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.