San Bernardino, deemed eligible for bankruptcy, may take knife to pensions

http://www.lasvegassun.com ^ | Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2013 | By Jennifer Medina, New York Times News Service

[redreno]

LOS ANGELES — A federal bankruptcy court judge granted the city of San Bernardino eligibility for bankruptcy protection Wednesday, raising the possibility that the city will propose a plan to dig itself out of debt by cutting money promised to the public pension system.

The ruling by Judge Meredith Jury came despite opposition from the powerful California Public Employees’ Retirement System, more commonly known as CalPERS.

San Bernardino, a working-class city of 240,000 about 60 miles east of Los Angeles, declared Chapter 9 bankruptcy last summer, saying it had effectively run out of money to pay for day-to-day operations, in large part because of pension obligations.

[The KG9 Kid]

Grew up right next door to San Bernardino as a kid. Back then the actual city of San Bernardino was a sleepy low-income little burgh nestled up against the nearby mountains which hosted some pretty nice communities like Arrowhead and Big Bear Lake. It had problems down in the flatlands, but overall it was OK.

Sometime after I left, Section 8 housing saw to it that zillions of Los Angeles people who raise gangbangers moved there for the cheaper living. Predictable results ensued.

It's now a slime pit. It never had a stellar reputation before, but it's much worse now. There's still bright spots, like Redlands, Yucaipa, and Cucamonga ("Train leaving on track fiiive...") but even they'll fall soon enough. The offspring of the last well-living people in those places just aren't sticking around. Fiends creeping in. Same story with formerly-neat communities all over California.

Up in the mountain communities, the former hayseeds who lived down in the flatlands have now moved up the mountain to escape the gangbangers who crowded them out. What you have in Crestline CA is the closest thing to Appalachia that the West Coast can emulate.

I'd never return to California, but that goes triple for Southern California. Not even if I had more money than Steven Spielberg would I live there.

[dragnet2]

The unionized government employees with their lottery style wages, benefits and retirement pensions are not only choking off that city, but the state and the entire country.

This is not a secret.

[Wuli]

“Route 66 icon, Just outside SB”

That “Icon” is in Rialto, where I lived many of my childhood years; when that motel was named the “Wigwam Motel”.

[Jack Hydrazine]

Government seems to ruin everything it touches.

[The KG9 Kid]

By the way, if San Bernardino city is filing for bankruptcy, the police there must be just blasting the crap out with handing out tickets for moving violations and anything else they can dream up. That's all I remember about what the police there knew how to do. It's their only police work they accomplish. Sure as hell wasn't fighting crime.

It must just be a GOT-DAYUM feeding frenzy of issuing citations there now. Like *berserk* with the infractions and fines. I'll never know because I won't be traveling through there again.

[Jack Hydrazine]

Great perspectives by all on SB. If I am ever near the area I’ll add it to my “Avoid Ghetto” app.

[dragnet2]

Even more interesting, is the black population of CA has dramatically shrank in the past 20+years...For what ever reasons ...Tens of thousands headed out of state, to the east, midwest and south, places like NY, SC, FL, Ohio, Texas etc...

In the past 15 years or so, the blacks in CA were mostly replaced by working class Hispanics....Crime all over CA has dropped substantially in the past 12 years or so.

This chart is slightly dated but for example, check out St. Louis Missouri....Places like that are even worse now.

Latest 2006 Crimes per 100,000 People:

	San Bernardino, CA	St. Louis, MO	National
Murder:	23	37.2	7
Forcible Rape:	24.96	97.15	32.2
Robbery:	451.2	907.2	205.8
Aggravated Assault:	507.6	1439.1	336.5
Burglary:	1065.7	2453.3	813.2
Larceny Theft:	2350	6802.4	2601.7
Vehicle Theft:	1456	2492.2	501.5

[Lancey Howard]

For decades the politicians have met in smoke-filled back rooms with union pinky rings and, with a wink and a nod, offered to give the rank-and-file lavish pension plans and lifetime retirement bennies IN LIEU OF big pay raises that would have to be paid for out of CURRENT budgets, and that might require tax hikes. But, see, lavish pension plans and lifetime retirement bennies, well... they get paid for out of FUTURE budgets - - decades in the future.

That is, the politicians buy their votes today with the taxpayer money of tomorrow. They just kick the can down the road and let future politicians and future taxpayers deal with the inevitable financial calamity that comes to bear in 20 or 30 years. "That'll be their problem, (shrug)", has been the unspoken understanding of the slimy politicians and their pinky-ringed public union co-conspirators. Meanwhile, current taxpayers shrug too because, hey... their taxes didn't go up this year.

This is this kind of corrupt "negotiating" that politicians get away with because, unlike in the private sector, they get to "negotiate" with other people's money. There is no "bottom line" or "profit and loss" statement to explain, and no annual report to stockholders to worry about. No, when politicians "negotiate" with government employee unions, it's like the foxes negotiating with the coyotes over how to divide up the chickens in the hen house.

Anyway, in many states and cities, 20 or 30 years have come and gone. This will be funny to watch - - until the scumbags come for my money.

[Jack Hydrazine]

“Tens of thousands headed out of state, to the east, midwest and south, places like NY, SC, FL, Ohio, Texas etc... “

Similar to when after Katrina hit and the Black population took their criminal ways to other cities when they fled.

[Wuli]

The scene you linked to has many look-a-likes around San Bernardino.

Then there are also sections like Hospitality Lane, at the southern border of SanBerdoo along the I-10 freeway (fine restaurants, major hoteliers and a lot of shopping), with the towns of Relands and Loma Linda (with the famous and very respected 7th Day Adventist run Loma Linda University Hospital) just across and south of I-10 there. And not far north of there you have the transportation and distribution industry hub that has grown on the land of the old Norton Airforce Base; and straight north of there just below the foothills the area of Highland, with many 2,000 sq ft homes in very nice neighborhoods avging in the 300k range (like this: http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/28256-Havenridge-Rd-Highland-CA-92346/17613056_zpid/); and then you have the northwest SanBerdoo area around SanBernardino State College, which also has many nice neighborhoods; and of course up the mountain are the communities of Arrowhead, Running Springs and Big Bear (yes NOT part of SanBerdoo city limits) - where many “1 percenters” live.

But yes, in the core of SanBerdoo, from the junction of the I-215 freeway & I-10, north and then east through the old downtown and on east to the border of the old Norton AFB, and north from there all the way to Baseline & then west back across to the I-215, a very large section of SanBerdoo city limits has big patches that look “Detroit-like”, and across that area I just described police helicopters in the sky at night are regular, not occasional. Been there seen that - when visiting siblings still in the area.

A lot of factors have contributed to SanBerdoo stagnation, inclunding and not limited to local public apathy and local corruption and often independent of each other as well. Surounding communities have had greater public sense of belonging, public activism vis-a-vis the goings on in city government and greater business commitment to their areas as well.

[Wuli]

“It could have been a great place, good climate, citrus groves, snow capped mountains surrounding it, close proximity to many attractions. But it turned into a pit with trashy people, greedy developers ripping out the groves, choking smog blocking out the vistas. McDonald’s began there.”

The land (not the greatest), the water availability and competition had as much to do with the decline of the orange groves as anything else - they provided the seeds that made developers offers better than rising costs and declining revenues from the groves.

[11th_VA]

In all honesty, I did my Navy tour in San Diego and work a lot now in LA County (up to 6 months per year) and would love to live in many communities around there; (that house you posted looks nice).

The grand kids keep me tied down back east though :)

[The KG9 Kid]

"... ...Tens of thousands headed out of state, to the east, midwest and south, places like NY, SC, FL, Ohio, Texas etc... "

... at least some remaining in-state within California correctional facilities.

Don't look at me like that, I'm only taking for granted the data revealed by several speakers at the 50th anniversary of the 'March On Washington' yesterday. Everyone's either in prison, was in prison, or is about to 'go to/go back to' prison. All told, the California penal system costs the CA taxpayer (thank God I'm not one of them) 11 billion dollars a year to house over 150,000 prisoners.

One thing about 'crime drop' in highly-populated metro/suburban areas like the Los Angeles/Orange County/San Bernardino/Riverside megalopolis: Statistically, you might be able to show FBI stats illustrating a significant drop in violent crimes/robberies on the 'per 100,000 persons' calculation, but when those persons are still packed in like sardines (like how I'd describe the counties above) with hundreds of thousands of people living on top of one another three layers deep, even a diminishing crime rate will still describe a fairly dangerous place to live -- statistics be damned. The 'per 100,000 persons' metric serves to hide the crime by not telling the whole story.

It's like this: If two localities had the same violent crime figure of '10 murders for every 100,000 people' you might never know anyone who's been killed if you applied that figure to Wyoming or Nevada, you being a resident in one of those two places. Maybe never even travel to that distant part of the state.

However, if you applied that same '10 murders for every 100,000 people' to Koreatown in Los Angeles there's a pretty good chance you might have driven past the crime scene on the way to work that morning. Maybe even knew the guy who was killed.

Flatly calculated crime statistics don't paint the entire picture. Really they're just jigsaw puzzle pieces, not the completed puzzle.

[dragnet2]

There are lots of inmates in CA because CA has some of the strictest criminals sentencing laws in the country, like 3 strikes laws etc...

In fact, many 2 timers who left the state completely will tell you that is the reason they left.

It’s the reason why San Bernardino has less crime than many Midwestern, eastern and southern cities of similar size...I already showed ya the stats on places like St. Louis.

BTW, I have friends in Reno and Vegas, and I am told in no uncertain terms the crime, illegals and low life in those towns is just out of control....My buddy from Vegas blames it on all the gangsters in CA moving there....lol

[dragnet2]

Absolutely...Those in the local governments there have lined their own pockets at the expense of the local communities...No debate about this.

In fact, this is what the article is about.

The glaring ugly truth here is this is going on in nearly every town in nearly every state.

Government at all levels are economically gang raping it’s own communities...

[1010RD]

This is the biggest national story and one that will change the nation faster than DC conservatives can. Once a municipality knows it can bc and say goodbye to all that pension debt - look out.

Those that don’t will carry a big stick against public unions. The market wins again.

[1010RD]

The same bureaucrats that ruined the economy via regulatory overreach are now eating their own supper. Very good.

[1010RD]

Sounds like any Democrat run city. Which ones are the Shining City on a Hill?