Election Section

This November election voters in the Berkeley and neighboring communities have a chance to improve our East Bay Regional Parks by voting Yes on Measure CC. This is a funding measure to raise money to pay for habitat restoration and improvements in the parks.  

Measure CC was put together by leaders in the Sierra Club and Golden Gate Audubon Society. We worked with the Park District staff and board to craft a measure that directly addressed park district needs for environmental maintenance. This measure was originally put on the ballot in March 2000 and covered projects and parks in all of the Park District’s lands in Alameda and Contra Costa Counties. But in that election the measure just missed the 2/3 vote because voters in Eastern Alameda and Contra Costa Counties did not support it with enough votes.  

The voters in the area from the City of Alameda to Richmond, or in the zone West of the Berkeley Hills, however, supported the measure with well over the necessary 2/3 vote. After that defeat, the Sierra Club, Golden Gate Audubon Society, and many other community and park user groups urged the district to focus on the environmental maintenance needs for those parks in area West of the Berkeley Hills where the people showed their support for our parks. This was how Measure CC got on the ballot. It was not the creature of high priced consultants as the anti-tax opponents claim, but came out of the desires of grassroots organizations to see that our regional parks are well maintained with funding to restore and protect habitat and wildlife. 

The projects and parks are specified, and the money can only be used for those projects and uses. They are all set forth in your voter pamphlet, just check them out. As an example, in the Berkeley area, Measure CC will fund the operation and maintenance of the newly created Eastshore State Park. It also provides funding to restore the water quality of Jewel Lake in Tilden and improvements at the Point Isabel off- leash dog park. 

Measure CC will also provide the funding for a comprehensive ecologically-based assessment of how we can reduce the danger of fire in the wildlands from Richmond to Oakland that accomplishes two purposes: protecting us from wild fire while also restoring and enhancing native habitat and wildlife. The restoration of native habitat also promises to reduce the costs of maintenance because native habit is less fire prone and less costly to maintain. Measure CC also funds the implementation of this ecological-based fire safety plan. What a win for the environment and our communities! 

Measure CC will cost very little, a residential household will pay just $12, or a buck a month! That is less than a cup of coffee. Apartment dwellings are assessed even less at .69 cents a month.  

Measure CC has protections to ensure the money is spent wisely. It has a sunset clause. After 15 years, if voters don’t like it, it won’t get renewed. At the insistence of Sierra Club and Golden Gate Audubon Society, it has strict financial controls. The money will go into a separate fund to be used only for the projects on the list, and each year the Park District must show the public that it spent the money for the projects on that list. 

The opponents are the few and usual Jarvis-Gann anti-taxers some of whom masquerade as “environmentalists.” They have raised a specious argument that we should not vote to support our parks because people in other areas of the park district won't be taxed. Using that logic, the people of Berkeley should never have voted to create the East Bay Regional Park District in 1934 because people in Orinda, Walnut Creek, Fremont, and Concord, who were then not part of the original Park District, could use Tilden Park back then without paying anything for that pleasure. How ridiculous! We should recognize that this argument is really the Right-wing's attack all public uses and facilities. Voters should reject this selfish argument of those who just don’t want to pay for public goods like parks. 

The anti-taxers also make the well-worn and specious claim that the Park District really has the money to pay for all of these projects now. As the Sierra Club and Audubon leaders who have worked on Park District issues for over 20 years, we can tell you that there just is no money for the projects on the list. That is why we created Measure CC. Moreover, the district is losing revenue. It will take a 10 percent cut this year and next year as part of State's methods for balancing its budget. This is a $12 million a year loss in revenue.  

We urge voters to join Sierra Club, Golden Gate Audubon Society, Save the Bay, the League of Women Voters, Citizens for East Shore Parks, the Berkeley Democratic Club, and the Berkeley Citizens Alliance, and vote Yes on CC. 

Norman La Force, Chair Sierra Club Yes on CC Campaign and 

Chair, Sierra Club East Bay Public Lands Committee 

Arthur Feinstein, Conservation Director Golden Gate Audubon Society 

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