County corruption: a tasty morsel for a Friday

Williams

     As you know, that unsavory and hodgepodgular Fuentian stew of corruption known as Orange County government nevertheless includes many tasty morsels, such as the curious circumstance that DA Tony Rackauckas’ girlfriend, Peggi Buff, sans qualifications, somehow managed to snag a fancy job at the Public Administrator/Public Guardian office—she was second in command!—an office headed, of course, by Rackauckas’ crony and former SOCCCD trustee John “Orlando” Williams.
     By now, the whole world knows that Williams, who spent much of his time in Orlando, FL (on the district’s dime!), ran his County offices completely into the ground. And, I’m told, the likes of Tony's girl Peggi really helped out.
     Now get this: one of our sources down at the county informs us that the County has “demoted” Buff, “cut her pay from $120K to nearly $96K,” and has now got her doing “clerical work.”

Buff

     Oh my.
     Our source, Pen Pal, speculates that the Board of Supes (five blowhardian Republican creeps, four of whom have at some point, like Williams, retained Phil “ethically challenged” Greer as their lawyer) has agreed to save Buff “and Williams’ other Executive Assistant” from terminal downsizularization. But that hasn't prevented this demotion.
     This raises a question often raised during the Williams/Rackaukas/Spitzer mini-saga: why are the Supes bargaining with Williams at all?
     What has he got on those people?

Pen Pal

     Obviously, the Supes want to cut their losses and get Williams out of his County office ASAP; his presence there is an ongoing embarrassment, a veritable turd in the punchbowl. That wish has been stymied by the fact that elected officials, even corrupt, stupid, incompetent, and beDisneyed ones like Williams, can’t just be fired. They are, after all, the people’s choice (even if the people are ignorami or worse).
     But my guess is that Williams possesses more cards than just that one. Who the hell knows.
     Pen Pal reminds me that Williams had agreed to leave his office on January 20, 2012.
     But that doesn’t mean the fellow will actually hold up his end of the deal!
     Stay tuned.

Highly redacted internal memo:

From: XXX
Sent: Mon 11/14/2011
To: OCCR All Users
Subject: Educational and Professional Reimbursement Program - Updated Information and Procedures

   Beginning today, Monday, November 14, 2011, Organizational Development team member, Peggi Buff will be responsible for processing OCCR’s Educational and Professional Reimbursement Program requests.
   Please continue to utilize the Requisition Portal of Expeditor for processing and updating requests for reimbursement. The transactions will automatically be routed to Peggi, the Tuition Reimbursement Processor. Attached are updated procedures for your convenience.
   For assistance and/or questions related to reimbursement request processing, please contact Peggi at ....

Thank you.

XXX

Last night in Laguna Hills (just down the road)

Recommended reading:

‘Clues That Lead to More Clues That Add Up to Nothing’, HEATHER HAVRILESKY, New York Times

“The first three seasons of ‘Lost’ may have approached the imaginative charms of the original “Star Wars” trilogy, but the next three were nearly as awful as George Lucas’s catastrophic prequels. You could easily picture the stumped writers of ‘Lost,’ helpless in the face of an ever-growing pile of unsolved mysteries, madly skimming Wikipedia entries on space-time geometries and black holes.”