Santa Rosa council race could reshape city politics

The Santa Rosa City Council is poised for a shakeup that could reshape politics in the city for years to come.

With no incumbents running for the three seats open this November, the makeup of the seven-member body - which has seen significant infighting over the past year - is about to change dramatically at a pivotal time in its history.

Back on its feet financially after a bruising period of budget cuts, the city of nearly 172,000 people is poised for significant change.

It has a new city manager, Sean McGlynn, whose arrival from El Paso, Texas, has sparked a renewed sense of optimism at City Hall.

Several new retail, office and housing projects are under construction, including the long-delayed Museum on the Square in downtown, the Dick’s Sporting Goods at Coddingtown and a 270-unit apartment complex called The Annadel south of the shopping center. A new Target also opened Wednesday at Coddingtown.

Major public projects and initiatives all promise to alter the way the city looks and whom it serves, including the long- delayed reunification of Old Courthouse Square downtown, the long-avoided annexation of the underserved Roseland neighborhood - now a county- governed island in the heart of the city - and the arrival of the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit service.

In addition to finding ways to move such projects forward, the next council will have to grapple with a number of thorny issues that have vexed the current and past councils, including how to:

Balance public safety needs with other public services such as road and park maintenance.

Improve cooperation and cohesion on a council whose members have clashed with one another and with city staff.

Attract new businesses to the city and help existing ones expand.

Find the money to build affordable housing in a city with escalating rents.

Those and other issues will get a fresh look because all three incumbents this year opted not to defend their seats.

Mayor Scott Bartley and Councilman Jake Ours, who were elected in 2010, decided not to seek second terms, and Vice Mayor Robin Swinth, who was appointed last year to fill a vacancy, decided not to run for a full four-year term.

“This is a very unique opportunity, to have three incumbents leaving,” said veteran political consultant Terry Price, who until recently worked on former Press Democrat columnist Chris Coursey’s campaign. “It does give voters the opportunity to have substantial change on the council.”

It’s the first time there have been no incumbents in a City Council election that veteran campaign consultant Herb Williams can recall over his 24-year career in Sonoma County politics.

“You’re going to have three new council members, or new to the point that they weren’t on the council immediately prior, and those three are going to set the stage for where the city is going to go for years to come,” said Williams, who is managing retired Police Chief Tom Schwedhelm’s campaign.

While the election represents “an enormous opportunity to see new blood and new ideas on the council,” that doesn’t mean sweeping change is guaranteed, said Nick Caston, campaign consultant for candidate Ashle Crocker.

Not all candidates represent change, and the election could turn out to be downright boring, Caston said.

“It could be the firecracker that doesn’t go off,” Caston said. “From that perspective, we won’t know whether this is an important election until after the election.”

There are six serious candidates running for the three open seats.

In addition to Schwedhelm, Coursey and Crocker, they include Planning Commissioner Curtis Byrd, former Councilman Lee Pierce and former Councilman John Sawyer.

The three other candidates include Keith Rhinehart and Colleen Fernald, as well as assembly line worker Chucker Sims. Rhinehart and Fernald recently changed their voter registration addresses to places within city limits where they did not live, while Sims has not participated in campaign events and said recently he did not know why he was running for office.

Among the six viable candidates, major issues being aired include Measure O, economic development and dysfunction on the current council.

Measure O

The revision of Measure O, the 20-year, quarter-cent sales tax passed in 2004 that provides about $7 million annually for public safety and gang prevention, is something the city has struggled with for years.

In order to ensure the sales tax enhances public safety and gang prevention services, the measure requires the city to maintain baseline funding at a level that increases every year by inflation, unless the council votes 6-1 to go below baseline.

Critics such as Coursey say that the ever-increasing baseline provision needs to change or public safety will continue to receive a larger percentage of the city’s general fund budget, diminishing other services.

“Measure O was adopted in a time of different economic reality, and it needs to be adjusted for the economic realities of today,” Coursey said.

Pierce and Byrd also support giving voters the chance to revise Measure O. Pierce said he supported Measure O, but thinks the city needs to take a look at how Measure O affects other parts of the city budget.

Byrd said he supports “cuts to Measure O,” which has been used to purchase military-grade gear “that is being used against our citizens.”

“I don’t think we need to do that,” Byrd said. “I think we can find another approach to how we handle situations.”

Others such as Schwedhelm, whose former department benefits from the additional funding Measure O provides, have expressed skepticism about revising a measure approved by voters.

“I heard loud and clear in 2004 that 72 percent of the voters voted for Measure O,” Schwedhelm said during a candidates forum last month.

Schwedhelm said he’s spoken with residents who are concerned that politicians are now talking about finding ways to use those funds for purposes the voters didn’t intend.

“The reality is if we’re talking about reducing Measure O, we’re talking about fewer officers, more brownouts (of fire stations) and less gang-prevention services in neighborhoods,” Schwedhelm said.

The two other candidates, who have received the endorsement of the city’s influential police and firefighters unions, also oppose sweeping changes to Measure O, though they’ve expressed openness to minor changes.

Crocker has proposed pegging the baseline of Measure O to not just the consumer price index, as it is today, but also the city’s general fund, whichever is lower. She said she doesn’t support more sweeping changes to Measure O because doing so could jeopardize important literacy and restorative justice programs.

Sawyer says the basic goals of the measure are sound, but he supports getting a group of stakeholders together to see if there is a way the language of the measure, which he said can be confusing, can be “clarified and simplified.”

Council dysfunction

The current council hasn’t been getting along well for some time. Built-up resentments and personality conflicts between council members and staff have been on full display, leading up to the censure of one of their own - Councilman Gary Wysocky - in May.

Against that backdrop, all the candidates are touting their interest in changing the dynamic on the council.

Schwedhelm and Pierce both stress their degrees in organizational development, saying that those skills will help them be effective elected leaders.

Schwedhelm said he has heard from residents and community groups that the behavior they have witnessed on the council is “not a great representation of the city.” He said he’d focus on improving the council’s collaboration.

“I’m a big believer that as a team you can accomplish so much more than individuals working on their own agendas,” he said.

Pierce stressed that “mutual respect, cordiality and the ability to work together” are fundamental to the council’s accomplishing anything.

Sawyer, who at times during his tenure on the council clashed with Wysocky, said council members need to remember that they represent the public and their actions reflect the city they represent.

“It’s human nature to get a little excited about a position, but just because you’re excited does not give permission to become disrespectful,” Sawyer said.

Coursey thinks all the candidates are sincere when they say they want things to change. And he also thinks council members who will remain after November want the same thing.

“The four who are left understand the council has not acquitted itself very well in the public eye, and things need to change,” he said.

Crocker said she has a history of working well with diverse interest groups and will use her “cool, rational head” to work through disagreements.

Byrd said he can’t worry about how other people on the council behave, but only ensure that he does what he can to build relations and act with integrity and humility.

“All I can do is represent those things and be those things,” he said.

Economic development

Job creation and economic development are universal campaign themes, but this year Santa Rosa candidates are stressing both as a way to fuel growth in tax revenue to fund government services such as police, fire, parks and roads.

“There are a lot of things that community members would like done, but if you don’t have the revenue streams and if you’re not running an efficient and effective government agency, you’re not going to be able to accomplish (them),” Schwedhelm said.

Many candidates are stressing the importance of downtown development, citing projects such as the Museum on the Square that some see as a signal of economic revival at the city’s core.

“I’m really wanting to shine a bright light on the downtown,” said Sawyer, who operated his family’s store, Sawyer’s News, on Fourth Street for 26 years until it closed in 2010 after 65 years in business.

Sawyer said he wants to remove as many obstacles for developers as he can, such as by lowering or deferring fees. He said he views such things not as subsidies but as investments in downtown that will pay long-term dividends.

Coursey, a former spokesman for the SMART rail project, and Crocker, a land-use attorney, both say they strongly believe the city should do more to encourage downtown development, particularly around future rail stations.

Coursey views the reunification of Old Courthouse Square as “a key piece of the puzzle” for revitalizing downtown, though he doesn’t support the $17 million plan now on the drawing board. “I don’t see a lot of support for a gold-plated project down there,” Coursey said.

Crocker says the city needs to reframe the perennial pro-growth/no-growth debate into one that focuses on encouraging the right kind of development. She contends that it’s possible to further streamline city permitting processes to encourage infill development, which she says serves environmental goals without limiting residents’ input into such projects.

“I feel for the community that says environmentalism has to mean no growth, because then we just sit where we are,” she said.

Pierce says there remains significant red tape at City Hall that is hampering businesses from locating or expanding here. While he says he doesn’t support limiting public input, he does support creating a “fast track” for businesses that have a proven record in the community and want to expand here.

Santa Rosa is better positioned than ever to attract new businesses that will help it generate the revenue it needs to tackle issues like the annexation of Roseland, Byrd said.

The widening of Highway 101, the extension of runways at the county’s airport and the planned start of SMART service in two years all are significant public assets that should attract major new businesses if the city aggressively goes after them, Byrd said.

“Those things have been talked about for generations, and we finally have them,” he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Kevin McCallum at 521-5207 or kevin.mccallum@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @srcitybeat.