Web facilitator's note: This is a letter from Former City Council candidate Donn Filbert shares his continuing concerns about City affairs with Dex, whose replies are interspersed below in bold.
1. Garbage/Re-cycling mess just will not go away.
A. Arcatans pay 4 times as much for garbage service as Fortunans.
B. Garbage is removed (in some places) only once per month. (Colony
Inn.)
C. Re-cycles rip-off the public by deducting 1 POUND for plastic
bags (did in 1993-94).
D. Arcata should start its own garbage district. Garbage is a
RACKET. Recycling is a RACKET. Recycling used to make money; then
in 1995-6 it was $28,000 in debt with a new dame in charge. Since
then recycling is COSTING THE City $160,000 per year when, in
fact, it should be making money for us. The Dame has since been
kicked "upstairs" to consult in D.C.
2. Police and City Manager attempting to micro-manage Arcata business. Are they looking for pay-offs? Police Chief should stick to solving crime. City Manager should stick to running CITY business, as in City Hall!
3. Arcata should fire Nancy Diamond as City Attorney. She is clearly INCOMPETENT, or stupid, or corrupt, or any combination of the above, and is directly responsible for Council, City Manager writing illegal resolutions, ordinances, and codes. Diamond disregards State law, as in Resolution 202.2 which sought to quash public information enquiry by forcing seekers to pay illegal fees of up to $600 (and more). State Law says people seeking PUBLIC INFORMATION may be charged ONLY for the cost of copies. Question: Is Res. 202.2 still on the books? If so, why? (Candidate Filbert brought this up in 1999. Council said they'd "look into it.")
[Dex: We agree to disagree AND we have common concerns!
Let's bring knowledgable citizens like Donn Filbert to our Citizens'
Forums AND repeat-speaking City Council Meets. Let us smoke out
the truth!]
4) City needs a thorough INDEPENDENT AUDIT, preferably from a
qualified firm from San Francisco. NOT LOCALS. Arcata hasn't been
audited in over 20 years.
[Dex: I desire a Citizens' Public Auditing with critiques of we who are studying the books and budget sheets the City provides (careful! Are these the actual accounts exchanged?), bringing our questions and suspicions for investigating deeper. We will have the assistance of experts from wherever, as long as they aren't beholden to those under our magnifying lenses.]
5) McKinley's Statue is still an eyesore...send it to McKinleyville.
[Dex: Vintage Filbert, God bless him! Heck, I say send it to D.C. and stick it by a Pres. Wilson, who signed the Federal Reserve ACT into unConstitutional "law" c. 1913.]
6) APEG/ACAT should get it's Pass-Through money. The high-handed tactics of former City Manager Breskin are now being carried forward by another arrogant City Manager, Dan Hauser.
7) Time to get fid of City Manager governance & get back to Charter-Government where things are done by statute and code; and the human equation is minimized. There is too much dance for graft and kickback schemes in present system.
8) Arcata should spearhead Elections Reform. Clearly, the present Humboldt Co. Elections board (Lindsey McWilliams) is not doing something. Arcata had over 16,000 voters registered in 1999. Yet, in this hip, ENGAGED town some 3,700 VOTERS only 15% of the voters turned out. Why? DO YOU REALLY BELIEVE THAT FIGURE?
[Dex: What do we feel unconciously about how our votes are "counted"? See the election-machine fraud links and study and think, please.]
9) Council should act RIGHT now to declare and make permanent, the OLD COMMUNITY CENTER a designated ARCATA COMMUNITY THEATER FOR THE ARTS. This will assure that this fine building (WHICH BELONGS TO THE CITIZENS OF ARCATA) is not sold off for pennies-on-the-dollar of value...to some person or group in cahoots with the Council, as was done in the case of the former garbage collection/recycling bldg. which costs the City (CITIZENS!) $1.5 million and was sold to Bob O's friends @ Humboldt Fire and Light Glass Works for $50,000: $.03 ON THE DOLLAR!
10) Get permits AWAY from Design Review Commission. This NON-ELECTED group (Web facilitator's note: The Design Review Commission members are appointed to four year terms by the City Council) exercises entirely too much control on citizen business, delaying or refusing permits for even structural repair. Redwood Motors has been waiting nearly 3 years to get permits to REPAIR the front of his garage to correct structural weakness. WHY? Do they expect the owner to grease their palms? He doesn't ask: I do! OWNER tells me the repairs would take a maximum of 48 hours. What's going on? How many others are held up by micro-managing by NON-ELECTED "officials".
11) The case of Mazzotti's licensing for Entertainment is another example of a NON-ELECTED OFFICIAL (the City Manager) and an ignorant new C.O.P. FROM out of state MICRO-MANAGING downtown business. The new C.O.P. has NO knowledge of the history of Cafe' Tomo, or ARCATA!
12) End the $100,000 SLUSH FUND FOR PLAZA BUSINESSES (ONLY). THIS IS THE USE OF PUBLIC MONEY FOR PRIVATE ENTERPRISE. SHAME. SHAME. This practice also smells of KICK-BACK schemes.
13) Council should dedicate at least 1/2 of the $100,000 to expanding Library Hours. Our Public Library is open only 32 hours per week. We should expand it to 6 days per week and at least 72 hours with $10,000 per year for new books. 10AM-10PM.
14) Any further cutting in Arcata Community Forest should be done only after vote by 3/4 majority of Arcata voters. Council too often in past has cut Forest to cover it's over-spending.
15) All new public works must be put out to bid. Council at present seems to think only R.A. Olsen and Danco are worthy. More potential graft? All bids should be published. [Dex: ALL BIDS SHOULD BE PUBLISHED, DONN, AND NEGOTIATIONS DONE IN PUBLIC WITH INPUT FROM THE "AUDIENCE" CAPABLE OF MULTIPLE COMMENTARY FROM EACH CITIZEN]
16) Regardless of who ELSE gets elected to the Council Arcata
needs to break up the Terrible Trio. Recalling ORNELAS and replacing
TEST will end the Rule of Three which has existed for the past
several years. This trio (including STEWART) has been involved
in some of Arcata's worst decisions in the past 20 years including
1) The purchase of the Garbage/Recycling property ($15 million)
on chemically polluted land.
[Dex: INTERESTING, huh? Aren't you glad we have crotchety old-timers still here...and potential government workers who ALWAYS HAVE A LOT MORE TO LEARN!]
2) The resale of same for $50,000!
3) The taking on of a contract with East Carbon Development Corp.
of Utah (a CONVICTED COMPANY in Utah which had paid over 600 councilmembers
$300,000) in GRAFT!
[Dex: Our local investigations will have far-ranging effects for honest governments elsewheres too. We shall network with people who have done their homework elsewheres too]
4) The secret agreement with Eureka and other local municipalities
to form a new garbage district (excluding Fortuna - which sued
the City of Arcata and Won!), thus assuring Arcatans would pay
4 TIMES too much for garbage service.
5) The letting of contracts to favored contractors; they don't
even bother with bids anymore.
6) Hiring Keith Breskin as City Manager.
7) Passing illegal resolutions.
8) Bail out of AEDC
in the Foodworks scandal: $965,000.
9) Awarding $385,000 to Arcata Ball Park for ? ? ? ? ?
The money for those two idiotic projects would have been better
spent in an award of $1,000,000 to Mad River Community Hospital
- WHICH SERVES US ALL.
[Dex: Well, they have their own black hole problems, Donn, between Administration and Insurance Scams.]
A) Foodworks WILL be sold to College of Redwoods (probably
at a 50% (or more) LOSS!
B) The Arcata Ball Park serves only a select group of athletes
and about 300-500 fans in a stadium in which only about 50 games
(or less) are played per year by "The Humboldt Crabs".
neither HSU, nor Arcata H.S. teams are allowed to play on the
APB.
[Dex: Well, I've been seeing some soccer under the lights
lately...some more of that "psychic pressure"? What
do you all think? dexanderson@dexanderson.com]
17) With former City Manager Breskin's help the Terrible Trio
(Ornelas leading the charge!) effectively dismantled Arcata
Community Access Television after the Munguias objected to
the former City Manager's refusal to release Pass-Through money
which ACAT was
entitled to for repair, maintenance, and renewal of equipment.
The money had been going into the General Fund. It still does
despite the fact that the Contract clearly says that Pass-Through
money (from Cox Cable) is to
be paid to ACAT
(Now called Arcata Public Educational-Government
T.V.). Breskin and the City Council have DEPRIVED ACAT/APEG of its INDEPENDENT STATUS. It no longer
produces programs of much significance to the Arcata/Humboldt
County area. City Manager Hauser continues this outrage!
[Dex: That's Donn Filbert's hand-written note to me, which I just transcribed. THANK YOU FOR YOUR UNSELFISH WORK, DONN, whether we disagree or agree.]
Go back to Dex Anderson, INDEPENDENT candidate for Arcata City Council in 2002 main page.