Choi won’t attend Town Hall on Moving Veterans Cemetery out of the Great Park either

June 4, 2015 Uncategorized 1

choinazi

Irvine Mayor Steven Choi has joined his council colleague Lynn Schott and won’t attend an announced Town Hall meeting organized by the Orange County Residents Association (OCRA) on Monday June 8.  OCRA is an organization made up of residents near the Great Park location for the Veterans Cemetery and Memorial and its leaders or members are not publicly known. But in announcing that the Mayor won’t attend, organizers savaged Schott and suggest they will still hold the forum anyway.

We’re not surprised Choi opted out of a meeting with a group he is trying to gain support from.  Mayor Choi lacks political courage required to effectively lead and it better suited for cutting ribbons at Chamber of Commerce business debuts than actually telling this group his planning commissioner lied to them about what they could do about the cemetery and memorial.  What is interesting is OCRA avoids criticizing Choi while letting Schott have it.

Here’s the notice posted on the group’s blog (we’ve bolded passages for emphasis):

Announcement from OCRA on Townhall Meeting Updat (sic)

Announcement  from OCRA on Townhall Meeting Update:Councilwoman Lynn Schott had notified OCRA yesterday that she and Mr. Choi will not participate in the Townhall Meeting scheduled on June 8, 2015 at Cypress Village Community Center.No written explanation or apology was given by Ms. Schott to OCRA for OCRA’s work and time spent on this TH efforts.

Although through a phone call and a third party blog site, we had learned that Ms. Schott cancelled the meeting due to her concern on others’ false interpretations on our event flyer, we are greatly disappointed in her no direct communication to us PRIOR to her decision and her unprofessionalism.

Our sincere apology for any troubles this may have caused you. We appreciate your joint-efforts with us in  making the event known to others.

We will discuss and notify you in short orders on the possibility of keeping the meeting date/time/location with you all.

We will still be present at the meeting location the same date and time if you choose to come out to learn more details about the cemetery issue. We will provide any answers or details concerning the situation.

Thank you for your patience,

Sincerely,
OCRA

It’s hard to say what the false impressions are.  The group claims the majority of Irvine residents oppose a cemetery at the Great Park and there’s no vote, no data and no survey that could possibly verify this.  The group claims an alternate site has been identified without saying where this is.  Previous alternative locations in Modjeska Canyon and in South County along the 5 freeway were deemed unsuitable for lack of infrastructure and land ownership issues.
Since it appears the OCRA will keep their meeting, perhaps its a good idea for Veterans to attend to explain the process of how the Cemetery and Memorial came to be.  The OCRA’s claim is the site was approved with little notice when frankly there was plenty of notice that there was a proposal on the table to place this Memorial at the Great Park.
What Veterans need to do is attend next Tuesday’s City Council meeting and call Choi, Schott and Christina Shea on the carpet over their continued squishiness on the Veterans Cemetery & Memorial.  And its also time to ask this group about their lack of transparency.

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