BIG BROTHER… Like any journalist, Squid is often nagged by doubts – did Squid remember to double-check a certain fact, or the spelling of someone’s name? There’s no edit button once ink hits the page.
One might think that a governing body, tasked with making decisions that affect the public, would be even more concerned about getting the facts right. But if that governing body is the California Public Utilities Commission, you would be wrong.
After two administrative law judges spent more than a year wrestling with just two questions – what the current water supply in the Monterey Peninsula is, and what the water demand will be in 2050 – the commissioners approved at least one answer they knew to be wrong.
The current supply, as determined by the judges in their proposed decision earlier this year, was to be 11,204 acre-feet. But on Aug. 14, the CPUC approved a current supply of 11,114 acre-feet, 90 acre-feet less, due to a typographical error that had been brought to their attention but still went uncorrected. Oh well, too bad, it’s now legally binding!
It was a fitting coda to a farcical process that Squid has been watching unfold over years.
BACK TALK… Squid doesn’t like to dwell in the past, but there are some who cannot let it go. Former Pacific Grove councilmember Luke Coletti is hanging on to his animosity toward former city manager Ben Harvey.
Harvey, now city manager of Ojai, and the P.G. City Council parted ways in July 2023, with Harvey resigning and both sides agreeing not to disparage the other in a separation agreement. Coletti, Harvey’s biggest critic, was a member of the council at the time. (He later lost reelection in 2024.)
In July, Coletti popped up on a Facebook post by the Ojai Valley News, which was reporting a lawsuit filed by a former Ojai city finance director, alleging Harvey and others discriminated against her.
“I am a former Pacific Grove City Council member who served during Ben Harvey’s time as city manager. Harvey’s tenure was fraught with controversy,” Coletti replied. He wrote a similar letter to the Ojai City Council, saying the complaint “sounds very plausible.”
Coletti himself was a source of controversy – Harvey and others filed complaints with P.G. alleging Coletti mistreated them, costing the city a pretty (undisclosed) penny.
Squid’s colleague reached out to Harvey, who says he’s abiding by the non-disparagement clause and he would hope the city would too. (Coletti did not respond to a request for comment.)
Squid is predicting a cease-and-desist letter in Coletti’s future, but is not sure if Coletti can ever help himself from ceasing or desisting in running his mouth.
(4) comments
I think that Ojai not being in Monterey County is a great reason for the Monterey County Weekly to not cover whatever is going on with him.
I think that Former City Councilmember Luke Coletti, whose political aspirations have clearly not been quashed by losing last year, and having spent half a million of our dollars out in the open, and uncategorized amounts of the City legal budget on the investigation and settlement discussions, would take the "win" and move on, rather than continuing to obsess on Ben Harvey.
It’s pretty easy for Ben Harvey to honor his non - disparagement agreement when Squid is doing all the disparaging for him.
The CPUC’s recent decision on Water Supply and Demand was a farce, but it was not a win for Cal Am. The decision did not rule on Cal Am’s desal at all. And the small deficit of only 2,618 acre-feet needed by 2050 calls into question the need for desal in the next 20 years. Why pay for a half-billion-dollar desal plant to supply 5,376 AF now when you need half that much water twenty-five years from now?
And the CPUC’s projected 2050 demand of 13,732 acre-feet a year was flawed to begin with. The CPUC claims we will use 50% more water by 2050. That’s impossible. Our population would have to grow by 50% to use that water. AMBAG projects a 10% population growth by 2050.
Cal Am does not have permission from the CPUC or the Coastal Commission to build its desal. So why are they claiming they will break ground on this boondoggle by the end of the year?
Who is Squid?
And why not self identify?
I take exception to Monterey County Weekly’s ongoing and negative coverage of Luke Coletti.
Why not do a professional and actual investigative piece on city manager, Ben Harvey’s problems in Ojai? It is available to read online:
Re reimbursement of expenses…, “Claimant asked to see his signed employment agreement to confirm that the expenses were authorized by his contract. Harvey asked Claimant, “Why can’t you just process the reimbursement?” At first, Claimant thought Harvey was joking and explained that City policy required supporting documentation to justify any payment to employees beyond their regular paycheck. She soon realized, however, that she was dealing with a different kind of city manager,”
Sharon Nelson
Pacific Grove
Who is Squid?
And why not self identify?
I take exception to Monterey County Weekly’s ongoing and negative coverage of Luke Coletti.
Why not do a professional and actual investigative piece on city manager, Ben Harvey’s problems in Ojai? It is available to read online:
Re reimbursement of expenses…, “Claimant asked to see his signed employment agreement to confirm that the expenses were authorized by his contract. Harvey asked Claimant, “Why can’t you just process the reimbursement?” At first, Claimant thought Harvey was joking and explained that City policy required supporting documentation to justify any payment to employees beyond their regular paycheck. She soon realized, however, that she was dealing with a different kind of city manager,”
Sharon Nelson
Pacific Grove
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