Alameda Point: Getting more facts
Tuesday night, the City Council took up the issue of holding a presentation on the City’s two election reports. The referral was brought by the Mayor, and if you watch the full meeting the City Manager. (Interpretive video of the discussion below):
First off much appreciation to Marie Gilmore and Lena Tam, and Frank Matarrese who supported them, for insisting that any presentation be “holistic” giving the voters more info instead of less. As Gilmore pointed out, there is a high chance of voter confusion in presenting the election reports alone, without the context that the city and SunCal are negotiating the issues raised in it.
Basically, telling people there are concerns and leaving it at that is not the full story. If the City and SunCal come to terms with the issues in the report, running back out and shouting “we have an agreement so ignore what we said previously” will not necessarily correct the city-created, public understanding that there are unresolved issues.
Throughout the discussion, Mayor Johnson, Doug deHaan and the City Manager repeatedly tried to bring the focus back to the narrow “just the reports” idea. Literally saying, over and over, “but to get back to the referral,” in an attempt to dump the rest of the council discussion. It’s clear why deHaan wants the just-the-reports presentation, he is actively hoping to tank the initiative. Less clear are the Mayor and City Manager’s motivations. After a few years of Debra Kurita’s style, it’s interesting to see that we’re back to a stronger City Manger (a la Jim Flint) who has no qualms of jumping in and trying to direct the council where she wants it to go. (Not necessarily a bad thing)
In the end, the council unanimously passed Lena Tam’s motion to give a presentation that includes the election reports, summary of the negotiation issues (not what’s specifically being negotiated, but general overview of which items are and are not being discussed), working with SunCal to release more info that the City has, but which they did not include in the Election Reports and a request for the City Attorney’s office to make public their opinion on what can and cannot be negotiated. Also included was Matarrese’s request to update the City’s financial report on the project with recent economic assumptions (like the impending loss of redevelopment money).
In the end, the public will learn more about the city’s position, not less. And for that we can thank Marie and Lena for pushing to make it happen
Popularity: 3% [?]
Jon Spangler
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:47 pm
Tuesday’s decision is a major step forward for the City.
I hope that SunCal will soon provide whatever consent(s) or “permission(s)” necessary soon to make it clear that they are willing to make these issues more transparent.
Mayor Johnson told me this morning after the Chamber of Commerce breakfast that the City still believes SunCal “wants to have it both ways” and not be fully transparent, but I believe this is a misreading of SunCal’s actual position.
As I see it, there is clearly a need to make the communication process between SunCal and the City itself more effective and less adversarial…