Bolsavik.com

The lawsuit in San Jose where a Vietnamese-American group alleges the City Council improperly communicated before the vote to name the Vietnamese area on Story Road has been chopped off at the knees, when a judge granted summary judgment to the city on the Brown Act violation and left alive a dispute over $3,800 cost of a Public Records Act request.

Council member Madison Nguyen, long the subject of protests by the plaintiff group, was elated. She told the Bolsavik, “The summary judgment clearly states none of the councilmember violated the Brown Act,” which is not exactly what the order said.

The plaintiff group Vietnamese-American Community of Northern California, on the other hand, sent out a notice to Vietnamese press (read here) saying the judge “has recognized that there was a Brown Act violation,” which isn’t true either.

Judge Mark H. Pierce’s order, received Thursday (read here), ended the controversy over whether the City Council communicated improperly before voting to name the Story Road area “Saigon Business Distrct.” The plaintiff had claimed that the City Council violated the Brown Act through a series of email exchanges before the meeting.

The email allegedly resulted in a pre-meeting agreement by the majority to choose the name “Saigon Business District” over other names including “Little Saigon.” And the Council did vote in November 2007 to use the name “Saigon Business District.”

As protests erupted, the Council in its March 2008 meeting revoked its previous decision.

Judge Pierce (whom the plaintiff described in its press release as a new judge who lacks knowledge and experience) held that “the City Council’s alleged use of a series of communications to deliberate . . . was cured by its rescinding of Resolution No. 74127 on March 4, 2008.”

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The sole Vietnamese-American on the city council of San Jose said in a written statement that she is “greatly disturbed” by the police beating of Vietnamese student Phuong Ho (pictured). In a separate interview with the Bolsavik, Councilmember Madison Nguyen also said she supports putting body cameras on police officers that record audio and video.

The statement (click here to read the original PDF) was issued by three council members. In addition to Nguyen, councilmembers Sam Liccardo and Ash Kalra also signed. Kalra is a former public defender; Liccardo is a former D.A. and the alleged beating took place in his district.

The three wrote, “We are greatly disturbed by the video released by the San Jose Mercury News on the arrest of Phuong Ho, a Vietnamese exchange student at San Jose State University.” (Read more here)

They stated, “The behavior of the San Jose Police officers at the scene needs to be investigated thoroughly to ensure accountability for their actions.”

In an acknowledgement that the secrecy surrounding the investigation of the Daniel Pham shooting (read here) was - at the least - problematic, the statement said, “We also ask that if the District Attorney chooses to conduct a grand jury proceeding, that it be open to the public.”

In an interview conducted for Nguoi Viet Daily News, Nguyen told the Bolsavik that she believes San Jose police needs some department-wide reforms.

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Turns out people don’t need the Bolsavik after all. While the Bolsavik was at orchestra practice, polls closed in San Jose and Councilwoman Madison Nguyen handily won 55-45, according to numbers with all precincts reported here. This blog’s readers were already leaving comments here about the election result, even before the Bolsavik ever made it past his front door.

In another sign that the traditional polling booth may be becoming obsolete day by day, this special election was decided most by mail ballots, with 9,502 people voting by mail and only 2,247 showing up at the precincts.

That’s more than 4-to-1 voting by mail.

The petition for a special election to recall San Jose City Council member Madison Nguyen (pictured left, from the 2008 Tet Festival) has been approved, and the special election will be held March 3 next year, reports the San Jose Mercury News here.

According to the paper, the Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters found that at least 4,775 of the 5,180 signatures submitted (read here) were valid. Only 3,162 valid signatures are required.

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Even though there has been no verification from the Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters that there would be any recall election at all, the Recall Madison team is already all riled up over the potential shape and form of the recall ballot.

San Jose City Councilwoman Madison Nguyen (pictured) is facing efforts to recall her over the City’s decision to name a stretch of Story Road. The chosen name, “Saigon Business District,” is somehow seen as communist, as opposed to “Little Saigon.” So now the City’s taken back its decision and there’s no official name for the area. The City did give permits for privatedly funded banners proclaiming “Welcome to Little Saigon.” But apparently whatever name is not even the point any more.

More than three weeks ago (here), the group supporting the recall submitted 5,181 signatures asking for a recall election. The petition is impressive because it includes more than 2000 extra signatures (only 3,162 were needed) and it was submitted two whole weeks before the deadline.

The signatures are now being verified by the Registrar of Voters. The verification process will take 30 days.

Until then, there is no guarantee that there’s even any recall election at all.

But already the Recall Madison side is acting up over what the recall ballot may look like.

Someone leaked to them the idea that the recall ballot will be just that — “yes” or “no” on recall only. Allegedly, any replacement candidates will not run on the same election.

That made the recall side angry, and here’s why.

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The Bolsavik was forwarded the email that follows, purportedly from the San Jose City Clerk Lee Price, detailing the next steps after people seeking the recall of Councilwoman Madison Nguyen (pictured) turned in more than 5000 signatures. The Bolsavik hasn’t verified it, but it seems legitimate enough.

Anyway, according to this letter, it’s now too late for Madison Nguyen’s camp to try to get people to retract; apparently the deadline to retract was 5pm the day the petition was turned in.

Also, it seems that if the City Clerk’s Office certifies the petition as insufficient, that decision cannot be challenged — but the email says nothing about appealing a certification of the petition as sufficient.

Full text of the email follows after the jump. The “ROV” in the letter is short for Registrar of Voters. The verification must be done by the ROV because the signatures must be of registered voters in Madison Nguyen’s district.

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The people seeking to recall San Jose City Councilwoman Madison Nguyen, needing to get 3,162 petition signatures by September 12, last Friday turned in two-thirds more than that number, submitting 5,181 signatures two weeks early.

Read the San Jose Mercury News story here. Read more on the Little Saigon Inside blog here.

According to the Little Saigon Inside blog, the recall team said they actually gathered 7,000 signatures, but didn’t want to have to verify them all so submitted only the 5,181.

Supporters of the recall efforts (not themselves on the committee) gave the Bolsavik various explanations as to why the committee submitted the signatures two weeks early. One said they wanted to show up the people who were badmouthing that they didn’t even have 1000 signatures. Other thought they were tired and just wanted to get it done and over with and move on.

Well, whatever the reason, it struck the Bolsavik that the recall camp may not have thought it through and may have handed Madison Nguyen an advantage.

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Thursday was the deadline for both the Recall Madison Nguyen Committee and the No Recall of Madison Nguyen committee to file their financial disclosures for the period through June 30.

The recall side filed their papers a day early, and filed online, so the electronic copy is already available on the San Jose City Clerk’s web site here. The No Recall committee have been filing paper copies, so it may take a while to be posted on the web.

The recall side’s filing gives a definite impression of a lot of grassroot support. It shows $42,882 in contributions received, of which a whopping $28,742 came from non-itemized contributions of less than $100. If the numbers are correct, it means close to 300 small contributors.

Of the itemized contributions totalling $14,140, most come from people putting in $100 each, and just a handful of contributions over $500 — including $1,200 from a pharmacy, $700 from Sammy Castillo a truck driver, and $600 from a finance company.

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A week after people seeking her recall sent out their mailers, San Jose City Councilwoman Madison Nguyen went on Vietnamese radio and refuted the allegations made in the materials.

Just as the Bolsavik was pointed to the web site where the mailer was posted, the Bolsavik was also pointed to Madison’s Vietnamese site, where recordings from interviews on Que Huong Radio are posted — here.

Que Huong Radio is a controversial anti-communist radio program with its own set of enemies, that is has broken with other right-wing groups and instead supported Madison Nguyen.

In the interview, Madison rejected the claim that she directed $100,000 of city money to Lap Tang. (Read more here and here.) Or that she tried to hide it.

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Heating up an already hot potato, the campaign to recall Madison Nguyen in San Jose last week began sending mailers to all the voters in District 7 represented by the embattled councilwoman. Click on the picture to see the entire document.

The Bolsavik was pointed to the mailer at the Little Saigon Inside blog here. It is unknown whether the author of that blog is related to any of the several commenters on Bolsavik.com who name themselves little Saigon this or little Saigon that.

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