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Who's Who: Meet the Southeast Council of Mayors
AB 1381 Gives them Powers to Control LAUSD Schools in Southeast

They want to be in charge of 40 schools, 60,000 students, hundreds of
millions of dollars in school budgets and hire/fire of Superintendent

City of Bell
George Cole: Councilman; Director of Oldtimers Foundation; has a
long rap sheet in public service; seems to have exclusive rights for
getting city contracts from Huntington Park; got a multi-million
transportation contract from Huntington Park's Mayor, despite being
rated the worst of four qualifying bidders, but then-Mayor Escareno
and team rigged the contract anyway, as evidenced in public records.
Spearheads LAUSD Breakaway plan. Called a boycott of Miles Avenue
elementary school in HP in order to get top LAUSD brass to replace
the current principal with Cole's wife, an educator. Under his watch,
the City of Bell has called off municipal elections for the last two
election cycles (2003 and 2005). Only one other southeast city has
not held open elections for a longer period: City of Vernon, which is
currently under investigation for allegations of massive corruption,
as reported in The Times. Enrique Aranda, Cole's henchman and
operative in the Oldtimers Foundation tried to fire an LAUSD
employee with aspirations to oppose Cole for Bell council seat. The
city just went "Charter", an unusual move for such a small Town. Bell
collects the highest utility tax rates of all cities around (typical rate
is from 1% to 3%; Bell is approx. 10% and is rolling in dough).
Shares Francisco Leal's penchant for using tactics of intimidation,
threats, harassment as tools of civic engagement. Bought and paid
for the campaigns of two other Bell council members to do his
bidding. Has some education experience. Deploys senior citizens
from housing projects he manages for political campaigns and uses
them as foot soldiers on signature gathering campaigns and
boycotts. Huntington Park awarded Cole management contracts for
senior citizen housing projects. Cole runs the local program for
Meals-on-wheels serving seniors. Cole was awarded the management
contract for an AIDS clinic dispensing testing and prevention. Cole
managed to get control of a well funded Head Start preschool
program allegedly by shear brute force and thuggery by outright
falsely accusing the previous Head Start operator of gross
mismanement and misuse of its $200,000 plus operating budget.
George now runs that, too, and allegedly George manages to grossly
mismanage and misuse funds on a even grander scale taking in more
money and providing less service. George was just awarded a
$600,000 housing development grant by Huntington Park, plus a
$40,000 grant from Community Development Block Grants (CDBG)
the lion's share. HP's Mayor Noguez and Cole share a political
fundraising consultant, former staffer to Assemblywoman Jackie
Goldberg. And now Cole wants control of 60,000 students, 40
schools and hundreds of millions of dollars in school operating
funds. Cole is good friends with Rosario Marin who is good friends
with Attorney Francisco Leal, who Cole just hired to be the
southeast Mayors' legal counsel on retainer, without public bidding.
The D.A. Steve Cooley is a Republican chum of Rosario Marin. The
D.A.'s office recently confirmed that George Cole is not under any
investigation.

City of Huntington Park
John Noguez: Mayor; states that he is the successor to Assembly
Speaker Fabian Nunez. Shares political fundraising consultant with
George Cole. Allegedly asked for campaign contribution from charter
school developer in exchange for project approval (Noguez controls
3 out of 5 votes in city council). Keeps giving George Cole millions
of dollars in city contracts. Was roommates with Edward Escareno,
ex-mayor, now convicted felon. Kept Escareno's conviction a secret.
Has no education experience. John Noguez called a special council
meeting in April 2004, right after the multi-million dollar
transportation contract was awarded to George Cole. The meeting
was solely to award Cole $100,000 in start-up funds so George Cole
could get some buses to perform on his contract. The meeting
minutes reveal that Cole asked for $75,000. Noguez bargained hard
and instead gave Cole $100,000. No other bidder was given the
opportuninity for this same benefit since it wasn't published in the
RFP. Giving Cole the cool one hundred G's only confirmed what city
staff already knew, that Cole's Oldtimers Foundation was the worst
rating precisely for lack of operating funds and equipment. To
compound the problem, an independent auditor hired by the city to
rate the bidders, also arrived at same conclusion in a report sent to
city council members. This auditor was meant to give a sense of
legitimacy and transparency to the rigged bidding process. A later
version of the auditor's report was modified to in fact make it seem
as if the auditor had changed his mind and to reflect that George
Cole was indeed prepared to perform the contract, thus forcing the
rationale for issuing the contract to Cole. Guess who was in charge
of the transportation committee that orchestrated this fast hand
maneuver? The convicted felon Edward Esareno. The previous
transportation contractor already had buses, liability insurance,
drivers, and a maintenance shop and rated the second highest. The
D.A.'s office knows about this but does not investigate. These are
Rosario's people. Just a few days after the February 2004 contract
was issued to Cole and Victor Caballero, City attorney Francisco Leal
hosts a fundraiser for Rosario Marin's U.S. Senate primary race. An
invite for the event listed George Cole and Victor Caballero as
"Co-Hosts" and donated several thousands of dollars each to
Rosario Marin's campaign. That's gratitude. Reportedly, a city staffer
who questioned the legitimacy of awarding Cole and Caballero the
contract was fired at the behest of Victor Caballero, Rosario's good
friend. A city contractor dictating personnel matters to city council?
Wow! That's what happens when you have friends in high places.

City of Huntington Park, Maywood, Lynwood, Many Others
Attorney Francisco Leal: Was hired in Closed Door session by
Ex-Mayor and now convicted felon Edward Escareno. Was hired by
Southeast Council of Mayors as legal counsel (co-author of AB
1381, Assemblyman Dario Frommer, is former employee of Leal's law
firm). Quit on the heels of being fired by Alhambra Unified School
District for being hired in closed door session and by threat of
lawsuit by a parent. Was hired by Lynwood USD in closed door
session without competing bids. Was fired by city of Commerce as
its city attorney and is being sued for alleged bad lawyering and
unjust enrichment. Is good friends with Rosario Marin and the
entire California Latino caucus of legislators in Sacramento. While
HP's sitting city attorney, he brazenly asked to be hired as city
lobbyist as well. He negotiated the best possible deal...with himself,
conflict of interest be damned. And city council approved. As city
lobbyist in Maywood, Leal brazenly asked to hired as city attorney in
closed door session and without competing bids. Dictates city
policy and orchestrated, along with Mayor Noguez, to "fire" the old
police chief and immediately hire a new police chief who worked the
beat in George Cole's Bell before joining Maywood's finest.

Leal's next move is to remove the current city manager Greg
Korduner and install his very own lackey, like he did with the Chief
of Police. Between Mayor Noguez, Francisco Leal, Rosario Marin and
George Cole in charge of city budgets, policy and personnel, god
help us, because the District Attorney won't since D.A. Steve Cooley
has their back covered. Cooley and Marin owe each other political
favors. With so many good folks covering Leal, Cole, Noguez and
Marin's back, no wonder brazen corruption goes on unimpeded, for
so long and without fear of investigations. The Los Angeles Times
published an expose of Francisco Leal's tactics that he deploys
exclusively in Southeast L.A. County cities: He uses threats of
financing recalls against council members who do not vote to
contract his law firm for city attorney services. The Times report
from 1999 documented several allegations of corruption, threats,
intimidation, some of it done directly by Leal's friend's in the State
Assembly and Senate such as termed out ex-senator Richard Polanco
and the late Assemblyman Marco Firebaugh, who was an employee of
Leal's before and after his Assembly career. Maywood's city
councilmen Thomas Martin Jr. and Felipe Aguirre conspired to award
Leal the city attorney contract, without competing bids, and simply
because they "needed new blood". Sr. Martin was a staffer to the
late Assemblyman Marco Firebaugh. Firebaugh was dear friend to
Leal and termed out State Senator Richard Polanco.

City of Huntington Park
Rosario Marin and Steve Cooley, D.A.: O.K., neither of these
two are on the Southeast Council of Mayors, but they do serve as
enablers. Marin used to be an elected official here, and still weighs
in on all aspects of city management. Former U.S. Treasurer. Ex-
Mayor Huntington Park and current head of the States Consumer
affairs Division. Is a Republican and good friends with L.A. County
Steve Cooley. She is the political mentor to 4 of 5 current council
members in Huntington Park. Edward Escareno used to call her at
least once a day at her U.S. Treasurer's office in Washington D.C. He
claimed she dictated city policy and campaign strategy to him.
Marin endorsed and campaigned for Edward Escareno, and the
troika team of Noguez, Ofelia Hernandez and Mario Gomez. She
wields enormous power over elected officials in this city and public
record evidence suggests she orchestrated millions of dollars in
city contracts to her friends such as George Cole and Attorney
Francisco Leal. She was quoted in La Opinion newspaper that
Escareno violated "her" trust (read: not the Public's trust, "her"
trust) after news broke of his conviction. The convicted Escareno
was Marin's political protege and lackey. Marin is voting delegate of
the state's Republican party. Before her appointment to the U.S.
Treasurer's office, Marin was a Huntington Park councilwoman and
the state's Republican party Secretary, and was on the committee
that made endorsements of state-wide Republican candidates. One
of those candidates, the son of a retired FBI agent and young gun
at the L.A. County District Attorney's office, a relatively unknown
Steve Cooley, needed very badly the Republican Party's
endorsement. Marin was instrumental in delivering that
endorsement. Marin knows full well that no favor goes unpaid. And
she would get her money's worth, with high interest rate from
Cooley. Cooley's fist payment became due when Rosario Marin
needed to get political retribution on a fellow councilwoman in
Huntington Park. Linda Guevara, was the D.A.'s very first
prosecution under Cooley's Public Integrity Unit. The accusers
turned out to be Ofelia Hernandez, and Rosario Marin. Guevara was
convicted for not living in the city while an elected official, a felony.
She served out her term under house arrest (full disclosure: Guevara
provides public records to the Editor). Ample evidence in public
records indicate that Mayor John Noguez was not living in
Huntington Park when he ran for city council in 2003. A city
inspector alleged that he visited Noguez's empty unit and was not
lived in, this a few weeks before the March 2003 elections. But
Marin and then Mayor Escareno, the campaign manager, covered up.
In fact, with all the evidence on this website, the D.A.'s Public
Integrity Unit has not even blinked. Cooley takes Rosario Marin's
word that all is fine. A report in the L.A. Weekly published on 8-16-
06 reveals that Cooley has "crossed the line" and reveals a pattern
of alleged questionable ethics and obstruction ("Ex-D.A. Philibosian
has a good friend in Cooley"). "A former veteran prosecutor in the
D.A.’s Office, Sterling Norris, now the head of judicial monitoring in
California for Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog, says Cooley
and Philibosian have crossed the line. “Someone should declare a
conflict,” says Norris, whose group is weighing a legal action on
behalf of the city of Cudahy. “Cooley and Philibosian have been
friends for years... These guys are all in bed together. Cudahy
officials were buying juice. They were buying Philibosian — with
taxpayer money.” Rosario lives in Huntington Park adjacent.

City of Huntington Park
Edward Escareno: Escareno is no longer an elected official in
Huntington Park but is worth mentioning for the sole reason that
he's reportedly a convicted felon. He was also John Noguez's
roommate and campaign manager. He lost the 2005 elections then
was convicted in December 2005 for "Grand Theft" of public funds.
Escareno was also the campaign manager for council members
Ofelia Hernandez and Mario Gomez. Escareno took instructions from
Rosario Marin to rig a multi-million contract and give it to George
Cole and Victor Caballero as public evidence suggests. Escareno's
live-in girlfriend was Mayor Noguez' niece. Escareno was married to
another woman at the time, but left her because she was dying of
cancer. Escareno followed Marin's instruction to hire her good
friend and campaign donor Francisco Leal to be Huntington Park's
legal eagle, in closed session and without competing bids. Was
unemployed while in city council, yet called himself a
"Businessman" in his candidate's statement. Had no education
experience. The D.A.'s office did prosecute Edward Escareno for
Grand Theft, but kept it a secret from the media. Strong public
record evidence points to more egregious law breaking, but Rosario
would have been implicated.

City of Maywood
Thomas Martin: Councilman Martin voted to hire his own dad to
a $31,000 a year job. To cover up, he declared the city of Maywood
a sanctuary for illegal aliens. The senior Martin was a staffer in the
local district office of the late State Assembly member Marco
Firebaugh. Thomas Martin hired Francisco Leal to be Maywood's
Redevelopment city attorney and lobbyist. Is a UCLA graduate. Is
good friends with Huntington Park's ex-Mayor Edward Escareno
and John Noguez. Huntington Park's new police chief was taken
from Maywood's police force, and before that was in George Cole's
city of Bell's police department. Has no education experience.
Martin Jr. and Deputy Mayor Felipe Aguirre conspire together to
hire Franscisco Leal as city attorney without competing bids.

City of Maywood
Felipe Aguirre: Deputy Mayor. Looks like an old-school PRI party
crook, quacks like an old-school PRI party crook (the PRI is
Mexico's long dominating political party with long history of
corruption and penchant for shooting political opponents). Claims
he was victim of assassination threat by deputy city clerk.
Councilman Aguirre allegedly forced Maywood's police department
to protect him at heavy expense to city coffers. Craves media
attention while he hides hidden agendas to hijack the local water
company which would extend his reach and control of many more
millions of dollars, since Maywood is small city and has a limited
general fund. Is friends with city of Bell's George Cole and is
planning with George Cole not only a school take-over plan, but a
Police Department take over plan as well. He's in talks with George
Cole to create a Parks and Rec department for both Bell and
Maywood.
Declared city of Maywood to be a sanctuary for illegal aliens, not
realizing that such a public policy carries heavy liability
ramifications. Fires competent professional city staff, and hired
good looking young women at $15 per hour to sit there and file
their nails and whom reportedly also happen to be daughters of
campaign contributors. But Aguirre would prefer that you talk
about sanctuary for illegal aliens and alleged threats against him.
The threat against Aguirre was reportedly discovered when a local
crack cocaine addict fessed up to a Maywood police officer while
being arrested for unspecified reasons and claimed that he was
approached by Maywood's deputy city clerk to do a contract job on
Aguirre. Has no education experience. Conspired with Thomas
Martin Jr. to hire Francisco Leal as Maywood city attorney without
competing bids.

City of Huntington Park
Ofelia Hernandez: Councilwoman Ofelia is unemployed and is
the city's "Education Tsaritsa". Doesn't have a high school diploma.
Has trouble understanding standard LAUSD English. Her daughter,
a UCLA student, reads and interprets important city documents for
her. Francisco Leal gave her several thousands of dollars in
campaign contributions, along with John Noguez. She voted to hire
Leal without competing bids 7 months after Leal's contributions.
Her campaign was paid for by John Noguez. Her voting record is a
perfect dictation of John Noguez's instructions, of Edward
Escareno's instructions and of Rosario Marin's. Ofelia loves to travel
on the public's dime. Ofelia taught ethical values well to her school
age kids by showing how to tear down lawn signs from political
opponents. Ofelia's UCLA daughter, in her early twenties, was
dating Victor Caballero of Fiesta Taxi right about the same time
Caballero, in his early fifties, was trying to get a multi-million
transportation contract along with George Cole. When Ofelia,
Escareno, Noguez and Gomez voted to issue the $3.9 million
contract to Cole and Caballero, Ofelia's daughter finds that Victor
Caballero is no longer interested in romance. Ofelia gets free taxi
rides from Fiesta Taxi. She doesn't drive and doesn't have a driver's
license. Has no education experience.

Note:
The editor
means no
disrespect if
you are an
elected official
in the southeast
cities and your
picture does
not show up
here.

It will soon.

City of Huntington Park
Elba Guerrero: Councilwoman Guerrero's campaign in 2005 was
paid for by John Noguez, according to campaign filing statements
on file in the city clerk's office. Her voting record is a perfect
dictation of John Noguez's instructions. Her daughter is dating the
guy who's in charge of marketing for Fiesta Taxi and replaced Victor
Caballero (Fiesta is under contract with the city for transportation
services worth a few million dollars). Guerrero's sole reason for
running for public office was because John Noguez needed
someone's vote he could control in city council, like he does with
Ofelia Hernandez. This way, Mayor Noguez has the majority votes
and can shake down city contractors, charter schools, and other
developments for lucrative campaign contributions and guarantee
city council approval for any project. John Noguez paid thousands
of dollars for Elba Guerrero's campaign material. Noguez is getting
his money's worth. She lied and deceived the voters in her
campaign material by stating that she was going to be the "Voice of
the People". In fact, she's the echo of Mayor John Noguez. Has no
education experience.

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