It’s very rare when I actually agree with The OC Register’s editorial page, but today happens to be one of those rare occasions. Read this and weep:

As the Register reported, the city [of Santa Ana] hired a Sacramento-based polling firm in March in the hopes that residents would tell pollsters that they want higher taxes to pay to fix Santa Ana’s poorly maintained, pothole-filled roads. To the officials’ dismay, residents overwhelmingly opposed the idea of paying higher taxes for roadwork. But officials saw an opportunity in another question, in which residents said they would give “high priority” to higher taxes to deal with gang prevention.

So they commissioned another poll. And lo and behold, they got what they wanted! People were willing to pay more taxes to “pay for more police officers to fight crime”. So now, we’re getting the “gang-fighting tax” in Santa Ana. But is this really what city officials are telling us that it is?

Follow me after the flip for more…

Here’s some more of today’s Register editorial:

Had the city really believed that there is a desperate need for more police, then it would have commissioned a poll that focused on police needs. Instead, it commissioned the poll based on its presumption that roadwork was the prime need. Apparently, city officials will raise taxes for any and all purposes, which is easier than doing what 84 percent of respondents told the city-hired pollsters: that “spending tax money efficiently” is a high priority.

Now to be honest, I disagree with what The Register says later on about taxes being evil, blah, blah, blah. I just don’t buy Howard Jarvis talking points. That’s not the issue for me.

What concerns me here is that the city would mislead residents about the “need” for this tax. First, they said that it’s about fixing our streets. And now, they’re telling us that it’s really to fight gang violence. So which one is it? Or is it really neither?

Is it really meant to pay for subsidies that we can’t afford and that don’t work for us? Is it really to pay for these bloated salaries for these ineffective city administrators? How are we supposed to accept paying more taxes to the city if we can’t even trust the city to be honest with us?

Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to see any more gang violence. I don’t want to see any more decrepit streets. I don’t want to see any more dearth of open space in this town. I don’t want to see any more libraries closed.

But if this tax were really about these things, then why can’t the city just tell us that? And if this really weren’t just a reward to a bunch of incompetent jerks who have failed us on all these issues, then why can’t the city just tell us that? How are we supposed to entrust these people with more of our tax money when they can’t even be honest about why they want more of it?

Whose life is it anyway? Blog posted at Speak Out California

We need your help in urging California legislators to pass AB 374,  The California Compassionate Choices Act. This act will give terminally ill patients the right to decide their own end of life choices.

The issue at stake is whether each of us, at the end of our lives, is able to choose whether to continue in hopeless suffering or use medication to ease that suffering. Although the decision belongs to each of us alone, the legal right to do so will come down to who can best rally support for or against the passage of AB 374, the legislation making such decisions lawful.

Please send a letter to your assemblymember urging his/her support of AB 374 at Speak Out California. Please send this link to your friends so they can participate as well.

We will keep you posted on the outcome.

Thank you,

Hannah-Beth Jackson and the Speak Out California team.

From the (subscription only) Morning Report:

Asm. Mark Leno’s office reports that to mark today’s National Hunger Awareness Day and support his AB 1382 which would “remove California’s requirement that every adult household member must get fingerprinted and photographed in order to qualify for food stamps,” Leno has taken up the “Food Stamp Challenge” issued by the CA Assn. of Food Banks. He’s going to live on the national average food stamp budget of $21 a week and he’s going to write a blog about it at www.assembly.ca.gov/Leno. According to Leno’s press secretary Shannan Velayas, Leno went to the grocery over the weekend and bought his food for the week: six cans of soup at $2 each, 2 boxes of cereal on sale at $2 each and 1 gallon of milk at $3.99. $19.99 total, leaving him a dollar to spare. It’s not going to be an easy week, says Velayas. “Mark will have to withstand the temptation of food at events and food brought into the members’ lounge all week as the Assembly works overtime to meet Friday’s deadline. I’m going to do my best to hide my lunch when I eat at my desk.” But he has “great will power” says Velayas. “Today, a staff member happened to bring in four dozen delicious hand-dipped chocolate strawberries… Mark walked right on by.”

We need to pass Assembly Bill 1382.

Two not-so-eco-friendly Congressmen are working on a global warming bill in the House.  The trouble is that the bill includes provisions that block California from implementing stricter global warming measures, such as AB32, the carbon emissions law signed last year.

House Democrats, in their first draft of new energy legislation, would wipe out California’s landmark global warming law — despite their California speaker’s promises that her party would use the state as a model to combat climate change.

The legislation would pre-empt California and 11 other states from implementing laws requiring automakers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across their fleets. The bill would prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency from granting the states waivers to put their climate change rules into effect. California officials, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s top environmental aides, blasted the legislative proposal.
***
However, the pre-emption plan might never see the light of day — if, as expected, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco and lawmakers from other affected states use their clout to quash the idea before it gets out of committee. Pelosi was unavailable for comment Monday, but her staff termed the measure a draft that needed much more work. (SF Chron 6/5/07)

So, look like we know what we need to do here. If this comes close to getting out of committee, we need to call California’s Congressional Delegation to make sure the federal government doesn’t tramp all over us. Flip it

It’s not surprising that this is coming from Dems. You see these two Congressmen don’t have the best track record:

The proposal was written by Rep. Rick Boucher, a Democrat who represents a coal-producing district in southwest Virginia and chairs the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee charged with crafting climate change legislation. The full committee’s chairman, Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., a longtime ally of the auto industry, also played a key role in putting together the new legislation.

However, having a San Francisco Speaker should help things in our favor…

(OK, fixed! : ) – promoted by atdleft)

Today, the FBI confirmed what CA AG Jerry Brown said in May, Irvine is one safe city. In fact, it’s the safest in the nation:

For the third year running, Irvine tops all large cities in the nation with the lowest incidence of violent crime after posting a nearly 17 percent drop in 2006, according to a report by the FBI. Reported violent crimes for the city – which include homicide, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault – fell from a total of 151 in 2005 to 126 in 2006, for a rate of 67 per 100,000 in the preliminary posting of the 2006 FBI Annual Uniform Crime Report. (OC Reg 6/5/07)

Last time, I talked about the importance of parks and recreation.  And of course, economic factors surely weigh into the amount of crime. Given that Irvine has a pretty high per capita income, it’s not surprising to see a low rate of crime. But Irvine actually does better than similarly sized cities with higher per capita income. Take that Sunnyvale! (Ok…Sunnyvale is #2 on the AG safe city list, but that’s one slot below #1).

But something else is also at play here, that is the role of the city’s various crime prevention programs. Irvine has implemented geographic policing, neighborhood watch programs, and Internet reporting.  Follow me over the flip for more..

So for a city of about 200,000 people, how the heck does Irvine stay so safe? Well, how about the Police Department’s various programs. One such program is geographic policing.  This program gets beat officers out from behind desks and in the community, where they are visible. Irvine’s neighborhood alert has also been effective. Knowing your neighbors helps reduce crime and creates a more livable city. Or is it the WatchMail program? Can the internet actually be used as a tool to reduce crime in the community? Whatever they are doing, the Crime Prevention Unit of the Irvine Police Department is proving to be quite effective.

And clearly, it seems like Irvine has enough patrol officers to cover the entire community. And perhaps now that the Irvine Police Department now does “geographic policing”, officers really are connecting more with the community. And maybe, their Crime Analysis Unit is having some effect. Perhaps by finding out what had gone wrong, they can then work with the community to make things right. Whatever is happening, the Irvine Police Department must be doing something right.

And clearly Irvine’s Progressive Mayor and Police Chief know how tough it can be to keep such a big city so safe. Yet for the last three years, they have been remarkably successful in leading the way not just for Orange County, and not just California, but for the entire nation. From The OC Register:

“When you are the safest city in America, you have to work especially hard to maintain that position,” Irvine Mayor Beth Krom said. “This is a source of pride for the entire community.” […]

“Getting to know the people who live and work in these areas helps them to be able to identify the problems in these areas and any impacts on the quality of life,” said Irvine Police Chief David L. Maggard.

And how has Irvine been able to avoid what the other major cities in Orange County are suffering from?

The national crime trends were largely echoed in Orange County, with all eight cities with populations of 100,000 or above recording increases in robberies, and a sharp decline in property crime.

There were 19 more murders in Orange County’s biggest cities in 2006 than the previous year – a jump that can be largely result of a spike in gang violence in Santa Ana, which recorded nine more murders in 2006.

However, car thefts, arsons and other property crimes dipped across the nation for the second straight year, the data show. Huntington Beach – which saw a 12.6 percent drop in violent crime – was the only large Orange County city to see a rise in property crime, recording 365 more property crimes last year compared to 2005.

Huntington Beach must now worry about property crime becoming more prevalent throughout town. Santa Ana is now facing a crisis of escalating gang violence. Up in North Orange County, the cities of Orange and Fullerton are grappling with dramatic increases in violent crisis. Take a look at the major California cities on the FBI’s list, and things aren’t looking very good not just in OC, but throughout the state.

So what is Irvine doing right that other cities in California aren’t? Are Irvine’s police services that much better? Are they doing a better job of preventing crime? Are the parks and community services really making that much of a difference? There’s a secret to Irvine’s success, and more communities should try to learn this secret to figure out how to take a real bite out of crime.

(“Truth is the first casualty” – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

On Sunday, June 3rd 2007, the Los Angeles chapter of Iraq Veterans Against the War conducted Operation First Casualty. Former Marine Sargent Jason Lemiuex, who served three deployments in Iraq stated, “…under the premise that the first casualty of war is the truth. And the American people are getting fed this notion that we’re in Iraq spreading freedom and making Iraq safe for democracy when really we’re imposing a state of martial law on the people over there.” For more details and video, read on…

Taking the streets of Santa Monica by storm, Operation First Casualty was a huge success in raising awareness amongst the general population about the need to bring the troops home now. As veterans of the Iraq war shouted at, searched and hooded civilian volunteers, passers-by got a taste of what an occupation is like. During the street theatre, reenactments of a combat patrol, a riot with mass detention, and a soldier wounded by a roadside bomb occurred.

Tim Goodrich
Co-founder, Iraq Veterans Against the War