Morning News Round-Up -- 5.27.10: San Mateo is the new Ohio...

The Menlo Park City Council had a nice conversation about the Bohannon "Menlo Gateway" project on Tuesday night. (Admit it, you were there...) But two Councilmembers, Kelly Fergusson and Andy Cohen, are not buying what Menlo Gateway is selling and it is making Councilmember Heyward Robinson "uncomfortable" that the two aren't supporting it. He's probably uncomfortable because Menlo Gateway is huge, and in the future if the project is hated, Robinson will be the one who voted for it... except he hedged his bets and abstained last night.

The Civil Grand Jury says that consolidation of fire fighting services could save money for local communities. Thanks Civil Grand Jury, everyone is already on the case (San Mateo/ Foster City, Coastside, etc., etc.)

Which leads us to our daily dose of pointing out the screw ups of others... the San Mateo/ Foster City fire merger is so important that it has to appear on the homepage of the County Times twice...


100+ layoffs coming to a school district near you -- that is, if you live in the Redwood City School District...

Friends and farmers celebrated Jack Olsen's life yesterday at his funeral.


Fresh off the Mercury News endorsement this week, Rich Gordon gets the Will Oremus treatment...

Steve Poizner will be holding a town hall meeting today at noon at the Hiller Aviation Museum. Don't all jump for joy at once... try to contain your excitement. Whitman is in town tomorrow at Graniterock in Redwood City. Apparently San Mateo County is now Ohio.

Morning News Round-Up -- 4.21.10: San Mateo-Burlingame Police? Not. So. Fast...

Well, the San Mateo-Burlingame Police Department hit a road block yesterday. San Mateo approved moving forward, over the objections of David Lim. But Burlingame is balking at the idea... The Burlingame Voice was on the scene as the Burlingame Council looked at the police issue...

Congresswoman Eshoo testified in front of the House Financial Services Committee this week to blast Lehman Brothers for ripping off local governments, like the County of San Mateo. She also is pushing the Restitution for Local Government Act of 2010, sort of bail out for the 40 local government folks who lost $1.7 billion. Why should banks get bailed out for screwing up, but the local governments they screwed not get some help, the thinking goes...

Our other Congresswoman is busy too... Jackie Speier is trying to get $100 million in federal money for Bay restoration...

Menlo Park has serious concerns about High-Speed Rail... are you surprised? Anyway, they are sending a letter to the High-Speed Rail Authority, which the High-Speed Rail Authority will file under N, for NIMBY...

Ah, the San Mateo County Civil Grand Jury. We missed you. Yesterday, the Civil Grand Jury recommended that the County consolidate nearly every job in the County into one position: Chief Financial Officer. The job would be controller, treasurer, tax collector, and we assume registrar as well. Because it would be a lot easier to pinpoint blame when the County loses buckets and buckets of money if there was one Chief Financial Officer...

A murder in Woodside? What will the COWs say?

An obvious response on flawed garbage contracts...

The South Bayside Waste Management Authority (SBWMA) -- the guys that oversee the garbage contract and are responsible for the Garbage Saga -- responded to the Civil Grand Jury report that said their contracting process was flawed.

Unsurprisingly, the SBWMA said they did everything right and that they won't reevaluate the hundreds of millions of dollars worth of contracts that were awarded. So much for government oversight.

Recap: The only folks to look into how hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money is going to be spent said they had "no confidence" in how the contracts were awarded. The only person that seems to be paying attention is Burlingame's Jesus Nava (photo).

Seemingly, we are all so concerned that the State is taking local money away from us that we have missed that a local government agency might be overcharging us by millions and millions of dollars... oh well.

Morning News Round-Up -- 7.10.09: Two local, legal battles heat up...,

Sorry to begin with, but it is certainly the quote of the day: "I've never massaged a penis..." You guessed it, that's Dr. William Ayres' speaking in his own defense.

Another very serious local legal battle is heating up. The Burlingame Museum of Pez Memorabilia is being sued by Pez Candy Inc. for copyright infringement. (The previous two sentences are true.)

We have seen lots of reports coming out of the San Mateo County Civil Grand Jury, but we haven't learned a lot about the folks on the actual Grand Jury. Until today. The Daily Journal does a write up of Virginia Chang Kiraly, the Grand Jury forewoman...

Speaking of the Civil Grand Jury... today's report says that the County is losing out on all kinds of money. And anther update on the Civil Grand Jury: the full TRASHTALK report is published for all of you with nothing to do this weekend...

On the flip side, there are folks at Sustainable San Mateo County and San Mateo Acting Responsibly Together are looking to save folks money through energy efficiency programs in your home.

We hope that the local folks in Sacramento photocopy the Daily Journal Editorial today about the dysfunction in Sacramento and pass the copies around to their colleagues.

COWs of Woodside delve into the new cost for Woodside for outsourcing their police protection to the Sheriff's Department.

A letter on Coastsider does its best to imitate the Civil Grand Jury calling for new leadership at the Coastside County Water District.

Ahhh, politics. In Palo Alto, expect the next City Council race to be a biggy. Councilman John Barton is not seeking another term. That makes three Council-folk from Palo Alto that won't be on the ballot in November: Barton, Yoriko Kishimoto, and Jack Morton. The other folks up in November are Larry Klein, who is running again, and Peter Drekmeier, who will let us all know on Monday. Hold on to your hats, it could be a real barnburner in Palo Alto in November.

Morning News Round-Up -- 7.9.09: Quality Over Quantity

There aren't a lot of stories today... but we are going with quality over quantity:

Garbage:
The Grand Daddy of all Civil Grand Jury reports is in. (Thank you Assemblymember Jerry Hill.) The Garbage Saga Report has been published and recommendations given. We will have more on this issue later this week, but it doesn't look good for the South Bayside Waste Management Authority... A weird part about this is the story was in the Daily Journal, and Watch Dog received a copy of the report as well, but as of now, the actual report isn't available on the Civil Grand Jury website... Here are some choice quotes from the report:

• ...the SBWMA did not follow its stated goal to "conduct the RFP process with integrity and transparency."
• ...the Grand Jury has no confidence in the RFP processes by which the Collections Services Contractor and the Shoreway Master Plan Facility Contractor were selected...
• ...After four years of preparation, staff time, and consultant fees, the RFP process was poorly executed...

Dr. Ayres Trial:
The other big local story this week is the trial of Dr. William Ayres. He took the stand in his own defense yesterday... Ayres Watch was not impressed and called yesterday "...a very, very, very good day for the prosecution..."

And the rest of the news...

Here are today's local government in budget crisis stories:

• South San Francisco wants to raise hotel taxes to fill its budget gap...
• Senior services in San Mateo are in trouble...

There was a pedestrian death on the Caltrain tracks in Redwood City yesterday evening.

Here is a story about golf and Pacifica and it doesn't involve the San Francisco Board of Supervisors... thankfully. Pacifica golf courses and parks are going to use recycled water for irrigation.

Stay tuned for more insight on the Civil Grand Jury report on Garbage... as soon as we can get through the 25 page document...

Morning News Round-Up -- 7.6.09: Campaign Season Starts Early...

Election season... seriously, it is upon us. Usually the official season starts post-Labor Day, but 4th of July sounds good for the purposes of good blog material... The San Mateo Union High School Board of Trustees race could be a good one -- if Trustee Bob Griffin decides not to seek reelection. It would be for his fifth term...

Which brings up this question: Could there be worse time to be on a school board? Cut, cut, cut... then hold your breath that the State doesn't screw you any more than it already has...

While we are on campaign talk, David Lim, who is gunning for a seat on the San Mateo City Council, raised over $13k during the fundraising period that ended July 1st. We guess he must proud of that number (or it is intended to scare off folks) because he had a press release announcing it...

Sue Lempert writes in today's Daily Journal. Of note, she speculates that the recent findings of the Civil Grand Jury (District elections for Supervisor/Pay-Cut Gate) "...may stimulate action and change..." Perhaps she could help push the Civil Grand Jury to release the Grand Daddy of Civil Grand Jury reports (garbage) soon.

Craig Baker, the interim Superintendent for the San Carlos Elementary School District, gets a write up in the Daily Journal.

The "Susan Manheimer for San Francisco Police Chief" story also gets some ink in the Daily Journal, as the paper tries to unpack what happened because she wasn't even a finalist... the SF Chronicle's Matier & Ross come off as ill-informed gossip mongers. (But that is supposed to be Watch Dog's role...)

There is a new history book out about Atherton. Watch Dog has to wonder if the political in-fighting in recent history made it in. We doubt it...

A pipe-bomb was found during a traffic stop on 280. Seriously. But that's about all the information this story contains right now...

Morning News Round-Up -- 6.26.09: A King of Pop-Free Round-Up...

Dr. Ayres' trial is picking up steam. Coverage from the Daily Journal and other main stream media... but William Ayres' Watch is much more in depth...

In an (un)related case, a San Mateo County man was sentenced to 24 years in prison for molesting his granddaughters... Perhaps he and Dr. Ayres will meet someday?

Budget problems:

• San Mateo Union High School District = $3.5 million.
• We'll put this Editorial from the Daily Journal under budget problems, but the problem in Half Moon Bay is not just about the budget, it is about "political naivety" according to the Journal...
• Congratulations Shaun Bishop. The County Supervisors are (finally) looking at their expenses during this economic downturn...

It wasn't just Unelected Supervisor Carol Groome who got Civil Grand Jury attention this week. Pay Cut Gate got some love as well. Not surprisingly, the Civil Grand Jury found that the Daly City City Council wasn't justified in cutting the City Clerk's pay. PP Examiner chimes is as well...

Watch Dog spies tell us that the Civil Grand Jury report that we've all been waiting for is coming... it can't come soon enough. That said, we hope that the Civil Grand Jury doesn't cave to PR pressure and release it in the dead news cycles of the July 4th long weekend...

Atherton. How we love thee. The trial of a Public Works Supervisor who is facing misdemeanor assault and battery charges against a female Atherton Police Officer started yesterday.

The Coastside Family Medical Center's bankruptcy could be dismissed. Watch Dog is no lawyer (obviously) and the details seem sketchy in this story from the HMB Review. Hopefully more will come out...

Morning News Round-Up -- 6.25.09: The Civil Grand Jury Strikes Again...

NOTE: Yesterday's Round-Up got caught in the outbox... check it out for yesterday's Round-Up. Apologies...
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The San Mateo Civil Grand Jury gets off another shot at a local agency. This time, their object of affection was one that Watch Dog covered long ago... with the same contempt. The appointment of Unelected Supervisor Carole Groom. The report goes into extensive detail and comes out with the same point of view that Watch Dog had way back when in December. Could it be that Watch Dog is influencing the Civil Grand Jury?

(One question remains... where is the Garbage Saga Civil Grand Jury Report?)

The Civil Grand Jury Report notwithstanding, the Supervisors approved their (two-year) $1.76 billion budget yesterday. Watch Dog spies tell us that the Civil Grand Jury Anti-Appointment Report gossip was swirling in the room...

The County's budget is certainly taking big hits, so is Belmont's. That's why they are seriously considering taxing hotel visitors to Belmont more. When all else fails, tax those that don't vote for you...

As if public employee pension funds (especially in the City of San Jose) don't have enough problems, a Pension Trustee in San Jose was arrested in San Mateo following a domestic violence call... Patrick G. Skillsky then proceeded to attack the police that were called to the scene. Perhaps he was just really, really upset about all the market losses he didn't see coming... Ironically, the City of San Jose is considering having professionals oversee the Pension Funds rather than appointed, untrained folks. No time like the present...

In other local crime news...

Dr. Ayres' molestation trial continues... William Ayres Watch has the play-by-play... and laments the lack of coverage the trial is receiving. (Not from us...)

The fancy shmancy Olympic (golf) Club in Daly City was found liable for ($10 million) flood damage to the surrounding neighborhood. The Club Chief Groundskeeper did not say, "Heck, we thought the 18 holes were enough drainage to take care of all the rain..."

Menlo Park spends more time studying problems with consultants than fixing problems with solutions... or at least that's how some vocal folks feel...

Even political discontent can't stop Atherton from dipping into reserves to fix their budget gap... Watch Dog is a bit surprised the budget discussion was even put on the agenda, given the recent disagreements in Atherton...

Michelle Durand's Off the Beat in today's Daily Journal goes into the "Way Back Machine" to the beginning of the Burlingame Safeway discussion... May 1, 2003.

Morning News Round-Up -- 6.5.09: Kung Fu Remembrance Edition

No doubt this Daily Journal headline is true, given the Governor's speech earlier in the week: Jail faces more crowding.

Caltrain just let us know that weekend service isn't being cut but regularity of mid-week trains is... now they declare a 'fiscal emergency.' They must have learned that trick from San Carlos..

The (prolific) Civil Grand Jury took time to study an issue that seems relatively obvious to most folks who observe local governments: employee costs for local governments are high. Thank you Civil Grand Jury for proving that (sometimes) you have a keen sense for the obvious. We have to ask: where is the Grand Daddy of Grand Jury Reports?

A Daily Journal Editorial supports the San Mateo flood zone assessment for homeowners. (In case you were holding your breath for a positive Daily Journal Editorial on this topic...)

If you are one of the people that can't wait for the local gun show every year... you may need to make other plans. A bill that just passed the California State Senate (written by Senator Mark Leno) aims to ban the gun show at the Cow Palace. (Perhaps the bill will also ban the horrible fluorescent signs everywhere for the gun show too?)

Pacifica Riptide's Editor/Publisher John Maybury proposes a House of Commons-type regular series of debates in the Pacifica City Council Chambers. Let's see where this idea goes... it does sound interesting...

As two teens are mourned in Palo Alto, another train-related suicide was narrowly averted this week.

Morning News Round-Up -- 5.27.09: The Supreme (Courts) Day After

The day after Supreme (Courts) Tuesday (Prop 8 upheld/Sotomayor)... Watch Dog stays local...

The Burlingame Trolley has been saved... thank you Burlingame businesses that ponied up. (Remember when one of the hotels that foot the bill dropped out?)

The Belmont vote to make current parks permanent (by requiring a vote of the people to change the parks) was pushed off by Councilmember Warren Lieberman. A couple of weird things are happening around this issue. First, Lieberman wants the vote pushed off. Then, several folks are recusing themselves from the vote (Mayor Braunstein and Vice Mayor Wozniak) because live near parks. Next, a member of the Sierra Club got in a back-and-forth with Lieberman. So, the decision comes down to a Mayor and Vice Mayor-less Council that includes Lieberman, Coralin Feierbach (whose idea this is), and Bill Dickenson and they can't seem to agree if the idea is strong enough or not to protect parks. We can't wait until July 9th when it is set to be heard again...

The Grand Jury had good things to say about something yesterday (drug disposal)... but we still wait (anxiously) for the Grand Daddy of Grand Jury Reports (garbage).

Jon Mays (Daily Journal Editor) predicts a revolution in California because the State keeps stealing local tax dollars even though we all voted in 2004 to stop the theft. Good stuff.

The Star Light Lounge on El Camino in Millbrae always seemed like such a nice place... (unless, of course, you read about it on Yelp.) That was, of course, until the California Department of Alcohol Beverage Control shut it down. Don't worry neighbors, they are transferring the liquor license...

In a sure sign things are bad, Palo Alto Police Officers have deferred $800,000 in raises until 2011. Watch Dog has to wonder: will other public safety officials follow suit?

The Portola Valley Town Picnic is Saturday, June 6th. The best thing going is the pie bake-off. (For all you wise guys out there, this is not the same as your fraternity's "bake-off"...)

Civil Grand Jury... the suspense builds...

Thanks to a heads-up, loyal, and long-time reader, we know that the San Mateo County Civil
Grand Jury is in the "findings"mode...

Recently, these two important (sleep-inducing) gems came out...

• Camp Glenwood Should Remain An Honor Camp
• San Mateo Medical Center's Medication Administration Check System

But soon, the grand daddy of all Grand Jury reports could be out, thanks to Assemblymember Jerry Hill. The findings about the Garbage Saga contract... we can only assume that the good folks at the South Bayside Waste Management Authority (SBWMA) are on vacation this week (and next)...

In order to best protect those criticized in the report, expect the report to drop Friday...