The MGH Report

Michael G. Haran, Proprietor

ONE FOR THE ANTIQUITIES

Posted by on Nov 24, 2013

ONE FOR THE ANTIQUITIES

 

Published Healdsburg Tribune  11/21/2013

On a day dialed up by the Point Arena Chamber of Commerce, the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Sally Jewell, came, saw and listened. I attended Friday’s environmental love fest on behalf of Sonoma County Supervisor Mike McGuire who is running for the 2nd District Senate seat in which the beautiful 1,664 acre Stornetta Public Lands is being considered for a land inclusion into the California Coastal National Monument.  McGuire’s time is now limited as he is speaking to the Kiwanis, Rotarians and special interest groups times the seven counties in the district.

But this day belonged to Point Arena, Mendocino County and the California’s north coast. Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, who accompanied Jewel, was complimented several times for getting the U.S. House of Representatives to pass a resolution to add the land to the Monument. A bill sponsored by Sens. Barbara Boxer and Diana Feinstein is currently stalled. “There’s a lot of uncertainty in the legislative process,” Huffman said. Having Secretary Jewell visit the area “is basically sending a message that we’re going to make it happen one way or another.”Stornetta National Monument Meeting 030

Secretary Jewell told the crowd of over 200 people that by her presence she was confirming President Obama’s commitment to land preservation for future generations. “I wouldn’t be out here if it wasn’t a high priority,” she said. The twelve mile stretch of land is managed by the Bureau of Land Management and is open to the public.

The get-together was as folksy as you’d expect in a small town. A group of about 50 elementary students sang “This Land is Your Land,” read environmental poems to the Secretary and gave her framed copies. Dressed in native costume a few of the Manchester Band of Pomo Indians children gave a brief ceremonial dance.

After the representatives of Boxer and Feinstein said that both senators supported the effort, a representative of the Manchester Pomo’s gave an impassioned request to have the BLM do more to preserve some of their historic tribal areas.  Jim Keena, California’s BLM director who said the BLM has an archeologist who specializes in these issues and he promised to put the two together.

Next came a steady stream of environmentalist like the Sierra Club, Audubon Society and the Mendocino Land Trust to name a few. District Assemblyman Wesley Chesbro, talked about the California Coastal Trail which he help champion. Many local civic leaders, civic organizations and county supervisors all spoke of their support for the Monument addition. Both the Mendocino County Tourism Bureau and the local Chamber of Commerce said that the addition would help promote job growth in Mendocino County’s largest business, tourism.

Everyone got a chuckle when a local activist presented Secretary Jewell with a petition supporting the effort with over 800 signatures from Point Arena residents, noting how exceptional that was considering a population of 450. When Mendocino Supervisor Dan Hamburg expressed concern for the oil “fracking” off the California coast, Secretary Jewell said that being a petroleum engineer she knows a lot about oil “fracking” and that there is a lot of dis-information out there. She flatly denied it was happening and said that we need a balanced approach to oil extraction and protecting the environment.

In her summation the secretary got a laugh by referring to the local petition as being “Democracy in action.” She then asked for a show of hands for how many would prefer the Monument designation by a Presidential Proclamation or an Act of Congress. Overwhelmingly, people wanted a Presidential Proclamation but then several shouted, “Anyway we can!”

 

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ON PUBLIC PENSIONS

Posted by on Oct 30, 2012

ON PUBLIC PENSIONS

I have been following this year’s city council race in Healdsburg. The town has a sales tax increase, Measure V on this year’s ballot which will raise about one million dollars which current city council member have said will go toward public safety, street maintenance, economic development activities and general repairs and maintenance to city facilities. Two of the council members running for reelection are Gary Plass and Susan Jones both retired public employees.

Everyone knows we need a strong tax base to ensure public safety and a smooth running local, county and state government which provides for both business growth and a good quality of life. What bothers me about agreeing to a tax increases is that I don’t feel enough has been done to get rid of the waste in government. Once redevelopment funds dried up it became obvious that city and county government had been using these funds to expand government growth whether it was needed or not. A recent CBS report which showed Caltrans administrators using state rented pick-up trucks to shop for wine and clothes at Nordstrom’s during business hours and then being stonewalled by Caltrans management continues to erode voter trust.

Back in 2002 the Board of Supervisors enacted measures that have now increased pension costs by over 400 percent. The 2012 Sonoma County Grand Jury concluded that these pension increases were approved in a manner that did not comply with the law in an obvious attempt to dupe voters. In a September 2012 Santa Rosa Press Democrat article on the subject Brett Wilkinson wrote “Zane and other county leaders, nevertheless, were unified in defending the legality of the enhanced pensions. Trying to roll them back would be a costly lost cause, officials said, so the county will continue to pursue changes through legislation and collective bargaining.” I think a jury might think otherwise.

Most newly enacted pension reforms pertain to new hires in a so called “second-tier” reform. As far as I know nothing has been done to reduce the spiked pensions of current retirees who continue to collect lifetime pay increases because they were allowed to roll in their vacation, sick and car allowance pay into their lifetime retirement benefits.

I really don’t blame the public worker rank and file for this. In fact, as the LA Times columnist Steve Lopez recently said (Don’t Blame the State’s Teachers 10/28/12) “As a group (private sector workers), we’re torn between envy and anger, faced with uncertain financial futures while we pay for the comfy retirements of government retirees.” A friend has joked, “Where were we when this gravy train was went by?” Not wanting to be hypocritical I know that if I were a public employee and was offered the same spiking opportunities I would have taken it them too. But this isn’t about blame it’s about correcting a wrong.

Because of, the thinking went at the time, lower pay for government employees should be offset by taxpayer retirement guarantees. That was all well and good until the tide went out on the private sector and exposed the rotten under pinning of the public sector. Again, I don’t blame the public sector workers I think the whole immoral practice of pension spiking was a result of union shenanigans due to their unrestricted power over our state legislators. This is what gave rise to this year’s Prop. 32. This country’s oligarchs saw a chance to deceptively crush the state’s unions. This is frightening thought but the unions have no one to blame but themselves for this challenge.

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I’m not saying that what the Board of Supervisors did in 2002 is the same as what went on in Bell, CA but it came from the same “look how well the private sector is doing – we deserve this” mentality.  It was a culture of total contempt for the people who trusted them.

I don’t know if anyone has looked at what the saving would be if all currently retired public employees had their current retirement pay rolled back to what it would be if their retirement benefits hadn’t been spiked. I’m not suggesting reducing their base pay but just cutting off what was unfairly gained. Maybe if an actuary were to exam this it could be a substantial savings on the local, county and state budgets without reducing the retirement pay that the retirees agreed to when working. If the retiree has already collected what would have been a lump sum payment at retirement the overage should be cut off. If we just wait around for runaway inflation to bail us out the liability is just going to get bigger. There is nothing “grey” about insider trading and conflicts of Interest and there should be nothing grey about gaming a system of public trust.

This brings us back to our little burg north of Santa Rosa. Council members Gary Plass and Susan Jones are good people who care a great deal about our town. However, as retired public employees and the city facing a $26 million dollar unfunded pension liability I think their conflict of interest is just too great to ignore. One can’t help but wonder if they are supporting Measure V to help Healdsburg or to protect their retirement pay. If you have to rebuild the chicken coop you don’t want a fox designing the blueprint?

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