Citizen About Town

By Nancy C. Arcuri, Editor and Publisher

E-mail nancyarcuri@thecitizensvoice.net

Fax number 626-307-9081

I want to thank Monterey Park Councilmembers Mitch Ing, Anthony Wong and David Lau for granting a one-year extension for the Conditional Use Permit to establish and maintain a financial institution to the property owners of 201 West Garvey Avenue at the July 15 meeting.  The property owners have been trying to secure a bank as one of their tenants.

The City Council had previously voted to permit the CUP on the property with a one-year extension.

I want to thank City Manager June Yotsuya and City Attorney Mark Hensley for providing sound advise to Mr. Ing.  The Council majority voted to extend the CUP. They prevented Monterey Park from being sued by the property owners.  Since it has been the city’s policy to allow an extension on all the CUPs the courts would have found for the property owners.

It was very egotistical of Betty Tom Chu to state that the FDIC would not grant a license to another bank in Monterey Park.  They may allow another bank in our city since it would be a major international bank and Bank of America will be closing down 600 branches across America.

It was very selfish of Frank Venti to prevent other people from developing their properties since he owns multiply commercial and residential properties. If a city tried to pull that stunt on him he would have sued for damages.

Monterey Park has a long and sad story of egotistical Councilmembers and business owners in the city who put their own personal interest before the interests of the taxpaying voters.

Early city fathers decided to plan our city like a small Mid-west town.  They laid out the commercial areas on Atlantic, Garvey and Garfield to abut residential property.  The commercial lots never went from street to street.  Therefore making is extremely hard to develop a large shopping center or build a big box store in the downtown area.

Early City Councilmembers met for coffee at the old Paris Restaurant. They determined the fate of our city over their morning coffee.  The decisions were already made before the meetings.  It was just a matter of voting their decisions into the record during the meeting.

Thank God for the Brown Act that makes these informal meetings against the law.

In the 1980s one realtor traveled to Taiwan to sell Monterey Park as the Chinese Beverly Hills. He with the help of several Councilmembers and business owners was very successful in building the first Suburban Chinatown.

Soon most of the commercial property was sold to overseas landlords who raised the rents on American businesses and forced them from our hometown.  We lost most of our sales tax base when we lost the majority of our stores and restaurants that included KFC, Sizzlers, Garvey Hardware, Trader Joes, two Five and Dime Stores, several pharmacies, a stationary store, a camera store and more from our shopping areas.

The downtown shopping center looked like Taiwan with all the Chinese language signs. American businesses, ignored by the immigrants who brought their country into our city, also left town.

It was a battle royal to have English put on the signs. Finally a law was passed to put English on the signs for health and safety.

Monterey Park never recovered their sales tax base.

Now we are trying to bring American businesses back bouncy castle for sale into our city.  The Market Place and Atlantic Square areas should be successful. I have my doubts about the downtown area being successful.  The area needs to be spruced up and the Chinese signage needs to be reduced to a few characters stating the type of business.

Many long time residents and new immigrants are ready and willing to spend their hard earned dollars in our hometown when we have a selection of brand name stores.

Hopefully the financial future of Monterey Park will improve with a good sales tax base.

Monterey Park is just one of thousands of cities and counties facing financial issues.  Our 50 states are also having money problems too. In fact our whole U S economy is in trouble caused by greed and corruption.

Taxpaying voters have been attending town hall meetings by the thousands to ask questions of their Congressmembers and Senators about “Health Care Reform”.

The bill, reported to be over 1,000 pages, yet most of our representatives in Washington, DC have admitted that they have not read this bill.

This “Health Care Reform” may cost the average person their personal health insurance benefits.  It could reduce a person’s ability to receive medical care in a timely manner.

It could be used to ration good health care to seniors, premature newborns and people with disabilities. It would increase our national debt by billions of dollars.

The taxpaying voters have a right to demand answers from their representatives.

These are the same people who failed to read the “Stimulus Package” before rushing to vote it into law.  Now our country is mired in long-term debt and some foreign countries purchased it. They expect to be paid in full on their loans to our country.

Taxpaying voters know that our representatives have hoodwinked us by voting for this outrageous debt.

People are very angry and they are letting their representatives in Congress, State, County and local government know it. They are not going to take it anymore and will be throwing these bums out of office in the 2010 and 2012 elections.

You have freedom of speech. Speak up for yourself, your family and your country.

Demand our government representatives put We the People first.

They all took an oath to uphold the U S Constitution and protect it from all enemies both foreign and domestic that includes government sponsored dictatorships, fascism and socialism.

Keep our democracy alive for our future generations!

Hold our government officials to their oath to protect us. The future of our city, county, state and country belongs to We the People!