This is how it went down in a few more details:
Discussion opened by Mayor Steve Olsen by saying a procedure was created by him in consultation with the City Attorney.
Clarification made by City Attorney on voting: Requisite votes is a quorum (3), unless somebody abstains then it is majority. Basically, an abstension goes with majority.
Sue Horgan spoke first by saying she has concerns about the appointment process, even though she initially supported the appointment process over the election. In fact, we now have six candidates (as of 4:15pm today) and none of the council members have met with this person. Should we proceed or go to election?
Betsy Clapp still supports election.
Carol Smith said we voted for this appointment process; not back pedal. No choice. Appointment.
Steve Olsen had voted for appointment but didn’t know then it would only be $6k and that we can now reconsider, at least those who voted for appointment in November.
Sue: Have they all been treated equally and fairly? Makes motion to call for an election.
Monty steps in. It should be two motions.
1. Reconsider decision from November. (only Sue can make motion and only Steve can second, and they did so). This is only on to reconsider.
Public comment
Jerry Kaplan – appoint now
Scott Eicher – election
Suza Francina – fairness, election
Christine Golan – questions on process if election
Kris Young – this is real govt.
Unanimous yes to reconsider November decision.
2. Motion for a special election. (Horgan/Clapp)
Public Opinion
Susan Justice – questions
Bob Daddy – questions about filing. March 12 would be filing deadline for election. We might have more people step forward. Election.
Jerry Kaplan – questions about Brown Act in a council of four
Kenley – election
Dmitri – appoint
Vote was 3-1 in favor of special election. Carol Smith voted no.

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I’m not 100% certain, but I believe the sixth person was Ojai Unified Board member Dr. Pauline Mercado.

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Brad – I heard Steve use the word “unanimous” after that vote, but since I was typing while the vote happened I wasn’t able to visually see what happened. I could be wrong.
Carol definitely voted against the election in the second vote.

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Didn’t mean for Comment #6 to be Anonymous

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Great to come home and find all this on the Ojai Post.
Some clarifications on Comment #1.
“Steve Olsen had voted for appointment but didn’t know then it would only be $6k and that we can now reconsider, at least those who voted for appointment in November.”
That’s not quite what he said –the $6,000 cost was known from the beginning.
More clarifications later…

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What happened tonight had it’s roots at the December 8 meeting where the council voted 3-2 in favor of the appointment process. When the council moved on to the next Item on the Agenda Lenny Klaif went to the podium and pointed out that while the council had voted in favor of appointment, they had not discussed the actual appointment process.
The appointment process should have been made clear weeks ago, including setting a deadline for applications. To dream up a Seven Step Procedure (see previous article on tonight’s meeting underneath this one) and wait till Thursday late afternoon to reveal it to the other council members and the public, was, I think, the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Just remember, there is always more to these things than meets the eye!

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Great live blogging/tweeting of the City Council meeting! Thanks!
Congratulations to the Ojai City Council for going with the will of the majority of the citizens of Ojai and scheduling a special election for the primary election in June.
The Ojai Valley Democratic Club passed a resolution in December calling for a special election in June. At that time the council voted 3-2 to appoint. The OVDC resolution also stated that if the council voted to appoint that we would like to see the council appoint Len Klaif to the CC. As of right now, the club still endorses Lenny for the vacant seat.
We will be voting in March, after the deadline to file for the special election, whether to revisit the endorsement. If you are a Democrat, Green, Decline to State or registered to vote under any other party but Republican, you can come to our meetings and if you join the club you can vote. Our General Members Meetings are the fourth Monday of each month at 7 pm at the Ojai Arts Center. We will be endorsing candidates in the November election as well. You can also join the club on the internet Here.

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Well Ox, we are the Ojai Valley DEMOCRATIC Club.

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spk…you mean “…I would hope you and anyone could come ox. Is the meeting open? Though, be warned.. I can’t imagine you would come, listen, and not switch parties throw up.”

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can i join your clib if i’m registered green or independent?

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Chakra, yes of course you can. The Democratic Party wants genuine progressives, greens and supporters of an alternative in its tent, ready to stick with the “lesser of two evils.” Coming to the meeting is the first step.
The Democrats’ close friends/bitter enemies (depends who you talk to) in the Republican Party do the same thing: They welcome libertarians and the like, while playing to the God freaks, Promisekeepers, Palindrones and buyers of motivational-buy-real-estate-with-nothing-down! programs. (Hey, you might not like everything about Dick Cheney, but just think what would happen if the Democrats got in! Stick with the lesser of two evils, right?)
Really both are about the same thing: Scare you into voting for one or the other of their candidates. Don’t much matter which. As long as you’re convinced that your only real choice, and the only way your vote matters, is if you stick with the Democrats.
Or Republicans.
These things go in very simple cycles. After eight years of Bush/Cheney, when anyone who voted Republican could no longer look at themselves in the mirror and just decided to stay home, it was time to fire up the left-leaners: Just think how different things could have been if Gore had won in 2000! Don’t let it happen again. Organize! Vote Democrat! Donate Money! Knock on doors! Carry signs!
And come next election, when nobody who voted Democratic can look themselves in the mirror and they all decide to stay home, time to fire up the right-leaners again: Lord, just think how different it could have been if McCain had won in 2008! Organize! Vote Republican! Donate Money! Knock on doors! Carry signs!
Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
Yes, I know, there are real differences between Republicans and Democrats. For example, Condoleeza Rice is out shilling for the Republicans what a mortal danger we are in right now from little Iran, a faraway country that has not attacked anyone in over 150 years. Speaking for the Republicans, she says we must bomb now.
Whereas the Democrats think we can put in some sanctions, assassinate some scientists, and bomb later.
These are very striking differences. Notice how one subjects you to international warrant as a war criminal, while the other gets you the Nobel Peace Prize.
Of course, if you don’t like these choices, you can join the 50+% of eligible voters who pay their taxes but have given up on voting. That’s fine too. (But remember, Republicans and Democrats both agree: If you don’t vote, you can’t complain!)
Not that any of this applies to the Ojai Democrats. They are just talking about getting some decent people on the Ojai city council.
In that, they ought to be a good bet. They won’t be bamboozled by some smooth-talker. Been there, done that. Recently.
What was this thread about again?

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Thank you, SPK, for these Comments!

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so only republicans can’t join the club?
is this in the by-laws some where? or is this simply more progressive hate-speak from spk?

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yak, yak, yak

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SPK -
Slavery was abolished in the British Empire without a drop of blood spilled, more than thirty years before Abraham Lincoln promised revolting slaves freedom if they’d join his side of the mercantilist Civil War.
That promise was broken. African Americans didn’t get anything approaching civil rights for 100 years, despite a Constitutional Amendment specifically guaranteeing them equal rights.
Slavery was abolished in country after country by peaceful political means. Not here. You have to ask, why? A huge part of the reason is that so much political will and effort is wasted here in the hopeless two party system.
You are right that there has been progress over the years. But by and large, if you compare the U.S. experience to that of many other western countries, progress has been far less, taken far longer, and cost far more in terms of lost and broken lives. The reason can be found in your example: In other countries, people don’t keep on spending all their efforts in broken political parties that have proven over decades they will not be a vehicle for enlightened policy. They have meaningful alternative parties, and they have a voting system that makes sure small parties can have influence on an outcome. And, their peoples are ready to take to the streets and shut down commerce if their modest demands are not met.
In your example, civil rights, participating in the Democratic Party did not end Jim Crow. It was massive civil disobedience that threatened to shut down the country. That civil disobedience ranged from MLK’s nonviolent approach to armed groups like the Black Panthers. It was in the interest of the war elites to engage with the nonviolent movement as a way to isolate and defuse the violent groups; it was in the interest of a moribund Democratic Party to tap into this large new voter pool in order to regain office and create a winning voter base. It did not take long for the moneyed war elites to take control of a majority of Democratic politicians.
There is a prevailing mythology – Hillary Clinton even alluded to it on the campaign trail when she said something along the lines of “it took LBJ to get civil rights” – that somehow it was through the Democratic Party that real progressive change was put in place. That is hogwash. LBJ’s progressive changes were relatively modest in the big picture, and were a reaction to a country rising up. LBJ also ramped up a horrible war, another way to defuse radical action from the disaffected. FDR, who did implement real change, was an anomaly – he was more like a strongman, like perhaps Hugo Chavez in Venezuela – than a product of anything resembling today’s Democratic Party. And, he will not be repeated through today’s politics. Remember, in FDR’s wake, the Constitution was amended to prevent a President serving more than two terms. Look at the history of FDR’s Presidency – do you think if he had been limited to two terms many of the changes put in place would have survived as more than dead letters?
Today, pointing to the tidbits of “progress” that have been dribbled out through the two-party system requires some incredible blinders. Over the past thirty years, the United States has become the largest prison state, both per capita and in raw numbers, in the world. The United States spends more on military and has a larger attack capability than the rest of the world combined. This country right now is bombing and killing civilians in other countries who have done nothing to us, and pose no threat. This country blocks critical global environmental actions that pose real threats to human survival. At home, unions are busted, jobs are outsourced, bubbles are fomented, government services that help people are bankrupted, the judiciary is hopelessly peopled by hacks and ideologues, and there is very little purpose to the current national government beyond collecting tax dollars to distribute to party cronies, typically via horrible policies such as preemptive war, the war on drugs, prison expansion (and now, “health insurance reform”). All these things, by and large, are supported and effectively implemented by both the Republican and Democratic parties. And as long as people continue to dance with those two partners, in the hopes of either getting or stopping some minor progressive change at the margins, the prison and war state will continue to grow, the real economy of working people will continue to be gutted, and people will be further marginalized, alienated and disempowered.
And really, what does all this effort in the Democratic Party buy? The promise of “health insurance reform”? The Democratic Party’s health plan is a cruel farce in which people are going to be required to buy private “insurance” at whatever the companies want to charge, at penalty of federal prosecution, but will have no recourse when they are denied critical care by those same companies. Incredibly, it is certain to actually make things worse.
Denial is comforting. Indulging mythologies is at first easier than thinking, until one day you look around at the mess that has been made of one’s life and community. If you indulge enough mythology, then thinking can seem less cluttered. For an easy current example, if you accept uncritically that Iran is a threat, then all you need to think about is how to deal with it. Much easier than taking into account that Iran may not really be a threat at all, and that maybe we really don’t have such enemies. All of a sudden, options multiply and things get confusing.
Science tells us that almost all daily activity takes place at a subconscious level, without any critical thought or awareness. This is not just the automatic way you lift a fork full of food to your mouth; it is also the automatic way people accept that voting is meaningful, that it makes sense to go to a voting booth and punch a card for Republicans or Democrats. What makes us human is the very little bit of action that we take at the fringe, as a result of conscious thought implemented after critical, personal observation and experience. The more of this we do, the more human we become, individually and as a society. And, I submit, the more of this we do, the less we will participate in the Democratic or Republican parties, and the less we will accept in our own lives the huge amount of daily activity we do now that does not add one whit of joy, meaning or gain to our lives or those of our loved ones. (Or, at least, consider this: Given how little room we really have for conscious, purposeful action in our lives, what a waste to spend it with the Democrats and Republicans.)
“Extended” as it may be, what I am saying is just the opposite of a “rationalization for continued apathy and irresponsibility.” Apathy and irresponsibility are defined by participating in a party and system that does not serve your interests, and has demonstrated over decades not only that it is incapable of doing so, but will continue to make this world worse for you and your children every minute it remains in power.
The answer – aside from outright revolution (and keep in mind, the far right is preparing its brownshirts for that right now) – is to disengage from that party, and that system. Act locally. Don’t buy health insurance – set up a local clinic staffed by local doctors, open to community members. Don’t buy corporate food, or buy less of it – join one of the CSAs, and set up a coop among friends and family where someone keeps the cow, someone the chickens, etc. If you can’t stop paying taxes, earn less money, and make sure less goes out of your own circle. Starve the beasts that own these political parties, make these political parties less relevant, while building up the strength of the local community.
Bus aside from these standard platitudes, here’s what I’m saying: You act no matter what you do. If you withhold your obvious talents from the broken Democrats and Republicans, and apply your efforts to something or someplace totally different, I submit you are taking more effective action than is possible by engaging a counterproductive two party system.
That’s really what our forebears you refer to did, both here in the U.S. and abroad as well. It didn’t take LBJ; it took MLK, Malcolm X and the Black Panthers.

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#30 was to spk

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Anon #29:
Other than agreeing with me on most of my points from an oblique angle, I take it that your solution is either to hunker down in some sort of quasi-autonomous, isolationist enclave or to simply flee. Both options fail to address any of the actual problems on a national level unless you assume that the entire country will self organize into quasi-autonomous, isolationist enclaves en mass at the same time thereby obviating the need to address the myriad problems facing this country.
As I stated earlier, I attribute any of the progress this country has made to the ordinary citizens who stood up and made the crucial difference. You discount the progress this country has made. Fine. But simply claiming that we have not made enough or much progress in your view is not a sufficient argument for failing to make more progress.
You also claim that the political parties in this country are the problem AND that they have played no part in any of the progress that we have made. I agree with you that Kennedy and LBJ did not the civil rights movement make. But claiming that the Democratic party of that era and the leadership had nothing to do with the Civil Right Act and the ending of segregation is a serious misunderstanding of history. Do you really imagine that this progress would have been achieved under the leadership of the Republican party?
You, like me, lament the serious setbacks of the last thirty years. I maintain that these setbacks are a direct result of corporatism, also known as Reaganomics and later embraced and propounded by Clinton and his third way, DLC Democrats. Sadly, the DLC appears to be in the driver’s seat in Obama’s Administration. The Progressives in what we like to call the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party are working to change that.

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I take it that your solution is either to hunker down in some sort of quasi-autonomous, isolationist enclave or to simply flee. Both options fail to address any of the actual problems on a national level …
Ahh, spk, but they do. Either option – “hunker down in an isolationist enclave, or simply flee”, as you put it – more effectively address the actual problems on a national level than can be achieved in the two official parties.
You want to work from the “democratic wing” of the Democratic Party to get some progressive influence in the Obama administration? You point to Kennedy and LBJ as examples. But here’s the thing: At the same time the sixties Democrats came around to the Civil Rights Act, they massively expanded a horrible and unjustifiable war. 50,000 dead Americans, a million dead Vietnamese, millions more displaced.
The Civil Rights Act was a good thing. Was it worth that?
Martin Luther King Jr. wasn’t so sure. He was assassinated when he began to explore those ideas.
The Republicans came in, and over time started the War on Drugs and the whole litany of horrors culminating in Bush and Cheney. The war state just grew and grew.
Meanwhile, the Republicans attacked, dismantled and gutted most of the good progressive things done in the sixties and before.
Now, we are to fight to do what? Get a “public option” put in the health insurance mandate bill? While war expands in Afghanistan? While occupation continues in Iraq? While we still have more political prisoners held in Cuba, at Guantanamo, than the Castro government itself holds in Cuba even by the definitions of Miami gusanos?
How many dead Afghani children is the “public option” worth?
If we want our “public option” from the Obama administration and the Democratic Party, I hope we have a good answer to that question.

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Fair enough, Anonymous…
Food for thought on which I’ll ponder.
Thanks for the Rice info. I had hoped we’d have a break from this blatant neo-con agenda for at least a while…God help the people of Iran!

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