Beth Krom

Christopher Jordan Dorner Manhunt Reward Fund to Get $100,000 Boost from City of Irvine

When Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Police Chief Charlie Beck announced a $1 million reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of then-living fugitive Christopher Jordan Dorner on Feb. 10, they were surrounded by other city and police officials from LA, Irvine, Riversid ... More >>

Gustavo's Latest "Orange County Line" for KCRW: The Great Park Lunacy

Crazy but true story: years ago, a source approached me about all sorts of alleged insanity regarding the Great Park, Larry Agran, and his cronies. The editor at the time was thrilled at the story--then promptly took me off the story and gave it to Schou. Schou was thrilled to get on the story--then ... More >>

Tony Rackauckas Is a Robo Cop

[Moxley Confidential] DA's election-eve robocall for Irvine Democrat Larry Agran angers Orange County Republicans

Larry Agran's Irvine Machine Paid Off Decoy Candidate

[Moxley Confidential] Larry Agran recruits his Republican Katherine Daigle to steal the city's mayoral election, which he did before with Earle Zucht

Larry Agran Blasted By Three Former Close Allies As Corrupt & Unworthy of Irvine Mayor's Job

Three prominent Orange County men who spent years as close allies to Larry Agran have joined together in a campaign mailer to declare him a corrupt politician unworthy of winning the mayor's job in the City of Irvine's Nov. 6 election."He's betrayed his values--Agran does not deserve our vot ... More >>

Larry Agran is Stealing Another Election in Republican-Heavy Irvine

Documents obtained by the Weekly prove Larry Agran's liberal, Democrat political machine, the one that has ruled over Republican-heavy Irvine for 12 consecutive years, already secretly stole next month's election so it can keep power for at least two more years. The documents--a series of emails sp ... More >>

Orange County Great Park Gets a $1.4 Billion Puncture in its Balloon

A court in Sacramento today denied the city of Irvine's temporary restraining order request that would prevent the state of California from seizing Orange County Great Park funds. It's part of the city's lawsuit against the state Department of Finance, which has ruled the Great Park is not entitled ... More >>

What We Learned

The Year on Navel Gazing and Beyond!

Irvine Forces City Contractors to Pay their Workers a Living Wage--Unless They're Mexican Crop Pickers

Agran (at right): Can he finally do something progressive after years of being a tool?​This summer, the city of Irvine and its apologists made much about its decision to force any contractors doing work for the city to pay its workers a living wage, that progressive wet dream in effect wherever fo ... More >>

You May Not Know Your Future, But Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) Does

​Roy Reynolds is a Fountain Valley-based pollster with a bug up his ass about the Southern California Association of Governments.Thank God.For those who have never heard of SCAG, it is, as Reynolds puts it, "an unelected, unrepresentative pseudo-government-like group" that "we must tolerate in our ... More >>

[UPDATED with SJC Spooked:] Banning Pervs in Parks Sweeps OC

​UPDATE, AUG. 17, 11:17 A.M.: It's become so routine it's lost its news value: The District Attorney's office announces it's sending a rep before the latest of the 7,000 city councils in Orange County considering a ban on sex offenders in local parks modeled after the county law co-written by DA T ... More >>

[UPDATED with Early RSM Nod:] Banning Pervs in Parks Sweeps OC

​UPDATE, JULY 29, 9:41 A.M.: The Rancho Santa Margarita City Council voted Wednesday night to move ahead with a ban on registered sex offenders in city parks that is similar to the county law enacted in April.The council agreed that banning only those who have preyed on children would leave kids v ... More >>

Larry Agran, It's Time for You to Go

[Moxley Confidential] Recent interview inadvertently reveals the slimy side of Irvine's most powerful politician

Election 2010: Who's In and Who's Out in Irvine?

​Updated throughout the night, with the freshest post on topLate: Oy. Squeezed my way through the madness (good-looking madness) that was the OC Republican election night party in search of some Irvine players to chat with. No luck. Instead, I got to wander through a sea of boos when Presiden ... More >>

New York Times Data: OC Elections Aren't Really Contests

Ed Royce: Shoo-in elections are fun.​Do we have real congressional election contests in the Orange County/Long Beach area or, despite all the hullabaloo, is the whole affair preordained?Data from The New York Times, based on FiveThirtyEight Forecasts, shows the answer isn't necessarily uplifting. ... More >>

New York Times Gets Orange County Laughably, Stupidly Wrong

Never forget what's in our DNA...​As someone who collects any and all articles, dissertations, and books on Orange County history, this past Sunday's Page One New York Times story on how our fair land "is no longer Nixon country" was the literary equivalent of Rick Bayless talking about Mexican cu ... More >>

Coming Up Next From the Christina Shea Echo Chamber: Contamination Under the Great Park

​Christina Shea is not termed out as an Irvine City Council member until November, but she has given her first exit interview.If you expected the longtime City Hall fixture--who served as mayor from 1996 to 2000--to leave quietly, you obviously haven't been paying attention. Indeed, Shea lets slip ... More >>

A Rare Chance to Spot OC Progressives

​Quick, how many Orange County progressives can you fit in a phone booth? OK, that's a totally unfair question. There are no such thing as phone booths anymore.But there are, apparently, people identifying themselves as those Glenn Beck bogeymen. And, these progressives managed to scrape up enough ... More >>

[UPDATED:] Today's Important Unimportant Election, From My TV Screen to Your Computer/Phone Screen

​11:15 p.m.: Don't be surprised if KOCE is accused of turning over its election coverage to that rare Orange County bird known as the "Democrat." The "live, election night edition of Real Orange" came from the Artists Village in Santa Ana, OC's version of Havana. Their election expert was the Voic ... More >>

LA Times Spews OC Great Park Bull

Great Park or Great Home Park?​Michael Hiltzik's Nov. 30 Los Angeles Times article, "Putting the Green in Orange County Great Park," is the kind of journalism that delights Larry Agran, the controversial politician running Southern California's largest public works project in decades. Hiltzik didn ... More >>

Tale of 2 Police Forces: While Irvine's Fumes, La Habra's Bites the Bullet

To protect and serve . . . for less.​While their counterparts in "Safest City in America" Irvine fume over an employer-proposed wage freeze, officers who belong to the La Habra Police Association seem to have gladly accepted a deal that imposes what is essentially a 5 percent pay cut. "Although di ... More >>

Resurrected, Boisterous OC Pride Festival "a Smashing Success"

Photo by Christopher VictorioPark rangers talk with OC Pride participants about the noise at Mason Regional Park in Irvine on Saturday.​The crowd was small but boisterous, there was a minor issue with the noise and some participants did not know at first that the showy police presence was for thei ... More >>

Park Place Owners Have a Rocky History in Irvine

Maguire had this office tower built at Park Place in 2006.​Maguire Properties' announcement today that it has sold its Park Place I office property in Irvine is just the latest twist for a massive campus that seems to have been dogged by controversy since the Los Angeles-based developer acqu ... More >>

Orange County LGBT Pride Festival "Revival" Starts Small

Sasha Baron Cohen's comedy has nothing to do with OC pride festivals. We just can't find photos from past fests. ​Orange County's first-ever gay and lesbian pride festival was held in Santa Ana's Centennial Park in 1988, when angry Christian conservatives showed up not because they'd finally come ... More >>

Irvine Police Association Blasts Mayor Sukhee Kang, City Council Members Beth Krom and Larry Agran

Irvine Police Association has criticized Mayor Sukhee Kang (left) and City Council members Beth Krom and Larry Agran over stalled contract talks.​Anyone who has attended a city-run meeting in Irvine has heard elected officials, especially City Councilman and Orange County Great Park Corporation ch ... More >>

John Campbell Gets Caught Using a Twitter Ghostwriter

We usually glaze over any posts on Irvine councilwoman Beth Krom written by The Liberal OC, because the woman can do no wrong in their eyes. But that didn't stop editor Chris Prevatt from helping to out Representative John Campbell's Twitter writer: the king of Orange County sock-puppetry, Matt "Jub ... More >>

Congressional Candidate Krom's Son Dies in Fall

Beth Krom Congress 2010 Facebook pageThe Kroms in 2007 (from left): Hershel, Abby, Noah, Solly and Beth.The Weekly, which has taken jabs over the years at a certain Irvine city councilwoman and announced congressional candidate, expresses its deepest condolences to Beth and Solly Krom, who are mourn ... More >>

As Stephen Smith Leaves Town, Irvine's "Tattler" Calls on Others to Step Up

Stephen C. Smith calls on others to keep tabs on Irvine City Hall.CORRECTED!Lost in Santa Ana a few months ago, half paying attention to the street signs and half to Larry Mantle's KPCC interview show blaring out of the car speakers, I heard the host steer his Orange County "roundtable" guests--Oran ... More >>

John Campbell Targeted By Withering Democrat Copy-Pasting

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sent out a press release yesterday pointing out that South County U.S. representative John Campbell, by opposing the federal stimulus bill, opposed funding for local transportation projects:Representative Campbell Votes Against Major Road Improvements ... More >>

Lennar Corp. Flies Missing Man Formation Over Great Park

The hot question raised at this afternoon's Orange County Great Park study session was whatever became of Lennar Corp.? You know, big Miami-based developer? It's Chinese-made drywall stinks? Victimized by copper thieves in Anaheim's Platinum Triangle? Recently faced financial woes and serious allega ... More >>

Campbell Shrugged

With Irvine City Councilwoman Beth Krom indicating she will run for his 48th Congressional District seat, the big question is which novel Rep. John Campbell (R-Newport Beach) will pull off his shelf for prophesy. The Washington Independent reported on Campbell giving his departing interns copies of ... More >>

Councilwoman Blames Own Panel for Irvine Sister City's Demise

The Irvine Sister City Foundation--which has helped make Irvine a truly international city thanks to successful partnerships with with Tsukuba, Japan, Hermosillo, Mexico, and Taoyuan, Taiwan--voted to dissolve last night. Despite the denials of Irvine Mayor Suhkee Kang, an Irvine City Coun ... More >>

It's Thursday, Must Be Time for More Irvine City Campaign Sliminess

If you thought the man and organization behind Larry Agran's campaign slush funds was only involved in Irvine political shenanigans (as we previously reported here), now comes word that Frank Lunding is up to his eyeballs in it in the Carmel Valley as well. Jessica Lyons reports in the Monterey Co ... More >>

Great Park to World: Crisis? What Global Economic Crisis?

You'd think the dotcom crisis was just a bad dream, the housing bubble never burst and we'd mysteriously been time traveled back to the halcyon days of the Clinton economy considering the bullish way the Orange County Great Park Corporation is pushing the financial envelope. &nb ... More >>

I'm Not Dead Yet

Christina Shea had one of those gut-check moments when Orange County Great Park Corp. board clerk Steve Larsen read the roll at this morning's regular meeting at Irvine City Hall. "How come you didn't call my name?" Shea asked defensively. Last month's defeat in the mayoral race against Sukhee Kang ... More >>

Great Park's Hired Design Reviewers Get Another $2 Mil to Add to Their Previous $2 Mil

"Um, yeah, that's not gonna work for me." The city of Irvine is paying a private company at least $400 million to design the Great Park. It has set aside $9 million for city staff and an independent company to check the Great Park Design Studio's plans to make sure they more quickly clear future ci ... More >>

Plumbing the Depths of Irvine's Election

Dear Joe the Plumber, As you well know, you have unplugged many a drain at Casa de Coker over the years and sooner or later you'll be handling that bathroom remodel we talked about years ago. But first, I have a favor. I have started a petition drive where signees will let my bosses know what a goo ... More >>

Irvine Candidate Forum, Part 2

The mayoral candidates are covered in the previous post. Here are the council candidates: Eric Johnson: Run the city like a business. Build Great Park like a business, incrementally, so it pays for itself. More transparency and open meetings. While saying Gallinger's right to practice the Muslim fa ... More >>

Muffle Scuffle

*Moved up, 'cause the conversation's fun! Irvine's reigning feet-to-the-fire holder Stephen C. Smith has a very interesting post on his IrvineTattler.com site. Here is an excerpt from “Sukhee Kang Knows Your Birth Date”: Councilman and mayoral candidate Sukhee Kang used a California Public Re ... More >>

2006 WORST OC Candidate: Lynn Daucher

If I hadn't been stuck in the courthouse for the last several months, this award would probably go to Larry Agran's robot Beth Krom, a deceitful mess of a politician/hack who should shame any true progressive. More on her and Agran after their victory. I promise. But tonight the one candidate who e ... More >>

Letters

'He is smart enough to realize if he didnt get out then, he may have awoken a fortysomething with crazy-colored hair and a tattoo of dragons circle jerking'

Irvine Offends Thousands of Its Citizens

An Orange County Grand Jury recently decided that the Irvine City Council is trying to hijack the Great Park, and that the OC Board of Supervisors (who initially approved of Irvine's actions) might look into litigation in order to return control of this huge local resource to the county itself. Irvi ... More >>

Agranistas Fire Ordinance

Proposed law takes aim at political consultants, advisers and the media

Cable Guy

A lobbyists offer to represent Cox Cable at Irvine City Hall creates new trouble for Agran

All The Councilmans Men

Nestande joins other slimy ex-politicos in Larry Agrans inner circle

Three Major Irvine Democrats Question Agran, Krom Ethics; Endorse Republicans

Mears, Petracca and Goldstone abandon Agran, Krom in favor of the Dark Side

Letters

Larry Agrans Power Trip

Irvine mayors planned public utility could enrich a political pal

Run It Up the Poop Poll

Slanted survey supports sewage waiver

The Great Park Is Coming Back

El Toro Airport Watch No. 149