City Beat - citybeat's Blog

City Beat - citybeat's Blog - Bakersfield.com http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat Tidbits from the Californian's city hall reporter Tidbits from the Californian's city hall reporter en-us Ken Weir hosting community meetings http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/33040 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/33040 I've heard Ken Weir is hosting some community meetings this week: • Saturday, 10 a.m.-noon, at Thorner Elementary • Tuesday, 6-8 p.m., at Discovery Elementary Some people have gotten flyers in the mail. If you're a Ward 3 registered voter, have you gotten the notice?       Woodward loses (updated with trial notes) http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32449 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32449 The judge <a href="http://www.bakersfield.com/hourly_news/story/533476.html">ruled against Beau Woodward</a>. Woodward says he's leaning against an appeal, and hasn't decided to run as a write-in. The judge names 2107b in her decision, but I think she meant 2102b. Woodward's attorney, Eric Bradshaw, pushed section 2100, arguing that the court has the ability to order registration. But the judge apparently agreed that the legislature intended that to mean to let people vote, not for nomination papers.  Here's 2100: 2100.  No person shall be registered except as provided in thischapter except upon the production and filing of a certified copy ofa judgment of the superior court directing registration to be made. This seems like kind of a weak argument — yes, the court can order registration, but that in itself is not reason to — and apparently the judge thought so too. Here's some more details of the arguments, culled from my notes: That jurisdictional issue was disposed of pretty quickly. Bradshaw said it was a leftover from something, and the city and county were willing to overlook it. The 8607 issue never was raised by either side. Harold Hanson had an attorney, Tom Falgatter. Bradshaw argued that Hanson had no standing, but said he didn't want to delay the case to argue it. Bradshaw argued that being a registered voter confers two equally important rights — the right to vote, and the right to sign nomination petitions. Fallgatter argued that signing a nomination petition is not a right — the person being nominated does not have to accept a signature, and can even cross signatures off a petition. (I don't know why that would be done, but it's provided for in state law.) Etienne said for Bradshaw to prevail, he would have to argue that the DMV is acting as an agent for the county registrar, so that submittal of the voter registration form to the DMV would constitute that it's been received. Jennifer Zehry, the lawyer for the county, cited a case called Barnes vs. Wong, in which a statement of opposition to a ballot measure came in at 5 when it was due at noon. The trial court ruled that the interests of the voters to have the complete statement prevailed, and ordered the statement out into the ballot. But the appeals court overruled that, saying the Legislature set deadlines and the trial court was substituting its own judgement. Fallgater followed up on this, arguing that the rest of the citizens have a right to have a process they can depend on. Bradshaw ended his argument by saying "this is a unique circumstance." "There's a woman in this courtroom who wants her signature to count," he said. "Recognizing this woman's signature is the right thing to do." The courtroom was pretty crowded — three TV squads, one radio station, and me, plus some people from SEIU, Woodward and his wife, Frenzel and her husband and child, and Woodward's brother Gabe.     Woodward delayed http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32431 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32431 Court commissioner Linda Etienne started the hearing at 8:30, on time, but promptly pushed it back to 10 a.m. to give herself time to read the briefs. On hand were Woodward and his wife, Frenzel and her husband (and their kid), Woodward's attorney Eric Bradshaw, City Attorney Ginny Gennaro, Jennifer Azeri for Kern County, county Auditor-Controller Ann Barnett and Elections Chief Sandy Brockman, and Tom Fallgater for Harold Hanson. Counsel for the defense huddled in the hallway to discuss 8062(b), the argument raised by Woodward. One of them said it's a primary nomination statute so not on point; another said it's about verification of signatures, which isn't what this is about. More later. ...and the city's response http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32346 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32346 Here's the city's response to Beau Woodward's complaint. It basically says, "there are strict rules and you should uphold them." It puts a lot of weight on the Election Code sections 2102 and 2107, but doesn't directly address Woodward's argument relying on 8067. And first, it says, "throw this whole suit out, you're supposed to bring this in Sacramento."   Woodward's case http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32328 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32328 Here's <a href="http://static.bakersfield.com/smedia/2008/08/22/12/Document_16.source.prod_affiliate.25.pdf">the case (.pdf download) </a>Woodward's lawyers are making. The most interesting thing, for me at least because it's a new argument, is on Page 8, where the lawyers talk about law that specifically addresses the ability of a court to rule that a signature should be valid. Beau Woodward won't give up http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32181 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/32181 Beau Woodward got 95 percent of the way to running for city council. Now, he's going to <a href="http://www.bakersfield.com/hourly_news/story/528156.html">ask the courts to help him get over that last hurdle</a>. From talking to Eric Bradshaw, it seems the strategy will be to not make it about the candidate, but about a few voters who signed the petition. One supposedly registered to vote months ago, but didn't show up in the county's list. Here's the section of law elections officials point to, <a href="http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=elec&group=02001-03000&file=2100-2124">Sec. 2102 (b)</a>: For purposes of verifying signatures on a recall, initiative,or referendum petition or signatures on a nomination paper or any other election petition or election paper, a properly executed affidavit of registration shall be deemed effective for verification purposes if both (a) the affidavit is signed on the same date or adate prior to the signing of the petition or paper, and (b) the affidavit is received by the county elections official on or before the date on which the petition or paper is filed.   There are other sections before that, which allow someone to be considered registered to vote as long as they have an affadavit showing it was submitted to the DMV. But Woodward and Bradshaw will have to convince the court that the voter should count as registered. The second point will be a few voters who lived in Ward 5 four years ago, and thought they still did. But the lines were changed between the 2004 and 2006 elections, and now they live in Ward 4. Anyway, that's Monday morning. Here's my question to you: Does this make you more likely or less likely to vote for Beau Woodward? • It's not a good sign that he didn't, like, take a ward map with him, so not a chance? • He's obviously willing to put time and money into this, and that's the drive we need in a city councilman? • We need fresh ideas on the city council, and Harold Hanson is almost as old as John McCain? • He's wasting the city's money with this lawsuit, and therefore isn't good for the city?   Bike Path: The Tarabinos talk http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31979 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31979 I e-mailed some questions to John Tarabino, one of the brothers who sued the city, forcing them to build a road... and maybe tear up a section of the bike path. I'm attaching a couple of documents from the court case. One is the 1935 declaration of County Road 912; the other is the plan for the bike path sent by the city to the Tarabinos in the negotiation leading up to the land swap. Below are my questions and his answers: What is your position on the bike path? Should it be removed? We have no problem with a bike path and never have.  Our problem is that the City did not build the road next to the bike path that it promised to build.  Instead the City built only a bike path down the middle of where the road was supposed to be, and then blocked off all vehicle access with fences, gates, locks and bollards.  If the City would have built the road next to the bike path as they represented, and not blocked off vehicle access with fences, locks and bollards, we would not have had to file suit to protect our access rights.  We tried to work it out with the City before we filed suit, however, the City essentially told us that it would be their way and only their way. One document in the lawsuit shows the bike path next to the dirt road. Instead, they built the bike path ON the dirt road. Did the city ever tell you about the change? No, the City never told us about any change in plans from the road it represented it was going to build to what currently exists out there today. When the county road was created, it crossed land owned by the Tarabino Real Estate Company. How long did your family live in Bakersfield? Or did they just do business there? Did you ever live in Bakersfield? The Tarabinos have not lived in Bakersfield but have been long time landowners. How soon do you expect to subdivide and develop your property? Has the state of the market changed your schedule? Development of some of our property is the subject of ongoing discussions.  We have filed a parcel map on a portion of our property. Our property ln the area has been zoned residential for a long time, and ultimately, I am sure that is how it will be developed.  The market will dictate the timing. Given that there's no development now, why do you need public access to the road now? Do you not trust the city to open the road when the area is developed? The timing of why we brought suit when we did is easy to explain.  As I indicated, development discussions are ongoing and we already filed a parcel map.  The value of our property is critically tied to our legal vehicle access to Morning Drive.  Our parcels in the area are landlocked without vehicle access.  Historically, Morning Drive has always been the legal access to our property.  What many people do not know is that we have no right to directly access our parcels off Alfred Harrell Highway as those rights were comdemmed years ago. Access must be off of Morning Drive.  For example, we need to show that we have vehicular access off Morning Drivde for that parcel map we filed. We also complained in writing through our atttorneys shortly after finding out that the City had reconfigured the area and put up fences, gates, locks and bollards.  The City was not responsive to our request for a timeline as when the road would be completed by the City and when the fences, gates, locks and bollards would be removed.  Instead, the City told us we already had adequate access and gave no indication it would ever be removing any of the fences or locked gates.  Because we were advised that the City could argue that we waved any objection to the current configuration of the bike path and the obstructions to vehicle traffic if we delayed too long and did not preserve our rights, we filed our action for court assistance.  I turns our that it is a good thlng that we did, because even though we filed suit when we did, the City still tried, although unsuccessfully, to argue that we waited too long to object.  So even though development has not occured yet, we had no choice but to preserve our legal rights to legal vehicle access to Mornlng Drive to avoid any risk of losing those rights permanently. Hope this answers your questions.   Beau Woodward gets 19, still one short http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31789 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31789 Kern County Elections Chief Sandy Brockman gave Beau Woodward the benefit of the doubt and added one to his tally of valid signatures. One of his five signers was unregistered, but when Brockman checked the drop box Monday morning there was a registration for that person. Because staff hadn't checked the box when they closed up Friday, it might have been there on time. Still, that makes 19 signatures, not the requisite 20.   Why aren't YOU running for office? http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31758 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31758 Say what you want about Beau Woodward, at least he tried. What's with the other 52,000 residents of wards 2, 5 and 6? If you live in Westpark, why aren't you trying to punish Sue Benham for her vote to turn her back on the 2001 letter? If you hate Jacquie Sullivan, why aren't you running to replace her? And if you don't live in those wards, well, why aren't you running for KHSD or BCSD? Do you not support schools? My excuse is that I'm not allowed in my job to run for public office. Oh, and I'm too busy playing D&D and flying to Seattle once a month. What's yours? So much for the council race http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31711 http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/citybeat/31711 Out of 52,000 registered voters across three wards, only one was willing to step up and challenge an incumbent city council member. Unfortunately, <a href="http://www.bakersfield.com/hourly_news/story/520116.html">he stumbled</a>. Beau Woodward's last-minute filing included only 18 signatures of registered voters from Ward 5, plus five from unregistered people and 10 from neighboring Ward 4. That means he won't be running for Bakersfield City Council against Harold Hanson.