Candidate for
Council Member; City of Folsom

I am committed to independently representing you. I have not and I will not accept campaign contributions. I will work hard to keep you informed and involved in the process of our local government.

I strongly support implementing a new era of improved operational visibility. This has the automatic consequence of built-in accountability and informing and involving more of you, the residents of Folsom, in the process of our local government. We must better utilize modern day technology to deliver an improved flow of information. It is a primary goal of mine to dramatically increase the ability of our citizens, employees and businesses to scrutinize and participate in the decision making process. We need to comprehensively redefine and develop methods of publicizing every operational facet of Folsom city government.

Aggressively implementing this philosophy will help make the good better and help eliminate problems before they become crises. We can move from and environment of reactive scrambling to one of pro-action and calculated anticipation. We can then depend on a more informed and involved city with dramatically improved trust and credibility locally and regionally.

The Issues - Water Meters

Water is valuable now and will become increasingly so in the future. We cannot risk losing any of our existing water rights. What may have seemed like an expensive proposition for securing more water rights (a $5M estimate for installation of 6600 residential meters) in the early 90s will seem trivial in the future. However, I absolutely respect the protection of the expectations of our residents. I would propose a compromise. Water meters are installed on all homes but are not read until a change in home ownership. This would preserve "water rights" on an individual basis. We would spin up metering as a city through the attrition of home ownership changes while satisfying the conditions of our newer contracts with the United States Bureau of Reclamation.

The Issues - Traffic/Traffic Noise

We need a comprehensive approach to dealing with this dramatically escalating problem in our community. This means dedicated, continuous attention and application of resources to this problem. We need to define recurring revenue dedicated to the implementation of the recommendations recently provided by our traffic noise ad hoc committee. Considerations need to include but are certainly not limited to slowing speeds, reviewing, rewriting and enforcing vehicular engine noise thresholds, rubberized pavement and sound barriers. All public transportation opportunities must be identified, developed and most importantly, incentivized so their use will warrant public expense. In other words, let's try and fill our empty buses or develop alternatives that work.

The Issues - Aircraft Noise

This is a very serious issues for the residents of Folsom, especially those in neighborhoods in the southern parts of town. Folsom City activists Bill Bryant and Harriet Fratis, County Supervisor Roger Neillo, Council members Steve Miklos and Cyndi Dow as well as many others have worked relentlessly to develop and implement new steeper, quieter approaches into Mather Airport. A very frustrating and remaining residual to these new airline procedures is enforcement. We must devise solutions that require enforcement of these new approach guidelines. Working to move these approaches to an azimuth line closer to or over Highway 50 would also reduce impacts without moving the problems to other neighborhoods.

The Issues - Library

The Folsom Public Library fulfills an irreplaceable role in the lives of my family which includes my 2 young sons ages 7 and 10. Recognizing the gaping disparity between what we have and what we need, I chose to become more involved with the many fine library activists working so hard to improve our existing library and a plan for a new one.

I have experienced first hand the disappointment of unfulfilled hope that a new library would soon be built. I am committed to developing a responsible, achievable library building plan. We need to accept the possibility that Proposition 14 grant money may not be available for our community and plan accordingly. I believe the property tax base that supports operations and maintenance will grow sufficiently to keep a newer, larger facility operationally solvent and subsequently allow for a variety of less costly financing solutions for a new building.

I am proud of my association with the dedicated yet battle wary library proponents of Folsom. I am committed to continuing our drive for a new library as a city council member or as an involved resident.

The Issues - Affordable Housing

The inability or refusal of the City of Folsom to implement planning for affordable housing as required by state law is regrettable. The consequence of this inaction continues to reverberate throughout the community. As a member of the planning commission for the past year and a half, I have directly experienced the difficult process of working through the terms of our settlement agreement with Legal Services of Northern California. I believe increased input from the residents and businesses prior to settlement would have led to a more understood and accepted agreement. The most difficult condition of the agreement has been the requirement to rezone 128 acres to high density mult-family. To date (mid October) a relatively easy 98 acres has been rezoned and a very difficult 30 acres remain. There simply isn't enough remaining vacant property to engineer rezones acceptable to both property owners and adjacent property owners. Please remain involved in this process and make your voices heard.

The Issues - Budget/Financing

Foremost on our minds as we wrestle with the day to day issues of making Folsom as good as it can be must be the specter of a future city budget that will not include the largess of one time developer impact fees. The budget process of the future will need to rely more on recurring revenue streams such and sales tax and property tax increments. This can and will have to be done and prepared for early and accordingly. We need a plan for achievable annual fiscal solvency in perpetuity. We also need to grow our city reserve fund to be better prepared for emergencies. It is my desire to make more of the city budgetary process available on internet for all to view and scrutinize.

The Issues - Growth South of Highway 50

The continuous increase in regional job and population growth dictate that all jurisdictions in the area work to accommodate these mounting pressures. Properly accommodating population growth is a fundamental charge of local government. I support a well managed plan for growth south of Highway 50.

I do however emphatically support a public vote on this issue. Generally I would oppose ballot box land use planning. However, this is an immense and important expansion issue for the city of Folsom. This would increase the size of Folsom by 25 percent. We need to engage the public directly. A good general plan for this area will be approved a bad one won't. A vote of this nature would be an interesting public referendum on the trust of the city to properly handle this future growth based on the recent record of the city to handle past growth.