OC Blog

Moorlach Unloads On Carona

I just fired up the computer to check my e-mail and I see this "Moorlach Update" that arrived little over an hour ago, in which Supervisor John Moorlach unloads on Sheriff Mike Carona:

I now feel that I have achieved victim status.  I am the victim of time theft.  Yesterday’s calendar was wiped out by a constant stream for media interviews.

Ten years ago I came home one night and told my wife that Michael Carona had personally informed me that he would be running for Sheriff in 1998.  My wife’s reaction was so positive, that she gave me permission to rerun.  Until that time, she wanted me out of the County because of the many unsavory characters within County government that we had encountered during my first few years in restoring the Treasurer-Tax Collector’s Department.  My wife felt that if Mike was running, we may see a new day, and she encouraged me to rerun in 1998 as well.

Norby Wants To Put County Campaign Finance Reform On February Ballot

Following John Moorlach's call for Carona's resignation, Board Chairman Chris Norby announced his desire to place on the February ballot a countywide initiative to:

...improve and simplify, the county campaign finance limitations and other matters to make them conform to those that currently apply to the state legislature and number two, to enforce those and oversee those create a county election campaigns/ethics committee...

Norby pointed out, and County Counsel Ben De Mayo concurred, that this coming Tuesday is the practical deadline for placing an initiative on the Feburary ballot, and Norby solicited the advice and input of his board colleagues as the the content of this proposed ordinance.

Martin Wisckol has Shirely Grindle's lady-like reaction over at Total Buzz

OC's Non-Pension Related Retiremen Unfunded Liability Down Almost $1 Billion Since 2006

Another Moorlach update wafted over the transom this morning. This one trailed along a PDF of an article from tdoay's "Bond Buyer" (I never miss an issue myself).

Here's what Supervisor John Moorlach had to say in reference to the article:

The Bond Buyer has a subscriber-only website.  Fortunately, the County has at least two subscriptions, so a PDF file was made of today’s article and is attached.  The key quote is as follows:

“County officials estimate that they have reduced its unfunded liability for non-pension related retirement benefits from about $1.4 billion at the beginning of 2006 to approximately $440 million, including the estimated $140 million in savings from the new contract with the Association of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs, approved Tuesday by the Orange County Board of Supervisors.”

Janet Nguyen's Freeway Sign

There's a brewing blog tempest over an Adopt-A-Highway sign on the 22 Freeway from Sup. Janet Nguyen. Gustavo Arellano first reported it on Navel Gazing, followed by Peggy Lowe at Total Buzz (it turns out Bill Campbell has one, too).

Here's the sign:

Report: LA County Civilian Review Panel Working Well

H/T to the Moorlach Update for hipping me to this article in today's LA Times about a report from the LA County CEO on the Office of Independent Review:

The Office of Independent Review, which oversees investigations into alleged misconduct by Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies, does a good job of making sure internal investigations and discipline are fair and has increased public confidence in the department, according to a report by the county executive.

The Board of Supervisors ordered the review last month after agreeing to spend more than $3 million to fund the unit for the next three years. The office is staffed by civil rights attorneys who consult with internal affairs investigators and make recommendations about discipline and training.

When Mario Met Shirley

I just got off the phone with Mario Mainero, Supervisor John Moorlach's chief of staff. I called him to see how his meeting today with Shirley Grindle went.

Mario declined to go into details of their meeting about Shirley's proposal for some sort of county commission, complete with enforcement powers, to basically graft her soul onto a enforcement agency.

Moorlach's reaction in the October 14 LA Times article was skepticism, and he followed up with this clarification in his Moorlach Update e-mail:

The article also brings up some need for clarification.  The first is that Shirley Grindle has not made a presentation to me about a Fair Campaign Practices Commission.  My office looks forward to meeting with her about her plans.  What I recommended to the reporter is that Shirley needs to mentor someone to follow in her footsteps and carry on her passion.  What I’ve been pursuing is adopting the State’s full on-line disclosure policies and procedures.  If you can mine the data electronically, it won’t take someone thousands of hours and 5” X 8” note cards to manage the data.

More recently, Supervisor Moorlach's office has expressed finding Shirley's idea "intriguing." While noddig toward such open-mindedness, I hope it doesn't portend a willingness to create a mini-FPPC for OC.

AOCDS Agreement Looks Like A Net Win For The County

My initial reaction to the tentative agreement reached between the Association of Orange County Deputy Sheriffs and the County of Orange is it's a win for the county. I think if this were a private sector employer versus union situation, the employer would be considered to have come out ahead.

AOCDS has been fighting for more than a year to prevent the county from auditing their health care fund, and they essentially caved on that one. And agreeing to transition to defined-contribution medical retirement benefit is a big setback for public employee unions in general -- the fear being it will have the ripple effect of other local government agencies pointing to it in their own negotiations and saying, "See - the AOCDS agreed to it!"

AOCDS Reaches Deal With The County

H/T to Peggy Lowe at Total Buzz: the AOCDS has reached agreement with the County on a new contract.

Judging by some of the details Peggy blogs about, it looks like there are some positive outcomes for OC taxpayers. From Peggy's post:

I’m shocked at the details – in the most sticky of the sticking points, the deputies union agreed to allow the county to co-audit the multi-million dollar heath care fund.  It’s a so-called “dual agency” audit, which means the union and the county will pay for a look-see that both sides will be privy to. They’ve been arguing about that for years.

And get this: the deputies conceded to allow a transition to a defined-contribution medical benefit — a 401(k) style fund for each member’s health care. That could make Orange County the first county in the state to convert to that style of health benefit — and that’s a major concession.

The full details will be released at AOCDS membership meetings tonight, tomorrow and Monday. Members will have the opportunity to vote on the agreement at those meetings, and AOCDS hopes to have the pact ratified by Monday evening and approved by the Board of Supes on Tuesday.

Board of Supes Should Approve County Parks Strategic Plan

Approval of the Harbors, Beaches and Parks Strategic Plan will be on the Board of Supervisors agenda this Tuesday. On August 29, the HBP  Commission, on which I serve as the Third District representative) voted 4-3 to reject the Strategic Plan.

HBP Commission votes are advisory in nature, and as a commissioner I advise the Board to ignore that recommendation and adopt the Strategic Plan.

It's a solid, sensible plan for guiding the HBP Department into the future. For example, it emphasizes partnering with private land trusts to manage open space, which would enable the department to focus more resources on recreation. It also looks to have the county divest itself of scattered bits of parkland it really has no business owning, but which consume departmental resources.

The reasons a majority of the commissioners voted to reject stem, in my view, largely from issues that are largely extraneous to the plan: primarily re-establishing Harbors, Beaches and Parks as a separate department, the possibility of changing the department's name, and the establishment of Dana Point Harbor as a separate county department a few years ago.

Moorlach Responds To 'Hypocrisy' Charge

Supervisor John Moorlach's periodic "The Moorlach Update" e-mail came over the transom this morning. In it, he responds to the charges of hypocrisy being levelled at the Supes by the public employee unions:

The topic of pensions and pension reform continues to get press attention.

Today’s OC Register has an article on a recent pension increase for electeds and an editorial submission on one pension reform remedy that I have advocated for quite some time.

The headline for the article begs for a response, as the article does not provide the full story.