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For Whom The Bell Tolls
Bell, California, a working-class town of some 38,000 ten miles outside of Los Angeles, is a unique place. Its local government has proven to be citizen-proof, media proof, city-council proof and even leak-proof from inside its self-enriching top officialdom.
Get this: Bell city manager. Robert Rizzo resigned a month ago after a Los Angeles Times exposé revealed that he was being paid $800,000 a year, plus 28 weeks of vacation and sick time worth $386,000. He was also expecting to make $600,000 a year in guaranteed pension payouts. Mr. Rizzo also borrowed $160,000 from the city.
Mr. Rizzo had clever political protection. The Police Chief was getting $457,000 a year and members of the City Council of this small city were making, for very part time work, about $100,000 each per year.
Mr. Rizzo's assistant manager was making a $376,288 base salary a year with a total compensation package substantially larger.
The average per capita income in Bell is $25,000 a year. More than a quarter of its population lives below the poverty line.
Expressions of shock and dismay erupted from the expected quarters-state legislators, other city officials of much larger cities, and the president of the League of California Cities, Robin Lowe. He said: "the reported abuses are an embarrassment to the thousands of hard-working men and women in city government," and offered the League's assistance to the Los Angeles County District Attorney and the California State Attorney General in their investigations.
The League should start by explaining to the two prosecutors why it did not know about the staggering pay scale of its member town, especially since there is a state Open Meetings and Public Records Act for ready utilization.
Bell Mayor Oscar Hernandez unpersuasively tried to make the best of the multiple pay bonanzas. He told the Los Angeles Times that: "Our streets are cleaner, we have lovely parks, better lighting throughout the area, our community is better. These things just don't happen, they happen because he had a vision and made it happen."
Let's pause momentarily to observe the variety and depth of abdication by the governmental and civic culture in beleaguered Bell. The city has fallen behind on its bond payments, and acknowledged it overcharged its residents' property taxes by $3 million to pay for those exorbitant pensions.
At least a dozen employees in City Hall had to know of these excesses and chose not to talk or leak the news over the years. The nearby newspapers, TV and radio stations did not dig it out. The city council knew but was compromised by its own huge payments. Still, political gossip is supposed to be irresistible. None of the citizens, including the usual town gadflies or skeptics, bothered to find out. All that was needed to bring this to light was one or two people blowing the whistle. After all, this information is not opinion. It's arithmetic-crisp numbers that invite everyone's howl.
The greater Los Angeles area is the very definition of sprawl: a lack of community that promotes more citizen slackers. It is inconceivable that such outrageously bold and self enriching formal compensation could escape the notice of citizens of a New England town-even one without a town meeting type of government. Ask them in Lowell, Mass., Torrington, Conn., Newport, R.I., Portsmouth, N.H., Burlington, Vt. and Bangor, Maine. I'll bet their reply would be a version of: "Are you kidding?"
Californian largesse also resides in Vernon, California (pop. 91) an industrial-commercial center of 5.1 square miles of territory and nearby to Bell. It is now revealed by the Los Angeles Times, whose reporters have found a new exciting town-by-town beat, that the city administrator, Eric T. Fresch, was paid $1.65 million in total compensation in 2008. Last year was a bummer; Mr. Fresch, who calls himself an experienced finance attorney, received nearly $1.2 million.
Granted, Vernon's businesses have over 50,000 workers and the town owns its electric utility. But getting paid four times the salary of the President of the United States, who has considerably greater supervisory responsibilities, seems to be an over-reach.
Last year, the Vernon city administrator, Donal O'Callaghan, was paid nearly $785,000, but that included being the director of the municipally-owned utility. Still, together they were just one full-time job. He also had help. The city attorney, Jeffrey A. Harrison, earned $800,000 last year, down from $1.04 million in 2008, while the City Treasurer/Finance Director, Roirdan Burnett had to make do with $570,000.
The former city administrator, Bruce Malkenhorst Sr., made $600,000 in 2005 and is awaiting trial on public corruption charges. He still draws a $500,000 a year pension.
All this information about salaries and benefits is public information, but no one in the public was interested enough to find out why nobody was minding the store.
The saving grace in Bell is that, once they found out, some folks were outraged, rushed in protest to the crowded city council meeting and, around town, handed out 10,000 leaflets to engage more residents.
This local movement calls itself BASTA (Bell Association To Stop The Abuse), which means "enough" in Spanish. They strive to arouse the citizenry about where their tax dollars are going, and recall the Council members, if necessary to clean house. They have had enough, finally, at last!
The BASTA organizers must believe there is a limit to the anomie caused by the disintegration of a community's standards of conduct and norms.
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64 Comments so far
Show AllNader is a national jewel.
OK -- so let's de-countritfy the US too -- give it to Finland to run: they can use the work. :-D
The problem with Israel is it's like Bill Sikes and his attack dog, with the attack dog being so mean that Sikes does not want to risk crossing it. Americans have lots of similar attack dogs in Congress and the media too -- we have a plague of attack dogs (dogs of war) everywhere; peaceful Israelis have the Likude; Brits have Labor, the BNP, and now Tories.
Worse, the attack dogs have formed a world-wide association: 'fasicists of the world unite'. We got the Jewish ADs, Christian ADs, Muslim ADs -- Attack Dogs of all religions and nationalities -- all run by GE, Goldman Sachs, and friends.
This is not some isolated case but the breakdown of normative values everywhere (anomie). It's part of 'globalization' and the pervasive shift into the values of Ed Bernays and corporate dominance and authoritarianism. Zionism is just one focused marker, among many, of this -- one which would have never gone as far as it has in a sane world, which would not have permitted it.
In a rising flood everyone's boats are swamped, and we all drown.
Right on, RichM! Well said!
Yet another sign, in a long list of them, that the American Democracy has become putrid and rather more than self-serving due, in large part I think, to voter apathy and indifference.
"Is it ignorance or apathy?
I don't know and I don't care."
Jimmy Buffet
Our democracy is indeed putrid, if not all ready dead. This terrible condition is not due to apathy or ignorance,of course they play a part, but the real cause of this deterioration of our democracy is our two party system.
People believe, in spite of all kinds of evidence that it is not true, that there is a difference between the two corporate political parties. Voters believe that there is a contest between these two parties and one is worser than the other one. We are bombarded with media messages that mis inform us. We believe the lies. We then vote for the candidate that has the most money in their campaign fund. (that money comes from the extremely wealthy---the members of the plutocracy that rule this nation)
People believe their only duty is to choose which of these two parties will get their vote. This is wrong -- and the cause of the collapse of our democracy.
Accepting the terrible fact that both of our major parties are evil is a hard thing for us to do. As long as we continue to vote for either a Democratic candidate, or a Republican candidate, the evil will persist.
Want to end the wars? Don't vote D or R. That's it. This is how we can bring our democracy to life. We need voters who will not vote for either a Democrat or a Republican.
But voting is not our only responsibility. We need to keep informed as to what your elected officials are up to....this is at all levels of our government. Don't believe the campaign lies and watch their behavior. If they don't act as you want, vote them out of office.
Apathy and Indifference.
There has been a two party system for a rather long time, including times of great political unrest, demonstration and upheaval. Once there were great differences between the two parties and a clear choice offered.
I am not so much a believer in the two party system as the disease but the current sameness of those two parties as a clear symptom of what is wrong with our democracy, with our system. The two parties have been trained, as has the electorate in fact, to believe that there is nothing wrong with a ten million dollar war chest to win a Senate race or a candidate for President raising three quarters of a million dollars to win the White House.
That kind of money deflects the campaigners from seeking the support of the populace and its ten, twenty and fifty dollar contributions and forces them ( though they are quite willing indeed) to accept corporate funding thus placing themselves in debt to those corporations even before they successfully win office.
The "apathy" and "indifference" results from a lack of populist campaigning and a
sense that our elections/politics are fixed and faked --
And this is by agreement of both political parties to avoid any real discussion
of issues --
Both parties conspired together to put a PRIVATE corporation in charge of our
political debates! And, if you recall, Ralph Nader was BARRED, even from a
TV room where the debate was being shown!!
THAT's how dangerous Ralph Nader is to the corrupt forces at work in our
government!!!
And this right wing/elite control over our elections has long been in play!
$$$$$ - computer voting - a closed political system for the benefit of elites.
And -- let us not forget -- 50 years and more of overt political violence which
is the only way the right wing can rise.
.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
Yup
The corruption of American society is blatantly obvious and the example starts at the top of society and TICKLES down. This is the real definition of Reaganomics TRICKLE down. For instance I live in a privately managed public housing of the Department of Agriculture rural housing complex. The private managers and the local cable company, which is expensive with poor service tries to bribe the Management to force residents, all elderly, into the local cable service since they cannot/ don't want to compete with satellite services. They concoct bogus regulations attributed to the FCC that are absurdly ridiculous and easily challenged.The example starts at the example from the top which insults, abuses, steals and treat their victims, American taxpayers, customers,church members with derision and contempt that it just TICKLES down just like Reagan said, piss an diarrhea tricks down. The management would get a kickback from the local cable company.
The system will eat us alive unless we wake up. It all depends on us, the people. More democracy is the only answer. We must learn how to be vibrant citizens above most other goals. The dynamics of democracy needs to be taught in our families, in our communities, in our churches, and in our universities.
Unless we come to understand the powerful spiritual dynamics of honest participatory democracy, nothing will change. The survival of humankind is totally dependant upon the power of democracy to bring about radical social change. Democratic activism is meant to be transformational. It brings out the higher angels of our nature. It makes us more human.
More democracy is a higher social consciousness that is emerging in the world but it depends entirely upon us, the people.
Think this is a pipe dream??? Check out Vermont. I lived there for 11 years and participated in local politics. The people leave no stone unturned. Vermonters have faith in themselves. They believe change can come from below. Boston's own Tip O'Neil knew that when he so often stated, "All politics is local."
Vermont politics goes back to the "Green Mountain Boys", Ethan Allen, Ira Allen, Baker,Cochran and others. Vermonters know the Vermont tradition. It should be the American tradition.
And Bernie Sanders, our most upright of legislators, carries on the tradition. And if he has his way, it will be the American tradition.
STEPHEN: If you've ever driven the entire length of a state like Florida or California, you would be amazed by the diversity of little worlds that exist within the state's borders. Places carry energy and seem to attract residents who resonate with that energy, for the most part.
Vermont is imbued with a theme of radical independence; but that's not something easily found in Southern Bible-belt regions. The Christianity you advocate for is a far closer approximation to the ideals I associate with Christ than anything found in the small-minded bigoted churches of much of the South.
Still, just as the radical is often born to the racist family, pockets of spiritual darkness are often penetrated by the arrival of a few enlightened persons who elect to reside there. Their presence presents the possibility of "other."
Evolution happens!
I take it Bell has no community newspaper? I can't believe the entire budget and pay scales are not part of the public record and therefore subject to sunshine laws. Ralph; you made my ears ring with this column. I read this stuff and wonder what this does to the people who volunter their time and effort to their communities across the country. We are all suckers!! Serving your fellow citizens should not come with a seven figure check! End of story. GO BASTA!
Have you tried to get a copy of your city budget? Its like pulling teeth. And the community newspaper usually won't go against local politico's or business which I'm sure you know.
It does nothing to those that volunteer, good people don't let someone else define them or allow theft and corruption to defer their efforts.
And how about $100,000 for just showing up as a council member? WE need a CASTA and a USASTA too,
And all of the so-called conservatives bitch about "too much government" unless they make a buck off it.
BTW, was it not California that elected Reagan to governor?
DUH!!!!
"Well" . . .
If corporate $$$$$$$$ and computers were involved, we may never know!!
.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
And it was California which passed the infamous Prop. 13, and is dying a death of a thousand cuts because of it.
What Ralph is describing is a return to civic duty and responsibility. Something Californians abandonded years ago and most of the US followed like Lemmings.
And this lack of civic duty, civic responsibility has been encouraged by politiucians and ideologues for their own purpose. The Left is just as guilty as the Right here.
Its a bi-partisan effort.
Point taken Rich.
You are correct. Though I did intend to mean some of the radical left and right, I should have been more specific.
Between you on my tendency of being to be too general and SR's hopping on my spelling I usually am kept to the straight and narrow. And thank you for it. I'm not kidding.
Your civility and directness are always welcome.
MIGHTY: In CD's "Spelling Race to the Bottom," I assure you there are a number of candidates that are closer to "earning" that title, than you are! I find your politics sometimes limited by your patriotic ideas; but you have a very decent spirit. The genuine right wing posters who dominate these threads while pretending to be "other," hardly warrant THAT designation!
Thanks SR!
"MIGHTY: In CD's "Spelling Race to the Bottom,"
But I'm a contender none the less! Though I'll whine and say a lot of the time its my one fingered typing!
I DO trust you two along with a few others here to keep me on the straight and narrow.
who gives a fk! about your spelling. I don't. I want to know what you think, not how you spell. Sure, its nice when we can all agree on how to spell our words (ideas), it can save some confusion. But when there is no confusion, why should it matter at all? I have not been confused by anything you've written.
When someone stutters, do we say, "If you're going to try and hang out with us clear speakers, you'd better do something about that stutter of yours! How can we take you seriously!"
And grammar? who cares! It's just another way to separate people.
Folk music is full of bad grammar and no one seems to get excited about it. I don't get it.
hav a nise dae! :)
So socialists don't want to invest in Bell's waste management program for fear they may be infected with ideology from Democrats or liberals? OK. Maybe socialists want to infect us with having no " Commons " whatsoever so their garbage program remains pure and uncorrupted. Now if socialists could make it just not smell whatsoever they'd get my money and vote. Slanderous intentions, no problema. Garbage pickup, big problema.
The unreliable word on the street is that the situation in Bell, CA has motivated CNN (Chattering, Nattering Nabobs) to prepare a poll to test the level of pissedoffedness of the population regarding the socio-political situation in the country.
It is said they will ask people to rate some questions on a scale of 1 to 10.
1 = everything's fine, and why would you be asking silly questions like this?
10 = I'm ultra-pissed off, seeing red, because blood vessels are popping in my head already.
1. Where do you think the average American falls on the scale?
2. Where do you fall on the scale?
3. Where would you have to fall on the scale before you would decide to do something about it (if you haven't already)?
4. If you have done something about it already, how much did that change your position on the scale?
Tune in next week for results.
Right next door to Bell is Maywood. Does anyone else remember this article on CD from July 28 in which we learned the following?
"Maywood's cash-strapped city council decided to respond to its myriad problems with a revolutionary initiative: it voted to contract out every single public service the city once provided, from the management of parks and libraries, to the book-keeping at City Hall, to the running of its police department.
Today, Maywood is America's (and possibly the world's) first completely outsourced city."
The really sad part is that it sounds considerably better than Bell and Vernon.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/07/28-2
"Sacrificed Its Soul at the Altar of Capitalism': The US Town That Outsourced Everything
The authorities in Maywood decided on a drastic approach to their budget deficit – sack every municipal worker"
by Guy Adams
Surprisingly it didn't work, they now have more contractors at higher pay than the old city workers.
But you wouldn't hear that from the $100.000 city council members.
Go figure.
>^^<
Bring America Back !!!!
**The bell tolls for thee, Nader==our perenniel bad boy who rushes in at the last minute to save the day==then writes his latest book about it, fattening up his own coffers.
**There are numerous overpaid Feds in DC who need to be booted out of and off our Tax Roll superpay lists.Does the Congress and Senate still have a 2 or 3 day work week ??
**Are those same lawmakers still denying cost of living increases to our retired seniours, while just laughing at Big Bonuses to Wall Street, Lobbyists and Banks ? Yep.
**Nader is too old, they tell me, to run ever again for a serious Prez campaign, but he will always there driving
from the back seat, and doing his Monday Morn Quarterbacking.
And, it tolls for thee, Sir Raider.
I never closely read your posts, TruthKnoller, because your idiosyncratic formatting indeed reads as if you were a colonial-era Town Crier incessantly ringing a noisy brass hand-bell as he blows off his bazoo.
However, with all due respect I must note that THIS clanging effort is pure ding-dong. You're one of the last of the virulent Nader-bashers around here left over from The Great Nader-Bashing Re-Awakening of 2000, and your place has already been prepared in the dustbin of history.
One if by Land, two if by Drone ! The rest is a "dustbin'.
Give credit where credit is due.
Even though the US has a large population of poor people, there are no poor people serving in our governmental bodies unless it is a local city council where the payments (unlike Bell) are minimal. Once a poor person is elected to one of our legislative bodies, they suddenly receive salaries and benefits way beyond the group of people they would represent. Therefore, this is not a representative democracy as the poor people of america will never have one of them in a position of power. We need poor people who feel poverty every day of their lives to serve in our legislative bodies and make the changes that need to be made to serve the best interests of all people.
Ralph Nader is a great man. On the voting issue...no one remotely representative of their constituents can be elected anymore. It takes more and more millions, probably squillions by now, to get on the ballot. We need to scrap this system, fund elections with public money, so that anyone can run, anyone who can achieve enough supporters not from a treasure trove of dollars.
BTW, this local contretemps inspires a tangential observation:
Those who consider themselves rational, level-headed, common-sense "anti-conspiracists" are fond of arguing that it's simply nonsense to believe that a complex government scheme, scam, or caper can be carried off in broad daylight, so to speak.
It could NEVER happen, they insist, because obviously once a conspiracy involves more than a few conspirators, "someone" would surely either blab or inadvertently give away the game!
True, Bell is only a "small-town" laboratory, not a nation-wide one. But its Elected Misrepresentatives indeed successfully schemed, plotted, and colluded to execute what amounts to a long-term, long-range mechanism of heinous theft and what amounts to embezzlement and looting of the public treasury.
And all along the way, it turns out, there were people here and there who "knew" something about crucial aspects of it, or should have known, or WANTED to know but were prevented or dissuaded from pursuing the plain truth.
Yes, this was a white-collar crime that didn't rely upon, or culminate in, terroristic violence and mayhem. But IMO it's a good lesson for how "conspiracies" can indeed form and persist in plain sight-- if not indefinitely, at least long enough to achieve their purpose.
It all comes back to the line from the movie ( A Few Good Men) "You want the truth? you really want the truth? Well you can't handle the truth!)
Reminds me of arguments I had with friends and family during the Obama election, you know he seems to be getting a lot of money from corporations and banks, Thats ok he for the people, He voted for the war, No he's a Democrat and hell stop Bushies evil war.
After awhile I stopped bothering, the sheeple voted and got the clown they thought they wanted.
I won't place any bets for November, the sheeple are still out there, and still allowed to vote. Facts notwithstanding.
>^^<
It seems the first business of most governments is to fleece ordinary people.
If the truth were know nationwide, we would discover that many of our politicians and business leaders are nothing more than white collar criminals of the worst kind. This has become the American way. The only crime from their perspective is to get caught.
Congress and the White House are engaged in international war crimes. Wall Street and the bankers have stolen trillions. And let's not forget the mega-millionaire TV preachers who bless American every day, if you send them money !
Etc. Etc.
Meanwhile the average American pays the price.
When I first heard about the Bell, Calif. scandal I could hardly believe it, but the more I thought about it the more it made "sense."
One writer on this thread asks does Bell have a local newspaper. Today it probably doesn't matter, because the "local" newspaper isn't really "local," but has been bought out by a chain with no local roots and whose main goal is profit.
Back in the late 1970s I was elected to the council in a small midwest university city. Regular Council meetings were twice a month (plus many other meetings such as Planning Commission, Zoning Bord, etc.). The pay was $50 month! For me it was arduous because I wanted to make many changes and it became virtually a full-time job.
At the time the local newspaper was totally locally owned and the Editor himself appeared at almost every Council and Planning meeting. In addition reporters from nearby newspapers showed up often, depending on what was on the agenda. News reports appeared regularly and there were often editorials about local government.
A few years later the local paper was sold to a chain, the editor retired, and a guy who found government boring was named editor (I had known him for years). The paper pretty much stopped covering council meetings unless a "hot" issue was on the agenda, and the paper became more puffery and personality oriented as actual "news" coverage was replaced by more advertising. The real revenue came from expensive little classified ads, especially for the Real Estate Trust.
As the university grew, millions in porkbarrel projects, for new "bricks & mortar" construction came about---all requiring approval at the state level (Board of Regents, along the California model under Reagan). The expansion of the university brought in more people from outside the city, requiring expansion of the sewer and water systems, all to feed the Real Estate Trust. The quality of life deteriorated and citizen involvement in local government declined drastically.
The "local" newspaper was sold to a second, larger chain, part of a national trend towards "consolidation," which reduced diversity of views even more. The newspaper stopped writing editorials completely! Its circulation actually declined as the local population increased. It decided to try to boost circulation by "brightening" its "features" and going from black and white to color. Less and less hard news appeared.
Then came the digital revolution and people started using the internet instead of local classified ads and the paper's revenues declined. (A national trend...) The one saving grace was the newspaper's annual listing of the salaries of all public officials' and university administrators and faculty members, which was usually a revelation, but they stopped doing even that after a couple of years, probably due to pressure from certain overpaid officials embarassed by such reports.
Today there is virtually NO coverage of local government or of university governance or of the relationship between the city and the university, which continues as a contractor's cash cow as the quality of higher education goes down and the cost of education rises at twice the rate of inflation. Traffic congestion during the school year is equivalent to big city rush hours and "citizen" alienation is at an all time high. The City Hall chamber where the Council meets is actually HALF the size it was in 1980---the year Reagan was elected President!
So, in retrospect, the situation in Bell, Calif. should not surprise me, except for the sheer audacity of the excess there.
As for the situation in Maywood, Calif. that 4thefuture reminds us of:
"Maywood's cash-strapped city council decided to respond to its myriad problems with a revolutionary initiative: it voted to contract out every single public service the city once provided, from the management of parks and libraries, to the book-keeping at City Hall, to the running of its police department.
Today, Maywood is America's (and possibly the world's) first completely outsourced city."...
This is a logical outcome of the Reagan Revolution: government bad, "Free Market" good.
One wonders about the status of the pensions for all those laid off municipal employees, esp. given the trend in the past few years by so many governments---including state governments---to raid the pension funds of public employees.
The post-WWII sense of community ("we" won the war) is long dead. Corruption prevails. It's everyone for himself/herself. Them that's got, gets. And screw the rest, meaning mostly you and me.
Which Founding Father was it who said something about 'Those who would sacrifice Freedom for Security deserve neither'? Or the one who said 'Eternal Vigilance is the price of Liberty'?
Pogo was right. We have met the enemy and he is us.
-30-
Excellent, Ole Man,
Anyone who quotes Pogo deserves kudos on that point alone.
Your post tells me we are about the same age. Anyone who wasn’t asleep during our time saw pretty much the same things you reveal. We are of the ‘too young to have served in WWII’ generation, thus our numbers are small; and, consequently, our group never held any real political power.
This topic brings to mind a former neighborhood man I knew, in my California city, who was the boss of the Sanitation Worker guys. I remember him saying one day that his thirty-odd workers had been reduced in quality and quantity by some ridiculous number. You all know how that went down.
The motto of California is ‘Eureka’, which in Greek means ‘I have found the Gold, and it’s all mine’.
The thing about this city worker (you know, one of the workers who destroyed the economy of California) is that he was a damn good neighbor. As the street upkeep services were being cut back, I would see him out on the street in the early morning (before work) spraying weeds on the boulevard, and also those growing in the cracks of the asphalt of the street itself. He was doing this on his own – his own time – his own expense, to help cover for city services that had been eliminated.
He said to me, “As soon as I can retire, I am going to get as far away from California as I can get.”
Sad.
Reagan's Dream has finally come true: "It's Mourning in America."
"The thing about this city worker (you know, one of the workers who destroyed the economy of California) is that he was a damn good neighbor. As the street upkeep services were being cut back, I would see him out on the street in the early morning (before work) spraying weeds on the boulevard, and also those growing in the cracks of the asphalt of the street itself. He was doing this on his own – his own time – his own expense, to help cover for city services that had been eliminated."
alas, that this man's conscientiousness didn't extend to forgoing the spray, which ends up in the river, the bay, the ocean and/or the water table....
Regarding Maywood, they contracted their city services out to other nearby cities, one of them being... Bell, CA. From the article in question:
"In the former camp, perhaps naturally, is Aldo Perez, Maywood's new director of Parks and Recreation. He is actually employed by the neighbouring city of Bell, which is now paid to handle Maywood's records management, finances and human resources, under a monthly contract.
The city was previously so dreadful at running its own affairs that he believes locals could only have enjoyed tangible improvements from the great outsourcing."
The article about Maywood mentioned the Bell corruption scandal. I would like to see if the Independent does a follow-up to it's Maywood article, which I found to be more than a bit fawning over the concept of contracting out public service jobs.
Original article here:
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/07/28-2
If you've ever passed through Bell, it looks like an industrial wasteland taken over by casinos. I wonder if this scam might have been a mafia job (?).
Anyway, it is no wonder that the poor citizens of Bell would not participate by monitoring City Council meetings and diving into city records. It's not much of a city. There's likely no semi-retired group with leisure time for civic participation. Mostly, people just work and subsist, I suspect. Bell is a freeway offramp.
In general (it may vary from place to place), there seems no room for citizen participation in the country, except every two and four years with preselected duopoly pro-corporate candidates. There are no civic victories to celebrate. The public interest is largely ignored by public officials, who do real estate deals. If you spend what little time you have doing civic work, it likely will prove frustrating until you quit.
Newspapers have been monopolized and stopped local coverage. Radio stations are owned by holding companies playing recordings. The Los Angeles Times is a case in point - pretty worthless. Nader's chiding that Times reporters have "found a new exciting town-by-town beat" is devastating and true.
I think the larger problem is corporate control. It saps any citizen initiative. You know they'll accommodate the real estate barons. You know the wars will continue to be funded. That's bilking of the public too.
-TIA
OK you stated your thoughts
What's the action in response?
As the article alluded, the locals are angry and getting involved. That's a start, but it has limitations. Something a lot bigger in terms of consciousness has to take root.
There's not much one person can do. Effective action is collective. I'm not making excuses in saying that, it's just a fact. I take your question to not be a personal one - that is, you aren't asking me what I will do. I don't live in Bell, for starters.
I'm explaining why I think there's a disconnect and how it's a natural reaction. I don't believe in the motto, "we get the government we deserve." The object of a public institution is not to bilk the public, so any institution that does that is just criminal. No one deserves crime.
You won't like my idea of "action," perhaps. The first step is having a larger consciousness among the people that rejects all forms of corporate control. So, an educational effort is needed. In the Los Angeles area, the listener-sponsored nonprofit KPFK radio station, which accepts no corporate underwriting, is a good start. However, even with an effective public media outlet in place, it still may take years for one person to start getting it. Education is a BIG task. People still vote for Repugs/Dems - enough said, but that's a measure of widespread ignorance. Corporate-funded parties don't represent the public interest. Period. Lots of people who write in the Common Dreams threads don't get that.
Also, democratic participation preassumes having the leisure time to get involved. Most people are too busy working for the man or caring for their families to get engaged. I don't know what the solution is there. You first need people to gain political control to help reduce the amount of hours they work. But, once again, people vote Dem/Repug, which represents the interests of their employers, not them.
If there actually are people in Bell with the leisure time to check records, attend city council meetings and somehow broadcast that information to the public effectively (assuming the corporate press won't do it), then that's all good. I'd think people who are retired might do it, but retirement is a concept for a different generation. The cost of housing/rent, and the insecurity of employment, may mean no retirement for working people in the present and near future.
So, my view of action may ultimately seems glacier like - education, followed by political control (via a third party) and legislative change. There are no good short-term solutions for widespread systemic problems. Feudalism wasn't ended in a day, and it actually seems to be coming back in our present day.
How fast people pick things up may depend on whether they can connect cause and effect. The desire to learn may stem from the increasing immiseration happening around us. But this is hardly an encouraging course of action. It may be where we are, however, realistically speaking. Things are likely to get worse before they get better because a good part of the voting population can't determine accurately the source of the assault. Some may be looking to scapegoat immigrants, rather than their own Dem/Repug representative voting for NAFTA and GATT, for instance, whom they helped get reelected after the betrayal.
Once again, there are no easy answers. Lots of people would disagree with my thought that the source of Bell's problems can be traced to our present corporate-control milieu. They have their minds made up that it is just an isolated criminal act. In their view, I'm just attaching my ideas to this particular case. That's what I mean by it being a big educational job to achieve a change in consciousness among people.
By the way, this city was somewhat unplugged from the rest of legal oversight, being a "chartered city." So, that's an important detail to recall. It's different than other cities and was more susceptible to criminal intent. So, there are institutional safeguards that didn't apply in the case of Bell.
What's common in this case is that public office is now seen not as an honorable trade, but as a stepping stone to personal wealth. That attitude comes from years of corporate control over politics, I think. And the cycle can be broken by thinking differently and organizing. Any organization will only be effective if people already have the right frame of mind. Maybe that's happening now in Bell, but maybe not. I haven't seen a mind-shift taking place more generally. For instance, only about one to two percent voted third party in the last Presidential election. You can't have change if you keep doing the same thing, over and over again.
-TIA
For one thing, the salary packages of top officials in government and so-called non-profits such as hospitals that take government funds should be public knowledge. Any industry or business that gets a government subsidy, bailout or tax break should be required to disclose the budget including compensation figures. Same with charitable organizations who appeal to us for contributions. They should voluntarily publish comprehensible "getting and spending" reports.
I would like this in private industry too, so workers could see if the "no money" excuse for setting raises and health care reimbursements is really necessary. But think we could at least start with enterprises for which taxpayers pay and to which ordinary citizens contribute with the aim of helping good causes.
Joe
It might go a long way to help to explain why the Government is saying CALPERS the state retirement entity is unsustainable. Clowns like this only pay in a handfull of years and retire @ 50 or so. I can see where it would be a problem to subsidise their $500.000+ pensions on the backs of state employees who average only $45.000.
A good pension reform might be kicking these Fatfish out of the public pool.
>^^<
(gee)...
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"say there... what's that tv show you're watching?"...
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"it's a new show called "america's got corruption!"... the contestants are various government departments on the local and state and national levels... and their talent portion shows how well they've deceived the people!... the judges are citizen-advocates... and the home audience can also phone in their votes after the show... the winners get legal action filed against them right away!"...
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"and what do the losers get?"...
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"they get their corruption exposed with alerts to the proper authorities... along with follow-up segments too!... so none of the authorities shirk their duty or forget about anything without their own negligence being exposed!"...
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"wow!... for the first time ever i'm putting a tv show and time on my calendar!"...
(things need to change to get better... lotsa stuff to do... keep telling the lawmakers... ((no matter when their terms come to an end... and hopefully better workers begin!))... to wake up this government!... to care about the basics!... and stop misleading!... and end this war!... and don't waste anymore!...
and here's one of many links that can be used to do that... and get congressional information etc too)... http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/officials
(and there's lotsa other stuff to do too!)...
the best of wishes'n'ways'n'todays to each'n'everyone!... :)
Corruption happens everywhere but some places are more obvious about it than others.
Do not judge others lest ye be judged. I would have done the same thing what Rizzo and Co. did. That is the American way.
And then you'll run when you see the people coming after you with the torches and pitchforks, won't you?
This is NOT the American Way!!!
This is the way of a few corrupt individuals who are destroying the American Way of life for all the rest of us. If you would do the same thing as they did, commit a criminal act by stealing from taxpayers and think you can get away with it, then you are part of the problem and not the solution!
The American Way of life is suffering at this point in history because there are people in this country who have no respect for the Great Spirit this country was founded on and the greatness this country can achieve. I feel sorry for those people because they don’t understand what they’re missing. It’s not just that they have no respect for America, they have no respect for themselves.