Protect North County # Key Issues

By Kevin Barnard

"Build what needs to be built, protect what needs our protection"

1. Safety, Security & Public Health
2. Good Government # Respect for process and self determination
3. Transportation # "Traffic is no accident "
4. Good Growth = Economic Growth & Regulatory Balance that Protects Quality of Life
5. Conservation Ethic - Reduce costs to taxpayers and the environment

"Build what needs to be built, protect what needs our protection"

1. Safety, Security & Public Health
2. Good Government # Respect for process and self determination
3. Transportation # "Traffic is no accident "
4. Good Growth = Economic Growth & Regulatory Balance that Protects Quality of Life
5. Conservation Ethic - Reduce costs to taxpayers and the environment

- Safety, Security & Public Health

Public Safety The County's Public Safety Group oversees San Diego's criminal justice system, the Disaster Preparedness Agency, and the Department of Child Support.

The Group's total budget is $721 million, Sheriff's Dept. ($341 million), the District Attorney ($125 million) and Probation ($117 million) and employs approximately 7,300 employees.

As of 2000, the county's overall crime rate continued its steady decline. It dropped five percent from 1999 to
2000. Over ten years, from 1991 to 2000, the regional crime rate fell by more than half (53%). There are some indications that the downward trend might reverse, however, as San Diego police reported that crime in San Diego jumped more than 7 percent during the first nine months of 2001 when compared with the same period last year, mostly stemming from a jump in larceny and auto thefts.

The Sheriff's Jail master plans indicate that the County faces the potential of needing 7,627 bed spaces by
2020. The master plan shows county's jail population leveling off, with growth continuing at a slower pace.

Health Issues

The incumbent thinks that public health services like foster care, aid to families with dependent children, and environmental health issues aren't a priority. But like it or not, the State of California relies on the County Board of Supervisors to oversee and manage the distribution of billions of taxpayer dollars in mandated social service programs. This is a very important job that deserves both the moral and legal support of our County Supervisor. I would provide such support.

For FY 2001-2002, 53 percent (approximately $1,177 billion) of the County's general fund revenues were allocated to the Health and Human Services Agency. The County's Health and Human Services Agency provides a broad range of services to the community including indigent health, mental health, public health, child welfare, public guardian, and services to the aging, disabled and veteran populations.

Although the agency receives the highest percentage of general fund revenue of the County's six operating groups, general fund revenue only makes up a small portion of the Agency's $3.7 billion dollar total budget
- 98% of the Agency's money is dependent upon Federal and State revenue.
- The Agency employs approximately 5,835 permanent employees.

There is a growing need for home health care workers # to have a profession of people who care for people in their homes where they are most vulnerable. We cannot leave our seniors only to the cruelties of market forces providing minimum wages without benefits. Shouldn't those providing home health care deserve health care benefits of their own? The County must rise to a leadership role # instead of fighting with the state over it.

The County is currently using children as "lead detectors" with more than 9,000 children estimated in our County to have potentially dangerous levels of lead in their blood. This is a problem that could be completely remediated # if the Board of Supervisors took action.

2. Good Government # Respect for process

The incumbent Bill Horn perpetrated a backroom deal that turned District 5 into a inkblot test drawn of Bill Horn, by Bill Horn and for Bill Horn. It completely destroyed months of public work and testimony. The level of contempt for the public that I witnessed during the redistricting debacle has no place in professional government service.

I will restore the integrity of the redistricting process and fight to roll back the unfair changes perpetrated by the incumbent. I will seek to expand the size of the Board of Supervisors.

The incumbent has fought good planning, parks and open space and rabidly criticized consensus methods with stakeholders and has even taken steps to weaken and dismantle community planning and other volunteer groups.

Accessible leadership is needed now to show the way to a better future for District 5.

As a law enforcement officer I have spent my career protecting your freedoms - your property rights and the rights of your neighbors. In North County, we must work together for all kinds of communities: rural, suburban and urban. My leadership experience exemplifies an open, accessible, public process # incorporating all citizen stakeholders and building consensus.

Through consensus and democratic processes like the County's General Plan 2020 update - and with accountable leadership - we can secure a future for all residents - protect businesses, taxpayers and the environment.

3. Transportation - " Traffic is no accident "

Traffic is no accident. Why are we stuck in traffic? The system is broken. When projects go in without proper design or respect for a plan # and without funding to build needed infrastructure # it's no wonder we get more and more traffic. Sprawl development increases traffic.

Goods and services must be able to move about a region for businesses to thrive. Yet we do not currently link land use planning effectively with transportation planning or funding.

There are multiple things that must be done to get some balance back into the system:

- invest in our arterial systems and intersections
- rethink our circulation patterns in village cores
- design clean, efficient, reliable commuter systems that work for a reasonable price for the growing number of people who want out of traffic and the growing number of non-drivers # the young and elderly. Everyone who has alternatives to being stuck in traffic vacates a space for those who have to drive.

Finally, the cheapest and fastest form of traffic relief are the trips you don't need to make # or the trips that can be made off of peak commuting hours.

Through creative demand management, telecommuting and trip-shifting we can pursue the fastest, most cost effective relief.

Another solution is good community design, that decreases the volume of traffic. The way we design our urban areas can increase their health, safety and livability.

Build what needs to be built Protect what needs to be protected

What do we need to build? --- infrastructure (roads, transit, water, sewer, energy), economy, jobs, and housing # all kinds of housing # urban, suburban and rural.

What do we need to protect? --- open space, taxpayer dollars, property rights, community character, keep agriculture competitive

4. Good Growth = Economic Growth & Regulatory Balance that Protects Quality of Life

I believe in property rights, not pavement politics. Remember the song that goes, "Pave paradise and put up a parking lot # you don't know what you've got til it's gone?"

Currently, North County is on that course - the course to destroying the very things we love about North County by paving it over without proper planning and infrastructure.

We must keep building our wealth, but we must not destroy our quality of life in the process. Growth can be fairly redirected away from rural areas through the use of equity mechanisms that transfer development rights to areas where the infrastructure can support the growth that is proposed. Such transfers serve county taxpayers, by placing growth where services can best be efficiently provided, mobility can be improved and businesses can best benefit from those improvements.

Village-type growth can make our urban areas attractive, exciting and safe.
- Stimulates and builds the local economy
- Provides more options for local business people.
- Makes us less dependent on outside forces - and therefore more secure.

We are - to a large degree - already a region of villages
- with many villages now in need of infrastructure investment. With our current system where transportation and land use planning and funding is disconnected - it's no wonder growth currently has negative impacts. For San Diego County to thrive, San Diego County will grow. Wise leadership regarding growth is required to protect our county from becoming another LA or Orange County # losing our natural resources and our agricultural heritage.

We have rural lifestyles that should continue. We have suburban lifestyles that should continue. We have urban areas that need reinvestment. We have agriculture that should stay competitive.

Infrastructure investment is crucial. Our infrastructure needs are apparent. Leadership is needed to accurately define what is needed to address the existing problems, find funding solutions that are comprehensive, and focus resources where they will provide the greatest relief.

Regulatory Balance

Regulations that respond to problems after they occur raise costs, lengthen timelines and increase risk. Design standards "upstream" in the process can provide a level playing field and clear rules for all. This is the best form of real streamlining: prevention.

Build what needs to be built --- infrastructure, economy, jobs, and housing

Protect what needs to be Protected --- open space, taxpayer dollars, community character, agriculture

Fiscal health? The major risk to funding for major County programs is the State budget crisis. How that risk will actually impact the County depends on how the State deals with its revenue shortfalls.

As a result of current statewide economic conditions, the County is not anticipating any major, new programs being proposed. Furthermore, given its budget problems, the County does not anticipate any new programs from the State. The County must continue efficiency measures and pursuing good growth policies that build wealth.

- Conservation Ethic - Reduce costs to taxpayers and the environment

"Conservation is a great moral issue, for it involves the patriotic duty of ensuring the safety and continuance of the nation." President Theodore Roosevelt

Being sensitive to property rights, we need to preserve open space, critical habitat, farmland and recreation areas for public, private and agricultural use.

When we really protect what needs protecting, building what needs to be built will be far easier.

The air we breathe, the water that circulates in our bodies, rivers and oceans ultimately provides the basis for our good health. In San Diego, free and open beaches, beautiful rivers and lagoons mean little when they are polluted due to bad practices upstream. Clean water is a responsibility of the County and leadership is needed to educate us all about how both the big and small decisions impact the cleanliness of our waters.

Decisions at all levels affect our water quality and ultimately our health. San Diego County residents have consistently proven that they can conserve and become more efficient when made aware and educated about practices that make a difference. Prevention is always less expensive than paying for clean up after the damage is done.

Currently, North County is on the course to destroying forever the very things we love about North County. The incumbent has fought parks and open space and rabidly criticized consensus methods with community planning group and stakeholders. Accessible leadership is needed now to show the way to a better future for District 5.

San Diego County Parks, Open Space and Conservation

Unlike the incumbent # who opposed San Dieguito Park expansion - I support parks, open space and conservation # and protecting private property rights.

I support State Prop 40 on the March 5, 2002 ballot. Oceanside's per capita allocation will be $777,000 for Oceanside parks and recreation and an additional $468,191 focused for urban parks. There are additional funding opportunities in the State Coastal Conservancy ($200 million in grants), $50 million for urban parkds and youth services, $300 million for watershed protection, clean beaches, rivers and streams. Proposition 40 provides the seed money that opponents say is impossible to find to fund an El Corazon acquisition.

The will County will receive $8,257,000 per capita + $6,017,859 RZH (Roberti-Z'Berg-Harris Program) Urbanized Allocations

Carlsbad will recieve $396,000 per capita + $238,754 RZH Urbanized

Vista $414,000 + $249,527 urbanized

San Marcos $260,000 + $156,937

Valley Center Community Service District $220,000

The San Diego County Department of Parks and Recreation serves a county of

4,200 square miles with a population of approximately three million, for a cost to each person of only $3.50.

The County owns, maintains, manages, and/or operates:

I . Nine beautiful and unique camping parks;

2. Eleven regional day use parks;

3. Three community centers that provide recreational, educational, and social opportunities for preschoolers to seniors;

4. Twenty-three local parks providing residents with opportunities to picnic and play in their own neighborhoods;

5. 33,000 acres of open space, from urban canyons to salt marshes to mountain peaks and meadows;

6. One hundred miles of trails;

7. Seven historic sites, including the oldest house in San Diego;

8. Five sports parks;

9. As of December 31, 2000, 49,886.8 acres or 49% of the County's 101,268-acre preservation requirement for the "Multiple Species Conservation Plan" MSCP ; and

10. The MSCP agreement requires the County to purchase 9,425 acres of habitat using local funds. As of December 31, 2001, the County had acquired 7,810.30 acres or 84.5% of its MSCP local fund acquisition requirement.

Additional Department of Parks and Recreation activities include:

I . Offering REC Club and after-school youth programs that meet special needs in addition to offering sports, art, and cultural experiences;

2. Running an Environmental Education Program that teaches youth and adults about our natural and cultural resources;

3. Showcasing many parks that have specially designed indoor and outdoor locations for unique weddings and receptions; and

4. Providing Park Rangers and Volunteers to give talks, conduct tours, and host special events.

<Vote for Kevin Barnard # Volunteer at http://www.kevinbarnard.com>