Rohnert Park amends schedule for upcoming listening sessions

Rohnert Park council members, citing the resurgence of local coronavirus cases, have revised the city’s plan to host public listening sessions about residents’ experiences with systemic racism and proposed local reforms, postponing two in-person gatherings while proceeding with several online forums, including one scheduled for Wednesday.

“We’re telling people for 10 or more people not to gather, so we ought to think about that,” Mayor Joe Callinan said at Tuesday’s virtual City Council meeting. “I know I wouldn’t attend a meeting now in the community center with 50 people if we’re trying to tell everybody to stay home and do your part. That would be not be very wise.”

The timing of the listening sessions became a point of debate at the Tuesday meeting. Councilwoman Gina Belforte proposed that the city ought to first pursue sensitivity training for council members and staff about the complex issues underlying racial injustice and equity, a step that she said would make the listening sessions more valuable for policymakers.

“I think we have it backwards. If we don’t talk about that on our own, we’re going to have difficulty understanding it because to us it’s going to be a story, but it’s not going to resonate as deeply,” Belforte told the council. “We’re going to miss that, and so we’re going to fall back into the same patterns that we fell into right now.”

The council majority, however, pushed for maintaining the virtual meeting dates, which were already advertised and come in the wake of the the mayor last month signing the national My Brother’s Keeper Alliance pledge to review city and police procedures and consider future policy changes.

Sticking to the schedule would emphasize the city’s commitment to the process and perhaps reassure residents who have demanded the council more publicly denounce longstanding institutional prejudices and injustice.

“Already we’re accused of dragging our feet, of not doing anything, of being silent,” said Vice Mayor Jake Mackenzie. “We have not been silent. We have not dragged our feet. I do not believe that we should be waiting for months before we start having listening sessions.”

“The one thing I’ve heard over and over again is, ‘We would like you to listen. Start by listening,’” added Councilwoman Susan Hollingsworth Adams. “I’m not convinced that we need to wait until sensitivity training has been delivered and received and evaluated. I’m anxious to get started listening.”

The city has contracted San Francisco-based nonprofit Coro Northern California at a cost of no more than $28,000 to conduct the three public forums: July 22, July 27 in Spanish, and Aug. 12. Attendees are asked to RSVP to the city ahead of time.

Belforte’s suggestion for City Hall training on issues of race and inclusion, first raised last month, and backed at the time only by Mackenzie, won unanimous support from the full council. Scheduling that training may be problematic, however, as City Manager Darrin Jenkins noted that such courses are suddenly very popular, requiring several months of lead time. He said he would explore a number of options.

The call for city training has been bolstered by continued public pressure on Callinan, especially, over his use of the word “it” at the June 23 council meeting in what critics say was an insensitive reference to people who who identify as transgender or nonbinary — as neither male or female. An online petition demanding Callinan resign that has been signed by more than 400 people.

The citizen-advocacy group FAIR-RP, or Fair And Inclusive Representation in Rohnert Park has sought to keep the matter at center stage.

“It is appalling that the mayor has not listened to the 400-plus petition-signers or FAIR-RP’s membership that have publicly called for him to apologize,” Chris Borr, spokesman and a co-founder of the group, said in an interview. “Actions, like apologizing, speak to one’s character and the mayor continues to be silent.”

Callinan did not respond a complaint by Borr at Tuesday’s meeting. But he told his fellow council members he was looking forward to the upcoming community listening sessions and trying to put himself in others’ shoes.

“We’re going to go to the public and we are going to have some conversations and they’re not going to be easy conversations,” he said. “They’re not going to be tough ones, but they’re going to be different ones. It’s a different time and a different era that we’re going through. That’s how we’re going to better ourselves, by listening to everybody and moving forward.”

Callinan, who was first elected in 2008, has filed paperwork to seek a fourth term the November election, the first for Rohnert Park in the new system of district-based elections. Restaurateur Gerard Guidice, a longtime city planning commissioner who came up short in his first bid for council in 2018, is mulling whether to run against Callinan for the District 3 seat.

Two other City Council seats also are on the ballot, including the District 4 seat held by Mackenzie, who is running for his seventh term, and the open District 1 seat.

You can reach Staff Writer Kevin Fixler at 707-521-5336 or kevin.fixler@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @kfixler.