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Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2006 | The mayor’s “looking forward spin” that I received via email from his office on the SEC city fraud finding appears to suggest that we should let the culprits off the hook – namely unrepentant members of the San Diego City Council, the former mayor and his chief of staff, the former city attorney and the former city manager, who in 2002 increased benefits while under funding the pension system and issued fraudulent bond reports.
Two years ago I wrote an op-ed in the San Diego Daily Transcript titled: “From Municipal Bonds to Bail Bonds” along with several other columns calling pension foul in the Carmel Valley News. Writers Phil LaVelle, who did a yeoman’s job of reporting the pension story in the U-T, Scott Lewis, the business writer at the Daily Transcript, Neil Morgan, then a U-T columnist, KGTV reporter Tom Jensen among others including myself were called a spate of not very flattering names by Scott Peters, John Kern and Dick Murphy for reporting on the issue, including the very colorful term “Chicken Little,” used liberally by Peters during his 2004 campaign for reelection. In light of the SEC finding, we deserve an apology not a suggestion to let the sleeping dogs lie. I for one won’t be looking “forward” anytime soon.