BOS Could Face Restraining Order
The Monday Night Group stepped forward at yesterday’s meeting (June 15) of the Modoc County Board of Supervisors and fired yet another salvo across the board’s bow.
This time the ad hoc committee said it would seek a restraining order against the board if it makes any move in cutting services in either the sheriff’s department or the Modoc Medical Center.
“Our intent is to restrain the county from doing two things,” Don Demsher told the Modoc Independent News after the meeting. “One is to prohibit the Board of Supervisors from making excessive cuts in law enforcement, and the other is stop any cost reductions at the hospital that would mean it could not function.”
He said a restraining order would force the board to have “some organization about this whole thing,” referring to the fiscal crisis the county is facing because of the board’s illegal misappropriation of funds from the treasury.
“We need to get people involved who know more about it,” Demsher said, repeating the Monday Night Group’s opposition to a bond sale to raise more than $12.5 million in order to replace the missing money.
Demsher’s threat of a restraining order followed another blistering attack on the board by Alan Hopkins, also a Monday Night Group member, who said his committee was concerned about the board’s lack of concern in using a bond underwriter whose firm, Finacorp, recently folded.
Calling “the whole bond issue a sham,” Hopkins said the board was in violation of the law because it continues to use money from the treasury. “I was flabbergasted, the board didn’t bat an eye” at the news that Ken Hedrick, the bond underwriter was without a job.
Hopkins strongly urged the supervisors to check Hedrick’s professional background.
Janie Erkiaga, speaking from the audience, said she agreed with the Monday Night Group’s position on bankruptcy and then called for Supervisors Dan Macsay and Dave Bradshaw to step down “as lame ducks” and let the newly elected supervisors take over.
As for the bond underwriters, Erikiaga was even more blunt.
“The bond underwriters should pack their bags and leave town,” she told the board.
15 comments:
Good plan ... the BOS should have been served with a restraining order long ago. This fiasco is taking on dimensions of the Mad Hatter's Tea Party. Quite disconcerting.
Getting bankruptcy advice from a bond salesman. What will they think of next.
Did anyone else note that when asked, Mr. Hedrick claimed independence from Mr. Glasser's firm, WJ Public Finance?
I think that claim is disingenuous at best, as his name is listed in the "About Us" section on the companies website, and his email address is with the company:
Email: kenhedrick@wjpublicfinance.com Phone: 415 990-6536
The website address of Glasser's and Hedricks enterprise is here:
http://wjpublicfinance.com/pb/wp_697ae2f6/wp_697ae2f6.html
Please Read aboutPredatory Municipal Bond Issuers Ripping Off Main Street. (Links below)
Remember, Ken Hedrick is a salesman. In fact, whether or not he and his comrades actually get a job may hinge on whether he has a book of business (in the form of Modoc on a silver platter) to bring to his next firm. There are plenty of bond salesman and underwriters, but no so many suckers who want to sell bonds.
See following link for a succinct discussion of the Jefferson County bonds and bankruptcy, and how the debt crisis in Greece AND US county bonds are the next big crash on its way. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=ahSJgzIBbboA&refer=home
Here is the same story, but described in much more detail. (And yes, it is in Rolling Stone...but Rolling Stone writes the same kind of detailed articles that you find in the Wall Street Journal...only Rolling Stone is not a hopeless apologist for New York investment bankers.)
And see more here regarding fraud and double dealing in relationship to Federal Stimulus Bonds. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/16/business/economy/16bonds.html?src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fpolitics%2Findex.jsonp
Also....beware Mr Hedrik's cautions about the evils of lawyers in bankruptcy. At least, in bankruptcy, you are paying to rationally manage your debt.
In the case of the bonds, you are paying a giant commission and underwriting fees, just to postpone rationally managing your debt.
Take your pick. I pick bankruptcy.
Wonders never cease! Yes the bond man Mr Hendrick looked very pasty, yet he told a bold story to make his bonds look great. Gave a list of credentials a mile long, which by the way does not make him credible.
He still does not work for a company, he told us last week by week's end, now by this weeks end. The weeks keep passing by. No company should make the deal null and void one would think.
The board does not listen to MNG, they are very talented citizens of this community, and truly care what happens, yet the BOS has followed the path set up by Richard Arrow and his cronies, a one way street into hell. Now time has run out just like he orchestrated and low and behold possibly a loan from the state. It just goes on and on, the misguided baloney.
Yes all of that did happen, but my fellow readers of this blog, this is only one-sided. There was a lot of other things that were discussed at the meeting, and if you weren't there you should listen to the audio on the county's website.
First of all, they did discuss cuts. The other departments are down to one and two people in an office. The Sheriff-Elect seemed to understand. He said he wasn't opposed to taking his share in cuts, he just wanted to review what was proposed for his department and see if he could come up with a better solution. He did also say that it would affect law enforcement and the way it would be handled. Unfortunately that department makes up almost 50% in employees that fall under the General Fund.
Second, they went over the difference between revenue bonds and bankruptcy. They discussed why bankruptcy would be much, much worse than the revenue bonds.
You should make your own opinions on this though and not let anyone else tell you. Go listen to the audio and make up your own mind!
The statement that the Sheriff's department employees
represent 50% of the general funds employees is in
the least very misleading.
Nearly 50% of the Sheriff/Jail budget is funded by
oustide sources. Logic then tells us that only
11 or 12 of the offices emloyees ar paid out of the
general fund.
The Sheriff is being asked to terminate 9 of these
employees. Is this equitable and in the best
interests of our county's residents?
More smoke and mirrors.
We should not rely only on one bond salesman to provide us with information on bankruptcy, or in fact, our financial future period - bonds or no bonds.
I did listen to the entire meeting audio. What I heard was one consultant that has invested time in return for potential future profit giving advice in an area that he himself professed little knowledge of, municipal bankruptcy. That is two strikes against his impartiality and capabilities.
I was also concerned, as another poster noted, that he claimed no connection with Glasser and WJ Public Finance, when in fact if you go to the sites in the post above you will see that he is listed on their web page.
So, even if he is not getting paid by the county (yet, I do not know if he has) the consulting firm he claims independence from is most likely compensating him in some fashion already.
We must get competent, impartial and professional advice from more than one person (i.e., other than Mr. Hendrick, currently without a firm, if you discount WJ Public Finances) in order to make the best decisions possible during this extraordinary time.
Just because you ask a judge for a restraining order dosent mean it will be automatically issued, you need to convince the judge its warrented. And I'm sure the BOS would fight it if it was issued.
The BOS COULD ACTUALLY GO THROUGH A PROCESS SIMILAR TO BANKRUPTCY THEMSELVES WITHOUT FILING UNDER CHAPTER NINE.THEY COULD AT LEAST ATTEMPT TO NEGOTIATE WITH CREDITORS MANY OF THEM ARE LOCAL SPECIAL DISTRICTS.THERE HAS NEVER BEEN ANY REAL SINCERE EFFORT TO DEVELOP A SENSIBLE PROPOSAL TO SERVE AS A PLATFORM FOR DISCUSSIONS WITH THE OTHERS THAT ARE OWED MILLIONS.
DOES BORROWING FOURTEEN MILLION DOLLARS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA AND THEN PAY PART OF IT BACK WITH FOURTEEN MILLION DOLLAR REVENUE BOND MAKE SENSE? THIS SCHEME DOESN'T SPEAK TO SOUND FISCAL MANAGEMENT BUT INSTEAD TO DESPERATION.
IF WE TOLD THIS SORDID STORY TO OUR FRIENDS AND RELATIVES LIVING OUT OF MODOC COUNTY THEY WOULD SWEAR WE MADE IT UP.
“Our intent is to restrain the county from doing two things,” Don Demsher told the Modoc Independent News after the meeting. “One is to prohibit the Board of Supervisors from making excessive cuts in law enforcement, and the other is stop any cost reductions at the hospital that would mean it could not function.”
This is coming from the "smart" people right? Uh...remember the 12.5 million that the County spent to illegally keep the "HOLE" called MMC afloat in the first place? Get a clue folks all we really need is a MASH tent and an all weather Helio pad.
The hospital was not the only area of the county that benefited from the use of restricted funds.
Here are some other posters comments regarding this issue:
“The money loaned to the hospital wasn't the problem, per se, but rather not facing the fact that cuts would have to be made without deficit spending or using restricted funds was.”
“Since you decided to steal restricted funds and not increase revenue, borrow or reduce costs, the cash funds on hand went not to just to running the hospital, but also to the ever increasing costs of all county employees that you refused to reduce.”
” For years, we are provided funds restricted to fix roads and deal with public health issues. The County decides to use it instead to keep the current staffing, provide pay raises, pay for employee health benefits and to keep the hospital open. Fast forward a decade or so later: The County knowingly uses cash received in error to do the same thing.”
“Also mentioned was the false idea…that only the hospital got those restricted funds. Common sense would indicate that since the county was basically spending money it didn't have during this entire period - essentially throwing all of the incoming cash into a virtual slush fund and using it wherever it saw fit - that therefore all of the employees received salary and benefit increases that they otherwise would not have if the books were done right.”
” The point is, the Save Our Hospital group, the Monday Night Group… have been pleading with both the BOS and the county employees to take a stand, either jointly or separately…all in order to have made significant progress in minimizing the impacts to the county, its taxpaying citizens and employees, but to no avail.”
“Think about it. The money wasn't allocated just for the hospital costs over the past decade or so, the money was used throughout the county to keep it running at a certain level without layoffs or salary reductions.”
“The county employees as a group, hospital included, got the illegal funds in the form of salaries and benefits”
” Many of the county employees who benefited by all the mis-management and mis-handling of restricted monies probably would have been laid-off or terminated sometime during the ten plus mis-managed years so why don't they count their blessings (namely having remained employed and benefited) and agree to pony-up the repayment of those unearned and undeserved funds. Those who might have survived even under proper management should be willing to help with the repayment inasmuch as they've received more than they should have during this unholy time.”
“You cannot rob Peter (the restricted funds) to pay Paul (the hospital and ALL of the other county employee salaries and benefits) for over a decade, and then expect Jesus (the taxpayers) to come in and save the situation with a loan essentially rewarding this bad behavior.”
“Does anyone really think that the BOS and county staff that OK'ed this idea of using restricted funds over 10 years ago … actually had an accounting system in place to do just that - keep track of where the funds went? The funds were unaccounted for during this whole time, and because they were not allocated per the grant and program guidelines, but instead went into ALL of the county employees benefits and salaries - to keep them whole - we are now in debt.”
“It is just the unfortunate truth…that the funds were dispersed willy-nilly for over a decade throughout the county to all departments, and that all of the employees benefitted because of this slip-shod accounting.”
And that is only some of the posts (after about a ten minute search of this blog) that have as yet gone unchallenged as to why we are in the mess that we are in.
Blaming the hospital for this is entirely too simplistic, especially considering that the BOS and its hired staff continue to hide and divert attention from the real and only cause of this debacle:
Stealing the money. Over and over again.
If you take the hospital to a MASH unit then 150+ jobs are lost. thats about 15 million dollars a year that will not come into the county. then people that lost their jobs leave and will not pay taxs here thats what 3 million gone. If they leave they take their kids out of schools here thats $ 5000.00 dollars
per kid per year more money gone.
Less people here so next the few shop owners that are here have less bussiness so they have to let people go too. and that means less dollars to the county in sells taxes.
So if you think all you need is a MASH unit or a 1st aide station JOIN THE ARMY 3 hots and a cot.
I agree for the most part with june 16 8:23 post.
But now the BOS is using money for next year this year to pay for employees wages which also enclueds the BOS:s wages,and benifit package. Would really like it if each of the members of the BOS would state for the record what cuts they took,
Okay, let’s look at some numbers here. All population numbers are from the County Web page which is taken from the 2007 census.
Modoc County Population: 9197
City of Alturas Population: 2795
So run the figures and you’ll see that the City’s population is roughly 39.39% of total resident’s or 849 people.
The Hospital’s CEO has stated that they serve “about 30%” of the people in Alturas. This works out to 255 people, which is 2.77% of the population of the entire County.
Now tell me again why the other 97% of the population should be paying to keep the Hospital open.
Laws are only as good as how they are used...
"But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully; Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient....."
Source: I Timothy (ch. I, v. 8-9)
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