Five chosen for Local Entity By DARREN SIMON,Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 13, 2006 3:28 PM PDT
A citizens’ committee assigned to distribute millions of dollars in aid to businesses hurt by a water transfer with San Diego was reformed Tuesday with five members.
The first goal of the new so-called Local Entity is to distribute $3.5 million in funds to the community, but it could take three months before that occurs, Imperial Irrigation District officials said.
“A key element is we have to move forward,” IID General Manager Charlie Hosken said as the district board approved his five picks for the new entity.
Hosken called the five committee members courageous individuals.
Those five replace an 11-member committee that was disbanded by a 3-2 split vote of the IID board weeks earlier.
In that previous vote, President Andy Horne and Director Stella Mendoza had voted against removing all 11 board members.
On Tuesday the board was again divided, this time by a 3-1 vote. Horne continued his opposition while Mendoza was absent from the meeting.
Horne credited each new entity member but said their hands will be tied and they will lack independence.
“It will be kind of a shell organization,” he said.
Hosken said the new entity will be in a better position to succeed as it will have more support from the district.
His comments targeted the role of the district and the San Diego County Water Authority in the disbanded Local Entity’s inability to complete its mission — to get money to those hurt most by a fallowing agreement between IID and the San Diego County Water Authority.
“The Imperial Valley has waited long enough for San Diego and, to a certain extent, the IID, to do the right thing,” Hosken said.
He added the new entity has a tough road ahead.
“Their job won’t be any easier than it was for members of the previous entity, but they won’t be hampered in achieving their objective by either a lack of support from IID or resistance from its legal staff,” Hosken said.
Some who attended Tuesday’s meeting and spoke on the issue raised concerns about the new committee.
Nicole Rothfleisch, executive director of the Imperial County Farm Bureau, asked the board to delay a vote to give her a chance to review the bylaws for the new committee.
She said the Farm Bureau opposes the board’s action because there is no specific language in the bylaws that states the money will go to those directly impacted by fallowing.
Benny Andres, an Imperial Valley College history professor and a member of the defunct entity board, said he was insulted by the board’s removal of the committee.
“It is quite evident to me and two members of this board that it was a political decision,” Andres said.
THE NEW FIVE-MEMBER ENTITY CONSISTS OF:
n local attorney Carlos Acuña, who also serves on the Imperial Valley College board;
n educator Mary Camacho, who is superintendent of the Imperial Valley Regional Occupational Program;
n accountant Glenn Sampson, who has his own firm and serves on the Calipatria Unified School District board;
n Ben Solomon, an El Centro city councilman and executive director of the Imperial Valley Small Business Development Center; and
n David Wells, an agricultural business adviser and management consultant.
If you have an account already, just enter your Member ID and Password to access this page.
If you're new to our site, please create a new account.
Register FREE
To use certain features of ivpressonline.com, you must register FREE on the form provided. The Imperial Valley Press’ use of any personally identifying information you provide as part of registration is governed by the following privacy policy:
ivpressonline.com does not, and will not, release your personal information to any third party without your consent. We may, however, share some of the information we gather, in aggregate or demographic form, with advertisers and other partners. That is, we may provide general information about ways people use our site without identifying any particular individuals.
The opinions above are from readers of ivpressonline.com and in no way represent the views of the Imperial Valley Press staff or Schurz Communications Inc.
ivpressonline.com encourages readers to offer their opinions on our local stories. We ask readers keep their comments on topic and avoid derogatory comments about fellow readers. Our goal is to promote a civil discussion about the news.
We will never edit or alter comments, but we do reserve the right to remove comments that violate our code of conduct. No comment may contain:
Subscribe Get the Imperial Valley Press every morning at your home or office. Start a subscription for your family, for yourself or give it to someone special. Click here.
Text Message AlertsReceive text message alerts on breaking news, latest updates, sports scores, offers and much more on your cellphone or PDA. Sign up here.
RegisterRegister free and start receiving email alerts on breaking news, a sneak preview of upcoming stories, reminders and much more. Click here to begin.
About UsWant to know more about the Imperial Valley Press? Want to contact us? Get general and contact information. Click here.
