SoCal wants to secede from rest of state

California taxpayers are paying a Los Angeles investment banker $400,000 to serve as a part-time board chairman of stem cell research agency, pushing the combined salaries of its two top officials to nearly $1 million per year.

http://www.latimes.com/health/la-me-stem-cell-20110705,0,1765742.story

But please lecture us some more on how we need more taxes in California.

 

If you don't like it there, leave.

 

I was born in Southern California and grew up in Northern California and worked/interned at two papers there and I wouldn't go back for anything. It's such a mess.

 

http://www.laweekly.com/2011-05-26/news/rich-fireman-named-in-shoplifting/


El Segundo firefighters make $210k a year in their little little burg. There are two fires a year in El Segundo.

55 percent of El Segundo Fire Department retirees in the past decade have been awarded either partial or full disability status by the city — a high figure for men who spend most of their workday hanging around a firehouse eating, sleeping or exercising.

The fire chief makes $370k a year - for two fires a year.

But taxes are too low in California.

 

El Segundo has quite a gig going, at taxpayer expense.

El Segundo is nearly broke. Last week ­— two years after the City Council, amidst the deep recession, handed city employees a series of fat raises ­­— the council tapped out the last few cents from its reserve funds.

"We're Mayberry-by-the-Sea," Burns says. "We can't afford these crazy salaries and pensions."

Recently departed Police Chief David Cummings hauled in $425,000 last year, including a $200,000 "leave buyout" that almost doubled his final year's take. Cummings was hired for six months as an El Segundo contract employee, even while starting to draw his $210,000 pension.

"Chief Cummings' real take last year was north of $525,000," Councilman Don Brann, the only El Segundo council member who called for fiscal sanity, tells the Weekly. Cummings did not respond to several messages seeking comment.

The Weekly has learned that 23 city employees are being paid more than $250,000 in total compensation this fiscal year, while nine get more than $300,000 and four get more than $350,000.

http://www.laweekly.com/2010-10-14/news/a-stink-in-el-segundo-over-cadillac-salaries/

But California taxpayers need to be shamed, for not wanting higher taxes.

 

It seems like every LA suburb has a similar problem.

 

California prison psychiatrist makes $838,000 a year... Must have been a good year for him.

But California has a tax problem.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-05/california-prison-psychiatrist-paid-838-706.html

OK

oh btw, can't wait to see what his CALPERS pension will pay.

 

Six figure salary for lifeguards. More than half the lifeguards in Newport Beach collected more than $150,000 for 2010 with the two highest-paid collecting $211,451 and $203,481 in total compensation respectively.

Then retire as early as 50 with 90% of your salary. A recently retired lifeguard, age 51, receives a government retirement of over $108,000 per year for the rest of his life.

http://orangepunch.ocregister.com/2011/05/10/lifeguarding-in-oc-is-totally-lucrative-some-make-over-200k/44783/

But god forbid someone complain about the tax structure and deficit in the state.

 

South California is trending on Twitter.

If they balance this by combining the Dakotas to keep it 50, this could fly.

 

It's a $24.5B shortfall.