• City Council Meeting June 30, 2021

Here are my notes from the June 30th city council meeting. 

1.1 Santa Rosa Plateau Nature Education Foundation (SRPNEF) Special Event Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)

This item was discussed in more than one public comment and ended up being tabled until the next meeting. 

There was some confusing and troubling wording regarding this year's Brewfest that is slated for Marna O'Brien park in October.

In short, the city is "partnering" with Santa Rosa Plateau for this event. I'm in favor of this event, though I would like the language of the terms to be changed from what they were.

Link to event website

Here is what the city will be putting into the event: 

City participation would include, but not limited to providing the following and related services: 

1. Park Fencing 

2. Restroom and Janitorial Services 

3. Providing Security 

4. Trash collection bins and pick up 

5. Traffic Control 

6. Special event signage and traffic barriers 

7. On- Site EMT/First Aid 8. Parking and Shuttle Service if needed.

l support this event

It would be great to see this evolve into Wildomar's signature event. Most cities have yearly events that distinguishes them from their surrounding cities, and I see this as a great opportunity.

What I didn't like was the wording in the MOU. Particularly this part: 

2.0 ALLOCATION OF SPONSORSHIP FUNDS 

    2.1     The sponsorship funds identified in Section 1.1 of this MOU will be first applied toward costs and expenses incurred by the City in relation to the Event at the Park. City will provide Foundation with an estimate of the costs it will incur for each Event that will be applied toward the sponsorship amount 120 days prior to the Event based on an estimated attendance of 4,000 people. The cost estimate will include any and all costs incurred by the City associated with the Event, including but not limited to: permit fees, public safety staffing and services, temporary barricades or fencing installed at the Park, parking and traffic control costs, shuttle, sanitation costs including restroom stocking, portable toilets, trash receptacles and pickup and janitorial services. 

    2.2 If the cost estimate provided pursuant to Section 2.1 is less than fifteen thousand dollars ($15,000) the City will allocate the remaining sponsorship amount toward Event marketing and promotion expenses. Foundation will present to City a marketing plan and budget for approval. If approved by City, the City will create a purchase order with Foundation to enable payments to be made to Foundation for approved marketing expenses. Foundation will submit an invoice to City detailing the Event marketing-related expenses incurred in sufficient detail so that City can verify the expenses were pre-approved. No more than one invoice will be submitted each month. City agrees to pay each undisputed invoice within thirty days. 

As I said, I support this signature event in the making, and I'm ok with the city spending up to $15,000 on it. 

Nice things cost money, and even if you aren't personally down with it, even if it's not something you personally are going to attend, that doesn't mean it's not a good event for the city to sponsor.

What I'm not ok with, and will not support is if the language above remains in the MOU. Staff time and the things mentioned in the list are costly enough, but still understandable. What is not understandable to me is gifting cash to the plateau, if there's any left in the $15,000 budget.

We shall see if it gets hammered out, I hope so. 

3.1 Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) Policy and Resolution Implementing (35 minute mark of the meeting)

The city is going to install 14 cameras throughout the city that will be used for investigative purposes. Seems like a great deal for under $40K per year and the start up costs are small too. Plus, this is year to year and a lease, we won't be buying the equipment that may well be out of date in five years, and it can be discontinued if so desired.

A slide from the presentation that showed the success in a local city.

I voted yes for this. 

I can hear the civil libertarians out there decrying this as an unconstitutional intrusion on our rights. Sorry, I disagree. It's the out of control civil libertarians that have greatly contributed to cities having their hands tied when it comes to urban campers. 

For the complete presentation and discussion please watch the video link below. 

3.2 Wildomar Active Transportation Plan

Here's my take. 

This is something that is forced on all cities to do. The work done by staff was top notch, but that doesn't mean it makes sense when looked at through the prism of reality.

80% of the people that responded to the survey said the current biking conditions in Wildomar are neutral or difficult. I'm not sure if you can read the options listed in the graphic, but high temperatures wasn't among the "challenges" options to choose from.

We all know it's going to get parked on a shelf until it has to be updated some distant time in the future... where it will then go back on a shelf, again, for another generation, ad infinitum until the Earth falls into the Sun. 

Thank you Sacramento, nothing like forcing all the cities in the state to do expensive work that will never see the light of day. 

Since I knew that was the case, I didn't bother going into everything that didn't logically measure up but I did ask about something in the agenda packet, but not gone over in the meeting.

I mentioned that I was confused by the cost of the #1 Bike Project – Sedco Boulevard Bike Lanes & Roundabouts.

I took the position that even if we were gifted this money, I couldn't imagine voting for something like this. This was probably a pretty cool street before the freeway got put in, but why would we put roundabouts there (even in a report that is going straight to the shelf)?

I thought I was making a reasonable point that temps are too hot and distances too far in our part of the world to address WRCOG's stated goal of By providing more bicycle lanes and better connections between existing bicycle lanes, WRCOG jurisdictions can increase the viability of bicycling as an emission-free commute option.

Come on Emperor (WRCOG), you're as necked as a jay bird and I'm happy to point it out to you since everyone else seems to think that you're decked out in some highly bedazzled duds.

[CAPLOCKS WARNING]

NO ONE IS EVER GOING TO COMMUTE BY BICYCLE IN ANY PART OF SOUTHWESTERN RIVERSIDE COUNTY. NOT NOW, NOT NEVER [sic]. 

Therefore, the idea of creating "emission free commuting options" with bike lanes is flat out bogus. 

But my colleagues all disagreed with me, sort of.

None of them actually tried to refute my points about it being too hot here to commute by bicycle, or that the distances were too far for such a thing to even be considered in polite company. 

Instead they all seemed to praise bicycles in one fashion or another, but not one of them mentioned the point that this item wasn't about recreation, but about workers commuting by bike in hopes of reducing GhG emissions. 

So, I chimed back in with, "I love bikes, but it's 100 degrees here often and it's far from one street to another." Which brought a good laugh from those in attendance.

3.5 Position Classification Schedule Update (1:35:00 in the video)

This is where the the cart came off the rails a touch. 

The updated pay rates for city employees showed very generous compensation marks for all who work at the city, especially the closer to the top of the pyramid you get.

Mayor: I haven't verified the numbers, so I'm just asking the question [...] have you been able to check any of that, does it add up (referencing the above graphic)?
Robert Howell: Based on what we put in the budget plan for 22-23 it does, but however that number (regarding the assistant city manager salary) is high, but will be adjusted downward when we get to (indecipherable).

If you look at the numbers, our staff gets far more than their counterparts in the private sector (and believe it or not, they do have counterparts). I'm talking about comparable work, with comparable responsibilities and comparable education requirements.

The rest of the council doesn't see what I see, and that's ok.

Where things went off the rails is when counterarguments were nothing more than weak strawman attempts to belittle my points.

Maybe my points don't hold up, if that's the case, ATTACK THE POINTS, don't put words into my mouth.

I used a district manager of Home Depot as an example.

According to reputable sources on the net, they have a salary range of about $120K to $180K according to salary.com. Other sites like glassdoor and ZipRecruiter also offered figures on the position.

Please show me where the qualifications and requirements of this job are less stringent than the jobs in Wildomar. Having different opinions, even about city salaries, shouldn't be the cause for resorting to logical fallacies.

As a refutation of my points that our staff compensation nearly dwarfs what their counterparts make in the private sector, this was a offered: 

"We could go get the guy from Home Depot for $95K per year and we'd get crap service. He doesn't know what he's doing [when it comes to running a city]. The guy may be really good at separating paint, and ordering supplies but [won't know the finer points of running a city]."

My brain was melting.

Where did I even suggest to pay $95K? Or that I was talking about any particular position?

Did you honestly think I was suggesting that anyone from HD's paint department could run our city, or head any other department? Really?

I used the District Manager position for a reason, and not a local store manager, because I was looking for similar levels of expertise and responsibilities to illustrate a point. 

How is that lost on people? 

Watch the video, perhaps I'm plumb loco, or perhaps I just have different opinions that, if you want to argue against, how about let's go apples for apples and just attack what I actually said and not something that sounds close to what I said? 

I ended up interrupting two of my colleagues when they tried to rephrase my points into something ridiculous. Both were on Zoom, and perhaps it's time to no longer allow that option unless someone is truly on vacation or laid up in the hospital.

I do owe an apology to my colleagues for not allowing them to intentionally mischaracterize my points in attempts to make thier points stronger. I should have exercised better decorum and addressed it when it was my turn to speak. Lesson learned.

Public Comment of the Night 

The prize goes to Veronica Langworthy when she called us out for only having 2 of the 5 members of the council actually at the dais. 

She pointed out how all five members were basically cheek to cheek "in close proximity" at a ribbon cutting for Stiiizy (Wildomar's first cannabis retailer) just a few days earlier, but used Governor Newsome's emergency covid rules to continue using zoom instead of attending in person. I have to agree with her. 

Veronica Langworthy:  "[...] all five of you were at the opening of that business, in person, very close and no partitions between you... jus' sayin'."                                          

Veronica made a great point.

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The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.

– Dolly Parton

Wildomar Rap is neither rain nor rainbow, more like condensation on the outside of a glass of iced tea on a hot day.

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