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August 21, 2008 CCSD Meeting Highlights
Last Thursday’s CCSD meeting had a larger than usual crowd of Cambrians, most of whom came to speak and view the outcome of the Rate Protest tabulations - though that was not the only item on the agenda that will affect us all in the next several years. Board President Joan Cobin rearranged the agenda to move the Rates issue to about fifteen minutes into the meeting, instead of after the staff reports, committee reports and consent agenda, as in the published agenda. I applaud her desire to “get right to business”, though the representatives from the League of Women Voters (Sara Horn and President Ann Garfinkel) missed at least half of the report from by General Manager Tammy Rudock on the counting. Ms. Horn and Ms. Garfinkel were only at the meeting very briefly, leaving before the public comments and before the Board officially accepted the League’s report. Watch their report by clicking here:
I also missed the start of item VIII A, having planned my arrival based on the original schedule. Fortunately, the Board meetings are recorded, so I was able to catch up on what I missed later - and Cambrians who had come pretty much only for this item seemed appreciative that it was given priority and moved to the start of the meeting.
Excerpts of that part of the meeting will soon be available at Google video and audio is, as always, available at Slo-span.org. I encourage anyone who couldn’t get to the meeting to watch the conversation and deliberation of the Board that followed the public comments and lead to the unanimous approval of a resolution to raise the rates 12% and revisit the issue next year to determine if an additional 14% is really needed.
The bottom line, as Kathe Tanner notes in the week’s Cambrian, is that the Water and Wastewater enterprise funds will have more money in them to keep the system running and the effect on our pocketbooks won’t be as severe as initially proposed. The Board also directed that staff shouldn’t use any staff time to pursue a loan of any size until getting further direction from the Board.
I applaud the entire Board for the time they all clearly put into considering how to move forward. No matter what the actual number of accounts or valid protest letters, there was a clear and strong message from half of the community, and a pretty loud silence from the other half. Muril Clift’s measured approach showed he had spoken to his constituents and had the best interests of the community and the CCSD at heart when he came up with an alternative most in the community find reasonable.
More excerpts will be available in the next couple of days. Watch some of the public comments made on this item and Art Montandon’s responses to questions raised by Cambrians in their comments.
More valuable than a gallon of gas? Say YES! with a small donation today.Tags: 93428, Cambria, proposition 218, Rates
Recent CCSD Computer Investment - Fiscally Responsible?
CCSD Candidates: Want My Vote?
My Requirements for a CCSD Director
Michael Stoddard
A commitment of understanding that:
- The CCSD Board of Directors are elected to be beholden to the Cambria Community Services District’s ratepayers
- The CCSD administration, staff and Board are employees of the District’s ratepayers
A commitment to action for fiscal responsibility, accountability and transparency:
- Including improved cash flow tracking, and cash flow justification that the public can understand
- An expense review that includes expense justification from CCSD administration on a quarterly basis - a commitment to no more “rubber stamping” of district operating expenses
- An overt Board involvement during any negotiations for employment/union/CIP/Capital Outlay contract negotiation process prior to public meeting Board approval of such contracts
- A budget development policy that provides for active public input at even the earliest stages and requires review of fiscal-related policies used to develop the prior budget (i.e. what is the status of capital projects, priorities placed on infrastructure spending or possible opportunities for cost savings
- An annual review of expenditure-reducing Capital Outlays (e.g. SCADA, etc.) to determine if an objective of cost reduction is being met
- Inclusion of fiscal analysis in all CIPs and Capital Outlays
A commitment to a new, future water rate structure that reflects a fair infrastructure usage demand rate between commercial and residential - and includes a rate structure that eliminates the discrimination against families, as the current rate structure does
A commitment to publicly explore the creation of a citizen’s advisory committee(s) - or “kitchen cabinet(s)” so that Directors can informally call forth on a regular basis, community input on policy decisions (not for debate or lobbying, but for input)
A commitment to implement policy to improve public access and understanding of CCSD policies and expenditures
A commitment to study how Board of Director’s meetings can improve the format for public input and discussion (i.e. review of three-minute input rule, timing of public input during meeting, early public distribution of documents, documentation and answering of public questions, etc.) while trying to reduce overall meeting time and improving effectiveness of public meeting time for the Directors and the public
Water = Growth ? Really?? I Thought Procreation = Growth
Of course, the issue of growing communities and resources that are not is a more complex issue. San Luis Obispo County’s Planning department will be having a “study session” on the county’s growth management and resources management plans. Check out the Planning Department’s web pages for more information on this.
Or take a visit to some other interesting articles, like the ones in the Santa Clarita Valley Signal recently that was critiqued quite effectively back to back on the water blog Aquafornia that discuss the “conundrum” of mandatory water conservation as developers build more homes to use the limited water. I highly recommend a visit to read the post on Aquafornia and the two original opinion pieces from The Signal. We are not the only community dealing with the issue of a growing population and receding water availability. These folks have some interesting views. What’s your opinion?
Hello world!
Welcome to About Cambria! We’re back up and running on a new host with new security. Thanks for your patience while we’ve been offline…more soon!
Just wondering…
Just wondering…Who will be able to vote for CCSD board candidates in the November election. By incorporating the local election with the national election, will those who own second homes in Cambria but are not registered in SLO county be able to vote for the local candidates? Will there be a provision for absentee voting for these folks? How exactly will this work? Just wondering…
This post was submitted by Just wondering....
Update on 218 Protest Validation
On Friday, 8/1/08, the CFRCCSD rates committee had one of its periodic meetings. CCSD Director Muril Clift attended the meeting and shared the following information. CCSD HAS hired a handwriting expert to participate in the protest validation process. This stems from the fact that CCSD believes that there are “suspicious” protest votes where the signature on the protest may not be valid. Although they have not used the word fraudulent, their contention is that some of the protest votes have not been signed by the “real person or persons” authorized to file a protest.
Back on July 21, 2008, at the discussion session with Art Montandon, Tammy Rudock, and other CCSD employees with members of the community, held at the CCSD offices, the community members present were informed that CCSD had compared signatures on a sample of 92 ballots with signatures on file with CCSD for some ratepayers, and that some of them did not match. At that time, I suggested that if CCSD had concerns about the authenticity of signatures they should contact the applicable ratepayers, ask them if they filed the protest, and if they indicated that they had, ask them to come to the CCSD office, provide valid I.D., and sign a sworn statement if CCSD felt that was necessary. For out of town protesters a similar produre could be devised via mail. CCSD’s response was that there was no procedure to do that and that they would only consider such a procedure if the Board directed them to do so.
At the July 24, 2008, CCSD public meeting, I spoke on the protest counting/validation procedure. For those who saw the video, I was “attacked” by Director Funke-Bilu and no procedure was established. Art Montandon alluded to the possibility of hiring a handwriting expert, which has now been done.
Many CCSD ratepayers are elderly and have been ratepayers for a long time. Undoubtedly their signatures have changed over time due to medical issues and the simple aging process. While not an expert, I seriously doubt that a handwriting expert can take those factors into account when comparing a current signature sample to one from years ago. However, here’s another example of CCSD hiring an “outside consultant”, spending ratepayer money, on an unnecessary procedure.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve had more than enough!
A Test of the Human Spirit
Muril Clift offers this story for keeping perspective:
Most of us live our lives trying to make the best of the surroundings we find ourselves a part of. We seek some challenges in our work and try to participate in our communities through our children, church or community activities. Very few will “put it all on the line” to challenge themselves to achieve goals beyond most of our dreams. Although everything we do daily is the most important thing to us, consider the great adventure of Zac Sunderland.
A week ago this young man age 16 left Long Beach, alone, aboard a 36 foot sailboat for a journey to challenge himself with the ultimate test. The first leg of his journey is a 4500 mile 5 week sail to the Marshall Islands. 5 weeks alone at sea, testing his physical ability and even greater his mental ability to cope with loneliness and the unknowns he will have to conquer. From the Marshall’s he plans to continue his quest to sail around the world and become the youngest person to accomplish that goal. You can follow his efforts online at www.zacsunderland.com.
When you get down or discouraged think of Zac and his minute by minute challenge to stay alive and conquer his internal doubts knowing there is little help for him out there other than his own resources. Even if he does not accomplish his ultimate goal he will have know he has challenged himself to the ultimate limit and can face any future challenges as man.
Zac’s dream of sailing around the world and his pursue of the dream by putting together the sponsors who are making it happen is an example to all of us. Although our dreams and passions may not be as lofty as Zac’s I hope he is an inspiration to you to carry forward with whatever you consider your important contribution to the human spirit.
God’s speed Zac.
El Colibri Hotel
Here’s an excerpt from the broker listing for the new El Colibri Hotel:
Amber Hotel Company is pleased to announce a price reduction on one of its exclusive listings in Cambria, California. Property highlights are as follows:
That’s over $394,000/room, which would require an average daily rate of well over $200/night year round to make any economic sense as an investment. This makes it look like hoteliers in Cambria may not be hurting so bad after all. |
Green Idealism
By Thomas Sowell
Skyrocketing housing prices are forcing out families with children [from upscale, liberal communities like San Francisco, Monterey, and Los Angeles], as well as…other people with low or even moderate incomes.
But these runaway housing prices in California did not just happen for no reason.
Prior to 1970, California housing prices were very similar to housing prices in the rest of the country. In more recent times, it has not been uncommon for California homes to cost three times what homes cost nationwide.
What happened in the 1970s was that severe government restrictions on building became common in coastal California. With supply restricted and demand not restricted, it was inevitable that prices would soar beyond many people’s ability to pay.
The main impetus behind severe restrictions on building is environmentalist zealots who demand that vast amounts of land be set aside as “open space” on which nothing can be built.
It is not uncommon for substantial proportions of all the land in an entire county — sometimes more than half — to be set aside as “open space.”
Environmentalists often talk as if they are trying to save the last few patches of greenery from being paved over, when in fact 90 percent of the land in the United States is undeveloped and forests alone cover more area than all the cities and towns in the country combined.
Behind much of the lofty and pretty talk are some ugly and selfish realities.
People who already own their homes in an upscale community pay no price for making it hard for others to move into their community. On the contrary, the value of the homes they already own shoots up when they restrict the supply of new homes.
In other words, they can keep out the less affluent people — or, as they put it, “preserve the character of the community” — while benefiting themselves economically in the name of green idealism.
“Open space” laws are just one of the weapons in their arsenal. Other legal impediments to building include so-called “smart growth” policies, historical preservation laws, and zoning boards and coastal commissions with arbitrary powers to limit or forbid building.
The financially ruinous powers of delay that these and other laws and institutions can impose on anyone wanting to build anything can be illustrated by a current legal case involving a developer who has for 15 years been prevented from building in the coastal California town of Half Moon Bay.
A judge recently awarded him $36 million in damages but that decision has been appealed. Anyone familiar with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals knows that anything can happen there — including more years of delay.
Someone once said that the ability to tax is the ability to destroy. So is the ability to delay.
When a business sets standards or policies with adverse effects that fall disproportionately on [lower income people]…, courts call that a “disparate impact” and equate it with discrimination.
But the same liberals who applaud that approach when it comes to businesses would be appalled if the same standard were applied to their own environmentalist restrictions that force vast numbers of [lower income families]…out of their own upscale liberal communities.