I asked the city council for the procedure to do a public document search on lawsuits.
After reading an account on the Malibu Township Council’s (MTC) lawsuit against the city, which accused the council of breaking the Brown Act when they voted on the possibility of swapping Charmlee Park for Bluffs Park, I was astounded by what that must have cost the city. MTC asked the city to provide council members’ laptops, cell phones, emails and almost everything else they could think of. That lawsuit dragged on for years as MTC’s lawyer, Frank Angel, ran up the bills.
The Superior Court tossed out that suit, and then—adding insult to injury—the MTC appealed. Now they’ve lost that appeal, Frank Angel insists on dragging it to the Supreme Court.
I think it’s time that Malibu taxpayers found out exactly how much all these losing lawsuits by MTC and their lunatic franchises have cost them. We all know about the big ones like Measure R, but how about the ones that drag on for years? Those cost us millions that could be spent on buying land for ball fields instead of making Frank Angel’s mortgage payments.
A final question: We know that Malibu taxpayers are on the hook for the city’s legal bills, but who’s paying for MTC’s? Their books are closed. We don’t know what their membership is or who their donors are. We only know that John Mazza and Steve Uring—two planning commissioners—are on their board.
Something doesn’t smell right.
Lloyd Ahern