Mayor Rich, please put a stop to the Gravenstein Project – The supplement from the City Manager is alarming.
He is telling you that the SVdP ini�a�ve is taking up a lot of �me. Obviously from the new informa�on in the original staff report and the updated-on ac�vi�es since last Thursday he is doing a great job, but it is taking up �me. Lots of �me.
It is really scary how many crucial issues are facing this city right now that he is trying to juggle.
Mr Swartz is asking you what is priority? He is kind not to burden you with the consequences of neglec�ng any of these.
The budget? If there is not a budget in place in 90 days then the city cannot func�on.
Employee group nego�a�ons? I guess a walkout will not help make our water and sewer opera�ons safer for ci�zens.
Consolida�on of the Fire Department? Fire fighters are not really important to the ci�zens…. right?
Water and Sewer rates? Why would that be important except every month that you do not bring a proposal to rate payers is another month the opera�on sucks cash out of the general fund or freezes in opera�ng expenses that delay needed repairs and create risk of failure and severe health effects. Every month you delay the deficit grows and the rate increase to fix the problem gets higher and higher. At some point there is a real risk the city has no more cash and becomes insolvent. We can’t be very far from that point and I’m sure the members of the City Council are aware of this.
Oh, I almost forgot we have a vacancy in the one key posi�on (Planning) that should be point on this project and Canopy. And we have been burning through fire chiefs.
If someone on City Council is con�nuing to push this, it needs to stop. Building a homeless shelter that will not house a single homeless person now in Sebastopol and not house anyone for 2 or more years of planning and construc�on is not a cri�cal priority.
END this now, before you destroy the city…….
Anyone tempted by the updated informa�on in the supplement, consider this:
1. Tina Rivera cannot promise to backstop anything. The Supervisors control the decisions, and I don’t see them calling an emergency mee�ng. Barbi Robinson made us many promises and then le� for Houston.
2. The conflict in the Capital Funding gap size is directly the result of the fact there is no approved building plan anywhere at this �me. How they got grant approval without an approved building plan is an indica�on of how broken this system is.
3. A third-party expert paid for by SVdP is a clear conflict of interest and doesn’t save �me. Consultants can be helpful, but they require direc�on, produce analyses that need to be reviewed and ask for decisions to be made. Mr. Swartz will s�ll have his hands full.
4. The fundamental risk is not the “Capital Gap” it is the 15-year commitment. Poli�cal winds shi�, laws change, new theories for dealing with issues like the homeless shi� and any of these might make the Gravenstein project fail. This is not a theory, changes in laws resulted in SAYS closing. New laws resulted in 20 Group Homes closing in Sonoma County and 120-150 foster youth no longer have a bed to sleep in or a home to live in.
5. These projects start out with promises and verbal explana�ons of policies and procedures. As DEMA is discovering what may have been the County or States verbal promises will evolve over �me as regula�ons get firmed up and SVdP like many other non-profits may unwi�ngly not be able to con�nue.
Councilman Zollman as head of the budget commitee wisely reminds all of us, we are in a fiscal crisis. The City Staff needs to refocus on the cri�cal issues facing us and the City Council needs to support them.
Please for the sake of our city, make a quick decision to withdraw from the “partnership”. -