Ten More Years?

In view of this revealing quote  from Andrew Galvan's recent OC Weekly article:

"I think Gil had good intentions with his bill [SB2], but I think that bill also had some expectation that there would be sufficient outreach to the surrounding community," Sarmiento said. "That's where the failure took place." He acknowledged that "the county really doesn't have an obligation to do any outreach if they don't choose to. They could have just selected a location out of right." Still, Sarmiento added, "If you engage the public, even if it's not the most desirable site for everybody ...  everybody at least walks away from the process feeling like they've been heard."

This stands in sharp contrast to 10 Year Plan Chair Roper's decision to "go live" at the last possible minute regarding the location of Santa Ana's Emergency Shelter.  

Years ago, Moorlach's chief policy aide summoned me to a meeting with the Directors of County Health, Education, and the Assistant Director of Social Services to upbraid me for calling Roper a liar, loudly, publicly and showing no sign of relenting. Then, as now, she was saying we had 540 emergency beds in the County.  It was Summer, so I said there were no County beds.  In reality, open records requests have been answered showing the OC, then and now, pays not one cent for such beds.  After the AD chided me for calling Roper a liar, he decreed that in the future the County would admit that there were no "low-threshold, non-subpopulation limited beds" funded by the County.  That is still the case, and probably always will be now that Roper and the Supervisors have squandered their two most likely locations via hubris and ineptitude.

Probably five years ago, when she still took my calls, I sent Roper a federal manual listing best practices for ten year plans.  I doubt she read it; my offer was met with umbrage, and she has failed to implement most of those listed practices within her purview. 

Perhaps I should "go live" and return to calling Roper a liar, and add dangerously incompetent to my allegations.