Save Newport Real News in Newport Beach
At least one Newport Official is now facing the music in regards to his questionable behavior and missing contribution reports with the Newport Beach City Hall project. The original City Hall project was set to cost $46m in cash, but ballooned to over a quarter-billion dollars by the time city officials were done with it.
The project not only resembles an airport, but it also has an astounding ~1,000 square feet per employee, and used the entirety of a quarter-million dollars of playground funds to purchase gigantic concrete rabbits, instead.
The project was granted to CW Driver, and CW Driver was also given the management contract for the project– meaning that CW Driver oversaw the work of CW Driver.
As costs ballooned year after year, the only thing that the city seemed capable of doing was keeping their foot on the gas. The stated reason for building the city hall was that the old city hall was unusable because it had become so dilapidated. However, anyone not involved with the building of the new city hall seems to disagree. In fact, we are– to this very day– leasing out the old city hall to churches and holding town hall meetings within it… and nobody is complaining about its structure.
The project was criticized from the beginning, but the city did a good job at dodging complaints. I have been demanding an audit since the middle of the last election cycle. Here are just a few times that I have documented, at the tip of my fingers: March 24, 2015 (4 minutes 30 seconds into video), Oct 13, 2014, Sept 18th, 2014, Aug 21, 2014, Aug 20, 2014, July 30, 2014, and May 28, 2014. There have been many more which went undocumented, as well.
Before the election happened, all four winners of the council positions said they would support a full audit of the project. Dixon took up the audit as her first item of business on council… however, as it turned out, that was all lip-service. Instead of commissioning an actual audit through outside agencies, Dixon asked the city to review the audit that it had already done on itself. Unsurprisingly, the city investigated itself and came back without finding itself of committing any wrongdoing.
Meanwhile, as we sit on our quarter-billion-dollar debacle, Irvine’s quarter-billion-dollar debacle– the Great Park– was going through an audit of its own, eventually unfurling massive corruption.
It took four more months before a leaked memo by city officials finally got leaked to the press.
Now, the game is on. The construction company, CW Driver, is refusing phone calls. ONE of the accused recipients of bribes is also avoiding the press and is retiring effective in 2 weeks (the claim is that his retirement is unrelated). It is now that we must demand an outside audit. It is apparent that unsavory actions occurred. Let’s get to the bottom of this and sift out any bad players in our government who are practicing embezzlement, receiving bribes, or participating in any other form of corruption.
The public has a right to an OUTSIDE AUDIT, with NO MORE EXCUSES.
