**Update 9:40am — I received a voicemail from Senator Tom Harmon’s District Director who informed me that the Senator is not a co-author of the bill, and does NOT support it. So my earlier intel was not correct, and I want to get this out there. Maybe someone out there can send me an official list of legislators authoring/co-authoring AB 523 and we can get that information out there, too.
THE 2006 LEGISLATIVE GOLDEN TRASHCAN AWARD GOES TO…
The final days of the 2006 legislative session are upon us, with hundreds of pieces of questionable legislation being negotiated and bartered about as the days turn to hours before no more bills can be passed on to the Governor. This year, the FlashReport is awarding its Golden TrashCan Award to Assembly Bill 523, that would change California State Law to allow the scheme of a former Orange County Congressman to come true — subsidizing a public television station with a de facto gift of millions of dollars – at the expense many thousands of Community College students…
STORY OF AN ORANGE COUNTY SCANDAL
…A FOUNDATION WANTS THE TAX PAYERS TO SUBSIDIZE THEIR PURCHASE OF A TV STATION
…TOM UMBERG DUMPED OFF THE BILL
…VAN TRAN DROPS HIS SUPPORT OF THE BILL
…DICK ACKERMAN OPPOSES THE BILL
…ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER AVOIDS THE SUBJECT?
…STUDENTS AND TAXPAYERS AT RISK
REVEALING THE "SECRET DEAL" THAT COULD COST TAXPAYERS MILLIONS
One of the best things about the Editorial Page of the Orange County Register is the watchdog function that they provide. Without any hesitation, there is no more vigilant voice in the Orange County media where it comes to abuse of government power than the editorial team over there. However, there is a major scandal taking place in "The OC" right now and the Register’s reporters and editorial page writers have been silent. It might be because at the heart of this attempt by some to use government for their purposes at the expense of taxpayers has as one of its beneficiaries Freedom Communications, the owners of the Orange County Register.
AT WHAT PRICE PUBLIC TELEVISION?
At the heart of this controversy is a local public television station, KOCE, which is owned by the 
Coast Community College District. In 2003, the Trustees of the District voted to sell the station, which they no longer wanted to operate (suffice it to say that it does not make money). This was a good decision because the core mission of the district is to educate the students who attend their Community Colleges, not use student fees to subsidize a TV station. When KOCE went on the block, the highest cash bidder to buy the station came from a private company, Daystar. They are buying stations around the country and converting their programming to Christian broadcasting. 
Existing state law currently requires school districts to sell "surplus property" to the highest bidder for cash. This makes sense because this is a public asset, and so to sell the station for less than its highest achievable fair market value hurts the students and taxpayers of the district. But yet, let by liberal former Democrat Congressman Jerry Patterson, who serves on the board of the College District, they did NOT sell the station to Daystar for top dollar, but instead chose a lesser offer from KOCE television’s Foundation. Not only was the foundation offer for less money, but it was not a cash offer, as called for by the law.
THE COURTS GET INVOLVED, OVERTURNING THE EGREGIOUS SALE
Because the law is so explicit, the violation of law by the Coastline Trustees so egregious, Daystar went to court — and who can blame them? The case went to court and at the appellate level, Justice Sills (who is extremely well regarded in the Orange County legal community) voided the sale of KOCE to the foundation, ordering that the College District either reassume ownership, or once again sell the station to the highest cash bidder. Why do these Trustees want to cheat the District when they have a fiduciary responsibility to represent their constituents by selling this valuable asset for the best possible price? Could it be that they do not like religious broadcasting? Could it be that they feel that a public television station is a higher priority that the affordability of college for thousands of Orange County students?
Ironically, the Board of the Foundation is chock full of extremely wealthy folks, who could clearly capitalize the investment in KOCE as the highest bidder, but that is not what they want. Apparently what is wanted here is to have the taxpayers subsidize the purchase of this station by ‘letting it go at a steal’ — for significantly less than the market value. The financial supporters of the bid include the CEO of major healthcare and a major pharmaceutical corporations, and more. These folks need a government subsidy? I think not. Perhaps even more interesting is that the Chairman of the Board of the Foundation is none other than long-time Southern California Edison Public Affairs Manager Jo Ellen Allen, who is Vice Chairman of the Orange County Republican Party. Jo Ellen is a student of history, and understands very well the limited role that our Founding Fathers had for government in America. A role that did not include subsidizing television stations. I spoke with Allen about this sale, and she feels quite strongly that there is a ‘community interest’ in there continuing to be a KOCE television station, and that Trustees should be able to take that into consideration when they select a winning bid.
THE SILENCE FROM THE REGISTER…
Which brings us back to the silence of the Orange County Register, the ‘watchdogs’ against exactly this kind of abuse of government by the wealthy class. You see, KOCE, should it continue to exist, it is set to become a major tenant inside of the Orange County Register’s building, with Freedom Communications standing to make a lot of cash from leasing this long-unused space (the space has been empty since The Orange County News Channel went out of business many years ago). So you have to wonder if maybe the ‘muzzle’ has been put on Editorial Page Vice President Cathy Taylor and her aces, Steve Greenhut, Alan Bock and John Seiler. Their silence has been noticeable.
I wish that I could tell you that this was the end of the story – the end of the effort to get the taxpayers (and Coastline students) to subsidize this purchase of a TV station — that having been rebuked by the appellate court (and also by the State Supreme Court who refused to hear the case), Jerry Patterson and his fellow trustees are now prepared to go ahead and sell the station to the highest bidder. But that is not the case.
STEALTH MISSION – CHANGE THE LAW TO CHEAT TAXPAYERS
In late June, termed-out Democrat State Assemblyman Tom Umberg (pictured to the right) introduced legislation (at the behest Jerry Patterson) to literally CHANGE THE LAW to allow the district to, basically, cheat taxpayers. The law was stealthily introduced — only Patterson, on behalf of the District, was in Sacramento to testify at its first hearing. No one was told about this legislation, least of all Daystar, the highest previous bidder on the station. Of course, free of any controversy (because NO ONE KNEW ABOUT IT), the bill sailed through its first committee hearing.
Looking at this legislation a little more, and you start to understand exactly how much it fails the ‘smell test’ — it is just bad news. Not only does this bill, AB 523, allow the District to sell the station for less than full market value — but the bill is specific only to Orange County. In other words, this bill is an earmark, allowing an egregious practice in only this case. Even Jo Ellen Allen, the President of the KOCE Foundation, told me that this bill is not worded the way that she would like.
Here is the operative text of AB 523 (you can read it all here):
UMBERG DROPPED AS SPONSOR
As we now get into the last week of the legislative session, things are heating up (despite the silence of the Register) as the public is starting to become aware of this potential abuse of power. The politics in the capitol have become interesting. Tom Umberg has been dumped as the sponsor of the bill (Umberg is very unpopular with Senate President Pro-tem Don Perata) and now the bill’s official sponsor is none other than liberal Democrat Carol Lieu of Los Angeles County (yes, a Democrat from Los Angeles County is carrying a bill to change the law that governs the sale of a television station in Orange County).
But wait, there’s more!
VAN TRAN DROPS HIS SUPPORT WHEN CALLED
There are several Orange County Republican legislators who are co-sponsoring this outrageous, bad bill — including Umberg, State Senator Tom Harman and State Assemblywoman Lynn Daucher. Assemblyman Van Tran (pictured to the right) is listed as a co-author, but when I called him this weekend and spoke with him about it, he informed me that he would no longer be supporting the bill, and will have his name removed on Monday.
ACKERMAN CALLS THE BILL ‘POOR PUBLIC POLICY’
I spoke with Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman (pictured to the left), dean of the Orange County legislative delegation, who was extremely critical of the bill. He said that it, "Is poor public policy and sets a bad precedent for these kinds of matters. I will vote no and urge my colleagues to do the same."
What is it about the possibility of a religious broadcasting station that has so many people willing to challenge and, in fact, change state law at the expense of Coastline Community College students, and the taxpayers of that district?
The principle is very clear — if there is enough support for KOCE through the fundraising efforts of its foundation, then they should be able to put in the highest bid, and everyone wins. But if supporters of KOCE cannot pull together enough money, it is unfair and wrong to ask the school district to subsidize their efforts — and make no bones about it, that is what they are after.
LEGISLATORS SHOULD OPPOSE THIS BILL
We urge Harman, Tran, Daucher and any other supporters or potential supporters of AB 523 to see this bill for what it is — a blatant attempt by a small group to allow for the taxpayers to subsidize their private foundation’s efforts to buy a television station.
I should add that I have nothing but the utmost respect and admiration for the job that the Ed Arnold, Ann Pulice, Mike Taylor, Maria Hall-Brown, David Nazar, Rick Reiff, Shelly Guthrie and others have done over at KOCE, under the guidance of Mel Rogers. I worked closely with them in my Media Relations job with the Orange County Sheriff’s Department these last six years. But that does not mean that their efforts should receive a de facto gift of millions in tax dollars.
And as for the Orange County Register — we hope that the news department will put Tony Saavedra or another member of their investigations team onto this story — and hopefully Steve Greenhut gets a green light to expose this abuse of government power. If I know Steve, his editorial is already written…
There is no doubt that this end-run around current law is deserving of the 2006 FlashReport Golden Trash can award!
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