Politicking Around Rancho Santa Margarita

Posted By CotoBlogzz

Rancho Santa Margarita, CA – Consider that the  Saddleback College Forensics Team collected a sixth place sweepstakes trophy at the California College Forensics Association (CCCFA) State Championships Tournament on Sunday, March 20^th

Now consider questions in the following general categories:

Now consider that the Orange County Board of Supervisors, while it had a golden opportunity to radically change the culture of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department and appoint an outsider when Sheriff Carona was encouraged to leave the department, instead showed intestinal weakness and opted for a safe route by using BMA associates to cut through the shaft. In that case, BMA came up with question in three general categories

To select the candidates the Orange County board of supervisors would deem worthy of taking a second look, resulting in Adams as the number one candidate and Shereiff Hutchens as number 6.   Now, given the position and the questionable culture in the department,  we though the questionnaire would exclude otherwise qualified candidates form the post – for example  New York City  Mayor o RudyGiuliani or even General Collin Powel would not qualify for the position of Orange County Sheriff using the BMA matrix – results speak for themselves.

We thought other categories should be included and perhaps include more weight, such as:  Management experience, Demonstrated Leadership, Technological and Organizational Complexity.

And you know part of the rest of the story.

So the question is, what sort of position would require the scrutiny described in the first four questions, duplicated below for convenience?

1.  Why do you want to join such exclusive club?
2.  Pedigree
3.  Litmus Test
4.  Do you have a real job?

Hint:  Dog catcher is not one of the positions

Now consider that according the 2010 report from the Kosmont-Rose Institute Cost of Doing Business Survey results shows RSM to be the most expensive city in the county for businesses, and while   the RSM Chamber of Commerce, AKA as RSMBA has indicated that  Kosmont-Rose made a " gross error and are issuing an addendum to the report,"  we have yet to receive confirmation from the RSMBA, the RSM City Hall and or Kosmont-Rose  that an error was made.

Then there is the issue whether the city can comply with Public Records Ac (PRA) .  When we filed a PRA request with the city, on Sun, 10/31/10, Molly McLaughlin  wrote: “We have minutes and staff reports available online that might assist you with your questions….  I prefer not to run copies and charge the public if I can avoid it.”  Memo to RSM and other government officials:  The onus is on government officials to certify that all the pertinent information has been identified, not the other way around! - 


The RSM response is only slightly more dubious PRA response than the one from the California Law Revision Commission when its telephone records went dark for six months, just precisely the time period we were interested in.  Or the OCSD Lt. who claimed not to have any records of inquiries when we had copies of the inquiries, for example.

Finally, consider that the city is paying the county over $8 million/year for OCSD services, yet has no credible means to determine how the money is spent – although we do know that some RSM residents have been surprised to see deputies first thing in the morning, in their front yard checking license tags on properly parked cars and being cited.

You guessed it – while the aforementioned questions are the ones being used by the RSM city council to sort out the shaft from the wheat as it decides on which of the current 12 candidates will join the club after the resignation of  Gary Thompson, we find that the questions tell more about the current members of the council than it helps to determine which candidate has more potential. In case our assessment is wrong, we have asked the city council to tell us the rationale for the questionnaire and how it plans to use it – Arguably the Saddleback College Forensics Team could have come up with a much more substantive list than this one.

Actually, the aforementioned questions were volunteerd by one of the candidates and NOT asked by the city council.  The ones asked by the city council may be even worse, as these are generic and do not specify an objective criteria and or decision-making framework what will assure residents that the best candidate appointed is indeed the best qualified

RSM Interim City Council Memeber Questionnaire

 Makes you wonder if the city’s affairs are, to borrow a phrase, in good hands – No

RSM's The Good Hands Team