Thursday, July 19, 2012

San Bernardino -- Second Poorest City in the US After Detroit -- US Census Bureau -- Absolutely Nothing To With The Bakken

(If you came here looking for the Bakken, scroll up or scroll down, but definitely do not read this post if you are only interested in the Bakken. And if you are over 70 years of age, and on heart medication, consult your physician first before proceeding. If you are a teacher in California, read this post only if you are married to a policeman.)

... and then this:
San Bernardino’s general fund goes to cover public-safety costs, of which 80 percent is compensation. Firefighters’ wages averaged just over $130,000 in 2010, while police officers averaged closer to $95,000—this in a city in which over a third of the population lives below the poverty line. In 2010, San Bernardino’s highest-paid employee was a police sergeant, who took home $317,179. He and his fellow officers benefited from an amendment to San Bernardino’s charter, enacted in 1955, that based salaries on average police and firefighters’ wages in ten comparably sized California cities. Problem is, most of these cities—including Pasadena, Huntington Beach, Irvine, and Thousand Oaks—have per-capita incomes at least double that of San Bernardino’s.
Don't even get me started.
San Bernardino is, as Mayor Pat Morris calls it, a “blue-collar town”—and currently one with a 16 percent unemployment rate. The U.S. Census Bureau last year designated it the nation’s second-poorest city, behind only decrepit Detroit. Nearly 46 percent of residents receive some form of government assistance.
A police sergeant earns $320,000 in one year and 50% of the city he works in receive government assistance. And quite some time ago, someone took me to take for referring to California as "lala land." I don't  think I was far off. 

4 comments:

  1. You were being very generous to call it just lala land. I call it the land of nuts and fruits. No offense to actual fruits and nuts.

    The worse thing that happen to responsible government was the unionization of public sector workers. Lets see was it President Nixon who did that along with him establishing of the EPA. I'm a conservative not a establishment Republican who uses government to do so many wonderful things that turn around and cause havoc down the road.

    Thanks to AFSCME and SEIU as well as the teachers unions we are now in an era of the public sector ripping off the taxpaying sector. A form of legalized theft and we should never mind and just pay our taxes. Ugh

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    1. Yes, pretty sad. Hey, by the way, the same day that California legislators were congratulating themselves on funding the bullet train, they also increased salaries for their staffers by 5%. One of four California legislative staffers now have salaries in excess of $100,000. Secretaries, I assume. Californians will be given the opportunity to raise taxes on themselves in November to pay for these salary increases.

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  2. If you are interested, here is a list of retired San Bernardino City employees with pensions in excess of $100,000 as of 8-8-12. I would expect the list to grow substantially over the next few years. At the bottom of the webpage are the top 10 pensions paid by CALPERS. I copied this data from a website that tracks all CALPERS pensions exceeding $100,000. (Second link below)

    http://premium.investorvillage.com/smbd.asp?mb=6342&mn=46&pt=msg&mid=12002635

    http://database.californiapensionreform.com/database.asp?vttable=calpers

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    1. It would only make me (more) depressed to see that list. Smile.

      My hunch is that fellow Californians are checking that list daily!

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