Dean Andal: I'm a staunch advocate of the law I violated
How nice.
Andal said he lobbied at least one Delta College board member but said he never received any confidential, closed-session information from any elected official.
“If someone had tried to give me closed-session information, I would have stopped it,” Andal said. “I am very experienced with the requirements of the Brown Act.”
Andal called himself a staunch advocate of the Brown Act, a state law which spells out how publicly elected boards must conduct themselves in both public and closed sessions. Elected officials cannot disclose what was said in closed session and the law limits the topics under which they are permitted to hold discussions outside of the public eye.
Delta College Trustee Ted Simas, however, was quoted in a Stockton Record story of Aug. 21, 2006, saying that Andal had called him on the telephone several hours after the board concluded its Feb. 9 meeting and “had information that could have been obtained only by board members in closed session.” Simas said Andal told him that two college trustees had provided details of the closed-session negotiations to Kamilos. Andal was quoted in the same story saying that he did not remember the conversation.
So a staunch advocate of a law who claims to know its every detail just can't remember a conversation that would violate it. This is the explanation from a person who running for Congress and calling for a restoration of ethics and conduct? Weak sauce.
McNerney votes to eviscerate 4th Amendment
Short version of what McNerney voted for:
If the Executive Branch asks telecom companies to knowingly violate existing laws (FISA) to spy on American citizens without a warrant for several years after 9/11, that's OK with me.
Inexcuseable.
Full explanation of this issue
here.
Roll call
here.
McNerney holds firm to deny Iraq war funding
McNerney voted to deny $162 Billion in unconditional funds to continue the war in Iraq. Roll call
here. Make no mistake, this was no easy vote McNerney with the GI Bill included in the package.
Andal's ethics on display
One of the three grand prongs of Andal's campaign platform is Ethics.
Whoops...
The San Joaquin Delta College Board of Trustees has wasted millions of taxpayer dollars and violated open government laws by discussing closed-session matters outside its meetings, charges a San Joaquin County civil grand jury report released Wednesday morning.
The seven-page report found the board made decisions that have "caused serious problems'' and that trustees were "ill-prepared'' to handle the Measure L funds, a $250 million school bond approved by San Joaquin County voters in 2004.
[...]
At a closed-session meeting held by the board on Feb. 9, 2006, the college's attorney and administrative team said a developer would be missing the deadline for delivery of letters of credit, resulting in a breach of contract. The board then discussed the possibility of returning to a deal offered by the city of Tracy to put the campus on the corner of 11th Street and Chrisman Road, according to the report.
[...]
The day after the closed-session meeting, the report says, phone calls and a faxed letter indicated that one or more board members had relayed confidential information about the "breach of contract'' discussion to the developer and his consultant, Dean Andal, the Republican nominee for the 11th Congressional District seat in November.
"If true, this is a violation of the Brown Act,'' the report reads. "The Grand Jury has no confidence in the Delta College Board of Trustees as they are currently constituted.''
Andal was out of the area Wednesday and unavailable for comment, a campaign spokeswoman said. Kamilos did not return calls seeking comment.
Andal to McNerney: Help! Please!
Andal
requested a series of debates in every city in the district. The gerrymandered CA-11 is big district so we could be talking about 25 debates.
Andal is mostly an unknown quantity outside of Stockton and with his fundraising numbers in the
toilet, he must be struggling to get his name out in the district. Naturally, he asks McNerney to help him get that done. Nice try. Na. guh. ha. pen.
I can already hear the cries of "McNerney won't debate me!". Waaaaahhh!
Jerry McNerney: Declared SuperDelegate
McNerney
endorsed Obama.
He included a VP plug for HRC:
“I think Clinton would be a great choice for vice president,” McNerney said. “It would really energize the party. If I get the opportunity, I’m going to encourage Senator Obama to select her.”
Based on the timing and content of his statements alone, I would speculate that McNerney did not have a strong preference between Obama and HRC.
McNerney effectively leveraged his moment in the spotlight to underscore his sustainable energy vision. Good for him.
