Candidate for
Councilmember; City of Marina

Dear Marina Voters:

In 2000, and again in 2004, I was honored to be elected by you as a director of the Marina Coast Water District (MCWD). I now ask for your vote on the November 2, 2010 ballot, where I am listed as a candidate for Marina City Council. I feel my educational, professional, and community-service experience may prove helpful to serving on the City Council, as they have on serving on the MCWD board and on the Planning Commission for a combined total of ten years.

My service as a board member of the Marina Coast Water District (MCWD), including two separate years as its president, running meetings, together with experience on LAFCO and the MCWD city-district committee (the official liason between the City and MCWD), and on the Planning Commission, has helped me learn the arts of compromise and communication. As an attorney member of the Planning Commission, I have endeavored to contribute my skills in the area of some of the legislation the Planning Commission recommends to the City Council, as the Planning Commission recently did on an ordinance regarding the regulation of street vendors, for example. In addition, I have successfully insisted on city staff following the Marina Municipal Code requirement of holding at least one Planning Commission meeting per month, as opposed to the former practice of sometimes canceling both monthly meetings. (Though state law requires two planning-commission meetings a month for general-law cities, Marina is a charter city which can and does provide differently in its Municipal Code. That provides for at least one meeting per month.)

I believe in protecting the most vulnerable of our residents, including senior citizens and children. At the same time, I am concerned about the fiscal mess past city councils have created. Over five years, starting with the city's 2005-6 fiscal-year budget of $9.4 Million, to the current 2010-11 fiscal-year budget of $15.3 Million, Marina's population has increased only 2%, but its budget expenditures have increased 63%, despite annual inflation of 2-3% at most. The budget deficit each year (the amount borrowed or taken from capital funds obtained from the sale of Fort Ord lands) has mushroomed from a mere $8,922 (FY 2005-6) to almost $5 Million (FY 2010-11) + an increase of 56,000%. That is no misprint. The yearly deficit, over the past five years has increased Fifty-Six Thousand Percent from a few thousand dollars to a few million dollars, a 560-fold increase! (That's 56,000%!) What happened?

What happened is that in 2006-2007, the City received about $12 Million (too little, in fact) from the sale of Fort Ord lands, and the City Council went on a spending spree, increasing its budget expenditures from $9.4 Million (FY 2005-6) to $15.6 Million (FY 2006-7) + a 66% increase + in just one year. Since that time, yearly budgets have ranged between some $13 Million (FY 2007-8, 2008-9) and $15 Million (2010-11), and deficits have ranged between some $1 Million (FY 2008-9) and almost $5 Million (the current budget). These deficits have been funded by taking money each year mostly from the Fort-Ord land-sale proceeds, which are now almost exhausted.

Past city councils made two major mistakes: First, paying for bloated overhead out of one-time-only land-sales proceeds that should have been used for capital improvements. Second, gambling that the massive developments previously approved would generate tax revenue that would kick in by the time the $15 Million land-sale proceeds were exhausted. However, the recent decline in housing values has stymied development. The current Council proposes two tax measures, a 1% sales-tax increase and a 2% transit-occupancy tax (TOT) increase, which it estimates will bring in $2 Million each year. But even if both pass, $2 Million in new tax revenues won't go very far in addressing what amounts to an ongoing structural deficit that now approaches $5 Million.

My proposals for dealing with this structural deficit are set forth in my position paper on that subject. I add, however, that I will not propose budget cuts for senior and youth programs. For example, every dollar spent on our superb teen center and its adjacent skate park keeps youth from roaming the streets, and reduces by $15 to as much as $50 needing to be spent on law-enforcement costs.

In sum, I stand for fiscal responsibility while protecting our most vulnerable residents. I hope you will take that into account when you vote on November 2nd. Thank you.