“A committee of Lakeland Village and Wildomar residents was willing to kick in $600,000 in county redevelopment funds for a water district project, only to learn the money isn’t needed,” according to Monday’s Californian.
The Board of Directors for the RDA PAC, created several years ago to re-develop the “blighted” area of Sedco Hills and Lakeland Village, over the protests of anti-RDA citizens, has now proven the anti-RDA citizens correct. Zak remembers their protests ’cause Zak was there at the start.
Had the Board required more supporting documentation, they would have discovered that “the money isn’t needed” before reading it in the morning newspaper. The elected city officials in Wildomar need to assign one Councilperson to attend the RDA PAC meetings to protect its’ citizens in Sedco Hills. Send one with a brain, however. Don’t send Cashman to “facilitate” this one.
Yet there may be more than meets the eye. The “word on the street” that gets stuff to Wildomar Magazine may have put the “that’s why” to the “why” question. It appear that there may have been a developer seeking to get the benefit of the “doubling down” on the funding for a project in Wildomar and this was way to “make it happen.”
Even if this were provable, this funding request should have been stopped in its’ tracks by the Board at the RDA PAC as it should have instituted “due diligence” in their obligations to the taxpayers before they voted. Demanding supporting documentation as to the sudden need for the funding would have spared everyone this embarrassment.
Since everyone thought the EVMWD vs. Wildomar Post Office fiasco might have been an embarrassment to Wildomar, this display of financial stupidity trumps a water connection fee dispute by a factor of 10. Read that first line again and savor the stupidity.
One last word. Taxpayer’s money, ”taken” in a RDA process, if diverted for the benefit of a developer in an area outside of the RDA could/should result in arrests and prosecution of those involved.
If you’ve ever wondered how “good people” end up in prison, it’s because they lose their moral compass and begin to bend to the will of others who have financial agendas.
And are smarter than they are.
Comments can be made to zakturango@excite.com.
