At Least Buy Us Dinner First

Today's post is about leadership, present and future. For the current team leaders, kudos to the Anaheim City Council for voting against Item #19 on last night's consent calendar. The item as proposed would have created an Ordinance (that makes it permanent) allowing landowners to petition for CUPs to change land use for residential properties. Goodbye to that empty lot that the landlord cannot build on until the economy improves, and hello to a construction yard, landscape storage yard, or the use that drove the proposal, a vehicle impound lot! No kidding, this made it past the Planning Commission, and all the way to City Council. The community had a whopping 2 hours to rally in opposition, but folks rose to the occasion and made it to Council to ask for denial on the Item. The vote was 5-0 against. What I found most interesting was Bob Hernandez' statement that he understood Staff would never have brought this forward themselves (they know better) but that this was requested by one of the Councilmembers! Not one of them copped to being the instigator, and in the end they all voted against, understanding it was a losing proposition. Harry Sidhu was the only Council person who seemed interested in the item, and knowing he is running a losing campaign against Tom Daly for a County Supe spot, methinks Harry went fishing for developer dollars, using our own neighborhoods as bait. But that is only my opinion.

Now for leadership of the future. Tom Tait announced today his candidacy for Mayor in 2010. Tom had been appointed to City Council many moons ago, and then relayed that seat into re-election for another term. So it appears he will be back, running against Lucille Kring for Pringle's termed out spot. We have 2 Republicans running for one non-partisan seat (not that the parties have ever stayed out of the local races) so it looks to be an interesting race.