Spooky Tale

SPOOKY TALE… Squid’s put Squid’s tentacle in Squid’s beak and said something dumb, but never on video, thank Poseidon. Not true for CSU Monterey Bay Vice President of Administration and Finance Glen Nelson, who put foot in mouth during a meeting on Sept. 21 that sparked anger on campus.

The comment came during a board meeting of the University Corporation of Monterey Bay, a separate nonprofit supporting CSUMB. Nelson, who serves as the corporation’s executive director, was reporting on former Fort Ord military housing used for students and faculty. Per an agreement with the Department of Defense, DoD tenants can continue to live there until they move out. Once the number of DoD tenants drops below 10 percent, CSUMB will have access to all of it.

“I don’t know if we want to call people in the middle of the night and scare them and tell them their house is haunted so they’ll leave, or what, but we’re working on a process,” Nelson said.

A video clip on the anonymous Instagram account @mb_confess spread the comment widely and drew harsh criticism by people worried that veterans were in danger of being kicked out of their homes. One student, Akif Khaled, released a rap video on YouTube slamming Nelson. Nelson apologized for his comments and expressed his and the university’s commitment to veterans. Squid expects ghost hunters may start lurking the halls to look for any mischief.

JAIL PASS… Squid’s colleagues have been reporting on inmate conditions at Monterey County Jail – particularly the substandard health care that recently saw Wellpath, the jail’s for-profit health care provider, hit with a court order for falling out of compliance with a 2015 class-action settlement. But that hasn’t stopped the County of Monterey from tooting its own horn over the routine passage of a state inspection of the county’s jails and holding facilities.

On Oct. 3, a press release hailed the “remarkable results” of this year’s inspection by the California Board of State and Community Corrections. In July, inspectors visited to evaluate compliance with state standards on corrections operations and inmate care. “We are proud to announce that the results of these comprehensive inspections were exceedingly positive,” the county boasted – citing how inspectors found “NO items of noncompliance” (the all-caps emphasis is theirs) with the state’s “minimum standards” for local detention facilities “This is a complete 180 from the previous reporting [by regulators] during the previous [sheriff’s] administration,” Sheriff Tina Nieto claimed in a statement.

That’s all good news welcomed by Squid. Yet Squid still finds such back-slapping unbecoming in a year when five inmates have died at the jail on the new sheriff’s watch. But still, there’s politics.