by Thomas K. Arnold on October 20, 2010
In these days of millionaire politicians and campaign budgets that rival the gross national product of some fair-sized nations, it’s heartening to see some good old-fashioned campaigning going on here in North County.
Most candidates have been stung by the economy and aren’t collecting as much money as they used to. I wouldn’t be surprised if the total price tag for North County elections is less than it was four years ago, when many of the same seats were up for grabs.
Oh, we’re still seeing our share of slick mailers, glossy campaign pamphlets and ubiquitous signs. But we’re also seeing candidates taking to the streets, ringing doorbells and shaking hands with voters—far more than in the past, most observers agree. We’re seeing neighborhood meet-and-greets, barbecues, and candidate appearances at all sorts of community and neighborhood events.
And of all the people running for office, perhaps no one is working harder than Farrah Douglas, the Carlsbad planning commissioner now making her second attempt to land a seat on the city council.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on October 13, 2010
The tragedy could have been a calamity. Had gunman Brendan O’Rourke not been tackled by three heroic construction workers as he was fumbling with his gun, the senseless shootings last Friday at Kelly School in Carlsbad could have gone on—and we might have had one of the worst massacres in history instead of just two little girls being shot in the arm.
Moments after writing this opening line, I felt ashamed. “Just two little girls”—as though that isn’t tragic enough. Two little girls, 6 and 7 years old, happy that it’s Friday, happy that the school week’s coming to an end, probably looking forward to a soccer game Saturday morning and maybe a visit to the pumpkin patch or Legoland in the afternoon. A point in space, in time, and their lives are changed, possibly forever—strapped to a gurney, rushed to a hospital, worked over by doctors. Their physical wounds will heal, but their emotional ones? No one can tell.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on September 29, 2010
Two protests took place in North County last week, with wildly different views on what constitutes a proper use of taxpayer dollars.
On one end of the spectrum were Cal State San Marcos students, who demonstrated on behalf of a bill that would give illegal immigrant students a chance to legalize their status.
On the other was dark horse Carlsbad mayoral candidate Glenn Bernard, quietly picketing The Crossings at Carlsbad golf course with a sign that read, “Please patronize private courses only.”
Talk about a study in contrasts. In San Marcos, you had a mob of students whose educations are mostly subsidized by taxpayers demanding legal status for illegal immigrants who were brought into this country as children, provided they either attend college (on the public’s dime) or join the military (which, again, is funded by taxpayers). The protest died when word spread that the U.S. Senate would not move forward on the bill that would do precisely that, the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (or “DREAM”) Act.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on September 22, 2010
I almost spilled my morning cup of coffee the other day when I scanned the Google news headlines and found this little tidbit flashing on my screen: “Soaring pension costs will drive up North County property taxes.”
I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw the source was a public radio station in upstate New York, which apparently also has a “North County.” But the more I read, the angrier I became. State comptroller Thomas DiNapoli is warning that a steep drop in New York’s state pension fund will likely force local governments to hike property taxes. Mandatory pension contributions are going to jump 37 percent over the next two years, and guess who’s going to have to foot the bill? That’s right, the ordinary citizens of the great state of New York, who sweated, slaved and saved for their own little piece of the American Dream.
Here in California, property owners are less of a target for this public strong-arm robbery thanks to Proposition 13, which keeps our property taxes in check. But, as the saying goes, there but for the grace of God go we….
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by Thomas K. Arnold on September 1, 2010
There’s an old saying that to get elected to public office in Carlsbad, you have to be a Republican.
So it isn’t surprising that the two leading candidates seeking to replace Mayor Bud Lewis, who is retiring after a 24-year reign, are both Republicans who actively sought the endorsement of both the local party and its Lincoln Club offshoot, a group of mostly business leaders whose mission, according to its website, is to “advance free market principles and ideas by recruiting, endorsing, and financing business-friendly candidates and ballot measures.”
In the end, veteran councilman Matt Hall got the endorsement of both groups—which rarely happens in a race that pits a Republican against a fellow Republican. But in this case, freshman councilman Keith Blackburn is being actively supported by two public-employee unions, the “associations” representing Carlsbad firefighters and police officers, and as we all know unions are anathema to any red-blooded GOP partisan.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on May 26, 2010
I found it ironic that the day after the Carlsbad City Council imposed a realistic new contract on the city’s Firefighters Association, newspaper headlines up and down the state announced that the board of the California Public Employees Retirement System was asking the state for an additional $600 million handout to help pay for public employee retirement benefits next year.
The request (which was subsequently “delayed,” according to news reports, due to concerns about the state’s own financial viability) underscores the need for dramatic pension reform. Simply put, the overly generous benefits cities gave their employees in the early 2000s are unsustainable. We can’t afford to let our public safety employees retire at 50 and receive pensions as high as 90 percent of their peak-year salaries. But the unions that represent these workers have steadfastly refused to accept reality and renegotiate their contracts —- leading to two possible outcomes.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on May 12, 2010
It’s one of the best ideas I’ve heard yet for Carlsbad’s quaint downtown village: turning an ugly old city maintenance yard on the south end of State Street into a skateboarding museum and “action arts center.”
The plans, presented to an unimpressed Carlsbad City Council by the Carlsbad Village Association, are absolutely, positively brilliant. In addition to the museum, the decrepit old yard would be home to an art gallery, an education building, a multimedia production center and a skatepark. Best of all for a city concerned about its finances, supporters aren’t asking for a dime of city money, hoping to fund the project solely through donations and grants.
All they want is the land.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on April 14, 2010
I want to get the proverbial ball rolling early in Carlsbad for a massive, citywide Christmas-slash-“holiday” celebration centered on the beloved village.
I know December is a long way off. And I realize there are other, much bigger issues of civic concern, including building a long-promised pool complex, unraveling the Village H disaster, and reining in those overblown public-employee benefits.
But can’t we all take a little time out and stage something truly memorable? We’ ve already dropped the ball completely with the Fourth of July. Carlsbad has no parade and no public fireworks display. The closest thing we’ve got is fireworks at Legoland, and the citizens of Carlsbad are so hungry for something, anything even remotely celebratory, that each year they crowd into the business parks west of Legoland to watch the 10-minute show, creating a huge traffic jam.
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by Thomas K. Arnold on February 24, 2010
They just don’t give up.
The public safety unions, fighting to protect their overly generous pensions and health benefits, have just suffered a savage defeat in Oceanside with the failure of the recall campaign against Councilman Jerry Kern.
It was a classic union bait-and-switch to disguise the real issue: They riled up a group of senior citizens who felt Kern was rude and didn’t pay them the attention they deserved. They got them to launch a recall movement. And then they pumped huge amounts of money into the anti-Kern campaign in the hopes of getting a more sympathetic soul in council chambers —- a sympathetic soul who would turn a blind eye to the financial disaster these pensions and benefits pose to cities and states throughout our country.
Common sense, you see, invariably wins out. And the unions know their days of looting government treasuries are numbered, in light of the recession and gaping budget deficits.
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The tragedy could have been a calamity. Had gunman Brendan O’Rourke not been tackled by three heroic construction workers as he was fumbling with his gun, the senseless shootings last Friday at Kelly School in Carlsbad could have gone on—and we might have had one of the worst massacres in history instead of just two little girls being shot in the arm.
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TK Arnold: Farrah Douglas At Work
by Thomas K. Arnold on October 20, 2010
Most candidates have been stung by the economy and aren’t collecting as much money as they used to. I wouldn’t be surprised if the total price tag for North County elections is less than it was four years ago, when many of the same seats were up for grabs.
Oh, we’re still seeing our share of slick mailers, glossy campaign pamphlets and ubiquitous signs. But we’re also seeing candidates taking to the streets, ringing doorbells and shaking hands with voters—far more than in the past, most observers agree. We’re seeing neighborhood meet-and-greets, barbecues, and candidate appearances at all sorts of community and neighborhood events.
And of all the people running for office, perhaps no one is working harder than Farrah Douglas, the Carlsbad planning commissioner now making her second attempt to land a seat on the city council.
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