By: Libi Uremovic | Original Article at patch.com
Profiteers Could Not Remember With Whom They Made the Dirty Deals.
Last night’s Beaumont City Council Meeting turned into a parade of of victims that could remember that they made dirty deals with Staff and Council, but could not recall who.
Jim Love from Beaumont Electric started off the night by stating that Staff and Council made the arrangements to pay for all of his company’s wholesale supplies, but he could not recall which members of Staff and Council – because there’s been so many in the past decade.
Jim Love then explained how he was doing the City a favor by allowing the City to purchase his wholesale supplies: “The City makes 1% profit.”
News Flash: Government subsidies do not increase sales tax.
When the ‘Authority’ used a resale license to purchase items like vehicles and office supplies from out of town then claimed to sell the supplies to the City; it increased the City’s sales tax, but it was an illegal use of a State resale license.
Beaumont Electric is a local company. The amount of sales tax collected by the City wouldn’t increase from government subsidies, so the theory that Jim and Stacy Love were ‘doing the community a favor’ by receiving government subsidies in incorrect.
Councilman Orozco ‘demanded’ to know which members of Staff knew about that the City was subsidizing Beaumont Electric.
The answer is: Everyone in town knew except Orozco because it had been discussed several times. It’s been written about several times: http://beaumontgate.org/assets/docs/beaumontgate.org-Beaumont-Audit-13-Beaumont-Electric.pdf
Apparently Orozco never noticed that he’s approved thousands of dollars in Check Warrants for wholesales supplies.
Then it was Urban Logic’s turn to play the amnesia victim.
Kernan McKernan also could not remember which members of Staff and Council made his dirty deals. McKernan stated that his company did work for several other cities, but he couldn’t name one of them either. McKernan also whined that he doesn’t want to be called Urban Logic any more – he wants to keep the Urban Logic gravy train going, but under a different name.
Congrats to Acting City Manager Elizabeth Urtiaga for refusing to entertain Urban Logic’s name change based on the fact that the City has no contract for ‘we stole your INFRA structure’.
And speaking of past Councilmen and lying to the public:
In an email to Kyle Warsinski and Rebecca Deming dated May 8th Laura Vermillion wrote:
“Mr. Robert Homes came to my counter today stating: “You guys need to fix 8th street. It’s terrine…dilapidated… a mess..(etc..)” and asked: “When are you gonna fix it?” I stated that we have plans to improve all the city’s streets and 8th street is on the list. Unfortunately, I was unable to provide him with the information he wanted, which is ‘when’ it will be repaired.
He also stated that the “former mayor” told him “that the City has a billion dollars in funding for ..(indiscernible words/grumbling)…” to which I said I was unaware of and had no information. “
I wonder which “former mayor” would have such a fantasy grasp on the reality of the City’s financial position?