I don’t know about this Ceres City Council. It’s like watching amateur hour.

Last week Councilwoman Rosalinda Vierra took a break from her Kamala Harris style giggles to pull a consent agenda item relating to hiring a grant application writer, asking if the money was budgeted and from where it was coming. City Manager Doug Dunford had to point out to that the information she was seeking was spelled out in the staff report.

Later in the meeting the council tripped up again.

Mayor Javier Lopez couldn’t wait to motion for Ceres to cancel the limit of 10 taco trucks/mobile food vendors while at the same time appointing a committee to study a list of recommendations relating to changing mobile food vendor policy. Keep in mind that eliminating the cap of 10 vendors was on the list of recommendations the committee was to be charged looking into.

The part of Lopez’s motion eliminating the cap completely missed the ears of City Attorney Nubia Goldstein. When City Clerk Fallon Martin later confirmed to her what the motion included, Goldstein informed the mayor that he couldn’t bypass the process – that if you wish to change a city ordinance, you must first introduce the change and have a first reading, followed by a second reading and adoption, not just wave the magic wand and do as you wish.

Goldstein informed the council they would have to rescind the mayor’s hasty action because it was improperly done. That allowed Vice Mayor Bret Silveira to voice his opposition to lifting the cap, opining that nobody he has spoked to supports the idea. No matter, Lopez pushed past that and rammed through another motion to eliminate the cap … after he had to ask the city attorney how to word his own motion.

Council meetings are videotaped and can be viewed on YouTube. At one point in the July 24 meeting video you see the mayor amused at Councilman James Casey’s inability to hear some of the dialogue.

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The Courier is still trying to understand why Councilwoman Rosalinda Vierra recused herself from voting on the Landscaping & Lighting District (L&LD).

Some review is necessary. Segments of Ceres are included in an L&LD and homeowners inside their boundaries are charged an annual assessment on their property tax bill to cover the city’s costs of street lighting as well as landscaping along sound walls and street medians.

Each year as a matter of routine, the city orders a study as a basis for the assessments charged to homeowners and there’s usually an increase because of inflation.

Never in my experience of covering city government do I ever recall a council person abstaining from voting on the matter because he or she lived within an L&LD. But that was the case with Vierra.

Upon further review, it appears that Mayor Javier Lopez and Vice Mayor Bret Silveira also live in an L&LD. So if Vierra had to recuse herself why then did Lopez and Silveira not do the same? Obviously if all three resided within an L&LD and recused themselves from voting then there would never be a quorum to vote on such matters.

I bring this up for an important reason: With Vierra out and leaving only four to vote, on June 26 the council ended up in a 2-2 tie, which is a procedural denial. The significance of that is without a 3-1 or 4-0 vote, the city would have been unable to order any assessments at all and the General Fund would have had to absorb all those costs.

Typically a councilmember will recuse one’s self if being asked to vote on a matter that would benefit them financially. So tell me how a council person could benefit from an assessment charged to his or her property? We’re only talking about an assessment of like $10 to $30 a year.

Fortunately for the city’s General Fund, on July 24 one of the prior “no” voters (Daniel Martinez) flipped and the L&LD assessments passed 3-1. Casey held fast to his opposition.

I’m no attorney but it seems like Goldstein gave Vierra the wrong counsel which could have caused a big hit to the General Fund. Fortunately the hit was averted.

I emailed Goldstein asking her to explain her counsel to Vierra but she had not responded as of press time.

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Ceres resident Marie Joiner has been very concerned about the physical appearance of Ceres these days, especially unkempt properties with their code violations in addition to unlicensed vendors and pop-up events along the road which she says “often undercut prices, drawing customers away from legitimate establishments.” There is an added concern as the council is poised to open up a proliferation of mobile food vendors.

Joiner sent emails to the council voicing her concerns and said she was “pleasantly surprised” to receive positive responses from Councilmen James Casey and Daniel Martinez and Vice Mayor Bret Silveria. In an email to the council she had this to say: “Ceres has the potential to be a unique and charming boutique city, much like Pleasanton and Livermore. However, the current state of neglect gives the impression of a dirty and unkempt environment. The presence of dead grass, unruly weeds, and litter is not only visually unappealing but also undermines the sense of pride and satisfaction that residents should feel about their home.”

She also sent a list of ideas to reverse the growing trend of eyesores.

Mayor Javier Lopez sent a short reply but Joiner found his words had a dismissive tone. He wrote: “Just on your comments on how dirty you say our city is… This very council unanimously voted to support code enforcement and has made instrumental change in this very community (Since 2020).  Maybe not up to your standards to compare it to Livermore.

“If you want to sit down with me, we can go over any issue you like to address.”

Joiner answered back, “I am not here to be defensive, or to blame anyone. I’m just pointing out the facts that the city needs help when it comes to the appearance. I gave you some solutions to the problem, I do not see where you would be offended!

“I do not feel like you should dismiss me because you do not want to hear what I have to say.  That’s what your email said to me, ‘Sorry lady, you’re just a problem, don’t bother me.’ You are taking my perspective of the city personally.”

The mayor needs to take a step back from his ego and listen to what folks like Joiner are saying. Yes, strides are being made in the area of code enforcement but Ceres should not be inundated with street vendors, taco trucks – many from out of town – competing with established restaurants. The city also should not be willing to put up with eyesores.

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California state government never makes it easy on small businesses.

Starting next year, thanks to CARB (California Air Resources Board) and AB 1346 it will be illegal to sell gas-powered small equipment like riding lawn mowers, lawn edgers, trimmers, lawn mowers and leaf blowers. An estimated 80 percent of this equipment is owned and used by everyday ordinary citizens who have to take care of our yards. The other 20 percent is by landscapers who make their living with this kind of equipment.

Now if you are an environmentalist who thinks mankind is destroying the earth, you herald such a change. But for all the expense we are putting on businesses and citizens, is it really going to make any difference?

The cost could be extremely high for landscapers, as much as 400 percent more. For example, a riding lawn mower can be purchased for $3,000 to $4,000. The electric version can go up to $12,000.

If you have three employees on a truck, they would need 50 batteries to have enough power to last through the day. That also means workers now have to deal with plugging in batteries all day, reducing their productivity and possible loss of revenue. That means they will have to raise their prices for jobs, work harder or violate the law by procuring gas-powered equipment in states that believe in freedom.

Thank you, Democrats.

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Conditions in California are leading to an insurance crisis with some insurance companies like State Farm, All State and Nationwide are refusing to write new policies in the state.

Insurance companies cannot afford to do business here for a number of reasons but chiefly because insurance premiums have been suppressed – they are among the lowest in the nation – to handle inflation.

According to Chris Hebard, president of Hebard Insurance Solutions, the crisis could crash the state’s economy.

The issue is complicated but like any business, insurance companies are designed to make a profit. With the payouts from massive wildfires – due to the state’s mismanagement of our forests and underbrush as well as the negligence of PG&E to maintain electric line safety – insurance companies cannot pay out more than they take in.

An additional problem is that California has a heavily regulated insurance environment. In 1988 the voters passed Prop 103 which dictated that insurance companies cannot make more than 15 percent profit on auto and home policies. The system is rigged making it difficult to get a rate increase.

Also by making the state insurance commissioner an elected position, the now political position often caters to the whims of the voters and what is not right for the industry. Rates have been suppressed at rates lower than other states, making it tough for insurance companies to make a profit in California.

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It’s hard to believe that given the tragic history of Kennedy assassinations that the Biden Administration has rejected RFK Jr.’s request to have Secret Service protection. It’s been tradition since the 1968 RFK assassination and Wallace shooting of 1972 to protect “major” candidates for the highest office.

If you look at polling data, RFK Jr. is a major candidate.

You would think that a Democrat administration would bend over backwards to ensure another Kennedy isn’t murdered but not in this case. Unless, of course, they want it to happen. The optics don’t bode well for Biden’s Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

Look to the Democrats and their puppet media to destroy RFK because he has Trump like positions.

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Did you ever think you’d live in a country where the headlines would read: “Trump faces max of 140 years in prison if convicted on classified documents” at a same time when murderers spend only 12 years behind bars and other officials like Hillary Clinton get away with mishandling of classified information while prosecutors look the other way? Can’t you see what is happening here? The Deep State is working overtime to destroy Trump because he poised to return to take them on again.

Trump gets impeached for making a phone call in jest to Ukranian President Zelensky yet we have mounting evidence of Biden family corruption influence peddling to Chinese companies.

It’s hard to believe some Americans can’t accept the truth.

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Homelessness is worst in California but it’s a major headache elsewhere. Miami Beach is an example where elected officials have had enough.

Modesto, by contrast, has 1,642 homeless and San Francisco has an estimated 7,700. Miami Beach has a population of 80,671 – a bit more than Turlock – and a homeless count of 235 and yet their officials are squawking loudly. 

Miami Beach Commissioner Kristen Rosen Gonzalez said last week: “We can’t coexist anymore” as she pushed for the use of reserve police officers or armed private security guards to patrol areas with high concentrations of homeless.

Whatever we are doing isn’t working.

We can start by closing the southern border. Drugs flowing across are destroying Americans and contributing the homelessness.

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I bristle at these articles streaming constantly from the mainstream media that insist how racist our nation is. I was really hoping the election of Barack Obama would have ended this nonsense but it keeps coming. It’s unfortunate.

A recent AP article written by Laura Ungar was headlined: “Maternal deaths in the US more than doubled over two decades, black mothers died at the highest rate.” The article touched on research published by the Journal of the American Medical Association.

So now the “equity” crowd has infiltrated the medical community and I know that because of commentary from Dr. Allison Bryant, one of the study’s authors and a senior medical director for health equity at Mass General Brigham. She said the study is a “call to action to all of us to understand the root causes — to understand that some of it is about health care and access to health care, but a lot of it is about structural racism and the policies and procedures and things that we have in place that may keep people from being healthy.”

So according to Dr. Woke, black women are dying because hospitals are racist and it has little to do with education or healthy lifestyles. It’s all about racism, in her view.

Oh, oh, oh, but wait for this paragraph: “… the U.S. has the highest rate of maternal mortality …. common causes include excessive bleeding, infection, heart disease, suicide and drug overdose.” Wait, I thought Dr. Woke said “a lot of it is about structural racism.” You mean it includes a mother’s actions like overdosing on drugs and not wanting to live, maybe health conditions that she controls?”

Elsewhere in the article is also a clue that the biggest problem area is in the South, which historically has some of the least educated and poorest residents of the U.S. True, about half of the nation’s blacks live in the South but what role does the abandonment of moms by “baby daddies” play in how healthy a mom is? About 67 percent of black children are born to single moms!

Among all races, it appears that a fall-out of the sexual revolution is that while many men feel free to sleep indiscriminately with whoever they want, they feel no obligation to raising the children they sire. Who suffers are the unsupported mom and the child.

Let’s quit calling everything racist and take some responsibility to accurately explain that the lack of a desire to treat education seriously enters the equation of outcomes of wealth and health.

This column is the opinion of Jeff Benziger, and does not necessarily represent the opinion of The Ceres Courier or 209 Multimedia Corporation.  How do you feel about this? Let Jeff know at jeffb@cerescourier.com