Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/john-hanna/)
After a plea from a resident to “let the people speak” in November, board members decided not to appoint someone to the board seat, which was held by Jose Solorio before he resigned last month to run for Santa Ana City Council.
Trustees at the Rancho Santiago Community College District are considering filling a vacancy on the board less than three months before the November election – and thus giving their choice the advantage of incumbency.
After more than six years of holding the powerful accountable in Orange County, Adam Elmahrek is leaving for the Los Angeles Times.
The ban follows a Voice of OC series that revealed lavish gifts given to a high-level district official by district contractors. District trustees say the ban is a model for other community college districts to follow.
A board committee of the Rancho Santiago Community College District met Monday to discuss stricter rules on gifts and travel in light of a Voice of OC investigation into luxurious travel by trustees and officials.
The review by the Rancho Santiago Community College District board follows a Voice of OC series that showed how officials took thousands of dollars in gifts from district contractors and traveled in luxury on the taxpayers’ dime.
The benefits given to three board trustees at Rancho Santiago Community College District are the most generous statewide of those tracked by the state controller’s office. And the chancellor’s pay tops in OC.
In recent years, officials have stayed at five diamond hotels, eaten expensive meals, and taken limo services while students have had to sell hotdogs to save a math class.