Patterson Housing Element DRAFT: Need we say more?
The projected need for affordable housing units by income (extremely low; very low; and low) in Patterson from 2001 to 2014 was approximately 417 units. We have managed to build zero, cero, null, صفر, 零.
The purpose of these income group goals are to ensure that each city within the county attains its share of state housing goals without any relative disproportionate distribution of household income groups. Clearly, the city of Patterson isn’t pulling its weight.
We don’t want any crap about how easy it is to buy a home now, the last chart will hopefully point out that home prices are similar to 2002, yet in 2002, there was still a significant demand for workforce housing. Today’s economic climate doesn’t eliminate the need for this essential human right. The bottom line: the city has totally failed our working residents who want, seek, and long for an affordable home.
Patterson Housing Element 2004
Patterson Housing Element DRAFT 2009
Patterson Housing Element DRAFT 2009
Do we have your attention yet?
For over a year now, we here at the Patterson IrriTator have documented numerous Brown Act violations by the Patterson City Council. Unfortunately, for the majority of this past year, these violations have gone unchecked by all us in this community. However, when a few residents stood up and questioned the Mayor’s decision to disregard public comment before a closed session, people took note. The Patterson Irrigator chided the council, calling them out on their rather pretentious decision to opt out of public comment because it “would take all night” and failing to disclose who voted for the John Ramos early Christmas gift.
New Patterson IrriGator Article: "Council pledges to better comply with Brown Act"
But the Brown Act violations are only the tip of the iceberg. The Mayor and City Councilwoman Annette Smith have collaborated on far too many tactics that can only be described as a total disregard for the public’s trust.
They’ve abused their elected office to settle personal scores.
They’ve appointed residents who stand to benefit economically to draft our city’s future blueprint…the General Plan.
They’ve used our tax dollars to keep their political benefactors from paying their legal fees.
You see, in the long run, the Brown Act violations are small potatoes, complying with the Act doesn’t stop the Slate from abusing their elected official powers. Until we demand more from our elected official, the circus will remain at city hall.
We commend those residents who chose to stand and make their voices heard, without you, this science project we call our elected officials, would have continued to embarrass our city and bring shame to our democratic form of government.
The Brown Act: Patterson Style
Patterson IrriGator: City Council may have skirted meeting laws
In the 1951, San Francisco Chronicle reporter Mike Harris spent six weeks looking into the way local agencies conducted meetings. State laws had required that business be done in public, but Harris discovered secret meetings or caucuses were common. He wrote a 10-part series on “Your Secret Government”, that ran in May and June of 1952.
Harris found elected officials, at all levels of government, who were outright contemptuous of the notion that their actions should be subject to public scrutiny.
Pay raises and layoff decisions were argued and decided in secret sessions. Major land-use policies and special favors for well-connected constituents were sometimes debated and settled without public notice or participation.
Sound familiar?
This was all suppose to change with the 1953 passage of the Ralph M. Brown Act, named after its author, a former Speaker of the state Assembly. Brown was a sharp but unpretentious lawyer from Modesto, who was considered a man of integrity in the lobbyist-controlled Capitol of the ’40s and ’50s.
As part of his law practice, Brown represented a group of Modesto nurses in labor negotiations with a public hospital in the early ’50s. After Brown thought he had a deal, the hospital directors reneged in a secret meeting.
The Brown Act said, “All meetings of the legislative body of a local agency shall be open and public and all persons shall be permitted to attend any meeting of the legislative body of a local agency except as otherwise provided in this chapter.”
Additionally, the Brown Act left us with these guiding principles:
- The people of this State do not yield their sovereignty to the agencies which serve them.
- The people, in delegating authority, do not give their public servants the right to decide what is good for the people to know and what is not good for them to know.
- The people insist on remaining informed so that they may retain control over the instruments they have created.
Last week, the Patterson City Council made an enormous unethical mistake. Instead of being forthright with residents, they zigged and zagged around any attempt to make “the morris issue” transparent.
Are we asking too much by insisting that our elected officials follow these simple laws, that are meant to protect us, the residents, their constituents?
We happen to believe that they simply do not care for our opinion or input, and like the back door politicians of the 1950’s, they would rather have us butt out.
So what can we do?
Unfortunately, violating the Brown Act is a misdemeanor of which no one ever has been convicted. Many cities simply choose to ignore it, or interpret it to meet their own agenda, without any consequences.
We can continue to keep a close eye on the councils actions to ensure that they carry out the oath of which they swore.
We can support those who have bravely spoken out against the council for the benefit of us all.
We can support City Staff, whom because of our voting, have to deal with this inept leadership on a daily basis.
We can take back our city, by supporting and voting for individuals who will make decisions that best serve our city, rather than their political benefactors.
Lastly, we would like to thank the Patterson Irrigator, for not letting this story die, without a local newspaper, events like this would never be brought to light. If you haven’t read the article, please click here.
Patterson City Hall: Lots of Tricks, Little Treats
With all the buzz surrounding city hall these days, we thought it would be nice to take a break in the action and celebrate our $27,000 contribution with the recorder’s rather appropriate production. If you can”t laugh, maybe you should cry.
How many youth recreation scholarships could this money buy? How many months of service for an extra deputy on the beat? How many afterschool events for “loitering youths” could we fund with the $27,000? What we really want to know is ……..do they think the people of Patterson will stand for this?
City Council Overstepping Boundries?
Over the past few weeks, city staff have been the target of several intimidating tactics by certain council members. We thought it would be beneficial to point out, as the image below displays, that the city manager is given the task to manage city staff, the name kind of gives it away. More importantly, as you see below, council members are not necessarily charged with the task.
The Witch Hunt
That was a great showing of support at the meeting tonight!
This kind of civic participation keeps our elected officials honest and makes the message loud and clear, they can’t continue to do as they please, instead they must do their jobs as elected officials and make the best decisions for the community not the money!
Speaking of money, somehow the rich continue to get theirs! Ramos getting his money back is ridiculous and unfortunately has sent a message to anyone wising to sue the city…. all they have to do is sue, tie it up in litigation and wait for our incompetent city attorney to fold, and boom! You got your money back and probably your way with the city!
Isn’t our city attorney looked at as a subordinate? I hope there is review of George Logan with possible action on an agenda soon! He seems to be padding his retirement with the billing of the city for countless of useless hours he has spent to fold to Ramos! Ramos quoted it best, “if Logan’s opinion had been sought out before staff approved the move, the appeal and the coinciding legal fees would not have been necessary.”
Here is a good question, why would the city attorney just sit back and not give his opinion as our legal analyst, knowing that there may be possible law suits pending? Is it not his job to protect the city’s best interest, is he not the legal voice on the council? George Logan is a joke! I’ve said it once and will continue to say it!
He is reaping the benefits of siding with the Slate and their benefactors! Georgie needs to go! And one final note, is there any question how the vote went to pay Ramos?
Let’s have a replay: Councilwoman Smith- Pay Ramos, Councilman Fahrina- Pay Ramos, Councilwoman Shelton- Dont pay ramos, Councilman Cuellar- dont pay ramos, Mayor Campo- Pay Ramos…after the vote the slate cheers and Georgie Logan secretly does fist pumps under the table!
“Dem Crazy, We gonna kick dem crazy baldheads out of our town!” – Bob Marley
KEEP THE PRESSURE ON, MAKE OUR ELECTED OFFICIALS SERVE THE COMMUNITY NOT THE MONEY!
PTOWNMESSENGER
Patterson City Hall: A Palace Again
There seems to be no foreseeable end to the amount political maneuvers at city hall today. However, we hope residents will stand up and finally tell this Mayor & Co., enough is enough, we will not be sheep. It was a palace, and it can be a palace again.
The Big Squeeze II: Morris and Co.
Modesto Bee - Click Here!
The Modesto Bee reports that Cleve Morris is on the Mayor target list. We’re glad to see that they read the agenda. We believe there is much more to the story. There is a strong possibility that the Mayor and Ms. Smith are unhappy with particular city staff. Morris, who has never been one to sell his team down the river, is now caught up in this mess. For years now, Cleve Morris has served our city well, he is deeply respected amongst his peers and Patterson would be worse off without him.
This is simply another example of the Mayor’s inability to lead. Why would you want Cleve gone now? I’m sure they will many reasons, probably similar to those that allowed them to snipe Funez and Molina. They’ll probably use the word “vision” without ever defining what in fact their vision is….they’ll probably bring up the check fiasco, even though its been years since they were discovered in a drawer. What the council fails to realize is….at the end of the day, most residents probably trust Cleve more than the council.
If the council chooses to can Morris, we thought it would be fun to draft a potential city manager list for the Mayor and Co.
1. Ron West – We already handed him a seat on the Planning Commission, he seems to want to run the city from that seat anyways. $$
2. Joel Hallowell – He already has the council’s ear, some go as far as to say that he can create an agenda item. $$$
3. John Ramos – He essentially owns the city, why not hand him the keys to city hall? $$$$
Editor’s Note: At the end of the Modesto Bee article, Garth Stapley takes a misleading shot at Cleve Morris by writing, “Under Morris’ leadership, Patterson has grown from 14,221 people to an estimated 21,168 in January — a far greater rate than any of the county’s eight other cities.”
My how short of memory Mr. Stapley possesses, was it not his article that praised Patterson for it’s smart growth policies and practices? In fact, they ranked Patterson #2 in the entire Central Valley.
We called the report nonsense when it came out, and we still think it was a rather useless report provided by the modesto bee and the great valley center. The Modesto Bee and Stapley claim that they relied on city administrators to provide information. If this was the case, why did Stapley lead readers to believe that this was a “a comprehensive planning audit“.
We bring this up for one reason. Only a year has passed since this smart growth report was released. However, for some rather odd reason, over this past year, the tone of articles directed at Patterson have been scathing, focusing primarily on urban growth. We have one question for Stapley, why the flip flop? We don’t mind the criticism, we actually welcome it. We’re just hoping someone isn’t pulling your strings to pin this on Morris.
The Big Squeeze
October 19, 2009 · Filed under Patterson, city council, city of patterson, fred ross, patterson irritator · Tagged brown act, california attorney general, closed session, patterson ca, patterson city council, Patterson city staff, patterson mayor, public comment, smells, special meeting
According to the Brown Act, at every special meeting, the public must be given notice that describes the public’s right to comment.
We just reviewed the notice for the “special meeting” and there is no indication that the public was given such notice. Furthermore, even if the council retreats to closed session, the Attorney General advises that legislative bodies should afford the public an opportunity to comment on items prior to adjournment into closed session.
Bottom line:
Outside of any notice modification signaling the public’s right to speak before the council retires to closed session, it appears that the city may violate the Brown Act for not providing the public with proper notice. This violation may allow the contents of such meeting to be revealed for public review, despite it’s closed session status.
After the council returns from the closed session, they will have already decided whether to take action or not. This is the precise reason why the opportunity for public comment before closed session is so important. It’s your only chance to say something before the council makes a decision.
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