WESTMINSTER : Capizzi Backing of Recall Targets Decried

A director of the Westminster Firefighters Assn. on Friday assailed Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi for his support of four city officials who are facing a recall election on Tuesday.

Mike Garrison said that Capizzi has shown a lack of knowledge about the situation in supporting Mayor Charles V. Smith and the other recall targets.

“As the leading law enforcement officer in Orange County, it was appalling to see you reduce the office of district attorney to nothing more than a political puppet show,” Garrison said in a letter sent to Capizzi Thursday.

Garrison was reacting to a letter Capizzi sent last week to residents endorsing Smith and council members Craig Schweisinger, Charmayne S. Bohman and Tony Lam.

The firefighters union is leading the recall drive stemming from last year’s $900,000 in cuts in the Fire Department’s budget.

Capizzi said Thursday that the recall is ill-advised and an abuse of the recall process because the council members, in approving the cuts last year to balance the city budget, were performing “the duty we expect of all elected officials.”

He also said that while an investigation found insufficient evidence to prove criminal wrongdoing, city firefighters have engaged in payroll practices that were neither in the best interest of the city nor morally defensible.

But Garrison argued in his letter to Capizzi that the overtime practices at the Fire Department have been approved by the council. He added that during the district attorney’s investigation, the firefighters volunteered to be interviewed and to provide documents to prove their innocence.

Investigators refused to act on the offer, Garrison said.

Meanwhile, Smith, Schweisinger, Bohman, Lam and their supporters will hold a rally today at the Westminster Center, a shopping center at the corner of Golden West Street and Westminster Boulevard.

Police Chief James Cook and Fire Chief John T. DeMonaco Jr. are expected to speak at the 10 a.m. rally. Also expected to attend are officials of the Municipal Employees Assn. and the Police Officers Assn.

The firefighters union and its supporters have also scheduled a precinct walk at 10 a.m. today.