CITY ATTORNEY RESPONDS TO GRAND JURY REPORT

ELSINORE MAGAZINE 2

City Attorney Ducts Independent Audit A 2004-2005 Grand Jury Report HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that the City Attorney,Barbara Liebold, have her billings audited and once again the Grand Jury has been wholly ignored by the attorney and the city council. Instead, the answer to that recommendation has been"Oh look at how wonderful our city attorney is and all the millions of dollars she have saved the city." This statement being made without one shred of verifiable documentation!!! And without any details as to how these wonderfull savings were accomplished!!! EM2,however, has documentation on MILLIONS of TAXPAYER DOLLARS were WASTED at the recommendations of our so called City Attorney's watch who, to this day swears that she is the attorney for the City Council not the City Attorney. The LOUSY excuses that have been given not to do the audit.......................................................... 1.) The City Attorney currently provides detailed billing of all activities performed. Ha! Ha! yea right!!! The public is unable to review the billings without blackouts on what was billed. 2.) The City currently retains an independent third party to audit the city's financial records every year. "BS"!! EM2 is aware that a regular auditor used yearly does not do INDEPENDENT AUDITS. That is a hogwash excuse!!! the auditors just scrape the surface on what is given them by the department heads no indepth detailed auditing is done. It is mostly random. QUESTIONS: 1.) How would the public know whether or not the so called detailed billing information is correct when the information is BLACKED OUT!!!!!!????? One cannot tell if what should only take 2hrs to do was actually charged to 10hrs of work. And how is it possible to charge the TAXPAYERS 50 hrs per week on one issue(40 hr work week) when many issues have also been charged to that same week??? The public have no accounting as to what is billed under the 50 hour per month retainer BASIC SERVICES oppossed to the hourly charges for SPECIAL SERVICES. The public has the RIGHT to know and determine this. IT'S PUBLIC FUNDS BEING SPENT. 2.) If an individual is HIRED to do a specific job for the city WHY ALL THE OUTRAGEOUS RETAINER FEES!!!??? HEY! GUESS WHAT!!! Now That the "Grand Jury Report Response" is already done and has been sent to the Grand Jury, (pack of lies), our wonderful City Attorney is going to hit the City up for a WHOPPING $1,500.00 retainer fee raise that would bring the retainer fee to $8500.00 per month. And also SHE wants a raise in services from $155.00 PER HOUR to $170.00 PER HOUR!!! Our City Council, gullible and pride riden that it is, will undoubtedly vote for these outrageous raises on Tuesday's meeting, September 27,2005, to keep everything covered up and going the same way, as always!!! THIS COUNCIL APPEAR TO BE VERY GOOD AT KEEPING WRONG DOINGS COVERED UP. They also appear to work infavor of corruption. FUNDS TAKEN WRONGFULLY BY STAFF. NO ONE IN FAVOR OF HAVING THE FUNDS RETURNED. FOLKS GET DOWN TO THE CITY COUNCIL MEETING AND SPEAK UP!!! YOUR HARD EARNED TAXDOLLARS ARE BEING SPENT WRONGFULLY. It starts at 7pm but you must be there to fill out a request to speak before the meeting gets started.

A City Council That Is In Oversight And Denial

Elsinore Magazine 2 September 15, 2005 It took the City of Lake Elsinore's councilpersons Genie Kelley, 7 years, Bob Schiffner, 6 years,Thomas Buckley and Daryl Hickman, 2 years and Mayor Magee, 9 months after his election, to see that former city manager Richard Watenpaugh was not competent and used the office of City Manager for Personal Gain!!! He mislead the citizens completely on the cities finances in the running of our city. Even after going into close session to finally make this determination, Babs Leibold came out crying at watenpaugh’s termination. The council, under the threat that Mr. Watenpaugh will sue the city if they fire him, was sent away with a hefty, UNDESERVED, retirement package. Number 1.) He was AWARDED about 9 months of his salary pay. Number 2.)The AWARDS also included a Health and Wellness advancement of $3,000.00 after according to a cursory report done by Mayor Magee that Mr. Watenpaugh had been paid $150 a month when it should have been $100 per month.

With the City Council's approval, this so called leader LIED and MISINFORMED the public as to city debts, stadium debts, home owner bond debts, etc.

If this council had USED the information they knew about Watenpaugh’s improprieties, he would have been terminated a long time ago, and rightfully so.

Our City was left, and still is, under a heavy debt situation, with a new City Manager who was APPOINTED by some of the same persons who APPOINTED Mr. Watenpaugh. Who,by the way, has had no experience at the City Managers position, who is unqualified, temperamental, argumentative and talks over everyone and anyone like a locomotive who disagrees with how the city is being run, .

To get to the point, Mr. Watenpaugh AND his "VERY, VERY CLOSE FRIEND" and "ASSISTANT" Marlene Best, were allowed to resign instead of being terminated and or indicted!!!

Citizens, EM2 wants you to know that Mr. Watenpaugh immediately took a position as interim City Manager in the city of Calimesa in February. It is hard for EM2 to understand that our city did not inform Calimesa about his egregious improprieties. But even so, it only took less than six months for the City Council of Calimesa to discover what kind of a, so called leader, this man is and was immediately terminated.

The CALIMESA council noticed such shenanigans as too many property taxes all of a sudden, with weed abatement bills as high or higher than $2000.00. Also Mr. Watenpaugh hired an engineer, who was a member of our planning department at the City of Lake Elsinore, and then tried to hire a consultant to do the job that the engineer was to do.

Obviously the Calimesa City Council is not as corrupt as they are in Lake Elsinore. That problem got nipped in the bud very quickly. Mr. Watenpaugh’s last day was September 9, 05. Lake Elsinore's City Council is oversighted on just about everything!!! Why? Because they are the problem. As one very wise man said,"This council is a citizen's worse enemy." Any and all persons involved in such scandalous behavior need to be punished!!! The punishment needs to fit the crime, therefore restoring the faith of the citizens. Knowing what we know a push for this to happen is needed by all the citizens in this city.

The to often OVERSIGHTEDNESS of this council is way beyond reasoning. Any more would put this council in DENIAL. IT’S CRIMINAL!!!!! Mayor Bob Magee made an incorrect statement at Tuesday’s Sept. 13 council meeting when he stated that the council runs the city. Not so! The council SETS POLICY AND LAWS. These policies and laws are enforced through the city manager. The city manager is responsible for the running of the city through a staff under his guide.

In turn the City Council is RESPONSIBLE to seeing that the manager is FOLLOWING all POLICIES and LAWS set forth by the City Council, including State and Federal laws under their watch. If they have been direlict in their responsibilities and duties to all procedures and how PUBLIC FUNDS ARE SPENT, then they become liable together with those who have BROKEN the LAW and misused Public Funds not in keeping with the law and policy. Instead they have been following their own practices not policy that states public Funds shall only be spent for public benefit. It is inconceivable that any staff member would not know that they cannot personally use funds that do not belong to them for their personal or any other persons gain. Honestly, a junior high school student can figure that one out. Staff throwing parties for their own pleasurable benefit using a CREDIT CARD PAID WITH PUBLIC FUNDS DOES NOT QUALIFY AS PUBLIC BENEFIT. Especially when the Public at large was not allowed to participate. This is a NOGO!!! It only takes a PERRY MASON sort to work diligently in GATHERING all the information leading up to these wrong doings for the sake of JUSTICE!!! We must not WAIVER BUT FIGHT. "I REPEAT IT SIR, WE MUST FIGHT FOR JUSTICE."as said by Patrict Henry.

Instead of Mayor Magee always pointing his thumb and index finger at Supervisor Bob Buster, he needs to take a look at the other 3 fingers that are aimed squarely back at himself, pointing out the bureaucratic image he himself is projecting.

A flim flam man who disreguards public opinion.

EM2 perceives that Supervisor Bob Buster is a far better Statesman than the mayor would ever attempt to be.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE HEAVY RAINS COMES

ELSINORE MAGAZINE 2

September 6, 2004

In view of the tragic disaster that has hit New Orleans. What will the city of

Lake Elsinore do if 2005-2006 become a wet year as

did in 1980 or even more and floods should happen?

Levees break where as flood waters rush in?

A lesson should be learned from the New Orleans disaster.

Are city officials or the City Council planning for the worse?

Will the City Council take another serious look at

the development of homes in the back basin of

the flood plain elevation level of 1267 msl for the

floor level?

In 1980 flooding reached above 1265 msl, less than

2 feet above the flood level allowed for new construction.

EM2 has never agreed with development in the flood

plain behind the levee. Its like begging for trouble. A

high risk potential and the city council would be

prudent to put human safety before dollar bills. Lets not set

death traps for more needless drownings. Enough already!!!!!

Home buyer beware of purchasing a home in an already designated flood

plain especially below 1270. Better yet 1280 just to be safe.

Mr. Bob Brady you are the city manager at the head of the chain of

command, and are responsible for the smooth operating and

safety of the city in every manner or form. The rainy

season is near, are you coordinating emergency plans with all

neccessary agencies i.e. FEMA, ARMY COORS OF ENGINEERS?

Are you scheduling meetings with citizens to inform them

of saftey measurers they should take in the event

of flooding or any other diaster? Think about it!!

Mr. Mayor and City Council, are you thinking about

making saftey proposals in the event a diaster should occur

or are your agendas to full of development and bond issue

plans to even think about the citizens safety?

pre position is prudent.