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Health & Fitness

Why I am Running for City Council

I managed to live this long without running for election.  Happy to be just be another neighbor in the neighborhood, minding my own business.  What made me change?

I suppose it started with the plans to urbanize San Rafael.  That got me into the race.  But once I got a look under the hood, I began to understand just what bad shape our San Rafael is in. 

San Rafael is changing in ways we never could have imagined.

Did you know that San Rafael’s crime rate is 3 times higher than the rest of Marin?  We are only 20% of the population but produce 60% of the county’s jail bookings.

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San Rafael’s downtown growth industry is suddenly “massage” parlors.  Don’t think so?  Visit http: //www.rubmaps.com/erotic-massage-euphoria-spa-san-rafael-ca-4793 for a review of just one of the 20 erotic massage parlors they have reviewed in San Rafael.  I did not pay for a website membership so I could not read the reviews posted by “rubtits” or “Hubbahubba”, but I presume they were satisfied.

Our homeless population exploding, now 4 times greater per capita than the rest of Marin, as San Rafael has turned into a magnet drawing from other areas into our homeless encampments.

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And in the face of all of this…San Rafael has cut back our police personnel by 15%.

How, or why, did this happen?  As I looked under that hood, I found decades of mismanagement.  Past administrations have squandered our fortunes (on many levels) and put us on a road to so deep a debt that we cannot afford basic services anymore.

At the heart of it is pension debt.  One in four of San Rafael’s taxpayer dollars now goes to trying to keep up with unfunded pension liabilities.  Mind you, that is not salaries and pension, but just the pensions.  We have to pass Measure E to set our sales tax higher than anywhere else in Marin, Sonoma, or San Francisco, because our pension obligations prevent us from repairing our emergency infrastructure. 

But even this tax increase will not substantially dig us out.  The debt is way deeper than that, and our city is in the very worst shape of the entire Bay Area.  This is shameful.

Does anyone think the solution is high density housing?  If the state and ABAG have their way, we could see multiple versions of the Corte Madera Monster going up around town.  Tax exemptions for nonprofit housing leave us with no money to hire teachers for those new students, much less helping restore our police force.

If the 200 to 300 new homes at Northgate Mall ever materialize (on top of the stores!), they would pay a single parcel tax.  That means the school tax all of those homes combined would equal what pay if you live in a single family home.

Tax exempt housing is fuel to the economic fire.

I do not fault our police or firefighters.  They need to negotiate tough for their contracts, and we respect their right to do so. 

No, neighbors, it is the fault of downtown society, political insiders through a number of administrations, who fail to understand the harm caused by their myopic policies.  Either they did not see the problem they were creating, or they found it easier to kick it down the road.

And do you know where that road ends?  At my block.  It awakened the civic duty in me.  I used the internet to learn how to put my name on the ballot, and announced I was running.  The huge network of supporters for my candidacy is not so much because of what I say but, rather, because of what my neighbors have heard and seen in our hometown.

Now that I am in the race, I see the impact of staggering amounts of special interest money and how it serves to make the political insiders’ candidates look like they are the answer, rather than merely being the legacy of our past failures.  When I see their big campaign signs at the shopping centers and at the monied interests who do business with the city, the name I really see on those signs is Hubbahubba.

Councilmember is just one seat out of five.  But I think it is important our neighborhoods get a voice on the council.  Let the political insiders know that our neighborhoods don’t want excuses.  We don’t want avoidance.  We don’t even want to blame.  We just want a responsible city government with people who will put the city’s interests first.  We want a plan.

(Randy Warren is a candidate for San Rafael City Council.  His endorsements include Quiet & Safe San Rafael, the Sierra Club, and Citizens For Sustainable Pension Plans.  Randy’s campaign website is www.randywarrenforcitycouncil.com .)

 





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