Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Brandau and Bredefeld Deserve to be Read the Riot Act
Bill McEwen updated website photo 2024
By Bill McEwen, News Director
Published 6 years ago on
April 3, 2019

Share

Can I just call in Jack Nicholson to give Steve Brandau and Garry Bredefeld the full “You Can’t Handle the Truth” treatment?
If anyone deserves a big-league butt-chewing from the fictional Col. Nathan Jessup, it’s the north Fresno councilmen who find themselves buffeted by the city’s newly liberal political winds.

Portrait of GV Wire News Director/Columnist Bill McEwen
Opinion
Bill McEwen

A New Council Majority Calls the Shots

Now that the shoe’s on the other foot and their progressive colleagues are calling the shots, Brandau and Bredefeld suddenly are all about equality and staunch opponents of class warfare.
Tell that to south Fresno residents who were abandoned long ago by a City Hall that pointed in one direction — north — and never much concerned itself with figuring out how to pay for parks, sidewalks, roads, sewers, and storm drains — in any part of town.
In the name of affordability (Hey, folks! Fresno is cheaper than everywhere else!) our city chewed through land with nary a look in the rear-view mirror. Meanwhile, Doc Buchanan had figured out that families would pay a lot more to live in a city (Clovis) with really good schools.

The Trump Economy is booming. The city budget is growing. Yet, the city’s roads are in worse shape than they were a decade ago.
Toss in Fresno’s long history of segregation and decades of failed Fresno Unified leadership and our once friendly farm town morphed into an urban economic train wreck.
“Is it right for us to make the citizens of north Fresno to pay for the sins of the past?” asked Brandau on Monday.
Well, if not north Fresno residents, then who, Steve-o?

Day of Atonement

That’s the problem with sins. It’s all fun and games until the Day of Atonement.
Fresno is staring into the mouth of a lion. Think about it. The city’s unemployment rate has been below double digits for nearly two years. The Trump Economy is booming. The city budget is growing.
Yet, the city’s roads are in worse shape than they were a decade ago. About $600 million in repairs are needed. Thanks to the state gas hike, Fresno has an extra $12 million this year and will get $9 million more annually over the next four years.
What we have here is progressives and conservatives locked up in a street fight for scraps of funding. Expect many more — over parks, hiring cops, and development.

No Vote for Brandau But Plenty of Theatrics

But this particular fight is over already.
Mayor Lee Brand pulled the rug on the lame-duck Brandau by delaying the vote on the spending plan a week.
It’s off to the Fresno County Board of Supervisors for Brandau, who spent his last weeks on the council trying to criminalize residents for giving a homeless person a bottle of water and muttering such inanities as “South Fresno already receives a crapload of money unavailable to north Fresno.”
As councilman Miguel Arias points out, while Brandau repeatedly cites $70 million in state Transformative Climate Communities funding coming to downtown, Chinatown, and southwest Fresno, he fails to mention the $139 million Veterans Boulevard project underway in northwest Fresno.
There’s a term for such an oversight: political amnesia.
Brandau exits thoroughly thrashed on his last two hot-button issues. Not that he cares. All the insults tossed at his colleagues achieved their intended purpose: feeding red meat to his conservative base. Probably his only regret is that he forgot to throw in a couple of “poverty pimps” for extra measure.

Brand, Progressives Will Work Out a Deal

Mayor Brand now has a week to do what he does best: pore through the numbers, consult with experts, hash out a compromise, and declare a “win-win” when it’s all over. Unlike Brandau and Bredefeld, the mayor is a realist and disinterested in feeding the social media beast.
Brand knows that the progressives, with Arias leading the charge, have the wind at their backs, are well-organized, and eager for public tussles. The mayor knows, too, that his path to re-election is making good on the promise he made in 2016: He, the kid who grew up on McKenzie Avenue in the rough part of town, will do what’s best for all of Fresno.
If not for November’s election results, Brand likely could’ve skated on that promise in 2020. But two of his endorsed candidates lost — Arias beating Tate Hill and Nelson Esparza clipping Brian Whelan — and the often ignored side of the city suddenly had City Hall clout.

Legislation Calls for Fair Distribution of Funds

Arias told me that he’s “95% confident” the councilmembers and the mayor will arrive at a satisfactory solution. In the best-case scenario, they’ll agree on the outline of a plan for future years, too.
But I will also remind Arias and others that the gas tax hike legislation included this clause: “Fairly distribute the economic impact of increased funding.” Meaning: Everybody who fills their gas tanks gets something.

In my book, neighborhoods in south Fresno annexed back in 1913 deserve sidewalks before a north Fresno street gets a median repair.
Equity or equality?
In my book, neighborhoods in south Fresno annexed back in 1913 deserve sidewalks before a north Fresno street gets a median repair. And kids who walk to school on dirt or in the street anywhere should get sidewalks ASAP. Muir Elementary School, near Palm and Belmont avenues, opened decades ago and there are still no sidewalks.
However, I concur with Fresno Public Works Director Scott Mozier that it’s best not to let streets deteriorate to the point a complete rebuild is needed.
It’s always a juggling act, more so in Fresno, where the sins of the past haunt us each and every day.

Does North Fresno Really Want Equality?

If equality, not equity, between north and south Fresno is what Brandau, Bredefeld, and others want, they best be prepared to handle the truth.
Along with the arrival of more industrial plants, landfills, recycling centers, affordable housing projects, dirt paths, and liquor stores.
[activecampaign form=19]

Watch: Jack Nicholson’s Oscar Nominated Performance

DON'T MISS

What to Know About Pam Bondi, Trump’s New Pick for Attorney General

DON'T MISS

North Korean Leader Says Past Diplomacy Only Confirmed US Hostility

DON'T MISS

Democrats Strike Deal to Get More Biden Judges Confirmed Before Congress Adjourns

DON'T MISS

Newsom Gaslights on Potential Gas Price Hikes in Fresno Visit

DON'T MISS

Automakers to Trump: Please Require Us to Sell Electric Vehicles

DON'T MISS

President Biden Welcomes 2024 NBA Champion Boston Celtics to White House

DON'T MISS

Ohtani Makes History With 3rd MVP, Judge Claims 2nd AL Honor

DON'T MISS

Trump Chooses Pam Bondi for Attorney General Pick After Gaetz Withdraws

DON'T MISS

Average Rate on a 30-Year Mortgage in the US Rises to Highest Level Since July

DON'T MISS

Cutting in Line? American Airlines’ New Boarding Tech Might Stop You at Now Over 100 Airports

UP NEXT

Fresno Council Lowers Speed Limits on Friant and Audubon

UP NEXT

How About an Honest Conversation About the Range of Light Monument Proposal?

UP NEXT

How Trump Can Earn a Place in History That He Did Not Expect

UP NEXT

Shoppers Flock to Clovis for Vallarta’s Grand Opening

UP NEXT

Demography Drives Destiny and Right Now California Is Losing

UP NEXT

Defining Deviancy Down. And Down. And Down.

UP NEXT

Wired Wednesday: How Fresno is Preparing For Trump’s Mass Deportation Plan

UP NEXT

How Three Trump Policy Decrees Could Affect California Farmers

UP NEXT

Piedmont Airlines Workers in Fresno Picket for Higher Wages

UP NEXT

Donald Trump Is Already Starting to Fail

Bill McEwen,
News Director
Bill McEwen is news director and columnist for GV Wire. He joined GV Wire in August 2017 after 37 years at The Fresno Bee. With The Bee, he served as Opinion Editor, City Hall reporter, Metro columnist, sports columnist and sports editor through the years. His work has been frequently honored by the California Newspapers Publishers Association, including authoring first-place editorials in 2015 and 2016. Bill and his wife, Karen, are proud parents of two adult sons, and they have two grandsons. You can contact Bill at 559-492-4031 or at Send an Email

Newsom Gaslights on Potential Gas Price Hikes in Fresno Visit

3 hours ago

Automakers to Trump: Please Require Us to Sell Electric Vehicles

4 hours ago

President Biden Welcomes 2024 NBA Champion Boston Celtics to White House

4 hours ago

Ohtani Makes History With 3rd MVP, Judge Claims 2nd AL Honor

4 hours ago

Trump Chooses Pam Bondi for Attorney General Pick After Gaetz Withdraws

5 hours ago

Average Rate on a 30-Year Mortgage in the US Rises to Highest Level Since July

5 hours ago

Cutting in Line? American Airlines’ New Boarding Tech Might Stop You at Now Over 100 Airports

5 hours ago

MLB Will Test Robot Umpires at 13 Spring Training Ballparks Hosting 19 Teams

5 hours ago

Death Toll in Gaza From Israel-Hamas War Passes 44,000, Palestinian Officials Say

6 hours ago

Jussie Smollett’s Conviction in 2019 Attack on Himself Is Overturned

6 hours ago

What to Know About Pam Bondi, Trump’s New Pick for Attorney General

NEW YORK — Pam Bondi, the former Florida attorney general, was chosen Thursday by Donald Trump to serve as U.S. attorney general hours after...

2 hours ago

2 hours ago

What to Know About Pam Bondi, Trump’s New Pick for Attorney General

3 hours ago

North Korean Leader Says Past Diplomacy Only Confirmed US Hostility

3 hours ago

Democrats Strike Deal to Get More Biden Judges Confirmed Before Congress Adjourns

3 hours ago

Newsom Gaslights on Potential Gas Price Hikes in Fresno Visit

President Joe Biden with Mary Barra, the chief executive of General Motors, at the Detroit Auto Show, Sept. 14, 2022. President-elect Donald Trump has promised to erase the Biden administration’s tailpipe rules designed to get carmakers to produce electric vehicles, but most U.S. automakers want to keep them. (Doug Mills/The New York Times)
4 hours ago

Automakers to Trump: Please Require Us to Sell Electric Vehicles

4 hours ago

President Biden Welcomes 2024 NBA Champion Boston Celtics to White House

4 hours ago

Ohtani Makes History With 3rd MVP, Judge Claims 2nd AL Honor

Former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, speaks before Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a campaign rally at First Horizon Coliseum, Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024, in Greensboro, NC. (AP/Alex Brandon)
5 hours ago

Trump Chooses Pam Bondi for Attorney General Pick After Gaetz Withdraws

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend