Emeryville Noise Ordinance Fails Relevancy Test (Again)

Favored Developer Tests Noise Ordinance,

Residents Lose

Wareham Breaks Law Four Times & is Rewarded By Council

Emeryville's Noise Ordinance, a 2003 law designed to protect resident's reasonable desires for some peace and quiet in a massively re-developing town, traditionally has not been able to stand up to the interests of developers and Emeryville's new progressive City Council, like their conservative predecessors showed us Tuesday they also have no interest in enforcing the ordinance.  In a 5-0 vote, the Council granted a waiver to Wareham Development to work Saturdays starting in May to help the corporation as they work on the controversial 'Transit Center' office tower project on Horton Street.

The waiver now gives official permission for Saturday work to Wareham who has already been busy working Saturdays in violation of the ordinance.  And tellingly, beyond simply granting a waiver for no reason other than helping Wareham increase its profit margin, the Council also saw fit to pardoning Wareham for the four previous violations of the Noise Ordinance over the last six Saturdays in which the police had to intervene to stop work at the site.

Wareham Gets a Pardon
The City Council is so incensed with
Wareham constantly violating our
Noise Ordinance, they're getting
rid of the ordinance so Wareham won't
have anything to violate. 

Emeryville's Weakest Law
The Noise Ordinance has never been enforced.  Indeed, the whole thing has served a different function; making City Council members look good to the cameras as they feign support for the ordinance.
Usually when developers seek to get a waiver for the Noise Ordinance from the City Council, a reason 'beyond their control' is offered such as an unusual amount of rain (even during a drought year as embarrassingly was the case for Turner Construction and the ECCL).  However Wareham on Tuesday only offered that certain jobs they need to complete for the construction of the Transit Center (welding, pouring concrete) are especially impactful and these components should be done on weekends because...well, no reason was given to that question.  The fact that these components of the job being loud and impactful (precisely the reason why the Noise Ordinance was passed; to protect our weekends from this) was not seen as something the community would object to by the Council, illustrates how inconsequential the ordinance is.

The four recent violations of the ordinance by Wareham have been assigned police department 'event numbers' but no provisions within the ordinance itself provides for a remedy for the residents or punishment against violators, leaving the resident's interests unsupported except by the City Council, if it were of a mind to support them.  However Tuesday's Council action, rewarding lawbreakers, tells the developer and business world that regardless of recent City Council elections, their interests are still sacrosanct in Emeryville at least when it comes to crashing and banging on weekends in our town.

Caught Again!

Transit Center workers get caught working on another Saturday in violation of our Noise Ordinance.  The workers tried to palm off the loud concrete form work as "cleaning" but they were cited (no fines) by police for violating the ordinance.  Wareham Spokesman Geoff Sears told the City Council Tuesday that workers have merely been "dewatering" the site after rain storms, a claim not supported by the observations of the Emeryville Police.

Watergate Neighborhood Explodes as Emery-Go-Round Scales Back Bus Service

Bus Service at Watergate Cancelled

Watergate residents have been flooding Emeryville City Council members with angry calls and e-mails after the Emery-Go-Round bus service has been terminated along Powell Street adjacent to the resident condominiums recently.  The popular free bus service, paid for primarily by commercial businesses in town, is used by many Watergate residents and service has been disrupted ever since the Emeryville Public Works Department started a sidewalk restoration project there a few weeks ago.  Emery-Go-Round officials informed residents that the City didn't confer with them before they began the sidewalk project and now as a result,  there's no room to turn the buses around, a requirement because the street dead-ends.
The charge of non-cooperation with the City is being denied by Public Works.
Meanwhile, the President of the Board of Directors at Emery-Go-Round announced at a meeting that the problem is not the new sidewalk but instead that Watergate residents aren't payers into the bus system and that is why service has been curtailed there.

Watergate residents are incorrectly assigning blame with the City says Maurice Kaufman, the City Engineer and head of Public Works.  He flatly denies the charges made against the Department, "Emery-Go-Round has known of the sidewalk work proposed there for years, We've been discussing it with them for a long time" he told the Tattler.  "They've changed their minds about their acceptable method of turn around" he added, indicating that EGR officials now don't want to make 'K' turns at Watergate condos since the street in the area isn't wide enough for a U-turn for buses both before and after the sidewalk work.   Mr Kaufman conjectured that perhaps prior EGR managers didn't communicate with new managers as to the source of the miscommunication.

If there is a miscommunication.

Geoff Sears, President of the EGR Board of Directors, hinted to Board meeting attendees that sidewalk

EGR President Geoff Sears
We have a fiduciary responsibility to accommodate
the payers into the bus service, not the non-payers.

work by the City has nothing to do with the cancelled bus service.  He says they are attempting to curtail rising costs and that they are responsible to the payers into the bus system to do so.  "Watergate residents don't pay into Emery-Go-Round" he said at the last meeting adding, "We need to optimize the route for payers into the system."
Board member and Emeryville commercial property owner Francis Collins agreed, "The turn around controversy isn't a big deal as far as I'm concerned.  The real deal is this bus system is dead unless we can figure a way to legally fund it" he said, in a nod to the payers/non-payers calculation.  Mr Collins indicated that the way the service is being paid for now is illegal and unfair to the payers into the system, the commercial property owners.

Former Council member Ken Bukowski, a long time supporter of the Emery-Go-Round said the service should be paid for by an Emeryville sales tax.  He noted "Alameda County is going to have an additional 1/2 cent sales tax before voters in 2014.  Emeryville should get enough to fund the EGR.  Perhaps we should have a 1/2 cent sales tax of our own to help pay."

Council members have indicated they are going to work to resolve the issue, "Elderly Watergate residents [and others] need the Emery-Go-Round" Jac Asher told the Tattler, "Some have gotten rid of their cars and use the service for all their transportation needs".  "EGR is extremely popular" the Councilwoman said.