One of the more interesting pieces of communication this week came from a community member who reminded us of a December 2008 piece that in many ways delineated perfectly “how a seemingly casual accumulation of small quasi-decisions that weren’t really public-vetted actual decisions were crushing and confining our water planning into a straitjacket.”
As we lament the current state of affairs, we now find ourselves behind the proverbial eight ball, trapped into either a bad deal with Woodland or forced to beg West Sacramento for relief.
Mayor Joe Krovoza and city staff have basically declared the West Sacramento option as dead. However, others have claimed that it is not dead yet and some maintain that the documentation to the WAC represents an incredible misrepresentation of West Sacramento’s position.
Hopefully this gets delineated more clearly in the coming weeks.
In the meantime, it seemed prudent to repost the 2008 piece for the benefit of a different audience, in a different time.
Water Issue: Can Council Stop This Runaway Locomotive?
(ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED December 18, 2008) – In January of 2007, the Vanguard featured an article entitled: “Tracing the recent history of the water supply project.” In it, we argued that there was a series of decisions that changed the trajectory of water policy to become a far more expansive and more expensive project than the original course of action. The remarkable feature is that at no point was a decision actually made to proceed with this project. Instead, there were a series of staff recommendations approved by council to explore various options which lumped together became a decision.
This is very important in trying to understand where we are right now. There is a basic inertial quality to this issue that is rather remarkable. There are basically two forces driving the process, neither of which are necessarily council approval. First, the concern that we will lose our place in line. Second, the concern that down the line the costs of construction will increase if we delay now. The result I think is that at this point the water project has moved far further than where the council actually stands on this issue. The council has never made key decisions.
What we are seeing now is a realization both by the council and the public that the cost of this project is increasingly becoming problematic. As the public is slowly awakening from its slumber on this issue, the sobering fact has awakened it that this project means as much as $200 per month hikes in water costs. The city has already gotten a glimpse of what that might look like when they did something as simple as change the methodology for assessing the sewer rates for some a small group of people, that meant a huge increase in their sewer bill–something that was limited and temporary caused an uproar. What will a massive hike to people’s monthly water rates do?
We see these countervailing inertial forces at work on Tuesday during the water discussion. Council really was trying to put the brakes on the project a little bit and try to explore alternative means to accomplish water changes. For instance, the city is looking for an extension before they begin getting fined for having water outflow that does not meet quality standards. Currently the city has until 2015, in February the Regional Water Quality Control Board will discuss granting Davis an extension of two years.
The board was torn on Tuesday night as to whether to have an independent firm for value engineering of the Preliminary Design for Secondary replacement project. Council was leery of the added cost and wanted to look at other alternatives. In fact, they will look at other alternatives concurrent with the value engineering.
The basic argument that prevailed once again was the issue that if we do not do this now, it throws off our timetable and may increase our costs. The costs of the independent firm not withstanding.
There were two basic viewpoints raised at the council meeting. Councilmember Sue Greenwald repeatedly asked what the rush was here. On the other hand, Mayor Pro Tem Don Saylor suggested that the council’s questions and alternative suggestions have already been asked and explored.
In the middle was Mayor Ruth Asmundson concerned about two types of costs, the first the cost of the value engineering firm and second the cost of delay. The cost of delay won out for now. Councilmember Stephen Souza was also in the middle, his compromise was for the council to take a field trip to look at how other communities do this, while at the same time continuing forward.
The breaking point for this project will be when either Mayor Asmundson or Councilmember Souza become concerned enough with the costs that they can pull away from the inertial pull that this project has been taking. They came closer on Tuesday than they have in the past, but city staff was still able to push the project forward with the warning about increased costs and place in line.
The city desperately needs a paradigm shift here. There needs to be some alternative that can come forward. They also have to weigh the magnitude of the fines compared with the cost of repair.
However, we are beginning to see a shift. Council is recognizing that this is cost prohibitive and that the public will likely balk at it when it becomes clear to them just how much this will cost. The question remains whether they can stop this train before it runs off the tracks.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
David, the above is interesting; however, does anything in your 2008 article help us in terms of the decisions we have in the road ahead regarding water?
Also, how exactly are we “trapped into either a bad deal with Woodland or forced to beg West Sacramento for relief”? Said another way, exactly how is the deal with Woodland bad?
In my mind, the road ahead is constrained by the decisions made in the past. Understanding how we got here I think is important.
In terms of how is a Woodland deal bad, depending on one’s perspective: overall costs, rate increases, lack of cost sharing agreement, JPA constraining future decisions, DBO, and the private operations of water.
What would be a ‘good’ deal with Woodland?
I believe this has been asked and answered. A better deal with Woodland: Start with a regional agreement involving West Sacramento. Look at cost sharing. Eliminate DBO or have a clearer ability for Davis to opt out of private operation. Those are the obvious points.
David Greenwald: “[i]In my mind, the road ahead is constrained by the decisions made in the past.[/i]”
The road ahead is always constrained by the decisions of the past. This is not news worthy. Life doesn’t give out many mulligans. Get over it.
The decision we need to make today is based on the best option today, not what we wished had happened years ago. You are making an argument that confuses the facts (as they are today) and in doing so, are misinforming those readers who have not been on top of this from the start.
In short, your argument if total nonsense and makes me believe that your only goal now is to scuttle the water deal and damn the consequences.
David, I think you called this all wrong in 2008 and again today. What has been “crushing and confining our water planning into a strait-jacket” is the failure over many, many years to act. Constantly kicking the can down the road has led us to where we are today. We have a regulatory fines gun pointed at our head, with very little time left and with very few alternatives, perhaps only one, to avoid getting shot.
-Michael Bisch
There is no hurry for a project
The Enterprise quoted the Woodland Council as saying that they would not be a “bargaining chip while they blithely attempt to hold Davis HOSTAGE! Sue Greenwald was the only Council member who publicly and vigorously challenged the Saylor Council’s plan, with the complicity of Emlen’s city staff, to sneak this project through under the public’s radar. Brett Lee now sits in Sue Greenwald’s Council seat and we will have to wait to see whether he is up to the challenge of being a vigorous public minority Council voice defending the interests of Davis voters.
“… We have a regulatory fines gun pointed at our head”
I posted a question some days ago about whether Dixon coffers are currently being bled dry by large penalties when their voters rejected the rate increases some time ago that essentially scuttled their water project for now. No response.
“….forced to beg West Sacramento for relief.”
No one is “begging”! Put the JPA project officially on hold(IMO, Woodland will not go it alone as long as Davis is a potential future partner as a further politically prohibitive Woodland rate increases would result). Then ask West Sacramento to describe what a Davis-West Sac deal would have have to look like for them to agree. Let the Davis voters see their official reply.
[i]”…when their voters rejected the rate increases some time ago that essentially scuttled their water project for now.”
[/i]
They don’t have a water project.
I believe they have paid $220.000 to date and are operating under a cease-and-desist order while they try to develop an effective mitigation plan.
Is that your proposed solution to our water quality problem?
[i]IMO, Woodland will not go it alone as long as Davis is a potential future partner[/i]
Can you cite a single Woodland official who agrees with your hunch that Woodland will not go it alone?
[i]ask West Sacramento to describe what a Davis-West Sac deal would have have to look like for them to agree[/i]
You have that in writing already.
[i]A better deal with Woodland: Start with a regional agreement involving West Sacramento. Look at cost sharing. Eliminate DBO or have a clearer ability for Davis to opt out of private operation. Those are the obvious points.[/i]
Woodland isn’t interested.
West Sac isn’t interested.
Woodland won’t do a project without DBO.
Davis can’t opt out of a large municipal project.
Those obvious points are pointless.
” I’ll pose it to you this way: had we made better decisions 2006 to 2010, would we be in a better position today?
But we didn’t, and so we are faced with the current situation. Unless you have a direct point of exact comparison and are asking us not to repeat the exact same mistake, this is just idle rumination. Clearly, there is not a direct comparison since the WAC just spent many months investigating every aspect and option that anyone felt was worth investigation. The city council, staff and WAC did just exactly what many in the community including the Vanguard asked of them. They took a much closer look at our water issues. Not liking the outcome is very different from making an argument that because we were dealt a bad hand, we should not move forward.
“There is no hurry for a project.”
It would seem to me that this process cannot be claimed to have been hurried. It has been very deliberate and thoughtful. It has addressed expressed concerns. And yet, we are still hearing that because it is not perfect, there is no need to move forward. I find this a curiously obstructionist point of view. I am sure that there are those who oppose any surface water under any conditions. It would be helpful if they would simply and honestly make that declaration instead of pretending that they believe that what has occurred over a greater than 10 year timeline has been rushed. I am sure there are others who oppose any project at this time because it is financially hard on them personally. I have a great deal of empathy for this position. Again, I wish that they would simply say so instead of speculating that we as a community will be better able to afford it in the future. I am not confident that we know enough about our economic future to say our kids will be better able to handle it than we are.
Personally, I see the responsible thing to do is to use the best information provided by the WAC, the best negotiation possible within the realm of a collaborative approach with one of our neighboring communities ( looks like that is more likely to be Woodland as initially agreed) , and move forward.
[i]David Greenwald said . . . “In my mind, the road ahead is constrained by the decisions made in the past.”
Mark West replied . . . “The road ahead is always constrained by the decisions of the past. This is not news worthy. Life doesn’t give out many mulligans. Get over it.” [/i]
I fully agree with Mark’s first and third sentences, and for the most part I agree with his second question as well. The fourth is a matter of perspective. David’s perspective is one of lamentation . . . [i]”As we lament the current state of affairs, we now find ourselves behind the proverbial eight ball”[/i] and that has been a consistent recurring theme in his water articles over the past year. Mark’s perspective pretty clearly is that at this point in the process, lamentation will not improve our situation even a smidgen, so lets refocus our efforts on the task at hand.
I certainly won’t go as far as “get over it,” but I do agree with Mark that no amount of lamentation is going to improve either our current situation or the road ahead.
David Greenwald said . . .
[i]”In terms of how is a Woodland deal bad, depending on one’s perspective: overall costs, rate increases, lack of cost sharing agreement, JPA constraining future decisions, DBO, and the private operations of water.”[/i]
Lets drill down into that statement a bit. David lays the blame for the overall costs of the surface water project on the “Woodland deal.” How exactly has Woodland forced Davis to accept any terms of a business deal that have added to the overall costs of a solution to Davis’ water issues? If Davis had chosen not to “deal” with Woodland and had pursued a water treatment on its own when the water right was granted would the overall costs to Davis have been less? No, they would have been even more . . . substantially more.
How is the magnitude of Davis’ impending rate increases the result of any term of the Woodland business deal? In simple terms Davis’ rates are wholly and completely independent of Woodland. That problem is one of Davis’ own creation.
When you say there is a lack of a cost sharing agreement, you clearly have not done your homework. First, there absolutely is an agreement. It is actually between Woodland, Davis [u]and[/u] UCD. It has existed for well over a decade, and the cost sharing proportions in it have been formally modified by amendment as each of the three parties got a better sense of what their water needs are. Where did you get the idea that there is no cost sharing agreement? Further, in a proactive step that was the result of the resizing of the plant design to 30mgd (18 for Woodland 12 for Davis) the construction cost sharing of the water treatment plant has been adjusted from its old 54-46 ratio. Interestingly enough the new ratio isn’t 60-40, but rather 61.1-38.9 . . . with Woodland agreeing to pick up more than their 60% share of the construction costs.
When you say that the JPA constrains future decisions, is that the fault of the “deal” with Woodland. The simple answer to that is NO it is not. It is the fault of the banks/lending institutions who will give significantly more favorable interest rates for borrowed money in the situation that the JPA was designed to capitalize on. What alternative “deal” structure do you know of that would have been acceptable to the lenders?
When you say DBO is a bad deal, what evidence do you have to support that claim? Have you talked to Seattle about the Jerry Gilbert DBO model that they have implemented and used in two plants (one since 2001 and the second since 2005)? Have you talked to San Diego about the Jerry Gilbert DBO model that they have implemented and used in their plant? Have you talked to Santa Fe? You are indicting, trying and convicting the Jerry Gilbert DBO model without a trial. You are indicting the whole DBO process on the basis of a single vendor’s actions in a non-DBO situation. You need to dig deeper if you are going to put DBO to death . . . otherwise Yolo Court Watch will be writing scathing articles about a wrongful execution.
When you say private operations of water is bad, isn’t that a worldview question? Have you done any significant polling of Davis voters/rate payers to know that they share that worldview? And even if the polls confirm that that is indeed Davis’ worldview, how is it Woodland’s fault that Davis feels that way? How is it the fault of the Woodland “deal”?
Bottom-line, you are laying a whole lot of negative baggage on the Woodland deal that if it is even accurate belongs to Davis and Davis alone.
“Bottom-line, you are laying a whole lot of negative baggage on the Woodland deal that if it is even accurate belongs to Davis and Davis alone.”
That’s actually the point here. The point is not that Woodland is necessarily evil, it’s that Davis did not do what it should for several years and created this dichotomy of choices both of which have downsides.
It’s not just a dichotomy of choices. There are two other choices: do nothing, or delay for years. Those also have downsides. But they appear to be the options being advocated by some.
“The road ahead is always constrained by the decisions of the past. This is not news worthy. Life doesn’t give out many mulligans. Get over it.”
The first sentence is true, but a cop out of past responsibility.
You are correct that life doesn’t give out many mulligans which is why holding past leaders responsible for mistakes is needed. We’re in a bad situation because of those decisions and its going to kill this project.
davisite2 said . . .
[i]”No one is “begging”! Put the JPA project officially on hold(IMO, Woodland will not go it alone as long as Davis is a potential future partner as a further politically prohibitive Woodland rate increases would result). Then ask West Sacramento to describe what a Davis-West Sac deal would have have to look like for them to agree. Let the Davis voters see their official reply.”[/i]
West Sacramentoi already has provided that information [u]in writing[/u] to Davis. A copy of their letter is available on the City of Davis website at [url]http://city-council.cityofdavis.org/Media/Default/Documents/PDF/CityCouncil/Water-Advisory-Committee/Agendas/20121011/Packet/05-Water-Supply-Negotiations-Update.pdf[/url]. In that letter West Sac City manager Marty Tuttle says, [i]”. . . we would be able to commit to a term of approximately 20 years (2032) . . . “[/i] and [i]”Without supporting analysis, your connection fee falls short of that needed to advance the negotiations between the two cities. According to the analysis provided by our consultant, the connection fee required would be $12.66 million or $19.4 million, as outlined in the attached staff proposal.”[/i]
Lets look at City Manager Tuttle’s words in the light of day. First, given that the permitting process will take at least 3 years based on my personal meeting with the Executive Director and the Environmental Program Manager of the State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB), Davis would not take delivery of any water from West Sacramento until early 2016, so Mr. Tuttle’s “approximately 20 years” is no more than 16 years based on his 2032 outer fence. If you use the 4-6 years that the WAC consultant said the permitting and construction process would take for the pipeline that term comes down to “approximately 13-15 years.”
Do you really want to spend all those millions of dollars for a 13-16 year contract?
Lets also look at Mr Tuttle’s connection fee statement. First, the analysis that the WAC can provide to support its request for a $6 million connection fee is as follows. David Purkey in his role for the Stockholm Environmental Institute shared with his fellow WAC members his recent experience in Portland Oregon, where the City has three large water customers of similar size to our 12 mgd. The original contract period was coming to a close and Portland proposed renewing the contracts on the existing terms, but the three customers counter offered with a price that was one third (33%) of the current price. In the end Portland did extend the contracts of those customers at the one third value. David shared that experience as an example of a “market condition” that could well apply to the West Sac-Davis situation. Not wanting to be greedy, the WAC decided on half (50%) of the $12.556 million connection fee provided to the WAC in the Carollo Engineers report about West Sac costs. What City Manager Tuttle is saying in his response is that the Yolo County water market and the Portland water market are different and the discounts that applied in Portland do not apply here. Does that make sense? Is his position supported by the facts? I confirmed in my meeting with the SWRCB the consultant’s assessment that West Sac currently has a surplus of 16 mgd. Remove Davis’ 12 mgd from that and they only have 4mgd left to support any economic growth they might have in the City or in the Port of West Sacramento. City growth is expected to be minimal in the coming years, but economic growth in the Port is not. It is very reasonable for West Sac to ask is 4 mgd enough? Compare that to Portland’s situation. The three customers David Purkey referred to wouldn’t have tied up any additional plant capacity, so they represented pure and simple pricing on the margin, which is a very different situation . . . very different.
Finally lets look at the cost comparison of Woodland to West Sac. As of the last WAC evaluation spreadsheets, the difference between the West Sac alternative and the Woodland alternative after you remove all the contingency dollars is $18 million ($147 million vs $129 million) Going from 54-46 to 60-40 on the plant construction costs reduces the $147 million to $136 million. Going to 61.1-38.9 removes another $3 million so now we are talking about $133 million vs $129 million. If Woodland agrees to a 60-40 split of the O&M costs that removes another $4 million and actually brings the cost of the Woodland alternative to the same level as the West Sac alternative. If Woodland agrees to share the treated water pipeline costs 50-50, then the Woodland alternative is actually cheaper than the West Sac alternative at 12 mgd.
Time will tell how this all will play out, but I think the business data that is in front of us now supports deciding on a direction and going for it with full force.
(the WAC consultant said 4-6)
“I believe they have paid $220.000 to date and are operating under a cease-and-desist order while they try to develop an effective mitigation plan.
Is that your proposed solution to our water quality problem?”
Thank you Don for that number although you admit that it is your “belief”. In any event, your figure is “to date” and this probably comes to about $75,000/yr., hardly a penalty that would break Davis’ bank while it takes the time to explore all options and even this kind of penalty is not likely if Davis shows a good faith effort in moving forward to deal with the water issue.
It’s my ‘belief’ because I didn’t bother to look it up again. The information is available.
Is this your proposed solution to our water quality problem, davisite?
[i]We’re in a bad situation because of those decisions and its going to kill this project.[/i]
Maybe if you spent more time disputing the factual errors and distorted analysis of the referendum proponents, and less time bemoaning the past, you could help avoid the possibility that the project might be rejected by the voters. It has been almost impossible to tell what you actually would support, even if a proposal wasn’t your first preference. You do have a bully pulpit, but you seem to prefer to use it to criticize those who have spent considerable time and effort fleshing out the options and working out the details.
Try devoting an entire column, just once, to the nonsense Mike Harrington posts. That would be a good starting point.
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”That’s actually the point here. The point is not that Woodland is necessarily evil, it’s that Davis did not do what it should for several years and created this dichotomy of choices both of which have downsides.”[/i]
If that is the point, then why refer to the business deal with Woodland as the outward and visible sign of Davis’ own actions. This is Davis’ deal with itself, and whether we look to the north or look to the east, the realities we have placed on our own shoulders are fundamentally unchanged.
Further you don’t appear to be able to fully disclaim Woodland of evil. You threw in the word “necessarily” to allow yourself room to come back in and take a whack at them.
In prior threads you have indicted Woodland for having a worldview that is different from Davis’. At thet time I asked you which city has a worldview that is closer to Davis’, Woodland or West Sacramento? You didn’t answer that question then, so I renew the same question now . . .
[b]Which city has a worldview that is closer to Davis’ . . . Woodland or West Sac?[/b]
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”The first sentence is true, but a cop out of past responsibility.
You are correct that life doesn’t give out many mulligans which is why holding past leaders responsible for mistakes is needed. We’re in a bad situation because of those decisions and its going to kill this project.”[/i]
David, it isn’t a cop out at all. It is simply focusing on the task at hand. There will be plenty of time for lamentation once the immediate task is completed. Why do you prioritize looking backward into the past over dealing with the present?
“You have that in writing already.”
NOT TRUE since the entire Davis-West Sac “negotiations” have taken place within the context of their accurate assessment that the Davis Council majority is just going through an exercise in political theater and is not truly considering the West Sac. option.
“Can you cite a single Woodland official who agrees with your hunch that Woodland will not go it alone?”
The above argument drips with political naivete. Any diverging of a unanimous Woodland Council position on this attempt to coerce the Davis voter with their “deadline” would undermine its effectiveness. You can be sure that positions would be reconsidered if they found it necessary.
davisite2 said . . .
[i]”You have that in writing already.”
NOT TRUE since the entire Davis-West Sac “negotiations” have taken place within the context of their accurate assessment that the Davis Council majority is just going through an exercise in political theater and is not truly considering the West Sac. option.[/i]
davisite, there really haven’t been any negotiations with West Sac at all. There have been a well thought out detailed sharing by Davis of its initial negotiating position with West Sac.
What West Sac has said to Davis is that our stated position of a 30 year term with a 30 year renewal period far exceeds what they are willing to commit to, and puts them in the position of having to burden their own rate payers with the capital costs of expanding their water treatment plant. That position of theirs has nothing to do with any political theater that may be going on in Davis, but rather with the fiscal realities that their own citizens will face if they do this deal.
Further they have said that our desire to reduce the $12 million connection fee to $6 million makes no fiscal sense for all of the reasons stated above. Further they are saying that because of those parameters, the $12 million connection fee should actually be $19 million. Again, those key points have nothing to do with Davis’ political theater, but rather to do with their fiduciary responsibility to the citizens of West Sacramento.
City Manager Tuttle didn’t even get to the fact that West Sac wouldn’t see a penny of money from Davis for 3-6 years. The above two points were more than enough to say thank you, but no thank you.
You may think this is about political theater, but that is simply a side show. The main stage is about dollars and sense.
davisite2 said . . .
“The above argument drips with political naivete. Any diverging of a unanimous Woodland Council position on this attempt to coerce the Davis voter with their “deadline” would undermine its effectiveness. You can be sure that positions would be reconsidered if they found it necessary.”
I understand your argument davisite, and in a vacuum you are 100% right, but the Regional Water Resources Control Board issues and the nitrates in their existing wells issues that Woodland faces are very real, and make their real-life situation anything but a vacuum.
There has been an extraordinary arrogance on the part of water project opponents that West Sac and/or Woodland will somehow come around and work with Davis, on Davis terms, at Davis prices, whenever Davis finally gets around to deciding what it wants to do.
They’re fed up with us. Our options are narrowing.
Matt: “David, it isn’t a cop out at all. It is simply focusing on the task at hand.”
Don: “They’re fed up with us. Our options are narrowing. “
And why are they fed up with us? Because they believe that (A) Davis is being fickle (or being Davis) and (B) that Davis is trying to use the two projects as leverage against each other.
But recast in terms that the past has been screwed up and the present is correcting the past, changes the way both sides should look at Davis. It’s not arrogance such much as we never had the opportunity to explore these questions because every time there was a discussion in the past, it was shoved forward in the name of time tables and so the leadership was ready to move forward last September, but enough of the public wasn’t to the point where there were sufficient numbers to put this to a braking halt.
David, any reasonable person would see that as Davis simply making excuses for what you are arguing has been Davis’ past inept behavior. Why should either Woodland or West Sac have to take on the responsibility for Davis’ past? Did they contribute to that behavior in any way?
You say the current events [i]”changes the way both sides should look at Davis.” [/i] Why does it do that?
You say, [i]”we never had the opportunity to explore these questions because every time there was a discussion in the past, it was shoved forward in the name of time tables.” [/i] Whose fault is that and why should that matter to either Woodland or West Sac?
Bottom-line I think you are failing to recognize that there is a point where reasons morph into excuses, and the worldview of everyone outside of Davis is that Davis is simply making excuses.
I really couldn’t disagree with you more when you say Davis is making excuses. The problem that Davis has is that it can’t get too far ahead of public opinion with an election now five months away.
“Why should either Woodland or West Sac have to take on the responsibility for Davis’ past? Did they contribute to that behavior in any way? “
Woodland has about $30 million reasons, West Sacramento between 6 and 12 million. Now the question they all must ask is whether it is worth the money to deal with Davis. I think understanding Davis within this framework suggests that once Davis sorts things out, it is probably not going to be a huge ongoing problem.
“Bottom-line I think you are failing to recognize that there is a point where reasons morph into excuses, and the worldview of everyone outside of Davis is that Davis is simply making excuses. “
How is that? Davis has to win an election, no?
David Greenwald: “[i]And why are they fed up with us? Because they believe that (A) Davis is being fickle (or being Davis) and (B) that Davis is trying to use the two projects as leverage against each other.[/i]”
They rightly look upon as as being fickle because we are attempting to back out of a signed contract with them without cause. Further, we did try to use the two projects as leverage against the other, which is precisely what you have been advocating. You get an assist on making us all look like fools in this process and you whining about their ‘playing hardball’ in response makes you look really silly.
Don, Steve et al. did the heavy lifting on this project, first by securing the water rights that we needed to move forward, and second by negotiating a good deal with Woodland to share in the expense of the project. The fact that they accomplished it under the nose of the ‘no on everything’ crowd just makes it that much more impressive. The JPA project with Woodland is the best option that has ever been on the table. We can speculate all we want on what might have been, but that is completely fruitless because those other options were never made available to us (for whatever reason). With the information that the WAC has brought together we can see that the only real fault they could find with the original project with Woodland was the ultimate size, but even that is arguable and in my mind a short term answer. We have not been locked into a bad decision, rather we have been handed the best decision possible. Unfortunately, your world view won’t allow you to accept that the people you want to blame actually made sound decisions on our behalf.
“back out of a signed contract with them without cause. “
Without cause? The cause is that the voters demanded it and the city actually doesn’t have the authority to go forward now without authorization.
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”I really couldn’t disagree with you more when you say Davis is making excuses. The problem that Davis has is that it can’t get too far ahead of public opinion with an election now five months away.”[/i]
When does Davis take responsibility for its actions. It entered into a formal agreement with Woodland with both parties acting in good faith. Is Davis upholding its part of the agreement? Is Woodland upholding its part of the agreement?
[i]”Woodland has about $30 million reasons, West Sacramento between 6 and 12 million.”[/i]
So this is all about money? Are you going to abandon Cecilia the next time you meet a rich heiress?
[i]”Now the question they all must ask is whether it is worth the money to deal with Davis.” [/i]
Davis is doing its level best to ensure that both West Sac and Woodland say “No, it isn’t” West Sac has actually said that twice regarding water. Once about 6 years ago and a second time last week. BTW, if someone says to you that they want to buy your car from you for the right price (lets say between 6 and 12 thousand dollars), would you agree to sell it to them?
[i]”I think understanding Davis within this framework suggests that once Davis sorts things out, it is probably not going to be a huge ongoing problem.”[/i]
Why does everyone have to understand Davis? Is Davis doing anything to try and understand Woodland? Is Davis doing anything to try and understand West Sac? The answer to those last two questions is [i]”No, absolutely not.” [/i] Why is that? Could it be because Davis has a different worldview that those two other cities?
[i]”How is that? Davis has to win an election, no?”[/i]
How is lamenting the past going to win the upcoming election?
“When does Davis take responsibility for its actions.”
What does it mean take responsibility for its actions? Who do you believe that the Davis City Council owes more to Woodland or its own constituents?
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”Without cause? The cause is that the voters demanded it and the city actually doesn’t have the authority to go forward now without authorization.”[/i]
You are conflating separate and distinct events.
1) Please show me anywhere in the Davis contract with Woodland where it says that the agreement is conditional on a vote of the people?
2) The City absolutely has the authority to go forward with the project. All the referendum did was call into question the authority to go forward with the implementation of the rates from the Prop 218. That is where the voters’ authority starts and stops.
You are trotting out some truly textbook fallacious logic in your arguments.
Further, you are making assumptions about certain outcomes that are speculation at best. Of the 67,005 people served by the Davis water system, how many of them have you actually talked to? Your election predictions are based on sampling within a small homogenous portion of a large heterogeneous population. I personally think your conclusions are interesting and important, but they are far from definitive or prescriptive.
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”What does it mean take responsibility for its actions? Who do you believe that the Davis City Council owes more to Woodland or its own constituents?”[/i]
That is a matter of law. Davis has a legal contract with Woodland. There is no legal contract between Davis and its citizens with respect to water.
Lets draw a parallel to your familial status. There is only one person in your family with whom you have a legal contract. When push comes to shove and you have to make a decision on an issue, who do you owe more to, Cecelia or your parents?
Matt:
I don’t think I am conflating.
“Please show me anywhere in the Davis contract with Woodland where it says that the agreement is conditional on a vote of the people? “
That potentially becomes a problem, no?
“The City absolutely has the authority to go forward with the project. “
Not at this point they don’t. I suspect they are even more constrained politically though than legally.
I don’t think my logic is fallacious at all.
I’ll comment on your last portion of the comment shortly
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”Please show me anywhere in the Davis contract with Woodland where it says that the agreement is conditional on a vote of the people? ”
That potentially becomes a problem, no? [/i]
No it does not. Does every contract the City signs have to go to a vote of the people? If your answer to that question is “No” then you are chasing the wrong change IMHO. You need to be chasing a change of our form of government from a representative democracy to a populist democracy. Until you affect that change, our governmental form, structure and rules of action will continue to say “No. We elected our representatives with the full expectation that they will carry out those actions on our behalf.”
David, what I am sensing is that your worldview is getting in the way of reality.
Your missing a key point here – the city has put it before the voters and if they didn’t Mike Harrington would get enough signatures to see that they did. So I’m not sure what your end is with this argument.
No David, they have put the rates before the voters. That is all the Council has the legal right to do.
With that said, the Council is very wisely going to provide as part of the voting process, all the detail about how those rates were developed, including details about the project and its costs. Their decision to do that is a political decision rather than a legal decision.
I don’t know what my worldview is with respect to this that is getting in the way of reality
You are imposing a populist worldview on a non-populist reality.
Matt: I believe you are wrong. The 218 is the rates. The question before the voters will be whether or not to support a surface water project.
David Greenwald: “[i]Without cause? The cause is that the voters demanded it and the city actually doesn’t have the authority to go forward now without authorization.[/i]”
That is a complete pile of used cow feed. We authorized the City Council to act on our behalf when we elected them and nothing has changed that fact. The referendum was against the water rates, not the project, and I will remind you that there never was a vote. It is arguable whether or not the referendum would even have passed since fewer than 20% of the electorate signed it and then only after being fed a line of false statements from Michael. Your expectation of the outcome is complete unjustified speculation.
“The referendum was against the water rates, not the project, and I will remind you that there never was a vote.”
That’s correct the referendum was on the rates, that’s the only thing they could referendize. However, they were planning to follow it up with an initiative which would have been on the project and the March ballot is on the project not just the rates.
I agree my expectation of the outcome is speculation, but I take exception to the term “unjustified.”
David M. Greenwald said . . .
[i]”Matt: I believe you are wrong. The 218 is the rates. The question before the voters will be whether or not to support a surface water project.”[/i]
David, what was the legal basis for the referendum? Ir was the next step of the Prop 218 process. It wasn’t a free-standing event, it was the logical next step of the protest portion of the rate setting process. Its constraints as such are one of the reasons that Mike Harrington has moved over to the thinking that an initiative is a much better political tool than the referendum was. The power of the referendum in this case was that because it was indeed linked to the rate setting process it was a direct way to stop the implementation of the approved rates.
Go back to all the hullabaloo about the November ballot. Dunning and Harrington and you yourself beat the drum loudly that a vote on a surface water project was meaningless by itself. The vote isn’t really about a surface water project at all. It is about the fiscal impact associated with a surface water project.
Here too your own words confirm that that is the case. Before Elaine went into her self-exile, she argued long and hard (with strong support from Don Shor and Mark West) that you had no right to say that tripling the water rates would result in a defeat in the March ballot. The closest you came to including anything about the project itself was regarding how it was to be operated, and that public vs. private issue is independent of surface water. It would apply just as strongly to wastewater as well.
Mr. Williams,
You have a freightening misunderstanding of our form of government. Power resides with the people at all times. It is only entrusted to elected officials for good behavior. All actions of elected officials are subject to public veto, revision, repeal; and the public may take the initiative to enact whatever legislation it chooses.
An election does not transfer power from the people, nor does it require the people to defer to the decisions made by those who were elected.
You may disagree with the objectives of Mr. Harrington, but you can not object to his use of our democratic process, or whine that anyone should just accept the decision of an elected body.
Anonymous Pundit,
You have a frightening misunderstanding of what I have said. Mr. Harrington will be the first to disagree with you that I disagree with his right to pursue his objectives. What I have said to David is that Mr. Harrington chose to pursue the referendum route rather than the initiative route in this case. The referendum and the initiative differ in their provisions. This particular referendum, which was signed in good faith and in sufficient numbers to properly qualify, challenges the rates approved under the Prop 218 process. It does not challenge the surface water project itself. Anyone who wants to can challenge the surface water project at any time by gathering sufficient signatures in an initiative qualification process. In fact, Mr. Harrington did indeed state that he would go the initiative route if the WAC and the Council had not made the March ballot a binding one.
Your frightening misunderstanding of the point I was making is further demonstrated that as a WAC member I voted for making the ballot binding. So you can feel free to take the wax out of your ears and rub your eyes and reread what I have said. The practical reality is that Davis is currently in the midst of a referendum process not an initiative process.
If there is anyone who is whining, it is you.
When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bustling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity !
Dale Carnegie
Matt: Fascinating comment that the Woodland Davis Agreement left out the proviso that Davis has to get clearance from its voters for this massive project.
That omission was by design, by the usual political, staff, and consultant suspects.
I told Jacques deBra in about 2001 that they had better put it on the ballot.
Mike, in a way they didn’t, and in a way they did. In order to get the necessary financing to build the project rates needed to be passed by the people. So the thinking was almost surely, “the people will have a say,” but as we all know now after the events of last year, the Prop 218 process does not give every registered voter a vote. As biddlin said above, each individual emotional reaction to that “flaw” in Prop 218 is different, and runs the gammut.
Matt, it’s not the rates but the project and the rates should have been on the ballot The proponents knew what they were doing
Prop 218 protest process is nearly worthless as a measure of community sentiment
I agree with your thoughts vis-a-vis the effectiveness of the Prop 218 protest process . . . and the Council appears to be headed for handling the ballot the right way, even though the Prop 218 referendum process puts them in a position where they could legally define the ballot language in a narrow way. I’m comfortable that the voters will see 1) rates, and 2) the underlying project costs that created the revenue requirement that necessitated the rates, and 3) a description of the project that produced the underlying costs.
Matt: confident the proponents will disclose it all, including the analysis behind the rates? Im not so sure
The CC has hid the analysis behind the Sept 6 rates And one of the prime thinkers behind those rates is now theCityManager of Woodland
No, Matt, they will disclose what they think is needed to win and get their project
Quoting a local notable, “Trust me on this.”
Not true Mike. The analysis behind the September 6th rates is available now and was available then. All a citizen had to do was attend the public meetings that the City held leading up to September 6th. I personally missed all of those meetings except the very last one.
Further, the analysis behind those rates was documented in the September 6th Staff Report, which is available at [url]http://archive.cityofdavis.org/meetings/councilpackets/20110906/08 Utility Rates Approval.pdf[/url] and says
[quote]Water Utility
Current water utility rates yield annual revenues of $10.5 million supporting operations and maintenance, capital investments and existing debt. The proposed water rates are projected to result in annual revenues up to $20 million by Year 5. This level of annual revenues is primarily required to fund increased debt service costs for the proposed Surface Water Project and related capital improvements, as well as increased costs of operations of the City’s wells (due to wellhead treatment) and regional water facilities.
Overall revenues requirements are projected to increase by 100% over the five-year period, with the average single-family residential customer experiencing an increase in their monthly cost of water from $34.75 to $77.18 in Year 5. These estimated monthly water bill impacts assume an overall 20% reduction in single family residential water consumption over the five-year period. Customers with below average water use now will experience lower-than-average monthly water bill impacts, while customers with above average water use would see higher than average monthly water bill impacts. The individual water bill impact will vary depending on a customer’s current water use and their future conservation efforts during the five year period.[/quote]