Life goes on and nothing changes. Two, three, four, or perhaps five grand juries will do the trick.

Property tax funded radios, and heart monitor links never purchased. Really? No problem, Stone just doubled the Pine Cove and mountain property tax funded contract, maybe that will buy the monitors, hmmm.

The Pine Cove parcel tax already had automatic responsible tax increases built in. I guess they wanted more.

There’s nothing like an unwanted threat to breach a safety contract and hold a community hostage to get
a little extra. Really? What catastrophe demanded a doubling of the contract fees, fiscal mismanagement and six-figure union pay with raises, an old union trick. Just tell ’em pay cuts long enough to panic everyone until they get more money.

The new grand jury investigation found at www.riverside.courts.ca.gov/grandjury/12auditorcontroller_internalaudit.pdf cites the following, “Certain special districts have been habitually delinquent, as much as two to five years, in conducting their mandated annual audits.

“In the case of one special district, Idyllwild Fire Protection District, the Management Discussion and Analysis was omitted from the report to the Audit Division at the request of the special district board. This omission violates Government Accounting Standard Board Statement No. 34, the rights of taxpayers to know the financial status of their district.”

The grand jury continues “The Auditor-Controller must review submitted audits from special districts and take the initiative to ensure that special district boards are taking corrective action on disclosed financial and performance deficiencies.”

That finding sets standards for this board folks — [Commissioners Jerry] Buchanan, [Dr. Charles “Chip”] Schelly, [Jeannine Charles-]Stigall, [Pete] Caparelli and [Larry] Donohoo. It also holds members of the board accountable for repeatedly and willfully violating the law against our interests.

The grand jury recommends investigation of the collapse and consolidation of IFPD. We should follow the jury findings and solutions, not blame Pine Cove residents for department misconduct.

It’s stupid to think, a [patient] survey or extra money will fix this other than to smear it. Misconduct terminations would.

Firefighters and EMTs should be heroes, not incompetent rejects distrusted by fellow firefighters and EMTs. Hence the dissolution or consolidation recommendation [given to] the grand jury through expert witness testimony.

Talk about the safety of my family and those who are sworn to protect us jeopardized.

If IFPD refuses to fix itself, then replace it. Riverside County Fire stands ready to replace each employee; and to think they will do it for free. And a refund doing what we already pay property taxes for.

Jeff Smith
Pine Cove

Editor’s note: The grand jury report referenced in this letter was released in June 2012 and was a report on the Internal Audit Division of the Riverside County Auditor-Controller Office.

It did single out the deficiencies in the IFPD audits, as an example of the inadequacies of county oversight. There was no further reference to IFPD in this audit.

The grand jury recommendation for collapse and consolidation of IFPD referenced by Mr. Smith is from an earlier, entirely separate grand jury report.

4 COMMENTS

  1. Jeeze Jeff…. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. For you of all people to be calling others incompent rejects is laughable. The problems at IFPD can be layed at the feet of a certain former Chief and a couple of former board members. You have shown yourself ( in my humble opinion) to be nothing more than a mean, spiteful, small little man in a large mans body. You have no credibility Jeff. If there are still problems that need to be addressed, let someone else do it.

  2. Coward? Anthrex threat? No Jeff, not me. I'll keep the handle because this is about you and your lack of personal ethics. I, like so many others on the hill, are just tired of your bomb throwing. You are not truthful Jeff, and you know it. And so does everyone else. Like I said, you have no credibility. If you really care about the health and safety of the hill, let someone else raise the issues because no one takes you seriously.

  3. jeff…. are you talking about things that happened several yrs ago? I thought maybe something had happened recently, but you are still harping about things that were settled long ago. Reprimands given, sanctions imposed….. why are you trying to make it sound like some current is going on? These things were dealt with long ago. You know this, but I shouldn't think that you'd be honest in your communication…. silly me. I'm not going to comment on this anymore, no point in rehashing things over and done with years ago.