More on lawn signs

My lawn sign post from Wednesday drew some attention from readers. After talking with Sam Pedroza again the following day, it turns out volunteers with the Democratic Club of Claremont was putting up signs for Pedroza and Robin Haulman, both Democrats, in the yards of DCC members. But if members were not home when DCC volunteers showed up, the signs went up in their yards anyways.

Strangely enough, I got a voice message the morning after my post from Rudy Mann, who complained that someone put a lawn sign from candidate Opanyi Nasiali, a Republican, in his front yard. Mann is the husband of DCC president Zephyr Tate-Mann and an active volunteer in the club.

We've been playing phone since then, so I haven't had the chance to ask Mann if he was one of the volunteers putting up lawn signs in DCC member's yards without asking permission first. If so, it seems odd to me and a bit ironic that he's complaining about an unwanted lawn sign while his DCC was going around doing the same thing to its members.

Democratic Club monthly meeting

The Democratic Club of Claremont will have its monthly luncheon this Friday, October 9th beginning at noon. The location is El Ranchero Restaurant, 984 W. Foothill Blvd. in Claremont.

This month's guest speaker will be Professor Mitch Avila, currently the Chair of the Philosophy Department at Cal-State University, Fullerton. Professor Avila is a Claremont resident who specializes in theories of global justice and human rights. His topic will be entitled "Two Kinds of Property" and will focus on regulated markets, distributive tax policies, and personal property. Cost is $10.00.

A mess that could have been avoided

Sparks flew at Tuesday night's city council meeting with a number of residents upset over the Claremont Police Department's handling of the health care reform debate.

Members of the Democratic Club of Claremont rallied around Rudy Mann, who was cited for allegedly assaulting a disruptive participant, Charles Cox.

Andrew Winnick, a DCC member and a Human Services Commissioner, said police should have been aware of a potential threat and called their response a "major failure."

Mann also spoke out at the meeting. He said he was "denied his right to file a complaint against this person who committed this crime against me and against the public."

The police officer who did show up cited Mann for assault but refused to cite Cox for disrupting the meeting. Both men were attempting to make citizen's arrests against each other, but the officer refused to handle Mann's request.

So the officer either showed bias against Mann or simply did not understand how citizen's arrests should be handled. Either case is inexcusable.

Another speaker, Carolyn Gonzalez, President of the Mountain View Republican Club, also addressed the council. She place the blame on the organizers (the event was sponsored by the Democratic Club of Claremont), calling them "irresponsible" to host the event without any security.

She went on: “[Cox] did stand up. He did shout. He was loud and that is accurate. However what is not being said is that one of the moderators went to him and was poking him in the chest. Physically poking him. He did nothing in response to defend himself. Another gentleman came up, an older man and physically grabbed him. Again, this protester did nothing to defend himself."

I wasn't at the debate, but it seems Cox's whole goal of being there was to draw attention to his pro-life organization, Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust.

He was annoying enough to get organizers to poke, grab, push or otherwise physically confront him. Then he can file a citizen's arrest and get his name and his organization's name some media attention.

If just one police officer had been there throughout the meeting, perhaps none of this mess would have happened. The officer could have removed Cox from the meeting for being disruptive, and organizers would never have touched him.

Police Chief Paul Cooper argued that the Police Department is not a private security force, and the organizers could have hired police to be there.

But I've been to plenty of protests in Claremont, and there's always a police presence. Why have 3 cops at a rally for peace in Iraq and none at a heated health care debate?

It would have been wise to designate at least one officer to monitor the event. After all, health care debates across the country have erupted into yelling matches and even violence.

The follow-up investigation, the citizen's arrests, the accusations of bias and threats of lawsuits could have all been avoided by sending one officer to the 2-hour meeting.

Are the Council elections non-partisan? I don’t think so.

Election fever is underway. For all the election junkies out there, the COURIER City Beat will have plenty of coverage, interviews and opinions about candidates and their fight for every last vote in the weeks to come.

Candidate Larry Schroeder kicked things off on Friday by speaking to the Democratic Club of Claremont. Schroeder is a retired finance director for Glendora and Lakewood. As far as his platform, he wants to push economic development, sustainability and responsible budget management.

In 2007, former Councilmember Jackie McHenry, who was running for re-election at the time, made a big stink about the DCC inviting only party-affiliated candidates to speak to their members.

Regardless of what they said, the Democratic candidates in 2007, Linda Elderkin, Sam Pedroza and Michael Keenan, got the club's unofficial endorsement. The same holds true this time around for Schroeder. They're Democrats after all, and the DCC wants Democrats in positions of power.

“You have to take into account a person's party and their ideas on various things,” said DCC President Bob Gerecke at Friday's event. “We don't give endorsements, but we urge our members to support fellow Democrats because we share the same ideals.”

The problem, according to McHenry, is that city council elections are supposed to be non-partisan. McHenry said her political leanings are plenty liberal, but as a registered Independent, she never got invited by the DCC to share her positions with potential voters.
In any event, the other candidates, Corey Calaycay (Republican) and Bridget Healy (Independent), were not invited to speak at the DDC lunch. They will have their campaign kickoff events on Sunday. Calaycay at the Claremont Place from 2 to 4 p.m. and Healy at the Claremont Forum in the Packing House from 3 to 5 p.m.

Schroeder will have his kickoff event at his home at 619 N. Indian Hill Boulevard. It's also on Sunday from 3 to 5 p.m. I will try to be at all 3 places at once.

As the least known of the 3 candidates, Schroeder will have his work cut out for him. To be successful in this election, he may need the wisdom offered by his fortune cookie from Captain KJ, where he spoke to the DCC at their monthly meeting.

“Cut through organizational impediments and get some real work done.”

For complete stories on Schroeder, Calaycay and Healy's kickoff events, be sure to pick the Wednesday, Jan. 14 edition of the COURIER.