Fillmore City Manager Yvonne Quiring

In an effort to clear up the confusion surrounding the surprise (September 28) public reading of the city employees’ no confidence letter, comments were requested from Mayor Walker and four council members. Only Councilman Jamey Brooks refused to comment. Brooks’ refusal could be seen as a manifestation of his commitment to open government.

Due to a mix-up in phone and email efforts, the Gazette was unable to interview City Manager Yvonne Quiring directly. She did submit two comments as follows: In terms of Lathrop, “The Council conducted a thorough background process, including a trip to Lathrop and selected me to carry out their vision.”

And in terms of the letter [Vote of No Confidence] —“Right now we have budget challenges, labor negotiations and a class and comp study as well as an election cycle. Given the uncertainty, it is understandable that nerves are frayed and employees are worried. I remain committed to healing these divisions and working through these challenges.”

Fillmore Mayor Pro Tem Gayle Washburn commented that she “[may have] been the only one” to not know that this letter was coming. And even though she has heard comments from community members that the presentation of this letter could “be a political event… designed to discredit the Mayor and City Manager”, Washburn still recognizes that “these are serious allegations and concerns… which the Council needs to address as soon as possible.” Commenting on what is happening now she stated “as we speak, the Council is scheduling [a meeting] to determine the process” that will be used as the Council investigates the employee complaints.

Washburn went on to CONTINUED »

Nurse Martha Romero RN (above) presented the statistics for FUSD showing that it has 1.5 registered nurses for about 3818 students. The California School Nurses Organization has a recommended ratio of 1 nurse for every 750 students.

On Tuesday October 5 the Fillmore Unified School Board of Trustees met for a regularly scheduled meeting. Board President Tony Prado and Board Vice President Virginia De La Piedra were not in attendance. Board Clerk Liz Wilde conducted the relatively short meeting.

Brief reports were presented by Board Member John Garnica regarding the great football game at Homecoming, and Wilde about the dedication of Sierra High, a Junior Varsity Volleyball game, and the Fillmore High School Boosters club. Wilde has received comments from those planning the 100th Year game between Fillmore and Santa Paula “[that it’s] pretty much been handled by Fillmore… if you know anyone in Santa Paula they could sure use some help.” The Board heard from District Nurse Martha Romero RN who presented the Health Services Annual Report. Romero’s report was aimed at giving the Board a better idea about “what a day is like in the [health] office.” She presented the numbers of students who received the state mandated hearing and vision tests and those that were referred to further medical assessment. Romero stressed the importance of the nursing staff for keeping kids healthy and in school. The current staff is made up of two registered nurses, one who works full time and one part time, not only because of their role in caring for the students who need regular daily care due to chronic illness, but also for the unexpected sometimes emergency situations that arise. The district nurses work to make sure that all site office staff, and teachers are trained to assist students who may need their care should the nurse not be on campus during an emergency. Romero presented the statistics for FUSD showing that it has 1.5 registered nurses for about 3818 students. The California School Nurses Organization has a recommended ratio of 1 nurse for every 750 students. Although Romero commented that very few Districts are able to meet that recommendation.

The Board then voted to CONTINUED »

During my most recent counter-terrorism training mission to the Middle East, I had the honor of meeting a courageous and innovative individual.

Her name is Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, ESQ. Nitsana is the founder of the non-profit Shurat HaDin (English translation: The Israel Law Center). Western Intelligence agencies and countries, including the United States, have benefited in their fight against Radical Islamic terrorism because of the dedicated work of Mrs. Darshan-Leitner and the Israel Law Center.

Mossad officials (The Israeli Intelligence Institute that is the equivalent of the CIA in the U.S.) stated because of the legal activities of Nitsana and The Israel Law Center, terrorist activity in the Gaza Strip has been reduced by as much as 60%.

Established in 2003 and based in Tel-Aviv, Shurat HaDin has become the world leader in fighting terrorism through civil lawsuits and other legal action. Shurat HaDin works together with western intelligence agencies and volunteer attorneys around the world to file legal actions on behalf of victims of terrorist acts.

Following the model pioneered by the Alabama-based Southern Poverty Law Center a non-profit legal center that over the last four decades has successfully confronted and shut down racist groups across America,Shurat HaDin represents hundreds of victims in cases against Islamic terrorist groups and countries that are state sponsors of terrorism such as; Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Palestinian Authority, Iran, Syria, and the financial institutions that act as front organizations for these terrorist elements finances.

Shurat HaDin’s main goals are:
-Stop the flow of terror CONTINUED »

Interested parties who wish to become a write-in candidate can do so. The write-in nomination period opened on September 6th (technically the 7th as the 6th was a holiday), and will close on October 16th; a notice concerning the write-in period is posted on the Fillmore city’s website. The same candidacy provisions apply, i.e., 20 valid signatures of registered voters are required to become a certified candidate, and FPPC forms need to be completed and filed with the City Clerk’s office. The candidates name will not appear on the ballot and would need to be written in by a voter at the polls.

On October 28th, the CSEA will be hosting a forum at the Sespe Auditorium at 6:30 p.m. We will be putting a list of questions together for them. Come join us and ask where your children’s monies are bring spent. There are three positions opened. Nominees are: Tony Prado, Mark Austin, Kim Rivers, Lucy Rangel, and Dave Wilde. For information contact gamapiggie@yahoo.com.

Response to Brian Sipes’ Ventura County Star interview [“Five candidates seeking two seats on Fillmore City council” 09/27/10]:

SIPES’ INTERVIEW, VC STAR: “Sipes said the current City Council is grappling with what he characterized as the overspending of past councils, including the approval of the city’s new water recycling plant. Fillmore Public Works Director Bert Rapp has put the price tag at $70 million, to build the plant, related components, and a recycled water main throughout the city. Sipes believes the cost could have been considerably less, which might have averted sewer rate increases that the council adopted earlier this month.

“In 2006, we as citizens brought up numerous issues with the plant in respect to increases to our rates,” he said. “The City Council at that time refused to take our concerns seriously. And now we’re paying dearly for it.”
Sipes said the City Council chose to finance the plant with state bonds, as opposed to state revolving loans, at least part of which could have been erased with federal stimulus funds.

With the tacit blessings of a majority of the city’s property owners under Proposition 218, the council on Sept. 14 adopted an initial $2-a-month increase in sewer rates, raising a property owner’s bill to $82 a month, to help offset the costs of the plant. On July 1, 2011, and continuing each year until 2014, the sewer rates will increase by 5 percent plus the inflation rate.”

RESPONSE:
Use of the State Revolving Loan fund would have increased rates $4.00 per month, due to 20 year payback of loan. The goal is to have the lowest monthly rate as possible. It was considered and rejected. Now Mr. Sipes can stop saying “I don’t know why it wasn’t considered”.

The new Sewer Plant work was advertised nationally, competitively bid and the least cost vendor was selected to do the work. Mr. Sipes has buried his head in the sand and refuses to acknowledge the truth on this matter because it does not serve his political purposes. Mr. Sipes cost saving idea was to put the new plant near the Santa Clara River without flood protection (to save money) and to pump the sewage from the new business park up to the new plant thereby increasing costs forever.

Delaying the project to study his and Gayle Washburn’s Google research on uncertified impractical and in some cases experimental concepts may have delayed the project to the point it could not meet the State Mandated Time Schedule Order which would have started the meter on Minimum Daily Mandatory Fines. If he followed Gayle Washburn’s lead he would not have competively bid the work at all and would have single sourced the work. Mrs. Washburn stood before the Santa Paula City Council, just like a salesperson, and got involved with their affairs now their sewer bill is $77.12 plus $0.58 per unit of water starts Sept 1, 2011 (see attached table) and the city doesn’t even own the plant. The construction bid price was $57M but if Santa Paula gets tired of high operating costs and wants to own their plant it will cost them $85,000,000 to buy it plus pay another $1M operations termination fee. Wait till that bill is added to the rate they are paying now.

Concerning “Obama-money” Brian Sipes fails to mention that Fillmore, and Santa Paula for that matter, did not qualify as economically disadvantaged communities because the median incomes were too high. Piru qualified and got an $8M grant. Fillmore did get a $3M Prop 50 grant for water recycling. Brian won’t tell you but Santa Paula did not get any grants.

For all the time he sits in council meetings one would think that he would be able to present facts and truthful information, but that just doesn’t seem to be his style.

Brian states that his voice wasn’t heard. The truth is every time he speaks at Council Meetings his comments are in the minutes. He’s in a lot of City Council Minutes. He says “past councils” didn’t listen to him or others. Does he not remember, or does he just not want you to remember, the numerous sewer workshops specifically the one with the panel of experts which answered every single question posed to them. All concerns were not only heard, but addressed with answers being provided. No Brian, if anyone is not listening it is you. You failed to listen then and you fail to listen now.

November 2nd you will be able to vote for TWO candidates

Question #6: Should the city financially assist the completio of the business park? Why/why not? Do you agree or disagree with the financial and contractual decisions made concerning the new wastewater plant?

Patti Walker: The City provided assistance by lending money to drill and cap Well #9. The Council voted to approve the formation of a Community Facility District (CFD) for the sale of bonds to cover the infrastructure. In addition, the Council approved requested changes in the building conditions to align them to the requirements to the Floodway section of the Fillmore Municipal Code .
In my opinion it would be wasteful of staff resources to further study and discuss borrowing of a substantial sum of money from the CA I-Bank. The loan would have been paid back from the CFD, but the General Fund was the collateral. The evening this item was debated, the Council moved to foreclose on property that had defaulted on its CFD causing a loss of revenue to the City. Also, the applicant had given no thought to repayment of a requested loan from the Redevelopment Agency, nor had there been discussion with other property owners to garner support for the loans.
The cost for the wastewater plant is enormous. Too costly for our community. Regardless, we will have to live with that decision for too many years. It’s true that it’s easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission, but when making decisions that have such a huge financial impact on the entire city, the community should have been asked to support the project prior to making the financial obligation on the plant. If that had been accomplished, the City may have seen buy-in by the community.

Brian Sipes: I am a strong advocate of collaboration. I also believe in the free market system. But, government can only do so much. And, the free market system will determine if the business park is viable. I am hopeful and I fully support the concept of a business park. This community needs jobs, services and goods. While some assistance can be justified, the City has already gone above and beyond in assistance for the business park.
The City used taxpayer funds to purchase land for the sewer plant from the developers for $2.6 million. The City also chose to locate the sewer plant at this site to anchor the business park and assist the developers in paying for the levee, roads and other infrastructure. Other locations already owned by the City may have been more cost effective for the ratepayers but would not have helped the business park. In addition, the City Council loaned $750,000 to drill Well #9, which was required before development could proceed.
Being a fiscal conservative, I disagreed with the decision by our prior Council to finance our sewer plant with municipal bonds instead of state loans with half the interest cost. As far as the contractual decisions, if I were on the Council at that time, I would have proposed that the contract not be approved and signed before the taxpayers could vote on rates. I would have proposed a re-bid which is what Piru and Santa Paula did. Those are actions that could have helped Fillmore.

November 2nd you will be able to vote for THREE candidates

Question #6: What do you perceive as the most important issues for the School Board, and the District? What policies would you work to change, add or subtract? For example, 20% of a student’s grade is determined by the AR program. How would you handle objections from parents in regards to the AR standards? Should the program be modified (and how?) or remain unchanged? Why?

Tony Prado: The most important issue facing the Board and the District is money. The federal, state and local economies are in bad shape and will continue to be in bad shape until tax revenue increases. All district employees deserve salary increases, all our educational programs need an infusion of money and our facilities need upgrading. The District is working hard in educating our students with less money. Not knowing what monies to expect from the state has put the District in a position of guessing how much to cut from their budget as has been the case the last two years
Grading issues of teachers at each school site becomes the responsibility of the principals. Board members should not attempt to micromanage grades. When parents have a concern about grading systems of a teacher or a school site, parents should contact the teacher first, then the principal and then the superintendent. If the concern continues then it should be brought to the attention of the Board. The Board then will discuss the issue. A majority of the Board members will determine a course of action.
AR is having a positive impact in our District. More students are reading! In our District 2nd language learners are a high percentage of our students and its helping them learn English, other students are learning to be better readers and writers. Personally, I do not believe AR should be 20% of a students grade. Remember, vote for Tony Prado.

Lucy Rangel: Some important issues are: earning back the trust of parents, staff, and the community, future budget cuts due to lack of funding, and evaluating the effectiveness of programs to raise student achievement.
I would like to address the current change at the high school regarding the Accelerated Reading program as I have had a number of parents contact me regarding this issue. We have had this program in our district since the late1990’s. Most of the research has been done in the elementary classroom, where it has proven to be successful. However, there are limited studies regarding AR use with high school students. It is at this level where most parental concerns have been voiced now that AR will count for 20% of a student’s English grade. Since AR is a supplementary and not a core program, I understand the concerns of these parents.
If I could make any change in this program, I would use AR as an incentive. Once students scored proficient or advanced on their standardized tests, and they maintained this level, they would have several options. They would be allowed to read any book they were interested in (with parent approval), and not have to take a test. The other option would be that if they read an AR book, took a test, and received a passing score, then they could earn extra credit points. Forcing students to read for pleasure can become counteractive for high school students, especially if they are already good readers.

Mark Austin: An important issue facing the School Board and District will continue to be providing a quality education, while experiencing ongoing budget constraints. This issue will require a strong School Board in the coming months, as it is likely that additional budget reductions may be needed. Another issue facing the School Board and District is the continued failure to meet the State Academic Performance Index (API) and Federal Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) standards. While some progress is being made to meet the API and AYP standards, my belief is that this is not good enough, and that we are failing to provide our children a quality education.
The Accelerated Reading (AR) Program may be an opportunity to improve a program that could substantially improve the quality of education. The AR Program’s primary objective was to promote reading, which has been shown to increase academic achievement. However, what has occurred within the District has become quite the opposite of positive in many cases. Children are circumventing their reading assignments by watching movies done on the assigned book. Other students have gone so far as to have their peers prepare the written assignments on the reading assignments. In other words, the AR Program is not working as intended. In my opinion, this program needs to be re-examined by the School Board and modified to attain its objective of promoting reading. www.votemarkaustin.com.

Kimberly Rivers: The greatest challenge our Districts faces is providing a first class education to ALL students. Too many students are being suspended and not enough are graduating. Our District must have a program in place for families struggling to keep their kids in school that let’s them know every child, even the so called “problem” kids are welcome in our classrooms. Not only is this the legal duty of our District, but also I believe it is a basic requirement for public education.
Second, wherever I go in the District I talk with people who feel heard, while others feel their ideas will never be heard. A promise I can make is that my door will be open to everyone; students, parents, staff, residents, you are all stakeholders in our District. Only with input from everyone can we define and create a path to a first class education.
I understand the AR program is intended to encourage reading. I have heard from families and teachers that the excessive reading assignments and detail orientated quizzes are causing students and parents to be resentful of reading, leading some students to pretend they have read a book and trade quiz answers. For some, reading has become distasteful. Clearly the AR program needs to be evaluated for effectiveness. I believe that with input from parents, teachers and students the program can be modified to not only encourage reading, but to encourage a love of reading that is so vital to creating life long learners. www.votekimrivers.com.

Dave Wilde: The budget issue is huge. We have to do what we can reduce the threat of staff layoffs. Teachers and support staff are what make the difference in a student's education. Funds must be made available for instructional materials and instructional staff preparation. An addition to the budget issue is the student environment and safety. With decreasing funds we must continue to do what we can to guarantee students a safe and positive learning environment.
The second question is not about policies in general, but specifically the high school AR program. Parents, teachers, and student responses have not been decisive. Most high school teachers feel they are preparing students to be successful readers in what ever future challenges they face. That is their job. The 20% issue is designed to impress students with the importance of reading. When the percentage was 10% many students failed to complete their AR assignments, and the hope was that 20% might change that. Is it right? I don't know yet. If students still fail to complete their reading assignments another plan should be implemented. The board should not be making decisions about the AR program, otherwise they could be accused of micromanaging the district. It is the high school that has that responsibility. If there is a significant number of students and parents who have concerns about the program they need to continue meeting with the high school to reach an agreement. The board's input should be a last resort.

As part of the Ventura County Ocean Water Quality Monitoring Program, the Environmental Health Division (EHD) is providing the following precautionary information for the public. Rainfall that is significant enough to result in runoff can flow into storm drains, channels, creeks, and rivers that empty onto the beaches of Ventura County. In general, 0,2 inches (2 tenths of an inch) of rain may be enough to create significant runoff conditions.

There is a potential for storm water runoff to carry disease causing bacteria to the beaches and into the ocean water. In addition, storm water runoff can transport physical hazards such as partially submerged tree limbs and logs into the ocean that could result in serious physical injury. Contact with this runoff water will result in an increased risk to human health and should be avoided for at least 72 hours after all rainfall activity has ended.

EHD is advising the public to avoid body contact with all storm water runoff and ocean water at all Ventura County beaches. Any items that may have come in contact with runoff or ocean water should also be avoided. If contact occurs, wash thoroughly with soap and water.

Any shellfish on or from Ventura County beaches may have also been exposed to this contamination and should not be eaten.

This advisory is in effect for all Ventura County beaches as a result of the recent rainfall and will remain in effect for 72 hours (3 days) after all rainfall has ended. Results for specific beaches are also available on the EHD hotline (recorded information), 805/662-6555, and on the EHD Web page at: http://ventura.org/rma/envheahh/prograrn$/tech^serv/ocean/index.html