Scott Peters for Congress? Seriously????????????

The 52nd Congressional District does not need to experience the negative effects of the “Peters Principles.”  Specifically, I’m referring to former San Diego City Councilman and current Port of San Diego Commissioner, Scott Peters.  Mr. Peters late last year announced he was running against incumbent Republican Brian Bilbray in the re-aligned 52nd Congressional District in November.  You might remember Scott Peters for truly historic reasons, none of which are the least bit flattering.  He served on the San Diego City Council from 2000-2008, including the last two as Council President, a period infamous in the city’s history due to financial mis-management so serious that San Diego was referred to as “Enron-By-The-Sea” by national media.  In August, 2006, the Kroll Report, led by a cast of accounting luminaries including Arthur Levitt, former chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, said San Diego "fell prey to the same type of corruption" that ruined companies including Enron Corp. and WorldCom Inc. and prompted Orange County to file for bankruptcy protection in 1994. The 266-page tome, which took 18 months to complete and cost the city $20 million, offered one of the most detailed accounts of how San Diego created a $1.4 billion pension shortfall that  crippled its ability to borrow money. The disclosure deficiencies focused on two areas: the pension system and the wastewater department. For years, the city failed to inform investors about the deteriorating health of its pension system and a number of irregularities in the way it funded the system and hid liabilities in outside reserves, the report stated. City officials also knew for years that they were violating the terms of the Clean Water Act by harboring a user-rate structure in the wastewater system that overcharged residential users of the system to the luxury of large industrial users. The structure, changed in 2004, jeopardized $265 million in loans and grants the city had received and opened it up to a $200 million lawsuit on behalf of residents. Those liabilities were never disclosed to investors in the city's bonds, the report states, despite City Council and top staff's knowledge of the potential costs.

And guess who was one the Council members cited in this damning report……you got it; Scott Peters!  Having been termed-out for re-election in 2008, Peters the narcissist thought he’d make a great City Attorney, only to find out that San Diegan’s don’t have short-term memory loss.  Peters only received 20.4% of the votes in an election won by Jan Goldsmith.  He has since been exiled politically to the Port of San Diego as a commissioner, where, fortunately, he can do little, if any, financial damage to the people of the city and county.  However, now Mr. Peters hopes he can be resurrected like a Phoenix, and rise from his burnt political ashes and be elected to Congress!  Yet, with the tons of baggage he still carries from his City Council days, Peters bid is a long shot.  Perhaps most troubling with him is his non-repentance and lack of responsibility for his action as outlined in the Kroll Report.  Consider this snippet from a recent Q&A in San Diego City Beat:

Q: Let’s get a big one out of the way. You were on the City Council in 2002 and cast votes to under-fund the pension system and enhance retirement benefits for city employees. You were also deemed negligent by the Securities and Exchange Commission—.

Peters:  “No, by Arthur Levitt, a consultant working for the city. We hired Arthur Levitt. I think that’s very important. I don’t want to re-litigate all those years, but it wasn’t the SEC; it was Arthur Levitt. And, by the way, let me just say that I think that’s a great experience for working in Congress. I had not intended to be a pension reformer when I went to the City Council. I wanted to clean up the beaches and bays and finish the highway and build the parks.”

Yeah, if I were Peters, I wouldn’t want to re-litigate those years, either!  And from a literal standpoint, Peters is correct; he was not deemed negligent by the SEC, but by the then-retired Arthur Levitt.  The same Arthur Levitt, who at the time of being hired as a consultant by the city and advisor on the Kroll Report, was and is the longest serving Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission in its history!!!!   Peters would also like to convince the voters that the experience will lend well for his success if elected to Congress.  Exactly how, I’m not sure, unless one assumes that for every bill which is brought up for vote in the House with financial implication to the tax-payer, Peters promises to vote “absent” or “abstain.” Lastly, his claim that he had not intended to be a pension reformer and instead planned to focus on clean beaches, parks, bays, etc. leaves the reader with two questions regarding Mr. Peters intellect:  Is he a liar or is he stupid?  An examination of his education leads us to side on the former.  He has an undergraduate degree from Duke University; not Simpleton State U. 

Decide for yourself, but my bet is the more you learn about Scott Peters, the less you want him serving in any elected office.  Let him focus on private practice in environmental law, which he claims is his specialty, and continue to work with the state Coastal Commission.  We’ll all be a lot safer and richer if Scott Peters spends his time building sand castles.