Simi Valley City Council candidate Tim Shannon has started placing his signs. What do you think of the inclusion of a clover on his signs? Should an Irish politician include a 3 leaf or 4 leaf clover?

Click here for past coverage of clovers on campaign signs.

The City of Ventura has a dedicated group of Tea Party activists.

They had gathered signatures to remove the parking meters in their town under a variety of arguments including it was a part of the United Nations Agenda 21 plan. It was going to be on the ballot but a Judge ruled the law didn't allow voters to choose rules over parking by ballot petition.

Now their leader, Carla Bonney , is running for the city council. Her Tea Party platform has created an energized base of supporters. But it has many critics too. A loyal reader sent in this picture, and there are more to go with it, of a sign placed in violation of The UN Agenda 21 The City of Ventura rules for political signs.

This isn't proof of any wrongdoing by the campaign. Often overzealous supporters place signs for a candidate without direction. Then they get upset when the signs are removed and assume they are stolen.

The City of Ventura has a great website with the relevant city code if you would like to read it for yourself.

I'm looking forward to an exciting city council campaign.

( Do you remember the Judge Wapner?)

Have you been following the race for Judge? In Simi Valley it seems Jeff Bennett is running with Rep. Gallegly as I see their two signs together. How are you going to make up your mind? Both candidates are Republicans and both have strong backgrounds.

Both of them have endorsements from a wide group of community members. Bennett has the support of previous Democratic congressional candidate Michael Case and Rep. Elton Gallegly. That was surprising to me as Bennett seems to be tied into the local Republican Party fairly well. Roberto Orellana earned the endorsement of The Star due in part because of his willingness to have his confidential referrals be open to the public.

Both candidates attended the recent debate in Simi Valley put on by CPAC.

One of Orellana's supporters, attorney Brian Vogel, sent me this email to post explaining why he supports his candidate. If you click on continue reading you can see Orellana's background.

The following few paragraphs are from Brian Vogel:

I am a lifelong liberal democrat who graduated from Wesleyan University in Connecticut , went to law school, became a public defender, and recently opened my own practice. My wife works at County Counsel with Roberto Orellana who is running against DA Jeff Bennett for Superior Court Judge here in Ventura . Many of us in the legal community encouraged Roberto to run because he is qualified, intelligent, fair-minded (even though he is a Republican) - and every other qualified lawyer was too chicken to run against the DA machine on short notice.

To give you a little background, Judge Bruce Clark retired a few days before the deadline to submit papers for the June election giving no advance notice to the legal community and prospective judicial candidates. The DA's handpicked candidate, Jeff Bennett, submitted papers immediately and held a press conference, probably expecting that noone would run against him on such short notice. Roberto had the courage to stand up and run on very short notice. Please help us support his candidacy and feel free to forward his qualifications to prospective voters and anyone who you think can help out financially. His list of endorsements and qualifications are available at www.Roberto4judge.com and donations can be made via Paypal. He still needs money for automatic phone calls and possibly radio air time.

We have enough white, DA Republicans with no civil experience on the bench already. His opponent was a cop who went to a local law school and then got hired by the DA where he has been ever since. Roberto has vast civil experience and impeccable academic qualifications. He graduated cum laude from Notre Dame Law School , wrote on the Law Review and clerked for a Ninth Circuit Judge. He will also be only the second Hispanic on the bench along with Judge Covarrubius now that Judge Gutierrez retired. A simple comparison of their credentials makes the better choice obvious, yet the political machine in this county makes the overwhelmingly more qualified Hispanic candidate an underdog in this election. If the voters are educated as to the credentials of the two candidates and vote wisely, Roberto should win handily. Thank you for your consideration.

I received an email that Mary Pallant's signs are in. It got me wondering. Do you see many signs for candidates in your part of the county?

I see a few Rep. Gallegly signs but that is about it.

Also, I see that Gallegly owns a campaign bus? Has anyone seen it?

Suggest some names for his bus.

( Editor's note: The above picture was sent in by a reader)

Before this becomes a thread about me picking on Peter Foy rest assured if you have a picture of another campaign's signs I will also post it for discussion.

My main objective is to create a discussion about the merits of the local sign ordinance.

With that being said, is this sign in compliance?I believe it is as the spot of ground appears to be a part of the shopping center and not a part of the public land. Am I right?

I doubt the property owner was asked, but I could be wrong. I remember in the primary a whole host of signs at the same location.

You can also discuss these pictures from the primary and tell me if they are public or private.
#1 Cochran and Galena
#2 McDonald's off of Yosemite ( Really good photo for a zoom in on the fence line).