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Judgment Finalized In Legal Battle Over Golden Hill Maintenance Assessment District
Many thanks to the people who have worked so hard to bring about justice to the property owners of Golden Hill and South Park involved. Hal, many thanks :) and Ms B you are a champion. My husband and I had just moved to GH in 2006, happy to purchase a home with no HOA. Then we got hit with this GGH MAD BS. What a learning experience to realize and understand that your own elected officials and government actively work against you, the tax payer, in order to benefit themselves and their cronies. We were double taxed for the same benefit. Well, ok we also got those great *cough* Clean Green and Safe banners and those nice logo embroidered polo shirts for the contractors given our funds to come and... um, swept a few bits of dirt off the curb in front of our home which is already swept by the city each week. When I actually came home mid day and saw the waste of my funds for this I was appalled. Further I was appalled that my "special" tax money was going to fund new/existing city employees who also required a taxpayer funded pensions and perks... the city seems to grow it's own need for expansion into our pocketbook. My jaw dropped to read that the city hired Marco, wow. Thanks to all!— February 13, 2012 8:52 p.m.
Mad About Getting Rid of MAD
They used my money to put up some communal flower pots along Broadway... said flower pots will now need regular maintenance and weeding, replacement of dead flowers and regular watering... seems this MAD just creates reasons to sustain itself. They used my money to dump a hand full of river rock in the well of the said dying tree in front of my home for "aesthetics." I could have put the rocks there for free, I have plenty in my yard and in fact give them away free to neighbors. The rocks I removed because they had ants now nesting in them and the trash from people walking by as well as cigarette butts were collecting in the rocks and they also provided a great growing ground for weeds... Sheesh! Please GGHCDC and MAD folks, don't do me any more favors because you are creating more work, cost and problems than you can ever resolve! What you all did to the property owners was a travesty at best and 2 judges have told you that. Get over it, disband it as you were ordered to do and if you have some folks here who want to donate their money toward doggie poop stations and benches for merchants please take up a voluntary collection. This MAD needs to go and the only people who support it are the ones who are gaining from it.— October 5, 2011 9:03 p.m.
Mad About Getting Rid of MAD
What?! I have NOT changed my mind at all!!! The services I have "come to expect"?!!! The services provided thus far have already been paid for through my regular property taxes and this "refuse collection from public waste containers, tree maintenance, street and sidewalk cleanup and large litter removal" is the biggest pile of ... ever stepped in! Graffiti Removal: Done this myself from the moment I moved here, others around me do it as well. Beyond this, we already pay for this service through the city via our property tax & anyone can call the hotline to have it removed, how is this so special a service?? The city does a questionable job of removal anyway, as well as the MAD and the citizens have done a much better job, because we actually care about our homes and neighborhoods. Public waste containers: "MAD" money extorted from me paid to for, now I have to pay to have them emptied. Get rid of them and we don't have to pay to have them emptied. Tree Maintenance: paid for by the city through my taxes, but now I pay again through my MAD fee, and they came out once in 3 years and trimmed... a few branches off the DYING tree in front of my house. I can do that myself. Street and sidewalk cleanup: I had the joy of coming home mid day recently to find a nice tan truck in front of my home with 2 men in nice tan slacks and tan polo shirts with the Clean Green & Save logo I PAID for with my extorted MAD funds embroidered on their shirts. They got out of the truck and used a little dust broom to sweep the NOTHING in front of my home for a few moments and then left. BTW 40 percent of this MAD money they extort from us goes to pay the city and overhead and also paid for the "Clean Green & Safe" branding - not a reasonable use of my money! They used MY money to put up benches in front of retail establishments. Retail establishments should pay for benches outside their stores, not me. They used my money to pay for doggie poop collection stations around the park. I don't have a dog and it is the responsibility of dog owners to take care of their dog's poop, not mine.— October 5, 2011 9:02 p.m.
Spread the Wealth
Dear Surfpuppy619, You are actually pathetic to say that 50 percent of what we pay to this MAD going to administrative costs is "good." Not one penny of this should go to administrative cost because all money collected by law needs to go to "direct benefit" of the particular property owner. The fact that we are already paying for Pedro's salary and now we have to pay even more directly out of my pocketbook to pay Pedro directly, well, not happy and not good and most of all... not legal! Here is an example of how my MAD money is spent: A few months ago the MAD decided that putting river rocks in the tree wells along Broadway would be a good thing because it would "stop the trash, stop the dog poop/pee," keep it cleaner. Well since they have put the river rock in the very small tree well in front of my house (we paid thousands to brick the walkway in) I have had trash and cigarette butts caught up in the rocks, the dogs pee on the rocks and as well I now have an ant problem because the ants like the moisture under the rocks and they are currently building a nest that I will have to pay to exterminate. Beyond even all this, I have the same river rocks in my backyard that I am getting rid of and you all made me pay for the "privilege" of having you put cheap rocks in front of my house that I had to remove? The GGHCDC MAD is nothing more than a Robin Hood tactic to make me pay double. Period.— May 2, 2010 10:40 p.m.
Bypassing Bylaws in Golden Hill
The Doobiest: Bravo to you: "Remember: Rome fell when citizens became subjects. The political class ceased to really care, and started doing their own thing. That’s why I'm passionate. I want Golden Hill to be the best community it deserves to be. So I wonder: am I citizen, or a subject to the kings that want to be?" I'm afraid this local MAD is a microcosm of exactly this and we are becoming "subjects" on the local, city, state and federal level. Re-reading the last comment by GHsupporter, it is obvious that we are just subjects to the GGHCDC/MAD and they want no one to question them or what they are doing with our money (i.e. shut up we know what is good for you). I too am very passionate about my community in Golden Hill and I, like you, want my community to be the best it can be. There is a lot of potential here, but that is not being addressed by the GGHCDC/MAD. They have their pet projects which benefit a few (please see comments 20 and 21 by HonestGovernment). I walk by Golden Hill Fountain almost every day and so far I've been treated to men "making love," people doing drugs, a few friendly homeless and a lot of trash. It is really a beautiful part of Balboa Park with great trails and I would hope that the city would revitalize it and keep it safe in conjunction with what it is, part of Balboa Park. That is an issue for the entire city, not something a few property owners in Golden Hill should be responsible for, it is a public city park. Of interest to one or two of you out there, would be my recent sightings of the "hand street sweeper crew," I was informed at one of the GGHCDC/MAD meetings that the "enhanced" street sweeping was sweeping that would only be done in the business districts (shouldn't the businesses be paying for that?) so I was rather surprised this last week when I was leaving for work and spotted one of the Urban Corps sweeping the corner of my neighbor's yard. They are not the most tidy of people, but gosh, that is for them to sweep in front of their house, why should I be paying for that? PS – Urban Corps – used by the city for graffiti removal and cleaning etc and now hired by the GGHCDC/MAD to do exactly what they were already doing paid for with our property tax dollars and now funded by MAD money so the city now has more funds for… what? Bread and Circuses.— September 20, 2009 8:48 p.m.
Bypassing Bylaws in Golden Hill
WOW! GHsupporter, on your comment #17: That was the biggest pile of "thugly" rhetoric I've seen yet. "Let’s put things in perspective about what is really at stake. We're talking about graffiti, mattress pickups, garbage cleanups, etc." Let's really put this into perspective: those are all things that we already pay for through our property taxes and all anyone had to do was call the city to report it (I know, I have, and it was before your little MAD fiasco was forced on us by a rigged majority vote from the city itself!). And what the heck does being dem, repub or independent have to do with this anyway? You speak as if only white people are repubs and all the rest are dems, and as if that really matters at all in this issue! What I'd really like to know with your quoted statistics "What we really have here is a small group of white anti-tax zealots, in a community that is 80% Latino, pretending that they somehow represent the majority." is this: given that district 8 was gerrymandered to include parts of the city down by the border (nowhere near Golden Hill) so that it would create a solid Latino voting bloc so Hueso could get on the City Council, and it also include Logan Heights (predominantly Latino) but yet the GGHCDC MAD is only the area involving the parts of Southpark (district 3) and Golden Hill (district 8) that are around Balboa Park, AND what is the composition of Latino/white/black property owners who were actually eligible to vote on this MAD? I will bet you it is nowhere near 80 percent Latino. BTW, what percentage of the GGHCDC is Latino and is it representative of the 80 percent you quote? And Pedro doesn't count :)! And what the heck is this about a "next election"? There is no next election and you know it! And regarding your statement: "Well, tax whiners, hear this: you weren't democratically elected, you don't have a God-given right to sit on an oversight committee, and you absolutely do not have a right to destroy the work of our MAD, which was democratically approved in a real vote. Your removal from the oversight committee is not only a good thing, but it is legal." Wow again! WE THE PEOPLE did not have any kind of a vote regarding all of you in the CDC who are spending our money! And WE THE PEOPLE who are funding this MAD have no say in how the money is spent now that we all know the truth which is that you lied to the people when you initially told the people that the oversight committee would be elected by the people to bring their voice into the spending. The GGHCDC which is not elected by the people controls our money and makes the decisions as to what our money is spent on so you bet your thugly little behind I will stand up and I will speak my dissent to this abortion of democracy called the GGHCDC MAD!— September 20, 2009 12:46 p.m.
Bypassing Bylaws in Golden Hill
Golden Hill Supporter - you are correct that "No other oversite committee has ever been chosen by election." but that is not the issue here. The issue is that when the GGHCDC came around trying to gain support for this idiocy called the MAD, they told the property owners that we could all rest assured that our interest would be safe because we would have an oversite committee of ELECTED residents to ensure that our voice was heard and everything would be on the up and up. We were assured that our assessments would never go up unless approved by this ELECTED oversite committee which would represent the residents. The elected folks on the current committee have done a very fine job, the best they could given the nonsense the GGHCDC has been pulling at every turn. This MAD has been nothing but a waste of time and property owner money. $5000 dollars of our money just spent to pay for a logo design that will go on stickers and refrigerator magnets (at what cost???) indeed! And, Golden_Hill_Supporter, as far as "The GGH MAD is accepting nominations for any qualified member of the community and the panel revewing the nominations consitsts of various community groups, not just CDC board members." that doesn't provide any comfort for the property owners given that the "various community groups" all have ties to the CDC and share some members in common. Gosh, almost forgot, the property owners were also promised that 100 percent of the funds collected to go into projects to better the community. Well that wasn't true either - about 30 percent of the funds go into administration. Thankfully some of those "obstructionists" you speak of were able to eliminate some of the outrageous waste. The Greater Golden Hill MAD is a travesty and nothing more than some special interest groups picking our pockets to support their pet projects.— September 18, 2009 3:32 p.m.