The City Council on Tuesday evening denied a request from the Friends of the Hercules Library for a fee waiver (on the order of $80) to display banners around town in their efforts to raise funds and maintain library hours. The item came to the council following a recommendation from the Community & Library Services Commission (CLSC). Several members of the council stated that they feared setting a precedent during this troubling economic time, that other recognized non-profits would expect the same benefit, and that the parks department wouldn’t be able to stay budget neutral.

The rhetoric was just too much for me I had to interrupt the proceeding — somewhat rudely, I guess, according to the mayor’s expression¹ — and remind them that it was this council that had already established the precedent they were now claiming they did not want to set. I informed the council that they were actually reversing their own precedent.

At the September 13 meeting, the council had approved a fee waiver for the Friends of the Hercules Library to rent out the Community/Swim Center for a savings to the group of $375 — and at a real cost to the City of $1,000 (the market-rate rental value). The Friends were planning a fundraiser to raise funds and maintain library hours. Sound familiar? (How can you blame them for asking for another waiver four months later?)

The CLSC — which I had been a member of at the time — took the issue up the evening before on September 12. I was the lone nay vote. I was also probably the only commissioner who was not a member of the Friends of the Hercules Library (perhaps one of two). Councilmembers Romero and Wilkins sat through the meeting.

According to the meeting minutes:

MOTION: Vice-Chair Williams-Weinstein motioned to waive the fees for the HELP project. Commissioner Madfes to second the motion.
AYES: Marcotte, Chen, Madfes, Kirby, Williams-Weinstein, Jones
NOES: Wisniewski

Commissioner Wisniewski stated that he feels that it is a bad precedent that they are putting out there to other groups. He understands the fees but the timing could not be any worse. [...] Mr. [Pedro] Jimenez [Recreation Director] stated that the department is asked to be budget neutral and when you approve to waive then the department can not be budget neutral. Mr. Jimenez also stated that yes it is community wide and that is why there is a commission to make that decision.

What was a bad precedent on Tuesday evening was a bad precedent in September.

Being principled — setting or not setting precedent, or policy, or priorities — is not something you simply say or talk about. It is something you do — or not do, depending on the scenario — consistently, substantively. Words mean something, or they should.

The council is going to make mistakes. That is fine and expected; they are human. But they cannot expect to take credit at both ends of a decision. Some people are listening.

UPDATE — The video of the council jockeying over setting precedent (I interjected at the 1:50 mark)…

I understand that this is largely a criticism of semantics, but being familiar and frustrated by the original fee waiver, the council avoiding accountability on the issue was too much not to say something on record.

In a remarkable reversal of the not-so-distant past,¹ Bob Sewell, a Hercules resident and representative of Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 159, spoke during public comment at this evening’s city council meeting to announce labor’s support for the long-delayed Hercules Bayfront project.

Sewell announced the recent agreement — an absolute milestone — between labor and AndersonPacific (the owner/developer of the private development that surrounds the planned Intermodal Transit Center public project) and strongly encouraged the City to finalize negotiations with AndersonPacific so the community — and labor — can realize the immense benefits.

This was a major endorsement for the project from an unexpected source, and should be a reminder of the significance of the development agreement currently being negotiated (the council returned to closed session on the subject following the lengthy meeting) — and keep the council focused on the ultimate goal. This project is great for the city and community, the entire bay area, and for labor. It is a win-win.

Three items related to the waterfront project are on the agenda for Tuesday night’s council meeting — 7pm at city hall — not including a discussion of negotiations in closed session prior. (The two parties met for a full day of exhaustive negotiations on Friday.)

• Extend special consultant Charlie Long’s contract by one month — through the end of February. Cost: $5k.
• Execute an engineering design contract with BKF for completion of the John Muir Parkway extension and other ITC infrastructure. Cost: $299k. (Funds will come from wastewater revenue bonds.)
• And a resolution to support the project (a gesture) as well as submit a revised funding plan to CCTA which asks for an advance of Measure J funds.

With respect to the design contract, it was asked during last Thursday’s task force meeting — alright, I asked — if a design-build contract would be allowed by the regional funding agencies. The City would still have to pay for the design services, but the payment would be deferred until the much larger construction contract was awarded (and therefore funded).

The design is reportedly at the sixty percent level which is ripe for design-build implementation. Comparatively, thirty percent is often too early due to concepts not being fully evaluated and additional exploration and studies outstanding, and ninety percent is too late (bullet list of items, closing comments) to realize the value of design-build — not to mention the time necessary to compile and compete the package.

The bulk of the problem has been overcome however in the commitment of wastewater revenue bonds instead of dwindling general fund dollars.

The agencies are allegedly watching for continued support for the project — from both the council and public — as they themselves are forced to commit funding between several priorities. The items on the agenda do not constitute a milestone (by any measure); the items are an exercise of diligence.

A Bayfront task force meeting requested by residents has been scheduled for Thursday evening — 6pm at city hall. The meeting will supposedly focus on the recent delays in negotiations and will hopefully make headway in solving them.

Ticking time bombs do remain in the development agreement at this point and appear to be roadblocks to a successfully executed deal, but separately, the ongoing sad state of the City’s finances are its own impediment to success. Special consultant Charlie Long included a summary in his most recent project status report:

[S]hortly after the Planning Commission’s [recommendation for approval on November 28], the City completed a substantial reassessment of the City’s capacity to fund the local share of the project costs, including the land acquisition. [...] [T]he plan had been to use advances from capital 2 accounts to be repaid from the sale of real estate owned by the City. The reassessment concluded that the funds available in capital accounts had been severely diminished by massive deficits in redevelopment. In addition, proceeds from the sale of City-owned real estate are not likely to be available for another 12 months and may be subject to “claw back” by the state. Based on this lack of available funding, the City was forced to take a step back and to re-assess how to address the funding for the project.

[Insert snarky comment about the owner/developer refusing to execute on the train station land agreement portion without the other required documents for full entitlement as the reason for delay.]

I fully expect an unadulterated discussion of the pertinent issues facing the project. Anything less will be insulting to the community that has worked so hard for so long to push this project from a perpetual track towards failure to one that has even the potential for success.

The complete project status report by Charlie Long is embedded below:

UPDATE — Charlie Long has sent out an updated report with discussion points for this evening…

The Patch continues to run their series of “prominent Herculeans” and their predictions for 2012.

Similar to Mayor Romero, Councilman Bill Wilkins expects a finalized waterfront deal: “2012 will bring the conclusion of negotiations for the ITC and Waterfront Development and the approved agreements will have been signed by all parties. The City and Hercules Bay Front LLC will be working to move both projects forward. The City should be working on the Bay Trail and infrastructure needed for both the ITC and Waterfront Projects to be successful.”

Although this is a positive outlook on a very critical project for the city’s recovery (note the non-capitalized ‘c’ in city), signs are emerging that cracks remain in the City’s commitment to executing a fair deal. In fact, the pretense within the City Manager’s description in his latest weekly report of the current standoff between the City and owner/developer (Jim Anderson of AndersonPacific) is telling (emphasis mine): “The Implementation Agreements, Tentative Map and Waterside Purchase and Sale Agreement are yet to be finalized and the approved Landside PSA [purchase and sale agreement], which the owner/developer has refused to execute until the other documents are approved, will require modification due to delays in funding.”

City Manager Steve Duran is new to Hercules so he must not realize its very recent history of a council and staff conspiring against waterfront residents to prevent progress and funneling bond funds (meant for the waterfront project) to other projects in decisions that were hidden from public view (Sycamore North, New Town Center, very nearly Hilltown) that ultimately bankrupted the city (just not officially). The previous council repeatedly lied, distorted facts, and acted against the interest of the city. The staff followed orders and never exercised their civic duty to speak up and act for what was clearly wrong (except in one case when everything was crumbling down anyway).

The actions of the past council and staff has resulted in the following in the past year or so (in no order):

• two veteran councilmembers being trounced in an election to reformers;
• the most popular city politician resigning in the face of a recall;
• two councilmembers being recalled;
• three reformers being elected to office;
• the hiring (and firing) of an outsider interim city manager;
• the hiring of two insider interim city managers;
• the replacement of the city attorney;
• key staff changes (a lot of department heads shown the door); and
• the hiring of a permanent city manager (Duran).

That is probably not even the half of it, if that. The point being — this city remains in a period of uncertainty. Almost everything the City owns and stands for is debatable — land assets, staff, programs, even the tax base. It is quite unfortunate, but the City needs to retreat from its steep demands to make this work. The project and the future of the city (again, the lowercase ‘c’) require it.

And you don’t buy a car without knowing what the dealer will pay for your trade-in.

One step at a time. One step, at a time.

The City Council will approve the revised zoning for the waterfront project (principally the Hercules Bayfront private development that surrounds an intermodal transit center that converges train and bus and eventually ferry) at Tuesday evening’s city council meeting — 7pm at city hall.

Get this — the item is (properly) included under the unfinished business portion of the meeting’s agenda. Unfinished business. Could there be a more perfect euphemism for the long-stalled (by city hall) waterfront project — the award-winning, public-supported new urbanist development plan that would serve as the finishing touch and crowning point for a community that began a decade ago? That development plan? Unfinished business.

What isn’t included tomorrow evening, of course, is the development agreement. In fact, according to the city manager’s most recent weekly report, the City provided “its final comments on remaining documents under negotiation to the owner/developer on December 26 and set forth a schedule that would have resulted in final approval on January 24. However, the owner/developer has requested more time to respond.”

It is heartening to see that the city has finally resolved itself and finalized the documents for the developer to consider. Perhaps all the ticking time bombs have been removed. Perhaps the City Council is being honest with the community it serves and following through on its commitment. Perhaps staff will not railroad this deal one more (last?) time.

The owner/developer (Jim Anderson of AndersonPacific) has shown no indication that he is willing to throw away the potential and value that this plan represents because of political miscues by the City (e.g., push poll), and there is no reason to think that that has changed to date, at least in some dramatic fashion that would disrupt the deal from indeed being finalized in our lifetimes.

What remains much more disconcerting is the City’s poor standing and understanding of their land assets (which will be used to finance their portion of the deal, including the intermodal station project itself, whatever grants do not cover) — all the properties purchased with redevelopment bond funds (plundered from the waterfront) whose fate have been tossed in the air by the governor’s budget plan that was affirmed as constitutional by the Supreme Court. That is where staff focus should be. And the mayor’s too. He should be in Sacramento pleading Hercules’ case. The solvency of the City depends on it.

But, yea, zoning; time to get that settled.

East Bay Regional Parks District — EBRPD, the largest urban parks district in the U.S. — will vote tomorrow to approve the EIR for the completion of the Bay Trail through Pinole. The WCCTAC and TIGER-funded project involves closing the gap between Pinole Shores and Bayfront Park by constructing a bridge over the Union Pacific railroad tracks.

The meeting starts at 2pm on Tuesday at EBRPD headquarters in Oakland (2950 Peralta Oaks Court).

I am familiar with the results of the geotechnical exploration conducted for the proposed bridge. The engineering concerns are similar to those facing the construction of the Intermodal Station (and related infrastructure) in Hercules — point being, it will be an expensive pedestrian bridge. I’m assuming at least a portion of the funding will come from the recently-approved Measure WW, another perfect example of local taxes staying local. Although Hercules will be competing for the same pool of funds, an improvement along Pinole’s shoreline is an improvement for Hercules — particularly for those within walking distance.

And — again — the EBRPD annual membership is a great deal (especially if you have a dog). The park system is truly one of the best resources in the bay area.