Summary of City Council Expenses

Due to the increased activity on this site and the multiple requests that I have received, I have decided to spare people the trouble of having to scroll through the blog posts to find documents related to personal expenses, so I have summarized them below.

Expenses for Melendez and his wife:
Korea Hotel and Meals
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/korea_hotel.pdf
Korea Airfare
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/korea_airfare2.pdf
Washington D.C. Airfare:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/amexstat2.pdf
Las Vegas:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/lasvegas.pdf
ICSC Trip:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/ICSC_Trip.pdf
Cell Phone:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/060806_Cell.pdf
Laptop:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/060806_NB.pdf

Cantu's Expenses:
ICSC Trip:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/ICSC_Trip.pdf
Las Vegas:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/060806_LasVegasTrip.pdf

Santillano's Expenses:
ICSC Trip:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/ICSC_Trip.pdf
Las Vegas:
http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/lasvegas.pdf

City Council Recall Flyer

Saturday morning we got up early and beat the heat to distribute ~1600 flyers to nearly all of the households in McFarland. It felt good to get out and inform people about the election, plus the excercise was great.

The flyer consists of a diagram in English and Spanish that advises people how to vote and fill in their absentee ballots. We also included a copy of the letter from the Kern County Grand Jury with a version that was translated into Spanish. The last page was filled up with statements showing only a few of the mayor's travel expenses. I wish we would have had more room for the rest of the travel expense documents but this flyer could have turned into a book. :)

http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/071206+Council+Recall.pdf

Council Recall Billboards

Here is a picture of one of the billboards that has gone up to remind people of the recall election on August 15th. Several of these will be put up around town. Our sign supplier did a great job turning these around in less than a week, plus they gave us a really great deal on the price once they found out who we were trying to remove from office.

The pictures of the recycling bins were taken this morning and they were edited and placed into the final version of the billboard within minutes. The billboards were completed within a few hours after that. Incredibly fast!

City Council Recall Absentee Ballot

I received my absentee ballot in the mail today and I quickly filled it out and put it in the mail. I voted "Yes" to recall all three people on the ballot.

http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/072606_RecallBallot.jpg

Sample Ballot for Council Recall Election

I checked my mail this morning and found a nice surprise. A sample ballot for the McFarland city council recall election that is being held on August 15th. This was a wonderful reminder of the hard work and effort that our volunteers have made to help clean up this city and restore order. Note that there is a section where Melendez, Cantu, and Santillano were allowed to respond to our claims that they are doing a horrible job, but they didn't even bother to form a response to our statement.

http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/071506_SampleBallot.pdf

Draft Letter to Grand Jury

Here is a draft letter of a response that Melendez wants to try and send to the Grand Jury. He fails to give a good reason why he and his crew decided to accept Sunset's bid after the deadline. He states that Sunset has "considerably more recycling experience" and this is one of the reasons they were selected. I still don't believe that this justifies paying a 100% more for our recycling services and I doubt that most of the residents of McFarland care that Sunset Waste has more experience in this field.

"Sunset had a financial incentive to maximixe diversion and recycling because it has invested millions of dollars". Well of course, that is why they are charging us twice as much. We are paying for their multi-million dollar investment.

I like the suggestion that he makes to the Grand Jury in the final paragraph, where he asks the Grand Jury to give him notice "before you issue a further letter of this type". Of course he doesn't want letters like these coming out, they demonstrate how he and his buddies Cantu and Santillano have failed. But these facts are bound to get out and it won't be long before the entire community is aware of it.

http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/071406_LettertoGrandJury.pdf

Delano Record Article on Grand Jury Letter

Last week the Delano Record published a great article on the Grand Jury letter that was sent to the McFarland city council. Most of the grand jury letter is quoted word for word and it speaks for itself.

http://www.shafterchevron.com/resources/071106_DelanoRecord.pdf