Citizen About Town

By Nancy C. Arcuri, Editor and Publisher

E-mail: nancyarcuri@thecitizensvoice.net

Fax: 626-307-9081

During the May 6th Monterey Park City Council Meeting I thanked Teresa Real Sebastian for requesting the Council and the residents of Monterey Park to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide of 1915 and its 100th Anniversary.

The Ottoman Empire supported their one religion, Islam.  The Empire exiled and murdered hundreds of Armenians who were Christians as well as many people from other cultures in the known world.

This resolution, passed by the City Council,  should remind us since the beginning of human history mankind has tried to destroy any fellow humans from different tribes, different races, different religions and different cultures that they believed to be their enemy.

We need to remember that we are all members of the human race who live together on our planet, Earth.

Hopefully we will all learn from our past history and try to improve the future for the next generations before it is too late to save our world.

Since we are still in the middle of some of the worst drought years in recent California history Gov. Jerry Brown has issued very strict water restrictions.

I did object to the new construction of Olson’s 80 units not just on the land use issues but also on our drought concerns.

If you recall our representative Thomas Wong was elected in November 2012 to the Board of Directors of the San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District, Division 3, representing the City of Monterey Park. His former employer, Imprenta Communications Group represented Olson Homes in their Special Election to change the zoning from Commercial to Residential in 2014.

Mr. Wong was preaching to us to conserve water while he was getting paid to sell the Olson Homes project to the Monterey Park voters.

I challenged his possible conflict of interest with the Water Board by mail. Their letter dated February 26, 2014 stated they did not believe that Mr. Wong had a conflict of interest.

Now we are facing the strictest water reduction laws in recent history.

The word is out that everyone will be expected to reduce their water usage by 36% to satisfy Jerry Brown’s new water laws.

Since we live in beautiful sunny Southern California and have faced droughts before you would think that our elected officials would have kept better tabs on our water. They should have passed laws to require that all of the rain runoff be saved into dams and lakes to provide water in the dry years.

The elected officials should have also kept an eye on the over development of our neighborhoods and restricted building homes, condos, hotels and businesses in the drought years.

Since hindsight is 20-20 maybe we can make vast improvements on our water usage before all of our wells and rivers run dry.

Imprenta Communications Group has been very active in Monterey Park since the Olson Homes’ Special Election held on June 3rd, 2014 and the City Council Elections held on March 3rd, 2015.

This group is now representing Athens Services who contracts with Monterey Park for their trash and street cleaning services.

Athens Services provides wonderful services to the residents of our hometown.

The Council must go out to bid on our trash services in the future so the bidding process will be very interesting to watch.

I noticed that new Councilmember Stephen Lam is not “quite up to snuff” during the meetings.  He seldom asks questions on the first “go round” and sometimes he will agree with the other members on their statements about agenda items.

I know that serving as an elected official is done on a learning curve so I hope that other elected officials will provide him with guidance as he learns about the city’s issues.

I am disappointed Mayor Hans Liang pulled a power play on May 6th and unseated Councilmember Teresa Real Sebastian from the Councils of Governments.

Councilmember Real Sebastian has been a member of that committee since she was first elected to Council.  She has been working passionately to provide advantages to Monterey Park. One of her major issues is having the 710 Freeway completed for the benefit of the residents and businesses in the West San Gabriel Valley.

Many residents are wondering if Mayor Liang really wants to serve the residents on COG or was it a power play against Councilmember Real Sebastian.

Only time will tell but many residents know a power play when they see it.

So the Monterey Park government is still locked into the Hatfield and McCoy’s war where a victory is more important then the best interest of the residents.

Please remember all of the men and women who fought and died to protect our freedoms on Memorial Day! Don’t let their sacrifices be in vain!