STN
STRAIGHT TALK NEWS
June 20, 2009 - Board of Supervisors Ellen Pirie, Neil Coonerty, Tony Campos, Mark Stone, John Leopold and former Jan Beautz; CAO, Susan Mauriello; Planning Dept. Director, Tom Burns; and County Counsel Dana McRae, . . . . Read the laws they have violated to disband the due process, independent Building and Fire Code Board of Appeals Commission. COUNTY OF SANTA CRUZ IGNORES LEGAL NOTICE TO CEASE AND DESIST
COUNTY OF SANTA CRUZ VIOLATES STATE LAWS.
LOCAL GOVERNMENTS MUST OBEY GOVERNMENT CODES THAT ESTABLISH THEM, ATTORNEY GENERAL OPINIONS AND PRECEDENT CASE, LESLIE V. SUPERIOR COURT.
May 18, 2009 - Appealgate, the Santa Cruz County 33 year concealment of the Building and Fire Code Board of Appeals Commission from citizens applying for permits or fighting false redtags, has been fully exposed at last night's second public meeting. Read the California Attorney General's Opinion clearly stating that Appealgates are unlawful governance. In Leslie v. Superior Court the court ruled that the county was not following State law.
California Government Code Establishes the Board of Supervisors. It is mandatory for BOS to respect State higher laws. Read Government Codes that hold Supervisors for neglect to perform duties or if they violate any law or fraudulently or corruptly performs any duty.
September 13, 2008 - As far back as November 19, 2007, the Board of Supervisors have been legally notified by letter to reduce government cost and growth. They have also been advised to cease from adopting ordinances that are not required by the State and to clean up the ones that have false restrictions conflicting with the State. Not only have these substantial and valid legal points been ignored, the Board of Supervisors have continued to allow the Planning Dept. to issue Notices of Violation and record Red tags in violation of Smith v. Village of Maywood 699 F.Supp. 157. The court determined that, " . . . a property owner's procedural civil rights were violated . . . prior to a taking of property". The summary abatement procedure that the County of Santa Cruz is using is a civil rights violaton. In addition, the whole Santa Cruz County enforcement system is in conflict (breach) with state law - Health & Safety Code sections 17920.3, 17922(a)(1), 17980 et seq. and 17995 and in conflict with the Penal Code, 4th - 5th and 14th Amendments. Additional legal points why the red tag process here is illegal are posted in FAQs and Court Cases. The county also has breached Health & Safety Code 18,949.25 et seq by not training and certifying its staff - this is a State mandate. Public confidence has been lost. Ellen Pirie and all the other supervisors, who have been operating their web of deception, should resign along with Tom Burns and his managment groupies, not today - yesterday. Please read this important letter, click here.
SANTA CRUZ COUNTY SUPERVISORS AND PLANNING DEPARTMENT OBSTRUCT RELIEF AND DUE PROCESS SINCE 1956 by A. Adams, Editor
August 12, 2008 - In 1956 the County of Santa Cruz adopted the Uniform Building Code for the first time. In that book, the Uniform Building Code, is a section that requires a Building Appeals Board. See current State Code 108.8 that must be abided by and cannot be reduced by local ordinance restrictions by the County of Santa Cruz Board of Supervisors or Planning Department. In 1970 the County of Santa Cruz adopted its first General Plan, although they had a temporary one for five years before that. A Building Appeals Board is required. The State of California again forced counties to establish Building and Housing Local Appeals Boards. The Health and Safety code requires the independent appeals boards as well.
Summarized explanation of true law for your protection and recourse.
This County government by its actions on record since 1956, believes they can usurp precedent State and Federal laws with their conflicting local ordinances. Not so. The Supervisors headed by Ellen Pirie and Tom Burns, Director, again today in their statements, are continuing to try to usurp property owners right to due process. Through internal memos and recounts of conversations, Staff Planners and Code Compliance officers are guided to "go after" property owners, are not properly trained and are unlicensed in their fields. They have and are generating binding documents not based in law; we have found in our research based in building fees and dislike for those who do not agree. Will it take the courts, currently handling multiple large lawsuits against this County government, to teach them how to run this government by proper laws above them? Will it take instituting fines and imprisonment terms on the Supervisors and Planning Dept. management to obtain justice for harmed citizens? Straight Talk News polling numbers support this.
None of the Board of Supervisors or Tom Burns today gave an apology to the citizens and property owners of Santa Cruz County. They had to be continually redirected to follow the State Code that supersedes any of their personal agendas to restrict the appeal boards. They settled to advertise the open five seats for applications for the Building Board of Appeals Commission. No statement was made to recognize a needed and missing Housing Board of Appeals Commission nor a declaration that one board will manage Building and Housing appeals. It looks like the Supervisors do not know what the laws are that they must follow and certainly there is a big mess to clean up by not managing the Planning Department and its Code Compliance section. How long will Tom Burns be left to mismanage the Planning Department that is now vulnerable to return hundreds of millions when the appeals board(s) begin their hearing audits and findings?
Why have the County civil servants, especially Susan Mauriello, Ellen Pirie, Jan Beautz, Mark Stone, Tom Burns, David Lee, Mark Deming, Ken Hart, Jennifer Hutchinson, Kevin Fitzpatrick, staff planners and many others never disclosed the citizen appeal boards required by law? The County is not allowed by law to be Judge and Jury in an insulated vacuum. They are not insulated from liability either. The public is very dissatisfied with these civil servants and perhaps through their outcries, restitution will be made to those who have experienced violations of their civil rights and abuses of actions in conflict with State and Federal laws. It is important to clarify with your County Staff Planner what building or housing code they are referencing for your project and correct them to use the Uniform Building Code or Uniform Housing Code, if necessary. If they ignore you and say they adopted the California Building Standards Code on January 1, 2008, ask for a copy of the section they are relying on for your circumstances (they are legally required to supply fixed terms and standards by the State) and then contact one of our our Help Resource volunteers to help you. How To Appeal. Health and Safety Code 17995 limits the County to a maximum of $1,000 per violation. This does not allow Notices of Violations to be made against property owners. Read Code 17995. Additional Health and Safety Codes that override County ordinances and more information regarding Housing appeals boards. Read Codes 17959.4, 17930 and 17925.
Today we checked throughout the 4th floor Planning Department lobby and could not find any flyer or brochure regarding any kind of appeals board for public relief and due process. The Planning Department receptionist was unaware of any information piece.
The Alliance for Change has been protesting at almost every Board of Supervisors meeting and have mailed in requests for appeal hearings for many years and have not been given proper respect and response. We will be posting some of the larger lawsuits challenging a mismanaged local government and their often proven and alleged illegal practices. Due process and an avenue for independent relief have not been given to the public since 1956. Those just finding out, that their civil rights have been violated by the County of Santa Cruz, now have at least two years for recourse no matter how old their matter is. Stay tuned.
SANTA CRUZ COUNTY ADOPTION OF THE 2007 CALIFORNIA BUILDING CODE IS INVALID
The Health and Safety Code Section 17922(a) requires that the State Building Standards Commission requires the adoption of the Uniform Building Code by the International Conference of Building Officials. The County of Santa Cruz has adopted the 2007 California Building Code written by a different group. Because the State of California requires the Uniform Building Code to be adopted, it is the legal code to be used for any new structures. In addition, the County did not adopt the Uniform Building Code within the 180 day required time period. The County has adopted by default, June 30, 1999 the Uniform Building Code. This additionally invalidates their adoption of the 2007 California Building Code January 1, 2008. Note below that the California Building Code was incorporated into the Uniform Building Code in 1988.
Remember this most important law to protect yourself:
STATE CODES SUPERSEDE LOCAL
Article IV § 16 (b) of the State Constitution states:
"A local or special statute is invalid in any case if a general statute can be made applicable." This is one of the most important laws and one which the County continues to willfully and blatantly ignore.
State Codes are the general laws of the state. Read more.
The Health and Safety Code does supersede the California Building Code because of the Constitutional restriction found in Article IV § 16:
"(a) All laws of a general nature have uniform operation." I think that means that the Health and Safety Code should have uniform operation all over the state.
(b) A local or special statute is invalid in any case if a general statute can be made applicable." This means that the general law (i.e. Health and Safety Code) supersedes the special statute -- 2007 California Building Code or the California Building Standard Code alternate. The same would hold for the Uniform Housing Code that does not have an alternate and the County of Santa Cruz needs to formerly adopt.
SANTA CRUZ COUNTY HOUSING APPEALS MUST USE THE COUNTY HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL AGENCY FOR APPEALS
The Uniform Housing Code is required to be adopted by Health and Safety Code § 17922 (a)(1). If the local government does not adopt it then pursuant to Health and Safety Code § 17958 the Uniform Housing Code becomes the preemptive local Housing Code. No other group has written a version of the Housing Code. The 1997 version is still the only legal one to use because that is the one the State Legislature authorized and it was the last one adopted by the State Building Standards Commission. It is the Santa Cruz County Housing Element of January 2007, that states the County Health and Environment Agency enforces the Uniform Housing Code. When we inquired to this agency they had no idea what was going on and deferred to the County. How To Appeal regarding existing structure.