What's the total amount that Robert Jones and Lupe Almaraz wasted on February 2, 2007...in time, resources, and most important-taxpayer dollars?

Let's assume that they both flew down from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Let's assume that they failed to resolve an impending court case in Southern California. Let's also assume that they had no intention of resolving that court case.

There were two items to be resolved in avoiding the lawsuit:

1) they leave the blogger alone

2) they can pay attorney fees (no damages)

They had stipulated to pay the attorney's fees, but we were not there to discuss separation of service; the blogger wanted to continue serving the public, as the blogger's productivity statistics demonstrate excellent success (as opposed to the DLSE's lack of any productivity standards). We were not there to discuss a 1-month paid severance package. If they knew that we were not there to discuss that, then why did they waste taxpayers funds with full knowledge that the court's voluntary settlement conference would not yield the results that the court had desired.

The Acting Labor Commissioner and the DLSE Deputy Chief have a duty of care concerning how taxpayer dollars are to be spent. These two have a fiduciary responsibility to the People of California. If these two had a reasonable belief that this would not be resolved, then they could have only sent Richard Munoz to not settle and saved the taxpayers thousands of dollars. It's as if Acting Labor Commissioner Robert Jones and Deputy Chief Lupe Almaraz conspired to waste state time, state resources, and most importantly-taxpayer dollars by flying down to mock to court's voluntary settlement conference.