The CotoBuzz Journal, Community Journalism

The CotoBuzz Journal recently published a piece titled Running Scared ……For Laguna Woods City Council attempting to identify the various players and their role in the upcoming City Council election. Coincidentally, the September – October 2008 issue of the Historian, states that “a ten-year lawsuit ended when GRF agreed to pay Laguna Publishing Co. a $1.85 million settlement. At issue was the publisher’s right to deliver his newspaper free, door-to-door”.

Now we turn our attention to the travails of the Resident’s Voice and the story of the confiscated tape-recorder deemed stolen property: The Laguna Woods Residents Voice became an active group circa 2005 with a focus on fiduciary responsibility - anything over two million dollars would have o be voted on by the residents, and approved by a majority, in order to not disrupt business, for example, and to change the By-laws to prevent GRF and PCM from selling the community’s land.

A second objective was to bring security brought in-house, given that the majority of the security employees were residents. PCM has a rule that residents are not allowed to be full time employees, hence taking away full time positions away from community residents. The group’s approach was to collect as many signatures of support in a very short amount of time and then present the petition to the “Boards.” Resident’s Voice gathered sixty four hundred
signatures of residents in ten days. By knocking on doors. If residents declined, declined the group’s representatives simply walked away.

One resident collecting signatures was stopped at a residents front door by a Security Sergeant. The Sergeants at the time were all retired police officers, and were armed. He told the resident collecting signatures that she was breaking the law. He stated that she had no right to harass the residents, she was breaking the law and should stop immediately, while the resident who was signing the petition told the Sergeant that she wanted to sign the petition, and she was not being harassed by anyone. The resident collecting the signatures was frightened and fearful of reprisal. A group’s representative sought advice and was told the group had the rights to collect signatures and circulate petitions, as long as residents were not bothered and or harasses. This incident took place in August of 2005. The group then proceeded to complete its petition drive without further incident.

Resident’s Voice representatives report that “there have been other instances of abuse and intimidation by GRF and PCM in an attempt to shut down Residents Voice. Last year United Mutual Board, made a ruling no longer allowing groups to announce their meeting dates and any other information at the monthly board meetings which are televised to the community. United board also ruled that flyers may not be left in the laundry rooms, bulletin boards, or other common areas. They reinforced that ruling by changing more rules stating that any flyer larger than four by seven could not be distributed in United, without permission and approval by the board. All of Residents Voice flyers, Press Releases, and all other information is eight and a half by eleven inches in size”

Recently, the GRF board ruled that no club or group can announce their meeting or any other information at their monthly board meetings.

Roughly a couple of months ago a Resident’s Voice representative received a call from PCM Property Services Manager Wendy Pinizza asking if the group had filed an application to obtain authorization to pass out The Voice, the group’s newsletter, citing residents complaints and need to be pre-authorized. Apparently Ms. Pinazza did not specify who would issue such authorization nor how long the authorization process would be. A latter on the same subject, was also received by the Resident’s Voice, prompting the following question: Why is it that a Property Services Manager is involved in a case such as this?

The case of the confiscated tape-recorder-turned-stolen-property can be detailed later, as we have asked Mayor Bert Hack and or Councilman Robert Bouer to comment, before we publication.

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Supreme Court: Leisure World finances must be openThursday, August 28, 2008 Residents of Leisure World Seal Beach to have full access to financial records of the Golden Rain Foundation, the state court has ruled.

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The Historian - September-October, 2008A ten-year lawsuit ended when GRF agreed to pay Laguna Publishing Co. a $1.85 million settlement. At issue was the publisher’s right to deliver his newspaper
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