April 9, 2008 - Daily Brief
Written by Jeff on April 9th, 2008It’s like the day after Christmas, no? No more drama, no more anticipation. What to write about?
News
- Kellar, Ender Domination: Incumbent Bob Kellar and Parks Commish Laurie Ender didn’t just win yesterday’s election, they won convincingly with almost 1,000 votes between them and the third place finisher Bob Spierer. Ender actually beat Kellar with 5,404 votes accounting for some 24.6% of the ballots. Democrats Diane Trautman and Maria Gutzeit placed fourth and fifth, respectively. Reached at her victory party at her home, Laurie Ender told The Signal that she won because her campaign focused on “bringing the community together and giving families a voice.” Bob Spierer, who was the target of several negative mailer, including some associated with the Ender Campaign, expressed disappointment that the election had gone dirty but said he enjoyed meeting people and discussing the issues. As for the election and vote-counting itself, Ender and Kellar had the lead from the outset as the first batch of mail in and absentee ballots were counted. Everyone’s got a story on this: The Signal, Signal part 2, KHTS, Daily News
- How Tim Myers predicted election outcome: In the days and weeks leading up to the election, local blogger/math wiz Tim Myers continued to predict a near-landslide victory for Ender and Kellar. Myers told me last night that in his discussions with local political consultant Scott Wilk, he found out before the election that two precincts in Valencia had mailed in 200-250% more ballots this year than the same precincts did in 2006. As he said in an SCVTalker’s forum post, “Those folks aren’t voting for Maria Gutzeit,” noting that Laurie Ender had connections with the PTA in the two precincts.
- Election went “very smoothly,” turnout likely higher: I spoke with Sharon Dawson, City Clerk, last night who told me that the mechanics of the election went off very smoothly yesterday. According to The Signal, 50-60 city staffers worked on the election, and an average of four volunteers manned each of the 30 polling places (two precincts had no voters in them.) About 1,000 late, provisional and drop-off ballots have yet to be counted, but as Dawson told me, those aren’t expected to change the results of the first and second place finishers. Bob Spierer and Diane Trautman, however, finished only two votes apart. Dawson wouldn’t give even a gut feeling on turnout, but noted that mail in ballots were far higher this year than in 2006.
- After the Election: MRF: One of the first things the next city council may have to deal with is community opposition to the Materials Recovery Facility in Canyon Country. We heard about it at the last city council meeting as scores of Canyon Country and Newhall residents lined up to oppose the project. Get up to date on the suspended project by watching Leon Worden’s interview with Travis Lange, Environmental Services Manager for the City over at SCVTV.com
- Famous Musician donates $15 million to CalArts School of Music: Musician and 8 time Grammy winner Herb Alpert will announce today that he is donating $15 million to the School of Music at California Institute of the Arts on McBean Parkway. Alpert told The Times that he feels CalArts is a “real creative place where people could push the edges and come up with things that are different from what we’ve heard in the past.” The money will go to funding three faculty chairs, student scholarships, and new music programs and the school will be renamed the “Herb Alpert School of Music.” LA Times
- New Editor at Daily News: Carolina Garcia is the former editor of the Monterey County Herald and comes to the Daily News with some 20 years of experience in the news business. LA Observed has an auto-biographical entry from Garcia in which the new Daily News editor says she values hiring diverse staff and taking creative risks. Will the Daily News get back to covering Santa Clarita news? Doubtful; some 20 staffers from the news room were laid off in February and the San Fernando Valley is the DN’s bread and butter. Link
- Horse/Vehicle accident near Piru: Sad story out of Piru on Monday night. A horse was killed and four people were injured when a car collided with the horse at around 11pm on Highway 126. The four people in the car were injured and were taken to Henry Mayo Hospital. Ventura County Star has more.
- Part of One Valley, One Vision to be presented next week: A specific safety aspect of the One Valley, One Vision plan, the joint initiative between the City and County on the Santa Clarita Valley, will be presented and discussed at next week’s Planning Commission meeting according to the city. The so-called “safety element” includes “seven State-required elements of the General Plan. Areas covered in this element include geologic and flood hazards, police and fire protection, and emergency preparedness.” More details here.
- This American Life broadcast at Regal Valencia: The popular public radio and television This American Life will broadcast out of New York City to over 300 movie theaters across the country, including Regal Cinema in Valencia. The show, which features outtakes and never-before-seen stories, will broadcast on May 1 at 6pm locally (time delayed three hours).
Opinion
- LAUSD at fault for budget crisis, not Governor: State Senator George Runner (R-Lancaster, but reps part of the SCV) says the Los Angeles Unified School District is to blame for its own budget problems, not the Governor. “Let us not forget that even as the district complains this year, during the previous five years, the LAUSD’s enrollment has actually declined by nearly 40,000 students while its revenues rose by $1 billion,” Runner says in an op/ed in the Daily News. It’s fashionable for local Republicans in the State House to pile on LAUSD; our own Assemblyman Cameron Smyth has a bill that would break up the nation’s largest school district which has had an unprecedented run of bad press in the last few years.
- Not so fast on predicting Real Estate recovery: RedFin, a Los Angeles Blog, takes a look at the latest stats from the Southland Regional Association of Realtors which studies the real estate market in the SCV and SFV. Though SRAR voiced optimism at the February real estate report, RedFin is skeptical that the worst is past.
- Myers on election results: He just posted a new blog outlining the results last night and gloating somewhat. He says supporters of the losing candidates shouldn’t despair. “The facts again: Bob Kellar likely won because of the absolute sanctity attached in this City to incumbency. Laurie Ender will win if she did manage to get 200-400 Helmers and Northpark Elementary PTA Moms and Dads to vote for her in their first ever City election. If she failed, Bob Spierer wins. Simple as that.But to those that lose, and specifically to those that support them, please do not withdraw from the public square.” Link
City Council Election Winners & Losers
Aside from the obvious, there were several other winners and losers after last night’s votes were tallied. From the cheap seats, here’s how I see it:
Winners:
- Scott Wilk
- Roger Searver’s bank account
- G&L Realty mucky-mucks
- PTA & its new found political power
- McBean Parkway north of Newhall Ranch Road
- Frank Ferry
- Tim Myers
- Out of town political consultants
- The Signal- best coverage and writing in years
Losers
- McBean Parkway & Orchard Village Road
- LA Times, which was too busy reporting & retracting fake Tupac Shakur documents to even devote one story to an election in the county’s fourth largest city.
- David Gauny & SmartGrowthSCV
- KHTS radio for their stinging criticism of Ender
- Community Holiday Tree
- Daily News for half-assed coverage of the election, candidates, and controversies
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You’ve got most of the winners and losers listed except for the largest group of folks in the loser column…those folks are the people of Santa Clarita.
You’ve all complained about growth in our valley. You’ve all complained about how developers and a political machine always win the elections for candidates they pick. Well, my friends, a dirty and malicious campaign season has ended. Election laws were violated and it appears that the campaign of the top vote getting candidate did the deeds to break those laws. They even admitted it in a public format. (Newpaper and Coucil meetings).
You, the citizens of Santa Clarita, need to follow up on those violations and recall the violator.
If you live in the “SUMMIT” area of Valencia, you need to sell your homes now while there is a little value left in them. After the hospital office project starts those home values will go through the already low floor.
If you live near the old Mule Farm, you need to sell now before the G & L high rise structures start to build.
If you think the Hart High School Board has problems now please realize they are going to have an equally problematic counterpart called the Santa Clarita CIty COuncil. Jeff will have plenty to write about in this blog. The fun is just beginning.
Most of all I’m glad my heart remains true to the whole SCV. It is good to know that “Mentryville” is safe from developers. I can always go there to escape the Frank, Laurie, and Marsha URBAN sprawl.
Developers bought this election.
You took what they bought and will be paying in quality of life payments for many years to come. No matter. With all that the new Santa Clarita City Council member will be doing, the already depleated “Quality of life account” will soon be showing a large, fat “ZERO” as a bottom line. (And Laurie still won’t have done anything for the schools like she promised she would do if elected to City Council).
You got what “they” paid for…gotta love the truth found in the words of an old circus owner…”There is a sucker born every minute”. At least there were enough suckers in Santa Clarita yesterday.
Sad. So very, very sad.
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Jeff,
Thanks for linking to the LA Redfin blog in your Daily Brief today!
SCVTalk is a great blog and resource for the SCV, and I must admit I wasn’t aware of it before. But there’s no doubt I will be a regular reader from today on.
The SCV is included in the area I’m assigned to cover, but because of the sheer size of the SFV and its market, the SCV has yet to get in the rotation. I hope to rectify that before too long.
By the way, Redfin hosts real estate blogs in its market cities and regions across the country. We have six areas/bloggers in the L.A. area alone.
Congratulations on SCVTalk - I’m looking forward to getting to know it better.
Tim Hebb
http://losangeles.redfin.com/blog/category/northridge_san_fernando_santa_clarita
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“Bob Spierer, who was the target of several negative mailers, including some associated with the Ender Campaign…”
Can someone please list the each of the negative mailers targeted at Bob Spierer?
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Hi Darryl, this has been THE dirtiest, ugliest election in the history of this city, as you have seen.
Scott Wilk is not a winner - everyone close to the Kellar team KNOWS Scott is G&L to the marrow of his bones. Come on, if Scott had the LEAST bit of influence, if he was actually worth what he was paid, Kellar would have got a hell of a lot more votes, even with the trouble he had. Kellar won IN SPITE of Scott Wilk - and everyone knows it and people were even talking about this openly last night. I myself asked Scott when the big G&L party was starting, but Scott didn’t invite me to attend.
Now all future candidates know that in order to win an election, they will have to be at least as dirty as the Ender/Ferry team. Ender says she is thrilled to have the support of the community? Ender ONLY has the support of people who believed her campaign mailers full of lies, they have no idea who they really voted for and all the worthless, empty promises not kept will be forgotten because these voters are so uninformed anyway.
Patricia McKeon, “congressman” McKeon’s wife, sent a last-ditch effort e-mail out telling people how much Laurie Ender did for this city fighting Cemex. So not only is our do-nothing “congressman” a liar, PATRICIA MCKEON is a liar, too! McKeon didn’t have the guts to put his own name on the e-mail so later, if trouble arises from this e-mail, he can claim it was his wife, not him, especially if this comes up in his election.
Now you can be sure that all the big project developers will be calling Laurie Ender ASAP to promise her truckloads of money if she will say yes to their projects. LOL, they don’t even know they can save their money, she is only there TO vote yes to everything. Say good-bye to Santa Clarita as you know it.
Some of us who actually care about this city did what we could to get the truth out, and KHTS did all they could to get the truth out - Carl put his life and his livlihood on the line to help save our city from our own “home-grown” carpetbaggers. So at least the truth got out somewhere and we don’t have to say “if only we had done something…..”
Marsha McLean will have Frank Ferry working very hard to keep her in her seat next election for that third puppet vote, so at least we will have Diane around at the Planning Commission level, and Maria is still on the water board. And you can bet the farm that whoever Frank Ferry picks for Ender’s planning commissioner and parks commissioner will be some know-nothing future city council puppet-in-training just like Ender, and one of those commissioners will be running in the next election supported by our lying, do-nothing “congressman.”
Santa Clarita is the big loser here, and you can be sure the next election will be even worse, with the corrupt Ferry/Ender/McLean gang working as hard as they can to get one more seat filled with a Frank Ferry puppet. G&L Realty and special interests now own this council AND our city because lies and corruption worked.
Yo, West Ranch - you do NOT want to be a part of this over here, toss those studies NOW and hang on to what you have. Your community over there seems like a pristine haven compared to the lying, conniving Ferry/Ender MESS over here. You have super representation from Rosalind Wayman of L.A. County; Rosalind actually cares about the communities she serves, and you won’t get that from the
Ferry/Ender/McLean gang. Local representation is only a plus if the council members care about who they represent and that is NOT the case anymore with a Ferry/Ender/G&L/special interest, 3 vote-city council that will never again have this city’s best interests at heart when voting. And you can quote me on that, Dave.
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No list of the several nagative mailers hurled at Bob Spierer? I thought you’d know for sure…
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Tim Myers deserves credit for his scientific breakthrough, but his PTA calculus is faulty. You only win so big with widespread appeal, which she clearly had. She would have won big without any special Helmers vote. And Bob S. barely had 3rd place, so his certainty vis a vis Trautman was off too.
I agree with your post mortem and love the original reporting. This may have been the best reported election, but judging by the outcome, I wonder how many people were paying attention.
I’m going to catch the “live” T.A.L. in Burbank with someone who actually knows Ira Glass, as luck would have it, but I was happy to see that Valencia is an option. Palmdale too, so go believe that. Surprisingly, it’s playing in very few theaters in the LA Basin, but quite a few in the Valleys.
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Officer Kellar has a bunch of cats to herd! He and queen Weste are not going to be happy campers. Bargaining chips for Kellar to use: give more trails for Weste, give more parks and Big league dreams for Ferry, give fewer plastic bags for McLean, give more programs for the kids for Ender, and Kellar gets a rubber stamp for his good ole boy projects.
Sad state of affairs for the taxpayers.
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What, no Jason Smisko jokes? Where’s John Boston when you need him?
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Can someone please list the each of the negative mailers targeted at Bob Spierer?
You’re right. That’s not a fair characterization of the mailers. I maintain however, that several of them played fast ‘n loose with her record and that of her opponents.
You’ve got most of the winners and losers listed except for the largest group of folks in the loser column…those folks are the people of Santa Clarita.
Well, you’ve got to respect the will of the majority. I didn’t vote for Ender, but as Mike points out, she has appeal and she won, convincingly.
Now you can be sure that all the big project developers will be calling Laurie Ender ASAP to promise her truckloads of money if she will say yes to their projects. LOL, they don’t even know they can save their money, she is only there TO vote yes to everything. Say good-bye to Santa Clarita as you know it.
I recognize there’s many people out there who feel this way, but this blog will cover the new city council with a blank slate and give Ender a chance.
Regarding my winner/loser list:
I want to add KHTS to the list of winners as well. They did have excellent one-on-one interviews, they leveraged their popular website to display videos of candidate debates and other information.
Their editorials, however, seemed to have no impact.
As for everyone: chill out on the personal attacks. I hate to use the cliche “Now is a time for unity” but that’s what one says after an election, is it not?
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Can someone please list the each of the negative mailers targeted at Bob Spierer?
You’re right. That’s not a fair characterization of the mailers
Several people blogging here, plus KHTS have repeated talked about all the negative mailers hurled at Bob Spierer from Laurie Ender. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think only one mailer sent out by Ender or an I.E. supporting her (a total of 11 mailers) even mentioned Bob Spierer.
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The issues and concerns that people have do not go away just because the election is over. The council needs to earn any position/belief change that is appropriate. This is not a Jeff issue to decide or try to manage. A day does not change anything; spots or bad odors!
Bill and Hillary have proven this.
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Regarding KHTS, with about six stories attacking Ender, they clearly were the biggest negative campaigners during the entire news cycle. It got so bad that they even pulled two of their own stories down.
That they had no impact on the voters is easy to explain: They are not a legitimate news source and nobody listens to their station or goes to their Web site.
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Mike:
You are right about the broad appeal of Laurie Ender. (I did not predict that.) The 500 probable additional votes she generated from the areas north of Newhall Ranch Road served to get her into first place rather than finishing a fairly distant second. Bob Spierer and Diane Trautman nudging together in third and fourth, way behind the first two, proves they were not really a factor.
More important perhaps than the votes was that Laurie’s soccer mom/PTA connections got her scores of foot soldiers not previously engaged to walk precincts, make phone calls, hang material on doors etc. Bob Spierer and Diane Trautman did not possess these resources.
Someone on this blog weeks ago made the assertion that “200 nobodies” showed up at Laurie’s rally at Bridgeport Park, obviously denigrating the effort. Those folks read that entry and that became their rallying cry, stated several times at Laurie’s party last night “200 nobodies put a council candidate into first place.”
One last math point. Sharon Dawson will reveal a vote by mail ratio of 70%, up from 60% two years ago. That means that all the maneuvering of the last three weeks meant NOTHING.
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Pauline:
Time to take a deep breath and actually reach out to Laurie Ender. Someone does not get such a broad base of personal friends by being evil.
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Well, you’ve got to respect the will of the majority.
More than anything, I want Ender to be a competent and fair member of the council. I won’t write her off until she isn’t. Whatever my opinion is, it doesn’t count any more than my neighbors. Everyone was that part of them that wants to be vindicated, but I’d rather be proven wrong. Until a few turns of events, I thought she was a very promising candidate. I endorse the blank slate theory.
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Thursday, 03 April 2008
And the Hit Pieces Just keep on Coming
Local activist dismayed at how dirty City Council campaigns have gotten.
Editorial by Pauline Harte
Here is a portion of my KHTS editorial regarding Laurie Ender’s hit mailers, of which I received 2, and these lies on a hit mailer about Bob Spierer do indeed entitle this mailer to be called a Laurie Ender hit mailer especially when the same mailer was mailed out a second time:
Laurie Ender says: “Why is Bob Spierer playing politics with your hospital?” Then she says, “If he plays politics with your healthcare, he’ll play politics with anything!” And this was mailed by “The Friends of Laurie Ender.”
Of course, as dishonest as Ender is, she can hide behind the question marks, but ethical people see her lies and hit mailers and question marks for what they are. Bob Spierer was such a gracious, generous man last night, and the fact that this city has been deprived of his leadership, and of the leadership from super candidates Diane Trautman and Maria Gutzeit, is a horrible injustice from which this city will not recover.
“TeeJay” now that the election is over, and in the interest of that “full disclosure” you previously requested of me when I was hiding nothing, not even my identity, why not post under your own name? How is it you request full disclosure from others, but refuse to abide by your own requests?
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Now all future candidates know that in order to win an election, they will have to be at least as dirty as the Ender/Ferry team. Ender says she is thrilled to have the support of the community? Ender ONLY has the support of people who believed her campaign mailers full of lies, they have no idea who they really voted for and all the worthless, empty promises not kept will be forgotten because these voters are so uninformed anyway.
Pauline - shouldn’t that read “Councilmember Ender?”
Just asking.
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Tim,
Please let me ride in your DeLorean someday.
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I asked anyone it they could list each of the negative mailers targeted at Bob Spierer. I stated that I knew of one, which is the same one Pauline just refered to.
My point is that people–in this case Pauline, with her headline that the “Hit Pieces Just Keep on Coming”–have been dishonest by claiming that Ender sent out several hit pieces on Spierer.
One piece mentioning Spierer’s name… is that it? Come on, given all the talk on blogs and KHTS editorials, there would have to be more than ONE piece that mentions Spierer’s name.
I will now unveil my real name: T.J.
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Well said, Mike, but don’t count a no vote for the MRF as anything, Frank Ferry and Ender know they can’t give that to that community when they are going to destroy Valencia. It’s just all about votes, nothing more, Wait until the hospital vote comes up. That’s what Ferry and Ender are there for, that and to provide McKeon with back-up when he can’t hide the fact anymore that he is going nowhere with Cemex legislation. Frankly (no pun intended) I’m done and moving on. A lot of us tried to get the truth out, we did what we could and that’s that. We love our city, this valley, and we tried to save it. Trying counts.
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My point is that people–in this case Pauline, with her headline that the “Hit Pieces Just Keep on Coming”–have been dishonest by claiming that Ender sent out several hit pieces on Spierer.
NOT my headline, I sent that in untitled. See the assumptions you make? And I got that mailer a second time, even after Ender knew how much outrage it caused the first time. May be the same piece, but it was sent out twice, so that’s two hit mailers, “TeeJay.” Also, I never claimed “several,” please bring up that claim from my editorial, please, with a “direct” quote, exactly how it was written, thank you. When I received the second hit mailer, saying they “keep on coming” was correct.
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What’s the current roll call on where the new council is on the hospital master plan as-is?
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Someone on this blog weeks ago made the assertion that “200 nobodies” showed up at Laurie’s rally at Bridgeport Park, obviously denigrating the effort. Those folks read that entry and that became their rallying cry, stated several times at Laurie’s party last night “200 nobodies put a council candidate into first place.”
Haha. I made that “nobodies” comment. I find it humorous it caught on like that.
I didn’t mean to denigrate the people who showed up, rather I meant it to emphasize that they were new to the local political process.
Well congrats to her though. Her strategy paid off.
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Jeff:
It really did motivate them, though I remember now that you met it as a compliment that these folks were ascending.
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Actually, I don’t see this as a loss for either myself or Smart Growth SCV. Conversely, with the coming “YES” votes for future development, I think the entire city will begin to understand what a few of us have known for awhile: we’re all NIMBYs, we’re all at risk, and we will all face being marginalized by developers and our city officials. Ender’s win may be a necessary evil for realizing the wrongs and reclaiming our city’s Master Plan.
Currently, there is a trend toward more community involvement, not less. Many are just starting to realize problems in our city’s processes and it is my hope that ALL of the community will be ready for real and significant change in two years. That election is where we should be looking though, along with PicoKid, I don’t think a recall is a bad option either. The methods employed to win this election were dispicable.
Jeff’s appeal for unity is both understandable and necessary. But the comments here reflect emotion from people that have given immense amounts of time, heart, and personal resources to achieve something better for our community. That time cannot be recovered and it becomes a bit personal when some do-nothing comes along and takes credit for the effort. I totally understand Pauline’s outrage that Ender takes credit for her (and many others’) work on Cemex.
It is infuriating that hard work and honest, well-researched arguments have been trumped by tons of money poured into a campaign of smears and misrepresentations. But in my view, we’ve only lost if this doesn’t motivate the readers here to gather together for a grass roots effort for change in 2010.
While this blog may be SCV’s best resource for what is REALLY happening, real personal cost is needed from many more of us to get the word out. Without this, then loss is all we will have.
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I think everyone is missing a very important result of the election. The local
gatheringpackgroupgaggle of conspiracy theorists will still be around to amaze and amuse (mostly the latter).It’s akin to the cast of SNL or the late night talk show hosts praying for certain candidates to get elected so they can continue to provide material. Except in this case the ones we hoped will continue to provide the ridiculous fodder are those not involved in the election.
That’s a win/win for everyone!
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“NOT my headline, I sent that in untitled.”
The headline was attributed to your story. If you did not approve of it, you could have told Goldman to change it or you could have pulled your article. The fact is, you let them run your piece with that title–it’s your responsibility.
“And I got that mailer a second time.”
So you say.
“May be the same piece, but it was sent out twice, so that’s two hit mailers”
Actually, it’s one piece, sent out to about 20,000 voters… would that actually be 20,000 hit mailers in your world?
“I never claimed “several,” please bring up that claim from my editorial, please, with a “direct” quote, exactly how it was written, thank you.”
I guess you forgot your previous posts. Let me refresh your memory:
“And Laurie’s mailer used a lie and that makes that Laurie Ender mailer another dirty hit piece against Bob Spierer from Laurie Ender”
“Laurie is the only one who is attacking fellow candidates with nasty hit mailers.”
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“Regarding KHTS, with about six stories attacking Ender”
The KHTS bunch had a clear motive. Say or do whatever it takes to reelect Kellar, even if this means trashing Ender.
Ender seemed to be working the hardest to be elected, Ms Rock and her Boss appeared to be worried about this. Kellar is the choice of the VIA and Chamber, and KHTS needs both agencies to survive. Even with all the support, KHTS will have a tough year as ad’s begin the dry up because of the economy.
No Tim Myers here, but I think the station is out of business this time next year.
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More math:
If you just take the poll votes counted yesterday this is how it breaks down:
Diane Trautman 1779
Bob Kellar
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Misfire:
More math:
If you just take the poll votes counted yesterday this is how it breaks down:
Diane Trautman 1779
Bob Kellar 1760
Laurie Ender 1662
Bob Spierer 1,566
Maria Gutzeit 1,131
This has happened in the last five elections where someone who finished “out of the money” would win if vote by mail did not “exist.” This arithmetic fact led to a series of editorials from Lynn Plambeck and Michael Kotch back in 1998 after the election asserting tht mail in votes should not really “count.” (Frank Ferry ascended to his first term winning the vote by mails but not the poll votes.)
Unfortunately, this argument assumes you can win a football game by scoring the most points in the fourth quarter, no matter what happened in the first three. To the naysayers I would perhaps state the ultimate winners wire down their votes with vote by mail rather than hoping their supporters will make it to the polls.
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Very interesting numbers. The secret seems to be in the organization of actual votes and organization over persuasion. Ferry’s was probably the first grownup campaign we had in this city, at least the second time around when he actually won.
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“And Laurie’s mailer used a lie and that makes that Laurie Ender mailer another dirty hit piece against Bob Spierer from Laurie Ender”
“Laurie is the only one who is attacking fellow candidates with nasty hit mailers.”
“Another” does not mean “several,” pluralizing “hit mailers” still does not signify “several. As I said before, there were two received and I was quite clear about two being sent. Actually, I believe it was Jeff who said Spierer was the target of several hit mailers, in his opinion area here at the top of this thread, I didn’t write that. Neither one of my comments here have the word “several” in them.
I did not title my article, which you attributed to me and this required clarification, but I did not say I did not approve of it, because the hit pieces did keep on coming making the title entirely appropriate. Again, “keep on coming” does not mean “secveral.”
Tim, when I asked you last night what Laurie Ender did for
Cemex, you said, “nothing.” I guess a lot of people just didn’t care about the lies, oh well. But at least our Cemex sub-committee of Kellar and Weste is safe for the time being, and Laurene WILL win her seat back in 2 years. We will still be working to keep Cemex at historic levels of mining, but of course, we need Cemex legislation and that won’t be happening.
As for me taking a deep breath, Tim, I don’t know what that means. I am responding to posts directed to me, and I am responding in a patient courteous manner, as always.
Ender is Frank Ferry’s puppet, and she ran a dirty race and no amount of double-speak will change those facts. Funny thing, you just target me, “TeeJay” when there are other posts from people on this site right now saying the same thing. I feel honored - and somewhat empowered - to know that I am such a huge (irrelevant, now) problem for you. You need to move on, “TeeJay,” take that deep breath, and appreciate how gullible the voters are. I think it is hilarious that you are here - proves SOMEONE can’t take the heat - and the truth - STILL. I love it!
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It sure is a shame that Gutzeit robbed Trautman..
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Thank you, David. And you are always right on the mark.
Discussing an election the day after is quite normal. Please let me know when the next meeting is, OK? I am there.
Now, not sure if the “several” was being attributed to me -”…..Bob Spierer, who was the target of several negative mailer, including some associated with the Ender Campaign…..” - but if this is being attributed to me, the following commentary belongs to Jeff, not me. Since I don’t write as good as Jeff and I make gazillions of typos, doubt Jeff would want to be mistaken for me, LOL.
Kellar, Ender Domination: Incumbent Bob Kellar and Parks Commish Laurie Ender didn’t just win yesterday’s election, they won convincingly with almost 1,000 votes between them and the third place finisher Bob Spierer. Ender actually beat Kellar with 5,404 votes accounting for some 24.6% of the ballots. Democrats Diane Trautman and Maria Gutzeit placed fourth and fifth, respectively. Reached at her victory party at her home, Laurie Ender told The Signal that she won because her campaign focused on “bringing the community together and giving families a voice.” expressed disappointment that the election had gone dirty but said he enjoyed meeting people and discussing the issues. As for the election and vote-counting itself, Ender and Kellar had the lead from the outset as the first batch of mail in and absentee ballots were counted. Everyone’s got a story on this: The Signal, Signal part 2, KHTS, Daily News
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It sure is a shame that Gutzeit robbed Trautman..
At the risk of being told to take a deep breath :-/ I too must wonder where Diane would have been without Gutzeit, but I can’t fault Gutzeit for running. She is a very viable candidate, and she has done a lot in this community. Everyone takes votes from someone in an election, and maybe the name recognition isn’t out there for her. But SCV still has them both and that’s good. I can’t believe the money spent in this race, I think it will take $100 grand for a candidate to think about trying to get a seat in the next election, what do you think, Tim, can someone win a seat anymore with, say, half that amount?
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Politics - Definition = A place where people are sometimes rewarded for their bad behavior.
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Pauline:
When I told you “nothing” I met compared to you, and that is really everyone. In my mind there are only two effective actors in the Cemex fight. You, who first discovered and exposed the issue and kept it at the forefront of peoples’ minds and the City (really its collective taxpayers) who spent millions keeping Cemex at Bay. Everyone else involved either got paid (attorneys and lobbyists) or cheered from the sidelines.
On the money front I would like to tally up the expenditures in the last three weeks by all the candidates. I would assert that this money was “wasted” since it did not effect the outcome (Bob Spierer got EXACTLY the same percentage of absentee votes as poll votes.) The spend on Laurie was around $125K but Maria Gutzeit and Bob Spierer did not expend low amounts. I sometimes suspect that professional campaigners say a certain amount of money is needed because that drives their pay for the campaign and then a bunch of mailers get sent.
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Tim, here is where I get confused. Last night, I was told by a couple of people who are experts on these things, that the counting was being done by mixing the absentee votes in with the day-of voters. So how can elections be predicted when the first numbers show up? Before, it was the absentee votes that we first saw, at least I assumed so, but if it is a mixture I would think results would not be as easily assumed, although it did work out that way. Is mixing the votes that way something new?
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The KHTS goon squad has been driving by my house.
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Did any of you notice several staff people making marks on some ballots during the count last night?
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Which candidate has the privilege of nominating Ms. Enders seat on the parks commission? Is it Ferry?
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Pauline:
They did not mix it. In past elections, they counted all the vote by mails BEFORE 8:00 pm and then released ALL of them by about 8:05. This time, they brought in the vote by mails in white boxes sorted BY PRECINCT and then machine counted them there. They then released the VOTE BY MAIL only results by precinct in those first four or five announcements, so by 8:45 they were all done. (If you were’nt watching on Channel 20 or the webcast you would not have known this.)
About 8:20 pm they brought in the first ballot box from a polling place and began counting those AFTER the vote by mail results. That is how it went down. The only change? Spreading the vote by mails over four or five announcements rather than one.
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I’ll second Tim, I was watching the live webcast and Pulskamp described it exactly like that.
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Well, I don’t have enough time to sit around and hate anybody or dig in to the mindset that we are heading down the primrose path. There are some truths here that Ender cannot escape and that’s her willingness do be dishonest. That is a wide open fact about Laurie Ender that she will never shake. My whole life has had one repetitively taught theme– Honesty is the best policy and the worst reputation to have is being known as untrustworthy. She is now known as untrustworthy. When anyone runs for local office and truly loves and wants to serve their community then people run Honorably. When a candidate pulls dirty dishonest tricks to garnish their support then that candidate is running for Ego & Ego alone. She is in this for herself and her own self aggrandizement. She ran for herself, not us.
That being said, I have complete confidence that we have enough great people and groups in our valley who are ready and able to hold our council accountable to make the right decisions. After all, the intended check and balance for all city councils are we the people showing up to vocally make our needs and desires known. That is how we do it and that is how Ender (and others) will not get away with things. We the people are the best oversight and sense of direction there is.
It’s time to be more involved then ever before. When Ender lacked what it took to win on the merits of her own positives - by inventing false negatives against others, taking illegal campaign dollars, and deceptive hit mail, then her election is truly unholy and illegitimate. She won by deceived voters obtained by lies and deceit. It’s an absolute same for all of us.
Everyone needs to be on “SCV RED ALERT” with her councilship. WethepeopleSCV will be a constant reminder to her and take action when deeded to correct issues that will directly appose Santa Clarita Valley and our future. I have hopes She will become her own person and dump the secret combinations by those working against our interests. We will see. Overall - I love this place and I’m not going to let Ender change that. God bless you all.
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WethePeople
So 5,404 people were “tricked”? 3,800 before any of this maneuvering started?
I guess it is charitable that you believe that people who disagree with you are either benighted or simple, but not evil.
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I second WethePeople’s comments!
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THIRD!
Thanks, Tim. I must have misunderstood the info I got.
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Pauline:
You did not misunderstand because that is how I heard it too beforehand (combining both poll and absentee by precinct, but that is not how it actually went down.
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Tim, we have close to 200,000 people who live here and 21,971 voted. We will never know but if you looked at the majority of those voters you would find that their decisions were made from a very narrow range of information. I personally spoke to numerous voters who went on just what they viewed in their mailbox and or a small glimpse from the papers.
Are people simple? In some respects they are. Not in everything.
Step outside of the inner circle of who’s who at city hall, the opinion makers, speakers, accusers, movers and shakers, and you’ll find that most people don’t know a darn thing about what’s gong on in the city and nor do most of the people care. They’re busy feeding there children, going to soccer, cub scouts, and coaching T-ball, and paying their mortgage. However a few do perform their civic duty and vote even when they don’t know who’s really who and what their motivations really are. Not to mention who has worked secret combinations with who and why. Why do you think 30,00 Ferry mailers, with false Spierer information, was so important to Ferry and G&L? Because people believe what they hear. In our good Citizens lives they only have time to be influenced by what they narrowly see in the limited time they have to see it. Then citizens vote accordingly to that they have been told. The same goes for her invention and inflated hard work on Cemex.(A lie) Not to mention thousands of Emails against a candidate that she claimed were not hers, even when they were found to come from her advisor’s offices over the hill. (another lie)
Yes, people were tricked and for anyone to argue otherwise is totally ignorant of the facts and human nature. She bashed the mentality and integrity of her more qualified opponents thus shaping public perception in her less qualified favor. Thus tricking some people into her camp.
I agree with Ender on several things but we part ways in the Honesty department. She lacked Gravitas so she invented some and tore down others to win. I speak for everyone when I say that it reflects all that is bad about public service. To win without being self serving is to be truly for the people. That’s the councilship we need and 3 other candidates would have fulfilled that.
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Thanks CIB Bill for your second!
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WeThePeople:
Well, I don’t think people were tricked, so I guess I am totally ignorant of the facts and human nature. But my Mom thinks I’m cool.
By the way, the infamous “Bob Kellar” must go email, which was actually just a cut and paste of a letter to the editor in the Signal, came from a firm that actually did work for Maria Gutzeit. This was pointed out to KHTS so they took DOWN the original story, but did not do a retraction.
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Hay Tim, I’m sure you are cool. I don’t want to disagree with ones own mother. I liked your work last night by the way. Good job.
“The email”- If that’s true I can easily take that, however the other facts remain. Her behavior is unchanged. That being said, if you really don’t understand social manipulation based on human gullibility then you really need to head over to our local collage and take a sociology course or something. Social manipulation are things that math doesn’t have the answers for. However, statistical models will tell you that people have just the same probability of being influenced to accept incorrect information as truth, the same as correct information as untruth depending how it presented. Her strategy was (based on a lack of personal qualities) to get as much misinformation out to the masses that would hoist herself up based on negatives of others. If the negatives were true that would be one thing. In this case they weren’t.
Yes, some people voted for her, not because she was their favorite person, but because she falsely knocked out Spierer in the minds of voters with characterizations that were untrue.
Needless to say it’s over and now the people work begins. I hope we all plan to be a part of it.
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WethePeople, your assesment is spot on! For the record, T.M.’s mom wears combat boots. . .
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“You need to move on, “TeeJay,” take that deep breath, and blah, blah, blah…”
I was hoping that, seeing as you and your side got your butts spanked (oooo… bad visual) that you’d just take a deep breath and go away.
It wasn’t to be, you’re still here, spewing hate. It’s OK, though, because my side won. Deal with it.
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WethepeopleSCV on Apr 9th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
“Step outside of the inner circle of who’s who at city hall, the opinion makers, speakers, accusers, movers and shakers, and you’ll find that most people don’t know a darn thing about what’s gong on in the city and nor do most of the people care. They’re busy feeding there children, going to soccer, cub scouts, and coaching T-ball, and paying their mortgage. However a few do perform their civic duty and vote even when they don’t know who’s really who and what their motivations really are.”
I was one of those who did ‘their civic duty’, but didn’t know a thing about what was going on untill the G&L Developement came up almost 4 years ago. I’m also ashamed to admit (but will)that I voted for Frank. Why? I didn’t know better! My husband knew-of-him from the Indian Guides. I had a friend who knew him from Parks and Rec. That’s about it. It’s apparent now that Frank got into the City Politics Scene for ego only. It’s apparent at the meetings that he has not done the necessary reading and research into any of the issues that come up before him.
I will try to remain optimistic that most of the people making the decisions for us tax payers are making those decisions without any special interests behind them.
I will continue to keep my ears and eyes open whenever something comes up within our city that will effect EVERYONE, not just a few. The G&L developement will effect EVERYONE. The Mule Farm development will effect EVERYONE.
I will never vote for any candidate on any level again, without knowing what that candidate stands for. Why that candidate is running.
Being a PTA/Soccer mom, and I’m sure VERY involved with her community, Laurie ‘knows’ a lot of people. However, knowing people is not going to make the Council Member! She’ll have to work very hard to show it wasn’t her ego that made her want to run for City Council. I will be at those meetings when these 2 particular issues come up and hopefully she’ll prove herself to those ‘civic minded’, ‘don’t know who they voted for’ people. Hopefully they won’t be as dissapointed as I was when I found out who the ‘real’ Frank Ferry was.
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Lvogel,
Very well said, thanks for your comments. WethepeopleSCV will certainly be involved helping you when those issues come at us. Redemption for Ender will not come easy, your right. We’ll see!
CIB Bill,
You crack me up! LOL Cheers mate Thanks again
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We the people, you have amazing insight into the “social manipulation” issue. “TeeJay” still bugged by lil ol’ me, I see, but isn’t it nice to know, Wethepeople, that he didn’t refute or question a single thing YOU have stated here. When you’re right you’re RIGHT!
As for for being told to reach out to Ender, it is Ender who needs to reach out to us. As an elected representative, she will be working for us. When she apologizes to us for her part in this mess, then I will be more than happy to reach out, and I will wipe the slate clean.
We who are attempting to bring honesty and transparency to our local government are the truly disenfranchised in this city right now.
I will make it easy: if Ender “just” apologizes for any “regrettable misunderstandings” thst arose from her campaign in this election, I would accept that. My husband and I raised our two wonderful daughters to understand the principals of being personally accountable for their actions. We raised them to be sorry if their actions hurt others, and we raised them to hold their heads up and apologize when neccessary so all concerned have a chance to move on with a clean slate.
So - in the spirit of moving on and wiping the slate clean, if Laurie Ender would like to apologize for “misunderstandings” that arose from her election “mishaps,” I would personally accept that apology and move on with my clean slate. I think the council session at which she is sworn in would be a perfect opportunity for Ender to reach out to all us disenfranchised folks who have trouble accepting how this city was torn apart in the name of the win at any cost kinda politics from the Ender campaign. This city is wounded and bleeding, and an apology is the ONLY medicine that will start the healing process on its way.
I don’t even need an apology for Cemex because I have always just considered myself a cog in that great machine. My outrage there is pretty much for Bob Kellar and Laurne Weste who worked their rears off for this city on this issue while being TOTALLY abandoned by Buck McKeon year after year after year. But, free ride here, in the interest of moving on.
So here is how it is: forget Cemex, Laurie, just apologize to this city, to the disenfranchised, for all the “misunderstandings,” and we can all move on. The healing process must begin now, or it will never happen, and only you, Laurie, can set this process in motion. If we receive an apology from you, even if it is for misundertandings, I will be applauding along with everyone else as you are sworn in.
As we told our daughters, a clean slate must be earned - and this important life-principal should certainly be applicable to all elected representatives.
And here is my phone number, in case Laurie would like to start the healing process even sooner: 255-2695.
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Enders missteps have not be proven. Kellars missteps have and he has not apologised!
Are you not using a double standard here?
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Uhhh, Cash….. I suppose you missed Ender’s full support for Henry Mayo/G&L’s Office Expansion Project. I’d call that a misstep!