Talk:Bell, California

Notable natives
I would like to question the removal of the "famus natives and notables" section whenmany other cities have a mention of famous people born to or from thir home city. For what reason was this removed without question or discussion? JasVe3 (talk) 18:35, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Salary controversy
This is quite a story. It's made it into the national news, and probably the late-night comics have been at it too. Even so, let's try to keep it in proportion and follow applicable Wikipedia rules. I just reverted an addition of a comparison to the LAPD, because it's based on our own research and not on what has been printed in reliable secondary sources. That was a violation of WP:NOR. We should also make sure that material on the people involved has to meet the strict standards of WP:BLP, even if they are widely reviled.  Will Beback   talk    08:17, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

This paragraph was carefully researched using reliable sources. There was no violation of either NOR or BLP, (where did THAT come from?)   The comparison of Bell to LAPD has been on the news both radio and television for a week. I even called LAPD to verify my information. To remove an article without any discussion is a violation of good faith. Everything in Wiki is based on our own research so I don't know what THAT means either. I will replace the paragraph, with the rest of my sources. Please do not remove it without discussion here, preferably with a third party! 09:59, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

The state about the 2005 elections being "dubious" makes the article biased. The person who posted that statement did include a reference but if anyone looks at the reference source itself, the source does not confirm that the election was rigged. It only says the Attorney General is investigating. Being investigated is not the same as being guilty. Whether the entire election or if half the ballots in the election were fraudulent still remains to be seen. Therefore that sentence, which appears in the opening paragraph to the article, needs to be either edited or removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.83.102.163 (talk) 17:49, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

''Comparison of Bell Police Department Patrol is part of the Bell Police Department's Field Services Division and is responsible for manning the streets in marked police vehicles. The Bell Gardens Police Department has two motor units to enforce traffic laws throughout the city. Traffic Officers also handle the investigation of major traffic accidents and assist with traffic control. The Parking Enforcement Unit consists of two community service officers. They are responsible for enforcing all parking regulations and ordinances throughout the city. They also assist with traffic control and special events. The former police chief Randy Adams, who resigned last week, was paid $457,000 a year, Thirty-three percent more than the $300,442 salary the of LAPD Chief Charlie Beck responsible for the large city of Los Angeles each of whose 19 divisions are larger than the entire City of Bell. An officer from Pomona, CA, stated that Bell is smaller than the area he patrols by himself. DocOfSoc (talk) 10:17, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * The BLP matter addressed edits by others - sorry if I gave the wrong impression. This article concerns Bell, not the LAPD. Calling up to get information is, by definition, original research. Let's keep the material that is found in reliable secondary sources, like the LA Times. We might add the number of officers in Bell to show how small it is - I believe that's been reported. Separately, if we want to expand the section on the police force, and if we have good sources, we can go into details about their parking enforcement, etc.   Will Beback    talk    10:23, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Sometimes you start with original research and then find the source. I added the info about Bell to emphasize how small the place is and was going to add those reference later today and I will now. If you want to assist in a rewrite, I would appreciate it. Living locally, I probably listened to more news about the facts in this case, Unless you live in the LA area too and are as much of a newshound as I am.DocOfSoc (talk) 10:30, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I do appreciate your efforts on this article. When writing an encyclopedia, it's best to start with the sources. We also have to keep an eye on the "weight" issue - this shouldn't be as long as the rest of the article, though we could potentially split it off into a standalone article in which case weight wouldn't be a problem. As for sources, I'm afraid I don't listen to the radio much, but broadcast news reports aren't verifiable unless they post transcripts or podcasts. Blogs are also unusable as sources. That'll pretty much limit us to newspapers, supplemented with judicious use of the Bell city website or similar primary sources. See WP:PSTS.   Will Beback    talk    10:39, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I have put a lot of work into this article and was making what I thought was a valid analogy. I sometimes write newscopy for a local radio station so I have to make darn sure my sources are correct! And I do have the podcasts.  So I gather you want me to spit  oops split ;-) the paragraph.DocOfSoc (talk) 10:57, 26 July 2010 (UTC) oops bolded, sorry.DocOfSoc (talk) 10:59, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Are the podcasts publicly available? I meant splitting out the section into a separate article, something like "2010 City of Bell salary controversy", and leaving a short summary here. That's not an ideal solution, but if there is so much material that it swamps the rest of the article then there are only two choices, cut it down to size or split it.   Will Beback    talk    11:08, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Ok, Thanks. Will ponder and find podcast. And split! ;-) DocOfSoc (talk) 11:15, 26 July 2010 (UTC) I see now what you mean about weight. Could that whole section start out as a stub? or? DocOfSoc (talk) 11:34, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * If we create a separate article it'll need to meet these standards: Notability (events). I don't think that'll be a problem since there has been reaction and coverage at the state and national levels. We could move all of the existing material to a new stub. It'll be tricky to decide on a name, but we can always move it if we think of a better one. We should leave a short paragraph here summarizing the matter.    Will Beback    talk    11:37, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Ok I have a little time to do this anyways before leaving. Reading the section I found this, The former police chief Randy Adams, who resigned last week, was paid $457,000 a year [1], Thirty-three percent more than the $300,442 [2] salary the of LAPD Chief Charlie Beck[3] responsible for the large city of Los Angeles each of whose 19 divisions are larger than the entire City of Bell. [citation needed] An officer from Pomona, CA, who wished to remain anonymous) stated that "Bell is smaller than the area" he patrols by himself. DocOfSoc (talk) 10:17, 26 July 2010 (UTC)  I removed it from the main article since it's a signed comment I am assuming it is meant for this talk page and not the main article. I don't think it's necessary also the paragraph that was just above this one needs removing where it call someone a name with a lousy source.  Got go sorry, -- Crohnie Gal  Talk  11:46, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for catching that. I hadn't been following all of the editing. I did a little more polishing. We need to avoid references like "Thursday" or "last week", as those won't make any sense next week. Let's try to give a coherent, encyclopedic, and neutral narrative.   Will Beback    talk    12:06, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

I have pruned the section for now. I really like the idea of a stub, although I have never created one. I have a lot more material. Help? I apologize for my red-headed rant too. ;-) TY for your patience. 5:AM. here. Should probably head to bed. More later, I hope. Namaste...DocOfSoc (talk) 12:04, 26 July 2010 (UTC) Sorry, did not mean to over write. Definitely bedtime. Just one more reference to find. Have a great day wherever you are! DocOfSoc (talk) 12:19, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * No prob - it's easy to do when there are multiple editors. I've copied it all to 2010 City of Bell salary controversy (as a working title). In the context of a full article, and if secondary sources can be found to set the groundwork, then a fuller comparison to average or comparable salaries wouldn't be out of place.   Will Beback    talk    12:27, 26 July 2010 (UTC)


 * You both did real good while I was away. Good work, both of you, it's awesome the difference I now see compared to what was here when I had to leave. :)  I saw the stub too.  I have a lot of reading to do. :)  -- Crohnie Gal  Talk  16:36, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

New "Controversy" section is weak
Trimming it down to less than the Oscar controversy is way too much. Without knowing the relative scale of the salaries (compare with LA mayor or LAPD chief) the raw numbers are not very useful. Are people supposed to guess they are way out of line? -MarsRover (talk) 16:43, 26 July 2010 (UTC)
 * It does say that they are unusually high and possibly the high salaries in the country. Add more if you like, but keep it short and neutral. It doesn't need to be longer than the Oscar event, since it now has an entire article devoted to it.   Will Beback    talk    20:35, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Name of scandal section
I was thinking the previous section title "2010 Salary controversy" was too mild but the new title "2010 Official corruption scandal" seems a bit misleading and too strong. The term "Official" has two meaning in this context which is slightly misleading so I would remove that word. We have a "corruption investigation" and we have a "salary scandal" but I don't think we have a "corruption scandal" yet. --MarsRover (talk) 18:04, 1 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I disagree, between the salaries, the possible voting fraud and the property taxes question, I do believe we have a full fledged  "Corruption Scandal" going on here.  Namaste... DocOfSoc (talk) 03:20, 2 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Los Angeles Times today called it a "Salary Scandal" again. Their is even more salaries that the residents are complaining about . IMO, this event will be more known for the salaries than the corruption (if there were any) "Corruption Scandal" = 13k hits vs. "Salary Scandal" = 40k hits --MarsRover (talk) 03:02, 8 August 2010 (UTC)
 * It was just revealed on the news tonight that there are further scandals to be revealed. One is a Multi-million dollar Bond Issue that was not approved by the voters and is double Bell's actual budget. Looking for links now... BTW< LA Slimes doesn't always get everything right, i.e. the LAPD Chief's salary.  Tonight I interviewed an LA  Sheriff  with 29 years of service,  he stated there is more to be revealed about Bell and it's surrounding cities.  As he said: News at 11  ;-) Obviously, we now have to find references as they are revealed.  Namaste...DocOfSoc (talk) BTW, the Times doesn't get to name our article, WE do :-D! DocOfSoc (talk) 09:03, 8 August 2010 (UTC)
 * As the story grows, I think that "2010 Official corruption scandal" makes increasing sense. It's corruption by officials, too many kinds of corruption to come up with a more specific label.   Will Beback    talk    20:17, 8 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WillBeBack, will you be changing the name of the article? I defer to your expertise and it is surely beyond my ken. BTW I did check out WikiNews and came away slightly cross-eyed.DocOfSoc (talk) 10:11, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The bond issue as far as I can tell is more "mismanagement" than "corruption". Mr. Rizzo didn't make any money from the deal. And I take issue with the term "corruption" not "scandal". I have no problems with calling it a scandal and even think the other article should be renamed from "controversy" to "scandal". We get to name the article but there are guidelines (WP:COMMONNAME) were you should use the most common name for the topic. LA Times is a reliable source that calls it "Salary scandal" and I am unaware of any other reliable source that calls it a "corruption scandal". -MarsRover (talk) 17:23, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
 * To the best of my knowledge, nowhere is the bond issue mentioned as part of the "corruption" or "scandal'. Did I miss something? The 3 issues are the salaries, voting fraud and and property taxes, so it is more than a salary scandal no matter what the Times says. And, no, Mr.Rizzo didn't need to make any more money. Namaste...DocOfSoc (talk) 12:54, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
 * You mentioned the "Multi-million dollar Bond Issue" as a rationale that this is a corruption scandal. I was replying to your comment . I guess we now agree that is not a rationale. So, the alleged "voting fraud" and high "property taxes" are your only reasons you think this is "Political corruption"? Sure, that's more than just the "salary scandal" but things need to be labeled they way they are and not what they could be in the future. "Alleged corruption" or "corruption investigation" is not the same as "corruption" just like "alleged crime" and "criminal investigation" is not the same as "crime". Also, your statements that you know more what to call this scandal better than the LA Times (who explained scandal to you) proves you're pushing your personal opinion. You might want to review WP:NPOV. --MarsRover (talk) 21:02, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

At NO time did I say that I know better what to call this article. How DARE you say that PROVES my POV. What exactly are you referring to? Maybe you should you should review Civility and Good FaithDocOfSoc (talk) 09:10, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Sorry if my comment came across as uncivil. You repeatly said "we get to decide" and since it only us talking "we" comes across as just "you". Anyway I think Qwyrxian hit it on the head with it just matters what's verifiable. If you find an LA Times, NY Times or Newsweek article called "City of Bell is full of Political corruption" then I agree we should change it. But until someone is arrested, I doubt newspapers would since they have to worry about being sued. BTW, your edits have definately been in good faith and sorry if my comment implied otherwise. Hopefully you don't take too long of a wiki-break. --MarsRover (talk) 17:32, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Just to clarify to everyone above--we need to call the events what the reliable sources are calling them. We cannot lump multiple scandals together under one "corruption scandal" until reliable sources have done so.  DocofSoc said that sometimes the LATimes doesn't always get it right--well, as far as Wikipedia is concerned, they do.  I mean, if other reliable sources use other terms, then we have to find the one that seems most prevalent.  But we can never declare our interpretation of events to trump that of reliable sources.  I haven't looked at the sources yet, so I have no opinion on what the proper name is.  But please bear in mind WP:NPOV and WP:OR as you consider the issue.  Qwyrxian (talk) 21:57, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Please do not talk down to me. I know exactly what POV and OR say. And I repeat: "the Times doesn't get to name our article, WE do." As far as the Times is concerned, their first revelation of this scandal contained inaccurate info; i.e. the comparison of the Bell's Police chief's salary to that of LAPD's chief. It would have taken less than a minute to check out that fact but The Times does not always check their facts. BTW, LAPD officers refer to that newspaper as "The LA Slimes" as they have been portrayed wrongly so often. I personally have been interviewed by the Times several times and not once did they quote me correctly. As it is out only major newspaper in the area we are stuck with it, and they often get things right. Just because Wikipedia recognizes them as a reliable source, does not mean they always are. As another editor pointed on the scandal talk page, each article is 1 or 2 reporters' opinions, go see. More later,need to take a "Wiki-Break." Namaste...DocOfSoc (talk) 03:37, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Apologies if you thought I was talking down to you. In our edit above, I felt like you were saying that we get to define the names of things, not reliable sources.  I certainly agree that newspapers aren't always "correct," but, of course, we don't actually care about what's true, just what's verifiable.  I'll try to take a look at the sources we have so far (or others, if I can find them) and see what a consensus name among them might be. Qwyrxian (talk) 05:57, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * TY for your kind reply. I get frustrated with "we don't actually care about what's true, just what's verifiable." ;-)  Looking forward to hearing back from you! DocOfSoc (talk) 06:54, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * After looking over the citations over at the other article, I see far more support for the word "Scandal" over corruption. Most of them seem to cluster around "Bell * scandal," where * = nothing, "city," or "salary." Older sources used the word "pay probe," but I think that was before it was "agreed" to be a "scandal". While the word "corruption" does get used, it seems more to be used within the articles, not as the "title" of the event/circumstances. So my feeling is that, for this article, the proper section title is "Pay scandal" (we don't need to say Bell City here), and the proper title of the other article is "2010 Bay City pay scandal" or "2010 Bay City scandal". Does anyone read the sources any differently? As far as I can tell from looking at the sources, the pay issue vastly dominates over the other issues. Qwyrxian (talk) 06:58, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Name Game
Bell is in Los Angeles, not a bay city ;-)DocOfSoc (talk) 07:21, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The two secondary scandals are relatively early in their evolution, whereas the salary issue is months along and actually started with issues in Maywood, CA. I am thinking maybe instead of corruption, "2010 Controversies in Bell, CA" may be more encompassing, yet not ugly. Your thoughts?DocOfSoc (talk) 07:27, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * For this article, I don't think we need to say "in Bell, CA" (since it's implied that we're talking about Bell in the Bell article. For the other article, that could be okay, although I'd say this should be decided on that article's talk page.  Qwyrxian (talk) 08:19, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Sanchez (2011 Controversies)
I don't think that any of the information about Sanchez belongs in this article. This is an article about a city; the death of one politician in the course of one election is not nearly important enough in the several hundred year history of this city. It should all come out as being overly focused on the death of a single person. We are not here to memorialize people who happen to be currently in the news. Qwyrxian (talk) 22:21, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Agree. You can remove it if you wish, and see if anyone challenges the removal.--Jojhutton (talk) 22:25, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * This is such a small town, I felt it was appropriate to include it at the time. I was goingI  to remove it shortly anyway.  — DocOfSoc •  Talk  •  07:11, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

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Original name
I seem to recall that this place was originally "Bell Gardens" and the name was subsequently shortened to merely "Bell". Anyone know of a reliable source indicating this? 2600:1004:B122:B0C0:D52E:2881:AEC6:4BC3 (talk) 00:32, 28 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Bell Gardens seems to be a separate community southeast of Bell. Click one of the maps here.  Magnolia677 (talk) 03:09, 28 December 2016 (UTC)

Newspapers?
Can someone check the status of local newspapers?

As of 2017-01-22, the article said, "In 1924, George O. Wheeler founded the Industrial Post, the local newspaper which now serves the communities of Bell, Cudahy and Maywood."

Bruder writing for the Christian Science Monitor, quoted community activist Christina Garcia, who told interviewers for a 2011 Federal Communications Commission report. "The city of Bell doesn't even have a local paper; no local media of any sort." Bruder continued, "It was years ago that Bell had a community newspaper. It was called the Bell, Maywood, Cudahy Community News," wrote Brian Hews, publisher of the Los Cerritos Community Newspaper, which is head-quartered 10 miles from Bell, in a postmortem of the scandal. "I know this because it was part of a larger newspaper group my family owned. Art Aguilar was the editor at the time, and, suffice to say, you did not mess with Art. Coincidentally, we sold those papers in 1998, right around the time Bell hired [Rizzo]." Eventually, the News shut down.

"There's no telling whether a tiny, now-defunct paper would have detected – or deterred – corruption in Bell. But it's also impossible to know how many communities, in the absence of watchdog institutions, are currently getting hollowed out from within."

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