The Burlingame Voice

San Mateo council chaos as a harbinger

I've had a motivation challenge on making new posts since last week's very difficult post, so here are a couple of simple "just taking notice" posts to get back on track.  Our southern neighbor, San Mateo, is in city council turmoil as noted by the DJ in both the news pieces, a deluge of letters to the editor and Mark Simon's column.  With three new members and an open seat from Diane Papan winning an Assembly seat, the 2-2 tug-of-war over the mayorship is a sight to behold.  Simon notes

Most of the time, the title of mayor rotates between councilmembers and is largely ceremonial — the person presides at council meetings, cuts ribbons, gets to deliver a largely fungible “state of the city” address and is the center of attention for a year. Ah, not this time.

Having been married to a mayor, I can tell you there's a bit more to it than that.  Committee assignments, setting the bi-monthly agenda, certain management tasks and setting the direction of inter-city interactions are some examples.  But all of that aside for the moment, we should ask if the chaos in San Mateo is a harbinger of things to come in B'game?  Back to Simon

There were announcements of recall efforts targeting both Diaz Nash and Lee. Some flatly declared that blocking the election of a mayor violated the city charter, which it does not, and that it ran contrary to published guidelines on how the council is supposed to elect a mayor, which it does. But guidelines are, you know, only guidelines.  Monday night’s (city council meeting) hootenanny laid bare some significant incisions within the body politic.

Not the least of which is that district elections have wrought a profound change on local politics, including an unprecedented political immunity. Opponents can launch a recall effort to oust Diaz Nash, but it is likely she and her views are completely safe in her district.

Tiny little districts (ours average about 6,000 people each and voter turnout is usually around 15-18%) may make for safe seats or they may make recalls easier to qualify--or both.  The time, money and hassle of special elections and spot campaigning of it all is completely predictable.  And sad.

2022 Council non-races are decided. Decidedly concerning.

Very few people seem happy about moving to district-based elections for city council or school boards, but nobody has a plan for changing the state legislation loophole that a SoCal lawyer crawled through to force this on us.  We discussed the 80% voter suppression this generates for the Burlingame city council here.  Last night was the perfect example of the problem.  Incumbents Ricardo Ortiz and Michael Brownrigg walked back into their seats in District 1 and 3 unopposed.  But the oddest thing was the result in District 5 where Rachel Cyr remained on the ballot even though she put out a social media message withdrawing from the race EIGHT WEEKS ago.  (One of the nice things about the Voice is you can go back in time and see these sorts of things--see the Sept. 1 comment on the old post.)  That was too late to get her name off the ballot.

The concerning thing is that after withdrawing, sending out no mailers - snail mail or otherwise--having no lawn signs, knocking on no doors, appearing at no candidates' forums and having a couple of local papers note the withdrawal, 236 people in District 5 still voted for her as of the first 8:10 pm tally last night!  Talk about a "threat to democracy" election.  This is the closest vote to your doorstep you can cast.  C'mon people, let's pay attention.  Please?  This afternoon the total for Cyr is 302.  Just doing the quick math, if this had been the old city-wide election, we might have 5 x 302 = 1510 people not paying attention but voting anyway.  That is a third of the actual voters!

CD15: Peas-in-a-Pod for Free Stuff

We are down to the final days before we know who will replace Jackie Speier in Congress.  The scramble started last November when she announced her retirement. Kevin Mullin is likely to be the winner, but I doubt it makes much difference since their positions are basically clones of each other's.  Since we have the new Free Stuff (Not) category, I'll give you another example from the Daily Post's running Q&A with the two candidates.  Yesterday we learned the two peas-in-a-pod think this 

Notice two things:  The Daily Post constructed the question too narrowly.  First, the people who paid off their loans are being taken advantage of and neither candidate says a word about it. That was the question.  But secondarily, the worse harm is to working folks (taxpayers) who pulled it off without taking a loan in the first place!  The ones who didn't go to college or whose family saved enough to pull it off are being abused by this blatant money grab from taxpayers--to the tune of about $605 billion, with a B.  Sadly, the seat may change, but the mindset will not.

California exodus accelerates in 2022

A year ago, the exodus from our lovely state was news as we discussed here.  The trend has accelerated which should accelerate the review of the state's housing requirement numbers as noted here.  The odd thing about the faulty RHNA numbers is that no one wants to talk about them.  I have mentioned it to several electeds and a watchdog news organization and all I get is crickets.  As a city, try to ignore them and Rob Bonta will be all in your face, but question them and he's silent.  You would think when a state auditor says this about the calculations, someone would go "hold on":

“Overall, our audit determined that HCD does not ensure that its needs assessments are accurate and adequately supported. …This insufficient oversight and lack of support for its considerations risks eroding public confidence that HCD is informing local governments of the appropriate amount of housing they will need.”

If someone is saying "hold on" they are doing it quietly behind closed doors.  But this is what is occurring in California out in the open from the WSJ:

California Gov. Gavin Newsom boasted this week that his state is poised to become the world’s fourth largest economy. Perhaps, thanks to Germany’s economic struggles, but a new Hoover Institution report documents an accelerating business flight from the Golden State.

The report by Hoover senior fellow Lee Ohanian and Spectrum Location Solutions President Joseph Vranich finds that 352 companies moved their headquarters from California between 2018 and 2021. Twice as many businesses left last year (153) than in 2020 and 2019 and three times as many as in 2018. The top destinations: Texas (132), Tennessee (31), Nevada (25), Florida (24) and Arizona (21).

California’s high top marginal income-tax rate (13.3%) punishes small pass-through businesses that pay income taxes at the individual rate as well as managers in C-suites. Manufacturers get slammed by high electricity costs from the state’s climate policies. The Mercatus Center ranks California as the most highly regulated state in the U.S.

Human capital is also becoming more scarce. The report notes that California’s net out-migration to other states increased to 277,000 in 2021 from 34,000 in 2012. Over the last 10 years, California has lost 1.625 million residents to other states—more than the population of Philadelphia. Foreign migration has compensated, but less so in recent years.

Tally that up with the layoffs and hiring slowdowns being reported at the major firms in the Bay Area, and you could say my "confidence is eroded" in the RHNA numbers that drive all of the residential building being jammed down our throats.  And the electoral response?  Raise the top marginal tax rate some more (Prop. 30) under the guise of fighting wildfires and encouraging more electric cars--like we don't already have enough subsidies and browbeating for EVs. 

Business Licenses: X misses the mark

Now that you have your ballot, you see that you have only one B'game-specific vote to cast--to increase (or not) the B'game business license fees.  (District 5ers also have a city council non-race to vote in since Rachel Cyr withdrew, but after the ballots were set.)  I'm of mixed mind on Measure X, and not because of a reflexive dislike of tax/fee increases although I do have that too.  I get that licenses have been $100/yr for every business forever, but I think the city missed the mark at the high-end of the tax schedule.  You won't find it anywhere but on the city site here, so I will retype the proposed schedule:

            Gross receipts of the business                    Annual license fee

           < $250K                                                        $200

            $250K to $1M                                                $300

            > $1M                                                           $750

That's it.   You can gross $1.25M or $125M and you pay the same amount.  Or $1.25B, looking at you Meta/Facebook/Oculus.  Not sure why there isn't a $20M or $40M level with a good-sized number attached to it.  Many cities take a percentage of gross receipts--I'm not in favor of that, but shouldn't some of the big companies adding crushing density and traffic to our town pay more than $750?

The other aspect of the measure that needs mentioning is the last bit of text which reads "....until ended by voters, requiring audits and all funds staying in Burlingame".  Sounds innocuous enough, but the Oct. 10 Daily Post ran a frontpage article titled "Ballot wording called misleading".  It describes a Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury report that calls out several ballot measures' language that may be misleading:

That included phrases such as "until ended by voters," which falsely implies that the measure includes a way for voters to repeal it later, the grand jury said.  The grand jury report, released on Friday, pointed to other deceptive "tricks and tactics" used in ballot questions, such as adding the feel-good phrases like "all funds spent locally".

Whooops.  Measure X is two-for-two.  We shall see if anyone decides to use the Santa Clara findings to challenge the result here in B'game.

No election. No debate. One overview.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve posted here. I’ve been busy, or maybe nothing has motivated me to put together a post?  But having attended last night’s candidates forum at the Burlingame Woman’s Club featuring candidates Michael Brownrigg, Ricardo Ortiz and Peter Stevenson, I feel the urge to render an opinion. Let me get right to it. I was “disappointed.”

First, I was discouraged at the size of the crowd attending to listen to the candidates. It was a shadow of the size of the crowd that attended such forums in the past. The engagement of the crowd was underwhelming as well. The questions asked were few and not tough enough.

Most importantly, I was let down that all three candidates were running unopposed. This too is a far cry from the crowded fields we’ve seen in the  past here in Burlingame.

Alright, let’s not dwell on the past and focus on the present. I will be naming names here as I believe the readership has a right to know. I will most likely be an equal opportunity offender in this regard.

I’ll try to react to the questions and answers given.

First up, The answer Council member Ortiz gave regarding public safety and growth was weak at best. In short, he stated that the council has not been asked to increase the number of patrol personnel, so by inference, there is no need to increase the number of individuals on the BPD. Wait? What? Does he not see the increase in petty crime, car break-ins, porch pirates, catalytic converter thefts? Does the council need to be asked to increase staffing? Really? The question was trying to tie growth and development to a need to increase the force. In my opinion, there is a lack of patrol in our neighborhoods, there is no substation on the bayfront where massive development is slated ( and the crime rate is higher due to the transient nature of the area) and both Ortiz and Brownrigg are not concerned? This outlook has me concerned.

Bothered by the comments from both candidate Council member Brownrigg and first-time candidate Stevenson when discussing growth. Both agreed with one another that Burlingame can no longer be a quaint bedroom community to San Francisco, it’s simply no longer possible, according to them. I, for one, want council members that recognize that the beauty of our community has always been its quaint, smalltown community feel. If this notion is disregarded than the fabric of the community is at risk. I want council members to protect this town, not just add and support what seems like unbridled growth. Did I say disappointing?

Brownrigg also said that studies have shown that Burlingame can handle more growth and that we still have capacity for even more density.  Someone asked regarding the issue of growth, “When is enough, enough?” All candidates didn’t really know how to answer this question. To me this is a red flag moment. Isn’t this one of the biggest issues facing Burlingame today? Council member Ortiz made a convoluted comment that more density is actually making our property values even higher. Not sure I understand that logic, so I won’t dwell on this point.

From my perspective, there is much more density in the pipeline than I ever imagined when I moved here over 27 years ago. Reminder there are seven, eight, nine and ten story buildings ready for approval right now. I’ve said it here on The Voice years ago that Burlingame will be unrecognizable and sadly, it is coming true faster than I thought.

Simply put, there didn’t seem to be any real concern over growth from any of the candidates. In fact, there seemed to be a satisfaction that the revenue generated by growth is worth it. This gives me great cause for concern. On the east side of town, District 5, I would have thought candidate Stevenson would have a stronger position as much of the development has a direct effect on District 5. ( District 5 not only represents the residential neighborhoods on the east side of Burlingame, it also encompasses the bayfront.)

There was some justification that growth comes with benefits like open space like what is planned for the massive downtown development that is being constructed at the downtown post office site for example. Concerts, gathering spots, places to play chess were mentioned specifically by Council member Brownrigg. The notion of closing Burlingame Avenue to vehicular traffic was also mentioned. I would suggest that all three candidates talk to experts like those with the Project for Public Spaces to gather bonified expert opinions before rendering their so-called expert opinion on open space and street closures. These are issues have unintended consequences and that again will change the fabric of Burlingame and should be taken seriously before any decisions are made. Covid has made the talk of street closures a popular topic. Perhaps I will opine on this subject in a separate post as it is a complex issue that much of time is oversimplified. Proceed with caution, I say.

Finally, there was a topic upon which I actually agreed with an answer. The topic of Broadway was on the docket and Council member Ortiz eluded to the fact that property owners bore some responsibility for the look and feel of the street having lacked the pride of ownership of their respective storefronts. It’s not simply just a streetscape improvement issue. I would add that no one seems to have the institutional memory that Broadway improvements actually happened well before the improvements to Burlingame Avenue. New bulb outs were built that included seating capacity, the old Magnolia trees were removed and brand-new trees were planted and new sidewalks were poured. Granted those improvements are now about 20 years old, but what is the schedule for wholesale streetscape improvements anyway? Seems to me that based on Burlingame Avenue and nearby downtown’s, infrastructure improvements generally happen about once a century.

One observation. All three candidates seemed to agree with one another on all the issues presented. Where is the independent thinking? Where are the strong perspectives? Where’s the debate? Is this what we have to look forward to—four years of, ”I concur, I agree, good point, well said?” Good lord.

So, there you have it. My take on the forum was disappointment all the way around.

As forum moderator Renaldo Pasquali accurately stated, it was nice to hear from the candidates, but in the end there really is no election. All the candidates are running unopposed. Perhaps there should be a new rule? If there are uncontested district races at the time of final candidate filing, or a candidate who has filed pulls out of the race, the filing deadline should be extended so that candidates who might have been considering running have another moment in time to consider throwing their names into the hat so that elections aren’t a wasted exercise. Just a thought.

Follow the money....out of state

Dan Walters at Calmatters.org is back on the economic case with a piece titled "California is leaking vital high-income taxpayers".  Before we go to his big picture, Calmatters also just reported the month-to-month changes:

For the second month in a row, the Golden State’s tax revenues fell short of projections: The state in July collected about $1.28 billion less than expected, largely due to lower proceeds from the personal income tax, according to a Monday report from the state Department of Finance. California in June collected about $2.4 billion less than expected.

That $97 billion dollar surplus burning a hole in Sacramento pockets could evaporate pretty quickly.  Here's some snippets from Walters' piece

Since 2010, 7.5 million people have left California while 5.9 million people have come from other states.  That gives rise to a question: Who is leaving California and why?  The Chronicle found that 39,000 San Franciscans who had filed federal tax returns for 2018 had moved out of the city before filing 2019 returns. Collectively, they took $10.6 billion in income with them while people who moved to the city during that period reported just $3.8 billion in income.

California’s top income tax rate, 13.3% on taxable incomes over $1 million, is by far the nation’s highest and when added to the top federal rate of 37% pushes the overall bite to more than 50%. Moreover, a tax overhaul during the Donald Trump presidency basically ended the ability to deduct state income taxes on federal returns.

If anything, California’s taxes on the wealthy are likely to increase. Proposition 30, a measure on the November ballot, would boost the top marginal rate to over 15%, raising money for programs to battle climate change, and another tax hike is headed for the 2024 ballot.  Income taxes account for three-quarters of California’s general fund revenues and the top 1% of California taxpayers generate nearly half of those taxes.  That’s just 150,000 taxpayers in a state of 40 million, so even a trickle of departures has a potentially huge impact on the budget.

Half of three-quarters is 37.5%.  Just saying.  The annual change in population has been trending down for 12 years, but we still need to destroy single-family residential zoning via SB9 to build more.  We are "leaking" vital taxpayers--nice phrasing from Dan.  And we are going to push more through the "leak" to fund climate change even after the Feds have just approved trillions for climate change.  All good.  Nothing to see here.  And in another slick Federal tax move, we are going to give the IRS $80 billion, but they still need to figure out what they will do with it.  Probably should have done that first.

 

80% Voter Suppression in Burlingame

The slimy little lawyer from Malibu who has no friggin' clue about anything in Burlingame has finally gotten his scummy little way.  Yesterday was the deadline for filing for the B'game city council election and we will have 1/5 of the election we would have had, thanks to someone who has probably never even graced our lovely avenues, roads or courts.  Our prior post covered the background of this travesty with our new five little districts here.   Further back you can read here.  As a B'game resident, you used to have five votes for the five seats on the city council.  They were all your council members and had to answer your phone calls.  No more.  40 percent of you (including me) get NO VOTE this year for city council even though three seats are up.  Another 40 percent of you can vote, but there is only one candidate running in your tiny little postage stamp district, so if you dislike them and their policies you are stuck writing in Ronald McDonald--and your fries will be cold.  Nice work scummy lawyer.

20 percent of the town has an election.  This is real voter suppression to the tune of 80%.  Not the BS you read about in the paper where showing an ID to vote is somehow an insurmountable challenge.  It's right here in the vote YOU DON"T GET TO CAST.

Ricardo Ortiz and Michael Brownrigg, formerly known as "Mike", are now unopposed in their north end districts.  The little lawyer from Malibu must be so proud.  No need for two incumbents to go to debates (although they probably will out of respect for the process), knock on doors, ask for endorsements, answer pointed e-mails about why they did this-or-that...or DIDN'T do this-or-that.  Congrats on the win, gents.

The formerly ignored southeast end--the "Lyon-Hoag" section of town in the Old Days, has three newcomers vying for the newly created, open seat.  I applaud them.  The development and traffic windmill they are going to push against is massive, but they are willing to try.  Rachel Cyr, John Martos, and Peter Stevenson--welcome to the show.  The Daily Journal quick survey had this description of them:

Rachel Cyr, a mother and businesswoman, is running against businessperson Peter Stevenson and John Martos in District 5.

I find that a little odd and worthy of oversight.  I know Stevenson a bit and he has kids, so why is he a "businessperson" and not a "father and businessman".  I don't know Martos, but he must deserve some descriptor.  C'mon DJ, get it together.  Don't make me expose your bias before we even get started.

Update 8/15:  I just heard from the city clerk that John Martos did not finish the filing process (i.e. he effectively withdrew).  He was listed as "pending" mid-last week.  So District 5 is Cyr and Stevenson, head to head.

Late Summer Musings on Politics

If you have read the Voice for much of its 19 years on-line you have run into the occasional "think piece" that spices up the usual fare.  The quiet weeks of mid-August before everyone gets back to our little town is a particularly good time for such a post.  With plenty of time to read things like book reviews of books I'll never read (perhaps that is the purpose of a book review), some gems can pop out.  Barton Swain at the WSJ did just such a favor in reviewing a new book about John Locke, the 17th century British philosopher.  Locke is sometimes referred to as "the first liberal".  Swain uses that as a jumping off point:

One way to sum up postwar American politics is to say that conservatives try to stop liberals from breaking the liberals’ own rules. The “rules” in this formulation are those of liberalism in the broadest sense: constitutional principles, the rule of law, rights-based protections. 

“Liberal” regimes aren’t supposed to impose a particular understanding of the Good on their citizens; they’re meant to ensure local and individual freedoms and enable citizens to figure out what the Good is for themselves. But some liberals—typically the highly educated and privileged sort—tend to forget they are liberals and try to define righteousness for everybody. They do this by reallocating citizens’ wealth according to their own ideals, regulating private economic behavior, dictating to local communities how they should govern themselves, imposing protean codes of correct speech and behavior on everybody else, and so on. Conservatives, in this admittedly biased way of putting it, are there to stop liberals from indulging these illiberal impulses; to remind them, in other words, that they are liberals, not potentates.

Well put.  We see the potentates very clearly in Sacramento; and the county and our city are not immune by any means.  We see Sacramento "dictating to local communities how they should govern themselves" all over the place.  It makes one wonder why someone who just wants to serve the community, instead of climbing the political ladder, would want to run for city council when Newsom, the state senate and assembly can dictate how everything will run?  We have an election in 13 weeks.  We will have at least one brand new city council member (in the new, open seat that was dictated to us), a new assemblywoman and a new federal House member.  Here's hoping they will be truly Locke-style "liberals".

Election 2022: Coming into Focus

This summer primary election has been very heavy on the signage with tons of it placed illegally by pretty much every candidate.  But thankfully we only have four more days to go until the blurry races come into focus.  Won't be a minute too soon for me.  You can drop your ballot in the box in front of Walgreen's on B'way.  Why the County would spend good money to put these boxes out and then service them regularly when every ballot is mail-in ready and postage-free eludes my logic.