A great candidate has emerged to take on Armando Ruiz – the Trustee who ripped off the taxpayers by retiring then running again for the Coast Community College District’s Board of Education, so he could double his pension. The challenger is Dr. Lorraine Prinsky. You can find out more about her at her Smart Voter campaign website. She also has a regular campaign website.
Prinsky has been teaching Sociology at Cal State Fullerton for 35 years. You can read more about her biographical highlights at this link.
Prinsky has a lot of endorsements, which you can read by clicking here. Her supporters include:
- Women in Leadership
- Jack Bedell, President, California County Boards of Education; Member, Orange County
Board of Education - Brian Conley, Governing Board Member, Rancho Santiago Community College District
- Coast Federation of Educators
- Community College Association/CTA
- CTAE–California Teachers for Academic Excellence
- Bonnie Castrey, Trustee, Huntington Beach High School District
- Dean Mancina, President, Coast Federation of Educators
- Michael Matsuda, Trustee, North Orange County Community College District
- Kimoanh Nguyen-Lam, Garden Grove Unified School District Trustee
- Patricia Arfsten, OCC Faculty
Prinsky has my full endorsement as well. Ruiz ripped off the voters. It is past time to dump him already.
UPDATE:
Our friends at the Liberal OC Blog just posted another story about Ruiz and his wasteful ways. Here are a few excerpts:
Coast Community College Board Trustee, Armando Ruiz, known for resigning just before the last election four years ago so he could double-dip on his retirement, is feeding from the trough once again. He has booked a trip to New York City the weekend before the election to attend a conference of the Association of Community College Trustees.
At a time of severe budget shortfalls, Ruiz has decided to extend his stay an extra night even though the conference ends at noon and there is plenty of time to catch a flight back the same day. I wonder if he is staying the extra night so he can watch the New York City Marathon?
“The fact that he’s going to the conference and that we’re paying for it isn’t an issue,” says Trustee challenger Lorraine Prinsky, “the issue is that Ruiz didn’t bother to consider the budget shortfalls and save a little money by leaving on the day the conference ends.”
According to fellow Trustee Jerry Patterson, Coast Community College Board exceeded its budget for travel by over $20,000 last year. Trustees Patterson, Hornbuckle, and Moreno have cancelled their participation in this years conference due to budget shortfalls. While community college classes are being cut due to lack of funding Ruiz continues to fund travel junkets and authorize extended stays.
Click here to read the rest of this Liberal OC post.
Best of luck to Lorraine. She is a passionate, hard working women a and friend who deserves the vote of all!
Just saw this on Red County:
Str8aero said:
Thanks everyone for the heads-up on Armando Ruiz.
Having suffered recent events and disclosures regarding corporate greed, it’s important we remain vigilant at every level and call to account unethical officials of all stripes.
Ruiz’s shameful greed and deception in October and November 2004 have been well documented; the information is readily available on line to anyone who takes the time to Google his name.
Worse yet, this isn’t old news. Ruiz continues to this day to collect full time retirement pay of about $54,000 annually for his part-time employment as a college district trustee (which paid about $5,000 per year, on average) AS WELL AS collect another $9,000 a year by staying in the job he “resigned” from just three days before his last election.
How many of us will be able to get retirement pay nearly ten-fold what we earn per year? Ruiz didn’t earn such special treatment. It was an undeserved loop-hole that presented itself and he just wouldn’t say no even though his action was and is so obviously unjust.
His conduct was all the more odious for an “educator” in a community college district, and is even more contemptible when put in context.
Ruiz was present at a district board meeting in September 2003 – just a year before his dubious deed – when the presidents of the district’s colleges announced that because of state budget cuts more than 1,000 classes had to be cut from the fall class schedule. This meant thousands of students couldn’t get into required classes; delaying many from getting timely certificates and jobs. Everyone in the district — faculty, staff, students – were asked to “belt-tighten,” suck-up the loses, give a little extra for the good of the whole.
If Ruiz were as dedicated to students as he so often claims, he might have offered to donate that extra (and unearned) $54,000 each year to student scholarships rather than scarfing it up for himself.
No, Ruiz has to go. If he doesn’t, he delivers Gordon Gecco’s clarion message; “Greed is GOOD!”
Thankfully, Lorraine Prinsky has come forward to offer her wisdom, experience and dedication to the Coast Community College District.
She’s a real educator, in the best sense of the word; a beloved class-room professor for over 35 years. She’s promised to support faculty and students and return integrity to the Area 3 seat on the board. Check her out at lorraineprinsky.com.
And please pass on her message and the importance of this race to everyone you know in the district.
Str8aero
Check your facts. You’ve gotten a lot of them wrong. If Mr. Ruiz can single-handedly be so corrupt, then why hasn’t the rest of the board stepped to join this anti-Ruiz campaign?
The truth is that Ruiz does drive a Mercedes. It’s well over 10 years old. And, more importantly, who cares? The chancellor drives a Lincoln, other board members drive BMWs, VW vans, PT cruisers and an old police car. Once again, who cares?
The CVS deal was done prior to the Costco proposal and all of the board members were fully aware of and voted on the deal. The Costco proposal was just that, a proposal from Costco. It was presented to GWC, not the board. It never even got off the ground and Ruiz was not the only board member on the land development committee. Once again, check your facts.
And, really – do you think that Ruiz would purposefully cause OCC to get a warning from the accreditation board? That’s simply ridiculous. It’s OCC that caused the warning for themselves. Ruiz is the ONLY board member that knows about the accreditation process as he is the only educator on the board.
As for the trip to NYC – once again, check your facts. There were several other board members scheduled to go to New York that backed out recently in order to help use the trip against Ruiz in this campaign. Why don’t you check to see how much this little political stunt is costing taxpayers in cancellation fees? Ruiz is going to NYC to give presentations and chair the ACCT Trust Fund meeting – which raises funding for student and faculty scholarships for Coast students. He is scheduled to leave immediately following the conference and his hotel room costs a little over $200/night – not $600 as reported in this blog.
Voters – check your facts! Ruiz is not the devil portrayed in these libelous postings. He actually cares about students and employees and does not cater to unions – which is why they hate him so much.
Have you read today’s OC Register, “Natalie”? See: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/ruiz-year-district-2194039-coast-election
It is obvious that “Natalie” is either Ruiz himself or someone put up by him to write this twisted response.
You say check the facts, but you, “Natalie,” have twisted the facts in support of someone who does not have the public interest at heart. The only reason the Costco proposal didn’t get anywhere is because Trustee Patterson scheduled a Board meeting at GWC that was well-attended by neighbors. I know that because I was there. Ruiz could see that his Costco proposal was politically unpopular and so it was unanimously voted down.
You say that other Board members backed out of the NY trip in order to use the trip against him. Why is he so unpopular?
He has had too many years on that board (20+!). It is time to vote him out.
Lorraine Prinsky believes Gregory Haidl, who was convicted a raping a teenage girl with a pool cue, should not have been sent to prison. In the October 13-17, 2004 edition of the Daily Titan. Prinsky was quoted as saying “It definitely hurts a young person (because) his punishment could be with hard criminals.”
I wonder if Dr. Prinsky paid any attention to the victim? By the way, Haidl is now out of prison and said to be a student at OCC.
Judy,
I do believe that Gregory Haidl should have been sent to prison. Of course I was concerned with the victim in that case. Either I was misquoted or you took that quote out of context. I am happy to set the record straight.
Thanks to my friends for alerting me to Judy’s comment.
Lorraine Prinsky