Van Tran and November 2010 Election.

Today, Nguoi Viet Daily News reported the latest fund raising activity of US congressional candidates Van Tran and Quang Pham in their race against the incumbent Loretta Sanchez.

http://www.nguoi-viet.com/absolutenm/anmviewer.asp?a=102852&z=1

Nguoi Viet reported that Van Tran has a total of $253,000.  Quang Pham raised $117,000 in his effort since August.   

When asked about the upcoming primary against Quang Pham,  Van Tran replied: " I put my funding to work for November election and not so much focus on the primary."

With his major donors coming from Vietnamese-American multimillionaires who have close business tie with the communist government (e.g. Hoang Kieu, owner of RAAS, who received commendation from State President Triet Nguyen and is now responsible for the promotion of Miss World 2010 to be held in VN), Van Tran was very confident that he could raise $1.5 million. 

He will have at least 1 dozen fund raising events in November, he boasted. 

One interesting note about the Nguoi Viet's article is that they pointed out the fact that he received $4,800 from David Duong, the multimillionaire from San Jose who is has mutliple investments in Vietnam and is a close friend of the former prime minister of Vietnam, Phan van Khai and a strong supporter of the controversial Madison Nguyen, San Jose city councilmember.

Madison Nguyen and Brown Act

The California Court of Appeal last week upheld the jugdement against the gag order requested by the City of San Jose on the Brown Act violation by Madison Nguyen in the naming of Little Saigon. 

A little more than a year ago, The Vietnamese-American Community of Northern California (VACNORCAL) brougth the lawsuit against Nguyen and city for violating the Brown Act.  Nguyen is accused of conspiring with a majority of city councilmembers behind close door before the council open vote on the naming of a 4 block street Little Saigon (In this case against Little Saigon).

The city had requested a gag order asking to not have any discussion of the ongoing lawsuit to be in the public domain, including factual information about the lawsuit available to the public under the law.  VACNORCAL's argument against the gag order is violation of First Amendment. The presiding superior court judge, Kevin Murphy, rejected the request and granted the VACNORCAL and the press to report the progress of the lawsuit as well as the release of the deposition tape interviewing Madison Nguyen, Forrest Williams, Nora Campos, etc...

The trial date is set for Dec 14, 2009.  The judge also has requested additional information from both parties for a possible summary judgement before trial.

The outcome of the lawsuit of is unknown but considered the fact that the community is poor and lacking resources to take on the unlimited resources of city government well funded with tax payer money,  this will be an interesting case to keep an eye on.

The Brown Act is the corner stone of California government to prevent elected officials to conspire against the public before an open vote.  It is the law designed to uphold the integrity and transparency of elected officials.

Daniel Pham and The Silence of Madison Nguyen

After winning the recall earlier this year relying on labor union’s money (most of the record $350,000 she raised came from unions all over the country) and effort, Nguyen has shown to be under their influence substantially.

The latest episode is her silence on the issue of mentally disturbed man, Daniel Pham, who was shot to death in his house by San Jose police officers. Unlike Councilmember Kansen Chu who showed immediate concern for victim’s family by visiting them within a couple weeks of the shooting and taking an official from SJPD to meet with the family, Madison Nguyen has decided not to meet with the victim’s family or even offered support. Being the only elected Vietnamese-American in the city where the population is 10% Vietnamese-Americans, this is a strange action to take.

She was elected to office by her promise that she would represent the Vietnamese-American community. She made her name for herself at that time with her effort against the shooting death of Le Thi Bich Cau, a mentally disturbed woman who was shot to death in her house by San Jose police officers who claimed that she was a threat to them while holding a potato peeler. The policemen later defenfed themselves by claiming that they thought she was holding a knife. The latest victim here was also a mentally retarded man who was shot to death at his house while holding a knife. According to the victim’s brother who called 911, the police officers who arrived at the scene were given warning by family members that the victim was mentally ill and had asked to officers not to shoot him.

Recently, the Vietnamese-American community demonstrated in front of San Jose City Hall and then Santa Clara County Hall demanding to know why the SJPD and the DA office (Dolores Carr) have not released the 911 tape as well as the coroner’s report on Daniel Pham.

The investigation is still pending but it should not preclude the SJPD and the DA office from releasing the information. In the Le Thi Bich Cau’s incident, the same set of information was released without fanfare.

For Nguyen, instead of showing leadership to the community that elected her in office in first place, she has decided to play it safe not to disturb the hand that keeps her in office for now.

Note: The San Jose police union is one of the most powerful unions in the city.

Andrew Lam Receives Award From SPJ

The Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) has released its 2009 Excellence in Journalism Awards. Winners will be honored at a 6 p.m. awards dinner on November 10, 2009 at Jillian's restaurant in San Francisco.

Among the winners is Andrew Lam for Best Opinion. Andrew Lam is an editor for New America Media, the largest ethnic news organization in the country. He also is a commentator for National Public Radio and recently published his book - "Perfumed Dreams - The Reflection of Vietnamese Diaspora".

He receives the award for "Letter from Athens: Greek Tragedies and News Media in the Age of Twitter", "Our Man Obama: The Post-Imperial Presidency" and "How McCain Became MacBeth", the opinion pieces reflected a unique ability to portray contemporary events in a rich context by drawing on history, literature and philosophy.

Winners in other catogories include:

Journalist of the Year: Holly Kernan, KALW Public Radio
Career Achievement: Susan Sward, formerly of the San Francisco Chronicle
Distinguished Service to Journalism: Paul Kleyman, New America Media
Unsung Hero: Geoff Link, Central City Extra
John Gothberg Award for Meritorious Service to SPJ: Janet Mandelstam, freelance writer
The Economy: Charles Piller, Sacramento Bee
Public Service: Sean Webby, San Jose Mercury News
Breaking News
- Print (daily): The Oakland Tribune

- Broadcast: Steven Short, KALW-FM

Explanatory Journalism
- Print (daily): Nanette Asimov and Jill Tucker, San Francisco Chronicle,

- Print (non-daily): Joe Eskenazi, SF Weekly,

- Broadcast: Craig Miller and the Quest Production Staff, KQED Public Media

- Online: MarketWatch, for "The Spiral of Deflation,"

Investigative Journalism- Print (daily): Sean Webby, San Jose Mercury News

The complete of winner is listed on

http://www.mediabistro.com/baynewser/bay_area_journos/diverse_winners_in_society_of_professional_journalists_awards_137004.asp

Tram Be & Vallco Fashion Park

Tram Be, 50, a real estate tycoon in Vietnam, recently invested $60 million to buy Cupertino Square - previously known as Vallco Fashion Park. .

Tram Be is known to have investment in Southern Bank (Ngan Hang Phuong Nam), Trieu An Hospital in HCM City, and other real estate investments in Binh Chanh (HCM City).

He has close tie with Le thanh Hai who is currently the person in charge of HCM City, the largest city in Vietnam (equivalent to a mayoral position).

This is a first multimillion dollar investment by a Vietnamese from Vietnam (a communist dictatorship country) into Silicon Valley, albeit real estate or hi-tech companies.

Located in one of Silicon Valley’s most prosperous communities, the 4th biggest mall in San Jose has a checkered history.

The origininal investors of the mall is consisted of Vietnamese-American and Chinese-American investors in the Bay Area. One of the Vietnamese-Americans is the owner of Grand Century Mall on Senter Road. They were hoping to turn the mall into the largest Asian mall in the US. They acquiried the mall for $80 million in early 2003 from foreclosure after the previous owners defaulted on the mortgage. They were forced to sell the majority of their equity in late 2007 to an international turnaround specialist OrbitResources (A Tawainese company with Philip Liao as its CEO) after running into financial troubles for missteps, particularly the over construction costs for a new 16-screen theater. Orbit became then the main investor in Cupertino Square LLC and Vallco International Shopping Center, LLC.

According to a San Jose Business Journal's article published on 9-4-2008, Gramercy (a New York-based real estate investment trust) is the lender of a $113 million construction loan. The mall owners filed for bankruptcy on 9-2-2008 because they could not meet their debt obligation.

The reorganization plan proposed in early 2009 by the debtors was supposed to be a compromise with its lenders. Pursuant to the plan, a newly-formed entity would acquire the shopping center for $105 million (plus additional consideration), which purchase price would likely be financed by the pre-petition lenders and other investors.

The $60 million investment by Tram Be is believed to allow him to be the majority stake holder of the shopping mall.


According to San Jose Business Journal, Cupertino Square has more than 1.2 million square feet of retail space situated on slightly more than 50 acres. The mall has four anchor tenants — three department stores and an 80,000-square-foot movie theater — plus more than 500,000 square feet of in-line shop space and a food court. Only about half the building area and 21 acres of land are owned by the debtors, however, with the balance of land and improvements owned by the department stores.

Van Tran & AM 1190 KXMX

State Assemblyman Van Tran and Nguoi Viet Newspaper last week entered an agreement to share 4 hours of radio on AM 1190 KXMX. This is foreign language radio station that is popular with the Vietnamese-American community.

The detail is being worked out but it seems that Van Tran will have one hour for him and his "Gang of Seven". The other three hours ( or two) will be reserved for Dinh Quang Anh Thai and possibly Vu Quy Hao Nhien. They both are recently hired editors for Nguoi Viet. In the case of Hao Nhien, it was a rehire. But knowing Hao Nhien, he might back out from doing radio show. He is more comfortable writing blog (Bolsavik) then doing live radio show. Anh Thai of course came from Little Saigon Radio, the most popular radio show in Little Saigon before financial difficult affected their operation.

Van Tran realizes that without having control of a radio show, he is at the mercy of talk show hosts who don't like him and his group. Now with Nguoi Viet on board and he has access to 1 hour of radio time every weekday, Tran feels confident knowing that he is sitting pretty next year during the primary.

Is Quang Pham for Real?

Last week at the Pacific Club in Newport Beach, Quang Pham, a Republican congressional candidate running against the incumbent Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez (D), officially kicked off his fund raising effort.

Quang Pham is a well known figure in the Vietnamese-American community for his autobiography about his journey as a young boy growing in America and ultimately served his country as a Marine pilot fighting in the first Gulf War. He is also an entrepeneur building successful businesses in the health care industry.

The event was packed with his supporters including some of the who's who in OC - Rod McDermott, managing director of the McDermott and Bull (A high power recruiting firm) and a New Majority member, Gen. William Lyon, real estate magnate and heavy-weight GOP donor, Tom Davin, president the Panda Restaurant Group, Robert Mosier, president and CEO of the Mosier & Company, etc..

Pham also announced at the event that he so far has raised over $100,000. This is impressive but his goal is to raise much more in order to have his run at the Republican primary first against State Assemblyman Van Tran.

He is having two additional fund raising events in Philadelphia and Washington DC this week alone.

In the last 3 months after his candidacy announcement, Quang has been working hard to build a team and raise money. He has the name recognition and goodwill in the Vietnamese American community and within the business world. However, similar to Van Tran, his name recognition in CD 47 is limited.

The conventional wisdom is that in the Republican primary, Van Tran will have a big advantage especially with his Vietnamese American constituents. The reality is that Van Tran is a controversial politician within his own Vietnamese-American community and mainstream. His continous personal attacks on County Supervisor Janet Nguyen for last two years as he tries to consolidate his political power has earned him the nickname of the "Godfather" and his political machine as the "Gang of Seven". His recent controversy with the Andy Quach's DUI episode garnered him the headline in the mainstream media as well local Vietnamese-American media: " Van Tran Interferred with Investigation".

But what is more damaging to Tran in the Vietnamese-Ameircan community is him receiving of a lof of money from wealthy businessmen who have close tie with the communist government. There are a lot of questions being raised.

This is a long race from now until June 2010. Both Van Tran and Quang Pham are raising money furiously to prepare for the firework. Van Tran is well known for his viscious politcal tactics so the question is does Quang Pham have what it takes to take on the "Godfather" and his gang?