Extra
Monday Feb. 1, 3pm: Defend the Landmarks and Design Review Commissions
Sunday January 31, 2021 - 09:47:00 PM
On Monday starting at 3pm, please dial into the City Council's Agenda Committee meeting to defend two valuable City advisory commissions. The Zoom info is in the agenda packet:
The only agenda item is a proposal by extreme pro-growth Councilmembers to kill off the Design Review Commission, and possibly the Landmarks Commission, too. These are two of the primary venues for citizens to block berserk developments. See pages 11-13 of the agenda (PDF page numbering).
- Both commissions help the city grow smartly – without destroying Berkeley's history and heritage, or repeating the cheaply built tilt-up's of the 1960s, or building high-rise concrete prisons like European cities' notorious suburbs.
- Whatever the cost in staff time, it's a deal. Commissioners volunteer multiples of that value, contributing expertise and effort that staff and elected officials lack. They help ensure a livable city, and prevent bad development, and protect the City against potential liability for bad decisions. They also handle complex decisions, which take a lot of time – relieving Councilmembers and their staff of this burden.
- If cost were really an issue, Commissioners could do more on their own, with less staff time.
- But the sponsors' language around efficiency and saving the City money is palpably false. (Really, they're just gunning for these two specific commissions.) Rarely in recent memory has the Council actively tried to save residents money, and the public doesn't seem to mind this expansive approach to City government. Last fall, the public endorsed every new tax the Council put on the ballot.
- Last fall, the Council itself switched City power purchases to the most-expensive plan available – EBCE's "Renewable 100" – costing taxpayers an excess $95,000/year. They also authorized the City Manager to switch individual ratepayers to this broken plan. They could have picked an equally green plan – PG&E Solar Choice – and instead saved taxpayers tens of thousands of $/year. And the $95K/year the Council wasted just about equals the total annual staff time for both Commissions targeted in this proposal. But, by comparison, this $95K/year surcharge gives residents zero value.
- If the City government really needs to save money post-pandemic, there are lots of places to cut – that power bill is just one example. The very last place to cut should be venues that maximize public participation in government, and promote better decisionmaking. After a year of strenuous (and sometimes violent) national attacks on democracy, Berkeley of all places should be strengthening – not destroying – its democratic institutions.
