[Vern here] Thanks to OJ friend and stalwart Irvine conservative Allan Bartlett, the Orange Juice Blog now has (before anyone else) the full, long-awaited, forensic audit of the goings-on thus far with the Irvine, I mean Orange County Great Park. Is it as damning as Allan seems to think, or is he looking at it through wishful lenses? I don’t know, I haven’t even opened it yet, just wanted to share it with you all! If Agran and his crew have been half as wasteful and crooked as their critics claim, I’ll be the first Democrat to rake them over the coals. But let’s see what’s up here first, yes? Click…
Great Park Forensic Audit.
Damn, 106 pages, and it’s NOT the kind of PDF that I can copy and paste, or I WOULD put it all here. You gotta click.
I’m about half way through. It’s a doozie. Missing millions of dollars, improper hiring and sole sourcing, paying for things twice, paying for things that aren’t approved, refusing to meet with auditors, paying PR consultants for design work . . . paying for things that are out of scope for a contract, but approved by the mayor! Good stuff, Vern. Good stuff.
Just finished. Wow. Someone has some serious ‘splainin to do. If I were these guys, I wouldn’t cooperate with the auditors either.
It’s a sad day in Irvine to read this audit, but I’m glad it’s finally out.
I used to work at the great park for Fuscoe engineering. I felt horrible doing that job because of the blatant mismanagement by the park board, and the waste of expenses unnecessarily.
Uh, oh. Mr. Business of Baseball is going to toss a hissy fit.
Responses are predictable.
1) The auditor had an agenda / The outcome was preordained
2) It’s not their fault, it’s the Republican’s fault
3) The audit just reflects recommendations. No one did anything wrong
4) The auditors are incompetent
It’ll be fun to watch. Back flips! Somersaults! Triple gainers!
I’m going to try to make time to write about this over the weekend. All I’ve read so far is Moxley’s article. I remember being told — alas, by Mr. BOB — that F&M were essentially acting as “general contractors” for many other tasks and that the vast majority of that money did not stay with them. So I’m still open to the possibility that even the design part can be benign — though it does open a critical question of WHY you’d have F&M serving in a sort of “general contractor” capacity in the first place.
(Note to Dan C.: just write the answer in your own blog. Don’t text me.)
That said, anyone who thinks that being unable to trace that money’s ultimate destination PAST F&M is not a serious political problem is fooling themselves. What’s presented there is not a *damning* case, but it is a prima facie one — that is, it raises questions that, if unanswered, suffice for grounding negative judgments (at least in the court of public opinion.) It won’t just be easily waved away — especially when it comes to elections. Anyone saying otherwise is giving really bad advice.
Oft criticized by Dan and those whom he has convinced that I am somehow evil and out to get his business and his family unfairly, I would bet his excuses will include, how he was working hard at his industry trade show, how he is a “part -time” blogger with a “real” read: regular job, that he is busy preparing meals for his family, of which include his adult wife and adult son, perhaps he’ll mention his daughter’s extracurricular activities, which he plays an integral par and again remind us he has a successful PR Firm (albeit run from his garage). All of these and more, he repeatedly touts: FAMILY, BUSINESS, INDUSTRIUSNESS, all of which he uses to separate himself from the blog masses. We get it Dan, You are important, you go to trade shows, wait in line and get your picture taken with celebrities who are paid to sign autographs and take pictures with the uninformed masses.
We understand how committed you are to Irvine, the “BEST PLACE TO RAISE WHITE CHILDREN” .
But, please, please when you use your children as props, don’t text Greg Diamond and complain, when you brag about your “home based” business like you are Edleman Group and then SUE when somebody makes fun of you. When the space shuttle flies over Los Angeles en route to the Science center, say ” checkout this cool thing, my wife’s company let me be part of (the LA TIMES), instead of ” I had an important business meeting in downtown Los Angeles today……..”
As for the Great Park. Did anyone with a ninth grade education think this was going to be any different?
Come on, it’s the best place to raise Asian kids too.
“Did anyone … think this was going to be any different?”
Coulda been. Shoulda been.
Man I just came home from Gypsy Night early. I guess I do sound like I am attacking Dan personally.
My apologies. I know that you don’t stand for those kind of things around here.
I attack the dude just the same. The only difference is, he knows who I am, so if he wants to threaten to sue me or kick my ass he always can. That makes it a little more fair.
Does he really threaten people with physical rebuke? Really?
Thank you Vern,
Time to digest the examination and evaluate the City’s financial information, since this is a campaign year, I am certain this will be used as evidence in court.
Reading……………………
Just read that Irvine is one of the best managed cities in the U.S. Having trouble figuring that out given this audit and its findings. Perhpas the Great Park is not considered part of city government when evaluations occur for how effective a city’s managment is? Really having troulb reconciling this.
I see Dan, over at the Lib OC is examining the audit and has a quiver of excuses he is building up to defend Larry Agran and criticize the report and the company that did it. He posted a comment in one of his posts about the audit saying as much.