Calhouns Can(n)ons

HOLY COW. TIME TRAVEL COMES TO LOS OSOS! QUICK, WATSON, BOOK ME A FLIGHT!

Ah, yes, Holiday Time here in Sewerville. The stockings are hung with care, the mice are scurrying about, things are in the wind or hanging out to dry or running for cover or moving to France or something.

The State Revolving Fund Loan went bye-bye for now. This may be A Good Thing since trying to twist into knots to preserve that loan involved so many tangles to the whole Tri-W plan that cutting free MAY allow the community to get that millstone from around their necks so they can start looking seriously at alternatives. In other words, evidence first, verdict later instead of vice versa.

A whole bunch of lawsuits filed against the previous CSD Board have been settled, thus clearing the decks for -- no doubt -- about a jillion more to come. The Tribune story concering same fails to note just which 5 lawsuits were settled --Lord, there were so many, hard to keep track. But the CSD has retained Burke, Williams & Sorensen (who helped write the Measure B initiative, if memory serves, and went to court to sue the old CSD when they went to court to try to stop the Measure from being put on the ballot -- ah, such tangled webs we weave.) The Trib quotes interim General Manager Bleskey as saying that BW&S were hired because "Their specialty is dealing with messes."

Boy, did THEY come to the right town.

And now, a Dec 8 cover letter from the CSD to Marshall W. Davert, Vice President of Montgomery Watson Harza (the firm that designed and was acting as contract manager for the Tri-W sewer plan/plant) giving notice that MWH is in "violation of Government Code 12650, the California "False Claims Act."

Specifically, it cites that "The Contract . . . purportedly signed on September 1, 1999, by Bruce Buel for the LOCSD and attested to by Karen Vega purportedly on the same date . Carol Tate, a Vice President for MWH also purports to have executed the Contract on Sept 1, 1999." The letter contends that the contract may be invalid because the LOCSD Board didn't approve Agenda Item No 13 concering this contract until November 4th.

Here's how the letter puts it: "The date of execution of the Contract is September 1, 1999. It appears that the date of execution of the Contract is in conflict with the date of the Board's November 4, 1999 authorization. There is no provision in the Board's authorization to back-date the Contract."

Further, "There is no record of the LOCSD Board of Director's taking any action to ratify the Contract." And, weirdly, according to the letter, "On October 22, 1999, the LOCSD entered into a contract that established an employment relationship with Mr. Bruce Buel as the General manager, . . . Mr. Buel's first day of service as the General Manager was November 16, 1999. "

Further still, "Mr. Buel was not the General Manager of the LOCSD until November 16, 1999. Since Mr. Buel was not employed by the District until November 15, 1999, he was not an agent for the District and had no authority to execute the Contract and he had no authority to backdate the Contract."

Aw, Jeeeze. Does somebody gotta lotta 'splainin' to do, some more? Or, happier thought, Has Los Osos accidentally stumbled on the secret of Time Travel? And is now able to go back to the future?

Yes. Los Osos. Never a dull moment.