The Irvine Police Department came out in force to our meeting today for the IRC Community Service Award. Chief, Dave Maggard, also President of the California Police Chief Association, Commander Barry Aninag, Sergeant Amy Quiorz, Officer Tanya Ayalde and Dan Young, a special coordinator for the Irvine Police Department Community Partnership with Irvine Rotary, were on hand.

Young explained that Irvine Police Department has a program designed for public safety to help families register people that might be susceptible to danger wandering off with dementia. It is called the Return Home Registry. They get the endangered person’s name, personal information, description and emergency contact information of those caring for the vulnerable population. Also a juvenile run away program too. It is a new program that is successful.

Sergeant Amy Quiorz discussed an incident on 12/27/11, Tuesday night, in Irvine. Officer Tanya Ayalde and Sergeant Amy Quiorz were working the Tuesday night shift called “alpha”, also known as the grave yard shift that they work Mon.-Thur. from 9 p.m. until 7 a.m. Normally they have a briefing of the days events, assignments and boards of events from other local police agencies in O.C.

Of significance was a report of an 81 year old man with dementia, who had been missing for 18 hours from Santa Ana that his family had reported missing. At 10:30 p.m. on 12/27/11 a call went out to Ayalde and Quiorz that there was a suspicious person outside the block wall fence at the Husken’ family’s residence. The father Todd Husken’s called the Irvine P.D. because his daughter, Joli had heard some strange noises in the brush behind their home near Irvine Center Drive. There was an elderly man hidden in the bushes but he won’t respond to them. He was very cold and shaking. The police came to the Husken’s home and found the missing elderly man that was lost and disoriented. They called the man’s son and took the elderly man to the hospital. The Irvine P.D. later called the Husken family and thanked them for being such great citizens helping this disabled man. The conditions were such that this man would might never have been found as he was hidden by view of any road way or walk way.
The Irvine Police Chief said that there was a new project in Irvine’s Great Park the ground breaking of a 5,000 new residence plan. It would move more resources into Irvine even though Irvine is in good financial condition it is still difficult times.
There was a question about the movement of prisoners out of prison and also being transferred into County jails. There is impact in O.C. but the impact drastically varies from county to county. This was mandated by federal judge because the prisons were failing to give adequate health care to the prisoners. Some non-dangerous are released, others that need rehab are placed in facilities that help their addiction issues. The goal is less parole and more probation supervision. Like ankle braclets but it depends on the conviction. Releasing non-violent and non-sex offenders. So far the State has 35,000 people released from prisons into the communities of California.

Monday May, 21, 2012 at 9:30 am at the Marbella Country Club, San Juan Capistrano, the Irvine Rotary Club will kick off its first Holes for Heroes - Orange County, a very special signature fundraising event benefiting Wounded Warriors and their families. Plans are for this to be the clubs major annual fundraising event, and every club member is expected to pitch in.

Ray Sanford, a Vietnam Vet, has taken the lead on this event for the club, but it's a proven fundraising event that has garnered $105,000 this its 5th year run by the Rotary Club of Downtown San Diego Breakfast. Last year Chicago and Las Vegas Rotary Clubs also rolled out Holes for Heroes events.

OC is a natural to embrace this event, OC is the home to El Toro Marine Corp base, and we have thousands of military and their families close by. Our club has more than a dozen vets, and double that with club members who have family who are active or retired military members.

Dave Ferguson from the San Diego Club, and founder of Holes for Heroes, was on hand to explain how the event got started and how successful it is now. The San Diego club has provided the plans and background information for us to launch the event, and we have several committees forming now that need your help. This is a great way for each of us to say thank you to our troops. It will be an exciting day with a wounded military playing with each foursome golf group. Over the past 5 years the SD club has raised over $400,000; their first year 120 players helped provide a net of $32,000 to their club's fundraising efforts.

The event provides the community with an opportunity to interact and get up and personal with some of our military. And they love the opportunity too. At the evening dinner after a day of golf, each military member introduces themselves. This will sure to be moving and gain a standing ovation from everyone in the room. Golfers, non-golfers, military family members and friends are invited to join the evening festivities that include a silent auction.

Sponsors are key to the success of this event and there are dozens of sponsorship opportunities including: Sponsorships: from $25,000 title sponsor to $250 to sponsor a wounded Hero to play. Player Opportunities include Foursomes for $1,000 including 4 player spots with lunch, dinner and auction and participation in all contest for prizes; Army of one-1 player spot with dinner and auction; Dinner and auction only-$75.

We'll be turning Marbella into a military course for the day. Volunteers are needed, sign up your friends and family to either play or work one of the many areas including auction, registration, spotters for auction, set up the day of the event. We have six team chairs:

Advertising: Ray Sanford

Auction: Cisca

Day of Event: Dale Ford

Administration and Banking: Tom Mahony

Sales, Marketing, Sponsorships: Lucy

Military Coordination: Rick

So, what are you waiting for. Sign up for a committee and volunteer for this worthy event. More information to come at future meetings.

Holes for Heroes OC flyer & Signup

Holes for Heroes OC sponsorship package

OC County Treasurer Shari Friedrich is responsible for a $6.5 billion investment pool for Orange County. The good news, she keeps our money safe guarded and is responsible for investment of public funds and collecting taxes. She sits on OC Pension board and is a member of the public finance committee. Her responsibilities also include banker for school district funds (writing checks for payroll) and some OC districts also use her funds as a safe investment vehicle for their district's money. Her goal is safekeeping by providing safety, liquidity and yield (no risk). She has an unblemished record of safety, never having lost one dollar of tax payer monies.

Shari oversees a staff of 97 and a budget of $18 million. She's made changes to continue safety including reviewing exposure to risk, hiring a dedicated analyst for reviews investment instruments daily; she's redesigned reporting structures; streamlined investment operations; reduced administrative costs over 10%. Unfortunately our yields are at rock bottom. She conducts an annual treasurer's conference, is reaching out to each OC city to assist them with their investments through a monthly conference call. She has brought best business practices to the treasury. Her staff is responsible for collecting on behalf of 200 agencies; $4.7 billion in collections (a 97% rate); and 54% OC taxes have been collected before the end of the calendar year. 40% goes back to schools; 19% to each city and 34% to the state.

For us taxpayers, although she does not set tax values, she is working to make it easier to pay our taxes through online services. She's brought cost-effective practices to government,including restructuring her office. Including a better customer service office.

Irvine is the sixth largest economy in the US with 3.1 million people, we are doing better than state in revenues. Taxes collecitng rates are up for Irvine, 1.45% in 2011; .87% for California.

John W. Moorlach, Vice Chairman, Orange County Board of Supervisors, Second District predicted the biggest municipal disaster when OC defaulted on its debt. He talked about what elected officials in California and around the country are facing. The global reality is they are all mired in debt for municipal debt, deferred maintenance, pension funds and more. Although employees are paying more into their pensions, there's no raises and new tiers for retirement (including the ability for a municipal employee to opt out of the retirement plans), we are still mired in debt for the default 20 years ago.

OC reforms helped the county reduce unfunded liabilities, but all of CA is looking at OC to see how they handle the future. The majority of our general purpose revenue, $653 million, 87% of the county revenue comes from property taxes. 2011 was a balanced budget, every year we are laying off more and more municipal employees. But we inherited a retroactive salary benefit, worth $1.5 billion. In a bull cycle we enjoyed amazing growth, but there's a train wreck in slow motion about to hit OC.

OC Pension plans are doing fairly well, investments are bouncing back, but pension costs continue to rise, revenues are flat, and employees on pensions are living alot longer than predicted. The pension burden is $.31.5 per $1 in pension contributions. Irvine's unfunded liabilities alone are $1,823 per capita. We are running on fumes. If we don't see an uptick in the economy we'll run out of cash

What should CA do? Downsize, ratchet back regulations, roll back pension formulas, create hybrid pension formulas, freeze pension plans, privatize, merge and consolidate management, address the underground economy, report all debts, create a moratorium on bond debt and do something with public pensions.

There's a net migration out of CA. Watch what will be happening in other municipalities!

IRC member Randy Woods shared his personal and work story with the members this week, he's come to his current profession via a circuitous route.



Randy is a Security Industry Solutions expert, his company Night Hawk Security Solutions inserts covert cameras, CCTV, and handles Loss Prevention Training and Interviewing for companies. He's been in the security field for over 25 years. And Randy says "his goal is to get a confession from someone." He demonstrated his techniques with his Polygraph invention, a hilarious looking contraption that seemed to work, from his demonstration! Randy's secret self --everyone has one -- is as a Gadgeteer--he's always played with gadgets and made some machines.



He's firmly planted in OC now, but moved back and forth from the Pacific Northwest to the Southwest and back a few times. Randy grew up in Salem, OR. His first job growing up was working at the corner grocery store selling candy to kids. Later he went to work for several different restaurants...at Bob's $.19 Hamburgers, and before long he was managing their 13 stores. In Hemet, CA where he managed the Railroader Restaurant. He went to a broadcasting workshop and for a brief stint worked on-air at KIIS-FM 102.7, and later as a disc jockey at the Newport Beach Marriott.

Say hi to Randy when you visit the club, he's a great guy!