How Awesomely Great are Emeryville's City Council Members? Their Bronze Plaques Tell Us

Why in Hell Would the Emeryville City Council

 Brag About Christie Park With its 

Shameful 2636 Residents Per Acre?

How About a Plaque Reading "On This Site, the City of Emeryville Sold Out the Residents"

Opinion
What’s the adage about mushrooms sprouting after a rainfall?  It’s been raining a lot in Emeryville recently and we’ve noticed mushrooms are popping up everywhere.  But so too are commemorative bronze plaques extolling the would be great works of our City Council members.  Unlike the mushroom/rain nexus, Emeryville’s bronze plaques don’t come as a result of rain, rather they pop up upon completion of any construction project that could be conceived as having public benefit. After the rains quit, the mushrooms disappear.  But embarrassingly, the bronze plaques in our town remain, their numbers only increasing over time.

Bronze Plaques Give Emeryville the Opportunity for
Over The Top Brobdingnagian Hyperbole
"A city is not gauged by its length and width, but by the broadness
of its vision and the height of its dreams" reads the Herb Caen
quote.  Emeryville dreams of a city with 2636 residents per acre
of parkland.  How's that for a vision? 
Hey Council members: Mr Caen wasn't talking about Emeryville
with its worst park-to-resident ratio in the Bay Area.
Stop devaluing his name.

With so many of these 'informative' plaques sprouted up in Emeryville, by now, there can be no question about it; the City Council members are all awesomely great.  Or at least so say the ubiquitous bronze plaques the Council shamelessly installs all over our town.

We’ve never seen a town so big on congratulating itself. Maybe it’s because they screw up so often, they're trying to show us when they don’t.  Maybe the plaques are meant to serve as a tail wagging the dog counter narrative. It’s like our City Council is repeatedly engaging in one big conspicuous, Trumpian, in-your-face selfie after another.  It’s all because they want us to know they’re doing the job we pay them to do.

Or not.
Sometimes a plaque will present a project associated with and in tribute of the Council members, but it’s all out of proportion to what’s actually been built.  Sometimes it directly contradicts what's been built.
Take the recently rebuilt Christie Park upgrade and expansion far example. The plaque installed on the site brags that the council members are responsible for the newly expanded park.  But what it is not telling us is that the park they provided is substandard and in gross violation of the City’s own General Plan.

Council member Jac Asher voted 'NO' to a plaque at the
Center of Community Life.  After she was rebuffed by her glory
seeking colleagues, she said at least to keep her name off the plaque.
But bronze plaques can't be fought apparently, even by
modest Council members.  
Emeryville has a bad case of plaque build up.  

The Christie Park expansion that the City Council thinks is so great is anemic at less than half an acre of new park land added to the existing park.  The park expansion was paid for by the developer of the Public Marketplace project in trade for all the new rental units being built there.  That small size of park expansion (.46 acres to be precise) clocks in at an astounding 2,636 new residents per acre of park land. That number is helping drag down Emeryville’s whole town existing total of residents per acre of park land (a little over 500), already the worst among Bay Area cities. The Marketplace development project will bring 1,213 new residents (using the standard Emeryville formula of 1.8 residents per housing unit times the planned total 674 units the project brings).

The park acreage per resident ratio for housing projects is not to exceed three acres per 1000 new residents according to our General Plan.  Therefore Christie Park should have been expanded by a minimum of 3.6 acres to properly offset the new residents the Market Place project brings.  An additional amount of approximately one acre would be needed to offset all the new workers in the retail and office spaces generated by the project according to the General Plan.  Combining the two, the total amount of park acres to offset this project needs to be approximately four and a half acres instead of .46 acre. 

So the total amount of park land the people of Emeryville were screwed out of when the Council approved the Market Place development was about four acres.  Hiding that colossal screw up, they audaciously installed a vanity plaque of disinformation at the park telling us how great they are.  Christie Park: Far more pan-worthy than praiseworthy….but it gets a bronze plaque regardless.

These plaques our Council keep putting up will someday be seen like index fossils in the world of paleontology: representative of a very specific time and place.  In this case, of and suited to this time of Trump's America when people felt justified to wallow in narcissism and when government felt less constrained by public service and more animated by tooting its own horn.  And in the case of the Christie Park plaque, lying by omission.
What we need is some righteous truth presented in the commons to serve as a counter narrative to what the City Council is serving up and with equal audacity.  Graffiti artists, if you're listening....   

Emeryville Public Library: Promised, Not Delivered

Library Bait & Switch?

We Paid $95 Million for a Library, 

Where Is It?

Public Cafe, Jobs Training Center and Solar Panels 
Also Promised But Missing

City/School District Won't Say 

In 2010, the 73% of Emeryville voters who voted to tax themselves $95 million for a public library at the Emeryville Center of 'Community' Life and have seen their property taxes go up commensurately now that the Center has been finished these past five months, would be expected to wonder why no such library has been built. These same residents might also wonder why the job training center they also paid for has not been provided at the ECCL, nor has the cafe associated with the library they paid for been built.  Additionally, they voted for solar panels on the roof at the Center of 'Community' Life, presumably saving these same taxpayers money on electricity.  It was all paid for but none of it has been provided.
Distressingly, a year after the Tattler began a campaign to get some public accountability on this paid for infrastructure, we're no farther along as far as answers are concerned.  Officials at the City of Emeryville and the Emery School District still publicly say eventually these amenities will be built but they're not saying when, "We are exploring that" says City Manager Carolyn Lehr.
Privately, two officials who wished to remain anonymous told us they doubt these promised projects of the ECCL will ever get built.


Before the Measure J election in 2010, a public record in documents and video recordings of promises to provide the amenities was built up, leaving the City and the School District now exposed.  Measure J was the ballot initiative that brought the Center of 'Community' Life and was famously oversold as many have pointed out.  What beckoned at the ECCL as an aching to be filled up wish list for politicians seeking favor, easy in 2010, now becomes a sword of Damocles it would seem.

Former City Councilwoman Jennifer West who urged passage of Measure J told the Tattler recently she is particularly concerned about the fact that the public library with its promised public cafe has not been built, "The Council and the staff need to understand this was the goal.  It was sold to the public as part of the ECCL package" she said.
Ms West told prospective voters on her Council blog in 2010 to vote for Measure J, stating, "The library is another need in our area. According to the Oakland Public Library, this geographical area is under served and needs an expansion or an additional library.  A great school needs a library as well and by combining the library needs of both the schools and the public, we can create the efficiencies of scale to serve all users much better."  The former Mayor West used her blog to warn the community to remain vigilant, presciently expressing concern about "trust in our elected officials and leaders on this project".

The jobs training center was to be available for students at Emery but also it was sold to voters as an integral part of the Community Center and its services were to be available to the whole community.  The jobs center isn't even on the radar at this point; Pedro Jimenez, head of the Emeryville Community Services Department told the Tattler, "I'm unaware of it" and he said he doesn't know where it would even go if it were to be built.
Racks of solar panels that the voters authorized and taxpayers paid for at the ECCL were supposed to have been installed offsetting the electrical tab and saving taxpayers money but they have not been and officials would not say whether there are any specific plans to install them.

The public library, the job training center and the solar panels were explicitly part of the Measure J bond project list that was approved by voters in 2010 and likely must be provided by law since general obligation bond financing was used under the aegis of the Securities and Exchange Commission and the laws commensurate with that body.  Failure to comply with the terms of the bond sales could constitute fraud.
The cafe, as promised in City and School District documents as well as elucidated in many public meetings leading up to the vote, is not required by law to build, just ethics.

By 2015, it was becoming clear the ECCL project would not deliver all that was promised prompting then Emery School Board member and now City Councilman Christian Patz to muse, "Philosophically I agree with a lot of the concepts [of the ECCL]" he told the Hechinger Report, "but the execution has not been as promised".
Former Mayor Jac Asher was less circumspect, telling the Hechinger Report she didn't think the shared space idea behind the school/public library then touted would work, being "oversubscribed" as she said it would be.  The small parcel size of the ECCL space would drive this oversubscribing she said and called attempts to work out joint use by all stakeholders a 'logistical nightmare' for teachers and staff.

As far as the City of Emeryville is concerned as of now, these promised amenities will be built eventually but they refuse to commit to a date, "I can't give a date..." said Carolyn Lehr Emeryville City Manager, "it's not a simple thing".  However she did acknowledge the City is on the hook for providing the promised infrastructure, "I understand we're charged with bringing it forward" she said.

 

Emeryville Loses Two Game Changing Council Members; Our Worst and Best Ever

Nora Davis: Worst Council Member Ever

Jac Asher: Best Council Member Ever

News Analysis

December 6th, 2016, is a red letter date in Emeryville history.  On this date our town is presented with the final curtain call for two influential political personages; one with more than a generation in command, the other having logged a scant five years at the helm. Both however have been extremely consequential.  The retiring two represent near polar opposite views of governance; one from old Emeryville with its very limited vision of the role of government, a hands off pro-business approach, the other from our new way of imagining ourselves with a more active role for government expressing our values in the public arena.  On December 6th, we lose both these City Council members; Nora Davis, very likely the worst Council member we’ve ever had and Jac Asher, almost certainly the best we’ve ever had.  

120 Years:
Very likely Emeryville's
worse Council member ever-
Nora Davis

As they now take their leave and head for the exits, it is an auspicious moment to take stock in how these two have come to represent their conflicting views of the proper role of governance in our town and also to note that Ms Davis’ pro- developer/business philosophy, while long dominate, will likely have no role in Emeryville’s future.

120 Years:
Almost certainly Emeryville's
best Council member ever-
Jac Asher

Councilwoman Nora Davis, having served almost 30 years on the City Council, longer than any other in our 120 year history, used her prodigious political acumen to consolidate power and craft our town as developers have seen fit.  Ironically given her position of wielding near supreme power for decades and her wall-to-wall civic boosterism rhetoric, Councilwoman Davis always felt Emeryville was not worthy, not a real power center municipality.  This was reflected in her perennial and central philosophic position that the best Emeryville could ever hope for is that developers would pay attention to us.  

Ms Davis has always been fond of reminding citizens that when she started out on the Council, Emeryville was a blank slate; mostly abandoned factories and nineteenth century warehouses and such.  A blank slate and ripe for development it was and Councilwoman Davis was wont to give the town over to developers.

Of course as everyone knows, developers DID pay attention to us and the town that was built is the town that reflects Nora Davis’ philosophy.  It is not a town that was planned, regardless the copious planning documents ensconced in City Hall, rather it is a town built by developers chasing market ephemera seeking to maximize profits for their shareholders.  Ms Davis’ vision is to put developers in the driver’s seat and she has always maintained that is how we will get the best town possible.  Her vision has never wavered, even as it became increasingly clear that Emeryville is actually blessed with an envious geographical location and seeing developer’s interests as intrinsically sacrosanct, she never leveraged our strengths to drive a higher quality of development that would have served the resident’s interests. 

Ms Davis always placed business interests at the top of her agenda during her near 30 years in power but her biggest legacy is to be found in the built environment and her predilection to empower developers as her default position.  Along with her colleagues of like mind, the Councilwoman changed our town plenty over the years but not in ways that the residents would benefit with her ‘put developers first’ philosophy.  Quite the opposite actually.  Over her tenure, the primary things people claim to like in their neighborhoods have gotten measurably worse, like acreage of parks per resident, traffic and congestion, affordability, home ownership, locally serving retail and family friendliness.  The Emeryville Tattler will present documentary evidence of this slide and Ms Davis’ role in it with a series called The Emeryville Truth & Reconciliation Project coming soon.

Councilwoman Davis used her clout to green light a huge amount of development clearing out historical buildings, leaving our town with virtually no old buildings.  Market forces being what they are, this ‘new building condition' promises to lock our town into what we now have for the foreseeable future.  Like it or not, after the build out of the last few approved projects now in the pipeline, there’s not going to be any substantial change in Emeryville’s built environment.  As a result, our town, a town with tremendous potential 30 years ago is now substantially set owing to developer returns on investments.  The town we see is Nora Davis’ town, unerringly built by her developer friends according to the protean dictates of real estate market particularities over the past years.

Jac Asher, having served for five years at the dais on the other hand, has not been a pro-developer ideologue.  She inherited a town largely decided by her colleague Ms Davis. Instead of bringing development, Councilwoman Asher concentrated on two things; bringing fiscal health and stability as well as accountability to City Hall and reshaping our government to reflect Emeryville values.  

For all Nora Davis’ crowing about Emeryville’s budget, it has been Jac Asher that has actually delivered on that score.  Whereas Ms Davis produced austerity budgets with her lowest-in-the-Bay Area developer fees, Councilwoman Asher wasn’t blind to Emeryville’s real estate value and she worked to increase our developer fees and other revenue streams to reflect that value.  
Most consequential though was her work to change our town to a ‘charter city’, thereby bringing in literally millions of dollars every year to our General Fund.  Ms Asher fought the entrenched right wing in our town and the largest lobbying organization in Sacramento, the California Association of Realtors who pulled out all the stops to defeat the charter city ballot initiative.  Vastly outspent by these real estate special interests, she used her own money to inform Emeryville voters of the utility in becoming a charter city to enable us to tap into real estate transactions as other cities do.  Jac showed us she isn’t opposed to development but she worked to ensure developers paid their fair share for the benefit of the whole community.   
Before the charter city vote when Nora Davis ran the show, Emeryville collected 55 cents per 1000 square feet of building, now we collect $12 per 1000, still less than our neighboring cities but a vast improvement - bringing huge relief to our formally strapped budget now and into the future.

Councilwoman Asher wasn’t interested in collecting money from developers and businesses, leveraging our real value, just to do it.  She has had a goal in mind; to steer City Hall to provide amenities for residents and to use the largess of government to help the least fortunate and most vulnerable among us.  From her single handed saving of the Emeryville Child Development Center (Nora Davis fought that) to dramatically increasing funding for the Community Services Department, Councilwoman Asher used her turn in power to turn our city’s direction 180 degrees to a place that reflects our values.  

In addition to the help she has brought to residents, she has also used City Hall to offset Nora Davis' legacy and atone for the decades of chain store formula regional shopping mall development in our town and all the non-livable minimum wage jobs produced as a result.  With Emeryville’s landmark Minimum Wage Ordinance Councilwoman Asher was instrumental in passing, Emeryville now has moved from a locus of suffering and oppression to a place that treats the lowest paid among us with dignity, with a living wage (alas, we’re still an auto-centric place filled with suburban style shopping malls).  Again, in contrast to Ms Davis, Ms Asher saw our town as having value that can be leveraged to bring something positive for the whole community.

During their respective eras, the two Councilwoman concluded opposite findings about our town that propelled their competing visions.  Nora Davis saw an Emeryville of little value while  Councilwoman Jac Asher saw Emeryville as having great value.  One was essentially negative, the other positive. One used public policy to enrich the wealthiest among us, the other used it to enrich the whole community.  
It is Jac Asher’s vision for our town that has been shown to have resonance with Emeryville’s values; she wasn’t a push-over for developers and business interests and she kept a community perspective on the proper role of government. And that makes Jac Asher the best City Council member this city has ever had.  Ms Davis in contrast can fairly be put at the bottom of the heap, at least in modern Emeryville history.  

Regarding the 30 year tenure of Nora Davis versus the five years for Jac Asher; that’s been a disturbing pattern reflected in other City Council members over the years here in Emeryville.  It’s been our reoccurring bad fortune based on the lack of a community newspaper that the best Council members tend to be short lived here while the bad ones tend to go on and on.  And on and on and on in Nora Davis’s case.

And so they leave us now, these two game changers for Emeryville; one who over a generation squandered a never again to be seen opportunity in service of a select corporate elite only to open a path for the other who clawed back at least a way forward from that cynicism to reveal a polity that works for the whole community.

Staff Now Says 'Back-Up Beepers Can't Be Disabled'- Who Could Have Known?

Back-Up Beepers at ECCL Morph From 

'Deal Breaker' to 'No Big Deal'

As it turns out, back-up beepers on heavy construction equipment can't be silenced to satisfy noise ordinance restrictions we found out at the June 21st City Council meeting.  Who could have known that?  Emeryville's city staff?  Could they have known?  Perhaps Turner Construction, were they in any position to know?  How about John Baker, our ECCL construction consultant representative, is this something we could expect him to know?   The answer is apparently no one could have known, regardless of all the public money being doled out to know this kind of thing.

The thing is Cal/OSHA doesn't permit back-up beepers to be disabled on construction equipment.  But nobody paid to know that in Emeryville knew that.  Perhaps they're not paid enough.

The Emeryville City Council is concerned about all the construction delays at the Center of 'Community' Life.  They're so concerned that they granted Turner Construction a waiver of our Noise Ordinance so they can work on Saturdays starting in April.  Construction however is loud and neighbors have a reasonable expectation of quiet weekends...at least that's what City Hall said when the City Council passed our Noise Ordinance.
But not to worry, the new progressive City Council majority doesn't grant waivers willy nilly to developers like the previous Council did.  So this time they assured neighbors their reasonable expectations of quiet weekends will be taken seriously and so the Council required Turner to disable the loud back-up beepers on the heavy equipment being used.  All parties, the staff, Turner Construction and John Baker our construction consultant agreed this was the reasonable thing to do and so a contract disabling the back-up beepers was signed.



Oops!  Strike that!  The loud back-up beepers, a deal breaker at the April 5th Council meeting when the waiver was granted have now become no big deal they say.  By last Tuesday's meeting, concern over beepers had all changed.  Now Turner can beep away says our City Council and they still get their waiver.  What happened?  The City Council made no attempt to quantify the noise from back-up beepers, formerly determined by them to be excessive, citing instead the need to finish the ECCL project.

City Hall now holds that residents won't be told what constitutes a reasonable expectation of quiet weekends, however with regard to its imbroglio over back-up beepers at the Center of 'Community' Life, Councilwoman Jac Asher spoke for her colleagues, shifting blame to John Baker, our Turner Construction go-between working under contract ($1.2 million) with the City.

Ms Asher put it bluntly to Mr Baker, "Our staff takes the blame for being unaware of the OSHA regulations.  What I don't understand is why were you not aware of the OSHA regulations?  Isn't construction and management of construction projects what you do and what you're being paid for?"

John Baker's haltingly staccato response, unclear in its presentation, makes clear what's going on between the City of Emeryville, Turner Construction and Mr Baker himself as the ECCL construction struggles across the scheduled August finish line.  By way of an answer to Ms Asher's charge, he told the Council, "What, what occurred is when we, we started doing the Saturday work, there was some equipment that when, when, when, uh, Turner went to disable the back-up beepers, uh...we were not aware."

John Baker, Emeryville's Construction Consultant for ECCL
On the Job
"What, what... uh when, when, when, uh... we
were not aware" = $1.2 million

Revenue Numbers From Contested Real Estate Tax Reveal $3.4 Million Boon For City Hall

Real Estate Transfer Tax Rains Money 

on Emeryville

Emeryville's general fund received $3.4 million in calendar year 2015 under a new real estate transfer tax voted in by the electorate in November of 2014 according City Hall, an amount far exceeding what the City has hauled in during any other year for these transactions.  The tax, called the Real Property Transfer Tax (RPTT), was dramatically increased when Emeryville voters passed 2014's Measures U&V that transformed the town into a 'charter city' that enabled the revenue increase on real estate transfers and was panned in the run up to the election by the business community and outside lobbying groups including the powerful Sacramento based California Association of Realtors.

Councilwoman
Jac Asher
Urged passage of the
real estate transfer tax
in spite of dire warnings
from Sacramento lobbyists. 

The formerly cash strapped Emeryville took in a $3,397595 windfall for 2015, the first full year of transfer taxes at the new rate which became effective on January 1st, 2015 the City announced last week.  This compares to calendar year 2014 under the old tax rate when the City took in just $475,001 despite a vigorous real estate churn.  Before Emeryville voters approved the switch, real estate taxes were charged at the rate of 55 cents per $1000 of value, the maximum a 'General Law' city can charge versus unlimited but set at $12 by the City Council now that Emeryville is a 'Charter City'.  By comparison, one real estate transfer last year, the sale of Emery Tech on Hollis Street, netted City Hall's coffers more than a million dollars alone.

Supporters of the Charter City Initiative, including its chief backer and progenitor Councilwoman Jac Asher, told voters before the November 2014 election much revenue could be gained by raising the tax rate and the numbers released last week tend to vindicate Ms Asher.
Emeryville had stood alone as a general law city among its charter city neighbors Ms Asher reminded voters and the City Hall had left some $21 million on the table with its former anemic 55 cent rate over the last few years.

Jason Crouch
Real estate salesman
and former Chair of the
Emeryville Chamber of Commerce:
If Emeryville voters approve
this real estate transfer fee,
"It's the beginning of the end
for Emeryville". 

The NO on Measures U&V side said passage of the Charter City Initiative and the increasing of the real estate transfer tax would bring a domino effect of general business failure and real estate collapse to Emeryville, even possible bankruptcy for City Hall.  Former Chamber of Commerce Chair Jason Crouch posited himself as point man for the NO on Measures U&V and he hosted public forums warning of the dire consequences to befall Emeryville if the voters said yes to the higher tax rate even though at $12 per $1000, the new rate is still lower than what Berkeley or Oakland charges.  "It will be the beginning of the end for the Emeryville we know and love" the Vallejo resident said.

Voters soundly rejected incessant pleadings in the 2014 election from the NO side in the form of volumes of mailers from portions of the Emeryville business community and especially the California Real Estate Association who dumped more than $85,000 to defeat the two measures.

The money from the new tax, more than $300 for every woman, man and child in Emeryville, pays for among other things, sidewalk repair, park maintenance, street maintenance, landscaping and other needed infrastructure work.

Breaking News- Negoiations Complete, City Council Calls Developer's Bluff, Major Concessions for Residents

Market Place Developer Concedes: Will Build Affordable Family Friendly Housing

Progressive City Council Majority/Residents 

Emerge Victorious

Details are leaking out of City Hall today bringing light to what's shaping up to be a major victory for affordable housing in negotiations with the developer of the Market Place development at the hands of the progressive Council majority.  Details have not been confirmed but insiders tell the Tattler that City Center Realty Partners, the developer of the contentious Market Place development, finally folded and accepted the Council majority's terms for building more affordable units, now some 50 in total as well as increasing the number of family friendly units to match what is required by City Ordinance.

The project located at the existing Public Market on Shellmound Street, originally planned for 33 affordable units in the 456 total rental unit mix.  That plan was rejected by Council members Jac Asher, Dianne Martinez and Scott Donahue (the progressive majority).  The new plan, now agreed to by the developer calls for 50 affordable units, bring the project at or very nearly at parity with what exists in Emeryville as far as affordability goes town-wide in terms of percentage, a progressive Council majority goal.
In addition to rejecting the non-parity affordable housing, the progressive Council majority also rejected the "family flexible" plan put forth by the developer.  After negotiation, City Center Realty Partners now agrees to build actual family friendly units as called for by the City's new family friendly housing ordinance.  Originally the developer sought to ignore the new ordinance and instead build some number of what City Center called "family flexible" units, a cheapening of the provisions laid out in the ordinance.

Notably, veteran Council members Ruth Atkin and Nora Davis voted in favor of the previous iteration of the Market Place development, the deal favored by the developer, with only 33 affordable units and no family friendly units.

Details of the negotiations and the final agreement will be revealed at Tuesday's City Council meeting.

East Bay Express on Emeryville Development & the New Progressive Council Majority

From the East Bay Express:

Emeryville Is Finally Rethinking Development 

The East Bay's tiny development powerhouse is rethinking how it grows, with an eye toward building more affordable and family-friendly housing and funding public services.

By Darwin BondGraham @Darwinbondgraha

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Print

click to enlarge

• BERT JOHNSON
• Dianne Martinez is one of three progressives that now hold a council majority in Emeryville.

During the heyday of redevelopment, Emeryville was practically rolling in cash. An A-list of real estate developers lined up to build thousands of housing units and massive shopping malls. The compact East Bay burg, much of it a blighted and toxic landscape of hollowed-out factories, quickly morphed into a sparkling model of new urbanism. From 2000 to 2010, Emeryville's population expanded by 46 percent, but the city, a veritable growth machine, added housing faster than people, growing its stock by 56 percent. Emeryville's leaders took advantage of nearby Berkeley's aversion to big-box stores, adding retailers who generate millions in sales taxes.

But growth under this regime created problems — problems that have mushroomed in recent years, threatening the social fabric of the city. Emeryville's redevelopment-era regime raised money based on the expected future tax revenues that new retail and housing would generate, and channeled these funds into building even more housing, retail, and office buildings through the city's redevelopment agency. But under the rules of redevelopment, new property tax revenues raised in the city's redevelopment zones — which covered a full 95 percent of Emeryville — couldn't be used by the school district, transit agencies, and other public agencies responsible for essential services.

"Revenues just went back into more development," explained Emeryville Councilmember Jac Asher. "If you're building for a population that doesn't need or want schools, public transit, or more money for parks, that kind of financing makes sense, but what you end up doing is building housing and neglecting all those other things people need for a community."

The rest of the story is HERE.

Community Swimming Pool 2x Over Budget, Behind Schedule

School District Bungles Emeryville's Community Pool

Four Months Late

$700,000 Initial Price Balloons to Almost $2 Million

Emeryville's community swimming pool, a joint use facility located at the Center of 'Community' Life (ECCL) construction site and used by the Emery School District and the entire Emeryville community, is now projected to cost more than double original claims and will be finished well past its original time line schedule according to a representative for the City and School District.  John Baker of Swinerton Construction, the District's and the City's  paid representative overseer of Turner Construction, the ECCL general contractor, told Emeryville's elected officials at a City/Schools joint meeting Thursday night the pool will likely cost nearly $2 million, some $1.3 million more than budgeted, and will not be completed until November, more than four months late.

Mr Baker said the cost overruns can be attributed to Turner Construction not anticipating the need for a more 'robust' filtration system and other obsolete equipment in the existing pool mechanical room.

Remodeling and upgrading the community pool has been part of the ECCL construction project since its inception several years ago, but a shocked City Council and School Board learned Thursday this critical part of the project is not in the construction bid and was instead simply given a cost estimate and folded into the budget.  The ECCL construction bid is subject to hard fast numbers called a Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) but the community pool was not included in that metric Mr Baker said.
The project has a set aside contingency fund to handle cost overruns and change orders but the overage at the community pool will virtually wipe out the fund, it was announced.  Presumably, further cost overruns will be covered by the taxpayers as extra costs for the project.

Upon hearing the part of the Center of 'Community' Life that's not protected by a bid guarantee will be more than double what was advertised, several elected officials at the meeting expressed dismay and incredulity, "how convenient" Councilwoman Jac Asher said.   School Board member Christian Patz vowed to get money back, regardless of the bad news, "I Googled 'olympic sized pool cost' and found it should cost around a million dollars, for a new pool" he told the Swinerton representative.

No Community in a Community Pool?
Perhaps the most shocking revelation of the evening was the explanation offered as to why the cost has more than doubled for the pool; Turner Construction, the general contractor and builder of the ECCL from the beginning, did not anticipate the community would use the community pool at the Center of Community Life.  Mr Baker indicated Turner thought the pool was for the School District's exclusive use, not the community's and that's the reason for a much more robust filtration system than had been planned when the costs were first calculated.
Further, apparently nobody at Turner ever bothered to check the existing pool room to confirm the state of the equipment there before the pool cost estimate was prepared.  That outmoded equipment will have to be upgraded for the hard use of a community pool Mr Baker said.  These two reasons were offered to the City Council and School Board as the primary reasons for the more than 100% cost overrun for the pool remodel, double the cost of a new similarly sized pool if Board member Patz is correct.

Emeryville City Council Contingent at 'Fight for $15" Rally

4/5ths of Emeryville City Council Fights for Nation-Wide $15 Minimum Wage

Mayor Addresses Large Berkeley Rally

Emeryville Contingent
Left to right: Dianne Martinez, Jac Asher,
Ruth Atkin, Scott Donahue

Today the Mayor of Emeryville led a contingent of four out of the five City Council members to petition for a nationwide $15 minimum wage at a large rally at UC Berkeley's Sproul Plaza.  The protest rally, some 1500 strong, was organized by 'Fight For $15', an international activist conglomerate comprised chiefly of fast food workers agitating for $15 minimum wage laws.  Labor Unions joined social activist groups and students at the famous UC Berkeley site of the 1960's Free Speech Movement where Emeryville Mayor Ruth Atkin was the featured kick-off speaker.
Mayor Atkin chronicled Emeryville's recent foray into its own path to $15 minimum wage, noting Emeryville's leadership role.  Many in the crowd seemed to be unaware but pleasantly surprised by Emeryville's new prominent position in labor rights.  It would seem our business friendly reputation may be giving way to a new reputation.

Readers will forgive the first minute or so of Ms Atkin's speech being clipped:

Moratorium Victory Pyrrhic for Developers, Mayor

Onus Now on Developers, Mayor to Deliver on Housing

Family Friendly, Affordable, Ownership Housing

Opinion/News Analysis
Champagne glasses may have been clinking as giddy developers relished their victory in beating back the 45 day residential building moratorium in the Emeryville City Council chambers in a special meeting on the Friday before last.  But as the sun rose Saturday, aching heads from over-imbibing were undoubtedly made worse by the realization that the victory isn't all it seemed to be for developers in Emeryville, indeed theirs is a pyrrhic victory.   Because now they're going to have to deliver their residential development projects to the Council for approval, and they're going to have to impress the new progressive majority...the same three Council members that said YES to the moratorium.

Mayor Ruth Atkin
in Hot Seat
We're going to deliver
affordable family friendly
housing MY way, the
empower developers way
(strange it hasn't
worked up 'til now).

The developers have a little 3-2 problem;  Asher, Martinez, Donahue versus Atkin, Davis.  That's the new guard versus the old guard.  It's a problem for them because while a 4-1 super majority is needed for a building moratorium, to approve a specific development proposal, there needs only to be a simple majority.

Councilwoman Jac Asher got it right when she said from the dais, developers themselves would benefit from a moratorium.  The new majority is big on planning in our city and they intend on updating City Hall's regulations to make them comport with planning documents (and the resident's values).  A moratorium would have provided time and a space to do that.  Developers would have benefited because they would have known ahead of time, how to craft a project that would stand a chance of being approved by the new majority.  Now, they have no idea and onward they're going to march forward with project proposals that will not be approved, wasting their time and money.

Generally, it's a good idea to work with and co-operate with the people that lord power over you.  That's a lesson Emeryville developers are going to have to learn the hard way.

Build Our Way To Cheap Rent?
Integrity is not big with developers.  They lashed out at the moratorium with a disjointed and absurd idea; planning is not needed or even wanted they say because if a town plans how to develop, that will drive up rents.  Emeryville is in no position to get what it wants because the town's hands are tied; developers must be put in charge to keep rents low.  Not mentioned by them is the fact that they keep building luxury apartments (because that's how they maximize profits) and rents will not be lowered this way.  In fact rents will be pushed up around town.  Also not mentioned is why this deregulation idea of theirs has delivered precisely what they now say is no good; high rents (and lack of family housing).  This argument of theirs is just more lies on their part and those citizens who spoke out, forwarding the bogus low rent meme, are tools for this shameless developer money grab.

Mayor Atkin In The Hot Seat
The Mayor, Ruth Atkin, who threw in with the developers with her vote (as did developer's perennial favorite Councilwoman Nora Davis) now has a heavy burden to bear.  Having won, she's going to have to make sure her way, the anti-moratorium way, delivers the kind of housing we want and need.  Councilwoman Jac Asher and her colleagues had their idea how to do it but Mayor Atkin shot that down.  Now Ms Aktin is in the hot seat .  Emeryville residents want affordable housing, ownership housing and family friendly housing.  Ruth Atkin now has to see to it it gets done that way.  Ms Atkin, it's worth noting, never explained why her way, the same way we've been developing this town for a generation, hasn't worked up 'til now.  For their part, developers laid it on thick and heavy at the Friday special meeting; they will deliver affordable family friendly housing if only the moratorium is defeated.

"I just think this [the moratorium] is the wrong way to go about doing this" Mayor Atkin said as she killed the moratorium.  Let's see how she does, doing it her way.

City Council to Consider Building Moratorium

Residential Housing Projects May be Put on Hold in Emeryville

Starting Immediately

The Emeryville City Council voted unanimously last night to direct the city staff to craft language to hand down a city-wide residential building moratorium for at least 45 days with provisions to extend that time.  The proposal was initiated by Councilwoman Jac Asher who cited recent resident exasperation at the rapid pace of apartment building in town, saying of the action, "We need to hit the pause button."

The moratorium is being pursued for all aspects of all residential development proposals in the approval process.  Ms Asher said the areas of concern that residents have been vocal about include unit mix, family friendliness, ownership vs rental and out-of-date 'density bonuses' granted to developers that are encoded at City Hall.  The Councilwoman also noted the scale and the speed at which new projects are coming at the Council combined with the sense that the community feels the last parcels of fallow land should be more carefully considered contributed to her decision to call for a moratorium, "If we have anything on our side, it's time" and "People want us to do better" she added.  Mayor Ruth Atkin agreed, postulating, "We're seeing these large projects not meet community needs."

City Attorney Mike Biddle said after 45 days an extension to the moratorium could be granted if certain findings could be made and he said building moratoriums can be extended up to two years maximum.

The Council agreed to vote on the moratorium at a special meeting to be convened on February 13th at 5:00.

Follow the Money: Real Emeryville Residents VS Fake Emeryville Residents

Measure U&V Spending:

Emeryville David & Sacramento Goliath

Residents Outspent 43-to-1

$70 per vote vs $1.63

Follow the Money; sixth in a series

The Tattler introduces a new feature for the 2014 election season: Follow the Money. 

This election cycle is shaping up to be very expensive and very far-flung with lots of money from out-of-town interests pouring into the city.  We plan on digging out and exposing this money from people and organizations we don’t know that are trying to change our town to their liking.  These unfamiliar individuals and interest groups may effect our November elections with all their spending in Emeryville but the Tattler is going to make sure that while they assert their influence, we’re going to expose who they are. 

Click on the 'Follow the Money' label at the bottom of this story or use the search bar to review the entire Follow the Money series.

This election season, Emeryville residents are witness to an extreme asymmetry of two forces loosed on the town both looking to influence voters.  One is represented by the centralized Sacramento power of one of the largest lobbying interest groups in the State of California and the other, entirely locally homegrown, is comprised of Emeryville residents and businesses.  The Sacramento based group plans to spend perhaps up to $70 per vote and using the same metrics, the Emeryville side will spend $1.63 per vote.  Both entities claim to be operating only with Emeryville's best interests at heart.

The Sacramento group, representing the NO side, is unabashedly calling itself "Citizens to Preserve Emeryville" and is funded by the National Association of Realtors (NAR) and the California Association of Realtors (CAR) to the tune of $85,000 ($60,000 in their bank account earmarked for Emeryville with an additional $25,000 set aside for the Emeryville campaign).
The Emeryville group, "United Emeryville Yes on U&V with Mayor Asher" has raised $1050 and received  $912.07 in donations envelopes, stamps, etc) for a total of $1962.07.  Both sides have not spent all their money yet.

Measure U would make Emeryville a charter city, a local control governance model.  Measure V would institute a real estate transfer fee in Emeryville, the same as our neighboring cities have, re-capturing revenue lost, half Emeryville's budget, after Sacramento dissolved the Redevelopment Agency.  Both measures must pass for them to be operational.

The NO on U&V side has a committee located in Sacramento comprised of CAR & NAR members but they've secured a few Emeryville residents that signed their names, printed in the official Alameda County voter guide to give the impression there's a local grassroots swell against the measures.  It's notable that every Emeryville resident they've convinced to sign on is personally in the real estate business here.  The YES on U&V side is comprised of Emeryville residents both on the committee and with the signatories in the voter guide (with the sole exception of the CEO of the Emeryville Chamber of Commerce).  The YES side also has an Emeryville real estate agent as a signatory it should be noted.

Bucci's
The iconic
Emeryville restaurant.

We could totally

go there.

A Fabulous Dinner at Bucci's
If Emeryville residents vote this election the same as last local election (about 1200 people cast ballots) the NO on U&V side will spend about $70 per vote.  Put another way; at that price, each Emeryville voter could have a fabulous night out at Emeryville's premier restaurant, Bucci's on Hollis Street.  On the menu; zuppa del giorno with an antipasti plate of steamed mussels and a wild arugula salad, the entrée is a truffle marinated flat-iron steak paired with a glass of really nice Napa Zinfandel combining a leathery blackberry nose and a buttery vanillin finish.  Because we're not cheap and we believe everyone should make a living wage, we're also going to leave a very generous tip for Bucci's professional and friendly wait staff.  After that we'll still have some mad money left over.
The YES on U&V side will spend about $1.63 per vote.  We'll get a Kit-Kat bar and a gum ball at the 7-Eleven on San Pablo & 40th Street for that price (we might be a little short and have to kick in a little extra, depending on the gum ball).

Readers Note:  We don't do restaurant reviews here at the Tattler but Bucci's truly is a great neighborhood dining experience: the food is rustic and provincial Italian mindfully prepared with integrity and artistry.  

City of Emeryville U&V Information Mailer Mysteriously Lost in Mail

City Hall Perplexed About Mailers: 
Nowhere to be Found

Elections are always emotional events with passions running high and suspicions of dirty tricks the order of the day, especially in Emeryville.  Against this backdrop, eyebrows have been going up around town after City Hall announced recently that informative mailers about Measures U&V, many thousands of them mailed weeks ago, apparently have been "lost in the mail".  

City Manager
Sabrina Landreth
Missing mailers
"extraordinary"

The No on U&V side, lavishly funded by the California Association of Realtors (CAR) it should be noted, has had no problem getting thousands of their vitriolic mailers delivered to Emeryville residents in a timely manner by the Post Office.  

The City of Emeryville produced two  nonpartisan informational mailers so voters can get an objective analysis amid the hyperbole from CAR regarding Measure U, the charter city initiative and Measure V the real estate transfer tax initiative.  
Sabrina Landreth, Emeryville's City Manager, speaking about the City's two informational mailers told the Tattler yesterday, "It is my understanding mailer number two has arrived in some mailboxes, but mailer number one has yet to be located, even though it was dropped at the Post Office on October 8th".  She added, ^"We are working with our consultant to try to track them down, but as of yesterday, there is no sign of them even after [our] consultant searched the docks and pallets at the Oakland [Main] Post Office.  Even with the post office’s understaffing and major delays that we have heard about in getting these packets out this season, this has been an extraordinary delay."

The US Postal Service appears to have botched
the delivery of Emeryville City Hall's
objective, informational election mailer.  

Voter completed absentee ballots are already being returned and so in the absence of any information from the City, Emeryville voters have not been getting the benefit of an objective presentation of the facts about Measures U&V; a fact not lost on Mayor Jac Asher, one of the five City Council members that originally brought Measures U&V to the voters.  Ms Landreth said Mayor Asher is considering possibly filing a formal complaint with the Postal Service in response.

Follow the Money: Mayor Asher Decries "Scare Tactics" Used by Out-Of-Town Lobbyists on Measures U&V

Follow the Money; second in a series

The Tattler introduces a new feature for the 2014 election season: Follow the Money. 

This election cycle is shaping up to be very expensive and very far-flung with lots of money from out-of-town interests pouring into the city.  We plan on digging out and exposing this money from people and organizations we don’t know that are trying to change our town to their liking.  These unfamiliar individuals and interest groups may effect our November elections with all their spending in Emeryville but the Tattler is going to make sure that while they assert their influence, we’re going to expose who they are. 

Click on the 'Follow the Money' label at the bottom of this story or use the search bar to review the entire Follow the Money series.

Mayor Jac Asher

Mayor Jac Asher is issuing a warning to all Emeryville residents about the tsunami of cash flowing into our town from Sacramento real estate lobbyists.  Here is Ms Asher's letter from her blog:

“Yes” on U & V

Big Money flowing into Our Little City.

The five members of the Emeryville City Council voted unanimously to place a set of measures on this November’s ballot: Measures U & V.

Measures U & V work together.  Measure U allows Emeryville to become a charter city—this is the only way that we can set and collect a real estate documentary transfer tax.  We’ve constructed the charter to be very narrow, and are not changing the composition of our Council or other important elements of the way our City is governed.  Measure V is our transfer tax measure.  Real estate transfer taxes are collected when a property is bought/sold.  The cost of the tax is typically split between the buyer and the seller, or, like any part of a real estate transaction, can be negotiated by buyer and seller.  All of our neighboring cities are charter cities, and this tax provides millions of dollars for them to provide services and infrastructure to their residents.  To give you some idea of what this would mean to Emeryville:  In 2013, the year the office buildings located on Powell Street, West of the 880 Fwy then known as The Watergate Towers, were sold, Emeryville collected $130K. If we had the real estate transfer tax at that time, the City would have collected over $2 million, a huge difference.

There is wide support for Measures U & V in Emeryville.  Every candidate running for City council this election season supports U & V.

The Emeryville Chamber of Commerce has also endorsed these measures.  They understand that the city’s ability to provide amenities, services, and infrastructure is crucial to the businesses in our town and that these measures will help our city remain attractive to businesses.  The Alameda County Democratic Party as well as the League of Women Voters of Berkeley Albany Emeryville have also endorsed the measures.

As mayor, I pushed for these measures because Emeryville no longer has the funding mechanism of the State of California’s redevelopment program to build and support our infrastructure needs.  This program was eliminated by the state in 2011, taking $30 million dollars annually from our budget—roughly half of our city budget.  We must find a new way forward to build parks, support our excellent services, keep our roads paved and regularly maintained—all of the things that you value as a resident.  We cannot depend wholly upon the state to come up with solutions for us—it’s time for us to take this step.  Measures U & V will allow us to build up capital funds for our projects and to have a means to pay-as-we-go.

Money and scare tactics against the measures have begun flowing in from both the National and California Association of Realtors.  These groups are among the most powerful lobbying groups in California. The California Real Estate PAC has a “toolkit” at the ready for fighting transfer taxes even though they recognize that cities currently like ours (General Law Cities) have had those tax rates frozen since 1968.  They don’t want General Law cities to collect a dime more than they did in 1968.  That’s their bottom line.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics OpenSecrets.org Blog, the California Real Estate PAC has already spent over 1.5M in the 2014 Election Cycle.  The site also shows a list of their members.   Why are these people from San Diego, Long Beach, and Bakersfield interested in what we do in Emeryville?

Their lobbyist’s “toolkit” is already at work in our town.  Here are some examples of their possible tactics directly from their website: use your influence (behind closed doors) in order to get your message across because public meetings are so “adversarial” and “chaotic”.[1]  Create backchannels to City staff to see if that works.[2]  Find out if there are other community issues that could create a “quid pro quo” in order to peel off supporters.[3]  Reach out to local media.  Buy ad space.  And if none of that works, well, dump money and misinformation to mislead voters.  It’s this last “tool” that has already begun making its way to your mailbox before the election.

In a recent mailer sent to Emeryville residents, purportedly from “Citizens to Preserve Emeryville” (headquartered in Sacramento!), the scare tactics we expected were on full display, even suggesting that the Charter might one day be amended to give City Council Members a raise.  What the mailer fails to mention is that all Charter amendments go to the voters first.  Recent mandatory financial contribution disclosures show that “Citizens to Preserve Emeryville” has just one contributor, the National Association of Realtors, who has dumped $60,000 so far into this campaign.  That’s over $20,000 more than all Emeryville City Council candidates have raised combined!

Let’s set the record straight: Any changes to the charter would need to be approved by the voters first.  Transfer taxes do not make housing less affordable.  These funds can be used to help fund affordable housing.  The city’s ability to fund excellent services and amenities helps your real estate hold its value—real estate transfer taxes are your investment as a homeowner into the city.

Realize that the interests that are campaigning against these measures spread mistruths with no consequences—when residents want a dog park, when they need more services in town, when our growth calls for more infrastructure and affordable housing—these outside interests will have vanished and the City Council will be left with limited funds and the growing needs of our community.

The Emeryville City Council has been transparent, forward-thinking and responsive in its approach to doing what is right for the people of Emeryville.  That is exactly what leadership looks like in Emeryville and why voters should vote “Yes” on Measures U & V.

Sincerely,

Jac Asher

Mayor of the City of Emeryville

[1]      From their toolkit:  If a transfer tax surfaces, enlist the key contact people and possibly others versed on the issue to meet with council members prior to the public hearing on the tax.  In the privacy of the legislator‘s office, you will have his/her undivided attention, and the chances for meaningful dialogue are much better than at the public hearing where the process tends to be much more chaotic and adversarial.  Meetings prior to the hearing should provide your Association with some idea as to each councilperson‘s position on the tax.  If the vote appears close, the Association may want to concentrate its efforts on the members who constitute the “swing votes”.

[2]      Another “gem” from the toolkit: Establish working relationships with key staff people at the city[…]Many times, an idea such as a transfer tax emanates from the city staff, not the elected officials.   It is most advantageous to create an ongoing relationship with city staff (e.g., city manager, planning director, finance director), since these individuals may alert the Association to upcoming issues which will impact the real estate industry.

[3]      Their toolkit suggests:  Associations can utilize IMPAC funds to help establish a relationship with elected officials and their staff.  For example, IMPAC funds could be used to cover the costs of taking elected officials and staff to lunch on an ongoing basis as the Alameda Association of REALTORS® does.  The Association wants to establish a working relationship with their elected officials in a non-confrontational setting, and they want the city to know that they can be a resource when it comes to a host of issues relating to the community