Elk Grove City Council Member's Financial Disclosures Due Next Week; Crystal Balls?
July 22, 2014 | For four members of the Elk Grove City Council, next Thursday is the due date for filing of semi-annual financial discl...
https://www.elkgrovenews.net/2014/07/elk-grove-city-council-members-financial.html
July 22, 2014 |
For four members of the Elk Grove City Council, next Thursday is the due date for filing of semi-annual financial disclosure forms with the Elk Grove City Clerk.
As required by state law, California Form 460, Receipt Committee Campaign Statement, show campaign contributions each of the city council member received for the first six months of 2014. Council Member Bob Trigg, who did not accept any contributions, filed a Form 470 on July 1.
Six months before he first appeared in public at a Elk Grove City Council meeting, Gil Moore gave Gary Davis $5,000. |
According to Elk Grove City Clerk Jason Lindgren, the filings must be presented at the clerk's office or postmarked no later than July 31. In the past, the city clerk has generally posted the filings within one business day.
Review of 460 filings often can act as a crystal ball as to what sort of developments might be taking place in the near future. Prior to making his first public proclamation in March, 2012, some might say scripted, of his desire to gut the city's billboard ordinance to recruit a McDonald's for his strip center, Elk Grove fast food and gas station developer Gil Moore was a big campaign contributor.
As was said during the Watergate years and is just as true today, if you want to know why elected officials do what they do, just follow the money.
11 comments
EGN, you singled out Gary Davis. Why?
What about the $10K Gil Moore gave Steve Detrick right before Moore approached the council for the first time to get the sign ordinance changed; with Detrick asking for immediate consensus from the Elk Grove City Council to get it on a future agenda item?
Oh, and then let's not forget, the other $10K Moore gave Junior Detrick the next month for his Fittest of Elk Grove event -- a bonus perhaps for getting the job done?
Now, is it possible that a $20K incentive to the Detricks was enough for Detrick to champion Moore's cause all the way through to the end? No, it was not! Moore gave Detrick even more money.
So in reporting, why didn't you do a little comparison of how much money Moore gave to the entire council and who did most of Moore’s bidding? It was not Davis. It was Detrick all the way!
And there ain't a damn thing illegal about it.
Is it right? No.
Can it be fixed? Yes.
How can it be fixed? Campaign finance reform and improved transparency.
You gonna do anything about it? No.
As Bill Engvall (and Gil Moore) would say, "Here's your sign, Elk Grove."
Don't get excited...it was only an example and Mayor Davis is as good an example as any. As soon as they file their 460's we'll be able to see them all and do a comparison. Give us a better idea of just how tall those freeway signs will be...might just reach 100' with rotating spotlights, leaving those little mom & pop's in the dust. Just wait until you see the one Ricky's Escorts has planned for the EG Blvd. exit. You think that Elk was a little much...you ain't seen nothin' yet!
How about we grow up and leave the kids of our electeds out of the conversations.
Anonymous 10:50..
I'd typically agree with leaving the kids out... until the kids become part of the issue. "Paying the kids" is an oft used way around the rules... (See also: California Senator Ron Calderon)
To Anon at 10:50:
A la Senator Ron Calderon, when the offspring benefit from the elected official’s shenanigans, and receive money from people wanting a bill passed, and those offspring are adults, they are fair game as well.
Nepotism is alive and thriving in Elk Grove politics!
In 2004, and again in 2006, the Sacramento County Grand Jury “urged” the residents of Elk Grove to “closely monitor the actions” of the Elk Grove City Council and city staff. They also recommended that the council “avoid” even the “appearance of impropriety,” and/or the “perception of a conflict of interest.”
The grand jury also recommended certain council members be censored. But of course, the council refused, stating it is up to the residents to hold them accountable. And when we do?
Once a council member is elected, and voting history shows us that a very small segment of the voting public puts them in office, there is not much one can do to hold electeds accountable except file complaints which the council, on the record, has urged. The average voter probably never even heard of the grand jury reports, and just believed the campaign rhetoric.
But can we fault them? However, those of us who do pay attention and believe in daily democracy must not ignore the actions of the city council and we must speak up. And here’s the why, in my opinion:
In summarizing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter to the Birmingham Jail,” and applying it to today, author Paul Rogat Leob, author of “Soul of a Citizen” wrote, “Underscoring one of the common ways that democracy is undermined, he warned, “We will have to repent not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.”
Unfortunately, as we have seen at council meetings of late, except for a small handful, there has been a comparable silence that pervades our local citizenry today when it comes to the Elk Grove City Council and monitoring their actions
Calderon as an example...that's a stretch wouldn't you say?
I voted for and supported
Mr. Detrick in the past, but am disappointed with what I'm seeing from him at the podium, as well as Mayor Davis and Cooper.
Mr. Detrick's son may be an adult age wise, but not business savy for sure as most of our children lack at that age. They take guidance from us and IF we guide them down the wrong path...give us h---, leave the kids name out of it.
That being said, what in our system is not allowing real issues to be heard? What within our systems is permitting such behavior to go on unchallenged? Are we in the age of the "yes man"?
Getting back to political contributions, the sad fact of the matter is that even though most politicians are generally sleazy gladhanders, they are not irrational.
Like all of us, they consciously do a risk-benefit analysis in their political calculus. Obviously our council members have determined taking the money from the likes of Gil Moore offers more benefits than risk. Oh sure, they may take a little heat from the couple dozen or so people in Elk Grove who pay attention to such matters, but really, does the average voter really pay attention to such minutia?
Proud Heritage, Bright Future?
Elk Grove Thriving
A City by the developers, of the developers and FOR the developers!
Increase in armed robberies, assaults and various street crimes
More sprawl
$100 million soccer stadium
Garish 70 - 100 foot tall lighted signs
Sister city to the Kingdom of Zamunda
Octopus Civic Center
Amusement park right across from single family homes in Madeira "the Jewel of Elk Grove".
Visions of the Olympic Trials.
3,600 units of high density very low and low income housing on the way to "Meridian" (the Southeast Plan Area) - Hood of the future to be known as Mack Road South.
Bring on more low income housing projects, liquor stores, fast food joints, shooting ranges, gun stores, smoke shops and nail salons.
Elk Grove Thriving!
Proud Heritage, Bright Future?
Commissioner Gordon,
Unlike Gotham City, it didn't take Superman to rescue the City of Bell and uncover all the government corruption. It was one community activist who wouldn't give up and who got one reporter to write an investigative piece.
That was all it took to bring down that council and city manager.
So to those small few, never give up; otherwise as some have said about Elk Grove's future: "Corrupt as Bell!"
No Superman Needed,
Superman lives in Metropolis, Batman lives in Gotham City. Get your comic cities right
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