7th Ward debate
Paul Sanborn is the opening commenter. He says he accepts no contributions and is in no one's pocket.
He says he wants to talk about parolees because Mr. Penman is in the office tonight.
He says they get $200 and a bus ticket on release. He asks that the audience put themselves in their place.
He says his old idea about the Sante Fe building for parolee housing is no longer his idea. He says the old Holiday Inn building is the building to use.
Here is a picture of the candidates (L-R Mulvihill, Sanborn, McCammack)
He says parolees are big business in this town.
He says parolees live six to a house, and that's big business.
"It's a problem that is here to stay, it's not going to go away," he says.
He says people need to read between the lines. He says Ms. Marianne Milligan was hand-picked by Penman, then cut loose after he lost his bid to become mayor.
Wendy McCammack is next. She says we are making some progress, but that we need much stronger leadership to make the city "as safe as it once was."
She says a reason for crime problems is parolees.
"Parolees is our problem," she says.
She says we need to "take back our city from the criminal elements."
She says we need to start reinstituting parolee sweeps.
McCammack, echoing Kelley, says she doesn't take orders from downtown special interests or the mayor.
She says she's worked successfully with her colleagues.
SB faces many challenges, and we need leaders with real world experience to deal with them.
"I walk the walk that I talk," she says.
She says Mulvihill never really applies his teaching, not using Mulvihill's name.
"I will continue to vote against taxpayer waste," she says, adding that she is proud of her No votes.
Mulvihill is next. He says he came to SB in 1981 to teach at Cal State San Bernardino.
He says the city was deluged with proposals for thousands of cheap housing units and has always fought against it.
He says he's worked with the E Street corridor mass transit developments.
"My main proposal is to have more beat patrol officers in neighborhoods," directly interacting with residents he says.
He says more communication between police and residents.
"We need to have a vision, we need to have plans." He says he's competent and honest to develop those plans.
It's not honest to take advantage of council position. He says McCammack says she provided a grant for Perris Hill Senior Center. He takes out minutes from a 2004 meeting. He says McCammack made a motion to enhance soccer fields, not the center.
He says later that year the grant Susan Longville had written was denied. He says McCammack wanted enhancement of two baseball fields instead.
After two years of delay, he says, the council voted in favor of funding that. He says it's not honest to say she pushed for funding, when in fact McCammack blocked it for years.
HE moves to Highland Avenue corridor, which went from a viable corridor to full of tattoo shops and other businesses.
***
Question 1: How improve without spending more?
Sanborn says Fontana sends department heads to grant writing training that, if done in SB, could pay dividends.
"Maybe a thousand fold," Sanborn says.
McCammack says City Hall thinks like bureacrats and not entreprenuers. She says more animal control officers and development services department officials are examples of how investments could bring more revenue into city.
"The bureacrats in city hall don't think like businesspeople, they think like bureacrats," she says, drawing applause.
Mulvihill says Highland Avenue businesses should be given incentives to improve facades. He recommends business improvement districts.
Also, he says, Rancho Cucamonga looks like Highland Avenue used to look, and could look again.
Question #2, what should city do to improve air quality.
Mulvihill says we have to think green. Natural gas buses. Mass transit from Omnitrans. Unfortunately, a lot of bad air comes from the west, he says.
He says we should plant more trees.
Sanborn says we need to start with the city. He says code enforcement is driving four-door crown victorias with air conditioning on.
He says businesses have machines that eat garbage and convert to energy.
He says Colton has tried this technology. He says this would be his starting point.
McCammack says city-owned vehicles are becoming alternative fueled gradually. She says we have a grant for an alt-fuel station.
She says we don't incentivize residents to recycle trash properly. She says debris hauling trucks should be forced to cover their loads.
Question number three is are current resources sufficient in achieving SB long-term plans ?
McCammack says the city doesn't have a comprehensive plan. She mentions the ULI, thru Neil Derry, is one opportunity.
We need tax assessed properties in our grounds, she says.
She says a property transfer tax would have been a good idea. She says she tried to collaborate with Morris, but it was shelved, that idea.
Mulvihill says McCammack, after eight years on the council, doesn't know we have a comprehensive plan.
He says we need to build up our retail business base. He says how did Citrus Plaza ever get away from us, opting to go to Redlands.
He says developer fees are key. He says we need schools, sidewalks, streets and sewers from those fees. He says prop. 13 limits us, so sales tax and developer fees are key.
Sanborn says this question, to be answered, has to be seen thru the utility tax. He says it's too high. He says the general plan is 10 years behind. We need a new one, he says.
He says go to any Las Vegas casino manager can tell you how much money came in yesterday, yet we have to hire people for auditing.
"The big thing that will actually save this town, believe it or not, is water," Sanborn says. He says water is valuable.
Question #4 is on Measure Z. Do you believe we should spend that as stated in ballot language?
McCammack says, after fishing for the language, that it was campaigned as more police on the streets, but written as another.
She says we need to pay for the officers on the streets. She says we are spending $4 million per year on Z programs.
She says we need "to solve the emergency first."
We need to suppress it first, and then work on prevention and intervention.
She says Washington DC spends on prevention and is the most dangerous city in the U.S.
Sanborn says you have to use the money in the rightful way, and that's "order mainenance." Meaning officers should be proactive.
Policing is just police responding to crime, right now, he says.
Z money needs to stay with the police department, he says.
Mulvihill says we should spend the way voters read it. Prevention and intervention programs as well as suppression.
"It's important that these programs be done simultaneously," he says.
"We need to start working on kids in elementary school," he says.
He says suppression does nothing for the next generation. He says beat officers should interact with kids on bikes and horses.
He says that as a kid in Kansas CIty, the milkman had a horse, the point is that police need to present themselves as positive figures for kids.
Closing statements:
Sanborn reemphasizes that he takes no contributions and will be a full-time councilman.
McCammack says she prays for fire victims. She says she "grew up the hard way."
She says she got out of an abusive marraige. She says "that's not scare tactics, that's reality."
"I pulled myself up by my bootstraps, which has made me the person I am today."
She says a woman has to be assertive in a man's world of big city politics.
She says she is for reducing utility tax, and has been successful in doing so.
She says she'll fight parolees and registered sex offenders.
She says she'll keep pushing for business improvement districts, which the mayor has dragged his feet on, she says.
"Independent" "effective" and "steadfast" leadership, she says.
Mulvihill says he never expected to go to college much less be able to run for public office.
He says he was a victim of downsizing in the Northeast and went to college with the GI Bill. He says we've heard a lot about downtown special interests, and asks who are we talking about? County, businesses, who?
"We should be supporting them, and not engaging in parochial ward politics," he says.
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Andrew Edwards. E-mail Andrew here.
Actually, Candidate Sanborn said Marianne was hand-picked(by Penman), then, when Penman's reach for the office of San Bernardino Mayor fell woefully short, Penman cut Marianne loose right away.
The forum will continue to air, you can hear this statement, and all the rest on the reruns.
Actually, Candidate Sanborn said Marianne was hand-picked(by Penman), then, when Penman's reach for the office of San Bernardino Mayor fell woefully short, Penman cut Marianne loose right away.
The forum will continue to air, you can hear this statement, and all the rest, on the reruns.
See Susana read.
Read Susana read.
Poor Susana......
This is the 7th ward debate blog, right?
Why would we care if Penman handpicked Milligan for ANYTHING?
Does the ballot have either of them running for the 7th ward council seat?
Sanborn said he was getting in touch with his feminine side and changing his mind on where to place parolees – and it’s not in his ward.
Mulvihill brought up McCammack’s door hangers that mention the Perris Hill Senior Center as an accomplishment. Then he brings out meeting minutes from years ago……trying to make a point that was obviously endorsed by Susan Longville, judging by her reaction in the audience. Perris Hill Park, and the Perris Hill Senior Center in particular have enough “heavy-hitters” in their corner – past councilwoman Susan Longville, past mayor Evlyn Wilcox, current councilman Dennis Baxter. Talk about special interests. (ever notice the ONLY event Dennis Baxter mentions in comments before the City Council meetings is the Farmer’s Market at PERRIS HILL PARK ? ? ?)
McCammack voted first to spend money on soccer fields, the next time on baseball diamonds. McCammack voted to spend money on kids – generations of kids who will utilize those fields and hopefully stay out of trouble. With little money tough decisions need to be made, and McCammack spent the money on something that will benefit future generations.
Mulvihill mentions the facades of Highland Avenue. There should be incentives for owners to upgrade. Is he aware that an employee of the Mayor’s Office recently went door to door on Highland and Baseline trying to sell the EDA’s incentives to upgrade the facades? He seems to be “out of the loop” even though he carries the Mayor’s backhanded endorsement.
Sanborn mentions gas consumption by Code Enforcement vehicles when discussing how to improve air quality. Yes, they drive Crown Victoria’s however do they really cover that much territory with their non-proactive approach? They don’t drive our neighborhoods looking for violations – they cite only if they receive a complaint. So they can’t be using that much gas.
Measure Z was discussed…there is a can of worms! Sanborn and McCammack support funding police, Mulvihill supports horses……I mean, police riding horses and showing them to kids. Maybe Mulvihill’s idea would work – if the crime wasn’t already at epidemic levels. If our officers had the time to trot out the ponies and the police dogs at schools, I’m sure they would rather do that! They don’t have time…..they are fighting for our streets and if we spend the Measure Z money on “prevention and intervention” programs they might lose that war.
See you at the polls!
Steven,
I like the way you concisely lay out your points! I hope to read more from you here.
I'd like to share with you that the program you mention being shared door-to-door is precisely the program Mulvihill was expounding upon. It is good. It's been talked about for a few YEARS now. Hopefully, people hearing about it on TV will clamor for it and action will begin to take place.
The minutes were presented to expose the reality that, instead of supporting the Perris Hill Senior Center, Wendy opted to try any number of other things. Wendy was finally able to be convinced to vote in favor of Perris Hill Senior Center, but not until LOTS of time, measured in years, had passed while she asked, unsuccessfully, for the money to go to this and that and the other ideas of hers. Fortunately, the Perris Hill Senior Center project is completed and more improvements in San Bernardino's premiere park are on the horizon.
Before moving on, please note: Just last week the Perris Hill Senior Center was teeming with an overflow crowd of youth and mentors, staying until 9PM to determine the future focus of Parks & Recreation. So, Perris Hill Park Senior Center DOES provide positive impacts for the city's youth.
The Crown Victorias are really something it seems like we could do without. I've visited areas where the little electric cars (They were for sale at Costco for under $5,000.00 a few years ago), are used. In Riverside, the traffic enforcement uses Segways... there are many alternatives available to us for providing official transportation without contaminating the environment and using resources needlessly.
The Measure Z issue is, indeed, a complex issue. I am with you that we need to address today's problems fully. I also feel we need to look to the future and minimizing the potential for continuing a trend through implementation of proven means for success at reducing the propensity of youth to grow into criminals.
It may come as a surprise, but LITERACY is one of the KEY elements to predicting a person's potential toward becoming a member of the criminal element. The more we emphasize the importance of literacy, the better our future society will be for it. When Mayor Morris supported Jumpstart's "Read For The Record", last month, he was helping to reduce our future crime rate. The nuances of criminology are subtle but most well-proven.
Coaxing children out of neighborhoods rife with crime and into libraries through In & Out Burger's reading program, the One City, One Book program and many others are ways to turn the tide on crime.
Martha Stewart being an exception, the criminal mind is a simple mind. It hasn't been expanded and enriched through the enhancements a childhood spent reading the simple elegance found in the prose of Robert Frost and the page turning suspense of the Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew series' plots. By enticing today's youth to participate in cultivating the fallow territory between their ears through literacy, we will be achieving success in our battle against crime.
To catch a fish, you need to bait the hook. These children turn out with the promise of a free (NEW!) tee shirt ~ they may own NOTHING... and I mean absolutely NOTHING new at all... the prospect of going to school in a new article of clothing draws them to the programs, like Operation Phoenix. Some of these children survive on ramen noodles, soda pop and chips. Hardly a homecooked wholesome meal is experienced by many of them. By offering a burger or dog on a bun, we are successfully drawing them out to introduce them to the programs, like Operation Phoenix.
Eventually, program offerings are enough to retain the youth as loyal participants. Program loyalty is also built by serving the diverse needs of the service population. If you can learn about the renter's credit, or get help filing for it where little Johnnie goes to use the computer, you develop another layer of positive associations with the program and are more apt to allow your child to participate ~ especially if you are among the parents who are NOT selflessly providing for their children ~ the parents with the question, "What's in it for me" always at the ready. These people DO exist in our world, in SB. They are often the parents of the children dead of a traffic accident, or bullet, or overdose. What child wouldn't seek solace anywhere available with that sort of parent denying the nurturing we all crave when little?
You see Steven? There is a wide array of reasons for supplying programs to our city's youth. Just as there is a strong need to provide adequate law enforcement to the entire city.
I want to add one more thing before I close, Steven. The children receiving Operation Phoenix services may not live in 7th ward, or 5th ward, therefore the funding may not be directed to those wards, but believe me, when they grow up and think, "Hmmm... which houses should I burgle, which intersection should I carjack from, which bushes should I hide in wait in today", it'll be better odds they go for the ones where the affluence is greater, there being no explosive collars around their necks to keep them in their own territory - the central city ghetto areas, yet.
By doing these very unfortunate children a favor and tending to what it takes to increase their odds of becoming productive members of society when they are grown, the wards where parents don't need to be enticed to tend their children - or even enticed to allow someone else to tend the most fundamental needs of their children - the wards where the future VICTIMS reside will be doing themselves more of a favor than adding another ball field ever could hope to achieve.
I hope to see you write more commentary, Steven.
Your Friend & Neighbor,
Susana Atanasova
I will be voting for Wendy. It is evident by watching city council meetings that she is prepared, asks the tough questions and is a critical thinker. Most importantly she has a love for our city and it shows with her actions. Now if we could just clone her.