Torrance Conservatives Lose Mayor's Race Again. Who's to Blame?

Now I can write more freely about what happened with the Torrance Mayor's Race for Election 2018.

In 2014, two different members of the Scotto Team wanted to run for mayor after getting termed out from city council:

1. Tom Brewer
2. Bill Sutherland

Both candidates had run with Scotto in 2006 against the corrupt development projects forced on the city under Walker's regime. Dan Walker routinely violated the Brown Act, according to some sources, and he would pre-arrange the four other city councilmembers on his team to vote in such a way so that it would be a different set of four voters each time.

The massive building and construction in the city alarmed lots of voters, and the homeowners associations rose up to fight the cronyism--and they won.

Eight years later, Sutherland, Scotto, Furey, and Brewer were termed out and/or looking for higher office.

Brewer and Sutherland had met a few times to iron out their differences and find some way forward so that only one of them would run against Pat Furey for mayor. Nothing happened.

Bill Sutherland was dead to me in 2014 because in 2012, he had endorsed Al Muratsuchi for State Assembly. Not only that, but he had voted to appoint Democrat Kurt Weideman to the city council to replace Cliff Numark.

These decisions showed that Sutherland was more interested in himself and pushing his own ambitions rather than doing what was best for the city of Torrance. He had also floated an idea to raise the city sales tax by half a cent as one way to deal with the pension issues.

I supported Brewer, although even in 2014 he was low energy. He admitted that he was a moderate Republican too. A pro-choice Republican on abortion, for example, he also believed that Republican should give up on some of the divisive cultural issues in order to win over Millennial voters.

That kind of thinking does not generate or spring from a sense of leadership, boldness, or initiative. He was low-energy then, and he was low energy this year, too.

In 2017, Ron Riggs was the first candidate to throw his hat in the ring against Pat Furey for mayor. He had raised a significant sum of money for his campaign, too. Brewer then wanted to run a second time for mayor, and the two sides worked out a brief deal going forward. Riggs would change his mind and run for city council, and Brewer would endorse Riggs for city council, too.

Then Bill Sutherland jumped in to run again. Just as I had resisted his bid for council in 2014, so again I had no interest in supporting him. I wanted to help George Chen above all. I warmed up to Aurelio's campaign afterwards.

Then I got this sudden unpleasant news after I spoke to Ron Riggs a week after the deal had been struck. Brewer had backed away from his promise and chose to endorse Bill Sutherland. What a shame! Riggs was hurt, and I don't blame him. In turn, he changed his mind and chose to run for mayor once again.

For the next five months, I didn't make any endorsements for mayor or city council. I didn't know what to do about the mayor's race, since the two candidates were going to split the vote again and let Furey win re-election. Then came the Travis Allen-John Cox debate at the Marsee Auditorium in Torrance. Riggs was the only guy there. I also saw George Chen, but I didn't have a chance to speak with him.

At that point I decided to get behind Ron Riggs. He was the only one showing up to events. Brewer was low-energy as usual, and it seemed to me that he was more interested in coasting his endorsements and connections to the local political establishment as opposed to hustling to earn votes and victory.

If Brewer was such a strong candidate, why couldn't he clear the field to run for mayor? Such is the fallout when candidates run as a slate and set up machines. Scotto had worked with both men many times in the past. He expected some sort of fealty from them both, for sure.

I had asked Tom to drop out
since Ron Riggs was the only one
I saw doing anything

What do you do, though, when human ambition rises again? The two cancelled each other before, and this time Sutherland's refusal to sunset quietly hurt their chances again. Such is the result of putting insider friendships and political power ahead of the best interests of the city of Torrance.

Let's face it. Brewer was never a strong candidate to begin with. He didn't host many events in 2014 or 2018. He wanted to make nice and not take strong stances on key issues. One voter told me last week that Brewer showed no interest in taking on SB 54. "The city doesn't deal with immigration issues that much", the voter reported to me.

In contract, both Aurelio Mattucci and George Chen made SB 54 a focal issue in their campaigns. George Chen spoke out about it right away in the debates. Aurelio added the issue to his campaign literature. This issue resonates with everyone in the state of California, whether for or against, and a growing community in Torrance wants the terrible law repealed and demand that the city come out against the law in every way possible.

Also, Mattucci and Chen worked hard, put their names out there, including signs and flyers. Aurelio addressed quality of life issues in the city, too, and featured on his flyers the steps he had taken to start cleaning up the city. I must say that the Western Ave. border of the city needs a lot more attention, but Aurelio took steps to deal with it.

George Chen's signs were EVERYWHERE, including North Torrance, well-known as the most Democratic section of the city (Torrance Dem President Jimmy Gow lives there, along with Pat Furey, Kurt Weideman, School Board member Terry Ragins, and others). Chen's church connections were instrumental, too, in getting Chen elected, no doubt.

To recap, Brewer was a lukewarm candidate at the outset, and he reneged a straightforward, principled agreement to support his competitor Ron Riggs if he would switch his campaign focus to the city council. Riggs was willing to play along, but then Sutherland stepped in and Brewer broke his promise.

Blame Tom Brewer

Not acceptable.

If anyone deserves blame for Torrance conservatives' failure to win the mayor's seat, blame Tom Brewer. He didn't run a strong campaign, he didn't keep his promise to Ron Riggs, and he was more interested in resting on the laurels or efforts of endorsements and connections than doing the hard work of getting out there to rally voters and get the excited in his campaign.

Election 2018 Torrance Election Endorsement: Ron Riggs for Mayor

It's time to step up and make the decision.

Torrance needs new leadership, and not the same old corruption.

Pat Furey is a bigot, and he sold himself to the lowest bidder for the McCormick Contract.

He thinks that he is above the law, and we just cannot have that.

We need new blood, we need people who are willing to fight for what is best for the city, and we need people who are ethical and willing to work hard for the city.

The next mayor of Torrance should be:

Ron is a businessman and community leader. He is readily available. He shows up when you need him.

He is not part of the old political class (Tom Brewer, for example) that is more interested in just going along with doing what has already been happening.

Visit his website here.

Please donate to him, too.

Let's make Torrance Great Again--vote for Ron Riggs for Mayor.

Election 2018: Torrance City Council Low Energy Election

I guess there is no chance for making a difference unless men and women start getting serious about what's facing the South Bay and the rest of the state. Do we really expect to see victories in the South Bay, whether for the Torrance City Council races for the state assembly races if the same people keep doing the same things?

I have never seen such a wide bunch of low-energy candidates. It's so disappointing.

Tom Brewer and Ron Riggs couldn't make up their minds about who would run for mayor and then who else would run for a city council seat. I am so disgusted. This kind of dueling efforts pretty much guarantees Pat Furey another four years.

Tom Brewer is low-energy Jeb Bush. Boring.

Ron Riggs is hyped up Rick Santorum. Yes, he is a dark horse candidate, but he has energy, but not much else. Rick Santorum ran for President twice and lost both times. He was closer to winning in 2012! His plan to reach out to working-class voters and put their needs ahead of Wall Street and Big Business were all winning ideas, but he was not the vessel to impart those ideas.

Donald Trump took over and made those ideas a reality for American workers.

Here's another problem: the residents in the city are happy. No matter what crap and corruption waged by mayor Pat Furey, the roads are getting repaired, the streets are clean, the economy has picked up, too. I don't hear a lot of angry chatter from residents, either.

That kind of simple calm suggests that voters, however few choose to vote in June 2018, are going to go with the status quo. Some of the city council candidates have been raising a fuss about the dirty streets. The mayor and city staff are now addressing those concerns. For now, Pat Furey is going to play nice guy and respond to all the moral outrage over his bad dealings and the other issues.

There will not be a PAC going after Mike Griffiths this year, either, since Griffiths is not up for re-election. The hit pieces from reporter Nick Green at the Daily Breeze will not be effective, either, because voters are relatively happy. President Trump's reforms and regulatory rollbacks are going to help the vast majority of taxpaying residents in the city of Torrance.

I doubt that there is any moment to get rid of the Big Green phalanx of Kurt Weideman and Tim Goodrich. Everyone is happy, and even if crime is rising in key parts of the city, there aren't enough people affected buy it.

I want to see Pat Furey gone, but who's going to knock him out? Even if we whittled down the field to one candidate, I don't see Brewer or Riggs vamping up enough momentum to win.

The city council races ...

1. Heidi Ashcraft has my vote. I did not support her before because I was focusing so intently on the pension issue, but I have seen her demonstrate considerable independence on the council. She has stood up to Pat Furey and spoken her mind. She answers my calls, and she cares about my concerns, too. Her name has not officially appeared on the campaign filings, but she told me that she is running again. She has my vote.

2. I do not like Aurelio Mattucci anymore. He was a guy I could trust, but when he took the contact information for the Beach Cities Republicans to run for President in 2016, I found him to continue to act like a man who would cut corners to win. That kind of behavior is not acceptable. Besides, his "nice and clean" Torrance campaign, yawn!

3. I like George Chen, because Mark Tsuneishi knows him and likes him. I am OK with that. I do need to know more about the candidates.

4. Then there's Bill Sutherland running ... again! He would be better than Tim Goodrich and left-leaning Kurt Weideman. After all, Sutherland is not a left-wing Greenie ideologue. Still, this guy is like a John McCain type, more interested in playing nice and going along with the political establishment and the status quo. He also floated the idea of a quarter-cent sales tax increase to pay for more police on the streets. How about cutting costs?

I can definitely say that I am squarely in support of Heidi Ashcraft. To give a fully qualified answer on George Chen, I need to talk to him. I think it's premature for me to full endorse him when I still don't know that much about him.

The choices beyond all of that are not that great.

Here is what I am looking from the Torrance City Council:

1. No more Big Green boondoggles, including Community Choice Aggregation
2. Dealing with the pension debt in a serious fashion.
3. Standing up to the public employee unions to ensure that the city's budget and coffers go toward assisting the citizens, not just one dedicated, organized interest.
4. Keeping the refinery open and stopping this nonsense about banning Modified Hydrofluoric Acid.
5. Lowering the sales tax in the city. Wouldn't that be nice?!

That's all from me for now.

Election 2018 Update: Torrance Mayor's Race

The City of Torrance is at a crossroads.

On the one hand, the quality of life is still good, and business is booming. The roads are looking better, probably since that terrible gas tax was forced on all of us and now municipalities can justify paving their roads, I guess, because more money (?) is flowing in.

The city of Torrance remains a great place to live, in spite of the corrupt shenanigans of Mayor Pat Furey. I love living in the city of Torrance, and I have no regrets or major quality of life qualms about living there.

On the other hand, there are major issues rising on the horizon:

1. The pension and benefits liabilities are massive. At this point, $1 out of every four in the budget is going to a retiree, and most of them do not live in the city anymore. The redistributionist element of this move is not putting money into the local economy, as some collectivists would allege.

The costs of running the city are getting bigger, no doubt.

2. Public safety. I don't worry about well-being or security where I live, but more people have suffered burglaries and break-ins. The crime rate is a concern in the city of Torrance.

3. The "Clean Streets" program. More residents are up in arms about this new ticketing system, as more people have to get their cars off the streets at set times. The new street sweeping program is raking in at least $1 million a year, even though the program was supposed to be revenue neutral. What's up?!

4. Zoning ordinances, Historic District of Downtown Torrance. It was a sad day when I saw the city council decide to impose new rules and strictures on homeowners in the "Historic Section" of the city. The council went along with the Historical Society's interest in preserving the quality and character of the neighborhood.

So, property rights mean nothing in the vain pursuit of hometown history? Most of the homes in the region are old, not necessarily historic. If any ordinance needed to be imposed, the beginning enforcement period should have begun with home purchases after the passage of the ordinance.

The city council chose to impose a compromise ordinance on planning commission projects in the Historic District, but that still is not right.

5. Garbage tax increase. Why can't the city live within its means? Why raise taxes on anyone?

6. Corruption. Mayor Pat Furey violated campaign finance laws by colluding with the McCormick Ambulance contract. He was the key vote which terminated the contract with Gerber, a Torrance-based ambulance firm. He was fined $35,000, even though he protested that he did not pay a penny.

He also played the race card against me, Joseph Turner, and others who have fought against illegal immigration and want to stop the undermining attacks on our nation's sovereignty. He felt compelled to write some apology letter to every mayor in Los Angeles County. Not sure by what authority he has a right to apologize to anyone on behalf of anyone else who exercises their First Amendment rights. If the rule of law and the natural rights of American citizens are so offensive to him, then he needs to step down as mayor, since he doesn't want to honor or uphold his oath of office.

7. Big Green Agenda, Agenda 21. Tim Goodrich, the anti-war veteran, is still pushing the Community Choice Aggregation scheme, and it looks like the city is going further down that pathway. The city voted to continue participating in SBCOG, even though these un-elected shadow governments have no right to exist, and there is no accountability for them to be there in the first place.

8. Rule of law issues. The city attorney is frequently faces conflicts of interests, and has not prosecuted municipal code violations against the city council. The statute of limitations elapsed against Mayor Furey following the FPPC fine and dust-up which occurred shortly after the McCormick Contract debacle. Where is the rule of law here? Is the city council now above the law? Let's not forget, either, that the beekeeper ordinance has established that one objection to an apiary was supposed to mean a rejection of the permit.

9. The Torrance Refinery. Yes, the refinery, the big gas-maker which, in the opinion of all the fearful greenies, is going to explode and kill everyone within a twenty-mile radius. Blah, Blah, Blah. I have never felt safer, and the truth is that it's a diligent, anti-growth, anti-carbon agenda

Yet the city waived that clear-cut requirement in their own ordinance. Such lawlessness cannot continue unchecked.

So, who's running in the Torrance Mayor's race so far?

Yes, I live in Pat's head rent-free.

1. Evil, Crooked Pat Furey, who should be in a jail cell. This man reeks of an embittered arrogance which bothers many people. There are men and women in the city of Torrance who are as liberal as I am conservative, but they want Pat Furey gone because he is corrupt, enabling the labor unions to have everything and make everyone else pay for it.

2. Ron Riggs, a real estate agent, advisor, with a lot of money, but little else. He is not as well-connected to the inner workings of the community, but he is keenly interested in shaking things up in the city of Torrance. He has a number of business and other community contacts, of course, and has raised money, too. He has energy, and he is an outside voice, but he seems more hot air than ballast and balance.

3. Tom Brewer, whom I liken to low-energy Jeb Bush. He is very much an establishment candidate at this point. He served on the Torrance City Council for 8 years, and he has commensurate experience to run the city. Yet at the same time he isn't committed to changing much of the city's culture of spending and accommodating basic interests in the city. I supported Tom Brewer for mayor in 2014, and so did the Daily Breeze. He took a serious stance on dealing with the labor unions and reining in the pension and liability debt looming over the city.

I have a feeling that the Daily Breeze will endorse Tom Brewer for mayor--again, in part because left-wing journalist Nick Green has written one glaring hit piece after another against the mayor. Don't get me wrong. I am glad that he has gone after Furey with fury, and of course he has smeared conservatives, too.

So far, this election is ho-hum. I don't want Furey in office again, but the two candidates running against him are bound to cancel each other out and hand another victory to the incumbent. The public integrity and corruption issues have not excited enough outrage or interest from the public, it seems. The quality of life issues are on course.

One of the two candidates needs to step out of the race, and then ensure that there is one candidate who can grab the ongoing discontent with the city leadership and challenge Furey. Besides the fact that he is a progressive Leftist more interested in shaming his opposition and critical citizens in general

I wish that there was more excitement from the city to do something about the excessive pensions, benefits, etc swallowing the city whole, but nothing has come forward. It looks like there are too many people who are not paying attention, and because of that, we may see a replay of 2014, where all the elected officials get re-elected, and the nicest candidates are the ones who win any open seats.

Except this time around, there are no open seats at all. Gosh, can't we get this race into gear or what? Please, Torrance, we can do better for our mayorship than what we have now!