Dear Meghan – Crew Control, Please

Please, Meghan Sahli-Wells, rein in your team.

I do not support you Meghan, no matter how many lawn signs your team puts outside my office without my permission. How many more places around town have you put up signs without permission? I can’t imagine you do this just to irritate me. But it got me to finally write the following because I am concerned with what is going on.

We have the constant barrage of vicious attack articles and blogs aimed at Scott Malsin (I know Meghan, negative campaigning works). From what I can determine the writers (the ones that exist?) are in your court. What is next? False campaign mailings? Well, that already happened last weekend when a reprint of a blog from the Front Page without the required FPPC sender identification was mailed out. But when will we see the illegal postcard mailings? Like the one that was sent out at the end of the last school board election falsely using an unknown organization’s name as the sender in an effort to mislead the voters. The mailing was traced to a well known mailing/printing house working mostly with governmental labor union campaigns. I wonder if we will see the same shenanigans from your court in this election? I am emptying my mailbox with great anticipation every day.

You don’t take money from local developers, because you don’t want to be “beholden to developers”. How about the $1000 outside donation that came into your last campaign, at the last minute as to not make the filing report before the election? You got $1000 (the maximum allowed) from the SEUI, a union that doesn’t even have organized employees in Culver City. Was this why you kept quiet and never took a real stand in support of all the parents regarding the issue to unionize the parent-paid adjuncts at El Marino School? Are you expecting fresh outside union donations this week? You surely are very active in school issues, why not this one? Are you beholden (your word) to the unions? You took their money! How can I trust you putting the overall interest of the city first if you are elected to the city council?

It is a sad testament to our local election that your team and associates have turned this election into a contact sport with no rules. I have a hard time understanding how you can reconcile that with your community approach. I do not believe that the goal justifies the means, why do you?

This city is too small to have these divides, so why do you surround yourself with associates that are so divisive? The city council is not a republican, independent or democratic council. The issues in front of the council are not left or right ideological issues. They are pragmatic, practical issues to make this city the best place possible to live and work in for all. As a city we need the best and brightest at this challenging juncture for our city. I’m sorry Meghan, I had hopes for you, but this campaign and the people you have surrounded yourself with clearly do not measure up to the fairness and honesty I believe we need in the city today.

Back to the lawn signs. Political support may not be a tangible good, but implied support when it doesn’t exist should be considered a form of theft. If it has happened once (make that twice) how do we know it does not happened more often?

Göran Eriksson
Culver City resident and business owner

Topsy Turvy at The Actors' Gang 9/26-11/16

4 Comments

  1. This letter is not only cruel, but a testament to the dirty politics that have enveloped our city over the past two years. Meghan Sahli-Wells has run a clean campaign from start to finish. You have no real proof to back up your claims; you are looking under rocks to find anything to ensure that the candidates you support get elected. You shame our community.

  2. Mr. Eriksson,

    I’m surprised to find your attack letter here as well, after reading it over on the Patch. How many places have you cut-and-pasted your tirade? Since you didn’t put any extra effort into proofreading or editing your poorly ‘argued’ letter, I trust you will forgive me for cut-and-pasting my response, below, from the Patch.

    That’s quite a letter. I wonder if you actually took a moment to read what you had written before clicking “submit.” Your denouncement of divisive politicking in a letter so filled with innuendo and rancor would strike any level-headed reader as suspicious at best and more likely disingenuous and manipulative. The paragraph speculating about post-card mailings is especially odious.

    I’d like to try and give you the benefit of the doubt, despite the fact that you seem quite willing to speculate and vilify others. However, given the tone of your letter I’m finding it quite difficult not to see less-than-admirable motives in your tone and tactics. Therefore, I’ll simply take solace in the fact that your tirade is so poorly written and so lacking in logical coherence, that I doubt it will influence many people.

    Sincerely,
    Brian Treanor

  3. Mr. Eriksson does not own the property where his office is located. The owner of the property requested a sign from the Meghan Sahli-Wells campaign; the sign was taken down (probably by Mr. Eriksson). The owner notified the campaign that the sign was missing and requested another one; the second sign was also removed without the owner’s permission.

    No one involved in the Sahli-Wells campaign has written or spoken negatively about any of the other candidates. They have strict instructions not to engage in any discussion about other candidates even when asked. George Lasse has written a great deal about Scott Malsin, but Mr. Lasse is not a Meghan Sahli-Wells supporter; in fact, Mr. Lasse is not a registered voter.

    IRS regulations prohibit political activity by 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations such as the one at El Marino. The parents should not have tried to influence the outcome of the City Council election; by doing so, they risk losing their tax-exempt status. I believe the parents are now aware of this regulation. Mr. Eriksson is not doing the parents or their children a favor by bringing up this issue in his letter.

  4. I am one of the board members of ALLEM, one of the two 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations at El Marino (the other is the PTA). I can assure you that at no time has ALLEM ever tried to influence the outcome of this City Council election in any way whatsoever, nor the outcome of any other election.

    There are many parents at El Marino who are politically active, and some of the same people who serve as volunteers with PTA and ALLEM also volunteer elsewhere, including on political campaigns. Please remember that people who serve with a non-profit are allowed to be politically active in their private lives, provided that they say or do everything as private citizens and not as spokespersons for the organization or while using the organization’s resources. It is the organization *itself* that cannot endorse or oppose candidates, not the individual people who work or volunteer for the non-profit.

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