Canyon County Refuses Freedom of Information Request

Canyon County Refuses Freedom of Information Request
Oopsie, he threw them away!

By Sharon Fisher, 1-03-09 (from New West Boise)

The Kuna-Melba News, a weekly paper that covers western Ada County and eastern Canyon County, is reporting that Canyon County has refused a Freedom of Information request for the messages Canyon County Commissioner Steve Rule sent out from his county email account on Dec. 2, comparing First Lady-elect Michelle Obama to a black widow spider.

“I understand from Commissioner Rule that he does not retain sent email,” the paper reported it was told. “I also consulted with the County IT Department and understand that Commissioner Rule’s sent emails are not archived by them.”

The paper reported that it had filed one FOI request on December 15, asking for a copy of all of Rule’s sent e-mails for the months of October and November. “Two days after the Dec. 15 request was referred to the Canyon County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Samuel B. Laugheed sent a letter to the Kuna Melba News on Dec. 17, seeking an extension of the deadline on my request,” the paper reported. “On Dec. 29, Laugheed sent another letter, denying the request for information.”

Thinking that perhaps the email messages had been automatically deleted after 30 days, the paper re-filed the request on Dec. 29, asking for sent email from December. According to the paper, Laugheed sent a response on Dec. 31: “As previously stated in our December 29, 2008, letter responding to your request of December 15, 2008, I understand from Commissioner Rule that he does not retain sent email.”

Aside from this particular issue, it raises troubling questions about oversight of Canyon County government. Really? Canyon County commissioners are not required to save email messages they send out from their official account? And the county organization doesn’t archive them, either?

So what happens if a county commissioner sends out something patently illegal or unethical from their account? They’re off the hook by not saving it? Few other governmental organizations allow this.

Moreover, this opens Canyon County up to legal issues. The rules for electronic discovery and evidence in civil cases were changed as of Dec. 2006, and throwing up your hands and saying, “We don’t have them” is no longer taken as an excuse by judges.

Editor note: Canyon County uses Outlook as their email program. It might be interesting to know if Commissioner Rule cleaned out his "SENT" file. Outlook automatically puts a copy of all emails in this file. If so, would this be considered a violation of the FIO laws?

Circle J Trailer Files for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy

THE GUARDIAN learned today Circle J Trailer filed for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy on 12-30-2008. The shutdown of CIRCLE J will eliminate seventy-five jobs from the employment base in Caldwell. (You can pull the article up on the Idaho Business Review website.) This is not good news for the local economy.

Circle J has been around for more than 50 years in Caldwell. It is sad to note the passing of this Caldwell icon. We hate to see this happen to a long time Caldwell employer and the people who work there.

New Years Resolutions For Elected Officials And All Of Us

The IPT editorial board has a most excellent set of resolutions for our elected politicos for 2009. They can be found on the OPED page of today's paper.

1. Don't use your work email accounts to send out jokes that some people may find offensive.

2. Don't be packing heat when you go to the airport.

3. Don't plead guilty something you didn't do to "make it go away."

4. Don't try to sneak around the voting taxpayers when yo want to spend money on a project.

The rest of us can all get naked and stand in front of a full length mirror and come up with a decent list of things that we need to address. Add to that the usual smoking and drinking stuff and resolve to be a good role model for our kids and others.

That said, we can only hope for a better 2009 in the financial markets along with wisdom and good choices our elected politicos will need to make for the new year.

Dale Dixon of the BBB offers:

1. You didn't win anything despite what the email or letter says or how much the check sent to you says.

2. Easy money is not easy.

3. Always deal with reliable merchants and service people.

4. Safeguard your personal information like credit card, bank account, drivers license, and social security numbers.

Caldwell City Council Wisely Votes Down Property Offer

THE GUARDIAN attended the special city council meeting today regarding an offer on property for the "downtown catalyst project". The site is the old car dealership at 6th and Blaine in downtown Caldwell.

Mayor Nancolas called the meeting to order and immediately made a motion to go into Executive Session to discuss the terms of the offer with Caldwell City Attorney Mark Hilty. Everyone else, (that would be me and a student from Greenleaf Friends Academy) were excused from the meeting room. It appeared to be a simple straight forward real estate transaction and why the public was excused was explained by Mayor Nancolas as attorney client privilege.

Councilmen Rob Oates and Bob Sobba were not in attendance for this meeting. However, the ones who were there wisely did not approve this transaction. The purchase offer was $435,000 with an additional $129,000 due at closing. The total offer was $564,000 for the land,improvements and additional amount at closing as stated in the contract.

It would appear the Oppenheimer Group is negotiating purchase prices for property and the Mayor and City Council are the principals in the actual real estate purchase agreements. According to sources The Guardian knows and respects this is common practice all over the state.

If and when the land purchase deals are finally approved the block for the new city hall and retail complex will be well over $1 million just to acquire the land for this project unless falling real estate market prices take hold in downtown.

Something is clearly up with the downtown catalyst project, just exactly what remains a mystery to unfold with the passage of time. A city councilor I called gave me assurances that the Oppenheimer Group has not pulled out of the project for downtown Caldwell.

CWI Joins Long List of Faltering Ventures

Written by David Frazier

The new College of Western Idaho, set to open January 20, joins a long list of ventures that glibly blame “the soft economy” for failing to meet predictions. It looks like the long awaited opening will fall two-thirds short of predicted enrollment.

We fear the bill of goods sold to voters was overly optimistic and a bit simplistic. When folks–including the GUARDIAN–pointed out there were plenty of educational opportunities already available, they were shouted down. We are particularly concerned with the scheme being put forth by the city of Caldwell to build facilities for the Oregon based Treasure Valley Community College, in direct competition with CWI.

Officials at TVCC, CWI, and BSU have all claimed “there is plenty of need” go go around. Apparently that is simply not the truth. Truth is, the institutions all compete with one another for student dollars and government funding. All too often educational institutions view students as sources of revenue instead of minds to educate.

There is really a lot more involved in most of these “risky businesses” than a soft housing market, banking crises, stock market crash, demise of the auto industry etc. GROWTHOPHOBES need to unite and demand that proponents of ANYTHING impacting society “Show us the money.”

Remember Tamarack was claiming all sorts of huge sales–which were really nothing more than EARNEST MONEY AGREEMENTS. Those agreements didn’t translate into cash and they blamed a crooked stock broker in Paris. Right!

Micron gets all sorts of tax breaks, will never pay corporate income tax and remains the largest non-profit corporation in Idaho. Meanwhile businessmen who run a tight ship, pay their staff and don’t run off to Asia have to pay nearly double their unemployment tax rate to care for unemployed workers.

Today’s Daily Paper reports that growthophile developers are scamming to bring in more California companies to populate the foothills near Eagle. Meanwhile Idaho Power is quietly aiming–if we understand the P.U.C. filings correctly–to increase rates for those of us already paying for power so they can service new customers.

Easy to blame “the economy,” but most of these projects are ill conceived and are a house of cards waiting to fall. Whether it is dishonest lenders and borrowers or developer/promoters lobbying governments to give them breaks, the solution is NOT putting more individuals and businesses into deeper debt to “stimulate the economy.”

Editor note:
If you don't think post High School education facilities aren't in competition, then you have failed to notice all the TV advertisements on the tube. We are seriously oversupplied for the population base with higher education options in this valley.
If we build there are no assurances they will come.

"The very first law in advertising is to avoid the concrete promise and cultivate the delightfully vague." by Bill Cosby

Commissioner Ferdinand Takes the Deal On Gun Charge

Let's Make a Deal worked out well for our County Commissioner David Ferdinand. The first jury trial resulted in a "hung jury" and a new trial was scheduled. The below press release is from the Boise City Attorney's website.

"On August 28, 2008, Canyon County Commissioner David Ferdinand’s pending misdemeanor case went to jury trial. After two days of testimony, the six-person jury deliberated and was unable to reach a unanimous verdict. Consequently, the matter was set for a new jury trial.
As a result of significant discussion between the Boise City Attorney’s Office and Commissioner Ferdinand’s legal counsel, David Leroy, a negotiated resolution has been reached in this case. The agreement was for the Commissioner to plead to an amended misdemeanor charge of “Obstructing a Public Way” under Boise City Code § 6-17-02.
Both parties carefully weighed and considered the resources required to re-try the matter. Based upon each party’s reflection and vigorous negotiation, this resolution has been reached to avoid a lengthy re-trial and to avoid the uncertainty which trials inevitably pose.
To accomplish this, the City of Boise has dismissed its appeal and amended the Complaint to allege a violation of Boise City Code § 6-17-02, “Obstructing a Public Way”; Commissioner Ferdinand has entered an Alford plea of guilty to this non-firearm related charge; and Magistrate Daniel Steckel, upon the recommendation and urging of the parties, imposed a fine of $50 and court costs of $72.50."

Commissioner Ferdinand also had to fork over $1500.00 to the Feds in this case so maybe this was taken into account.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio Charges for Jail Meals

We have all heard of the many things Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Arizona has applied to make jail a less inviting place. The latest in his "innovations" is to charge inmates for their meals.

A GUARDIAN reader sent clippings from the ARIZONA REPUBLIC newspaper with articles about the move to start charging inmates for their meals. Charging for meals will start in January of 2009 if all goes according to plan.

Inmates with money on their accounts will pay for meals before any commissary candy and extras are obtained. Inmates without funds will not be charged for meals if they can't pay but a "tab" of expenses for meals will be kept on each inmate. Should any money be put on their books meal costs will be deducted. Maricopa County bean counters contend meals run an average of $1.11 for each meal served to inmates. The Sheriff is going to charge inmates $1.25/day for meal costs.

The policy of charging inmates for food was authorized by Arizona Legislature in the late 1990's, but Arpaio said he stopped requiring them to pay when he started charging for visits to medical professionals. With the economy down there is a countywide edict to cut 20% from department budgets. Arpaio predicts this effort will trim about 5% from his office's annual meal expenditures. The savings is expected to amount to $900,000 per year off a meal budget of $16 million dollars.

Note: Idaho has a daily charge of $25/day for jail time up to a maximum of $400 for a 20 day sentence. The percentage actually collected is unknown. The amount noted is several years ago and may have changed with the passage of time.

TVCC Bonding Question To Be Put Up For A Vote

THE GUARDIAN had a very productive meeting with Mayor Nancolas today along with the City Finance Director and Mayor's Assistant Maggie Colwell. A lot of issues were discussed but the main event is the TVCC revenue bonding will be put up for a vote of the people. I asked post meeting to be able to write the question posed for the ballot but was turned down on this offer by the City Finance Director.

As long as it is made clear the financial obligation to satisfy the bonding comes from property taxes THE GUARDIAN will abide by the pledge to remain neutral when this is put up for a vote of the people.

Urban Renewal has been a sore spot with your humble writer and I had the genuine feeling positive progress was made in a mutual understanding of the Mayor's as well as my sides of this issue. And in no small part I would like to think the Editorial Board of the local paper may have had a positive impact as well.

Final thought on this is why have a non-binding advisory vote when you could have a REAL VOTE for actual bonding. The Mayor and Finance Director said it would take a super majority to issue revenue bonds for the TVCC project.

THE GUARDIAN volunteered to write the question for the ballot but this offer was declined. Somehow my pledge to remain neutral is perceived as a conflict in this matter.

We anxiously await to see how this election effort moves forward for the good people of Calwell and the clarity of the question posed for the elction as well.

Team Garret and Caldwell Urban Renewal Are Raising Property Taxes Again

Team Garret and his merry men and women on the Caldwell Urban Renewal Board are going to ring in the new year with a plea to a judge to increase your property taxes next year to fund a $8.5 million building for TVCC. They are deeming this a "ordinary and necessary expense" for all of us to bear. The RAISE part comes from the easy pay part of their plan via tax anticipation bonding.

Property tax payers of Caldwell and all of Canyon County are going to get to fund two community colleges. There will be no voting on this so don't ask. Urban Renewal is once again abusing county property taxpayers without their permission.

All property taxpayers in Canyon County will fund this with their property taxes one way or another due to the funds siphoned off by urban renewal (increment taxes). It is a PONZI scheme most people do not understand. Urban renewal laws are quite simply a vehicle to circumvent the voters for big dollar spending projects. It's called THE PLAN.

In a discussion on Thursday (12-18) with the Mayor and the Finance Director, they want to keep the debt revenue ratio to 40% or less. This means they are comfortable borrwoing against 40% of anticipated property tax increment revenue for urban renewal projects. They are ready to leverage in the form of payments and carrying charges $2.4 million a year against the $6 million a year they already receive for Urban Renewal.

Urban renewal is funded with property taxes and not federal government money as most people would like to think. Urban renewal laws were set up by the state legislature to deal with urban blight. To date, very little of the urban renewal property taxes collected in Caldwell have gone to improve or renew blighted areas. Pork projects have dominated urban renewal spending. It is called "The Plan".

THE GUARDIAN learned today the City of Caldwell East Urban Renewal District is moving forward to issue $8.5 million in revenue bonds to fund TVCC in the Sky Ranch business park. This bonding will be in addition to $8 million in revenue bonds issued to subsidize water and sewer projects for developers. Bonds are like credit cards to these folks. Buy now and pay more later via the interst on the bonds.

The urban renewal board meeting will be this Thursday at 12:00 Noon at city hall to approve this next measure of property taxpayer abuse. The mayor and his finance director steadfastly have refused to put this up for a vote of the people.

The last meeting in early Dcember was attended by all the talking heads in favor of putting more debt on the already overburdened Caldwell and Canyon County property tax payers. It sparked a very enligtening editorial piece by the Idaho Press Tribune questioning why these matters are not put up for a vote of the people. This meeting will seal the deal and move it forward for a judge to approve their move without your approval. They are calling the TVCC project "ordinary and necessary". Most people paying their property taxes this week would disagree.

Urban renewal is the modern day equivalent of "TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION". And the bad news is most people have acquiesced in their opposition and rights to object to this abuse of taxpayers. State legislators know the abuses of urban renewal but continue to allow the abuses and pork spending of property tax dollars to continue.

See Don't Worry Be Happy Posting for Mayor Comments.

Commishes Commission Jail Study (Again?)

Well it looks like "jail planning" may have entered the Commishes vocabulary as well as their wish list for 2009 now that money is tight. They are now ready to spend near$10k to get a fix on the cost of building a new and improved 650 bed jail. All the usual suspects and threats abound with this latest effort. The ACLU, Idaho Sheriff's Standards and there may be more we are not yet aware of in the offing. ICRMP says they will continue to insure the county so that threat is off the table. Maybe they could set up a few buckets where the roof may be leaking as well.

The people we hired as leaders of the county are prepared to abandon $1.5 million in engineering studies for the 2,000 bed jail city and the 250 bed warehouse jail. Let's also not forget the false start on the Jerome property 825 bed jail project. Then there is the study done by Rocky Mountain Corrections a few years back that cost us all money. It will be interesting to see how they intend to market the concept of increased property taxes in this economy. The recent editorial the Commishes wrote in the local paper has not helped their cause on this at all. You can check that tome out on the IPT editor blog page.

Their first toss out to the taxpayers was $72.5 million for the Jerrome project. The 2,000 bed jail city was around $80 million for a good start on their second effort. The warehouse jail was pegged at $3.5 million before property and utility costs making this one around $10-15 million was a low-ball effort number three. Now we are getting the soft sell for $35-40 million for this latest attempt at a new jail to house 650 inmates.

The one question not getting answered is how much it will cost to staff, maintain and operate this new facility. If Canyon County is like anywhere USA the annual cost will be around $20 Million, The bond amortization and underwriting will be in the neighborhood of $4 million a year. So we have to come up with around $25 million a year to keep this jail project afloat.

The citizens committee that worked on the Hwy. 20/26 jail site was not given the whole truth when they made their selection for that site. The old saw about the ACLU, ICRMP insurance, Sheriff's Jail Standards etc. was bandied about by the Commishes and the Chief Civil Prosecutor and a short time line to get this jail project started or face some ill defined lawsuit threats. They used deceit to move the committee to their thinking on a jail site. In short, the process was nothing short of a sham per comments from several of the committee members.

If you want to see how good intentions can really go sour, type in Wapato Jail in your search engine and see the mess Portland, Oregon has created. Almost $60 million spent so far on a 550 bed jail and they don't have the money to operate it. I haven't checked lately but to date it has cost the sheriff his job, several commissioners their jobs and the public is really ticked off. Nobody has occupied it except a group of Boy Scouts because the don't have the cash to staff maintain and operate their new jail completed in 2004. Here is the link http://www.co.multnomah.or.us/dcj/oregon_live_wapato-prisonerofpolitics030608.pdf

The good news here is they have finally figured out they will need to ask permission to spend our money. This is a welcome change in attitude by our County Deciders. They ask and we get to decide ... finally!

Again, I am offering space to anyone who feels I am factually incorrect on any of this space to express their thoughts on this issue.