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Dear RPV Residents, Thank you for re-electing me to serve another 4 years as one of your city councilmembers. It is an honor to serve a community of the character of Rancho Palos Verdes. I set forth the results in both the council election and the user fee ballot measures below. The user fee was decisively upheld by over a 10% margin demonstrating the broad consensus against repealing it. The city council election was close and provisional ballots could conceivably change the outcome, but I believe that is unlikely. The campaign was characterized by ad hominem attacks on four of the incumbent councilmembers and fear mongering by a self-financed campaign by Mr. Wright that was nearly rewarded. This is a shame. Hopefully Mr. Wright will spend some time to become more familiar with the issues than his short tenure in the city and limited experience with government has permitted him to be. If he runs again I trust and hope his campaign will focus on real issues rather than contrived ones. I was not able to lend my campaign tens of thousands of dollars but I had to do what I could to try to match the opposition. Both my campaign and that of Mayor Pro Tem Stern are financially challenged. Both of us could use additional contributions at this point. The donation tab on this page provides information on how to donate to my campaign and allows you to donate on line. Follow this link [Doug Stern Donation] for donation information for Mayor Pro Tem Stern's campaign. Campaigns by candidates who are not personally wealthy depend upon the donations of constituents. Even now those donations can be helpful. More importantly than all of the above, let's get back to your business. This Saturday November 10th the council has a workshop starting at 9:30 a.m. at the Palos Verdes Interpretive Center to address the Vision Plan and the Annenberg Foundation's possible contributions to that plan for improvements to our civic center. I encourage the public to turn out and provide us with your input. This is an opportunity for the public to push aggressively for an improved civic center in place of what is now largely a trailer park and to reinforce in all of your councilmembers your preference for improvements in city services and quality of life. Our December 4th meeting is likely to be our reorganizational meeting at which we will choose a new mayor and mayor pro tem. Residents should ponder both the subjective aspects of that choice (who would best act as a mayor and mayor pro tem), who has the respect and trust of both other members of the council and residents, and who has respect and trust in his fellow councilmembers. Residents should also ponder objective information such as the attendance records of the councilmembers. Contrary to popular belief there is no requirement that the positions of mayor and mayor pro tem be automatically rotated to members in a certain order. The council majority may select whomever it wants to select. I will comment more on this later and I am sure the full council would be interested in public input on this issue on December 4th. In the early part of next year our management study will be complete and we will be given opinions and suggestions on all of the city's departments. I am most interested in comments on the council itself and how we can improve our efficiency and our working relationship with staff. As I stressed in the campaign, it is important for the council to behave in a more business-like manner and to avoid making decisions on an ad hoc basis. Items should be placed on our agenda with specific proposals for action. It is also important for councilmembers to discuss their issues openly and not strive to make important decisions "off line." Finally, all councilmembers need to to be respectful of both staff and residents. As and when staff make mistakes (they are only human and this will happen) the council needs to work collaboratively with the city manager to address the mistakes constructively. The city cannot afford continued abuse of its staff by an individual councilmember that undermines both morale and efficiency and increases city expenses by increasing turnover. I am confident the management study will bring forth tools that will allow us to firmly and decisively address the issues we have. Thank you again for your support. As always feel free to contact me with your comments and concerns. Tom Long
2007 Election Results (PDF Format) Measure C Results (PDF Format) Measure D Results (PDF Format) |
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Dear RPV Residents, Welcome to my campaign website. I have tried to gather here everything you need to help you decide on the city council election and the ballot measures. Under "Links" you will find links to all of the other candidates' websites, to the League of Women Voters' Smart Voter website and to the website of the committee seeking to preserve the storm drain user fee. Under the Campaign Platform, Campaign Brochures, and Ballot Statement tabs you will find statements about my qualifications and positions. Feel free to print them out and hand them out or e-mail them to others. (If everyone did this it would save a lot on postage and lessen the need for campaign donations.) The Events tab lists upcoming campaign events I will be attending. Feel free to come. Also feel free to send me questions by clicking on the Ask Tom tab. You can volunteer to help my campaign by clicking on the Volunteers tab and sending me an e-mail suggesting what you can do to help, such as hosting a coffee, sending a letter or cards to friends, putting up a yard sign, walking a precinct, etc. The Endorsements tab lists some of my endorsers. The Endorse Tom tab allows you to endorse me on line and the Donations tab provides information on how to donate and allows online donations. The Contact Information tab provides information on how to contact me and the Committee Roster tab lets you contact my committee to ask questions or to ask for signs. The other tabs provide some background information including local newspaper articles and letters and my e-mails to residents on my e-mail list. Personally I recommend that you vote to re-elect the city council incumbents Mayor Pro Tem Stern, Councilman Wolowicz and myself. I also recommend you vote Yes on C and No on D (the two ballot measures on the storm drain user fee) to assure that we keep the user fee. But the decision is yours and so I want you to have all of the information that will help you decide. One challenger has had two supporters circulate rather negative letters in the community criticizing the current council in his bid to unseat Mayor Pro Tem Stern, Councilman Wolowicz or me. Gordana Swanson, a Rolling Hills resident, has written a letter misrepresenting the council's record. My response to that letter is that it misstates what I have said and done and misstates my voting record. I have never voted against audits of the city's budget. Councilman Gardiner wrote a full page ad in the PV News as an advertisement for a challenger's campaign that is a very confused and inaccurate presentation of the council's record. I have a more detailed response to that letter which you can find by clicking on this link. I urge you to look to each candidate's own description of their qualifications and positions rather than to other people's inaccurate representations Let me know if you have any suggestions for other information I should include in this website to help you make your decisions. Tom Long
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Dear RPV Residents, I was disappointed to read of Councilman Gardiner’s concerns about the city council, but I feel they are misplaced and do not justify his apparent conclusion that at least some of his colleagues are not worthy of re-election. I respectfully disagree. I think we work well together and I urge you to re-elect Mayor Pro Tem Stern, Councilman Wolowicz and myself. Councilman Gardiner’s concerns relate to relatively small disagreements between himself and the rest of the council where in the end there is not much disagreement of substance. I must admit I am surprised by his reaction to these disagreements. But let me respond. Councilman Gardiner expresses concern about a council decision to add 4 staff positions at a payroll cost of about $500,000. Councilman Gardiner does not describe all of the votes. Each position was voted on separately and only Councilman Gardiner opposed all of the staff additions. One addition in particular, an additional public works person to help with the city’s infrastructure projects, was felt worthy of immediate action by all of us except for Councilman Gardiner. Nonetheless, the City Council unanimously agreed to defer any new hirings until the management study currently underway brings us its recommendations. Hiring additional staff will likely save the city money by lessening the use of expensive consultants and overtime costs. Surely we will all look closely at the recommendations of the management study to help make the city more efficient. In the end there is no substantive disagreement. Councilman Gardiner is also concerned about increased information technology (IT) expenses which now make up about 4% of the city’s budget. The council has moved proactively to expand the city’s use of technology to increase employee productivity and improve our communication with our residents. Much of the increased cost comes from automating document management and implementing a geographic information system (GIS) used by many other cities. Dr. Gardiner was the councilmember who brought the motion to implement the GIS technology using the PV on the Net intern program. The city has also expanded employee access to computer hardware and software to allow city staff to provide our residents better, more efficient and timely service. My review of a study by an organization cited by Councilman Gardiner on IT shows that government agencies are typically “laggards” in the use of technology that increases employee productivity. As some technology costs have come down most businesses are using more technology and spending more on IT to increase productivity. Councilman Gardiner did not mention that each new step authorized in IT has been supported by him and this council by unanimous votes. The current management study is looking closely at IT along with all city departments. We asked the consultants whether they recommended that we “go out to bid” immediately or first hear the results of their phase 1 study as to whether now was a good time to go out to bid. The consultant recommended that we receive their phase 1 report first. We voted 4-1 to do so. If the consultant then recommends we go out to bid for any of the different aspects of IT, I suspect we will. Residents may recall the city spending roughly $100,000 to go out to bid on waste hauling at Councilman Gardiner’s insistence only to find out that only one company would bid and only at a 50% increase. We rejected the bid and extended the existing contract. In hindsight it was a bad time to go out to bid for waste hauling. We don’t want to waste precious tax dollars going out to bid again without first asking whether now is the right time. I am confident we will all look closely at the phase 1 study results and devise a cost effective decision as to how to handle the city’s IT needs in the future just as we did in the past. Councilman Gardiner also is concerned about crime and suggests that “we missed it.” We are all concerned about crime, but no one has “missed” the issue. My colleagues Mayor Pro Tem Stern and Councilman Wolowicz, as our representatives on the regional law enforcement committee, have acted diligently. We increased the sheriff’s patrols for traffic enforcement when the sheriff recommended we do so. We have monitored the crime statistics which show no trend of increase in serious (Part 1) crimes and actually show a decrease in less serious (Part 2) crimes. We have asked the sheriff to bring forward a proposal for improved technology, such as the use of cameras to identify license plates at major entrances and exits to the city, to help solve and therefore deter crimes. (Ironically these improvements may lead to somewhat higher IT expenses.) We also took steps to control unwanted solicitors from “casing” residents’ homes. My colleagues and I remain vigilant to keep the crime in our city where it is, among the lowest in California. Councilman Gardiner has supported almost all of these efforts, except the ordinance to control unwanted solicitation which he opposed even though such solicitation can be a prelude to burglaries. Again there is largely a consensus on how to address the issue. The current city council is not treating residents poorly. All of our meetings are broadcast live and are available on the city website so residents can view the meetings and make their own judgments. Like any councilmember, Gardiner is free to agendize anything he wants. Under the Brown Act the council must agendize proposed action in order to act. Sometimes the council cannot do more than the staff has already done. For example, the council cannot add conditions to a building permit after the permit is issued without risking significant liability. Yet members of the public expect the council to act on items placed on its agenda and are understandably disappointed to find that their time addressing an agenda item does not lead to a productive result. It is inconsiderate to the public for a councilmember to agendize items on which we can take no action. It is important for the council to act in a business-like manner. I am committed to implementing the management study’s recommendations to address this issue once the study is complete. I am confident that a consensus will emerge on the council as to how to handle this issue as well. Whatever may be said in the election campaign, I urge you to judge the candidates’ positions on what they say, not on how others characterize their positions. Please vote Tuesday November 6th. Tom Long |
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Dear RPV Residents, The campaign season for this Fall's November 6th city council election has begun. Five candidates are vying for 3 spots. The challengers represent a major departure from the current direction of the council. Paul Wright complains of the city's "excessive spending." Don Reeves and his supporters at PVP Watch seek to "drive the city's expenditures toward zero." Neither has been very specific on what current expenses they would cut. But RPV has less than one-third of the money to spend per person as what the average California city has. All other cities on the Hill have nearly twice what RPV has and no South Bay city (except Lawndale in some years) has less. RPV gets 6% of your property tax, all of the 3% utility tax you pay, a portion of your car tax (VLF fee), a portion of the sales tax for items you buy in the city, and not much else. Add it all up and you will find on average that the city’s general fund is about $1 per resident per day, compared to a statewide average of a little under $4 per person per day. Even with the expenditures in all funds including grants the city receives, the spending is only about $2 per person per day. The user fee adds another 10 cents per day per resident on average. The City's problems in the past have stemmed largely from inadequate spending, not "excessive spending." Failed storm drains that could have been lined or repaired caused millions of dollars of largely uninsured losses to residents' homes on San Ramon and Sea Cove. Even now the city is dealing with lawsuits seeking over $12 million. Sinkholes on Western snarled traffic for months because storm drains were not properly maintained. Traffic enforcement was non-existent on weekends and late evenings. Major arterial streets have decayed. Landscaping, civic center, recreation and utility undergrounding projects have been either delayed or scrubbed. The current city council has taken steps to correct all of these problems by spending more money to take care of things that are vital to protecting the value of residents' properties. But it is difficult. Even now staff proposes a program for maintenance of major arterial streets that will result in continued decay "because we don't have enough money to do more." I have asked and will continue to ask "how much do we need to do it right?" and then work to find ways to get it done properly. My views are based on what is necessary to conserve and improve the city's quality of life and protect our property values, not a political agenda of minimizing government regardless of the consequences. Mr. Wright and Mr. Reeves would turn the clock back and give us the "sleepy village council" that PVP Watch has so candidly admitted it prefers and "drive the city toward zero." The choice is yours to make between two very different visions of the city's future. My website provides more information and links to all other candidates’ websites. I urge you to vote to re-elect all 3 incumbents. Tom Long Tom Long for RPV City Council I.D. # 1254521 |
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Dear RPV Residents, The campaign season for this Fall's November 6th city council election has begun. Five candidates are vying for 3 spots. Challengers Don Reeves and Paul Wright are seeking to replace at least two of the incumbents, Steve Wolowicz, Doug Stern and myself. The challengers represent a major departure from the current direction of the council. Mr. Wright complains of the city's "excessive spending." Don Reeves and his supporters at PVP Watch seek to "drive the city's expenditures toward zero." (PVP Watch's words). Neither has been very specific on what current expenses they would cut. But RPV has less than one-third of the money to spend per person as what the average California city has. All other cities on the Hill have nearly twice what RPV has and no South Bay city (except Lawndale in some years) has less. I encourage you to do the math. RPV gets 6% of your property tax, all of the 3% utility tax you pay, a portion of your car tax (VLF fee), a portion of the sales tax for items you buy in the city, and not much else. Add it all up and you will find on average that it is less than $400 per person per year, compared to a statewide average of $1300. The user fee adds another $90 per household on average. Consider what services you get for what you pay and whether you are getting good value. The City's problems in the past have stemmed largely from inadequate spending not "excessive spending." Failed storm drains that could have been lined or repaired caused millions of dollars of largely uninsured losses to residents' homes on San Ramon and Sea Cove. Even now the city is dealing with lawsuits for over $12 million. Sinkholes on Western snarled traffic for months because storm drains were not properly maintained. Traffic enforcement was non-existent on weekends and late evenings. Major arterial streets have decayed. Landscaping, civic center, recreational and utility undergrounding projects have been either delayed or scrubbed. The current city council has taken steps to correct all of these problems by spending more money to take care of things that are vital to protecting the value of residents' properties. But it is difficult. Even now staff proposes a program for maintenance of major arterial streets that will result in continued decay "because we don't have enough money to do more." I have asked and will continue to ask "how much do we need to do it right?" and then work to find ways to get it done properly. My views are based on what is necessary to conserve and improve the city's quality of life and protect our property values, not a political agenda of minimizing government regardless of the consequences. Mr. Wright and Mr. Reeves would turn the clock back and give us the "sleepy village council" that PVP Watch has so candidly admitted it prefers and "drive the city toward zero." The choice is yours to make between two very different visions of the city's future. I urge you to vote to re-elect all 3 incumbents. Tom Long |
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Dear RPV Residents, This November you will have the decision of who to place in the city council seats currently occupied by Doug Stern, Steve Wolowicz, and myself. As many of you may know Doug has announced he is running for re-election. I have decided to do the same. Given how slowly government moves, four years is actually a short time. Nonetheless, I think the current council has achieved a number of positive things. But we have only begun our efforts and so I would like to be there to try to see them through. One of our most significant achievements has been to make the process of government very open. We have used the city's website and e-mail lists to improve communication with the residents. We have also made sure our decisions in council have been thoroughly explained. (O.K. I know we are sometimes a little too thorough in our explanations.) Whether you agree or disagree with our decisions, I think we have kept you informed and explained the basis of our decisions to you. Personally I read every e-mail every resident sends me and (as many of you know) I answer the majority of them personally. I will work hard to stay engaged with you and work to try to achieve a consensus on as many issues as we can. The current council has also acted decisively to improve the city's infrastructure. I was in the forefront of pushing the council to act on this item promptly. You may recall in 2003 I warned that if the city did not act to repair dilapidated storm drains before they failed we would suffer considerable property damage. Sad to say, I was proven right when a sinkhole opened up on Western Avenue and when a wall of mud badly damaged a dozen homes near McCarroll Canyon. At least partially because of my efforts, the council placed a user fee on the ballot which passed and is now providing $1.2 million per year in funds dedicated to storm drain repair and maintenance. The council also allocated over $7 million in additional general reserve funds, $3 million at the suggestion of Councilman Gardiner and myself in an agreement we negotiated to support retaining the existing user fee and opposing the repeal initiative on this November's ballot. While that fee is less than I had hoped for, it will still allow the city to repair storm drains more quickly than otherwise would be possible, lessening the risk of further property damage and perhaps getting some projects completed more efficiently as costs continue to escalate. The average user fee of $86 per year is much less than we pay for insurance against fire and earthquake risks but it does help protect us against risks not typically insured. I promised to make infrastructure a top priority and I did so by helping establish the user fee and by committing significant general reserve funds to repair projects. The current council continues to make progress in preserving open space and preventing unsuitable development. We successfully concluded the acquisition of the Hon property, dramatically increasing the amount of land preserved. We have a negotiated agreement in place with the agencies that granted the bulk of the fund for the land acquisition. Most significantly we have worked with the Palos Verdes Peninsula Land Conservancy to obtain support from throughout the Peninsula and to place open space easements over the land to assure its preservation indefinitely into the future. The council also helped negotiate an agreement that protected the city from financial consequences in connection with litigation over the landslide moratorium. Moreover, the city won the litigation and we can now feel more confident that the city cannot be compelled to permit new development in unstable areas. More work remains to be done, particularly with the view ordinance which has been significantly weakened. We also need to give serious consideration to limits on mansionization similar to those adopted by our neighbors. After all open space is not simply preserves far from our homes, it includes the land around our homes as well. I think this council and the city have also been very careful with residents' tax money. Keep in mind the city receives only 6% of your property tax dollars. That small share is the city's largest source of revenue. Other taxes such as the 3% utility tax and the storm drain user fee are significant sources of revenue to the city. With less than $400 a year per capita, RPV has not even one-third of the revenue per person as the average California city. RPV ranks lowest in revenue of all South Bay cities except in some years we are ahead of Lawndale. Do we want RPV to provide a lower level of service than Lawndale? Now in asking this question I mean no insult to Lawndale. Indeed that city already provides more services than RPV. It does not have our problems with infrastructure. It is more densely populated and so has fewer streets, storm drains and sewers to care for relative to its population. So, unlike RPV, Lawndale has proactive code enforcement and inspects all buildings in the city every 18 months for code compliance. RPV is not providing such a service. This election, both in your choices for council and your decision on whether or not to retain the user fee, is about quality of life. There are services the city must provide and others it should provide which its residents cannot do on their own. The ability of RPV to provide the level of service its residents expect is being taxed to the limit. My vision of RPV is not of a city limited to struggling to provide its residents the bare necessities of municipal services. We should strive for a higher level of service consistent with protecting the values of our properties. This has been the approach throughout the Peninsula. Voters have approved a $209 parcel tax to provide additional funding for the schools (the schools provide far more than the basic necessities of education) and in PVE a nearly $700 parcel tax to help fund city services. Although much of what RPV does relies on private donations and government grants (such contributions funded over 80% of the costs of the Palos Verdes Interpretive Center (PVIC) and over 90% of the open space land purchases), the city needs seed money to attract private and government help and funds to maintain and operate facilities. If and when the city gets an additional reliable source of income from hotel taxes from Terranea we should consider not only reducing taxes, but also expanding our vision of what the city can provide. The city's civic center is a shell of what it should be and compares poorly to other communities that are similar to our own. The city's recreational fields are from another era and need to be updated. These things may not be "needs" but they are "wants" that are worthy of respect. I believe I have represented you well over the last few years and that I can continue to do so for the next four. If I haven't persuaded you of that yet I encourage you to write or call me with your doubts and questions so I can address your concerns. I ask for your support and endorsement. I also ask that you share this webpage by email with others and urge them to support me as well. Tom Long |
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Dear RPV Residents, Below is a recent PV News editorial for your review. As you know the council voted to raise the user fee by 2% this year (the amount of increase is limited by the ordinance the voters adopted to be equal to the allowed rate of increase of property taxes). Trump's golf course has done it again, planting trees that may not be consistent with city requirements and not seeking advance approval. A status report on this will come up on July 17th along with final approval of agreements on the flag pole. When I voted to keep the flag pole in place I did so because I thought Trump's failure to comply with city requirements was just an abberation. His organization seems intent on proving otherwise. My vote (and the outcome) on keeping the flag pole in place may change. Let's see what happens with the trees. Tom Long The Peninsula News, June 21 Editorial Thursday, June 21, 2007 Fee a small price to pay Regardless of how you look at it, Rancho Palos Verdes’ storm-drain infrastructure is a mess. In one sense residents were fortunate this year, as strong winter storms never materialized and the Los Angeles area endured the worst drought on record. But the Peninsula’s largest city may not be so lucky next winter. All it takes is a few downpours to open up a hole like the gaping monster on Western Avenue in January 2005. Fortunately, no one was hurt in that incident, but property damage occurred and a child was nearly killed when failed storm drains caused mudslides in McCarrell Canyon the same winter. The bottom line is this: The city’s storm drains are old, dilapidated and in dire need of repair. Knowing that, the RPV City Council two years ago voted to place a storm-drain user fee on the August 2005 ballot. The measure, which requires homeowners to pay $86 per year for repairs to the aged system, narrowly passed. Call it whatever you want — a tax, a levy, a tariff, a toll — this fee has made possible vital fixes throughout the city. In their continuing commitment to rebuilding the city’s infrastructure, council members on Tuesday voted to increase the user fee by $1.72 per year, or a mere 2 percent. Given the rising costs of construction and urgency of repairs, the Peninsula News supports council’s decision and asks residents to support continuing the fee on this November’s ballot. While the user fee is not a perfect solution, it gets the job done at a reasonable cost to residents. About 7 bucks a month is a small price to pay for sound storm drains and the peace of mind they provide. Still, critics charge that city officials should spend general fund monies or reserves to pay for the repairs. To date, council has allocated $7 million in general fund dollars for the effort. As for using reserves, that is a foolish choice given the city may need those funds in case of an emergency. Government agencies that spend down their reserves are walking a fine line between relative security and disaster. If residents fail to support a continuation of the user fee, projects that demand the city’s immediate attention could fall by the wayside or require the expenditure of valuable reserves. Crews are getting ready to start crucial work in the Sunnyside Ridge Road and McCarrell Canyon areas, but officials say the projects would experience delays of many years minus a reliable funding source like the user fee. Imagine the cost to the city in attorney fees and other expenses if officials don’t take action on necessary and doable repair work, only to see a slope failure or buckled road cause property damage or worse. The News agrees with RPV Mayor Tom Long, who said in a recent e-mail to an opponent of the fee, “I think most residents realize that an average of $86 a year … is a small price to pay (certainly not a day’s earnings for most city residents) to address a serious risk we all recognize.” Residents have a choice: Support the user fee and secure the city’s future, or wait for the infrastructure to crumble. |
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Dear RPV Residents: A note from my wife Laura Lee below. Tom Long Dear Family & Friends: I just wanted to let you know that the annual Revlon Run/Walk for Women on May 12th was very successful yet again. Tom and I completed the course with the many thousands of people who all had the same goal - to beat cancer. It was very touching to see so many people walking or running with tribute signs honoring their family and/or friends who are battling cancer, and so very sad to see just as many signs in memory of those who died of the disease. We participate every year to try to eradicate these signs. There was a great feeling of purpose and unity at this event, and I was honored to be able to participate for you. For those of you who pledged, I will be turning in the money on June 7th. You can either make your check out, payable to "Revlon Run/Walk For Women" and send it to me at 4830 Browndeer Lane, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275, or you can donate on-line. My Donation page can be found at https://www.revlonrunwalk.com/la/secure/mywebpage.cfm?pID=347759. Thank you all for your support. I deeply appreciate it, as do so many other people. Laura Lee
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I have two items of interest - the first concerns a Letter to the Editor that I wrote and the second concerns the storm drain user fee issue. Dear RPV Residents, I value your constructive criticism. Hence I sent the following letter to the editor in response to Don Reeves' criticism of the council. I encourage you to view the council meetings yourself and forms your own judgments and pass them along to us rather than relying on Mr. Reeves.
I am pleased to announce agreement by the city council's storm drain user fee subcommittee (Councilman Gardiner and myself) on what the user fee tax should be and on devoting additional funding and study to storm drain repair. The proposal represents an agreement between Councilman Gardiner (who originally opposed the user fee) and myself. If the proposal receives unanimous council support it will be on the ballot this November as an alternative to repealing the existing user fee. The proposal does not change the amount of the user fee but places a 10 year sunset on the fee unless the voters approve an extension. The proposal also puts the oversight committee that the council recently established into the ordinance as a permanent feature that only the voters could repeal. As part of the proposal the council will also budget an additional $3 million in general fund reserves toward storm drain repair allowing us to get large repair programs started early rather than having to wait for years to accumulate user fee income. Finally the proposal asks the council to seek expert outside engineering advice about how to proceed with future storm drain repairs. The proposal is not everything I had hoped for. Our storm drain repair program will last at least 30 years just to fix problems we know of now. By the end of that time new problems are likely to have emerged. Infrastructure repair and maintenance needs to be treated as a permanent issue. Hence, the answer to the question "When will we finish?" is never. Many of the repairs the city is doing as part of the 30 year repair program are simply storm drain lining projects that I have been told may last only 30 years. By shortening the length of the user fee tax we impair the city's ability to borrow against it if emergencies arise. We also may be creating a false impression that the tax income won't be needed in 10 years. While it is true that the city may have more income from sources such as the Terranea resort in a few years, the city has a very poor tax base. Even with anticipated hotel taxes, the city will likely still have less than half of the average California city's revenue on a per person basis. And the city's expenses continue to rise, many of them at a pace faster than the city's revenue increases. The city gets only 6 cents of every property tax dollar. Even if the city (and all of its taxes) were eliminated, most of the residents would not notice much more money in their bank accounts. But they would notice what the consequences of not having the city would be. All that being said, the proposal is a good compromise and perhaps the best result we can get in an environment where people reflexively distrust all government and assume that government is wasting their tax money. Under the proposal we get a devoted stream of tax money that can only be spent on storm drain repair for at least the next 10 years. We also get an additional $3 million of general fund revenues beyond the $2 million the city contributed previously as well as other monies the city has spent on storm drain repair. This revenue will assure us of vital storm drain repairs being made soon even if new revenue sources do not materialize or are consumed by other expenses. Below is the staff report signed by both Councilmember Gardiner and me today urging the council to support the proposal I describe above. Without a positive vote by the council next Tuesday and the voters in November, we will not have a guaranteed revenue stream to do essential storm drain repairs. Please e-mail or write the other council Members and urge them to support this proposal! You can e-mail them all with one e-mail addressed to cc@rpv.com You can also call, e-mail or write them individually and here is how (this is the public contact information on the city website):
Thank you for your attention to this issue. tomlong@palosverdes.com
SUBJECT: PROPOSED MODIFICATION OF THE ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF RANCHO PALOS VERDES THAT ESTABLISHED AN ANNUAL STORM DRAIN USER FEE RECOMMENDATION Direct Staff to draft appropriate documents leading to placing a counter-ballot measure to the November 2007 User Fee Repeal Ballot Measure that would include:
Direct staff to complete the following two items as a condition for Mayor Long’s and Council Member Gardiner’s support of the counter ballot measure:
BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSION At their September 5, 2006 meeting, the City Council received and filed the City Clerk’s Certification that the Petition to Repeal the Storm Drain User Fee (the “Fee”) qualified for the ballot for the City’s next regular municipal election, which in this case would be held on November 6, 2007. Also at the September 5, 2006 Council meeting, Council Member Gardiner suggested that he would be interested in bringing back a proposal for an alternative to the existing Fee. At the September 19, 2006 Council meeting, Mayor Pro Tem Long indicated that he and Council Member Gardiner had discussed the idea of exploring alternatives to the current Fee and were interested in working together to develop a proposal for consideration by the City Council. At the October 3, 2006 meeting, the City Council authorized the City Attorney spend up to $15,000 to explore legal issues related to various storm drain financing alternatives suggested by Council members and directed staff to investigate the experiences of other cities in similar situations in an effort to learn from their experiences. Mayor Long and Council Member Gardiner met with Staff on March 6, 2007 and discussed various aspects of the Water Quality and Flood Protection program (the “storm drain program”), the Fee, the November 2007 repeal ballot measure and alternatives to it. Based upon the discussion, Mayor Long and Council Member Gardiner agreed to the components outlined in this report and directed Staff to prepare this report with the following proposal for consideration by the entire City Council: Direct Staff to draft appropriate documents leading to placing a counter-ballot measure to the November 2007 User Fee Repeal Ballot measure that would include:
Mayor Long and Council Member Gardiner set forth the following conditions for supporting the counter ballot proposal: An additional $3 million shall be transferred from the General fund (not as a loan) to storm drain program fund to “jump start” finance improvements to the McCarrell Canyon/Bay Club storm drain system (or any other higher priority project that might emerge). The funds shall be transferred as part of the upcoming budgetary process for FY07-08. Direct Staff to begin developing the specifications for a Request For Qualifications (RFQ) for the retention of an engineering firm experienced in the assessment and planning of infrastructure projects like the City’s storm drain program. The goal of the analysis would be to identify ways to repair the City’s deteriorated storm drain system in the most optimal and cost-effective manner. The analysis would include a comparison of escalating costs over time with the cost of financing more repairs (and expending more funds) up front. The goal would be to establish an optimal and systematic program that will eventually cause the condition of the storm drain system to be comparable to the condition of the City’s residential streets. Experiences of Other Cities With Storm Drain User Fees/Taxes Established in Accordance With Proposition 218 Staff has made inquiries with other cities, professional consultants, and conducted an informal survey among city municipal finance officers. The following table summarizes the results of the inquiries made to other cities about storm drain fees/taxes:
Based upon our inquiries, no cities reported that they experienced a repeal ballot measure of a storm drain user fee during a Municipal Election. FISCAL IMPACT: No fiscal impact shall result from adoption of this recommendation at this time. Respectfully submitted:
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Dear RPV Residents, As you know RPV's "Whale of a Day" celebration is coming up at the PV Interpretive Center Saturday March 3rd 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. I encourage you to attend. We have received many suggestions about the city's "no solicitation" ordinance. Unfortunately an article in the PV News mis-described what we are considering. A recent United States Supreme Court case makes it clear we can no longer require solicitors to have permits. Nor can we simply ban them. We can, however, allow you to post a "no solicitation" sign and require solicitors to obey your wishes. But I have to admit enforcement will be difficult and expensive now that permits cannot be required. One councilmember has suggested exempting charities (such as Girl Scouts), political (such as me perhaps) and religious solicitors from the ordinance. Another councilmember prefers no such change. A possible third course would be to allow property owners to pick from two signs, one would ban all solicitors and the other would ban only commercial solicitors. If we continue to have only one sign then property owners (like myself) who prefer to allow non-commercial solicitors must choose between allowing everyone or noone. If most of us choose not to put up a sign that bans everyone, then enforcement for those of you who put up the sign won't work as well because there will be fewer such signs and it will be harder for the sheriff to catch violators. So I prefer (if we can do it legally) to allow residents to ban all solicitors or just commercial solicitors from coming to their door. But I am interested in your opinion (if you are not one of the hundreds who have already told us what you think) so send your thoughts to cc@rpv.com We have an exciting upcoming event--a groundbreaking at Terranea (the old Marineland) for a new resort. This is currently scheduled for early March. This event holds out the hope that the development now has its financing and may someday (perhaps as soon as 2009 or 2010) generate some tax revenue for us. Of course there have already been suggestions that the developer will want tax concessions because of large cost overruns and this is even before construction has begun. So I am reluctant to count the money until it is in the bank. Important votes to renew the school district's parcel tax and the city's user fee, at $209 and $86 on average per year annually loom in the upcoming months. The financial future of both the district and the city may depend on the outcome of these votes. More to come on these issues. During this year I will be trying to attend interested HOAs to answer questions about your city. But I encourage you to e-mail questions as well. As long as they are not related to Donald Trump's flag, I will try hard to answer all of them. Tom Long
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