August 18, 2010 – Daily Brief

Just in case you might have forgotten that you live in a SoCal suburb Teri Andrews comes in to remind us that the KEY to happiness is a Long John Silver’s franchise store!

According to the answers by the Sanitation District during their study sessions, all of the plants being built downstream are not being built to take chloride out of the water, as they are not reverse osmosis plants. The Newhall Ranch plant which has not been designed or built may have to take chloride out but that has not been determined yet. It is unfortunate that this article mixes apples and oranges to give the reader the impression that all these plants were built to remove chlorides.

Okay, I’ll start: Fledgling Americans would have expanded west “but ultimately decided against it because of a fear of the unknown”. Okay, who’s got another one.

There is also H & H Fish in Canyon Country. Excellent Fish & Chips!

The problem with Fish & Chips on the west coast is that its 99.9999999% of the time Alaskan Pollock, and not Cod, which it should be. Also, it should be served via wrapping in newspaper. Oh, man, I’m jonesing now….

With respect to the link to the old story on the sale of the Keysor Century property, which mentions the sale of Whittaker Bermite for $63.8 Million, it is important to point out that the $63.8 Million sale never closed escrow due to the collapse of the buyer’s funding source and the collapse of the real estate investment market generally. The vast majority of the 996 acre Whittaker Bermite property is still owned by Chapter 11 Debtor in Possession Santa Clarita, LLC, whose bankruptcy case has been pending in the Phoenix based bankruptcy court for roughly 5 years. The balance of the Whittaker Bermite property, i.e. the parking lot for the Santa Clarita Metrolink Station, is still owned by Chapter 11 Debtor in Possession Bermite Recovery, LLC, whose bankruptcy case also has been pending in that same court for roughly 5 years. Those two bankruptcy cases are consolidated for administrative purposes with a “lead bankruptcy case” called RFI Realty.

I’ve tried the Fish Tail fish and chips and was greatly underwhelmed. The fish was mushy. Carl’s Jr’s are better. Years back we used to enjoy H&H. Didn’t realize they were still open, they just fell off our radar. Thanks for the heads-up Kevin.

As a subtext in The Signal’s Bob Kellar story to which SCVTALK links, is the more important issue of retiring City Attorney Carl Newton’s comments. Sigh. Somebody is misleading the public about the disastrous extent of the eminent domain judgment against the City for the tiny piece of Golden Valley Road right of way. The judgment, including value of land taken, severance damages, land owner’s attorneys fees and land owner’s court costs is closer to $21 Million. Under the Court Rules, that cash is already out the City’s door, in an “escrow” pending an unlikely win by the City on appeal. It’s unfortunate when public officials do not tell the truth, especially when the actual court documents with actual numbers are in wide circulation. Carl Newton’s law firm Burke Williams & Sorensen spectacularly lost the Golden Valley Road condemnation case, and the only miraculous lawyering they pulled off was delaying judgment interest at 10% per year beginning to accrue on the jury verdict amount for several years. And of course the $21 Million figure does not include the hundreds of thousands of dollars in attorneys fees paid to Carl Newton’s law firm, Burke Williams & Sorensen, for unsuccessfully litigating that case. The court documents substantiating that $21 Million number, the condemnation trial judge’s comments about the “conduct” of the City’s attorneys during that trial and afterwards, and the penalty paid by the City for being unreasonable in the judge’s view, are a public record which I’d be glad to send to The Signal (again) if they really wanted to write a story about what has happened. The Signal’s report above also shows that retiring City Attorney Carl Newton failed to tell the audience that adding pain to the initial injury, the bankrupt owner of the parking lot for the Santa Clarita Metrolink Station has now moved that the Bankruptcy Court call up for trial the city’s “condemnation” of that parking lot, and use of it without paying rent for the last 8+ years. That will mean hundreds of thousands more in attorney’s fees to Burke Williams & Sorensen let alone several million dollars to pay for the parking lot itself. And of course Mr. Newton failed to disclose that the first mortgage lender is fronting the money for the bankrupt landowner to aggressively litigate that condemnation case as well, to maximize what the City has to pay out for the land. City Manager Ken Pulskamp needs to pull off a miracle to get the City out of the economic mess created by his predecessor’s conduct relating to the owners of Whittaker Bermite, i.e. the recipients of the condemnation award. In fairness to Carl Newton, the mistakes and losses relating to Whittaker Bermite are not Carl Newton’s alone. A lot of them are attributable to other attorneys at Burke Williams & Sorensen. The Signal’s story containing retiring City Attorney Carl Newton’s comments about the City’s biggest legal troubles, brings up the topical issue of misconduct in the City of Bell. Soon after the Bell controversy began, that city’s “private city attorney law firm”, Best Best & Krieger was relieved of duty, as was their lawyer assigned to represent Bell, Edward Lee. The alleged “crooks” on the City of Bell’s City Council went out and got a new law firm and new lead lawyer to guide them through their troubles. So Santa Claritans need to ask, when Carl Newton announced his retirement, why didn’t the City of Santa Clarita even bother to interview at least the two most prominent competitors of Burke Williams & Sorensen, in terms of providing a replacement attorney? I am betting the law firm names Richards Watson and Rutan & Tucker were never even publicly uttered in public Council meetings. And why wasn’t Michael Colantuano, an independent City Attorney who received the 2010 “Public Attorney of the Year Award” from the California League of Cities “city attorneys’ club” considered for the job? The California League of Cities municipal attorneys organization have online legal program materials discussing, at length, the duty of a City Attorney and his assistants to act INDEPENDENTLY in the best interests of the city as a municipal corporation and for its taxpayers. Those program materials make it clear that California city attorneys’ clients ARE NOT the “majority of the city council” or the “city manager who pays the lawyer’s bills”. It seems to me that given the economic hardships to the City created by City Manager Ken Pulskamp’s predecessor, which Mr. Newton allowed to occur by not exercising control over his “client” to protect the public interest, (just as City Attorney Edward Lee failed to do in Bell), the City’s present legal troubles with the Whittaker Bermite landowner would have warranted a meaningful public discussion by the City Council members about interviewing replacement city attorney law firms. Bottom line, the lawyers who lost the Golden Valley Road condemnation case are still the City of Santa Clarita’s attorneys. Neither Carl Newton nor the new figurehead City Attorney are the ones who actually do the city’s difficult legal work. It’s pretty sad when the City Council in Bell does the right thing in hiring a new City Attorney but the City Council of Santa Clarita does not.

I would concur with CoastalSage on the issue of reviewing the current City Attorney firm. It was a shock to be on the Council and not have the City Attorney be up to speed on basic Roberts Rules of Order. It was also disappointing to have the City Attorney change the election rules in the middle of an election with regard to the campaign sign ordinance. When the Council decided to ignore their own rules, the City Attorney told them they were right to do so because he had actually given them different instructions on the City law prior. The staff was given the blame, but the problem was apparently with the attorneys office because they are paid to review every change to the City laws. So either they messed up on their review, or they gave the Council bad info. Perhaps we should look to a qualified local firm, or a full time City Attorney.

If the farmers can show me that they have been growing avacados for five generations then they may have an argument about chlorides. But they haven’t (just chloride-tolerant citrus). Just because they have been farming SOMEthing doesn’t mean taxpayers have to ensure they can grow ANYthing in perpetuity.