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Speaker 1: Can't. I am six forty.

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Speaker 2: You're listening to the John Cobel Podcast on the iHeartRadio app.

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Speaker 1: Welcome, how are you? It's good that you're here.

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Speaker 2: We're always on every day Monday through Friday from one

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Speaker 2: to four o'clock and after four o'clock every day we

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Speaker 2: become a podcast John Cobelt Show on demand also on

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Speaker 2: the iHeart app. It's the same as the radio show.

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Speaker 2: You can listen to what you missed coming up next hour.

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Speaker 2: USC Professor Michael mcchey we had him on a couple

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Speaker 2: of weeks ago because he had a bombshell of a study.

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Speaker 2: He studied fifty years worth of California gas prices and

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Speaker 2: found out that the government has largely inflicted the excessive

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Speaker 2: gas prices on us. It is, he said, largely self inflicted.

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Speaker 2: There is little evidence of the oil companies price gouging,

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Speaker 2: price manipulating.

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Speaker 1: To me, it's do some lying is ass off and

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Speaker 1: it's got to stop.

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Speaker 2: The truth is that we've got gas that as of

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Speaker 2: yesterday was four dollars and eighty five cents a gallon

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Speaker 2: on average for regular and there are states back east

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Speaker 2: that are down around two seventy and it is so atrocious,

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Speaker 2: and there are several rounds of price increases coming, including

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Speaker 2: one potentially in the next year when the Valero refinery

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Speaker 2: in northern California closes down. We used to have forty

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Speaker 2: three refineries in the state. We're down to about eight,

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Speaker 2: and the Valero refinery. That would be a big blow

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Speaker 2: because we don't have much margin of Vara yet and

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Speaker 2: that a loan's going to drive the price up. Anyway,

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Speaker 2: Michael MChE wanted to talk about that, and we will

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Speaker 2: discuss it within Coeneugh coming up after two o'clock. All right,

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Speaker 2: let's get now to the ideocy of the Karen Bass administration.

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Speaker 2: If you remember, she briefly hired for a half million

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Speaker 2: dollars or so for three months Steve Soberoff, the businessman,

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Speaker 2: to kick start the rebuild, and then she and sober

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Speaker 2: Off had a big falling out. She pulled back the money,

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Speaker 2: he was pissed off, and he just a few days

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Speaker 2: ago was the end of his term. Bass switched to

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Speaker 2: something called Haggarty Consulting, a company out of Iowa, a

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Speaker 2: consulting firm. Beware of consulting firms because the word consulting

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Speaker 2: doesn't tell you what they do. They had a public

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Speaker 2: hearing at the Pacific Palisades Community Council this week. They

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Speaker 2: were selected by BASS to help with the restoration and

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Speaker 2: the environmental mitigation. Michael Monks was there and he's got

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Speaker 2: some audio clips of it, and because a lot of

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Speaker 2: people in the Palisades were unhappy, it didn't take long

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Speaker 2: for the crowd to start to turn on the Haggarty people.

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Speaker 1: Michael, how are you good afternoon to you John.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, this was absolutely a disastrous presentation for those consultants,

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Speaker 3: And I just want to make sure the audience understands

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Speaker 3: that the Mayor Bess hired Steve Soberoff as a fire recoveriesar,

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Speaker 3: but also hired this consulting firm separately. This is a

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Speaker 3: ten million dollar contract possibly if if it pays out

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Speaker 3: in its entirety. It's a contract that basically says, we'll

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Speaker 3: pay you up to ten million dollars for your work

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Speaker 3: over the course of the next year. And the questions

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Speaker 3: that a representative from Haggardy consultant faced by an increasingly

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Speaker 3: angry group of Palisades residents was what do you have

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Speaker 3: to show for your work? In fact, what work have

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Speaker 3: you done? If we got time John, I clipped some

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Speaker 3: sound and I'd love to play a little bit for you.

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Speaker 2: Okay, can you stay a second segment too, I would

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Speaker 2: love to. Okay, good, because I want to get all

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Speaker 2: your clips in. Well, let's start.

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Speaker 1: Okay, let's hear the first Eric, give me.

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Speaker 4: A concrete example of something you did in a prior

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Speaker 4: disaster such as Lehina or Paradise or wherever you guys

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Speaker 4: go to do this that is not just another layer

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Speaker 4: of bureaufic.

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Speaker 3: As a residents, it feels like after the presentation, I'm

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Speaker 3: looking for what did you just see?

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Speaker 1: Basically, can you tell me you did? Tell me how

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Speaker 1: this is relevant to me?

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Speaker 4: Moved things forward and moved the needle, and I'd appreciate

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Speaker 4: hearing it now.

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Speaker 2: Not later.

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Speaker 1: Now listen to the silence. Okay, back that back Harrison.

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Speaker 1: Harrison's the guy from at some point silence.

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Speaker 5: Hello, Yeah, you know I I don't mean to be disrespectful,

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Speaker 5: and I do intend to provide that information. We also

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Speaker 5: have a website that has a lot of examples of

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Speaker 5: our work. You know, I I what I I want.

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Speaker 4: Off the top of your head, just something that you did.

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Speaker 4: I mean, it's got to be a memorable moment for

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Speaker 4: you if this is what you specialize in.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, John, these these residents were not clicking on the website. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: It was basically visit our website and that will tell

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Speaker 3: you what we do. So I've got more of that.

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Speaker 1: For you now. It was this a zoom meeting. It

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Speaker 1: wasn't online meeting.

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Speaker 3: They did meet online and it streamed online and that's

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Speaker 3: how I got to see it. And the residents, they

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Speaker 3: really gave them an earful and you'll want to hear

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Speaker 3: the rest of this.

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Speaker 1: It was pretty embarrassing.

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Speaker 2: That is like the longest silence I ever heard. It

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Speaker 2: wasn't that hard a question, not at all. It's like

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Speaker 2: it's like Elon Musk question, So what.

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Speaker 1: Do you do all day? What did you do?

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Speaker 3: But it's shocking how consultants speak in a certain speech

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Speaker 3: pattern and I think any type of English language question

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Speaker 3: throws them off a bit.

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Speaker 1: Okay, I want more of this and Michael will have

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Speaker 1: it when we come back.

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Speaker 6: You're listening to John Cobelt on demand from KFI A

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Speaker 6: six forty.

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Speaker 2: We continue with Michael Monks. He covered this community meeting

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Speaker 2: Pacific Palisades. Everybody's on this big Zoom call to talk

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Speaker 2: to this consulting firm called Haggerty, which had gotten a

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Speaker 2: ten million dollar contract from Karen Bass to help with

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Speaker 2: recovery from the fire. And apparently they talked for forty

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Speaker 2: minutes and nobody understood what they said. And when it

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Speaker 2: came time for questions from the audience, you heard what

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Speaker 2: Michael played. This woman asked for one concrete example of

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Speaker 2: what Haggarty did in another similar disaster, such as the

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Speaker 2: Lahina Paradise fires. And it's the longest silence I've ever

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Speaker 2: heard my life from the Haggarty official. He had nothing,

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Speaker 2: He had no concrete example of what his company does

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Speaker 2: in this situation. So, Michael, what else here?

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Speaker 3: Well, and let me just also note that this guy

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Speaker 3: is not like mister Haggerty. He's not, to see always

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Speaker 3: some mid level guy that got put in this position

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Speaker 3: but just could not represent the company very well based

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Speaker 3: on the questions. And so here's a little bit of

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Speaker 3: what he has to say about what they do.

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Speaker 5: You know, So I mean I think that, you know,

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Speaker 5: I want to I want to go down that road.

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Speaker 5: You know, every community that we work in their recovery

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Speaker 5: and what we do with them is kind of unique.

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Speaker 1: Okay, just one thing though, I mean, this crowd is not.

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Speaker 5: So you know, in communities we've worked in where we've

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Speaker 5: worked on long term recovery, we've done work to make

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Speaker 5: sure that loan processing is faster and more effective and

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Speaker 5: more communicated to communities we've made well. See, So if

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Speaker 5: I give an example of apologies, but if I give

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Speaker 5: an example I could give. I mean, this is literally what.

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Speaker 1: We do all day, every day.

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Speaker 5: But he still about opt in and out opt out

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Speaker 5: processes and making sure the community is aware of those

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Speaker 5: and trying to leverage all the assets to making sure

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Speaker 5: that as many people can go through that process as

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Speaker 5: they can. Those are all things we're supporting. So I

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Speaker 5: would really suggest that you know, in in this case,

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Speaker 5: almost everything that is happening when when there's augmentation support

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Speaker 5: augmentation the augmentation support that that's the point of it.

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Speaker 3: The reason why I wanted to play all of that

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Speaker 3: in its entirety for you.

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Speaker 1: And you've already reacted the way I expected. Did you

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Speaker 1: understand support? Did you understand about Oh? I didn't understand.

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Speaker 2: So whenever whenever there's a meeting, right and some Wiener

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Speaker 2: stands up and starts talking about leveraging the assets. I

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Speaker 2: know he's a complete empty suit. It is leveraging the

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Speaker 2: it is.

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Speaker 3: I want to I want you to know you're not

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Speaker 3: alone in that feeling. The residents had something to say

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Speaker 3: about augmentation.

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Speaker 5: And we're trying to make it that means.

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Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't even know what is augmentation support.

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Speaker 2: It means.

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Speaker 5: It just means more people working on the recovery every

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Speaker 5: day so that the missions and the work of the

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Speaker 5: recovery can happen more fast, can happen more effectively and efficiently.

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Speaker 5: So you're bringing more people to bear, so they're less

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Speaker 5: thinly stretched, and you're achieving work faster.

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Speaker 1: So that is what augmentation is.

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Speaker 3: John, and the people weren't having it either, And I

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Speaker 3: know that you've got more to get to today. But

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Speaker 3: our friend David Howard, who works with us here at

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Speaker 3: iHeart in Los Angeles, is a Palisades resident whose family

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Speaker 3: did list their home in that fire, and who was

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Speaker 3: on this call, and I spoke to him. I'm gonna

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Speaker 3: have a full interview with him about it tomorrow night

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Speaker 3: on Michael Monk's Reports at seven o'clock here on KFI.

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Speaker 3: But he spoke out on the call to the haggardy consultant.

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Speaker 3: Let's hear from him.

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Speaker 7: I'm angry, really angry, because I spent twenty five minutes

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Speaker 7: listening to you speak and I don't know what you said.

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Speaker 7: Oh yeah, okay, and.

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Speaker 4: It's not great.

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Speaker 7: It's not to rip you or go, but you got

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Speaker 7: to start providing answers. And when you tell us you're

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Speaker 7: alignment the mayor's office, that's a problem because she has

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Speaker 7: not been there for us before the fire, and she's

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Speaker 7: not here for us right now. So the lip service

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Speaker 7: and the holding hands and the kumbaya it's over. It's over.

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Speaker 1: Now.

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Speaker 7: You got to start producing ten million dollars, ten million dollars,

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Speaker 7: pay me ten million dollars, and I'll do exactly what

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Speaker 7: you just did. Say nothing.

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Speaker 3: So David Howard's remarks there, John are pretty representative of

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Speaker 3: the call in general. People not happy with the progress

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Speaker 3: of the recovery, and certainly not with the amount of

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Speaker 3: money that's been set aside for this consulting firm that

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Speaker 3: could not explain its results.

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Speaker 1: That is that is beautiful, that is great stuff.

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Speaker 2: So you've got a show on this weekend, what time

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Speaker 2: and day, Saturday.

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Speaker 3: Night, seven o'clock Michael Monks reports every Saturday night, kind

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Speaker 3: of going over what happened in the week, with some

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Speaker 3: fresh interviews as well, and we will have more on

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Speaker 3: this meeting and a full interview with David Howard about

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Speaker 3: what Palisades residents really say that they want a need

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Speaker 3: right now in the wake of this recovery.

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Speaker 2: Well, we stay on top of this because I don't

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Speaker 2: want them ever to rest.

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Speaker 1: That was atrocious, That really was horrible.

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Speaker 2: All right, Thanks Michael, You've got John Michael MUCKs from

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Speaker 2: a KFI news.

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Speaker 6: You're listening to John Cobels on demand from KFI Am

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Speaker 6: six forty.

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Speaker 2: We're gonna have Michael miche on the USC professor right

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Speaker 2: after two o'clock.

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Speaker 1: He had the study we.

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Speaker 2: Discussed a couple of weeks ago that the California government

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Speaker 2: is largely responsible for the massive gas price situation we

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Speaker 2: have In California, we pay forty five a gallon. Other

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Speaker 2: states pay as little as two seventy. In fact, there's

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Speaker 2: twenty one states that pay less than three bucks a gallon.

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Speaker 2: We're at for eighty five. And he says mostly that

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Speaker 2: is the government that is taxes and fees and policies

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Speaker 2: and regulations. They created the monster Newsome is lying about

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Speaker 2: it when he says that the oil companies are gouging us.

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Speaker 2: Michael MChE found little evidence that the oil companies have

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Speaker 2: ever gouged us in the last fifty years or manipulated

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Speaker 2: the price in any way. It's really important because there

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Speaker 2: are three things that will be happening in the next

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Speaker 2: few months to drive up the price of gas. One

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Speaker 2: is a sixty five cent a gallon increase because of

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Speaker 2: a new California Air Resources Board fuel standard. It's called

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Speaker 2: a low Carbon fuel standard. Add sixty five cents to

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Speaker 2: gallon of gas. Just from that. There is an automatic

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Speaker 2: gas tax that kicks in on the first of July,

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Speaker 2: and Valero announced that within a year they are going

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Speaker 2: to be likely closing down their refinery in Benetia up

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Speaker 2: in northern California, and we had two other two other.

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Speaker 1: Refineries.

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Speaker 2: It was announced that they were going to close here

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Speaker 2: in southern California in the Carson, Los Angeles area. That

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Speaker 2: was Phillip sixty six. We used to have forty three refineries.

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Speaker 2: Now we're down to about eight. And all these things

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Speaker 2: are going to drive up the price of gas, and

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Speaker 2: we're already paying more than two dollars a gallon than

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Speaker 2: many states. Michael MChE is coming on because this is this,

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Speaker 2: this should be the number one crisis. And you know,

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Speaker 2: for all the people running for governor, and I think

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Speaker 2: there's probably about seventeen of them who's talking about this,

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Speaker 2: I'm just shocked there's nobody interested in finally blowing the

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Speaker 2: whistle and saying the hell with this. Forty five a

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Speaker 2: gallon headed for five point fifty five sixty five seventy

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Speaker 2: within a few months. Hello, Why everyone's putting up with

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Speaker 2: it is baffling. There is a tremendous amount of waste

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Speaker 2: in government. And again, Michael Michelle, beyond after two o'clock

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Speaker 2: and at the Internal Revenue Service, who would have thought?

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Speaker 1: Do you know?

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Speaker 2: New York Post has this exclusive story employees at the

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Speaker 2: Internal Revenue Service. There's a lot of squealing going on

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Speaker 2: because thousands are taking the buyouts, the early retirement. In fact,

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Speaker 2: this week there was some news that one third of

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Speaker 2: the IRS is quitting. And they've gone through several IRS executives,

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Speaker 2: several commissioners just in the last few weeks. But does

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Speaker 2: it really matter how many employees are working for the

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Speaker 2: IRS and how many quit because as it turns out,

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Speaker 2: they rarely show up for work. In fact, it's in

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Speaker 2: their contract that they don't have to show up to

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Speaker 2: work very often. The most recent collective bargaining agreement broken

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Speaker 2: between the IRS executives and the union, employees were able

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Speaker 2: to work from home eight out of ten days. Their

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Speaker 2: pay period lasts two weeks, ten work days. Eight out

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Speaker 2: of ten. They don't have to show up eight out

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Speaker 2: of ten. And here's a kicker. This was a lengthy

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Speaker 2: negotiation between the IRS and the union. We paid for

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Speaker 2: the negotiation, that's right. The whole negotiation was paid by taxpayers,

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Speaker 2: and in the end everybody agreed that the government workers

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Speaker 2: who were paying for don't have to show up for

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Speaker 2: work eighty percent of the time. The IRS management wanted

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Speaker 2: them to show up.

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Speaker 1: Six days a week. No, I'm sorry.

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Speaker 2: They wanted him to show up two days a week,

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Speaker 2: four days for every pay period. That was the offer,

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Speaker 2: and the union said no, and they won on that point.

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Speaker 2: So now they only have to show up two days

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Speaker 2: each pay period, one day a week. The union is

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Speaker 2: called the National Treasury Employees Union, and the whole deal

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Speaker 2: was negotiated using taxpayer funding. In fact, do you know

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Speaker 2: agencies in the federal government spend one hundred and sixty

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Speaker 2: million dollars a year on negotiating union contracts. There's also

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Speaker 2: apparently what they call bloated bonus structures. How do you

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Speaker 2: get a bonus when you're not shown up for work?

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Speaker 2: But the the IRS employees do. IRS employees who are

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Speaker 2: rated as outstanding and fully successful get extra money. Now,

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Speaker 2: Trump had signed an executive order directing all agencies and

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Speaker 2: departments to take all necessary steps to terminate remote work arrangements.

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Speaker 2: He wanted everybody coming in five days a week. And

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Speaker 2: this is run into all kinds of pushback and resistance.

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Speaker 2: They all should be fired. If you don't want to

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Speaker 2: show up for work, you don't have to. You don't

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Speaker 2: have to have the job.

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Speaker 1: I don't. I have no idea.

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Speaker 2: All my life, all my mom and dad's life, it

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Speaker 2: was obvious you showed up at work to get paid,

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Speaker 2: and you did the work. And here they don't do

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Speaker 2: the work, They don't show up for work, and they.

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Speaker 1: Want full pay with bonuses.

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Speaker 2: And I'm supposed to have a heart attack and die

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Speaker 2: because the thought of them are resigning now because they

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Speaker 2: don't like the new terms.

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Speaker 1: And remember their.

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Speaker 2: Whole purpose is to make sure they take my money

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Speaker 2: from me and.

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Speaker 1: You you work for them.

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Speaker 2: These IRS employees their entire career, their entire existence, depends

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Speaker 2: on them successfully separating you from your money. And if

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Speaker 2: they don't like what you're paying, they could put you

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Speaker 2: through all kinds of hell to wring more out of you.

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Speaker 2: They don't have to show up for work, they get

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Speaker 2: some nonsense bonus. And I'm supposed to be devastated. What

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Speaker 2: I'm going to march in the streets to save the

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Speaker 2: IRS jobs? Oh my god, Then I have to work

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Speaker 2: twice every two weeks.

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Speaker 1: What a load of nonsense.

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Speaker 5: No.

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Speaker 1: I hope Trump puts the whole Irs out of business.

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Speaker 1: I really do.

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Speaker 2: When we come back, Well, two o'clock is michaelmche from

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Speaker 2: USC we're going to talk about the gas price increases.

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Speaker 2: In fact, I'm gonna go check and see what the

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Speaker 2: latest prices are today. This is really crucial stuff and ordinarily,

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Speaker 2: entire political careers would be destroyed if the price of

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Speaker 2: gas was almost double any other state, but not in

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Speaker 2: Bizarro California. Again, that's coming up after two o'clock.

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Speaker 6: Michael mcchee, you're listening to John Cobels on demand from

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Speaker 6: KFI AM six forty.

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Speaker 2: John Cobelt here and after two o'clock Michael MChE from

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Speaker 2: USC he was done with us a couple of weeks

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Speaker 2: ago with his study fifty years of looking at California

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Speaker 2: gas prices and said it's mostly self inflict by the

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Speaker 2: California government against us. It's not the oil companies. Not

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Speaker 2: much evidence of price gouging over the years. And now

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Speaker 2: we have a new story this week that Valero is

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Speaker 2: closing a refinery in Benetia, northern California. And we have

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Speaker 2: dropped from forty three refineries to eight, and we're losing

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Speaker 2: this one. There's two more in the Carsonarrea there being

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Speaker 2: shut down, and you're looking to gas somewhere between five

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Speaker 2: fifty and six dollars a gallon sometime this year. Now

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Speaker 2: La Times have a story about you know, i'd every

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Speaker 2: time I see a story about where there's some kind

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Speaker 2: of loss of business, some kind of budget problems governments

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Speaker 2: are having. They all still as a reflex five years

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Speaker 2: later say well, you know, it was the pandemic, and.

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Speaker 1: I saw the same thing in this story.

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Speaker 2: Lax is sliding down the list of the world's busiest airports.

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Speaker 2: Excuse me, not that I really care, because the fewer

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Speaker 2: people at the airport the better. As far as I'm concerned,

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Speaker 2: I don't want to be at the world's most popular,

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Speaker 2: busiest airport. But it does show you what LA's perception

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Speaker 2: is in the rest of the world. Fewer people want

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Speaker 2: to come here because it's not that we're still recovering

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Speaker 2: from the pandemic. They get about well as in twenty nineteen,

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Speaker 2: LAX got eighty eight million passengers a year, and they

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Speaker 2: had planned for one hundred and ten million passengers in

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty eight. You know all that construction that's going

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Speaker 2: on at LAX, right, Partly that's because they there'd be

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Speaker 2: one hundred and ten million people a year coming through.

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Speaker 2: Now it looks like there's only only going to be

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Speaker 2: ninety million a year coming through. So they've spent a

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Speaker 2: lot of money upgrading and expanding the airport, and people

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Speaker 2: aren't going to show aren't showing up, and it's not

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Speaker 2: the pandemic. Compared to twenty nineteen, the overall number for

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty six will be about fifteen percent below the

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Speaker 2: pre pandemic level. And they keep using that word as

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Speaker 2: if that's the cause. It's like, no, the world sees

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Speaker 2: that Los Angeles is a disgusting cesspool. You don't think

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Speaker 2: all this stuff has been on television ten years of

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Speaker 2: disgusting vagrants in the streets doing drugs, acting crazy, all

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Speaker 2: the mental patients, all the poop.

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Speaker 1: And the needles. How terrifying is that.

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Speaker 2: For a family who wants to take their kids on

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Speaker 2: a vacation, you get to go to La You're gonna

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Speaker 2: go what in the Hollywood Walk of Fame where you

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Speaker 2: know every star has a pile of poop sitting on it.

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Speaker 2: And the thing is like Atlanta's passenger account I grew

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Speaker 2: by more than three percent, Dallas fort Worth, their airport

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Speaker 2: went up by seven percent. In fact, Atlanta's has one

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Speaker 2: hundred and eighty eight million passengers and Dallas has eighty

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Speaker 2: seven million. And lax is is they're spending thirty billion

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Speaker 2: dollars on the overhaul. And this is all supposed to

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Speaker 2: be done for the twenty twenty eight Summer Olympics, so

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Speaker 2: thirty billion dollars to make it. If the Olympics weren't happening,

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Speaker 2: they never would have done any of this. But they

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Speaker 2: also thought there'd be tens of millions of more passengers,

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Speaker 2: but none of nobody wants to address the issue about

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Speaker 2: about city leaders making LA disgusting. I mean, everybody's seen

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Speaker 2: the fires, right and that LA didn't respond to the

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Speaker 2: fires properly. And they've seen the homeless situation, they saw

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Speaker 2: the smash and grab robberies. This stuff, you know, goes

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Speaker 2: on social media instantly, and that's how people learn about

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Speaker 2: the world now, scrolling social media.

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Speaker 1: By far, that's the number one source of news.

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Speaker 2: And so those little clips of LA burning La, homeless

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Speaker 2: dying in the streets, smashing grab robberies at a jewelry store.

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Speaker 2: People have been getting this for years and years and years.

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Speaker 2: You just see a few of those, and you know,

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Speaker 2: at dinner you're going to say, Hey, what do you

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Speaker 2: think we go to LA for a vacation this year.

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Speaker 1: No, that doesn't look like fun.

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Speaker 2: We're gonna step in poop, get stabbed by an ego,

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Speaker 2: have a homeless person whack us on the head, have

407
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Speaker 2: our have our stuff robbed? I mean, all the clips

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Speaker 2: of tourists getting robbed up in San Francisco, pop open

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Speaker 2: their trunks and you know, people would park on the

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Speaker 2: on the side of the street and go into a store,

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Speaker 2: a restaurant, and here come the thieves and they pop

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Speaker 2: open the trunk and they run off with all the luggage.

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Speaker 2: People were doing that at Oakland Airport. People were doing

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Speaker 2: it at the Oakland Airport rent a car centers. You

415
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:49,520
Speaker 2: can drive up to a rent a car center. Before

416
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Speaker 2: you could get out of your car to return it,

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Speaker 2: the thieves already popped your trunk and ran off of

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Speaker 2: your luggage, all right, Michael mache Next, Also, people also

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00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:03,680
Speaker 2: probably have a stroke when they land here and find

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Speaker 2: out you got to pay five bucks a gallon for gas.

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Speaker 2: Imagine somebody coming from Mississippi. They're paying two sixty nine.

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Speaker 2: Tennessee's two sixty nine and we're at for eighty four. Well,

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Speaker 2: we're going to talk to USC professor Michael Machee about

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Speaker 2: this huge price discreptancy on how it's going to get worse.

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Speaker 1: That's next, and in for.

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Speaker 2: Dembor Markets Heather Brooker live in the CAFI twenty four

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Speaker 2: our newsroom. Hey, you've been listening to the John Covelt

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00:26:26,720 --> 00:26:29,080
Speaker 2: Show podcast. You can always hear the show live on

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00:26:29,200 --> 00:26:32,120
Speaker 2: KFI AM six forty from one to four pm every

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00:26:32,160 --> 00:26:35,080
Speaker 2: Monday through Friday. And of course anytime on demand on

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00:26:35,160 --> 00:26:36,359
Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio app,