Punch to the Face Heralds New Era of Political Violence in Emeryville

Tattler Editor Physically Assaulted by John Bauters’ Supporter 

Emeryville's Children's Harvest Festival Site of Political Violence

Unprovoked Attack Draws Yawns From Team Bauters

Commentry

By Brian Donahue

A friend and supporter of candidate for political office John Bauters, assaulted me without provocation last week as I was asking Mr Bauters a question at an Emeryville public event.  The assault came in the form of a punch to the face because the Tattler has been covering Councilman Bauters’ campaign for Alameda County Supervisor and the assailant doesn’t like the news the Tattler has been reporting.  It is the first example of political violence we know of in modern Emeryville history.

The Incident

Please review the video of the incident below.

Mr Bauters set up a tent to talk to voters and distribute campaign literature at Emeryville’s annual Harvest Festival at Huchiun Park on Sherwin Street October 5th.  The punch came less than one minute after I sat down to ask the Councilman a question for a potential Tattler story.  I wanted to ask him why, at an earlier public event in Berkeley, he had called his colleague on the City Council, Kalimah Priforce, a name that involves an expletive (he called him a “shitbag liar”).  

At first, Bauters said he didn’t recall calling Council member Priforce a name, and so I realized I needed to use the actual profanity, to jog his memory.   Because a man, the assailant with two young children, was standing under the Bauters tent and within earshot, I turned to him and told him I was going to quote back the profanity to Mr Bauters and for the sake of his children, I would give him ample time to move a few feet away for five seconds.  The assailant told me not to use the word in front of his children and he didn’t step away.  He told me I had to censor my speech.  I told him NO and I reminded him he could step back for a moment but instead, he menacingly ordered me to “stand up”.  I stood up and turned the camera to the man and told him his children were not in the camera frame.  Bauters, realizing his friend was about to turn to violence, called him by his first name and told him not to do it.  But his friend was not controllable.   He set down his child from his shoulders and punched me in the face.  I saw the punch coming and blocked it, turning it into a glancing blow but the kinetic force was enough to drive me backwards into my chair, which flipped over.  Then I tripped backwards over the chair and landed on the asphalt on my elbow, injuring it.

Writhing in pain on the ground and tangled up in the chair, the assailant verbally taunted me in front of his children he was seconds before trying to protect against hearing profanity, “Did that fucking hurt?” he said to me.   Because I did not defend myself against the small, 5’-9”, 150 pound man’s attack, there was no more violence.  Council member Bauters, who was standing six feet from me, did not offer me any assistance or help me to my feet, nor did any other of his political supporters standing or sitting under the tent.  The assailant did not apologize for his actions. 

The police were summoned as well as an ambulance.  The Emeryville police viewed the video and I pressed charges on the assailant who will appear before an Alameda County judge in December.  I was treated by medical EMTs.  My elbow is still injured.      

                                  

The Assailant

The Assailant 
Private school director.
He believes his calling is to treat
people with "respect and kindness".

The assailant, who lives in Oakland with his wife and children are long time friends and supporters of John Bauters’ political career.  He gave the Emeryville Council member $500 for his re-election campaign in 2019.  In 2023, when it was mostly Republicans clamoring for Alameda County DA Pamela Price to be recalled, the Bauters supporter gave $100 to the effort.  

On a popular social media site, the assailant prominently posted a photograph of himself and his two children.  The Tattler has blanked out the faces of his children for purposes of this story.  After punching me in the face and taunting me, the assailant said, “Don’t threaten my children”.

  At no time did I threaten his children as the video shows; as a matter of fact, I went out of my way to protect his children.  It was this violent man himself that (psychologically) harmed his own children.

The assailant is the Chairman of the Board of Trustees at an expensive Berkeley international private school where he is tasked with serving as an “ambassador for the larger community”.  The school claims their commitment to the community is to “interact with respect and kindness with everyone in our community.”

He is also the principle at an eponymous local insurance agency that is listed with $5 million revenue.

Political Violence

Amid ever increasing political violence around the nation, it was probably only a matter of time before it came to Emeryville.  Council member Bauters himself has been instrumental in changing the politics in Emeryville, leading a turn away from accountability, transparency and democratic inclusion.  This has come in the form of not answering emails, texts or phone calls of his constituents as well as a refusal to hold press conferences, all meant to keep his 'brand' untarnished, something not possible for a real politician in a true democracy.  The Mayor Courtney Welch and Council member Sukhdeep Kaur have also taken up this Bautersian ‘shield of darkness’ political tactic.  The total narrative control Bauters has birthed in Emeryville means constituents who ask him tough questions will find themselves frozen out.  The press as well.  In fact, the whole reason I seek to get questions answered at public events from these undemocratically minded Council members is that is the only time they can be approached and be subject to a question about their policies. 

The violence brought this condemnation from
Council member Priforce.  The rest of the Council
members refused to comment on it. Maybe they think 
political violence is no big deal?

With political violence spilling out of red states a lack of accountability from a politician, born of a binary narrative that the community is made up of good (supportive) people and bad (unsupportive) people, can lead to violence here.  What Mr Bauters and his Council followers are doing can rive the community into warring camps and ultimately, political violence.  Strong leadership is what’s needed to stop political violence.  But it also requires the whole community to be on board.  Sarah Birch, Professor of Political Science at King’s College London and author of Electoral Violence, Corruption, and Political Order says “A community that will tolerate violence will get violence. A community that does not tolerate violence is much less likely to have violence.”   

Emeryville citizens can put aside political differences and collectively refuse political violence, but it will take saying NO to it.  Greater American political dysfunction of the violent kind is creeping into Emeryville.  Because what may have been seen as abstract and foreign in the recent past can now be seen in actual fists impacting actual faces.   We have learned it can happen here.

The video of the incident may be viewed HERE.

Lifted from his social media account, the assailant 
posted this picture of himself with his two children.
We blocked out their faces out of respect for them.
He punched a man in the face, unprovoked, in front
of his own children. Lifetime memories were made.

Candidate John Bauters Flip-Flops on Recall of County DA

Councilman Bauters Quietly Contradicts Himself on Recall of DA Pamala Price 

He Tells Liberal Democratic Party He Supports the DA and a Conservative Activist Group He Supports Her Recall

Emeryville City Councilman John Bauters reversed his position on the most controversial East Bay topic of this campaign season; the recall campaign against Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price, by first publicly supporting the DA and then quietly voicing support for her recall, the turn around done without any new information about the DA having been revealed.  The Tattler recently learned of the surprising 180 degree flip, made in front of a powerful anti-Price activist group from whom he was seeking an endorsement for his November Alameda County Board of Supervisor’s run. 

Alameda County Supervisor Hopeful
John Bauters
He's joined conservatives in calling for
the recall of DA Pamala Price.

At the Alameda County Democratic Party candidate endorsement meeting in January, candidate Bauters, attempting to curry favor, said he was not supportive of the recall attempt then building against the progressive District Attorney.  By September, the tech/crypto currency funded recall campaign had picked up steam and Bauters quietly did an about-face when again, attempting to curry favor, he assured the conservative activist group Empower Oakland, he’s fully supportive of recalling the DA.  He added that he had personally not voted for Ms Price in her election in 2022, a fact he did not share with the Alameda County Democratic Party in January.  During the eight months between those two interviews, nothing newsworthy happened that would explain a total reversal other than a shift in the political winds.  

The Democratic Party supports the DA Pamela Price while the Big Tech funded Empower Oakland group as well as Republicans and corporate Democrats, are calling for her ouster.  It is noteworthy that Empower Oakland also strongly supports the recall of Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao, a dream project of East Bay conservatives.  

The evanescent flip-flop of Council member Bauters on such a serious and informative matter without an explanation has called into question his actual immutable values, to the extent there are any there of any substance.  Normally politicians will explain to their constituents and the press why they did a total turn about on a contentious and publicly impactful issue such as this but Mr Bauters is refusing to answer.  

The Alameda County Democratic Party ultimately did not endorse Mr Bauters or his competitor, the labor backed Nikki Fortunato Bas, but Empower Oakland did endorse him.

As Councilman Bauters shifts his campaign for the Board of Supervisors race into overdrive, some local pols are expressing concern over the gentleman from Emeryville and his appetite for political power.  The whiplash on the District Attorney issue is but one inflection point.  Many have noted Mr Bauters’ lack of truthfulness on the matter of his contrition on his Emeryville record of rolling back the wages of the poorest workers when he attempted to gut Emeryville’s Minimum Wage Ordinance in 2019.  Bauters told the Alameda County Democratic Party at the January meeting he regretted his attempt to cut Emeryville’s minimum wage.  He was sitting in the hot seat at the time, seeking their endorsement, telling them something they would want to hear.  Later when in a similar chair at the Empower Oakland candidates endorsement meeting, he told the conservatives there he had no regrets, “It’s hard to point to a vote I’ve taken in recent years I have regret for” he said.  Empower Oakland awarded him their endorsement.

But it’s his contradiction on DA Pamela Price that has everyday Democrats confused.  Is candidate Bauters for or against recalling the DA?  He has said both and he’s never answered for that.  Cynics point to the opportunism that would be Bauters to take if he was simply telling the County Democrats (more left wing) that he’s against the recall to get their endorsement and telling Empower Oakland (more right wing) he’s in favor of the recall to get their endorsement.  The cynics might be right but there’s no way to know for sure because Bauters isn’t saying; he has steadfastly refused to answer our questions on this pressing matter in the public interest.  Councilman Bauters seems to be less concerned with being transparent to the public, his constituents, and more concerned in picking up endorsements.  

Council Member Bauters Deceived Dems on Police Funding

 Democratic Party Endorsement Hopeful John Bauters Hides $2500 from Police PAC

"I Have Not Taken Any Money" He Falsely Asserts

Emeryville City Council member John Bauters has upped the ante in his push to win a seat on the Alameda County Board of Supervisors by deceiving the Alameda County Democratic Party about his campaign’s funding sources the Tattler has learned.  Mr Bauters and his rival for the 5th District Board of Supervisor’s seat, Oakland City Council member Nikki Fortunato Bas, both attended the County Democratic Party’s September 14th endorsement meeting and both responded to the same question about police funding the same way.  They both said NO, they had not received any such funding.  Using Councilman Bauters’ own FPPC Form 497, the Tattler learned his answer can only be described as deceitful. 

The meeting featured many prospective candidates vying for a coveted Dem endorsement in the heavily Democratic Alameda County and ultimately, neither Ms Bas nor Mr Bauters received an endorsement.  Perhaps Ms Bas might have gotten an endorsement had the selection committee known at the time the candidate from Emeryville had not told them the truth.  The committee has been informed about this matter in the interim we learned but they have issued no statement about it we know of. 

The straight question from the Democratic Party of Alameda County put to both candidates at the September 14th meeting was, “Are you endorsed by or taken any money from law enforcement?”  Ms Bas stated she had not and Mr Bauters said unequivocally, “The answer is NO, I have not taken any money.”  What Bauters failed to report was the $2500 taken from the Oakland Police Officer’s Association PAC on August 13th, payable to the FPPC registered committee, ’Bauters for a Safer East Bay’.

The Tattler reached out to the Councilman for comment but he did not return our multiple requests.   

The meeting can be viewed here:

https://www.facebook.com/acdemocrats/videos/494147616764347

Please go to 26:00 to 26:35 to hear candidate Bauters' incriminating claim. 

From candidate Bauters' Form 497 file, registered with the State of California:

Lack of Interest By City & Schools Puts Children's Safety at Risk

What Will It Take to Lock The School Security Gate at ECCL? 

A Bad Guy With a Gun?

Opinion

Rebecca Sermeno
Community Services Director

Emery School District begins the new year with an old reoccurring problem: a security gate off the San Pablo Avenue public sidewalk is constantly wide open during school hours, inviting anybody to stroll right in and access any classroom filled with children.  The Tattler has documented this for years now but so far there has been no fix for this easy to solve and potentially calamitous problem.

The school campus is part of a community center known as the Emeryville Center for Community Life (ECCL) and is a joint City/ School District facility.  As such, both the City of Emeryville and Emery Unified are responsible for keeping the children safe there.  The gate that they can’t seem to ever secure is just off the public lobby for both the Community Services Department and the School District. 

Quiauna Scott
Superintendent of the Schools

Rebecca Sermeno, the head of community services for the City and Dr Quiauna Scott, the superintendent of the schools are the two managers responsible for this ongoing problem and they have repeatedly told the Tattler they will fix it but virtually every time we pass by on San Pablo Avenue, we glance over and see the open gate. When we have time to stop and interact, each time the explanation is the same: “We thank you for bringing this to our attention, we take this seriously and we’re going to fix it.”  Then the next time, sometimes the very next day, it’s, “We thank you for bringing this to our attention, we take this seriously and we’re going to fix it”.

After a couple of years of this, it’s obvious they don’t take the children’s safety seriously.  Is it going to take some kind of violent security breach for the responsible employees, the one’s paid to provide safety, to fix this? We don’t think it’s too much to ask that the government keep our children in their care, safe.  Locking a security gate should be the simplest thing to do to provide a basic minimum of security for the children.  It’s sad the Tattler has to report on this.

 Here is a small sampling over the last few months:

Tattler Forced to 'Lawyer Up' To Get Public Documents

 New Culture of Secrecy Descends on City Hall

Citizens Wanting Accountability Must Lawyer Up

Public Records Illegally Denied

Emeryville Illegally Disregards California Public Records Act

News Analysis

Over the last eight months, the Tattler has been attempting to get three Emeryville police body worn camera documents due in accordance with the California Public Records Act but the City of Emeryville has been actively fighting the law that requires they hand over the public documents.  After the City said NO, they will not release the video documents, the Tattler obtained the services of a lawyer, prompting the City to announce after eight months, they are finally going to stop fighting and cough up the documents.  In this and other recent fights for public documents illustrates the extent of a growing culture of secrecy at City Hall versus the public’s right to know the doings of their government.  

City Attorney John Kennedy
Not a fan of accountability, he's been a
good fit with the City Council majority.

Fifteen years of Tattler public records request attempts have made it clear that transparency and accountability at Emeryville City Hall have never been as rigorous as they claim they are but a growing ‘next level’ of records denying puts City Hall and its Police Department now squarely into the realm of law breaking.  The new culture of secrecy at City Hall dovetails with a culture of unaccountability among some members of the City Council led by the nabob John Bauters, raising questions about who’s leading whom in Emeryville's governance.

The Records Act is how the Tattler and many other news sites obtain public records to inform stories for public consumption and to the extant municipalities violate the Act, the public will be less informed as a consequence.  The new City Hall obstinacy raises the specter of citizens and the press ‘lawyering up’ if they want transparency and accountability from Emeryville.

On March 3rd 2024, the Tattler first requested the police body worn camera documents of a trespassing event via a Public Records Act Request.  The City has ten days to respond to such requests according to law but Emeryville commonly misses the deadline or ignores the first request altogether.  This has been happening with greater frequency over the last few years and the City did begin by ignoring our March 3rd request.  After nudging, finally, the City responded on March 18th, five days late. However, in their responce, the City Attorney, John Kennedy, invoked a clause granted by the State that municipalities may cite to avoid disclosing requested public documents under the auspices of Times Mirror Co. v. Superior Court (1991), case law that posits greater public harm will come by the government disclosing the public documents than is caused by the government not releasing the documents.

The Tattler asked Mr Kennedy to elaborate on his refusal to disclose the documents because the Times Mirror case invocation was improper and we threatened to sue the City in court if we did not get a responce.  Days after that, EPD responded that upon “re-consideration”, they will release the requested documents after all, but the Tattler would have to pay the City of Emeryville $656 for the Police Department to redact sensitive personal information from the videos.  The State of California requires municipalities redact people’s personal information such a social security numbers, phone numbers, addresses and the like.

However, the City of Emeryville is expressly NOT allowed to charge the public for redaction of documents obtained by public records requests as delineated by California Supreme Court case law National Lawyers Guild v. City of Hayward (2020).  The Tattler notified Emeryville of the 2020 case in a September 13th letter to Mr Kennedy and again threatened to sue if the City didn’t cough up the public documents.  The City finally responded they will hand over the police videos without overzealous redacting (that would also be against the law) and without charging illegal fees on October 3rd, eight months after the first request that ultimately required multiple letters from the Tattler and the retention of an attorney.

Public documents ensconced at City Hall or the police station belong to everyone in the community, they are NOT the sole possession of the government.  The government serves as the custodians of our documents and they MUST surrender them upon request according to California law.  Insofar as this Tattler records request debacle may be emblematic of the new obstinacy at City Hall and among undemocratically minded City Council members, the City has effectively put the citizens on notice that if we want our documents, we’re going to have to ‘lawyer up’ to get them.

The Tattler will report if the City improperly redacts the videos when/if we receive them in October.

Cryptocurrency Executive's Major Campaign Donations to Bauters & Congressional Republicans

 Connection Between Wealthy Bauters Donor and Republicans Exposed

Emeryville City Council member John Bauters and conservative Republicans in Congress.  What do they have in common?  Besides not being fans of a living minimum wage for workers, they both attract lot’s of cash from cryptocurrency executives. 

Councilman Bauters’ campaign for Alameda County Supervisor is packed with cryptocurrency cash heading into the final stretch of the 2024 election, with $40,000, the maximum legal amount, supplied by tech bro Jesse Pollak, of Coinbase cryptocurrency exchange that also is a major donor to some of the most hard right Republicans in Congress.  Mr Bauters has been unabashed in courting the right wing in the county in his run for the Supervisor position and it has paid off with lots of money to fend off his rival in the race, Nikki Fortunato Bas.  Ms Bas, a progressive who honors labor, has gotten donations from many East Bay labor unions and ordinary citizens in her race for Supervisor.

Trying to be everything for everybody, Council member Bauters has recently been attempting to soften his anti-labor reputation in the county, trying to siphon donations from progressives that would go to Ms Bas but he is alone in the race in attracting conservative donors.  To the extent he has been successful casting himself as a pro-labor progressive across the county, it is attributable to the fact that Mr Bauters’ work as a politician has been in tiny Emeryville, outside the glare of the Oakland/Berkeley political spotlight.  In this way, many progressives in the county are unaware of Bauters' anti-labor record, specifically when he led a drive to cut the wages of the poorest working poor people in Emeryville in 2019.   The flood of cash from the right side of the spectrum to Mr Bauters’ campaign coffers, especially from tech bros, demonstrates the extent they have been paying attention however.  

Attempting to expose the Bauters' anti-labor record, staffers at the Nikki Bas campaign have produced a website, ‘The Truth About Bauters’ to reveal the things he doesn’t want us to know about him.  Things like the time when he attempted to roll back Emeryville’s Minimum Wage Ordinance and the people that appreciate that.  People like the cryptocurrency whiz Jesse Pollak of Coinbase who took some time off donating to Republicans in Congress to give the maximum legal amount to Emeryville’s John Bauters.  

From the website 'The Truth About Bauters' produced by the campaign for 
his rival in the Alameda County Supervisor race, Nikki Fortunato Bas.

Campaign '24 Fact Check: It's Not Possible to Re-Elect Sukhdeep Kaur

Campaign '24 Fact Check:

How Can She Be "Re-Elected" when Sukhdeep Kaur Was Not Elected In The First Place?

It's all over her campaign website.  Council member Sukhdeep Kaur wants Emeryville voters to "re-elect" her.  But how can we re-elect her when she never won an election in the first place?  Council member Kaur just made that up.  Perhaps it makes her seem more than what she is.  Maybe that's why she is telling us this fib.  

We'll never know why she is spreading this disinformation because Council member Kaur doesn't believe in answering questions from her constituents.  She likes the perks of being an elected official but she doesn't like the accountability part.  That's a thing now in Emeryville.  Starting with John Bauters and now Courtney Welch and Sukhdeep too.  They're not accountable to the people.  Council member Kaur likes to imagine that she was elected by the people of Emeryville but she doesn't want to be accountable to the people of Emeryville.

Sukhdeep Kaur is running for election to the City Council, not re-election.  For the record, the actual fact is Ms Kaur was appointed to the Emeryville City Council in February 2023 by then Mayor Bauters.  She replaced Ally Medina who quit her position in December 2022 before her term was finished.  Sukhdeep Kaur did run for election to the City Council in November 2022 and SHE LOST.  Ms Kaur came in fourth out of five candidates running for two seats.

Council member Kaur: Stop misinforming the people of Emeryville.
You were never elected to the Emeryville City Council, got it?

The Tattler gives this a
'Pants on Fire'

Labor Day Lies From Bauters and Welch

 Bauters' Audacious Labor Day Message

Mayor Welch Joins the Prevaricating & Pontificating Prose

Opinion

Happy Labor Day, Emeryville community!  It’s a nice thought that people can wish happiness for the community on this day we honor labor but like nearly everything else in post Trump America, even this has been co-opted and wrapped up in a lie by politicians seeking personal gain at the expense of the community.  Even here in Emeryville.  

Take the audaciousness of Council member John Bauters in his social media blitz today as he campaigns for the Alameda County Board of Supervisors race.  It’s shocking but not surprising that Council member Bauters is going around telling potential voters in the county, he supports labor.  It’s a deceitful re-write of his record.

People who have lived in Emeryville for more than a few years remember how Council member Bauters led a drive to drive down the wages of the poorest working people in Emeryville when as mayor, he rolled back Emeryville’s landmark and progressive Minimum Wage Ordinance.  Actual low paid workers struggling to make it on minimum wage were going to have their wages cut if Bauters had been successful.  Luckily, the Alameda Labor Coalition fought back and by a massive last minute resident signature drive, forced Bauters to back down.

It’s true that Mr Bauters has gotten the endorsement of police and fire fighter’s associations (some call them “unions”).  But those associations are not real unions.  You can tell because police officers and fire fighters NEVER walk fellow union members’ union picket lines like all union members are supposed to do.  Remember, the word is UNION.  The Carpenter’s Union did endorse Bauters but that’s because his public policy works for large development corporations.  The Carpenters' are making a bad calculation that by breaking with their union brothers and sisters, they will get rewards from all the new development Bauters says he will bring.  Splitting unions like this is part of the anti-union corporate playbook it should be noted.

John Bauters and his protege, the corporatist Democrat Courtney Welch (who is now Mayor and who said she “supports Bauters 100%”) are using Labor Day to convince voters Bauters’ record on labor is not his record.  It’s Trumpian in its shamelessness and dark, calculating disposition.

 We know you and we remember, John.  You are lying when you tell voters who don’t know you that you will “fight to protect workers’ rights, fair wages and safe working conditions”.  We hate this kind of cynical politicizing and hoodwinking.  The truth will be told about your record and Alameda County voters will know you don’t value labor if we have anything to say about it.  You can say what you will about other things you have fought for, like LGBTQ+ rights.  We won’t take that away from you, John.  But we will intervene when you lie about your record on labor rights.  

Happy REAL Labor Day, Emeryville.  

Say what you will about Councilman Bauters, but 'willing to fight for
fair wages' is an outright lie. Many politicians lie, of course.  We're not so 
deluded to think otherwise but when we see a brazen lie like this, especially
by an elected official, we report it here at the Tattler.

This is not a politician trying to put a positive spin on something they are exposed on.  This is just 

a lie.

John Bauters: Donations Reveal An Embrace Of His Conservative Side in Supervisor Race

John Bauters' Funding Machine Quietly Milks the Alameda County Right Wing

Corporate Lobbyists, PG&E, Developers, Police, Tech Entrepreneurs Tapped for Donations

Wareham Development Corporation Unloads $15,000 After Favors Granted

News Analysis

November’s Alameda County Board of Supervisor District 5 race has come down to Emeryville City Council member John Bauters, a white male lawyer with law enforcement and corporate backing, pitted against Oakland City Council member Nikki Bas, a woman of color with labor backing.  A conservative white man versus a liberal woman of color; it’s a dynamic that might be seen outside of Emeryville as so normal as to be considered not newsworthy.  But for Mr Bauters, his revelatory list of campaign donors recalls this political campaign stereotype he wants no part of, regardless of its inconvenient truth.  

The race for Supervisor this year is a race between corporate power and working people despite Mr Bauters’ denials against that framing.  Councilman John Bauters loudly says he's a true progressive.  But his actual record on the Emeryville City Council notwithstanding, consider who’s putting up the money in the hotly contested Supervisor race.  On Mr Bauters' side it’s virtually all corporations with a material interest in having a friendly voice on the Supervisors Board.  Them and right wing lobbying groups, tech entrepreneurs, police officer’s associations and the sheriff’s office, as well as corporate Democrats and Republicans.  Ms Bas has the backing of mostly regular Alameda County people (a few wealthy supporters) and labor unions.  With donor lists like those, not surprisingly, the backers of John Bauters have given their candidate more money (over $500,000 so far) than have supporters of Ms Bas.

Emeryville City Council Member
John Bauters

Despite his list of backers, Council member Bauters says he's a liberal.  But the campaign donors know better.  And they know a good investment when they see one.  That’s why Bauters has gotten major donations from PG&E and the pro-developer lobbying group YIMBY California as well as Sacramento’s corporate right wing California Real Estate PAC.  Silicon Valley tech entrepreneurs also have given generously to Mr Bauters’ campaign (expecting nothing in return if you believe them) as well as East Bay politicians; the controversial former mayor of Oakland, Libby Schaaf and Emeryville’s current mayor Courtney Welch, a corporate Democrat who generously gave her Council colleague $1,100 (so far).  

Mr Bauters strongly endorsed and supported Ms Welch for Emeryville City Council despite her only having lived in town for one month when she filed papers to run for the Council in 2021.  Ms Welch is running for re-election to the Council in November and incidentally, some supporters report she is considering seeking higher political office like Mr Bauters is doing instead of a third term on the Council four years from now.

Trolling for law enforcement money, Bauters is framing himself as the law and order candidate in the race and to clinch the deal, he set up an independent expenditure committee called ‘Bauters for a Safer East Bay’ that is independent from his campaign cash and has net almost $60,000 so far.  Bauters has called to lock up criminals with more jail time, a perennial favorite in the law enforcement community.  He has not said how this would be considered progressive.

Oakland City Council President
Nikki Fortunato Bas

But perhaps the most illuminating campaign donation so far this season is the $15,000 given to candidate Bauters by Wareham Development’s CEO Rich Robbins who was granted a major political favor by Councilman Bauters recently.  Robbins applied for a permit to build a major new bio-tech facility on Overland Street in Emeryville but the City Council had earlier certified a General Plan overlay district called the 'transit center transportation hub zone' around the Amtrak station that restricted the number of parking spaces for proposed developments in the zone.  The idea is the City of Emeryville has an interest in getting people to use alternative transportation rather than everyone just driving.  

The Council vote to implement the transportation hub zone was unanimous but Mr Robbins of Wareham said didn’t want to be constrained by the law.  He wanted to maximize profit for his project and he said future tenants at the Overland bio-tech project would all want to be able drive to work and his new building would be worth more money with more parking available.  So overturning the vote of his own handpicked Planning Commission who thought the new law should be obeyed, Councilman Bauters led a drive to give permission to Rich Robbins to build all the extra  parking spaces.  Councilman Bauters never said why Emeryville's new law should be overturned to help a single developer and he refused requests from the Tattler about it.  

In responce (but not officially because that would be illegal), Mr Robbins gave Mr Bauters $15,000 for his County Supervisor race.  The money for Bauters and parking spaces for Robbins was a win-win for Bauters and Robbins but a loser for the people of Emeryville who have a reasonable expectation their city planning laws not be overturned so casually.

In addition to that and more blatantly showing his anti-labor conservative side, Council member Bauters led a drive to roll back the wages of the poorest workers in Emeryville when he attempted to amend Emeryville’s hard fought Minimum Wage Ordinance in 2019.  The Alameda Labor Council successfully pushed back against Bauters' pushing down the minimum wage by rushing a signature drive of Emeryville citizens just in time to stop the Bauters juggernaut.  

That was back when and now, it appears labor groups across the Bay Area have not forgotten John Bauters and they’re actively supporting the candidacy of Nikki Bas in the Supervisor's race.  

Workers don’t have the financial resources of tech billionaires and giant corporate lobbying groups of course and not surprisingly Bauters has raised more money than Bas.  But Ms Bas has the backing of average people and the race is very tight according to polls.

This campaign season, Mr Bauters is attempting to run as a conservative but also not as a conservative and it's been tough for him to clearly message himself, trying to be everything to everybody.  He is trying for the entire Republican voter base, centrist Democrats and if he can pick up some progressive Democrats, so much the better.  

Clearly Councilman Bauters has some liberal ideas on social issues and before this campaign season, he would blanch at the prospects of outright being called 'conservative' or a 'corporate Democrat' but given his list of donors in the Supervisors race, Mr Bauters appears to have finally made peace with the epithets.  Thus the race for Board of Supervisors in left wing Alameda County has taken on the trappings of every other race in America; right versus left, conservative versus progressive.  And that’s a substantial change from the traditional election ruse around here where everybody's a "progressive" and the elections are 'progressive versus progressive'.  Though the conservative title is not something he has been advertising across the county, the voters' choice has been made more clear this election thanks to John Bauters' striking donor list.  

Imagine Democracy in Emeryville

 Emeryville Residents: 

Step Up and Run For Elected Office

Opinion

Time is running out and people are not registering to run in our November elections in Emeryville, threatening the election process itself.  Every election cycle it has tended to get worse as far as active citizen participation goes and this year might be the worst yet.  

Emeryville is not known for its engaged citizenry.  In fact our town usually ranks last in the East Bay in terms of voter participation at election time.  That’s most likely attributable to the lack of families in our town, revealed by our super low 1.8 persons per housing unit demographic and even more, to the fact we have become a ‘renter’ city revealed by the highest renter to homeowner ratio of any city in the East Bay.  It wasn’t always this way but like it or not, these numbers reflect our current demographics.  These numbers may help us to understand our lack of civic mindedness at the moment, and they are disturbing, but they do not necessarily reflect our destiny.

While we are not so oblivious as to think a little opinion piece in the Tattler would deliver an insurgency for the upcoming November election, we do have a duty to point out the urgent need for candidates to rise up and challenge the status quo.  Because as of right now, there won’t be elections for Emeryville elected office this fall; not for School Board and not for City Council.  It’s August and nobody is stepping up to do their civic duty to run for elected office.  We want you to consider helping your community.

The School Board has two seats that can be challenged and the City Council has three this year.  If no candidates for the School Board throw their hat in the ring, the two incumbents will simply be coronated and there will not even be an election.  If no challengers rise up for the City Council seats, the two incumbents Courtney Welch and Sukdeep Kaur will stroll right in for another four years.  The other Council seat, now taken by John Bauters, is up for contention because Mr Bauters is running for Alameda County Supervisor and the law forbids him from also running for his Council seat.  That leaves a vacancy, and so far, only one candidate has registered to run.  So if no one else rises up to challenge this, effectively, there will be three coronations and no City Council election in November as well.

It is common there are no elections for School Board in Emeryville because of the stultifying effect of the incumbent advantage.  What happens is School Board members commonly resign and new members are appointed by the other School Board members.  The appointees are friends of one or more of the existing Board members and then the appointee gets to run in the next election as an incumbent.  The result is a calcified polity, an unchanging status quo that’s reflected in the school district’s perpetually abysmal academic ranking.

But this election is looking to be different with the School Board AND the City Council both falling into indifference and apathy because no one will challenge the status quo. 

Given Emeryville’s demographic shift over the years, it is understandable democracy would suffer.  Understandable, but unacceptable.  To have a democracy, you must at least have elections.  We cannot expect our government to work for us if we don’t challenge it. Our nonchalance at election time both in terms of voting and running for office, will be rewarded with a polity that does not serve us.  It becomes a vicious circle at some point, an exigency we must push back against or we suffer the consequences.  What looms is corruption.

To Emeryville residents: please consider running for the School Board or the City Council.  Less than two weeks remain before registration is cut off for these five positions in these two offices.  Register to run, let us hear your ideas on governing and if we like them, we’ll vote for you.  That’s how it’s supposed to work.  Let’s show the statisticians that our demographic is not our destiny. Let's imagine democracy in Emeryville.