Monday, December 18, 2006

CM PRESS # 36


CITY COUNCIL MAJORITY SHOULD BRING IN THEIR OWN TEAM TO GET THE JOB DONE

BACKGROUND AND BASICS

In the best of all worlds, people run for public office because they have things that they want to accomplish--they have a big vision.

Of course, there are some who run because they just want to pad their resumes or for other reasons and they really have no desire to do anything except collect their pay checks and avoid controversy.

We've had some candidates in the past who told the CM PRESS, when asked about their big visions for our city, that they didn't have any visions and would just listen to the people. This was an empty suit and an empty head answer.

It goes without saying that elected officials should listen to people, but these officials should come to the table with big visions that they want to see implemented. We don't need empty suits with no ideas to be our political priests to intercede on our behalf between us and government. We can all talk directly to government ourselves.

We need elected officials with big visions for our city who will tell us what these visions are and who believe strongly enough in their visions that they will argue for them, but who will be open minded enough to listen to other arguments.

In other words, let's have our elected officials run their big visions and major ideas up the flagpole to see if we salute. Note that the CM PRESS isn't saying that all decisions should be run up the flagpole. Many things that are decided by government are routine in nature. Under our representative form of government, the citizens have delegated certain of their authority to our elected officials to handle these routine matters for us. Notwithstanding this, however, citizens need to keep a watch on these routine matters to make sure someone hasn't slipped in something major among the routine matters so it won't be seen.

THE TWO COMMISSIONS

How do our elected officials in Costa Mesa implement their big visions? It's often through many small decisions made by the Council and by the two Commissions appointed by the Council. The cumulative effect of many bad small decisions over the years by liberal City Councils has caused Costa Mesa to become less like our sister coastal communities.

The good or bad decisions often start with the two Commissions we have in Costa Mesa that are appointed by the City Council.

Each Commission is composed of five people: The Planning Commission (often called the no-Planning Commission by the CM PRESS), and the Parks and Recreation Commission. All Commission members serve at the pleasure of the City Council.


The Planning Commission is the second most important body in this city after the City Council. There are five Planning Commissioners. Planning Commissioners receive about $ 400 per month and some other benefits for their service. The current members of this Commission are: Bill Perkins, Bruce Garlich, Eleanor Egan, Donn Hall and Jim Fisler.

In third place in importance is the Parks and Recreation Commission. Parks and Recreation Commissioners get paid about $ 100 per month (if memory serves). The current members of this Commission are: Mark Harris, Bob Graham, David Stiller, Byron De Arakal, Wendy Leece ( Ms. Leece was just elected to the City Council so her seat is open).

It is important to note, here, that neither Commission requires that its members come to their positions with much specific knowledge or expertise. They are, however, supposed to have at least average intelligence and be able to reason logically based on the facts presented to them so that they can arrive at proper conclusions about matters that they decide. For example, a Parks and Recreation Commissioner doesn't have to know Elms from Palm trees.

The Commissioners are there for their judgement. Staff supplies specific facts and expertise. In the above example, Staff will tell the Parks and Recreation Commissioners the difference between an Elm and a Palm tree.

The Commissioners are a little like a judge and jury in a courtroom. They hear the pros and cons of various matters and make decisions about the things that come before them.

The City Council has a right to expect these Commissions to carry out the will of the Council and not go against the Council consensus especially as the consensus relates to the direction our city will take (the aforementioned big visions).

If you see the City Council constantly overturning decisions by either of these two Commissions, you have a clue that the Commission involved may not be in sync with the majority on the Council.

In the just past election, some of the members of both Commissions took political sides that give a clue as to whether they're for genuine improvement or not.

In simplest terms, some Commission members were on the side of improvement and some went with the anti-improvers and supported candidates who lost in the just past election.

Two visions. Improvement or anti-improvement. The lines were more clearly drawn in this just past election than in any election in recent memory.

Improvers took note of which side the Commissioners were on (and also of their past comments and decisions) and are telling the CM PRESS that on the Planning Commission, the two Commissioners who are most likely to help with genuine improvement are Donn Hall and Jim Fisler.

On the Parks and Recreation Commission the two Commissioners who Improvers feel are best for genuine improvement are Mark Harris and Bob Graham
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COMMITTEES

There are also a number of Committees whose members are appointed by the City Council.

These Committees consist of volunteer citizens, who receive no compensation, and their role is advisory. We'll get into these Committees in a future issue of the CM PRESS, but what you should keep in mind is that the Council has actually appointed people who don't even live in Costa Mesa to some of these Committees and has also appointed people to some committees who are strongly against genuine improvement of Costa Mesa.
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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.

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