Commentary:
By Carmen Miranda

The City of Escondido has demonstrated once again how NOT to run a city government. With the evidence presented by the ACLU and documentary filmmaker John Carlos Frey that Escondido has been profiting on the backs of immigrants and the poor with towed vehicles from driver license checkpoints, City Manager Clay Philips will oversee an “internal audit” to look for discrepancies. He is precisely the person who should NOT conduct an audit of his own office! To further exacerbate the problem, the City Manager granted huge raises to his department heads without consulting the city council. And if this were not enough, Phillips’ son was hired by City Attorney Jeff Epps…and neither Epps nor Phillips advised the city council of such an obvious appearance of nepotism and conflict of interest. Who is running the show in Escondido???

With this type of supervision (or lack of it), it should not be surprising that Police Chief Jim Maher has been operating unsupervised and unchecked for years. His illegal Driver’s License Checkpoints were stopped only after a threatened lawsuit; he entered into an agreement with immigration authorities (the only local law enforcement agency in the country to do so) without advising the city council or seeking public input; and now there’s evidence that his abusive DUI (Immigration) Checkpoints have illegally been generating millions of dollars for the city. And our elected officials did not know!

It is painfully clear that administrators, not our elected officials, are the policymakers of Escondido.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!!

What Should Be Done?

We want an independent audit of the city’s books on monies generated by OTS-funded DUI checkpoints.

We want the City Council to do what they were elected to do: set policy for the city and SUPERVISE THE CITY MANAGER AND CITY ATTORNEY!

We want the City Council to terminate the employment of City Manager Clay Phillips.

He has demonstrated that he cannot be trusted by engaging in actions that he should know are controversial without advising the City Council. The obscenely large pay hikes given to department heads, the informal and costly termination of a former employee, and the employment of his son as a deputy city attorney are only recent examples of Phillips’ arrogant and self-serving behavior.

We want the City Council to terminate the employment of Police Chief Jim Maher. This city has been divided since the passage of the Rental Ban Ordinance and continues to be divided by the policies adopted by Maher. His failure to see this huge divide caused by his policies of excessive checkpoints, his failure of transparency of his department with regard to who gets turned over to ICE, and his allowing himself to become the face of the anti-immigrant sentiment in this city has placed this city in a tenuous position in terms of safety and community relations. While claiming that checkpoints have increased public safety, he has yet to provide solid evidence that checkpoints have done anything but divide the city in two. Escondido needs to rid itself of the reputation of being an unfriendly place.

We want to end the unique and harmful relationship our police have with ICE. After years of working hand-in-hand, there is no evidence that Escondido is any safer because of this arrangement.

Will You Join Us?

The next city council meeting is scheduled for April 18, 2012. We want a large group of residents, organizations, and concerned persons to demonstrate their dissatisfaction with the way the business of governing is being conducted in Escondido. We need to make the council aware of what they need to do to get this city back on track. Escondido can be a great city, but first this most-important purging needs to take place. This is not really about immigration, it’s about treating people in way that reflects the best of American ideals. Come and help us make these changes.

Contact me, Carmen Miranda, at (760) 884-3818 or at DemandEsco@yahoo.com There will be more information on the demonstration of April 18 as the date approaches.