Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/norberto-santana-jr/)
Tonight, at a Santa Ana Unified School District Summer Enrichment Showcase at Santa Ana High School, local teachers from Lowell Elementary will be showing off the results from a summer reporting boot camp with Voice of OC.
Two former political allies-turned-foes running for Costa Mesa mayor, Sandy Genis and Katrina Foley, sparred at a political debate Monday evening, where moderators pressed the councilwomen to explain a late-night vote last year when Genis and two other council members stripped Foley of her title as mayor.
Recent court decisions stress that without adequate public sheltering infrastructure, leaders can’t legally enforce anti-camping ordinances. Given the failure of OC Supervisors to craft regional consensus among cities on housing homeless people, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter has now been put in a tough position, one he’s been trying to avoid since March.
Voice of OC today stands alongside hundreds of news organizations across America, pushing back against President Trump’s assertion that reporters are enemies of the people, defending the notion that a free and independent press is central to our democracy, our freedom.
As the summer fair begins to gear up, a battle over horse stables is prompting activists to question just how the 150-acre property in Costa Mesa is governed and how the future of the fairgrounds, in terms of public uses other than the annual summer fair, will be decided.
As Orange County Fair Board members consider a Performance Auditor to look under the hood, Voice of OC Publisher Norberto Santana, Jr. offers a review of how the revolutionary – now virtually extinct – auditing approach worked at the County of Orange and it’s potential use on a state property.
Local & Fed OC law enforcement agencies apparently target each over political investigations, prompting many to question who can be expected to regulate elected officials in Orange County. Meanwhile, south county mayors ignore the Orange County Board of Supervisors’ mandate on homelessness, insisting other cities continue to cover them on shelters. And with hundreds of millions being considered for affordable housing construction, voices are already calling for a new regional housing construction agency – independent of the Board of Supervisors.
As Orange County Supervisors have increasingly abandoned their regional responsibilities, they’ve largely been left with a one job they seem to hate: combating the effects of poverty.
After publicly confronting their own inability to craft a regional solution to the local homelessness crisis last week, Orange County Supervisors should face some hard questions about their own political futures. Yet instead of the usual recall talk, Orange County should think big picture…as in Part Time County Supervisors.
Today as many enjoy a day off thanks to President Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, Voice of OC Publisher Norberto Santana Jr. reflects on Lincoln’s Gettysburg address – a short, 272-word Oped that changed the meaning of freedom and offers a challenge to all of us to stay involved in our civic life.