Calhouns Can(n)ons

Calhoun’s Cannons, The Bay News, Morro Bay, CA, For Jan 31 07


Yes, It’s The January 22nd RWQCB’s Ongoing Disgraceful DumbShow Presentation of “Torquemada’s Mad Hatter Tea Party & Auto-de-fe Public Beheading & Traveling CDO Show Of The Los Osos 45, Part, Uh, Oh, Heck, I Can’t Remember, There Have Been So Many of Them”

First, the dumbshow boffo laffs as The Grand Inquisitor, Reed Sato, tried to claim that NOBODY connected with the RWQCB and/or staff would ever, EVER use the phrase . . . “vacate the premises . . “ as what will happen if the CDO’s drop dead date of 2011 comes and there is no sewer to hook up to. He further tried to make clear that NOBODY, except a COMPLETE MORON, would ever, EVER think, for a moment, that “vacating the premises” was even on the radar, was even the REMOTEST possibility, so he couldn’t figure out WHERE THESE STUPID CDO PEOPLE GOT THAT IDEA, THAT PHRASE, THOSE WORDS!

Until RWQCB staff member Matt Thompson was asked (under oath) if he ever said to a CDO recipient that if there were no sewer by 2011 “. . . you’d have to vacate the premises. . .” and Matt answered, “Uh, yeah, I guess I did . . .”

Oh, right. THAT’S where these stupid CDO people got that idea. From the staff go-to guy, the Main Man, the Primary Contact for all things CDOish, the Horse’s Mouth.

Then, The Weirdness: The RWQCB’s attorneys have fought from day one to make sure NOTHING gets into the record, except what they want there, which always raises the question: What is that Board scared might get into the record? If it’s irrelevant, a “real court of law” will dismiss it. If it IS relevant, a “real court of law” will have need of it. So what’s the problem? Unless this Board is afraid of certain evidence even as they deny the need for any evidence to justify what they’re doing.

Next up, The Scary Part: From the start, the game here has not been a legitimate process intended on solving a real problem. Even though the requirements of pump, repair, inspect is given as the reason for issuing a CDO, evidence had already been presented that this mitigation would NOT do diddly to the groundwater during the short delay until the county completes its new wastewater project. But, this process does have one clear function as a blandly deniable illegal electioneering tactic for the homeowners’ upcoming 218 vote by tying their vote directly and ultimately to the requirement to “vacate [your] premises” if the vote fails.

Hence the CDO tactic of moving the goal posts, changing the rules, even sending out some critical time sensitive documents that demanded responses within very tight time frames using a postal meter WITH THE WRONG YEAR ON IT, constantly morphing the language of the CDOs in an effort to create a Kafkaesque process designed to confuse, harass, exhaust and keep The Los Osos 45 chasing their tails until, under exhausted duress, they’d finally sign anything, thereby turning the fate of their property over to a bunch of guys who didn’t know how to set a postal meter correctly.

But it was the Board itself that remained the curious dark star in this proceeding. CDO recipient Bill Moylan challenged the Board to stop what they were doing since it wasn’t necessary, made no sense and that they alone had the power to stop harassing sick old people with a pointless procedure that was causing real damage to people’s health and lives.

The Board members and Staff sat passive and indifferent. Had their actions damaged people? Oh, yes. They knew that. They’d seen first hand evidence of what this process was doing to people. Were their policies irrational? Contradictory? Bait & Switchy? Mad Hatterish? Pointless? Intended to beat citizens down into exhaustion? Oh, yes. They knew that too.

But they simply didn’t care. To choose an ethical and common sense approach might actually require the smallest effort. Clearly that was out of the question. And to actually care about the people appearing before them would take courage they either didn’t have or chose not to have.

Instead, they again portrayed themselves as helpless victims, washing their soft hands of any responsibility, taking refuge in rules they had invented in order protect themselves, choosing expediency over meaningful action.

Finally turning away, smiling secretly sadistic smiles, these frightened, passive men, men who were faced with a moral decision, instead reached for a self-serving hankie, then left the room.