parties and the public before any contractual finalization can take place.” In the Fullerton version it states at A.1., Annual Analysis of Costs and Liabilities, second paragraph, as follows: “The annual fiscal analysis shall be submitted to the City’s independent auditor during the course of the annual City financial audit.” Under Fullerton law, there is no requirement to provide this information prior to the signing of the labor negotiation contracts, relegating the independent auditor’s information basically worthless because the public does not receive it in a timely manner. Therefore, the second component’s only purpose is not carried out under the Fullerton law.”
Ms. Fitzgerald failed to address this critical point as well. To use her vernacular….CHECKMATE!
I would also like to make one very important observation. I have been regularly attending Fullerton council meetings since early 2010. In those 4.5 years, any agenda item that even had the hint of potentially reducing union power, control and especially their salaries and benefits of their members always resulted in many, many city employees attending and speaking out at those meetings. Not one city employee, not one union president or member spoke out against the recently passed Counterfeit C.O.I.N. ordinance. Ladies and gentlemen doesn’t that tell you all you really need to know about which version of C.O.I.N., the Costa Mesa version or the Fullerton version is going to work best for the taxpayers of Fullerton.
In conclusion, Ms. Fitzgerald is certainly entitled to her opinions, but she is not entitled to her own facts. Unfortunately, we the people of Fullerton believed her when she told us that she would support an effective C.O.I.N. ordinance for the city of Fullerton. Now we know her opinion about C.O.I.N., and now the reader knows the facts.
Post Script: What is truly sad is that Ms. Fitzgerald as well as Ms. Flory and Mr. Chaffee will be asked to account for these and other shortcomings in the Fullerton ordinance in upcoming Fullerton city council meetings by the public and they will most likely not respond to any of the public’s questions. Is this the kind of government that our forefathers envisioned or is this the kind of government they feared might materialize while the public was not closely watching our city leaders?
BARRY LEVINSON
#1 by Barry Levinson on July 8, 2014 - 3:34 pm
It is my understanding that Ms. Fitzgerald used to be the treasurer or some other office holder or have some other direct connection to the local Lincoln Club.
I am sure that was just an oversight by the current president not to disclose that fact. However, it is important for full disclosure to inform the readers of this connection.
I REPORT, YOU DECIDE.