Naturally, I will opine on some of the content in the Mayor's Email and you are also welcome to.
"From: tomlong@palosverdes.com
Subject: RPV Council Election November 2011
Message:
October 9, 2011
Dear RPV Residents:
On Tuesday November 8th RPV residents will vote to select 3 new councilmembers to replace Steve Wolowicz, Doug Stern and myself. There are 8 candidates, 7 of whom have been actively campaigning. I have posted connections to the candidates’ webpages here http://www.palosverdes.com/tomlong/index.cfm?go=websites
and answers to my questions here http://www.palosverdes.com/tomlong/index.cfm?go=election2011 RPV TV (Channel 33 on Cox and 38 on Verizon) will be running broadcasts of city council candidate debates every day except Friday at 8 p.m. and school board candidate debates at 10 p.m. also every day except Friday. This election may be among the most important in the city’s history.
Over the last 8 years that Steve, Doug and I have been on council some important changes have been made. The city obtained grant monies that funded the acquisition of the Palos Verdes Nature Preserve, establishing 2 square miles—15% of the city’s land area--as open space in perpetuity. City revenues have increased from about $1 per resident per day to about $1.30. Most of the added revenue has been devoted to increase spending to restore decayed infrastructure that the city had neglected for decades. The council specifically decided to devote all of the new revenues from the Terranea resort to capital improvement projects rather than to the city’s operating budget. We are on the brink of obtaining a $9.4 million grant toward the repair of San Ramon canyon where the city and its staff outdid other applications from much larger agencies. We can also begin to plan for other civic improvements as well if we stay on course. All of this has happened with one of the smallest
city payrolls and employee headcounts and, until last week, without a city employees’ union—unlike most cities.
I am confident that the three candidates I endorse, Eric Alegria, Dave Emenhiser and Jim Knight will keep us on the constructive path the city chose 8 years ago with the 2003 re-election of Doug Stern and the election of Steve Wolowicz and me. Both Doug Stern and Steve Wolowicz have endorsed both Dave Emenhiser and Jim Knight as well. Dave and Jim both have considerable experience serving the city. Dave is a communications executive and a current planning commissioner and also previously chaired the city’s finance committee. Dave is an exceptionally skilled consensus builder. Jim is a retired real estate professional and has been a planning commissioner for 8 years. Jim is exceptionally intelligent and detail oriented. Currently I am the only former planning commissioner on the council. The city has almost always had former planning commissioners on council. Eric is a health care executive. Eric is new to the city but has experience with other city governments and non-profits and is a state commissioner such that he can bring a valuable and different perspective to governing our city. I have seen that Eric is a quick study on the issues facing the city. Our current city manager had not lived in the area before she was hired and yet the perspective she has given us has been very helpful. Many residents of the city moved here relatively recently and deserve a voice as well. Eric can provide that voice.
I am less confident that the 5 candidates I do not endorse will stay on a constructive path and I want to explain why. Unlike most voters I personally know all but one of the candidates and have had an opportunity to learn about their backgrounds and views. I address the candidates I do not endorse in alphabetical order below. Scroll down after my name if you are interested in these thoughts.
Tom Long
Mayor, Rancho Palos Verdes
Susan Brooks is a former one-term councilmember from about a decade ago. She spent much of that term running for Congress. She is a charismatic public speaker, president of her HOA, and has been very involved in local issues, particularly opposition to Marymount’s Measure P, although she is now supported by that Measure’s proponents. Ms. Brooks has been candid about her stand on the issues. She has stressed that the city had half the employees it has now when she was on council. Even though RPV has far fewer public employees and much lower payroll costs than most other cities our size, Brooks will reduce public employment—and services--even further in a quest to return to the “good old days.” Ms. Brooks claims that as mayor she “turned a $2 million budget deficit into a $2 million budget surplus.” But she doesn’t tell you she did so by abdicating the city’s responsibilities. City infrastructure was neglected during Brooks’ prior council term leaving the current council to deal with millions of dollars of deferred maintenance and property damage she and others left behind. Look for Brooks to seek abolition of the storm drain user fee and the utility user tax, which her PVP Watch supporters oppose and which combined make up about 20% of city revenue and are vital to street and storm drain maintenance. We could each save as much as $90 per resident per year as a result, but the impact on our public infrastructure would damage our property values. Brooks and her fellow PVP Watch slate candidates Duhovic and De La Rosa should also be credited with the city employees’ vote to form a union last week. Brooks and her supporters have exaggerated staff salary increases and have falsely stated that the council recently increased pension benefits. The council actually decreased pension benefits to the tune of estimated net savings of $1.2 million to $1.6 million over the next 6 years. By waging an anti-government, anti-staff campaign based on
falsehoods, Brooks and her supporters have given the city a union for the first time in its history. This will lead to increased costs and reduced efficiency and undermines a positive employer-employee relationship that took years to achieve and is instrumental to the city’s success in obtaining competitive grants.
Dora De La Rosa is the President of the School Board where she has served as a trustee for 8 years, a clear demonstration of her commitment to public service. Ms. De La Rosa is well spoken, intelligent, and the only lawyer among the candidates, although she has not actively practiced law for some time. Her views on city issues are a bit of a mystery. Although she is a registered Democrat, her support comes primarily from the Libertarian PVP Watch group, one of whose founders indicated that its goal is “to drive government toward zero” and which consistently opposed the city’s open space preservation policies, recently describing them as “mismanagement.” Ms. De La Rosa declined to answer any questions about her views indicating that “As to specific issues, I will wait until I am seated on the council and have all the information before making any decision on any issue.” In sum, De La Rosa appears to be a mystery candidate. Her prior history does give some clue to her views, though. De La Rosa is a close political ally of Erin LaMonte a PVP Watch member who is currently running for School Board. LaMonte is the former PTA President who, while on a lobbying trip to Sacramento with then Board President De La Rosa met with the state official in charge of the city’s grant application for millions in state funding for the Palos Verdes Nature Preserve to urge the state to reject the city’s application. (Former RPV Mayor Larry Clark confirmed the meeting by talking to the state official involved.) De La Rosa has been unhelpful on other issues important to RPV as well. Under her leadership the school board refused to cooperate with efforts to bring Eastview into the district and efforts to allow military dependents from the LA Air Force base to attend. The board also rejected the city’s advice to put the Peninsula HS lights issue through the normal planning process, instead triggering a lawsuit through a confused and chaotic process that treat
ed both sides of the question unfairly. Finally, as board president, De La Rosa has misapplied the Brown Act suggesting that it forbids board members from responding to public questions and public meetings and has stifled dissent from board members who have sought to change policy or just express an opinion De La Rosa did not like.
Jerry Duhovic is a financial services executive who has donated his time to public service as a member of the city’s finance committee. Jerry is very well spoken and exceptionally intelligent. Although he declined to directly answer my questions, the issues page on his website provides a very good summary of his thinking and is very thoughtful and well written. Mr. Duhovic indicated that he would not accept endorsements from any sitting councilmembers. But he does have the endorsement of PVP Watch and appears to share their views and distrust of city councilmembers, city staff and city government in general. He has also repeated some of the misinformation Brooks and others have spread about city staff benefits and salaries. But his time in city government has been limited to only a couple of years so perhaps with more time he will be able to better focus on the real issues and less on political dogma. Until then I cannot support him despite his good qualifications.
Ken Dyda was on the second city council and was one of the city’s founders and first mayors. No one has given more heart, soul, and time to the city than Ken Dyda and all of what he has given has been motivated purely and solely by a desire to serve the city with no thought to what is in his own best interest. Mr. Dyda is intelligent, well-spoken and a real assert to the city. He served on the council for several months with me filling a temporary vacancy. This allowed me to see that he is definitely up to the job despite his age (late 70s). Mr. Dyda would surely do his best to figure out what is best for the city. However, I think electing Mr. Dyda to council at this time would be wrong. Mr. Dyda is not shy with his opinions, so the new council will have the benefit of his views whether he is elected or not. When he was appointed to serve for a few months he hit the ground running because he was already familiar with all of the issues. He will spend the same amount of time helping the city as an elder statesman (which has been his role now for decades). It is time to develop new leadership for the future and electing Mr. Dyda would only delay developing that new leadership. I am also concerned that as a councilmember Mr. Dyda would micromanage the city. The city has changed in the decades since Mr. Dyda was first elected. It is no longer a brand new city with inexperienced staff. Instead it has a highly professional staff that needs to be allowed to run day to day affairs without improper interference. Indeed state law requires as much, making “councilmanic interference” illegal. The council is a board of directors and sets policy. Day-to-day decisions are handled by staff without favoritism toward the friends of particular councilmembers. Mr. Dyda’s desire to put individual councilmembers into city hall and supervising departments, however well intentioned, would be a serious mistake. Moreover, realistically, Mr. Dyda may no
t be able to serve 2 terms. Term limits means we will be having a lot of turnover on council in the future. We should not make the situation even worse by electing people who are much less likely to be able to serve a second term.
Cynthia Smith is the candidate about whom I know nothing. She did not respond to my efforts to contact her and I have been unable to find a website or any campaign information about her. I have no knowledge of her background or views and have seen no means for me or other voters to learn more about her."
Subject: RPV Council Election November 2011
Message:
October 9, 2011
Dear RPV Residents:
On Tuesday November 8th RPV residents will vote to select 3 new councilmembers to replace Steve Wolowicz, Doug Stern and myself. There are 8 candidates, 7 of whom have been actively campaigning. I have posted connections to the candidates’ webpages here http://www.palosverdes.com/tomlong/index.cfm?go=websites
and answers to my questions here http://www.palosverdes.com/tomlong/index.cfm?go=election2011 RPV TV (Channel 33 on Cox and 38 on Verizon) will be running broadcasts of city council candidate debates every day except Friday at 8 p.m. and school board candidate debates at 10 p.m. also every day except Friday. This election may be among the most important in the city’s history.
Over the last 8 years that Steve, Doug and I have been on council some important changes have been made. The city obtained grant monies that funded the acquisition of the Palos Verdes Nature Preserve, establishing 2 square miles—15% of the city’s land area--as open space in perpetuity. City revenues have increased from about $1 per resident per day to about $1.30. Most of the added revenue has been devoted to increase spending to restore decayed infrastructure that the city had neglected for decades. The council specifically decided to devote all of the new revenues from the Terranea resort to capital improvement projects rather than to the city’s operating budget. We are on the brink of obtaining a $9.4 million grant toward the repair of San Ramon canyon where the city and its staff outdid other applications from much larger agencies. We can also begin to plan for other civic improvements as well if we stay on course. All of this has happened with one of the smallest
city payrolls and employee headcounts and, until last week, without a city employees’ union—unlike most cities.
I am confident that the three candidates I endorse, Eric Alegria, Dave Emenhiser and Jim Knight will keep us on the constructive path the city chose 8 years ago with the 2003 re-election of Doug Stern and the election of Steve Wolowicz and me. Both Doug Stern and Steve Wolowicz have endorsed both Dave Emenhiser and Jim Knight as well. Dave and Jim both have considerable experience serving the city. Dave is a communications executive and a current planning commissioner and also previously chaired the city’s finance committee. Dave is an exceptionally skilled consensus builder. Jim is a retired real estate professional and has been a planning commissioner for 8 years. Jim is exceptionally intelligent and detail oriented. Currently I am the only former planning commissioner on the council. The city has almost always had former planning commissioners on council. Eric is a health care executive. Eric is new to the city but has experience with other city governments and non-profits and is a state commissioner such that he can bring a valuable and different perspective to governing our city. I have seen that Eric is a quick study on the issues facing the city. Our current city manager had not lived in the area before she was hired and yet the perspective she has given us has been very helpful. Many residents of the city moved here relatively recently and deserve a voice as well. Eric can provide that voice.
I am less confident that the 5 candidates I do not endorse will stay on a constructive path and I want to explain why. Unlike most voters I personally know all but one of the candidates and have had an opportunity to learn about their backgrounds and views. I address the candidates I do not endorse in alphabetical order below. Scroll down after my name if you are interested in these thoughts.
Tom Long
Mayor, Rancho Palos Verdes
Susan Brooks is a former one-term councilmember from about a decade ago. She spent much of that term running for Congress. She is a charismatic public speaker, president of her HOA, and has been very involved in local issues, particularly opposition to Marymount’s Measure P, although she is now supported by that Measure’s proponents. Ms. Brooks has been candid about her stand on the issues. She has stressed that the city had half the employees it has now when she was on council. Even though RPV has far fewer public employees and much lower payroll costs than most other cities our size, Brooks will reduce public employment—and services--even further in a quest to return to the “good old days.” Ms. Brooks claims that as mayor she “turned a $2 million budget deficit into a $2 million budget surplus.” But she doesn’t tell you she did so by abdicating the city’s responsibilities. City infrastructure was neglected during Brooks’ prior council term leaving the current council to deal with millions of dollars of deferred maintenance and property damage she and others left behind. Look for Brooks to seek abolition of the storm drain user fee and the utility user tax, which her PVP Watch supporters oppose and which combined make up about 20% of city revenue and are vital to street and storm drain maintenance. We could each save as much as $90 per resident per year as a result, but the impact on our public infrastructure would damage our property values. Brooks and her fellow PVP Watch slate candidates Duhovic and De La Rosa should also be credited with the city employees’ vote to form a union last week. Brooks and her supporters have exaggerated staff salary increases and have falsely stated that the council recently increased pension benefits. The council actually decreased pension benefits to the tune of estimated net savings of $1.2 million to $1.6 million over the next 6 years. By waging an anti-government, anti-staff campaign based on
falsehoods, Brooks and her supporters have given the city a union for the first time in its history. This will lead to increased costs and reduced efficiency and undermines a positive employer-employee relationship that took years to achieve and is instrumental to the city’s success in obtaining competitive grants.
Dora De La Rosa is the President of the School Board where she has served as a trustee for 8 years, a clear demonstration of her commitment to public service. Ms. De La Rosa is well spoken, intelligent, and the only lawyer among the candidates, although she has not actively practiced law for some time. Her views on city issues are a bit of a mystery. Although she is a registered Democrat, her support comes primarily from the Libertarian PVP Watch group, one of whose founders indicated that its goal is “to drive government toward zero” and which consistently opposed the city’s open space preservation policies, recently describing them as “mismanagement.” Ms. De La Rosa declined to answer any questions about her views indicating that “As to specific issues, I will wait until I am seated on the council and have all the information before making any decision on any issue.” In sum, De La Rosa appears to be a mystery candidate. Her prior history does give some clue to her views, though. De La Rosa is a close political ally of Erin LaMonte a PVP Watch member who is currently running for School Board. LaMonte is the former PTA President who, while on a lobbying trip to Sacramento with then Board President De La Rosa met with the state official in charge of the city’s grant application for millions in state funding for the Palos Verdes Nature Preserve to urge the state to reject the city’s application. (Former RPV Mayor Larry Clark confirmed the meeting by talking to the state official involved.) De La Rosa has been unhelpful on other issues important to RPV as well. Under her leadership the school board refused to cooperate with efforts to bring Eastview into the district and efforts to allow military dependents from the LA Air Force base to attend. The board also rejected the city’s advice to put the Peninsula HS lights issue through the normal planning process, instead triggering a lawsuit through a confused and chaotic process that treat
ed both sides of the question unfairly. Finally, as board president, De La Rosa has misapplied the Brown Act suggesting that it forbids board members from responding to public questions and public meetings and has stifled dissent from board members who have sought to change policy or just express an opinion De La Rosa did not like.
Jerry Duhovic is a financial services executive who has donated his time to public service as a member of the city’s finance committee. Jerry is very well spoken and exceptionally intelligent. Although he declined to directly answer my questions, the issues page on his website provides a very good summary of his thinking and is very thoughtful and well written. Mr. Duhovic indicated that he would not accept endorsements from any sitting councilmembers. But he does have the endorsement of PVP Watch and appears to share their views and distrust of city councilmembers, city staff and city government in general. He has also repeated some of the misinformation Brooks and others have spread about city staff benefits and salaries. But his time in city government has been limited to only a couple of years so perhaps with more time he will be able to better focus on the real issues and less on political dogma. Until then I cannot support him despite his good qualifications.
Ken Dyda was on the second city council and was one of the city’s founders and first mayors. No one has given more heart, soul, and time to the city than Ken Dyda and all of what he has given has been motivated purely and solely by a desire to serve the city with no thought to what is in his own best interest. Mr. Dyda is intelligent, well-spoken and a real assert to the city. He served on the council for several months with me filling a temporary vacancy. This allowed me to see that he is definitely up to the job despite his age (late 70s). Mr. Dyda would surely do his best to figure out what is best for the city. However, I think electing Mr. Dyda to council at this time would be wrong. Mr. Dyda is not shy with his opinions, so the new council will have the benefit of his views whether he is elected or not. When he was appointed to serve for a few months he hit the ground running because he was already familiar with all of the issues. He will spend the same amount of time helping the city as an elder statesman (which has been his role now for decades). It is time to develop new leadership for the future and electing Mr. Dyda would only delay developing that new leadership. I am also concerned that as a councilmember Mr. Dyda would micromanage the city. The city has changed in the decades since Mr. Dyda was first elected. It is no longer a brand new city with inexperienced staff. Instead it has a highly professional staff that needs to be allowed to run day to day affairs without improper interference. Indeed state law requires as much, making “councilmanic interference” illegal. The council is a board of directors and sets policy. Day-to-day decisions are handled by staff without favoritism toward the friends of particular councilmembers. Mr. Dyda’s desire to put individual councilmembers into city hall and supervising departments, however well intentioned, would be a serious mistake. Moreover, realistically, Mr. Dyda may no
t be able to serve 2 terms. Term limits means we will be having a lot of turnover on council in the future. We should not make the situation even worse by electing people who are much less likely to be able to serve a second term.
Cynthia Smith is the candidate about whom I know nothing. She did not respond to my efforts to contact her and I have been unable to find a website or any campaign information about her. I have no knowledge of her background or views and have seen no means for me or other voters to learn more about her."
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I wish Mayor Long had used an option to not endorse a third candidate.
It is tough to find what I have found in others in our community who have agreed with me that it might be the better thing to simply endorse candidates that they feel would do the best job in our city and for our residents, without necessarily needing to endorse a candidate for all three of the seats opening up.
It remains difficult for me to stick by my guns with the decision to not have a third endorsement offered. But I feel strongly enough, as others seem to tell me they also do, in endorsing those we feel would be best and remaining silent on who could best fill out the third or sometimes, second endorsement.
There may be some in our city who might also 'endorse' "none of the above", but I hope there are very few of them.
I am still at odds with someone like Tom Long who endorses someone like the wonderful-but-not-credible-enough-candidate Mr. Eric Alegria.
Sure, he may be a progressive Democrat. Yes, he may have a skillset that WILL benefit our city sometime in the future.
Of course he volunteers his time, intelligence and efforts in the greater good.
But he lacks a tenure in our city, with our city and its residents to make him, in my opinion, a candidate who I could vote for in this election.
He was not endorsed by Palos Verdes Peninsula Watch, so I give him great credit for not meeting what I feel is a narrow mindedness toward more progressive views and lasting progress in our city.
I truly feel he would make a wonderful Councilman and Mayor of Rancho Palos Verdes, SOMEDAY, but not in the next four years.
With regards to the paragraphs Mayor Long wrote concerning the five candidates he does not endorse, I am pretty comfortable with what he has written.
I do continue to find it alarming that one of the five appears to have harsh feelings towards a certain 'wealthy' Demorcart she ran against for Congress. Does this mean this candidate deminishes 'wealth' on members of the Democratic Party while possibly celebrating 'wealth' of members of the Republican Party?
Would this same candidate, claiming to be a mediator offer an indication that several members of our current City Council engaged in a possible Brown Act Violation, worded during a Forum for candidates, recently?
I'm not a mediator, so I don't always know when it is best to 'hold my tongue'.
Mayor Long did offer that Mr. Jerry Duhovic has "good qualifications". I think in financial matters, Mr. Duhovic has some good qualifications.
I must hope his qualifications are good because taxpayers paid for his College education at the U.S. Air Force Academy.
Academy grads are top notch people, no matter which academy they received their fully taxpayer funded education at.
The point I am making about a taxpayer-funded education is that is such a recipient of such an education then turns around and begins harsh criticism of taxpayer funded projects and taxation in general, it must come as no shock to that person that they have received a education that will serve them for the rest of their lives and offered them the abilities to grow in stature, wealth, and have some greater possibilities than others who did not receive a full ride from taxpayers.
*NOTE* Jerry's service to our country is something that MUST BE HONORED!. His services to all of us as a member of the U.S. Air Force must also be commended. But that doesn't mean he can't be reminded that his education was paid for by the dimes of other people and his paychecks while serving in the Air Force were also paid by taxpayers, just like mine were when I served as a Non-Com, in the very same Air Force.
O.K. lets continue working on another 'Air Force' theme, but with a different candidate.
I am still working on confirmation about the history regarding Ms. Dora de la Rosa's tenure on the PVPUSD School Board and the attempts and 'contempts' of having the children of U.S. Air Force members, living in San Pedro, attending PVPUSD schools.
There are some in our community who still try and make that issue more 'mirky' than I feel is necessary.
I would hope, as another U.S.A.F. vet, Jerry would also wish to know whether Ms. de la Rosa campaigned against having children with special needs, who are the children of Air Force members attempting to be kept out of schools which have higher test scores but are closer to their homes than schools in El Segundo.
I would also hold out for allowing all children of current members of our military being allowed to attend PVPUSD schools, whether they have special needs or not.
I feel Mayor Long's opinion that Mayor Dyda's election to the new council would delay new leadership in our city, might also be true for the election of Ms. Brooks and/or Ms. de la Rosa, too.
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