The Williams "review": the OC Supes sure do work in mysterious ways

Williams

     (For details concerning the "review" on the agenda for the Nov. 23 meeting of the BOS, go here.)

Review on public administrator delayed – again (OC Register)

     Findings of a much-anticipated review of the county’s public administrator/public guardian will be delayed at least until the beginning of next year as the county is set to hire its second law firm in less than two months to tackle the job.
     The county plans to pay Colantuono & Levin, PC $40,000 to investigate allegations that Public Administrator/Public Guardian John S. Williams and his agency is unnecessarily taking control of people’s estates to pad its own coffers, including taking aim at the multimillion dollar estate of Charles “Mask” Lewis Jr., the co-founder of TapouT, a mixed-martial arts clothing line.
. . .
     The switch is the latest in a series of delays that have pushed back the results of a highly-anticipated review of the Public Administrator/Public Guardian’s Office months....

     This article catches the reader up on the "Williams" issue, which concerns incompetence, corruption, and cronyism. For that alone, it is worth reading.

     The upshot (of this article) is that the Supes evidently have now decided to hire a law firm to help with the review afterall. A while back, facing various external pressures, they agreed to hire an outside (independent) attorney to “review” Williams’ embattled office and its operations. But a week or so after that decision, they changed their minds, and the review would be done internally.

     This development pushes the date of completion of the review to January.

     It seems pretty obvious to me that the Supes are attempting damage control. They don’t want the public to scrutinize their incestuous and corrupt little operation. This whole “Williams” episode has been a bewildering shell game. Nobody seems to know quite what is going on. That, I think, is the desired effect.

     No doubt in the end Williams will take some hits but will be allowed to limp into his well-compensated, Bennie-Wonderland Future, and everyone can claim to have done their due diligence.

     Man, this is one corrupt county.
     That is permitted because Orange Countians are appallingly clueless.

Bio faculty proclaim: Roquemore's characterization "was absolutely wrong"

NOV. 18
     ROQUEMORIAN REVISIONISM? At today’s meeting of the Irvine Valley College Academic Senate Rep Council (aka the “Senate Meeting”), during “public comments,” two full-time faculty of the School of Biological Sciences addressed the assembly. They proceeded to contradict what IVC President Glenn Roquemore said during his curious address at the last Senate Meeting (Nov. 4).
     You’ll recall that, at IVC one morning a few weeks ago, word spread that Dean Kathleen Schrader had been “fired.” The story was that she had angered IVC President Glenn Roquemore by making (or allowing), during a meeting of the School of Biological Sciences, comments about his wife’s role in providing a cake for an upcoming event. (Glenn’s wife is Chem instructor Kiana Tabibzadeh, notorious recipient of Roquemoreian invulnerability to discipline, correction, or criticism re her sometimes hinky professional conduct.)
     At the time, Bio faculty who had attended the meeting in question could not imagine what Schrader had said or done that would earn the emnity of the President. That day, Schrader (reportedly) was under the impression that Roquemore was infuriated by the Kiana-cake-related remarks. But Bio faculty explained that Schrader’s only participation in the “Kiana” jocularitude was her efforts to discourage such remarks.
     A week later, to everyone’s surprise, Roquemore showed up at the Senate Meeting to say: what was problematic during the Bio School Meeting was not remarks re Kiana and her cake—indeed, he explained, he has always been terribly scrupulous to treat his wife as he would treat any other faculty. No, the problem concerned alleged objectionable remarks about classified employees: something about their being at the shallow end of the gene pool.
     Oh my!
     Immediately after Glenn's remarkable Senate performance, I spoke with Bio faculty. One instructor told me that he had made the comment about the gene pool, but that it was not directed at classified employees. Further, he could not think of anything Schrader had subsequently done or said that amounted to expressing or permitting objectionable remarks about classified employees. Later (he told me), when he listened to an audio tape of the meeting, he realized that his recollection had been accurate: Schrader had done nothing that could be construed as stating or condoning or allowing objectionable remarks about classified employees.
     So, today, that instructor, a member of the Rep Council, explained that President Roquemore’s characterization of the School Meeting two weeks ago “was absolutely wrong.” He explained that he had made the “gene pool” comment, not Schrader, and Schrader’s subsequent comments were in no sense made at the expense of classified employees.
     He had not come alone. Another senior Bio instructor, who had also attended that fateful School Meeting, next explained that Schrader’s comment—the one that, Glenn now claimed, was problematic—“had nothing to do with classified.”
     Many faculty that I speak with at IVC are already under the impression that the President’s odd Senate performance of two weeks ago was an after-the-fact attempt to rewrite history and thereby to shore up the miserable case that he (and VPI Craig Justice) had against Schrader.
     Stay tuned.

Prendergast tally

     Not that it matters, but the latest update of the SOCCCD area 2 trustee race tally is the following:

THOMAS "T.J." PRENDERGAST
115,231 - 50.90%

KEVIN M. MULDOON
111,139 - 49.10%

     Only 144 ballots have been counted since yesterday: 84 for Prendergast; 60 for Muldoon. Nothing's changed. Prendergast continues to be the obvious winner.

Gotcha? Not-cha.

Video Killed the Faculty Star (Inside Higher Ed)
     In what seems the TMZ-ification of higher education, three separate professors have found themselves the subjects of “gotcha” YouTube segments in recent days. ¶ While the cases differ widely, faculty members at Cornell University, Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge and the University of Central Florida have all seen pieces of their lectures go viral in the last several weeks. Taken collectively, the carefully edited clips play up familiar stereotypes about faculty: there’s the quick-tempered bore (Cornell), the liberal indoctrinator (Louisiana State) and the lazy test-recycler (Central Florida). ¶ As one would suspect, there's more to these stories than any of the videos can provide. Moreover, there’s evidence at Louisiana State that clips were intentionally cut for effect….. [Check out the videos!]

13 Arrested at U. of California Regents Meeting (Inside Higher Ed)
     Authorities arrested 13 people, 11 of them students, who were protesting tuition increases and budget cuts at a University of California Board of Regents meeting, the Los Angeles Times reported. Authorities defended the use of pepper spray and the drawing of a service revolver by one officer....

Californians Are More Worried About Higher Education, Poll Says (Chronicle of Higher Education)