Last month, activists in Huntington Beach’s Oak View barrio scored yet another victory in their years-long battle against the garbage dump across the street run by Rainbow Environmental Services. This time, city officials agreed to pay $37,500 in legal fees to the UC Irvine Environmental Law Clinic after they sued HB because the HB City Council had originally passed an ordinance allowing Rainbow to separate organic waste within smelling distance of Oak View. Thanks to the Anteater attorneys and Oak View activists, Rainbow ain’t gonna be doing that.
That’s a nice story about working-class residents taking on a local polluter, and Surf City Latinos finally finding their political voice, right? That’s how the normal world sees it, and that’s what drew me to cover the original battle back in the summer of 2015. But tell that to the losers that run roughshod over the Huntington Beach Community Forum (HBCF), the bare-knuckles Facebook group that serves as HB’s town square and hosts some of the best sunset photos in OC. There, losers have fumed over anything and everything involving ComUNIDAD, an Oak View community group named as plaintiffs in the organic-waste lawsuit against the city. These losers are upset that the so-called Slater Slums don’t want to be meek Mexicans any longer. No, seriously: again, the normal world sees right through the coded language employed by the HBCF resident losers.
Leading the charge, as usual, is former Huntington Beach Independent columnist and 2016 OC Weekly Scariest Person inductee Chris Epting. Last Friday, he tagged city attorney Michael E. Gates on HBCF and demanded to know “how much tax payer money was paid to Comunidad” (none, Chrissie; you would’ve known this if you pulled the actual documents related to the case, like a real reporter would). Gates can’t be bothered to respond to Weekly requests for comments, but quickly responded to Epting’s query, along with that of other outraged commenters.
Epting also seethed that Oak View—a collection of apartments that’s one of the densest neighborhoods in Orange County and has long been neglected by Huntington Beach City fathers—is finally getting some civic attention. “This community gets what no other community gets- they have their own community center, library, TWO dedicated code enforcement officers, etc.” he moaned, asking why other Huntington Beach neighborhoods don’t get similar attention. “Why? Because they don’t play the social justice race card?”
One woman then complained that Oak View now have “a spot on google maps! Why? Who gave them this designation?”
“Good question,” Epting responded.
Far more stupid was the comments of HBCF head Michael Daly, who hasn’t been right ever since he got triggered by a baile folklorico group sponsored by ComUNIDAD that marched in the city’s Fourth of July parade. “The people of HB are getting strong armed by illegals and leaches [sic] on society,” Daly wrote, offering no proof whatsoever of anyone’s undocumented status. “[Ocean View School District trustee] Gina [Clayton] tarvin and her comunidad gang need to be put in their place. It’s not the fault of the rest of the community that these people are poor and partly illegal. Never settle, no compromise!”
Later on, Daly—who wields Negan-like power over HBCF and had Epting banned for a long time until Chrissie somehow got back in his good graces—complained, “So a lawyer got the check, not the guy that beat up his childrens mother, or his illegal sidekick?” Daly was referring to ComUNIDAD members Victor Valladares and Oscar Rodriguez, whom HBCF losers have obsessed about for well over a year. They’ve targeted Valladares in particular ever since he took a Donald Trump piñata to a rally last year, digging up records in a child custody case and painting him as a dangerous abuser. The irony about that is that Epting is the same pendejo who wants everyone to forgive felonious former Huntington Beach Mayor Dave Garofalo, even though Garofalo’s documented crimes are far more dangerous to Huntington Beach than Valladares’ alleged sins. Nice to know second chances are only applicable to gabachos who pay you, Chrissie!
Next up for ComUNIDAD: rumblings about asking Huntington Beach to switch to district elections. Epting—who has promised for nearly two years that he’s going to take down Clayton-Tarvin yet hasn’t done shit—and his HBCF channel of CHAVALAS will no doubt froth over that development. Stay classy, HB!
