Since 2010, Lawton has been employed as principal management analyst at Solano County in California, and his current salary is $122,600 a year. He was the Solano County deputy administrator from 2005 to 2008 and had an annual salary of $135,000.
From YouTube via the email inbox…
I really like this last one. A thirty-year Solano County employee falsified $41,000 in overtime?
For what it’s worth, there it is. But does it sound as if Solano County, California has been just hummin' along?
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Now, mind you, this is the full speech clocking in at a whopping 38:12.
I was wondering, if Barry Oblahblah and Palin were to engage in fisticuffs, who do you suppose would win?
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I lost track by the third round...
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Update: YouTube dad says authorities pay visit; Daughter gets job offer
According to informed sources at Endless Mountain Outfitters, the 2012 Wyoming Valley RiverFest is scheduled for June 23-24, 2012.
Contained within the following video thingie may be the final pictures taken from beneath our one-time dueling 8th Street bridges.
2011 Wyoming Valley River Fest (advance recon paddle) 6:39
Ramming speed.
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Students, parents: Racial tensions sparked machete attack near GAR
The attack - minutes after dismissal on a street corner across from the GAR Junior/Senior High School property - was the most brazen and visible manifestation so far of the tension between Dominican students and black students at the school. It put parents and students on edge and compelled school officials and police to dramatically increase security.
A long-simmering battle for racial supremacy at a Wilkes-Barre high school precipitated the nearby machete attack Thursday that nearly cost a 15-year-old student his hand as he swung his arm to block another boy from a potentially fatally blow, according to students and parents whose children attend the school.
Two weeks ago, while working at a public housing project within walking distance of GAR, I bent over to pick up what I thought was a shiny quarter lying on the sidewalk. Nope, not my lucky day. What I swooped up was 10 pesos which were minted in Republica Dominicana. And my first thought was about how the demographics have been blown all to hell.
Oops! I meant, corrected.
I figure not many people can make this claim save for the police and paramedics, but I have and will continue to spent untold hours in all three of the public housing projects that serve as feeders for GAR. Just a few years ago, that number was four.
While it’s not necessarily the fault of the kids who are mostly products of their less than ideal environments, do not listen for a second to anyone who claims that acts of random violence are the fault of teachers, administrators or the school district’s upper management.
While very many of the staff probably deeply care about the general welfare of the students they are entrusted with, there are probably just as many that are relieved they didn’t have to shield somebody else from an incoming machete. While the warring ethic groups seek dominance, the staff might be content to just get home in one piece.
The way I see it, you can’t paint a masterpiece atop a piece of frayed burlap. You can try, but you ought not feel deflated when you fail.
I’ve mentioned how my daughter coached varsity sports at GAR. I told you how she put everything she had into turning a perennial doormat into a competitive squad, something she accomplished before setting off to finish her college years.
And I made mention of the fact that she spent over 1,000 of her own hard-earned dollars on “her girls.” And after she had resigned her position and coached her final game, I also reported how she had exited the gym only to find her car painted over with dog excrement.
But in her case, I found the weapon of choice interesting, because I had told her about how GAR was the dumping ground of the housing projects. I basically told her that you can’t shine excrement. I begged her to reconsider and take the same position at Coughlin, all to no avail.
If she was still banging her head against a wall by coaching there, how hard would she should push her girls, how demanding of them would she be, and how willing would she be to spar with outraged parents over bench time when in the back of her mind comes the swinging blade?
To my Democrat friends, well, you wanted diversity and we got it. We, not you, because I’m quite certain you choose to live nowhere near it.
GAR is the diversity dream on parade. It’s part Bronx, part Queens, part Camden, part Newark, part Philly, part Juvie Hall, part of all parts south of the undefended border and all parts welfare state.
Anywho, based on what I’ve consistently seen and heard, and what I will assuredly continue to see and hear, I’ve concluded that GAR is gone…it’s a lost cause. For all intents and purposes, it has become a big city school in a small city.
Gives a whole new meaning to “Duck & Cover,” doesn’t it?
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In Fred’s case, his accusatory rhetoric and his very targeted invective occasionally crossed the line, and his employer came under fire for it. I imagine that’s why he was dismissed from his position. Then again, while Fred regularly referred to county officials as liars and cheaters and thieves, he seems to have been vindicated of late.
I once saw Ambrose so frustrated at a city council meeting while jawing at council, he punched his open palm with a clenched fist. I imagine he did that rather than lash out in anger. I loved that fiery guy and I always felt like I was in the presence of Moses when he got to interpreting the good book known as the city charter.
Nancy and Mary, ever the ladies they were raised to be, used words like corruption, transparency and accountability. Before Mr. Flood was elected to anything, he was impressive every time I heard him speak at public meetings.
While each of these folks varied in their approaches and their varying abilities to resist becoming too incendiary and too accusatory in public, they fought the battles they felt the need to fight in open, public forums. And fought those battles without employing slander, libel, defamation and all of the other good stuff.
Enter social media gibberish…
Unlike yesterday’s dogged heroes, the would-be activist/reformer of the present day Wilkes-Barre resorts to slander, libel, defamation and all of the other good stuff as if by rote. But let us not forget the baseless allegations, the misrepresentations, the constant grandstanding, the trumped-up charges, the do-it-yourself lawyering and the penchant for playing judge, jury and executioner, and all in one newspaper article, one blog post or one ill-advised social media appearance.
The following appeared in the comment section of the Times Leader early this morning…
kevin dougherty Just now
X.X. XXXXXX raped and killed a young girl in 1990.
I Xed out the name, not the person who actually posted the comment. It has since been removed by the Times Leader upon request.
Even though this comment was beyond ill-advised, scandalous, hurtful and baseless, it’s really not much worse than the usual, the typical swill the would-be local activists post on social media outlets on an almost daily basis. And I never understood how these people who are so easily self-impressed in their budding genius could be so reckless with their colorful commentary.
Every-name-in-book succinctly describes what I’ve heard every city official called during just this past year. Just yesterday I saw that one of the mayor’s underlings was again called a liar. Again.
This morning I read that an activist/blogger is daring current and former city officials to sue those they believe they were slandered by. Another activist/ blogger is accusing the mayor of being a car thief. And the city beat reporter who made them all, all dozen of them famous for a fortnight is leaving town as of tonight. So, without a totally sympathetic ear at a local newspaper, we can expect the already out-of-control and accusatory rhetoric and vitriol to get even more venomous on the Internet.
Since the primary election of 2011, citizen involvement in this city has reached a low so awfully low, it’s now looks like it might come back to haunt those who can not or will not control themselves to any degree.
That noise? No, that’s not an approaching tornado.
That’s Ambrose violently spinning in his grave.
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But first, an NFL fun fact: The NFC East, from which the NFL champion New York Football Giants currently hail, has now claimed 12 Super Bowl trophies. And not a single one of them are prominently displayed anywhere near Philthydumpia.
You green freaks went and got the sexy dog killer. And we, well, we got ourselves a boring pocket quarterback. Sucks to be you.
And to my hapless, but frenetic email friend, when the corner can't jam at the line of scrimmage outside of the hash marks, the safety usually can't come over the top in time to shut down a deep sideline route in a basic Cover 2 defense. Hence, Mario Manningham goes 38 yards down the sideline and the Jints ultimately win.
It ain't rocket science by any measure, but it is far more complicated than the casual one-night-a-year observer might want to believe.
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While a couple of the names, faces, cities and teams may have changed, I watched what happened in this dated video play out almost exactly during the past month.
While I pretty much hated the man when I was a sprat growing up in very western Connecticut, my step-father Leo and I made it a habit to jump on a bullet train to NYC and take in many a Giant's game.
Asked many years ago why I so completely loathed the man but grew to absolutely adore his favorite team, I remarked that while we were in NYC, while we were watching the Giants, and while we were bar-hopping post-game in hopes of rubbing elbows with those now-legendary black-and-white Giants, he was not cursing at me, he was not hitting me nor was he being mean to me in any manner.
When Leo and I were off in search of all things New York Football Giants, rarity of rarities, I felt like a son.
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