Citizen About Town

By Nancy C Arcuri, Editor and Publisher

Email: nancyarcuri@thecitizensvoice.net

During Oral Communication on 9/18 I congratulated to Miyochelle Yee and Paul Isozaki for becoming Public Figures as the faces of the Recall Petitions Against Hans Liang and Peter Chan (Legal Definition “A person may also be considered a “limited purpose” public figure by having thrust themselves to the forefront of particular public controversies in order to influence the resolution of the issues involved”.)

Now they can be subject to public ridicule for their actions. Many voting residents are not happy with them trying to recall Mayor Hans Liang and Councilmember Peter Chan. They are only doing the recall based on the facts that Hans Liang and Mitch Ing both live in District One. Hans Liang’s term expires in 2022 and he will be termed out. Mitch Ing’s term expires in 2020. He should be termed out based on the voters decision in 2013 that elected officials in Monterey Park can only serve two consecutive terms.

Peter Chan and Teresa Real Sebastian both live in District Five. Peter Chan’s term expires in 2022 and he will be termed out. Teresa Real Sebastian’s term expires in 2020. She should be termed out based on the voter decision in 2013 that elected officials in Monterey Park can only serve two consecutive terms.

Monterey Park voting residents said that Measure EE expressed term limits for elected officials as two consecutive terms. They were not aware that Councilmembers Ing and Real Sebastian as sitting Councilmembers in 2013 allowed a “back door” for themselves to count their terms after this election.

The residents have declared that they were not given a full disclosure by the sitting Councilmembers before Measure EE was placed on the 2013 ballot.

The same residents have also stated that Voting By Districts was not their idea and they did not get a chance to vote on it. The residents could draw up maps picking districts based on the 2010 census. It did not matter if the residents were of voting age or could legally vote in our elections. All five of our current Councilmembers voted to approve the Vote By District map.

District Two had one sitting Councilmember Stephen Lam, District Three had no sitting Councilmembers and District Four had no sitting Councilmembers so our city attorney said we had to sequence these district on our 2020 city ballot or be sued.

Attorney Kevin Shenkman terrorized our hometown of Monterey Park not with a gun but with a letter demanding we Vote By District to elect more Hispanics into office or be sued.

Sacramento did not demand we vote by district but their henchman Kevin Shenkman is making a bundle of money by suing cities that did not want to give up their legal rights to vote for their city officials at large.

According to our city’s records Mitch Ing has served on City Council since 2006. He has was elected in 2006 and re-elected in 2011 and re-elected in 2015. He grandfathered himself into office by Measure EE to be able to serve yet another term in 2020.

According to our city’s records Teresa Real Sebastian has served on City Council since 2011. She has was elected in 2011 and re-elected in 2015. She grandfathered herself into office by Measure EE to be able to serve yet another term in 2020.

The voting residents are not happy about Voting By District. They are not happy with Mitch Ing and Teresa Real Sebastian for their Recall Petitions against Peter Chan and Hans Liang.

They may never vote for Mitch Ing or Teresa Real Sebastian ever again based on their “Sour Grapes”. They should sit out this 2020 Council Election and run again in the 2022 Council Election.

Did Councilmember Mitch Ing and Councilmember Teresa Real Sebastian failed to disclose to the voting public that they could “beat the two year term limit” when they approved Measure EE for the 2013 city ballot?

Why have they become very self-serving?

This Council has always told the residents that our budget is tight.

Yet Councilmember Mitch Ing and Councilmember Teresa Real Sebastian want to use our hard-earned tax dollars to hold a Special Election to recall Hans Liang and Peter Chan so they can try to keep their Council seats in District One and District Five.

Councilmember Mitch Ing and Councilmember Teresa Real Sebastian you are taking a gamble on your political career. Either way you have lost the respect of many residents of Monterey Park.

During Oral Communications on 10/2 I gave the Council and the residents a short history of Monterey Park that began in May 1916 when the city incorporated to keep from becoming a sewer farm for Alhambra and South Pasadena.

In 1948 the city approved of a dump located on property next the Montebello border for a trash dump that was operated by a private company for many years until it was closed in 1984. The EPA labeled the dump a Superfund Site. Did having a trash dump in the city provide a financial benefit for our hometown?

It took over 25 years to have the EPA site cleaned up and our Market Place built for the financial benefit of our hometown.

In the early 1980s the residents and local businesses noticed that several tour buses were leaving Monterey Park heading to the various casinos and card clubs that hosted many types of gambling.

Several Councilmembers and developers began discussions on the benefits of having a card club in Monterey Park to supplement our sales tax. It would have been located on property near East Los Angeles.

People stormed City Hall and told the Council that did not want gambling in their back yard. The Council majority voted no, so the idea died.

In 1984 the California voters approved the Lottery so now we have gambling in our hometown. A lottery winner in California does not pay any California income tax on their winnings. It has no financial benefit to our hometown but does pay for certain items for our school districts.

In the early 1988 billboards were the rage and it was suggested to our City Council that we could install billboards on city owned property along the 60 and 710 Freeways for additional income for our city.

People again stormed our City Hall and told the Council they did not want billboards in our city. The Council majority vote no, so the idea died.

These were suggestions made by residents and Councilmembers to increase our sales tax to pay for our city services.

In November 2016 California voters approved Proposition 64, The Control, Regulate and Tax Adult Use of Marijuana Act. This year the Council had a discussion if we should consider benefiting from Proposition 64. No action was taken on this issue.

This is just another suggestion made by residents and Councilmembers to increase our sales tax to pay for our city services.

I have provided a copy of the Cannabis Tax Revenue for the Second Quarter of 2019 for Council’s review for your discussion on this subject at the October 16th meeting. (I published the Cannabis Tax Revenue in my September issue.)

Do we currently receive any financial benefits from the sales tax collected by the state and or county?

Mayor Hans Liang answered my question that Monterey Park does not receive any financial benefits from this sales tax since Monterey Park does not have any Cannabis shops in our hometown.

In 2018 One Legacy wanted to move into a property located on Saturn Street in our business park. They wanted a heliport to be part of their business.

Since our staff and city attorneys did not know the history of Monterey Park so their plans reached our Planning Commission. They pushed it up to our Council for a final decision.

Residents reminded the Council that we already had a law on the books that did not allow heliports in our hometown. Garfield Hospital had already tried to install a heliport on their roof. The nearby residents called the FAA to shut them down.

Residents also recalled that McCaslin Park is an office park that is not zoned for hospital use.

No one on the Planning Commission or City Council voted to approve One Legacy to do business in our hometown.

So they are going to sue us because our staff did not know about these laws. Only two people spoke in favor of One Legacy. One was an employee of Garfield Hospital and the other one was the real estate agent who should have check on the zoning use of the property he was trying to sell.

Now the Recall people are trying to say that our some Councilmembers voted for One Legacy. What a bold face lie!

During Oral Communications on October 2nd Miyochelle Yee complained that I called her a public figure who could be criticized by the public.  She is one of the faces of the Recall Committee and speaks in favor of the Recall of Hans Liang and Peter Chan during our televised Council Meetings. People who watch her speak may call her the Recall Lady.

Paul Isozaki, the other public face of the Recall Committee expressed his thoughts that these Recall Petitions are against Hans Liang, Peter Chan, Judy Chu, Mike Ing, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. He said by signing the recall petitions you are recalling all of these elected officials who stole the 2016 Democratic Election from Bernie Sanders.

I did not know that our Monterey Park ballot could recall our sitting Congressmember Judy Chu; California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Boardmember Mike Ing; Hillary Clinton, former 2016 Democratic Candidate for President and siting President Donald Trump.

What Paul Isozaki did was to advise all of those Monterey Park voters who signed their Recall Petition that they should support Bernie Sanders, the Millionaire Socialist, who is one of the many Democratic candidates running for President in the 2020 Election.

Paul Isozaki said he is 65-year-old. He should be receiving his Medicare Benefits that we working people paid for and his Social Security Benefits that we working people paid for by the age of 66.  He should also be receiving any pensions and 401-Ks benefits that he earned over the years working for a living.

My question is why is he supporting Socialism at this late date when he has been helping to pay the bills for our city, our county, our state and our America with his income tax, property tax, gas tax and sales tax?

We, adults, all have learned over the years there is “no free lunch”.

Generations of people have immigrated into our America for their personal freedoms. They fled Communism and Socialism in their home countries to enjoy our many freedoms.

God help our America is our Capitalist system is overcome by their Socialist system.

Our United States of America will never be able to recover from all of their “freebies” because we, the American taxpayers, cannot afford to support the whole world.

Please be very careful with your sacred votes in any and all elections.

Our personal freedoms are in danger of being taken away from us by elected officials who think they are smarter than the America voters.