City Wants Your Participation in Parks and Rec Master Plan Survey

It is with great irony that I opened an email on Saturday from Chair of the Open Space and Habitat Commission, Kemble Pope.

He writes:

Hi David, First of all, thanks for all of the time and effort that you put forth in maintaining the Davis Vanguard as an independent source of information and as a gathering place for interested Davisites.

Yes, flattery will probably get me to pay attention and at least consider helping you out.

As you are aware, the Parks & Rec Master Plan update is underway. A survey is available online that gives residents a first opportunity to voice their opinion on the future of parks, recreation, and natural habitat in our community. I was hoping that you could encourage your readers to take 6-8 minutes out of their busy day to complete this survey... there are plenty of opportunities to broaden the assumptions of the survey questions/choices by typing your personal responses as well.

http://www.city.davis.ca.us/pcs/masterplan/

FYI, the OS&H Commission will be meeting in joint session with Parks & Rec Commission in February to discuss matters of mutual interest.

Yes, and as Mr. Pope should be aware, I have been a strong opponent of using city funds in conducting another Parks and Rec Master Plan Survey, particularly when we had a large amount of unfinished projects from the previous survey. I am far from convinced that we need to do a survey to find out what people's usage of parks resources is and how we can better serve their needs.

It's not that I do not think these are important questions--but given limited resources, I do not believe this is the best use of $75,000.

Nevertheless, I give Mr. Pope space here for the very reason that he indeed asked. I want to encourage the city to start thinking outside of the box. The city did a survey back in the spring and discovered an amazing thing, while most people still received their information about the city of Davis from the Davis Enterprise, the percentage had dropped steeply from the previous survey. The internet had strongly increased as a source for information and news about the city. For the city, trying to get information out to the public, that means that they have to use non-traditional means.

I took the survey, it is a difficult survey to take in some ways unless you use the parks a lot, I'm not sure how helpful the feedback will be. It was interesting that in the end, it asked if people should be able to smoke in the parks and then if people should be able to drink in the parks.

The big thing I have noticed in the parks especially when I take my young nieces and nephews there is that we need to be able to keep the equipment in good maintenance. Other than that, I really do not have much to say about the parks, we seem to have a good amount of parks in the city, a good mix of large parks and small neighborhood parks. In any case, the city doesn't ask the one question I wish they would, whether they should be spending $75,000 trying to figure out what the public's needs are in terms of parks and rec.

Along the same lines, I note that the owner of Westlake Plaza is requesting a change:

"to the General Plan and zoning for the center to allow a remodel of the vacant 22,000 square foot supermarket space into new retail and office suites ranging from approximately 160 square feet up to 3,000 square feet. The owner of the center has signed a lease with a small food store to occupy 3,000 square feet at the front of the former grocery store space."

So let me get this straight, the owner wants permission to take what is currently a very small grocery store space and reduce it down to 3,000 square feet for a small food store? And they already have signed a lease with a small food store? There is a Circle K less than three blocks away, what would be the difference between the "small food store" and the Circle K that is literally right down the street?

"The General Plan currently requires the center to have a grocery store/ supermarket. The new food store does not meet the 15,000 square foot requirement. With the requested amendments a grocery store would be allowed but not required at the shopping center."

There are a few things I do not understand. First, why the city is not more supportive of continuing neighborhood grocery stores. Second, the owner of Westlake has allowed the quality of the building to degrade substantially over the past 10 years. They are finally doing some basic upgrades to the facilities. The city has a continued policy that rewards owners that allow their property to degrade.

Unfortunately there was a neighborhood meeting for this last week. Now this goes before the planning commission in January and before the city council in February.

I just think West Davis can do better than to take what was once a small but functional 22,000 foot grocery store and turn it into a 3,000 foot food store.

Then again, I am still dreaming of having a Trader Joe's there as I think the proposed location in the University Mall would be a disaster in a lot of ways.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Update: Answering Some of the Questions About Ultra Clean and Polling

On Tuesday, we ran a story questioning the relationship between Moore Iacofano Goltsman (MIG), Godbe Research, and Stephen Souza's company Ultra Clean Pools.

These questions arose as the result of feedback from members of the community who participated in the parks poll.

During the course of conversations, questions arose as to why the caller ID from these calls identified, Ultra Clean Pools, as the source of the call.

We made the decision to inquire as to how this came to be and whether there is a legitimate reason why the company owned and run by a sitting Davis City Councilmember would be involved with a vendor that has a city contract to conduct surveys and create a parks master plan.

Based on these questions, a letter was drafted to City Attorney Harriet Steiner and copied to the entire city council, City Manager Bill Emlen, and City Clerk Margaret Roberts.

The decision was made to ask these questions in a public manner including a full disclosure of the letter to City Attorney Harriet Steiner.

Davis City Councilmember Stephen Souza responded on the Vanguard:

"There is no relationship. You are confusing a poll on school board candidates and Measure Q with a survey being conducted by Godbe Research."

City Attorney Harriet Steiner confirmed Mr. Souza's contention.

"It is our understanding that there is no relationship between Stephen Souza and either Godbe Research or MIG. Rather, it is our understanding that Stephen Souza permitted the use of his phone lines at Ultra Clean Pools to be used to conduct telephone polls related to Measure Q. This survey was not done by the City and the City had no role in this survey whatsoever.

One of my associates has spoken with Bryan Godbe of Godbe Rearch. He explained that Godbe Research uses two primary data collection firms, Mountain West Research and EMH. A call from these data collection companies would likely register as an 800 number; the calls would not have been made from the Ultra Clean [line appears cut off]."

I appreciate the very quick turn around by the City Attorney on this matter. In fact, I have never gotten a response as quickly as this from the city.

The City Attorney further informed me that since the questionnaire is only a draft, it is not subject to a public records act request. The final questionnaire will be released when the survey and results are finalized, so as to not bias the survey itself.

This information clarifies that there was likely some confusion between the two surveys. However, some questions remain as to why and for whom Mr. Souza was conducting those polls and whether he was sharing the information generated from those polls with others including the school board candidates he supports, their campaigns or the campaign in support of Measure Q.

Mr. Souza states:

"The 3 question automated phone poll I conducted on school board candidates and Measure Q is completely separate from the live survey that Godbe Research is conducting on parks and recreation."

Again, when questioned by citizens and readers of this blog about who had requested or was benefiting from his polling efforts Mr. Souza's response to questions on this was less than satisfying and raise more questions than they answer:

"I am a citizen who is interested in the outcome of Measure Q. It will have an effect on our community and I wanted to see if it was passing. I wanted to see if I needed to do more to help assure its passage."

So the central question in our inquiry has been answered and addressed, but others still remain.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Questions Arise as to the Relationship between MIG and Ultra Clean

Last week the Vanguard questioned a survey that the city was conducting through a consulting group, Moore Iacofano Goltsman, Inc. Specifically the question arose as to the necessity of conducting a variety of surveys in the update of the Parks and Recreation Master Plan. The city has approved expenditures of up to $75,000 for such updates.

This expenditure was opposed by Mayor Sue Greenwald and Councilmember Lamar Heystek.

After running the article last week, we began to get feedback from members of the community who participated in the poll. Most of these individuals felt the questions were superficial and constructed in such a way as to arrive at some sort of preconceived answer.

In the course of these conversations, the questions arose however as to why the caller ID from these calls identified, Ultra Clean Pools, as the source of the call. Ultra Clean Pools is the pool company owned by Davis City Councilmember Stephen Souza.

After a long period of pondering, the decision was made to inquire as to how this came to be and whether there is a legitimate reason why the company owned and run by a sitting Davis City Councilmember would be involved with a vendor that has a city contract to conduct surveys and create a parks master plan.

As part of the my inquiry into this relationship, I have drafted a letter that will be sent out this morning to City Attorney Harriet Steiner and copied to the entire city council, City Manager Bill Emlen, and City Clerk Margaret Roberts.

I have attached a copy of the letter here for all to read.

It inquires into the "reason that the calls from MIG have Mr. Souza’s company noted as the caller ID and the nature of the relationship between Mr. Souza, Mr. Souza’s company Ultra Clean Pools and MIG."

I further make a public records act request to see the exact survey that is being used in contacts with the community.

Everyone who has spoken to me about this has been puzzled as to why Ultra Clean Pools would show up on their caller ID and therefore it makes sense to ask questions. If there is a legitimate explanation that is fine, but this is city money, taxpayer money, and a city contract and the public deserves answers to these questions.

Update: Stephen Souza has posted on the Vanguard this morning, he suggests that there was some confusion and that these calls were a survey for Measure Q and school board candidates rather than the Parks survey. The Vanguard will be checking into this and update the situation as new information becomes available.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: The City of Davis Spent $75,000 on THIS?

Background

Late last November, before many on who read this blog frequently, were even reading the Vanguard, the City Council had an item on the agenda that would consider hiring consultants at a cost of between $50,000 and $75,000 to update the Parks and Recreation Facilities Master Plan (adopted in 1998) and “create a survey to learn how residents can be better served by their parks.”

That's right up to $75,000 to learn about how residents can be better served by their parks. Frankly at the time this seemed an extreme waste of money. Both Mayor Sue Greenwald and Councilmember Lamar Heystek argued at the time that if we are going to spend money provided by Measure G it ought to be on projects that have not yet been completed that go to actual improvements of the park.

But the council majority did not agree with that viewpoint. How important was it to the council majority for this survey to be conducted? Well Ruth Asmundson was not at the original meeting because she was on her Philippines junket. So the vote ended up at 2-2, or should have ended up 2-2. However, Don Saylor recognized the likely outcome and utilized parliamentary procedure.

As the Vanguard described at the time:

But Saylor had one more trick up his sleeve and with a shocking move he joined Heystek and Greenwald in support of that motion. Why would he do that? Parliamentary procedure states that in order to reconsider an item, a person who voted with the prevailing side is the only one who can bring it up for discussion again. Saylor could not bring the item back had he voted against taking no action... Thus, when Asmundson returns, Saylor can bring the item back for discussion and they can vote to hire the consultant.

At the next meeting, Don Saylor as expected brought the item back for consideration, this time with his 3-2 majority in tow.

At that meeting on December 12, 2006, Don Saylor dodged accusations that he had strategically voted against the project in order for the item to be reconsidered.

Councilmember Saylor angrily responded to allegations of parliamentary maneuvers:

"Let me respond. I'll be very specific. Earlier this evening we talked about an item that had to do with Employee Assistant Program, one of the councilmembers asked that that item as a courtesy be held over and we agreed with that. I voted to hold that over as a courtesy to a colleague. Two meetings ago we had an item that we were stalemated on, two of us believed that we should proceed, two believed that we should not. I asked that we hold that item over until December 12 so that we would have a full council so that we could consider it. That motion was defeated. Then the motion that we were voting on was, should we take action on that item, and the motion was we should not take action on that item that night. And I think that was the motion... And having voted on that motion in the affirmative I now have the right to request reconsideration by the full council. That's what I'm doing."

Stephen Souza defended the authorization of the request for proposal (RFP) suggesting that he was just doing it to consider such a survey, not to actually authorize it.

"This an RFP, it is a request for proposals, it's not an adoption of a proposal, it's not the acceptance of a proposal, it was just a request for proposals. So if we consider this, all we're considering is putting out a request for proposals. I see no harm in putting out a request for proposals. We then would then if we had a proposal come back to us, we would then have to accept the proposal or reject the proposal."

On April 27, 2007, as we suspected at the time, with little fanfare, the city of Davis had an item on the consent calendar to approve at a $75,000 expenditure for the update of the Parks and Facilities Master Plan.

So what did the people of the city of Davis get for their $75,000?

Remember at the time of the January debate, Mayor Greenwald and Councilmember Heystek were arguing that this is something that staff could perform, and the staff and the Council Majority were arguing that they could not. Well here is the first of the surveys and what their "key findings" are and you decide.

First, they did not design a random sampled phone survey.

"On May 17, 2007 the city-wide Celebrate Davis event was held in Community Park. While sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce, the City of Davis is a platinum sponsor and signature participant in this popular special event. To kick-off the master planning process, an intercept survey was administered by Parks and Community Services staff during the event. The intercept surveys were designed to engage both children and adults about their parks usage, preferences and desires for the future. Over 900 complete surveys were collected and analyzed, key findings are listed below."

Here are the key findings:

• Nearly sixty percent of Davis adults visit Davis Parks daily or multiple times a week
• Walking/ running and playing with kids are primary reasons for adult park visits
• Rainbow City Park is the most popular park for Davis youth
• Davis youth primarily get themselves to parks by bike or by foot
• Davis residents have plenty of ideas for new park amenities
• Davis residents want more passive recreation opportunities, evening and after-school programming

These are all great findings and I am sure they are very helpful. However, let's look over this list very carefully.

First, it seems that extrapolating from a survey taken at a park is not a good way to determine the percentage of adults that visit Davis Parks. You are basically asking people at a park how often they use a park and assuming that holds for the general population.

Second, is there anything that they discovered from the other key findings that they couldn't have done by a cheap mail out survey prepared by staff? I like survey data as much as the next person, but we spent $75,000 to determine what people do at a park and what additional features they want. That seems overly extravagant.

Third, I really did not need a survey to tell me why adults primarily visit the park, I would guess that the other usage would be for picnics and barbecues.

Fourth, I think you could solicit ideas for new park amenities any numbers of ways that would be less costly.

Finally, I am very glad to know that youth get themselves to parks by bike or by foot, since they cannot drive. The only other option would be for their parents to drive them to the park. Did we really learn much from that finding?

Despite the arguments of the council majority, there is nothing here in the survey that could not have been done in-house. And I have to seriously question the validity of some of the findings of the survey, particularly the usage finding, given how the survey was conducted.

The bottom line here for me, is that the council majority went to extraordinary efforts to get this survey passed, it took them three meetings to do so. And what have we learned from it and what have we gained from it?

The city is having a phone survey as well this month. I have not seen the questions yet, but I have heard from a few people who have received the phone survey and they are not impressed with the level of questions.

The city has had long discussions in recent weeks about budget priorities. This money was earmarked for parks, so it could only go to parks, but my point is, given limited money, why not spend it to finish the long list of unfinished projects from the previous parks master plan? Why waste it on consultants? Why waste it on a survey that really does not tell us much that we could have figured out for ourselves? We could have come to the same conclusions for a considerably cheaper cost to the city, so why wasn't this done? If our budget is as strained as we believe it to be, this was a colossal misappropriation of funding. We said this to council at the time, but the council majority still went to extraordinary lengths to get this passed.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: Why I believe We Need More Officers

On Tuesday night, it was late into the evening, rapidly approaching the midnight hour. I stepped up the microphone to speak at public comment immediately after Davis Police Sergeant Rod Rifredi. I can only imagine what was going through the minds of the many police officers that were in attendance that night. However and perhaps surprisingly to the DPD officials who were there, I spoke of the need to hire six new police officers in the near future. In fact, I told the council that I "agreed with the DPOA and Mr. Rifredi."

As this blog has progressed, I have spoken less and less during public comment. For one thing, I feel I can speak better through the blog. For another, I sometimes get the distinct impression I make things more likely to fail than pass. But this was different, this issue. The issue of police staffing and public safety perhaps make my perspective more rather than less important. I am fully aware of the past and the perceptions in the community and most particularly in the police department about me.

On the other hand, I think some of those perceptions are wrong. Few in Davis are aware than in San Luis Obispo I was a close ally of the police chief. But last year the issue of police oversight for whatever reason became so polarizing that it became the defining moment for many about me, whom people had never met for the most part and knew even less about my background and most of my beliefs.

I flash forward to the current discussion at hand, but I believe that the past is paramount to understanding the future. Why was I so moved to advocate for adequate staffing of police officers? I believe such staffing is part and parcel toward fostering improved trust between the department and the community. For many, the police are strangers in this community, many of whom do not live here and merely move through town, driving around in their cars. Some of that has changed with the hiring of Landy Black as police chief. But I believe we need to move closer toward a model of community policing, where the police are part of the community in which they serve. The only way that can happen is that we have enough officers on duty to put some on foot patrol. To put some into various communities where they can work with the neighborhoods and the citizens.

This is also a political issue and it begins with city budget problems. I could see a sense of frustration on the faces of the officers as they recited past promises that a new officer each year would be hired and complained that this commitment fell by the wayside. I saw the frustration as the city council spoke of budget constraints and lack of resources, even as they have in the past put into place budgetary considerations that have served to hamstring the budget and put such changes out of reach.

A serious crisis looms for the city that has made financial commitments that will induce structural budget problems. The policy of five year employment leading to lifetime pensions is not sustainable. The rapidly escalating salaries of top end officials adds to this problem.

Councilmember Stephen Souza spoke in terms of three main areas for expenditure and played parks and recreation off police and fire in a budgetary tug-of-war.

However at the same time, he presented us with a false dichotomy. The city is prepared to spend hundreds of millions on the combination of a wastewater treatment plant that will be simultaneously upgraded with a new water supply delivery system.

When confronted on this issue Councilmember Souza suggested that money came from a different fund than public safety money. While technically correct, in practice it comes from the same place--the city resident. The money comes from them whether it takes the form of a rate increase or the form of a new tax.

The city is increasingly going to rely on taxation as a means to raise revenue because they have not controlled their spending in recent years. What that means is that the public is in the unenviable task of choosing between parks, police, fire, or water. Unfortunately, the decision on parks has already been chosen. The voters voted for Measure G last year.

Now I am not against parks, no one is. But we have to ask ourselves if that was the most pressing need that needed to be addressed with a tax increase or reauthorization. The problem is that the citizens chose between parks or less parks on their ballot. But the real choice down the line is a prioritization between parks, public safety, and water. And the public never had this laid out to them last year. They only had a simply choice. But at some point, as we face a parcel tax increase schools and one for the library (both of which are desperately needed and I wholly support), we have to lay all and not just some of the options on the table. Because at some point, the public is going to revolt over taxes. They are going to revolt over paying more and more to city government when a lot of the current spending has been squandered. And at the end of the day, they are never going to choose which things are priorities and which or not. They will simply be faced with a terrible dilemma--do I increase my taxes even more or do I cut vital city financed services.

Unfortunately, what our city council is doing forestalling that decision date. They are punting. They are putting the ball into the hands of a future council to make the tough decision as three of them are facing reelection in less than a year, and two of them--Souza and Saylor--have never met a program or budgetary increase that they do not support. But at some point, it will come to the point where it is too much to take and we really will face a crisis.

In the meantime, we need more police officers on the street. We need to insure the safety of the community and help to restore the vital trust between the police and certain communities, and that begins by our city giving the police the tools that they need to do the job they were hired and we trust them to do.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: Parks Consultant Proposal Approved

The parliamentary maneuvering on the park's consultant request for proposal are almost as interesting as the actually item. However, the item itself deserves some scrutiny.

A request for proposal (RFP) is basically a call to take bids on a given project. Generally if a bidder comes in that is acceptable and within the estimate, an approval for an RFP is tantamount toward approving such an item. The city staff estimates the cost for this consultant on parks will be approximately $50,000 to $75,000 and the stipulation is that the project will not exceed the $75,000 (unless the council approves such a bid).

Everyone loves parks, so this is not a knock on parks, this is an argument about the allocation of very scarce city resources.

The main argument for this project is that the parks' master plan is well out of date. I do not disagree with that. Nor do I disagree that it needs updating. However, Mayor Sue Greenwald made a very important argument that we are in the process (and just beginning that process) of updating the General Plan. The General Plan update will take a considerable amount of time. Once the new general plan is approved, we will have a good idea about where the new growth will occur and the new developments that will take place.

So why would you expend money on a parks' master plan when we do not know where the new growth will be and what the future usage will require?

Secondly, if we look at the list of the items that this will include--there will be data collection. What will be included in that collection? Site maps of all parks. Park and facilities inventories. For these types of things, we need an outside consultant? A major part of this expenditure will be a community survey.

I understand that the master plan needs updating. But I think we need to prioritize the expenditure of scarce resources.

Let me put it to people this way: would you rather the city staff and city council pay $25,000 for a community survey or use that money to fix existing problems and upgrade or repair existing infrastructure?

City staff and the majority of the city council want to spend money on demographic trends and analysis before they update their master plan.

On page three of the city staff report they list a number of either unbuilt amenities. City staff makes the argument that the consultant will need to include analysis of unbuilt or unfinished facilities to determine if they are still needed. Again, this begs the question--do we need a consultant to figure that out and can we not put some of this money toward just building the facilities rather than toward a consultant to make a determination as to whether to build the facilities?

The city has scarce financial resources and we need to really scrutinize some of these expenditures that seem to pile up piece mail.

We all favor parks, the question is what is best for the parks--consultants or construction. Let us do the new general plan and in the meantime complete the unfinished projects that are determined by staff to be needed.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Commentary: Where is the local coverage by the Davis Enterprise?

As I closed down shop late last night, I remarked to friends about just how extraordinary this past week's Davis City Council Meeting had been. There were no less than five major stories during that meeting: proposed merger of the Senior and Social Services Commission; the city’s general plan update process; the failed police car camera system; the city’s EAP service contract; the city’s parks consulting contract; the duplicity & disingenuousness of both Don Saylor and Stephen Souza as well as Ruth Asmundson’s Surrogate moment. We covered them all; it took until late yesterday for the People's Vanguard of Davis to finish covering that City Council meeting.

The remarkable thing about it, is that the Davis Enterprise and their city reporter, Claire St. John, covered one single story from it--the discussion on the general plan update with a brief mention of the Senior Citizens Commission merger at the end. I looked at the paper this morning and one of the front-page stories is that John Edwards is going to run for President but not Even Bayh. It is two years before the Presidential election, one year before the first primary, and frankly neither of those guys are going to win. If I want to read about national politics, I'll go to the New York Times, the Washington Post or read the National Journal. But I read the Enterprise to get local coverage and they have failed to provide that with regards to this past meeting.

For example, not a lot of people will pay attention to that Employee Assistance Program (EAP) issue, but that is a major scam being perpetrated upon City Employees by Cigna and the "pennies wise, pound foolish" cost-cutting city staff. Read the article several times if you have to, there was a lot of work put into that article, but my reading of this situation is that the only way that Cigna will make money off that bid is if they cut service from 9% of employees down to 2 or 3 percent. And it's being sold as a way to save money while maintaining or even increasing service level.

I am left with but one conclusion--if you read the Davis Enterprise, you will get a very small and a very skewed picture of what is happening in Davis City government.

Of the five most crucial issues that came before the council, only two were covered. The Davis Enterprise did have substantial coverage of the Senior Citizens issue in the weeks leading up to the final vote on Tuesday. But even in this case, the reader would have missed a lot of important context.

Claire St. John of the Davis Enterprise writes:

A subcommittee of Mayor Pro Tem Ruth Asmundson and Councilman Stephen Souza recommended the merger and asked the two commissions to explore the idea, but the Senior Citizens Commission rejected the proposal immediately, collecting signatures and making strong statements against it. "It was an idea," Souza said. "I'm sorry if it was misunderstood."

What the article on Wednesday does not mention is that it was more than "an idea." On September 12, 2006 the merger appeared as a resolution in the agenda backed by a full recommendation for passage. And yet, the reader having no context for this issue would conclude that Souza and Asmundson had come up with an idea and then changed their mind.

The striking thing about this meeting is how blatantly duplicitous the major faction of the City Council was during this meeting. The very last item that they discussed sums it up--Councilmember Don Saylor misrepresented his motivations for voting to take no action on an RFP (request for proposal) item that would authorize the taking of bids for a park's consultant. Saylor voted with Heystek and Greenwald two weeks ago so that he could preserve his parliamentary option to bring up the item for reconsideration once Asmundson returned from her oversees trip. Souza then claimed this wasn't an acceptance of the consultant--which is true to an extent, but also misleading about the way this process works. And finally, the need for reconsideration came because Asmundson was absent during her travels. Greenwald had very generously put any item that Asmundson wanted to consider, off until Asmundson returned. Yet, this generosity and courtesy was not rewarded by the council majority on an item that Asmundson had not requested be postponed until her return.

Then there is the issue of the police cars. Here is a case where the city knew that there was a problem with the in-car digital recording equipment that cost the city over $140,000 to purchase and install. The city does not come forward with this information to inform the members of the city council, let alone the public. And to date, the Davis Enterprise has not covered it.

The biggest ally of the council majority is an uninformed electorate. Unfortunately, a lot of people who believe they are informed are not getting the full story or any story at all. That is one of the reasons why in late July I started this blog. And one of the reasons why I continue to put time and energy into researching the stories that I write about.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Late Night Parliamentary Games on the Park Consultant Issue

Two weeks ago we reported that the Davis City Council had voted to take no action on a proposal that would authorize city staff to solicit bids for the purpose of hiring a consultant who would then work to create a survey that gathers community feedback about future needs in order to update the city's parks. We had opposed such a move as an expensive and unnecessary action.

We reported that Councilmember Don Saylor had joined Greenwald and Heystek in the vote to take no action.

"But Saylor had one more trick up his sleeve and with a shocking move he joined Heystek and Greenwald in support of that motion. Why would he do that? Parliamentary procedure states that in order to reconsider an item, a person who voted with the prevailing side is the only one who can bring it up for discussion again. Saylor could not bring the item back had he voted against taking no action."

The item was now brought back for reconsideration by Saylor at the last meeting. A discussion ensued late on Tuesday evening’s meeting.

There were several very striking features about this discussion.

First, Mayor Sue Greenwald suggests, "you voted presumably in order that you could bring it back." Saylor dodges this accurate assessment. It is perfectly within the rules of parliamentary procedure to strategically vote with the majority in order to have the right to ask for reconsideration. However, Saylor never acknowledges this very evident fact when pressed on the matter.

Second, Souza claims:

"This an RFP, it is a request for proposals, it's not an adoption of a proposal, it's not the acceptance of a proposal, it was just a request for proposals. So if we consider this, all we're considering is putting out a request for proposals. I see no harm in putting out a request for proposals. We then would then if we had a proposal come back to us, we would then have to accept the proposal or reject the proposal."

Now Souza's claim here is accurate, they would ultimately, as City Manager Bill Emlen noted, accept the amount once bids are received. However, it is misleading to suggest that all this is an approval of requests for proposals. The way this would then work is if the bid comes in under the amount allocated, it would then come back as a consent agenda item. This means that while a councilmember could ask for it to be pulled, the heavy lifting and debate of the proposal comes at this stage rather than at the acceptance of a bid proposal stage. And in essence, approval of the "request for proposals" will amount to an approval of a consultant assuming that they find a suitable bidder.

This is a procedural argumentary tactic designed to diffuse the heavy debate. There is no reason to avoid the debate at the stage of RFP as opposed to acceptance of the bid. Have the debate and then vote. But let’s not make the argument that we should accept this item merely as a means to see what proposals the city receives. That seems disingenuous. You authorize a request for proposal if you believe that we should do the project. And if you do not, as both Greenwald and Heystek have stated, there is no reason to approve the RFP.

Third, councilmember Heystek makes a good point that the vote for reconsideration should be based on new information rather than the presence of a councilmember who was absent at the previous meeting. This is not a parliamentary point. Parliamentary procedure allows anyone voting on the winning side of an issue to bring it back for reconsideration.

Saylor, however, gets very testy on this:

"Let me respond. I'll be very specific. Earlier this evening we talked about an item that had to do with Employee Assistant Program, one of the councilmembers asked that that item as a courtesy be held over and we agreed with that. I voted to hold that over as a courtesy to a colleague. Two meetings ago we had an item that we were stalemated on, two of us believed that we should proceed, two believed that we should not. I asked that we hold that item over until December 12 so that we would have a full council so that we could consider it. That motion was defeated. Then the motion that we were voting on was, should we take action on that item, and the motion was we should not take action on that item that night. And I think that was the motion... And having voted on that motion in the affirmative I now have the right to request reconsideration by the full council. That's what I'm doing."

As Greenwald points out, the issue is not whether or not he should have the right to reconsideration. He does. But she is absolutely correct that before Ruth went on her trip, they granted her a very large courtesy of holding over issues that she had the greatest interest in hearing. Mayor Greenwald and the council granted extreme deference to Asmundson on the issues that she is most interested in considering. The last two meetings in fact were very light, because they chose to keep items that were of interest to Asmundson off of the agenda.

Asmundson did not request the parks consultant item to be held over until she was back in town. Therefore it seems very disingenuous (not procedurally incorrect) on the part of Saylor to then request a courtesy in this case as he granted on another issue.

The fact is that Asmundson received far more courtesy when she was gone than either Greenwald or Heystek would have if they were gone on a similar endeavor.

Saylor distorts the issue by suggesting that they were arguing that he did not have the right to request reconsideration. Rather they are suggesting that the council should not grant reconsideration based on the absence of a member. And this is a very important point because it essentially means that any controversial action taken during the absence of a councilmember faces the prospect of being reconsidered if that member's vote was pivotal to the outcome.

Moreover, it seems to me that Saylor's speech about courtesy is a one-way street in this case. They were granted a huge amount of courtesy in the way the agenda was constructed with the interests of Asmundson in mind. That courtesy was not extended back to Greenwald and Heystek on the one issue that proved controversial during Asmundson’s absence.

I have no problem whatsoever disagreeing with people on issues. We can debate the merits and if they win, they win. When elected members of the council start playing games and pretend to be doing something that they are not—that is when I have huge objections. Saylor should have be upfront that he had voted strategically to utilize the parliamentary rules--which he clearly had. It is not a big deal until he dodges the point.

Souza should be upfront and acknowledge that a vote for the RFP is in fact tantamount to approval of the concept of the project. If you are opposed to the project, you should not vote to approve the RFP.

And finally, they should all recognize the extreme deference granted to Mayor Pro Tem Asmundson that they have failed to reciprocate on.

For those who missed it, here is video of that entire debate, it is very revealing and well worth watching.



---Doug Paul Davis reporting

Calling City Priorities Into Question

Everybody likes parks. We all want good parks for our children to play in. We want good parks for ourselves to have good recreation in (as opposed to bad recreation?). Politically speaking, everyone has to be for parks—just as they are for schools and firefighters and the environment.

That said, I’m as much a self-proclaimed and proud tax and spend liberal as anyone, but there are also budgetary realities and sometimes you have to really question the choices that are being made about city spending.

There is growing concern about the structural constraints of the budget—too much money being automatically tied up in ever-growing city staff salaries. Again, we do not begrudge people their livelihood but we have to question choices that are being made.

Claire St. John’s article last night demonstrates just such a problem. Tonight, the City Council will consider hiring consultants at a cost of between $50,000 and $75,000 to update the Parks and Recreation Facilities Master Plan (adopted in 1998) and “create a survey to learn how residents can be better served by their parks.”

So we are going to pay a consultant to take a survey to learn how residents can be better served by their parks? Is this why we passed a park tax?

When the city council decided to hire an ombudsman, one reason that they created a part-time rather than full-time position, was the lack of money. Parks are important, but one has to question the priorities of the council in this matter. Granted this is undoubtedly one-time money, but it is not clear that this is the most pressing need for the city at this point—to survey residents about parks.

Meanwhile there is the heated battle brewing over the use of public tennis courts and whether the Davis Tennis Club should have permission to reserve tennis courts in Walnut Park for league play.

I do not agree with Don Saylor very often, however, he did make a couple of good points at the last meeting. The first was that the Parks and Recreation Commission had a full hearing on the tennis court issue and rendered a recommendation. Perhaps, the council should have heeded that recommendation rather than rehearing the issue. The second point was that council was bringing up a large number of items that required staff preparation work, and that perhaps the council ought to start prioritizing the items they agendize. The rest of the council clearly disagreed with Saylor, but he did have a valid point.

The council needs to recognize that they have a very limited budget. We all love parks and we enjoy having nice parks, but sometimes you cannot simply spend money to create a survey about park usage. There are priorities and there are more pressing concerns that need to be addressed and deserve funding opportunities long before we start hiring Park Consultants to design surveys.

---Doug Paul Davis reporting