State "Borrowing" from cities: Robbing Peter to pay Paul

Facing a huge deficit, Governor Schwarzenegger is proposing to "borrow" two billion dollars from cities and counties. Of course, cities and counties are up in arms. Faced with their own revenue shortfalls, they are already making deep cuts in local services. Facing the third raid on local revenues in twenty years, they are appealing to voter anger against Sacramento politicians.

Ventura would lose $2.8 million in property tax revenue. Our city has already reducing spending on services by $11 million because of the economic crisis. Nearly 40 jobs have been eliminated and all staff are taking at least a 5% cut in compensation.

The League of California Cities has a new web site called "Save Your City" that allows residents to enter their zip code and hear a video from a local official or community leader blasting the State plan. You can also join the coalition to oppose the forced "borrowing."

Understandably, the argument is aimed at protecting local services -- the police, fire, libraries and parks that local residents rely on. But there is an even more powerful, if less emotional, reason to oppose the State plan: it only makes California's fiscal problem worse.

Of course, the State government has few options. The complicated and sloppy set of propositions designed to reduce the gap went down in flames. The Governor is now saying he must do what prior to the election he said he couldn't do -- balance the budget solely with cuts. Every day brings more news about just how difficult that will be.

But whether you think the State budget challenge is a "revenue problem," "a spending problem" or both, borrowing won't fix it. Postponing the problem only intensifies it.

Ventura has taken a different path. As difficult as it was to stop planting trees and fixing parks, to cut out Downtown foot patrol and reduce street maintenance, to cut beach lifeguards and cancel community events -- we had to balance our budget. The City Council did just that.

In life, my mother told me, you don't always get what you pay for, but you always pay for what you get. It's a useful point to remember. Plenty of people would like government not only to continue what it does today but to do more. There's a way to do that: pay for it. There's a way not to do it. Borrow from someone else with no plan for repaying it. That's what the State is proposing. It makes no sense. We will all be hurt if they go ahead with it.

City blogs: vital tool or faddish vanity?

How valuable is a blog for city officials? Are they eclipsing newspapers as up-to-the-minute sources of news and commentary -- or a faddish vanity that only a handful of digital fanatics actually read?

That was the lively topic of discussion yesterday at a crowded session of a San Diego conference for mayors and councilmembers put on by the League of California Cities.

Mike Madrid, who publishes the widely-followed California City News provided an overview how cities are adapting to rapidly morphing field of "social media" including blogs, Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter. Some cities are embracing the new communication tools, while most lag far behind.

Art Pedroza is a Santa Ana political activist who has turned his Orangejuice round up of news and views in Orange County into the third highest read political blogsite in California. With rapid-fire delivery that mirrors his around-the-clock posting of the latest in hot news and gossip, he described the way in which the Internet and smart phones have opened up political dialogue far beyond the old-fashioned cycle of a news article followed several days later by a letter to the editor, followed by a response days after that. Now news pings around the world in a flash, accompanied by UTube videos and 140 character Twitter blasts.

As one of the handful of city managers in California with a blog, I was asked to provide some insight and I outlined the broader canvas of civic engagement. I was inspired to begin this blog by the example of my Santa Paula colleague, Wally Bobkiewicz. If a blog is to be more than a trendy toy, it has to fit into a larger commitment to healthy dialogue that engages citizens, not just in government decision-making, but in real partnership in achieving the community's future goals and vision. That means community gatherings like our recent Economic Summit, that means face-to-face informal opportunties like our periodic "Taking it to the Streets" neighborhood open houses, that means lively involvement of citizen advisory commissions and task forces like the View Protection Task Force and Citizen Budget Ad Hoc Committee and that means a spirit of mutual respect between elected officials, public servants and the public we all serve.

Of course, the digital frontier can also seem like the wild west. I talked about three troubling aspects that I have no solution for, but believe we need to address as we operate in this new territory. First is the sometimes poisonous atmosphere that's fostered by anonymity. That's hardly new to American democracy -- in the founding days of the republic, anonymous pamphlets were frequently full of scurrilous vitriol. But for the same reason newspapers ultimately decided not to publish anonymous letters, we may need to move away from the lack of accountability that comes with "screen names" and anonymous posting.

The second is the isolation of the virtual world. Yes, there are intense exchanges in cyberspace, but they are often disconnected from the larger dialogues a community needs. Pedroza cited the 1/9/90 rule -- for every 100 netizens, one is a blogger, nine read and make comments and 90 are silent. The 90 need to be drawn into the mix.

Finally, there is the intense self-selection that comes with billions of web site choices. I'm not sure about the reliability of this figure, but one study found that 94% of blog readers regularly read only blogs they agree with. This is not a good sign for inclusive discourse.

Although no Ventura elected officials attended the conference, there was a diverse group from around the State with a fascination with the new digital world we are entering. Some people's old habits die hard -- some of us worry about going out to the driveway in the not too distant future and not finding a daily newspaper. Others could care less -- they are already hurtling down the Information Superhighway. To draw on a different metaphor, it is easy to lose sight of the forest for the trees. Cities and city officials are not in the digital business, we are not in the blog business -- we are in the governance arena. These new communication tools are increasingly vital avenues to travel -- but the goal is not measured in either "web page hits" or being first on your block with the latest technology. It is putting new technology to work on one of the oldest challenges of civilization: how to promote self-government that promotes the common good, not just the narrow and often selfish needs of a powerful and/or vocal few.

Aftermath

Yesterday, California voters had their say, turning thumbs down on five of six propositions put on the ballot by the Governor and Legislature. The only one approved was a "punish the politicians" measure that will have little impact.

Although we had early morning cloud cover in Ventura, it does not appear that the sky has fallen. Passage of the messy package of borrowings, diversions and spending formulas would have only reduced the State's looming fiscal train wreck from a $21 billion fiasco to a $15 billion crisis. But the fed-up voters have sent an overwhelming message to Sacramento. The problem is: what is the message?

We've already heard from an organized email campaign today that voters were saying: NO NEW TAXES!!! But in fact, there were no new taxes on the ballot yesterday. The closest was a future extension of the recently imposed sales tax increase -- and that was tied into a complex spending limitation measure imposed by the Governor and the handful of Republican legislators that agreed to the current State budget. What went down to defeat was a messy package of borrowings, diversions and the spending limit spilling out of the budget "compromise" that barely cleared the Legislature last fall.

So what were California voters really saying?

"We hate you, but we keep electing you!" is a pretty murky message. "Don't raise taxes and don't cut spending!" is pretty clear, but pretty unrealistic. "Go back and try again!" sounds reasonable, except that the ugly compromises in the ballot measures can now only get uglier as the Governor seeks alternatives that can get two-thirds approval in the Legislature.

Voter John Brockage spoke for the disgruntled majority in a newspaper story this morning. "We have a dope for a governor and the legislature is completely incompetent," he told Reuters. "I voted 'no' on all of them." Like most California voters, he rejects responsibility for the mess we find ourselves in. How could voters be blamed for electing a governor with no grander vision than his own political career - and then recalling him and replacing him with a foreign-born movie star? But if we elect dopes and incompetents - what exactly does that make us?

The road ahead is not promising. The State will run out of cash again this summer - unless the Governor and the Legislature can go back and come up with a new package of really horrible decisions - emptying out prisons, slashing public school funding, hiking college tuition, borrowing money from local governments that they have no realistic source of repaying etc. There are better alternatives, but no political support for pursuing the difficult, fundamental and long-term changes our state needs to restore the California dream.

The State's stalemate will have a direct impact on us. Cities and counties are howling, but it will be hard to stop the State from exercising its constitutional right to "borrow" 8% of our local property tax revenue next year. For Ventura, that is more than $2.6 million. Having already cut $11 million, chopping another $2.6 million would trigger drastic service and job losses. But that makes no sense. The "least worst" alternative will be to muddle through by borrowing from our reserves and waiting for the State to figure out how they will ever meet their constitutional obligation to pay us back within three years.

What is less certain is the impact of all this on local voters. Will it make them more or less supportive of a local sales tax, like the one recently passed in Oxnard? At least they would know that all the money generated would stay here - but whether the desire to punish politicians applies locally, who knows? All this must be weighed by the City Council as it weighs the wisdom of placing a measure on the November ballot.

Fire next time?

Earlier this week, I accompanied Ventura Assistant Fire Chief Kevin Renne and Battalion Chief Don McPherson on an inspection of the still-smoldering ash-covered Santa Barbara hillsides. McPherson commanded five engines for a 32 hour shift on the day where a wind-whipped firestorm trapped three Ventura County firefighters on the next ridge over from McPherson's strike team.

Living where we do, wildland fire is part of our lives, like tornadoes in the Midwest and Hurricanes on the Gulf Coast. I've lived near California's tinderbox foothills nearly all my life. I remember being evacuated from Sierra Madre Elementary School under a purple and orange sky. As a city official I've dealt with at least a dozen major blazes in three cities.

Yet I continue to be amazed -- at both the horrific power of wind-driven flames to create a moonscape and the extraordinary ingenuity of firefighters as they somehow manage to protect hillside homes as flames roar around them.

As part of the network of mutual aid that can mobilize thousands of firefighters from around the state, our Battalion Chief McPherson and his strike team had been assigned to defend a ridgeline full of homes strung along a web of narrow roads and lanes with only one fire hydrant. After sleeping in their trucks Tuesday night, his strike team was deployed early Wednesday morning. They did their best to prepare for the predicted "sun-downer" winds that can suddenly gust to 50 miles an hour. But within minutes of their arrival, the hillsides exploded with flame, forcing two of his crews to temporarily take cover.

In the end, some homes were scarcely touched while others were left with only a blackened chimney -- with each telling a unique story of how location, landscaping, luck and the heroic efforts of a handful of firefighters dictated their fate.

But taking a step back from the dramatic stories of homes saved and homes lost, you have to wonder about the sanity of building deep in the foothills. Yes, the roads could be wider and there could be more fire hydrants and water dropping helicopters. Yes, a better job could have been done in clearing brush around homes and preparing the kind of contingency plans we have for our hillside fire deployments. But the prospect of having more staff and more money to throw at protecting our hillsides seems bleakly remote for a long time, if ever.

Of course, most of the building in the Santa Barbara hills, like the building in the Ventura hills, took place decades ago when we more often thought of "conquering nature" than we did of "living in harmony with our environment." We know better how to build in what we today call the "urban/wildland interface." In most places, including Ventura, we are far more cautious about venturing out into brushlands and flood plains. But where we've already allowed building, it is hard to resist the continued incremental encroachment of bigger houses built on steeper lots -- or the rebuilding of bigger houses where ones have just burned down.

It's beautiful living up there in hills with gorgeous views and intimate contact with wildlands. But the danger and foolishness isn't obvious until the humidity drops near zero and the devil winds sweep away a lifetime of memories and sometimes lives themselves. It cost a cool ten million dollars to battle the Jesusita fire and it destroyed more than ten times that in expensive homes. The value of what else was put at risk during those fiery days and nights -- the lives of thousands of residents and firefighters -- is far beyond that. It's something to keep in mind the next time someone wants to build yet another dream home on stilts in our foothills.

We have met the enemy . . .

. . . and he is us, as Pogo used to joke.

Those "fools" and "thieves" and "clowns" in Sacramento are the people we elected.

California's dysfunctional thicket of constitutional restrictions and ballot box budgeting is the haphazard result of our short-sighted embrace of countless numbered propositions (13, 218, 98, 10 etc.) that just don't add up.

The partisan gridlock has festered because the vast majority of sensible Californians have turned away in cynicism and disgust from the circus of stupid, negative campaigns fueled by floods of special interest money.

Now look what we've come to.

Here's the Public Policy Institute's poll numbers on the ballot measures promoted by our Governor and Legislature:

• Proposition 1A - 52% no, 35% yes, 13% don't know

• Proposition 1B - 47% no, 40% yes, 13% don't know

• Proposition 1C - 58% no, 32% yes, 10% don't know

• Proposition 1D - 45% no, 43% yes, 12% don't know

• Proposition 1E - 48% no, 41% yes, 11% don't know

• Proposition 1F - 73% yes, 24% no, 3% don't know

Since many absentee votes have already been cast, the looming failure of 1A-1E means our State government will be short $21.3 billion between now and next July. But even more dismal is that even if by some miracle they all passed, we'll still be short $15.4 billion.

There is no quick fix. The Democrats are not going to shake off their short-sighted fixation on how to spend money nor are the Republicans going to abandon their obsession with holding down taxes. The Governor is not going to successfully reinvent himself yet again, nor does it make any sense to recall him.

As President Obama said during his campaign, we are the ones we have been waiting for.

Millions of Californians are going to have to start paying attention to substantive news, stop blaming other people for the mess we are in and work together to find answers. Oddly enough, given the magnitude of the crisis, the best place to start is at home in California's nearly 500 cities and towns.

Some years ago, a small group of thoughtful and idealistic activists from both parties (and independents) saw this trainwreck coming. They began meeting and tossing around ideas for heading it off. They adopted the name "Common Sense California." At first, they aimed to "reform" Sacramento. They had sensible ideas, like Redistricting reform to blunt the partisan stranglehold (an idea voters have adopted, but is still years from implementation.) Ultimately, however, they came to the conclusion that democracy needs to be reborn at the local level before we can fix Sacramento.

They call it civic engagement and they've drawn on promising models from around the globe and around our state to get people to take a healthy interest in the vital public issues that shape our private quality of life and standard of living. Last week, they highlighted Ventura's Economic Summit as the kind of "town hall" endeavor that can overcome the deep divisions that keep us from working together on solutions. They preach a simple, sensible message: we are going to fix our monumental self-induced problems only by changing from a "take no prisoners" activism that punishes moderation to an inclusive dialogue that seeks win-win consensus. Common Sense California doesn't claim we can solve our budget, transportation, economic and environmental challenges with a three point panacea. Their mission is "to help solve California's public problems by promoting citizens' participation in governance. We work with city governments, school districts, regional governance associations, and non-profit organizations to both support and promote legitimate civic involvement."

It is a long way from the digital OK Corral of virtual bloggers who never listen because they have all the answers. Which is why a revival of healthy civic involvement is so promising. Click here to learn more.

Winston Churchill said it best: "Americans will always do the right thing, after they've exhausted all the alternatives." Californians have zealously passed initiatives, recalled officials, ousted judges and ranted about the futility of it all. Now it is time to get serious and work together to put our State back on the right track.

Landmark Stormwater Permit Means Cleaner Water, Higher Costs

UPDATE: Yesterday, eleven hours after the hearing began, the Regional Water Quality Board voted 5-1 to approve the new permit. In the end, the majority chose the alternative crafted by the permitees and the environmental advocates. While that option was endorsed by the US Environmental Protection Agency, it was strongly opposed by the Building Industry Association.

After four years, today is the day the LA/Ventura County Regional Water Quality Board holds its final hearing on the landmark permit renewal for Ventura County. The hearing, expected to go all day, starts at 9 AM at the Ventura County Government Center, 800 S. Victoria Avenue.

The last permit five-year permit for the County and its ten cities was granted in 2000. Our County's pro-active program won a national award from the Environmental Protection Agency in 2003 and earned us recognition for the cleanest beaches in Southern California.

Nonetheless, when the Regional Board staff brought forth their proposed new permit in 2006, its 118 pages contained the most stringent stormwater regulations ever proposed. Although cities produce almost none of the pollution that washes through our stormdrains, for the first time in the nation, local government would be responsible for monitoring and correcting infinitesimal traces of copper, lead, zinc, cadmium, nitrogen, bacteria and other impurities - or face huge daily fines. The permittees estimated the cost to comply with the proposal was over $600 for every household in Ventura County.

The reaction was shock, frustration and anger from Ventura County city, business and community leaders. But the staff for the Regional Board essentially ignored the outcry through their third draft of the permit issued in early 2008.

Beginning in 2007, the city managers of the ten cities and the county manager organized a working group that has held weekly meetings and conference calls to organize a strategy to force the Regional Board to change course. Chaired by Thousand Oaks City Manager Scott Mitnick, the group has worked diligently to persuade the Board staff to take a more reasonable approach.

For a long time, this made little headway. So after the third draft was issued showing little progress, the City Managers working group decided to follow up on preliminary discussions with the two main environmental groups closely watching the permit: Heal the Bay and the Natural Resources Defense Council. Three City Managers (Oxnard's Ed Sotelo; Simi Valley's Mike Sedell and me) and the County Stormwater Protection District Director Jeff Pratt were given the challenge of finding common ground as an alternative way of shifting the momentum.

What resulted was nine months of increasingly intense negotiations, finally leading to a remarkable joint agreement between the two environmental groups and all eleven Ventura County permittees. A joint letter of consensus on several key points was submitted by the environmental groups and the County and cities -- a unique and remarkable collaboration effort.

Ironically, even as we were making progress with the environmental groups, our sustained efforts finally achieved a similar breakthrough with the Board staff. The fourth draft of the permit (a "Tentative Order") was released in February and dramatically reduced the financial impact - from $600 per household to a newly estimated $50-75 a household. (To read the Tentative Order and the Board staff report, along with comments by various groups and agencies, click here.)

Now, more than three years after the old permit expired, we are one day from the Board voting on the new one. The effort devoted to getting us here has been intense on all sides. To give a glimpse of just how many parties have been involved, the Regional Board lists in their staff report the following:

The Regional Water Board staff has conducted meetings from October 2005 through January 2009, with permittees their representatives (Larry Walker and Associations, and Somach, Simmons & Dunn), and various stakeholders (Building Industry Association of Southern California/ Greater Los Angeles Ventura Chapter (BIAGLA/ VC), California State Dept. of Health Services, Calleguas Water District, California Stormwater Quality Association (CASQA), City of Downey, City of Los Angeles-EMD, Collation for Practical Regulation (CPR), Construction Industry Coalition on Water Quality (CICWQ), County of Orange, Geosyntec Consultants, Golden State, Heal The Bay; Local Government Commission, Los Angeles City; Los Angeles County Department of Public Works, Los Angeles County-SD, Los Angeles Department of Water & Power, Metropolitan Water District, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Richard Watson Association, San Bernardino Flood Control District, Santa Monica Bay Restoration Commission, Southern California Coastal Water Research Project, University of California Sea Grant, Ventura CoastKeeper, and Charles Abbott Associates. On April 5, 2007, September 20, 2007, and July 10, 2008 the Regional Water Board conducted workshops to discuss drafts of the NPDES Order and received input from the permittees and the public regarding proposed changes.

For all the work that went into this, the real challenges lie ahead. The new permit doubles the costs to Ventura and other communities and imposes very significant new requirements and policies that must be sorted out and implemented. We have no new money in our budget in the coming year to cover the new costs. But we have built a remarkably solid regional partnership, a newly collaborative relationship with environmental groups and a far more sophisticated capacity for tackling the issue of water quality. Our own Deputy Public Works Director Vicki Musgrove has emerged as one of the most influential, trusted and respected experts in stormwater management and her tireless and constructive approach to the issue has been key to our progress on all fronts.

Perhaps the most significant element of this effort has been the success of a truly regional effort. Very few of our challenges - the economy, crime, transportation, the environment, homelessness, etc. - are strictly local. Working across city and county borders and jurisdictions is a very promising opportunity for the future. The intense energy and effort that has gone into the stormwater effort lays the foundation for a much broader blueprint for Ventura governments to work together.

Economic Summit focuses on sustainable prosperity

The free-spending consumer boom of the past 25 years led many to confuse prosperity with spending money. Nowhere has this delusion been more acute than amongst California municipalities.

In 1978, California voters revolted against a property tax system that drove taxes skyhigh when real estate values ballooned. They slashed the property tax by nearly two-thirds and permanently capped increases to 2% a year. Rather than develop a reasonable and fair alternative for financing local government services, then Governor Jerry Brown “bailed out” counties and cities with the State’s surplus (yes, in those days California State government had billions in the bank).

The surplus ran out. What the vast majority of cities eventually turned to as an alternative was the sales tax. For the last 25 years, cities have relentlessly, creatively and often foolishly pursued sales tax generating businesses. It has become the most important single measure of success for city governments.

So, for example, Camarillo declared its freeway adjacent strawberry fields “blighted,” clearing the way for “redevelopment” to subsidize building theaters, restaurants, big box retailers and an outlet mall that has grown into the biggest in the State. They outwrestled adjacent Oxnard in the outlet war (as Ventura outwrestled Oxnard in the mall war). As a result, Camarillo boasts a healthy budget and a beautiful new library full of new books and patrons.

But is Camarillo really more prosperous because there are lots of entry-level jobs at restaurants and retailers? Is such “prosperity” sustainable in the decades ahead?

For those who didn’t think much about a day of reckoning, such concerns seemed misplaced. So what if fat subsidies were being handed out to major corporations and well-placed developers in cities across California? So what if those interests poured back large heapings of cash into local City Council campaigns? So what if wealth-generating businesses were ignored or even discouraged in favor of auto dealerships and megamalls? So what if sensible land use planning was prostituted at the cost of traffic jams, polluted run-off and devastated downtowns and local businesses?

There are still many people who think that this downturn is just a cyclical adjustment and that we should be getting ready for the next big round of sales tax piracy. But more realistic voices are finally being heard that prosperity is based on high-wage, high value jobs that come from companies that provide value-added goods and services. Consumption is a product of prosperity, not a short-cut to prosperity.

That conversation needs to happen. The idea for an economic summit originated with Councilmember Ed Summers and the Chamber of Commerce embraced the idea. Mayor Christy Weir and Chamber Liaison Jim Monahan have also helped with planning the event. On Saturday, the community is invited to take a fresh look at prosperity in the 21st Century. Should we put all our focus on chasing real estate deals - or should we be asking how to improve the business climate for less glamorous producers of real wealth, the small to medium companies in engineering, light manufacturing, technology and other businesses struggling to make a profit in a high cost environment like coastal California? How can we be on the leading edge of the greening of America’s economy not only because it is a good fit with community values, but because it provides competitive advantage in the 21st Century?

The City of Ventura and the Ventura Chamber of Commerce are partnering to hold this important event in the Council Chambers at Ventura City Hall, this Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Sign up to attend here.

Local business owners, community leaders and economic experts are being invited to participate alongside Ventura City Councilmembers in strategizing a vibrant and sustainable economy for Ventura's future. Principal speaker, Bill Watkins, Economist with the newly formed forecasting and research center at Cal Lutheran University, will set the stage for serious conversations in five break-out sessions for attendees:

• Improving the City's Bottom Line and Fiscal Health
• Fostering Smart Growth
• Greening Ventura's Economy
• Retaining/Expanding Jobs and Businesses
• Enhancing our Business Climate
  

Immediately following the breakout sessions, each group will report their recommendations to the City Council that afternoon. Based on the reports, City Council will direct staff and assign action items for a 90-day, 1-year and 5-year work plan.

A single day will not dramatically revamp our priorities or bring instant success. Nor should it. Promoting prosperity is a long-term endeavor. But this Saturday is an important and highly visible opportunity to talk about what matters most - and help forge a community consensus for what we can be actively doing today to create sustainable prosperity for Ventura in the decades to come.