Copyright © 2010 WatchOurCity.com
In The Public Interest .com
A courageously innovative, muckraking web site that focuses like a laser on the political, financial and legal shenanigans of the local government
California First Amendment Coalition
WatchOurCity
BELL
[WatchOurCity.com Editor's note, August 15, 2010: Lance Williams of the Center
for Investigative Reporting posted this report on California Watch website (www.
californiawatch.org), connecting BASTA with the city of Bell's Police Officers
Association. What Lance did not know is who Bell's POA hired to create the fake
grassroots group now known as BASTA. The Center posted Lance's report on
August 2, 2010. On August 12, 2010, WatchOurCity.com posted a report
connecting the dots between BASTA, Interim City Manager Leo Carrillo, Rizzo
George Cole, and Leo Briones. Then on August 13, 2010, WatchOurCity.com
reported that Leo Briones admitted that he alone created BASTA, stating that
"BASTA will make me lots of money", that "the Police Officers Association is his
client", and the "Bell Residents Club is nothing". Not only that, but Leo Briones
also issued veiled threats to Nestor Valencia, who a few years ago founded the
Bell Residents Club. Briones sent email and voice messages to Nestor between
August 2, 2010 and August 13, 2010 saying "I'm disappointed in you". Briones
managed Cristina Garcia's and Pedro Carrillo's campaigns. BASTA's Cristina Garcia
failed to disclose her connection to Bell's Interim City Manager Pedro Carrillo.
Briones was campaign manager for Carrillo during his 2001 Assembly race
against Fabian Nunez; Briones was Cristina's campaign manager during Cristina's
November 2009 city council race in neighboring Bell Gardens, which she lost.
Cristina and Briones fail to disclose to Bell residents that Pedro Carrillo is a
political protege of Rizzo and George Cole." See side panel reports "Part I" and
"Part II"]

Following report is courtesy of California Watch, Center for Investigative
Reporting:

August 2, 2010 | Lance Williams,
Center for Investigative Reporting
(link to report)

“Firestorm” is an overused word in the context of public response to scandal, but
it describes the reaction to the Los Angeles Times’ report on how officials of the
city of Bell, in Los Angeles County, population 37,000, became perhaps the
highest-paid public officials in the nation.

The (now-departed) city manager was being paid $787,000 per year. His
assistant was earning $376,000. The police chief was paid $457,000.

Amid the uproar, the officials resigned. City council members renounced their
$100,000-per-year part-time salaries. The state attorney general, the state
controller and the local district attorney are investigating. Now the council is
fending off a recall campaign.

Driving much of the public reaction – including the proposed mass recall – is the
Bell Association to Stop the Abuse, or BASTA.

BASTA is a “coalition of concerned citizens and the Bell Police Officers
Association,” according to its website.

“We won’t stop until they’re all gone!” BASTA says.

But city records show that the police officers are being paid hefty salaries by the
same council they’ve targeted.

According to a salary list provided to California Watch, 18 of the 33 officers
carried on the city’s books as “safety employees – patrol” are projected to earn
more than $90,000 this year, overtime included.

The average pay of the 33 cops with OT is $118,900.

Top pay is $150,980 – two captains earn that much. Last year, 11 officers were
paid more than $10,000 in overtime. One worked $26,109 worth of OT. The list is
below.

A source familiar with Bell politics suggested the police union wants a new
contract – and wants to make sure the council doesn’t contract out police
services to the sheriff or LAPD, as have other small cities in LA County.

Are Bell cops overpaid?

There’s no ready source of comparative salary data for California police officers,
and wages range widely, says Ron Cottingham, president of the Peace Officers
Research Association of California.

“We have officers in the far southeast and far northern regions of California who
make between $35,000 and $50,000 (per year) and then we have officers in the
Bay Area and central coast who make between $85,000 and $110,000,” he
wrote in an e-mail.

“It all depends on the economics of their geographic area.”

Public records analyzed by California Watch suggest that Bell taxpayers pay
about $118,000 per year for each cop on the police force. That's almost exactly
the same price paid per officer by taxpayers in the city of LA.

(On its city finance website, the League of California Cities has tables detailing
costs to taxpayers of police services in more than 300 cities.)

Meanwhile, LA is a tougher beat than Bell, FBI crime statistics suggest: In 2008,
Bell had five violent crimes per 1,000 residents, while LA had seven – 37 percent
more. Other tables list staffing levels.

Median for the state’s departments was about $155,000 per officer, the data
reflect. More than 50 departments, including Oakland’s, spent more than
$200,000 per officer. Data was from 2004-05.

________________________________________________________________
Pedro Carrillo,
Bell's Interim
City Manager,
connected
directly to
Rizzo and
George Cole
Leo Briones:
"BASTA will
make me lots
of money".

The Police
Officers
Association is
my client, not
Bell Residents".
BASTA's owner revealed: "BASTA
will make me lots of money"
The Editor, WatchOurCity.com
August 13, 2010, 6:00 a.m.
Part II: BASTA issues
Press release criticising
Whitman's politicizing of
Bell; Gubernatorial
candidate Whitman
Dismisses BASTA as
funded by Police Union
Why BASTA is not calling for
Carrillos' resignation
The Editor, WatchOurCity.com
August 12, 2010, 6:00 am
Part I: Rizzo & George
Cole & John Chiang
Donated to Pedro
Carrillo's 2001
Assembly Campaign
California Watch, Center for Investigative Reporting:
In tiny Bell, police officers get
big paychecks, too (link to report)
Rage. Protests. Investigations. Resignations. Cries for reform.
Cristina
Garcia,
BASTA
founder
failed to
disclose
that Briones
was her
campaign
manager and
Pedro
Carrillo's.