Calabasas citizens need to be aware of current events in their city

The Acorn provides an opportunity for news to be disseminated. Journalists report on activities, readers write in with their opinions, and freedom of the press and open government is at its best.

At times, however, one scratches his head and thinks, "What’s happening?" This is such a time.

At present, certain council-members are forging a path that will not make their constituents pleased. Consider the following:

•A recent allegation during a city council meeting of $3 million missing from the city treasury has not been supported with facts, nor has there been a definitive follow-up. More statements attributed to councilmembers have been made in Acorn interviews than reported during council meetings.

•City Manager Donald Duckworth has presumably been terminated effective Dec. 31, 2003. Although the announcement was made by Mayor Pro Tem Harrison during a city council meeting with no details disclosed due to legal considerations, in a subsequent interview with The Acorn, where legal considerations are apparently of less concern, Mr. Harrison said, "We need new, stronger, more effective, more accountable city management."

•Calabasas is thought to produce the annual Pumpkin Festival, even though it does not. The Los Angeles County Almanac validates this perception. Since inception, the city has provided funding of $25,000 annually to help the festival defray the cost for the permit required by Paramount Ranch. It was the city’s mandate at inception to hold the festival there, with the understanding that funding would be available. This financial arrangement will not be available for 2003, the council voting 2-1 to withhold the grant, denying the city a continued link with its citizens.

•The Calabasas Chamber of Commerce has as members two of the five councilmembers. Membership is voluntary, but members join with 500 other business and civic leaders in the community.

One might ask why Harrison, an attorney with Calabasas offices, forsakes the Chamber in his city for that in a neighboring city and allows his picture to be in The Acorn linked to that Chamber. He has pooh-poohed this by stating that anyone questioning him is making a mountain out of a molehill.

Good government stems from good people with rational common interest and good common sense. I suggest that the recent election was an attempt by the electorate not only to return normalcy to council meetings, but to have individual councilmembers think before making statements.

Elected officials work for the citizens; they do not own city hall. I submit that the citizens of Calabasas need to be involved in both public forums and elections, more now than ever.

Donald Lucove

Calabasas

Lucove is a boardmember of the Calabasas Chamber of Commerce, but writes as a citizen and resident of Calabasas. This isn’t a position of the Chamber.