The topic of government providing transportation to seniors came up during our budget study sessions. Combined, the city and county currently provide a senior lunch program. The discussion was around the cost and value of increasing services like transportation to receive this lunch service.

Like many cities, San Jose has facilities that serve residents, such as community centers, libraries and parks. These facilities are typically scattered around cities so that all areas of the municipality may utilize them.

But if the city is being asked to provide transportation for seniors to community centers, why not expand this to libraries as well? Libraries offer social engagement and lifelong learning. Perhaps we should promote the value of fresh air and open space with daily transportation to Alum Rock Park.

We also have youth under 16 that are unable to drive and they certainly would benefit from free transportation to parks, libraries and community centers. In some communities, youth get free bus rides with a library card.

Allowing residents to access their government in person is another shared value. Perhaps providing free transportation to City Hall for the many public meetings occurring Monday through Friday?

The cost for point-to-point round trip transportation is $12.50 to $20, while the cost of a senior lunch provided is $6 with a requested $2.50 donation. Does it make sense to spend more on transportation than the meal? There is value providing socialization opportunities for seniors and a meal.

At a potential cost of $18.50 to $26.50 per person, should the city consider a gift certificate to an eatery that may be closer to the resident than a city facility and benefit a small business owner? Off the topic of transportation, but related, should the city build and maintain fitness centers or instead negotiate a low rate at private fitness clubs for residents that would avoid operation and maintenance costs to the city budget?

Should government, via VTA, provide free public transit to both seniors and youth? What if the community serving facility or the resident’s home is not next to a bus line? Maybe the City could add a requirement to its taxi license permits that requires a certain number of free or reduced rides for youth and seniors? Does a separate transit agency like VTA serve the goals of the city and county? Or maybe we should allow private vans, like Jeepney’s in the Philippines, to deliver people point to point?
Although all of these services have a value, we cannot ignore the cost.

I really appreciate the city of San Jose’s partnership with the county of Santa Clara to continue a senior lunch program. Thank you to the county of Santa Clara and the work of Supervisor Liz Kniss and Councilmember Pete Constant on maintaining this service.

It is time to announce the awards for best actor and best actress in local government for the “Pension Reform in Name Only” category.

Best Actress Award: Nancy Pyle
I have watched Nancy Pyle read from a prepared script time and time again, speaking for and against pension reform. But, from my perspective, she supported any roadblock in the way of pension reform the last four years. On Aug. 3, 2010, she voted against putting Measure W on the November 2010 ballot and voted against implementing Measure W on May 1, 2012. On the dais, Councilmember Pyle said she voted in favor of putting Measure B on the ballot because so many of her constituents contacted her office demanding the right to vote again on pension reform.

When asked to list her name on the argument in favor of Measure B on the sample ballot—since she voted to put it on the ballot as residents demanded—she declined. Nancy Pyle, in my view, did not lift a finger to help the passage of Measure B, as she was absent on the Measure B mailers. Instead, the campaign called upon the former, and perhaps more popular, District 10 Councilmember Pat Dando.

Best Actor Award: Donald Rocha
Donald Rocha campaigned for City Council in 2010 as a supporter of Measure W, both verbally and on his campaign material. However, when it came to implementing Measure W, Donald Rocha joined Nancy Pyle in voting “no” on May 1, 2012.  Donald Rocha, like Nancy Pyle, as told to me by District 9 residents and his comments on the dais, voted to put Measure B on the ballot based on pressure from District 9 residents who strongly favor pension reform. Donald Rocha, like Nancy Pyle, refused to have his name listed on the sample ballot as being in favor of Measure B. He was also missing from the Measure B campaign material.

Two good people but also two very good actors.

There are other characters in this screenplay, both in San Jose and Sacramento, like Assemblyman Paul Fong. Several of them are not acting in my view; they’re simply just opposed to pension reform. I respect these viewpoints, although different than mine, because you know where these people stand and their views do not blow in the wind.

The City Council will vote tomorrow on implementing Measure W. Will a second time be the charm?

I wrote an prior blog describing how I felt the initiative process will become the norm for San Jose and that seems to be the case. The threshold to gather signatures is obviously attainable, which can be attributed to the work and funding of organized groups. San Jose has four signature drives completed or in the process of finishing in the last 12 months: medical cannabis collective’s repeal of an ordinance (similar but different); the minimum wage initiative; the soon to be turned in “layoff police for libraries” initiative; and theexpansion of card clubs initiative.

Initiatives are part of our democratic process. Items are placed on the ballot for voters to have their say. In my view, nowhere does the limited pool of signatures trump the entire population of San Jose. To be consistent, if and when new initiatives come forward, they should go on the ballot and that group should have the responsibility of running an election campaign. But the initiative process requires a city, county or state to spend money to place an item on the ballot. Lectured guilt should not be used as a way to potentially implement a negative initiative in the future.

Maybe a future initiative bans pit bulls and german shepherds. Maybe a future ballot initiative bans loud motor vehicles. Maybe a future initiative bans certain types of legal business. It could be literally anything a city is allowed to do, so it’s best to be consistent.

Consistency was the principle I shared on the dais concisely, rather than speaking in a repetitive and circular fashion for a long period of time. However, based on the comments from my colleagues, it looks as though the majority of the City Council will be endorsing the minimum wage ballot measure this November.

On a separate note, I am pleased to announce that KB Homes dropped off a check for $1 million dollars to public works on June 1. I wrote about this on my last blog, which covered how lobbyist Jerry Strangis used his “friendly” relationships with certain councilmembers, like Nancy Pyle, to convert land from jobs to housing.

Some people have called the fact that San Jose will have 9 million dollars more than anticipated a “surplus.” Having this money will allow the city to avoid layoffs and add funding for libraries, as well as anti-gang programs this coming fiscal year. The mayor has called it a 1-percent cushion, because this money came about from last year’s budget action of layoffs and across-the-board pay cuts for all employees.

Having enough money to provide some services does not equate to a “surplus” or a “cushion,” in my opinion. For an analogy, I picture a family with a limited amount money and needing to make certain choices in order to save their house. The family might start off with no longer going out to eat, conserving water and electricity, trimming the food budget even for home cooked meals, prolonging car/house repairs, and avoiding discretionary purchases. But, still their situation gets worse, so maybe they choose to refinance the mortgage and stretch out the term of the loan to lower monthly payments.

The family may pray for better days ahead to make up for the more money they must allocate to interest over the life of the new loan. But, alas the situation worsens again and leads to the sale of major household appliances.

Some time later cash flow improves for the family—but not enough to buy back the appliances, so they must continue washing the dishes by hand, hanging the clothes out to dry and are limited in what they can cook without an oven.

However, there is some extra money that they may choose to either save towards repurchasing the appliances, or they can spend the money on dining out—it is immediate gratification and less expensive than the appliances.

This is similar to San Jose, in that our surplus/cushion amount of money cannot buy back all the positions that have been laid off since that number is significantly higher than cash on hand. Therefore, the city simply has less options with less resources, much like our family hanging onto the house while their lifestyle has drastically changed due to the loss of the household appliances.

Perhaps the family income increases by good fortune or working harder, and hopefully so do the revenues of San Jose … or not. Clearly “not” is the case for the state of California, because the budget deficit has grown from 9 billion to 16 billion. Both at the city and state level, it seems impossible to make a down payment on the big ticket items that are deemed the most important.

The now “famous” deadlocked 5-to-5 vote last week, regarding whether or not to move forward with a second-tier retirement system for new employees, was fascinating to watch but extremely disappointing in the end.

Sixteen months ago, 74 percent of San Jose voters approved of the city adopting a second tier for pensions. One could feel the shock in the chambers when half the council did not support the voters.

I believe it was a lost opportunity for labor to not embrace a second tier. If the unions would have embraced a second tier, it would have taken pressure off if the first tier, but that opportunity is now gone.

Retirement in the United States was never supposed to match your peak years of net income nor surpass the years actually spent working. Second tier is about new employees who do not work for the city yet.

One speaker had a good point—that a second tier should be actuarially sound. Ultimately, only a 401K would do that, but unfortunately there are not enough votes on the council to do adopt a 401K for new employees. Even the second tier considered last week would still produce debt for the next generation but significantly less than the current generous level of benefits.

Regarding health care, the city is subject to national price increases and the only way to reduce costs today—outside of a mandatory wellness program, like the city of Chicago—is raising deductibles. Neither the city of San Jose nor you and your family are immune to the double-digit health care cost increases. All residents of San Jose are included in the costs and fees that people pay for health care. All individuals across the country weigh deductibles/fees in their decisions on health care.

Another speaker at the council meeting said that he paid 1.45 percent towards his future retiree health care when he was employed by the city. However, that did not keep up with double-digit health care costs nor did it put any money aside to pay the billion dollar-plus unfunded liability.

If unions had agreed to pay a little something towards the unfunded liability when they agreed to a 50-50 split in 1984, we would not face the peril of running out of funds to pay for retiree health care. However, that would have required someone then to pay/sacrifice more, which it seems no one wants to do on any given day at any level of government when you can simply pass it on to the next person.

Retirees will still have healthcare and Medicare supplementals provided by the city, which in contrast is thousands of dollars per year if purchased on the open market. Current employees would avoid paying approximately $2,000 a year out of their paychecks with the implementation of a second tier since they must split the cost 50-50. Without changes, current city employees’ health care costs will increase dramatically.

I accept that some of my colleagues view important issues quite differently. Some of my colleagues voted against putting Measure W on the ballot in 2010 and also voted no last week. One of my colleagues has a long track record of publicly endorsing Measure W during his campaign but voted no last week as well.

I invite you to a conversation at City Hall on a similar dilemma at 7pm on May 9 with the Concord Coalition. The evening will allow you to make tough choices that elected officials from both parties have not made for decades at the Federal level. RSVP is required: http://concordcoalition.org/RSVP

I predict going forward that groups sponsoring ballot initiatives will be a constant part of the political landscape in San Jose, similar to the outside funding of planning department ordinances by third parties to move forward on regulations.

The minimum wage initiative recently gathered and submitted the required signatures last week, and action will be taken at the May 22 City Council meeting. A library initiative is also in the process of gathering signatures for a November election.

The city of San Jose budget director reviewed the impacts of implementing the potential library petition, which would require a certain amount of revenue to be spent on libraries. This increase would be $19.4 million from the general fund. This amount is ongoing and would require the layoffs of 175 police officers. Single-issue advocacy has its effect on other department budgets and this is an obvious example. Knowing that this could cut 175 police officers is too much to bear.

As far as the library advocates’ motives, I don’t blame them. It is a strategic move that will be duplicated by others. Those soliciting petitions will find many people sympathetic to signing the petition, especially as they enter and exit a library. However, to be fair, the signer of the petition should also be asked what do they want cut from other city departments to fund the library department. I understand why this path was chosen, because residents may not support a special library tax in 2014, which requires a ⅔ vote to pass.

Prior to 175 police officers being laid off, let’s give volunteers a chance to extend library hours, as this is a more viable option than relying on volunteer police officers.