April 24, 2012 – Daily Brief — The SCV Talk Archive

It's Councilwoman Laurie Ender's last day as a City Councilmember as TimBen Boydston & Bob Kellar will be sworn into office tonight at the City Council meeting. Expect the Mayor/Mayor Pro Tem thing to be settled and expect to see how our new (humbled?) Council and staff interact. All starts tonight at 5pm, regular meeting at 6pm. SIGNAL

Local Republicans were upset last night as assembly candidate Scott Wilk was the only candidate to show up at a well-publicized discussion forum for the 38th Assembly District race. There was much buzz about whether Patricia McKeon would show up at the evening event, but it turns out neither she nor Paul Strickland were on site. Democrat Edward Headington wasn't invited presumably because it was a Republican event. Facebook pics show a lonely Wilk on stage, having his way with the floor. So what really happened? One anti-Wilk partisan says on SCVTalk the whole show was a clever setup by the Wilk campaign while Signal commenters allege Buck McKeon lieutenants were busy calling around to local activists telling them the forum was canceled. SIGNAL, FACEBOOK, SCVTALK

Re: the above, Joe Messina has a good post over at WRB describing some of the background to last night's discussion forum and he excerpts from an email he says Bob Haueter sent on the subject. WRB. All I can say is that my All-Inclusive SCV Republican Club Guide 2011 is due for an update.

Speaking of the Assembly District race, as well as other races, the local Tea Party group has published an online poll to gauge support for the various candidates ahead of their 'official' endorsement next week. I think it's open to everyone because they even have Democrats on the ballot.POLL

Meanwhile, a Republican and Democratic candidate for LA County District Attorney came to speak with the only local Democratic club late last week. KHTS

Buck McKeon has raised more money from defense industries in the 2012 cycle than any other Republican: $393,000 so far according to Open Secrets. THINK PROGRESS

A Canyon Country resident is organizing opposition to Sulphur Spring's $72 million bond measure. Mike Nauom says the bond isn't affordable and has no cost-protection for homeowners of the elementary school district. District officials say that's not true. It's rare for a school bond to be opposed in the SCV, as the Signal notes SIGNAL

A companion article lays out what Sulphur Springs' Measure CK would do for special ed students SIGNAL

The City of Santa Clarita has deployed a new online bidding system for local businesses and it's enjoying rapid adoption and success with over 925 business registering so far. SIGNAL

Did you see it? Yesterday, briefly, the Signal posted a huge list of names of people who were arrested for various charges in the last few weeks. The charges ranged from graffiti to drug use to domestic abuse, and the story was linked off their Facebook and Twitter accounts. It was odd considering the Signal's own long-standing and controversial policy of not naming people arrested by the Sheriff's Department until they've been formally charged, a policy the Signal took a lot of heat for last year when it refused to name a child molestation suspect who worked as martial arts coach in Canyon Country. The story has since been removed from the Signal's website.

Speaking of crime, SCVNews has that list (with names redacted) and says overall, the City's major crimes rate is rising "as a direct result of Assembly Bill 109, Gov. Jerry Brown's prison realignment legislation which granted early release to thousands of convicted criminals." SCVNEWS. The DAILY NEWS looks more into how prison realignment is affecting local crime in the SFV

Why are old people driving alone up into Santa Clarita's isolated canyons, crashing mysteriously, and ending up lost, dead, and far from home? It happened last week with an 87 year old and last year with an 88 year old, both males. Jim Holt compares the two strange stories.SIGNAL

Fascinating piece on Cougar News about an 87 year old Greek Holocaust survivor who recounted his story of escaping the concentration camps, joining the American army, and avenging the death of his families. He spoke before Congregation Beth Shalom recently.Every time I would kill a Nazi or throw a bomb I would always say this is for you Daniel, this is for you sister." WOW

Today is the 50th anniversary of the Castaic Lake Water Agency, which was voted into being on April 24, 1962. The agency is going to put together a special video commemorating its history as one of the SCV's oldest public agencies. More at SCVNEWS

Poor KHTS: last week an email went around town accusing the station of knowingly hiding pornography links on its site. "I thought this was a family friendly website in a family friendly town. How can this be ok? The community needs to know that the safe local website is publishing adult content!!!!!! I let me kids on that website. I trusted KHTS. NOT ANY MORE! I will tell every one what I found and never to trust them again!!!!!" read the email from some hyper-active, ignorant person. KHTS explains it had no knowledge of the links and that its site was under cyberattack SCVNEWS

Local AT&T workers are striking after management refused to let them work wearing buttons with the letters "WTF" on them. An AT&T spokesman says it's obvious why workers shouldn't be allowed to wear WTF buttons when they visit customers but the union says the letters stand for something else entirely. SIGNAL

If any of you know who Lana Del Rey is, she was apparently in Santa Clarita last weekend filming another one of her low-budget but viral music videos LINK

Letter writer says you people dress like slobs when you go out to eat at SCV restaurants. This calls to mind Tim Myers' famous column about getting kicked out of the TPC for dressing in shorts. But seriously, we are a rather loose and low standard people when it comes to dress, are we not? Sweatpants -even high priced ones with letters on the ass- are not appropriate public attire people. LTE

City posts 25 reasons you should love the City of Santa Clarita. CITY OF SANTA CLARITA