Street Crime Attack Team | rialtonow

Flores Park Neighborhood Watch Meeting

We will be meeting this Saturday at firestation 203 on Ayala Ave for a Neighborhood Watch Meeting

Join the event on Facebook @ http://www.facebook.com/events/474866402555996/

We will be discussing the following:

Crime

Importance of the UUT (Utility Users Tax)

Holiday Safety

Looking for additional leadership

Special Guests in attendance:

Cpl Rob Muir – Current and long standing Rialto PD Liason for Flores Park Neighborhood Watch

Community Liason Officer Cameron Nelson – In a new position within Rialto PD in an effort to bring the community and PD closer and help residents with interior problems. Also he will have a holiday Safety Presentation.

Lt Andy Karol – New Area Commander for Area 1 great leader and he is a strong supporter of the community and Neighborhood Watch Programs

Councilman Elect Shawn O’Connell – Great new addition to the city council and strong supporter of the Neighborhood Watch Program

Since the Meeting will be at the firestation we would invite residents to bring a new unwrapped toy to the meeting for the “SPARK OF LOVE TOY DRIVE”

Please invite your freinds and family even if they dont live in the flores park area all are welcome.

David Phillips

NW Captain

Flores Park Area

Deborah Robertson & the Utility Users Tax

So on Tuesdays Council Meeting we had some serious shenanigans going on.

Pshing our police into the brink of disaster

Pushing our police into the brink of disaster

Council Woman Robertson had made statements prior to Tuesdays meeting that she was demanding that Rialto PD pay their full 9% pension costs or she would be the one to vote no on placing the extension of the UUT on the march ballot. So what did the Police do? They did what was in the best interest of the citizens and agreed to pay their full pensions.

So since she got what she wanted the she voted yes, right? Nope she clearly wanted more. She still voted no citing that she wants the police to do more.

After her no vote the council went straight into another closed session. While in the closed session Rialto Police Benefit Association President Richard Royce debunked the notion the police offer was anything more than their way of helping the city and Community and had no conditions as stated by George Harris with city staff. When asked what more does she want Royce said he had no idea.

Our police have given massive concessions over the years from loosing uniform allowances, cost if living, pay reduction and now paying their full retirement.

So after closed session they decided to go with our wishy washy city attorney Jimmy Gutierrez new interpretation of the law regarding just when this vote must happen. For the longest time they have said this vote must be done by the end of November. Jimmy stated that it’s his offices interpretation that they have until December 8th. Why it changed is indicative of what we saw Tuesday.

First off we saw council woman Robertson and city attorney Gutierrez having a dozen side conversations.

Second we saw council woman Robertson bring up the opportunity to delay this vote prior to rejecting it with her no vote.

So now they postponed the vote or finalizing the vote till Monday it leads us to ask what more does she want? Whatever it was she got it and its big, so big no one will speak if it. Not even off record!

The good part is in a message from Deborah Robertson she has been satisfied with the pound of flesh and blood she let from our police to vote with the fellow council members on Monday.

Here is what she said to me:

The changes have already been resolved. RPBA met with me and we appear to be good on my end and they indicated they are good as well. It was a good meeting!

These are 2 text messages she sent to me.

Everyone watch this council meeting Monday and let’s see if she finally lets the residents have a say.

Also check back Wednesday to hear how Deborah Robertson and George Harris plan to raise your trash bill……..

Were not the only ones smelling coruption

Let’s start with some awesome news we have the attention of more than just or city council we have senators and senators of the future, financial advisors and Dr. Imran Farooq.

Mr. Farooq is a partner at:

The Omnius Group – The Omnius Group specializes in comprehensive economic development to dynamically integrate public and private sectors. Our experience includes real estate development, commercial finance, green technologies, workforce development and extensive relationships across local, state and federal agencies. Our objective is to pursue projects that incorporate economic, social and environmental value in the local communities.

http://www.facebook.com/DrIFarooq

His preliminary advice is to look at:

Is it possible to propose exemptions to rate increases depending on household incomes? This might be a way to protect the most vulnerable in the community but still facilitate the deemed ‘necessary’ upgrades.

Now we were sent an interesting piece of news. The article below is about the failure of American Water to secure the contract with the City of Rialto. I find it interesting that in the press release they (RWS) claim they decided to sever ties with American Water, but here it looks like American Water was the one cutting the ties. Insiders have told me that the cities decision to ignore the residents desire to put the outsourcing issue to a vote in November gave American Water an uneasy feeling about moving forward. The city attorney’s bad advice to the council now looks like a failed political move.

You see they didn’t put the issue on the ballot for a ton of reasons:

They don’t want to know what you think, at least the Eds and the city attorney. Call them sometime and try asking questions they will try everything in their power to shove you off they just want to make their money.
They know it’s an election year with a presidential election which means more people at the polls.
Putting the issue on the ballot would remove their ability to say that most of the people want this deal.
The city wants to have a stock pile of money to dip into to bring us “Development”. What happens once the $30 Million is gone and spent? How then will you bring us the economic development we desire?
The city tried to hide from their bad decision by saying it was a union issue not a community issue, let alone I saw hundreds of residents getting petitions signed the union got what they wanted and left, the residents are still here and a few of us refuse to stop fighting.
Lastly, from the looks of the words of American Water’s CEO American Water walked away. So the city took what they thought would remain secret and tell us we (Council) have decided to remove American Water from the deal and not change the deal just the players right before an election. They didn’t hear us if they did they would have started from the ground up and better involve the community and find ways to protect residents that are elderly, poor and struggling.

Also if this deal is to bring Development to our city can someone explain the consequences of their miss-direction and lies as seen at the bottom of this article from the Public Works Newsletter:

The deal called for American Water to be paid $26.5 million a year to run the system and cover certain maintenance expenses – but not counting the automatic price escalator each year. Multiply that out 30 years – and that’s just for the O&M, which of course must be covered by sufficient revenues from the ratepayers, on top of covering the financing for the improvements, the $30 million “catch up lease payment” to the City, refinancing existing RUA debt (at much higher interest rates), etc.

When I asked Megan Madsen from Table Rock Financial about the built in profit guarantee that was there for American Water she said she had no idea what I was talking about. So when information I stumbled across leads one to believe there is more than they are telling us. Does anyone know that 27.4 million is going toward refinancing existing debt?

No one will tell us the rates they are financing at or why it nessicary to add such a massive amount of debt to something that’s tied to our WATER & WASTE WATER systems. On financial person told me that depending on how the loan is structured it may very well hurt more than help if the city ever found its self in the same situation as our neighbor San Bernardino. I have been told we will be in deficit spending this next fiscal year in the realm of $5 million dollars.

We need to be wiser to WHO is sitting on certain sub communities when it comes to dealings with contracting out services.

What do you want Rialto’s Political landscape to look like

Are you going to fall for the same old tricks, only to find our city and your wallet in the frying pan?

I want everyone to pay close attention to cities like San Bernardino, Colton and Fullerton.

Let me preface this post by making something’s clear:

We have a wonderful police and fire department. From everything I’m hearing both sides are doing their best to come to the table and negotiate to not only help the council and staff balance their budget but also still provide the community with the service we need.
We have a police chief that takes the time to listen to the community and a command staff out their doing their best to put the community’s concerns as a top priority.
Our chief of police is an out of the box thinker. By using grant writing abilities and technology we have the ability to see long term crime prevention. They do everything you can ask of an agency that plays by rules the criminals are not bound to.
I have found that when left alone and allowed to talk to the community our staff is open and honest, but once our council members find out their talking to you the communication shuts down. There is no reason we shouldn’t be able to ask questions of staff, staff is well aware of what confidential council just loves their CLOAK OF SECRACY.

Voting for an incumbent for council is not going to work this go around, they only started acting like the councilmember’s we need over the last month because of November 4th the election. There are 3 people being supported by our fire and police agencies only one deserves your vote. City Councilman Ed Palmer is up for re-election and Ed Scott is running for Mayor neither deserve a vote “IN MY OPINION”. Shawn O’Connell has a strong desire to see more openness in city government. One shouldn’t to use the threat of a freedom of information act request to get information from the city or strong arm the city government by going around and over their heads to get information that should be available to everyone.

When it comes to mayor I am making the best choice available this time and hoping a better candidate comes along in four years just in case Deborah Robertson fails me. I am backing Mrs. Robertson because when I pressed her and questioned her intentions on issues over the years she didn’t:

Call the police on me and make up lies about crimes I didn’t commit.
Call me into meetings and ambush me with other council members and the Captain of the Police Department.
Try and create a feeling of distrust amongst people I know and deal with.
Accuse me of being a liar stating I never spoke to people I directly quote.

What did Deborah Robertson DO:

When I have issues with graffiti she steps up and begins to contact the people that handle the specific area in question.
For Example – When GPC and the city were arguing over who was responsible to clean graffiti on the freeway construction staging area on the corner of Ayala and the 210 freeway. I called on her to use her to use her relationship with Caltrans to move them into cleaning up and vacating the lot. It took work but now there is nothing to tag on that corner because it’s gone.
She continued that progress by letting Caltrans know that graffiti on our freeway sound walls needs to be removed quickly. No other city sees this quick response in our area except for Rancho Cucamonga that’s because their council cares about their cities impression from the main vein of commerce on their north end.
My conversations with Mrs. Robertson are not hostile in nature and if I am the one upset she gives me the feeling she is there to find a solution to the issue not push my buttons.

People will tell you she isn’t good because of the whole outsourcing our police issue back in the 90’s. News flash no one is letting that happen & talk to any of the council member there now and tell me you don’t hear that issue is in the back of their minds? Even the councilman running against her ALWAYS reminds me how much of our budget the Police and Fire consume each year. It’s not what you say it’s how you say it that speaks to the true meaning.

Now to the three cities I first referred to.

Why these three cities you ask? Because they all have some big problems facing their cities and they are making horrible decisions on how to respond to issues plaguing their communities. Let’s break them down one by one and ill explain:

Colton a small city with big city problems. Their budget ran out of control so bad they began to gut their city workers starting with cutting their police force by a third!!!! Colton in my estimation & by the looks of their stats on www.crimemapping.com is rife with crime and no real way to combat it. With no more RDA like other cities how will they continue to attract businesses to their city to support a strong tax base. To top it all off their chief of police retired and their mayor passed away, the city hired a new chief and replaced their mayor with his widow which was a choice that was without controversy.

San Bernardino, where do I start????? Bankruptcy, Childish City Government, Poor Spending Practices or Crime and murders and homicides soaring through the roof, paying millions of dollars to attract business in a city that isn’t safe, a era of public safety that provides poor, poor service yet gets upset when the community. (A) Questions them and (B) asks them to help with their pensions so that the city can climb out of a hole. A hole created by runaway mayor and council by negotiating for an endorsement in the next campaign instead of doing a good job for the community. The article below is from the SB Sun Newspaper and shows one of these big babies in council asking the corrupt city attorney to investigate a citizen for telling him that if he voted to not allow the city to vote on San Bernardino Being a Charter City, he would begin a recall campaign against him???????? Well if this is the case call the police lock me up and throw away the key. I have been ridding Rialto’s Council and Mayor for months over their decision to outsource our water operations and create a bad financial deal. I told them you vote for this deal at your own political fate. I meant what I said, and I said what I meant.

Attorney says he threatened councilman with recall; DA investigating

Ryan Hagen, Staff Writersbsun.com

Posted: 08/07/2012 09:49:14 PM PDT

Special Section: San Bernardino

SAN BERNARDINO – Attorney Tim Prince told Councilman Chas Kelley he would pursue a recall if and only if Kelley voted against putting charter repeal on November’s ballot, Prince said Tuesday.

“I expressly told him, I don’t expect you to personally support repeal of the charter. What I do expect and demand of you is that you give the people the right to vote,” Prince said. “Despite all the errors he’s made, despite driving us into bankruptcy, he could have just let the people have their say.”

The District Attorney’s Office received a complaint Tuesday and is investigating, said spokesman Chris Lee.

Kelley said he considered the threat to be an attempted bribe.

“Someone was trying to coerce my vote, and that’s inappropriate, unacceptable, and I made that quite clear yesterday,” he said on Tuesday.

California penal code defines a bribe as “anything of value or advantage” given or promised with a “corrupt intent to influence.”

That probably wouldn’t apply to a threat to do something that is legal, said Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School.

“It’s certainly a threat, but is it chargeable? I’m not sure,” she said. “It’s along the lines of, ‘I’m not going to vote for Jerry Brown unless he pursues pension reform.”‘

Prince gave Kelley a notice of intention to circulate a recall petition just before discussion began on whether to add a ballot measure to repeal the city’s charter.

Kelley, whom Prince said was a swing vote, joined a 4-3 decision not to put charter repeal on the ballot.

The notice says Kelley deserves to be recalled for three reasons: an investigation into Verdemont Community Center, which Kelley “spearheaded and supervised”; advocating higher pay and other benefits for union members – who contributed heavily to his campaigns – despite warnings that the city was headed toward bankruptcy; and “dismissing his constituents by denying us the right to vote on repealing the city charter.”

The Grand Jury’s 2011-12 report criticized the construction of the Verdemont center for not having a certificate of occupancy, initial building permits or proper inspections and for construction that didn’t meet required standards.

The report also found city staff “had a general lack of understanding of the building requirements,” but doesn’t mention Kelley or other elected officials.

Kelley said he agreed with the Grand Jury’s recommendations, but the errors were made by city staff whom he said hadn’t built a community center since the 1980 s.

“I don’t micromanage or make the day-to-day decisions,” he said. “Every step of the way on this project was approved by the mayor and council.”

Prince said he had no regrets and was moving forward with petitions to remove Kelley from office and put charter repeal on a later ballot.

Several council members, including those who said charter repeal should be on the ballot, said Prince’s actions were unacceptable.

FULLERTON was most recently in the national spotlight over the Thomas Kelly case where a man died because after his encounter with some of their officers. Fullerton had a massive recall election, removed bad officers and the Chief of police. They made big changes to their use of force policy and used a PR campaign to show the community they were serious about changing the publics face of their department. So now the city council has asked the Orange County Sherriff to put together a total cost estimate to take over police services. Even though they split the vote to stall this venture this is one of those issues once the cat is out of the bag there is no going back, and this is an issue that is full of contriversary.

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FULLERTON, Calif. (KABC) — The Fullerton City Council was expected vote Tuesday on whether to begin a process that would eliminate the city’s police department and have the Orange County Sheriff’s Department take over.

The city council, which recently welcomed three new members after a recall, says the issue is one of money. Two council members said operating the police department costs tens of millions of dollars, so allowing the county sheriff to take over would save the city a lot of money, especially in management expenses. The Orange County Sheriff’s Department already provides services to other cities in north Orange County, the most recent of which is Yorba Linda.

However, there is speculation that the move is in response to the death of Kelly Thomas, a mentally ill homeless man who died after a violent confrontation with police last July. Many of the council members who support dismantling the police force have been sharp critics of the department.

Mayor Pro Tem Bruce Whitaker maintains cost is the true concern.

“Had the Kelly Thomas incident not occurred, I believe it would still be our responsibility to be looking at these costs,” he said.

With the city’s expenditures increasing by 9 percent and revenue only increasing by 1 to 2 percent over the coming years, it makes financial sense to cut the department. Should the police department be cut, about 95 percent of Fullerton’s cops would still be able to serve the public as sheriff’s deputies.

Whitaker says now that three former council members have been recalled, it will be a lot easier for the city to look at the budget more objectively.

“The city is shouldering many lawsuits at the moment, including that one from [father of Kelly Thomas] Ron Thomas. And there was an earlier settlement of $1 million to Kelly’s birth mom,” said Whitaker.

Fullerton police officials say they will abide by whatever the city council decides, but they also say public safety is more than just about dollars and cents.

Some Fullerton residents like Scott Darrah are for the idea of allowing the sheriff’s department to take over.

“As long as they get the corrupt people out and get the right people in and do the right job, that’s really all that matters, as long as we feel safe,” he said.

Others are not so keen on the idea.

“They’re doing a pretty good job, I mean they realized they did a mistake and they got rid of the people, so I think we need to keep the police, I mean it’d be ridiculous,” said Susan Montoya.

The president of the Fullerton Police Officers’ Association said he thinks the move is purely motivated by politics. He also said the entire department took a pay cut last year, and he hopes the city will honor a contract it has with the department that lasts through 2015.

Fullerton’s police department, which is about 100 years old and is one of the oldest in the nation, has undergone major changes in the past year. The police chief retired, three officers quit and two officers have been charged in Thomas’ death.

A cost analysis of the department’s dismantling would take about four months

Coffee With The Chief August

Coffee with the Chief is August 14th starting @ 8AM

This time we will be at:

Coffee Nutz

119 East Foothill Blvd

Come out and here what is going on in the department and have the chief and his staff there to answer your questions and concerns.

What I have found amazing about these meetings is when issues are brought up you actually start seeing results and action being taken. Everyone doesn’t always agree but one thing is constant is that Chief Farrar and his team truly care about this city and the communities well-being.

Another is that you always hear about or learn something new. From procedures to crime problems in other areas of the city you leave informed and empowered.

So come out and have some coffee and become an active part of making Rialto a safer place to work, play and live.

Re-Cap on Coffee with the Chief

On July 10th people in the community met with Chief of police Tony Farrar, Captain Randy De Anda & Volunteer Judy Roberts to talk about issues concerning the residents in the city of Rialto.

It was a nice showing of new and old faces to the coffee with the chief events.

Chief Farrar started the meeting with updating us on some of the recent goings ons within the department.

Nationwide grant giving police departments ability to hire additional police officers. There were 117 total positions nationwide and Rialto PD received 5. These positions will fund for 3 years for each position. When asked what will happen to the officers once the grant money is over Chief Farrar stated that officers moving to other departments, retirements would take place over the years to allow these officers to be ready and working so that they can fill the gaps. This grant is geared to give military veterans the ability to find work.
Rialto PD has done some aggressive hiring and we have 8 candidates going through the sheriffs academy 3 will graduate in September 6 started on 7-9-12 and there is one lateral position. This hiring will help fill the gaps created by the mass retirements a year and a half ago.
Sgt Gibbs will be the person in charge of building up our Reserve Program. The reserve program is where people who are sworn officers donate time working in our department to help us put more boots on the ground. Sgt Gibbs is a Background Investigator and will be able to handle the backgrounds on these prospective officers and bolster this important program.
On July 10th Chief Farrar went before city council to obtain final approval on our part in the new regional SWAT Program. THis means we will combine resources from Colton, Fontana & Rialto to share the resources and save money on certification, training and equipment maintenance.
Chief spoke about COP Link a regional program where law enforcement agencies all over the county can more quickly and efficiently share information on suspects, crimes and other information that may span from city to city.
Chief spoke about the awesome things our SCAT team has been doing in the city and county, like the POT bust in the corn field.

There were issues brought up by the residents as well They ranged from aggressive panhandlers and pushy homeless making it hard for people to shop in Rialto. The amount of illegal activity in our parks in the late hours and the need for posted park hours that the police and community could enforce. The amount of young children being put on Rialto Streets to sell candy and other items in the late hours of the night. Chief Fararr made mention of the need of a permit local businesses would obtain to have the ability to walk and solicit homes in the city of Rialto.

These meeting are a great way for you to be able to meet other people who care for this community. This venue is the best way to get your questions answered and know the Police Department heard you.

If you have an issue, problem or concern this is where you will get answers.

One comment that came up that started a little debate was, Do you think the Chief of police should live in the same city he works in? Why or Why Not? Post your answers here or on the Facebook or Twitter sites and get the dialogue going.