They eat their own

This week has been cabal cannibal carnage. The appetizers were soooo tasty. 4 star, really. I wonder who the main course will be?






We gleefully witnessed the breakup of the Taft/Gilbert alliance, and today, a crowded town council meeting witnessed the town mismanager sent home on administrative leave. Buh bye!

Temporary restraining order stays, case moves to federal court

Judge Randolph Bartlett allowed todays hearing to move forward, despite Justin Pierce of Jackson Lewis, the attorney for the town of Quartzsite asking the temporary restraining order to be thrown out, claiming that  employee versus employer agreements cannot be intervened in in such a manner. After about 20 or so minutes of riveting testimony by Sgt Will Ponce, the attorney for the town asked to approach the bench. Judge Barltett announced that they were excercising their right to move the case to federal court. He ordered that the papers be submitted in ten days and that the temporary restraiing order will remain in place.

No cameras or other recording devices were alowed, so if you want the transcript, you'll have to pay La Paz County for the CD.
http://www.kswt.com/story/15280504/quartzsite-officers-tro-case-maybe-heard-by-federal-judge

Brewer passes the buck on treason, while QPOA police officers on "house arrest"

Quartzite officials have become enemies of the Republic. When officers no longer have the right to remain silent, citizens cannot speak, there is no due process with the building official and enforcement of town codes and ordinances, equal treatment and equal protection have long gone by the wayside, town officials have committed TREASON!

 People are apparently receiving the following letter from Governor Jan Brewer's office:

The Governor’s Office of Constituent Services is in receipt of your email received July 13, 2011.  We are responding on behalf of Governor Brewer.

Thank you for contacting the Governor’s Office to express your concerns regarding the current situation in Quartzsite, AZ.  As you may know, the Governor does not have the authority to intervene in local law enforcement matters.  Nor does this office have the authority to investigate misconduct by the police, county jails, federal prisons, and/or judges.

We understand that you have filed a complaint with the Arizona Attorney General’s Office.  The Attorney General is the appropriate office to investigate allegations of Open Meeting Law violations.   We trust that their office will respond to your complaint in a timely manner.  For your convenience, we are providing their direct contact information.

Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne

Office of the Attorney General

1275 West Washington Street

Phoenix, AZ 85007-2926

602.542.5025

1.800.352.8431

Fax 602.542.4085

Website: www.azag.gov

In addition, complaints against law enforcement officers are filed with the Arizona Peace Officers Standard and Training Board (AZ POST), which is under the jurisdiction of the Arizona Department of Public Safety (DPS).  If you have not already, we suggest you contact the AZ POST to submit a formal complaint for review.  Once the complaint is received by their office, the investigation process begins.  The length of the investigation varies depending on the circumstances surrounding the case.  Upon completion, the AZ POST will then forward the results of its investigation to the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, which has the authority to take action as deemed appropriate by their office.  For your convenience, we are providing the contact information for the AZ POST. 

Arizona Peace Officers Standard and Training (AZ POST) Board

2643 E. University Drive

Phoenix, AZ 85034

Voice: 602.223.2514

Fax: 602.244.0477

Website: http://www.azpost.state.az.us/

Thank you again for contacting the Governor’s Office.  We trust our response fully addresses your concerns. 

Sincerely,
L. Lerma
Director, Constituent Services


/s/
Arizona Governor's Office
Constituent Services

www.azgovernor.gov


In the meantime, all members of the Quartzsite Police Officers have been put on paid administrative leave, and Assistant Town misManager Al Jognson is in charge of investigating whether or notit was an ethical breach of town policy to blow the whistle on Chief Gilbert. Clearly, the Constution appears to be suspended within town limits!

Renewable Power on Public Lands - from AZ Central

Renewable power on public lands

http://www.azdatapages.com/datacenter/business/power-plants.html?fCompany_project=%25

Developers from across the nation and globe have taken out 70 applications for wind and solar power plants on acreage owned by the Bureau of Land Management and State Trust in Arizona. If the projects get built, the plans are likely to change. For example, NextLight Renewable Power is researching four sites for solar-thermal power plants, but Tempe-based First Solar Inc. has agreed to buy the company, and First Solar uses photovoltaic technology.

Company	Megawatts	Technology	Location
Boulevard Associates LLC (NextEra Energy Resources)	500	Concentrating solar power (CSP) trough	Maricopa Co. between HarquahalaMtns. and Vulture Mtns south of Aguila AZ.	Details
Boulevard Associates LLC (NextEra Energy Resources)	500	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. and south of Big HornMountains and north of I-10 (exit 81)	Details
Ausra AZ II LLC	840	CSP trough (+280MWPrivate)	Maricopa Co. and southeast of Big HornMountains and north of I-10	Details
Iberdrola Renewables	900	CSP fresnel lens	Maricopa Co. and southwest of Big HornMountains and north of I-10.	Details
Horizon Wind Energy LLC	250	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. between HarquahalaMtns. and Vulture Mtns. south of Aguila AZ.	Details
AZ Solar Investments	500	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. and southwest of Big Horn Mountains and north of I-10.	Details
LSR Jackrabbit	500	CSP tower	Maricopa Co. in the Hassayampa Plain near JackrabbitWash	Details
Boulevard Associates LLC (NextEra Energy Resources)	375	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. east of SR85 and the Jojoba Substation	Details
Iberdrola Renewables	300	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. in Hyder Valley	Details
OptiSolar	500	Photovoltaic	Maricopa Co.South of Gila Bend	Details
OptiSolar	300	Photovoltaic	Maricopa Co.Saddle Mtn. south of 1-10	Details
Arizona Renewable Ventures	500	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. in Dendora Valley next to the Woolsey Peak Wilderness	Details
LSR Palo Verde	600	CSP trough	Maricopa Co. in Palo Verde Valley south of the Palo Verde Hills North of Eliot Road	Details
Arlington West	573	Photovoltaic	West of Arlington Valley	Details
Burnt Well	80	Photovoltaic	West of Burnt Well in Maricopa County, south of I-10	Details
Boulevard Associates LLC (NextEra Energy Resources)	250	CSP trough	Highway 93 & White Hills Road	Details
Boulevard Associates LLC (NextEra Energy Resources)	250	CSP trough	Highway 93 & Temple Bar Road	Details
Iberdrola Renewables	1,500	CSP trough	Lands both East of Hovatter Road along and South of I-10	Details
Iberdrola Renewables	2,000	CSP trough	Lands West of Hovatter Road and South of I-10	Details
Iberdrola Renewables	2,000	CSP trough	Lands South of Quartzite in the Stone Cabin area on both the East and West sides of U.S. 95	Details
NextLight Renewable Power LLC	500	CSP trough	Located East of New WaterMtns.	Details
NextLight Renewable Power LLC	500	CSP trough	Northeast of EagletailMtns.	Details
NextLight Renewable Power LLC	500	CSP trough	Hyder area	Details
NextLight Renewable Power LLC	500	CSP trough	South of Quartzsite	Details
Solar Reserve	600	CSP tower	Black Rock Hill area	Details
Solar Reserve	600	CSP tower	North of Quartzsite	Details
Solar Reserve	600	CSP tower	Hyder area	Details
Wildcat Quartzsite LLC (BrightSource Energy)	800	CSP tower	Along U.S. Hwy 95 South of Quartzsite	Details
Wildcat Abrams LLC (BrightSource Energy)	400	CSP tower	Northwest of Growler	Details
Horizon Wind Energy LLC	250	CSP trough	North of Wenden AZ south of the HarcuvarMountains	Details
Boulevard Assoc. LLC (NextEra Energy Resources)	1,000	CSP trough	Bouse	Details
Wildcat Harcuvar South LLC	800	CSP tower	North of McMullen Valley	Details
Solar Reserve	250	Photovoltaic	San Simon	Details
Gamesa Energy USA, LLC, GEUSA Hurricane Cliffs Site Testing &Monitoring Project Area	Met Towers Type II	Wind	Hurricane Cliffs	Details
Foresight Wind, Foresight Hurricane Cliffs Site Testing &Monitoring Project Area	Met Towers Type II	Wind	Hurricane Cliffs	Details
Foresight Wind, Foresight Black Rock Site Testing &Monitoring Project Area	Met Towers Type II	Wind	Seegmiller, Mokaac, and Low Mountains	Details
Mustang Wind, LLC,Mustang Buckskin Site Testing &Monitoring Project Area	Met Towers Type II	Wind	BuckskinMountain	Details
BP Wind Energy North America, Inc.,Mohave County Wind Farm Development Project	500	Wind	White Hills northwest of Kingman	Details
MusicMountain Wind Power, LLC	Met Towers Type II	Wind	Music Mountains, East of Antares Rd.	Details
Solar Arizona, LLC	Met Towers Type II	Wind	South of White Hills, East of Hwy 93	Details
Pacific Wind Development LLC (Iberdrola Renewables), Dolan Springs	Met Towers Type II	Wind	Northwest of Red Lake	Details
Iberdrola Renewables, Dry Lake	Met Towers Type III	Wind		Details
WindMatrix	Met Towers Type II	Wind		Details
Horizon Wind Energy, LLC	Met Towers Type II	Wind		Details
Oak Creek Energy Systems Inc.	Met Towers Type II	Wind		Details
Zenith Energy LLC	not stated	Photovoltaic	South of St. George, Utah.	Details
Albiassa Solar	200	CSP trough (wet cooled)	Kingman	Details
Enviromission	250	Solar convection tower	Parker	Details
Enviromission	250	Solar convection tower	Parker	Details
Solar Reserve	200	CSP tower (hybrid cooling)	Parker	Details
Blue Tower LLC	40	Photovoltaic	Quartzite	Details
Invenergy	40	Photovoltaic	West of Phoenix, north of I-10 near Tonopah	Details
Ausra	100	CSP fresnel lense (wet cooling)	West of Phoenix, south of I-10 near Tonopah	Details
Res Americas	100	CSP trough (wet cooled)	West of Phoenix, south of I-10 near Tonopah	Details
AVSE I and II	250	CSP trough (wet cooled)	West of Phoenix, south of I-10 near Wintersburg	Details
AVSE III	65	Photovoltaic	West of Buckeye, south of I-10	Details
AZ Solar LLC	100	Photovoltaic	West of Phoenix, north of I-10 and south of White Tank Mountain Regional Park	Details
Iberdrola Renewables	30	Photovoltaic	East of Casa Grande	Details
Res Americas	180	CSP trough (wet cooled)	Southwest of Gila Bend	Details
Invenergy	40	Photovoltaic	West of Gila Bend, north of Interstate 8	Details
Solar Reserve	200	CSP tower (hybrid cooling)	West of Gila Bend, north of Interstate 8	Details
Acciona	100	CSP trough (wet cooled)	East of Yuma, south of Interstate 8	Details
Acciona	100	CSP trough (wet cooled)	East of Yuma, south of Interstate 8	Details
Ausra	150	CSP fresnel lense (wet cooling)	North of Yuma	Details
EC&R West LLC	35	Photovoltaic	South of Yuma	Details
Iberdrola Renewables, Dry Lake	60	Wind	Completed near Snowflake	Details
Iberdrola Renewables, Dry Lake II	65	Wind	Adjacent to Dry Lake I near Snowflake	Details
Foresight Wind	85	Wind	Near the Aubrey Cliffs south of Grand Canyon.	Details
Foresight Wind, Grapevine Canyon Wind	200	Wind	Southeast of Flagstaff	Details
Foresight Wind	not stated	Wind	West of Springerville	Details

Quirky Quartzsite makes LA Times!

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-quartzsite-20110416,0,1914587,full.story

By Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times

April 16, 2011

Reporting from Quartzsite, Ariz.— 

Desert town clings to its quirkiness

Quartzsite, Ariz., is a truck stop town of 3,600 that draws about 1 million visitors in winter with its gem shows, swap meets and 'naked bookseller.' Officials are looking for ways to boost revenue in the off-season, but locals and the snowbirds don't want the town's character to be lost.

Debbie Eldridge was lolling about her 40-foot-long Monaco Diplomat luxury motor home with her twin sister, Betty Hayden, cooling off with a Diet Pepsi after a marathon morning at the flea markets.

Eldridge, 58, had reaped a modest haul — a dog toy for her beloved bichon, Boomer, and a decorative sun sculpture that she planned to display in the backyard of her real home in Merced, Calif.

Hayden was sporting her newest acquisition: a pink fringed T-shirt that read, "Quartzsite, Arizona."

The girls, as their husbands call them, come here every winter for some shopping, some sun and a break from the rhythm of retired life. Begrudgingly, they bring the boys along, too.
 
PHOTOS: The "naked bookseller," snowbirds and the desert 


The couples moor their RVs side-by-side at the Desert Oasis trailer park off Highway 95, where about $300 a month gets you a parking space, sewer hookups and a front-row seat for one of America's oddest annual migrations.

During the scorching summer months, Quartzsite is little more than a hiccup on the highway, a truck stop town of 3,600 baking in the Sonoran Desert where road trippers pull off for gas before crossing into or out of California.
Then winter blows in.

From October to April, more than 1 million people pass through, town officials estimate. Some stay only a week or two. Others call it home for the season.

During that time, Quartzsite may be the most eccentric place in the country, a weird Western outpost where "tea party" retirees mingle with cigarette-rolling rock hounds and white-haired hippies — and where no one bats an eye at a bare-bottomed bookseller.

But with that diversity come various views of what the town should be, and sometimes they conflict. After decades of watching its population rise and fall, Quartzsite has hit a midlife crisis, with some wondering if the town needs to rein in its freewheeling ways.

"This was like an Old West town," said Jake Jakubec, a 66-year-old retired truck driver who has wintered in Quartzsite since the 1990s. "We bought and sold and partied and camped. We had a ball here."

Jakubec, who lives out of a souped-up Chevrolet van, was sitting on a porch just off Main Street, trading tall tales with his old friend Harold Donaldson, 64. Both men have the archetypal Quartzsite look: sun-freckled skin that bears a resemblance to boot leather, and T-shirts the color of dust.

"Alien intervention is very real," Donaldson was saying when Jakubec cut him off.

"Harold, am I right or am I wrong?" Jakubec said. "They're trying to make this place into Palm Springs."

"Ah, it's a commercial deal now," Donaldson said, sighing. "It used to be you could just drive up here, throw your tarp down, pay the property owner $5, and that was all."

Town Manager Alex Taft would like naysayers like Donaldson and Jakubec to spend a week in her shoes. Then they'd have to reckon with the question she faces: How is a town with no supermarket and only 13 police officers supposed to cope with such a massive swell of people?

"It's kind of a wall of humanity," Taft said. Some days, traffic is so thick it's faster to walk than drive.

The snowbirds putter in from all directions in motor homes and campers, which they hitch up at one of Quartzsite's 70-plus trailer parks or on the federal land that sprawls in all directions beyond the town limits.

With metal roofs glittering amidst the saltbush and saguaro, the rigs look like covered wagons from a distance. Some part-time residents, like the Eldridges, dress up their lots with plastic flamingoes and fake palm trees.

Many are drawn by the gem and mineral shows that materialize each year in windswept tents along the side of the road.

One of the largest is the Tyson Wells Rock and Gem Show, a temporary tent city where bargain hunters pick through cardboard boxes brimming with onyx, rose quartz, meteorite and Brazilian jade. Other essentials for sale include gun holsters, hula hoops and diabetic socks, along with the sorts of deep-fried concoctions typically hawked at state fairs.

At 10 a.m. on a recent day, patrons were already knocking back cold ones at Beer Bellys, a bar set up on a patch of AstroTurf in the middle of it all.

"It's kind of like a big carnival," said Charlene Mullens, 58, who was dusting off jewelry at Dave's Bead Emporium. "People just have a good ol' time."

Nobody's sure exactly how Quartzsite became a haven for the RV set. But many say it may have started in the 1960s when a woman traveling west broke down on Interstate 10.

She had four young girls and no money to fix her station wagon, so she sold the kids' toys. Soon, others were imitating, exhibiting their wares in the backs of pickup trucks.

A man named Howard Armstrong decided to make it official. He started a winter swap meet called the Main Event, which drew crowds with its bargains and diversions (hot air balloon rides and camel races). Armstrong died in 2004 and the ownership changed. The swap meet still takes place every January, but now "a lot of that festivity is gone because he's gone," Taft said.

Taft is from Connecticut, by way of Phoenix. She is slim with chin-length silver hair and wears a silk scarf patterned with cats. She started coming here in the 1990s and stayed because the climate helped her health. She volunteered at the library — which sees 1,000 daily visitors in the winter — and was eventually drafted to help the town deal with its unique budget challenges.

Taft said the town charges vendors only $50 for a six-month license. Quartzsite does not collect property taxes and relies heavily on grants, which help pay for extra workers in winter. What the town needs, Taft says, are year-round attractions, fairgrounds maybe, as well as industry and stores. But she said the seasonal population shifts make it hard to attract investors.

Still, Police Chief Jeff Gilbert said growth is inevitable. "It's kind of a blank slate," he said. "It's a prime opportunity!"

To some folks, that's the problem. Jade Jones, editor of the Desert Freedom Press, helped organize a campaign this year to recall five of seven town council members.

A few weeks before the March election, Jones, 45, was bent over a laptop in a cramped trailer, strategizing with her closest political allies, Michael Roth, who pens a column in the paper called "The Patriot's Corner," and Quartzsite Mayor Ed Foster. A row of caged dogs howled at full volume. (Jones also runs a pet grooming and boarding business.)

"I get about as much respect here as I get on the council," Foster said.

"You probably get more here," Jones quipped.

Jones and Roth met a few years ago at a presidential campaign event for Ron Paul. They were upset with town officials, who they felt were too intent on steering Quartzsite away from its free-market swap-meet roots.

So they started attending council meetings with cameras and posting the footage on YouTube. Roth was arrested at one meeting. Not long after, Jones was arrested at her home after an altercation with a building inspector. Her framed mug shot hangs near her collection of dog show trophies.

"We're taking back America one small town at a time," Jones said.

When voters went to the polls March 8, they chose not to recall the council members. Taft, the town manager, said the results showed that people want to move Quartzsite into the future.

But for now, eccentric Quartzsite remains. Consider Shanana "Rain" Golden-Bear, editor of the town's other weekly newspaper, the Desert Messenger, who has thunderclouds tattooed on her cheeks; or Pinky Williams, a mountain man from Texas who journeys to Quartzsite each year to sell knives fashioned out of arrowheads and raccoon jaws. "I was born a hundred years too late," he says.

And then there's Paul Winer, who started coming here with his wife, Joanne, 61, in the 1990s to sell used books — three for $1 — out of a tent, but who now owns a bookstore with 180,000 titles.

Winer, 67, saves on taxes because the store, which has plastic tarp walls that unfurl from a frame, is technically an outdoor structure. He's good at skirting laws. A nudist, he covers up at work with a teeny thong, narrowly fitting the criteria for public decency.

Quartzsite's famed "naked bookseller" estimates that he poses for photographs 8,000 times a year with a variety of visitors, from Asian tourists to Willie Nelson types. He once performed across North America, family in tow, as an "adult cabaret" artist (stage name "Sweet Pie").

In 1991, after watching "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" with his daughter while on the road, she asked, "What is a neighborhood?" So they settled in Quartzsite, near Yuma, where Winer's parents retired.

Several years later, his daughter died at age 8 of a viral heart infection. Winer said he and his wife stayed "because this is the place where people remember her."

They stayed, too, because Quartzsite is a good fit. As night fell on the desert, Winer sat at a piano in his shop and danced his fingers across the keys, unsettling dust.

"I got a little nothing," he crooned. "A little nothing nowhere."

kate.linthicum@latimes.com

Copyright © 2011, Los Angeles Times

La Paz County funds frozen for non payment of judgement!

Although all three La Paz County Supervisors were elected on their pledge to negotiate a settlement with Jim Willet and Yakima Company, and despite Dan Fields being hired as County Administrator for the same purpose, stalled negotiations and appeals of a jury settlement have resulted in a writ of attachment against approx. $10.9 million in public funds supervised by the County.

Former Quartzsite Town Manager/Town Attorney, now County Administrator feigned shock and surprise at this standard legal tactic, calling Willet "foolhardy" and "unethical" (looked in the mirror lately Danny boy?). Fields had previously laughed off Willet's attempts at negotiation claiming "you cant get blood out of a turnip".

The Appeals Court issued a mandate to the La Paz Superior Court on January 21st 2011

http://apps.supremecourt.az.gov/aacc/appella/1CA%5CCV%5CCV080759.PDF 

 With no settlement in sight and the Supervisors approving to hire yet another law firm at the Jan. meeting, the writ means that the attached funds cannot be used by the State, Special Districts, Public Works or any of the other entities to whom it is being held for, essentially putting all of the county services and employees at the mercy of the Supervisors greed, arrogance and stupidity. Naturally, they are trying to shift the blame for this financial crisis to Willet, who saw his life's work go down the toilet and just wants what he's owed. 

An emergency meeting concerning the Freeze on County Funds has been called for Thursday 2/3/11 at 1:30pm. The location of the hearing is the La Paz County Superior Court Room.

The DESERT FREEDOM PRESS newspaper hits Quartzsite!

"The DESERT FREEDOM PRESS - Local news you can actually use. Serving Quartzsite and La Paz County".

The town is buzzing!

As promised earlier this year, a new local newspaper made it's debut yesterday! Reportedly, thousands of copies have been circulated around La Paz County and reviews have been quite positive! Aside from a couple of formatting errors, the "premier edition" is off to a great start. Of note is the column written by Quartzsite Mayor Ed Foster, who had previously declined an offer to write for that other free publication apparently sponsored by his possibly brain damaged critics.

Those wishing to submit an ad or write a letter to the editor may mail it to:

Desert Freedom Press
PO box 542
Ehrenburg, AZ 85334

thedesertfreedompress@yahoo.com

Ask for the current issue at the following locations:

Quartzsite
The Big Market
Quartzsite Bakery
The Grubstake
Mountain Quail Cafe
The Gamblers
Flash Jordan Taxi
Crawford's Trailer Park
A Fur Salon
Trina's Burgers
Casa Del Sol RV Park
Western Wall Art & Discount Grocery (Rice Ranch)
Val-U-Gem (Prospector's Panorama)
Three Sister's Kettle Corn (Quartzsite Marketplace)
Shell Gas Station
Taco Mio
Todd's Computer Repair (Hi Ali)
White Buffalo Sage Emporium (Quartzsite Showgrounds)
Gold Miser
JJ's RV Parts

Parker
BEST Grooming
Coaches Corner family restaurant
Crozz Bonez

Ehrenburg
River Lagoon laundromat and mini mart


Salome
Salome Cafe