Did Kris Murray QUIT the Metro Water Board Because She SPIT at Scott Baugh by Approving a PLA?

“Adios from your OCGOP Chair position, Scott! By the way, I’m voting for a PLA on the Metro Water Board. Suck on THAT!”

Your Faithful Author (“YFA”) asked, during Public Comments at the Anaheim Council meeting last week, why Kris Murray had resigned from a prestigious (appointive, not earned) seat on the Metropolitan Water Board, where she had “served” for the past five years.  YFA had been given to believe that it was because of her relatively new job with Curt Pringle, which created some conflicts of interests.

Sidebar: A similar new affiliation with Pringle led Jennifer Fitzgerald to resign from the Metropolitan Water Board.  (Note: this is not be be confused — which I did right here before being politely corrected offline, with Fullerton’s seat on the OC Water District Board, from which Fitzgerald had purged Bruce Whitaker in apparent retaliation for Tom Tait supplanting Gail Eastman on the OCTA Board, which lead to the appointment of Jan Flory to OCWD and apparently widespread terror at Flory’s wanting the OCWD to suddenly start following, you know, “state law.”)

That’s all that YFA expected to get out of that exchange — a little information about why she resigned.  Mostly, confirmation that it was a Pringle job.  But then someone contacted YFA with some really interesting information.

Supposedly — and I will leave it to OCGOP members to check this out themselves before they vote on any endorsements tonight — Kris Murray voted for a Project Labor Agreement (“PLA”) while on the MWB.  And perhaps she was hoping that no one (particularly not YFA) would mention this before the election if she went away quietly.  Incorrect, madam.

Now don’t get YFA wrong.  Like most pro-union Democrats — even those of us for whom that love is somewhat unrequited — I’m a big fan of Project Labor Agreements.  They give labor its due, ensure that money from a big project will go to help build the middle class and help the middle class build projects with the sorts of certified skills the public should demand.  So I do applaud Murray’s actions — even if, I would imagine, they were in the service of passing a proposal that would involve some chiseling for personal gain, or whatever.  But, seriously — in Orange County GOP politics, this comes near to driving Girl Scouts to abortion clinics for surgical procedures performed by a medical team including Angela Davis, Jane Fonda, and Nancy Pelosi.  (None of them are medical doctors, so in this analogy we’ll assume that they’re there to get the innocent Girl Scouts to sign up to ban Jesus from churches and support collectivizing farms, starting with Knott’s Berry Farm.  After that, you know where!)

(Note: if Murray has ever actually done that, I’m not aware of it, and I apologize for raising the subject.)

This is huge stuff.  It isn’t just a “I took a little huge gob of union money from the police unions” sort of thing; this is hocking up a gigantic gob of phlegm and spitting it into departing OCGOP Chair Scott Baugh’s face.

(Note: if Murray has ever actually done that either, I’m also not aware of it, and I apologize for raising the subject.)

So, hey, OCGOP!  Welcome to the ranks of Big Labor supporters!  (Some advice: if you ever go in to a OC Labor Fed endorsement meeting, do not to tell them that you oppose San Onofre and 405 Toll Roads and illegal Convention Center Expansion without a Prop 13 required vote, like YFA did.  They do not like that.)

The OCGOP may, or may not, vote on endorsements in the Anaheim City Council slate tonight.  Their previous votes would suggest that they’d want to support Tom Tait’s candidates, James Vanderbilt and Doug Pettibone, but Curt Pringle still wields the mighty cash-hammer that may smash some delegates’ will.  So maybe Murray and Eastman will come up for a vote — despite their having been already ruled ineligible for brazen violation of Baugh’s manifesto — and the OCGOP members will have the chance, if they want to take it, to kick their Chair repeatedly in the ribs before he departs by supporting a candidate who supported a PLA.  (Note to OCGOP delegates: don’t be surprised if she lies about this, at length, in a robotic monotone designed to burn off several layers of your cerebral cortex and leave you defenseless to resist.  I’ve seen it.)

From my position as a Democrat, this Republican discord is a lot of fun, so thanks to Kris Murray for the yucks.  I’m endorsing THE REAL JOSE MORENO #1 in the race — my big fear being that the OCGOP will endorse THE FAKE JOSE “JOJO” MORENO #2 tonight and further confuse everything — as well as Donna Acevedo.  (I have a great pitch for Donna that even most Republicans would appreciate: I want her to win mostly so that she can sit in the seat between Lucille Kring and the Mayor, so that every time Lucille looks at the Mayor she sees Donna staring back at her, her eyes boring holes into Kring’s forehead.  YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO SEE THIS!)  So whatever the Republicans do — including (heh-heh) supporting a candidate who cast a huge vote for a huge PLA on the huge Metro Water Board — I’ll be fine with it.  (As will Real Jose; as will Donna.)

I’m just surprised that they’d humiliate Scott Baugh like this on his way out.  But — with Pringle pulling the Stringles — perhaps I shouldn’t be.

UPDATE, 10 p.m.:  Neither Pringlistas Murray and Eastman nor Tait-Slaters Vanderbilt and Pettibone were endorsed.  No one so much as made a motion to break the apparent agreement to avoid a floor fight.