By Roberta Millstein

This is just a short update to follow on the Davisite’s earlier articles concerning the Housing Element Update (see here, here, and here).

This past Wednesday (June 9^th), the City of Davis’s Planning Commission met for a second time to discuss the recommendations of the Housing Element Committee (HEC)-- the first meeting was May 26.  At the earlier meeting, most of the comments from the public concerned 10 recommendations that the HEC had passed.  And a good number of the comments came from UC Davis students who were apparently reading from the same script, since their comments were identical or nearly so.

So, one might have expected that the June 9 meeting would be more of the same.  But that was not the case.

The Subversion of the Housing Element Committee (HEC) Deliberation Process by Hidden Development Interests

Note: Several recent articles in the Davisite touch on the subject matter discussed here: For other comments on the Housing Element’s failure to address affordability and the proposals being pushed by development and real estate interests, see Davis Housing Element Fails Affordable Housing (5/27/2021). See also Comments on Draft Housing Element from Legal Services of Northern California (5/25/2021) For comments on problems with the City of Davis’s decision-making process see Good decision-making process involves staff and City Council too (6/3/2021)

By Alan Pryor and Rik Keller

The City of Davis’s Housing Element Committee (HEC), which is supposed to represent a “diversity of interests” in the community, was instead co-opted by development and real estate interests. Two weeks ago, there were a last-minute series of policy recommendations that were sprung on the Committee by these same real estate and development interests in violation of Brown Act open meeting laws. The HEC then further violated these laws in considering and voting to adopt the recommendations. Furthermore, the development and real estate interests on the Committee failed to adequately disclose conflicts of interest in terms of their investments and holdings in the City that would be impacted by the favorable recommendations approved by the HEC.

This subverted process brings up important questions: Why has the City directed a process that has so little public input, especially from genuine affordable housing advocacy groups? How did the City staff allow so many violations of Brown Act laws regarding transparency and open government? Why did the City select HEC members with such a preponderance of real estate interests instead of appointing more representatives from the affordable housing community?

Concerns raised about lack of public participation from all economic segments of the community without adequate time to review, among many other concerns. Additional changes are needed to comply with the law and provide the most effective strategies to address the critical housing needs facing Davis residents with low incomes.

Background: The City of Davis is preparing the 2021 – 2029 Housing Element to evaluate current and future housing conditions and identify housing sites to meet the community’s needs. Updating the Housing Element is a state requirement. The following letter commenting on the Draft Housing Element from Legal Services of Northern California was sent to the Davisite to post.

The following letter was emailed as a comment for tonight's special City Council Subcommittee on Commission Process meeting.

Dear City Councilmembers and Commission Chairs,

It is extremely difficult to comment on this item without knowing more about what will be discussed. However, one concern I have – and I will just have to see where things go today – is how this group became a “Subcommittee on Commissions.”

The original letter that triggered this subcommittee, a letter that I co-signed, was titled “A Proposal for Improving City of Davis Decision Making.”  It included provisions regarding City Commissions, but it was not limited to that.  It also included provisions regarding “transparency, information, disclosure, and public engagement” as well as provisions “for developing and making decisions on Staff proposals submitted for City Council action.”  It was not just about how commissions operate.

It would be a missed opportunity if this subcommittee were to narrow its concerns from the letter’s original scope.  Indeed, it would be a sad irony, given the letter was in part prompted by commissioners feeling that they were not being heard and seeing their communications to the city lost in translation.

By Robert Canning

At next week’s city council meeting, council will be asked to change the city’s sound ordnance. With little discussion or notice, city staff have added an item to the agenda that could have big implications for city planning and residential neighborhoods in Davis.

In a nutshell, the amendment would, as one person has put it, allow someone to stand in front of your house and blow an air horn for a minute or two every hour without violating the sound ordinance. This would be allowed because city staff have decided it is better to measure sound by averaging it over an hour, rather than use a simple measure like the maximum allowed sound, how the current ordinance works. A quick check on the web shows that two other college towns – Chico and San Luis Obispo – have existing sound ordinances that use the “maximum” sound standard. Others have found that most cities use the maximum allowed sound rather than an average.

And this makes sense. Using maximum allowable sounds – particularly during quiet periods like nighttime – eliminates repetitive loud noises like, to use an extreme example, pile drivers and other such concussive noises as the Chico ordinance notes. San Luis Obispo has sound levels for daytime hours that are meant to limit loud noises such as leaf blowers and the like.

The following letter was sent to the Yolo County Board of Supervisors on May 4 and shared with the Davisite for publication.

Dear Chairman Provenza and Board of Supervisors:

On behalf of the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation, I write to voice our continued strong concerns about the manner by which the County of Yolo is proceeding with regard to its Cannabis Land Use Ordinance ("CLUO"). Our concerns are far-reaching and fundamental. We continue to believe the Environmental Impact Report the County commissioned is deficient under the California Environmental Quality Act ("CEQA"), for all of the reasons stated in our prior correspondence and which we hereby incorporate by reference.  For reasons we cannot fathom, the County continues on a myopic course, refusing to supplement or expand an analysis to one that measures the actual environmental impacts of an industry the County unleashed four years ago as an admitted experiment, and without any CEQA analysis whatsoever.  On a matter of such great import, involving a land use policy affecting so many people's lives, we fail to understand why the County is unwilling to take the time needed to get it right, or meaningfully consider reasonable alternatives to  protect people and their property. Instead, the County seems dedicated to moving forward against this deficient record, and recommending final action on an ordinance that will establish legal rights for a problematic industry.

We implore the Board to step back and review the record. The comments from long­ time Capay Valley farmers and residents are generally consistent. Furthermore, County responses to people's grievances are revealing, as they are largely dismissive and conclusory, and protective of the cannabis industry generally. By this correspondence, we ask the Board to take corrective action and slow this process down to ensure CEQA is satisfied and that the best land use policy is developed. At the same time, we ask the Board to grant the Tribe's and our neighbors' request to protect the Capay Valley region, and in particular to, carve cannabis grows out of the rural residential communities west of Interstate-505 along State Route 16, which are simply not suitable to cannabis cultivation. As noted, the Tribe would help mitigate the impacts to growers who invested in the Capay Valley, by helping finance their relocation.

Our Efforts to Reach A Resolution That Would Protect Much of the Greater Capay Valley Region from Cannabis Cultivation.

The Overwhelming Majority of the Owners of these Cannabis Farms are NOT Capay Valley Residents

by Alan Pryor

According to records provided by residents of Capay Valley opposed to the proliferation of cannabis farms in that rural and semi-rural area, there are 54 licensed pot farms in Yolo County with identified APN parcel numbers. Of these 54 farms, 27 (50%) are located in or near the unincorporated towns of Guinda, Rumsey,  Capay, and Esparto in the geographically short and narrow Capay Valley. The remaining 27 farms are located in other widely dispersed unincorporated areas of Yolo County. Based on land area alone, this is obviously a hugely disproportionate concentration of cannabis farms in this generally less wealthy area of the County.

It is further noteworthy that of the 27 cannabis farms in the Capay Valley, only 7 (26%) have a person or business owner with an actual identified mailing address in the valley itself – everyone else is from somewhere else.. (Note: County records are incomplete or inaccurate so some property/business owner information was not released or otherwise unobtainable. As a result, not all information is currently available for all cannabis farms licensees).

UC Davis's Ladder Fire Truck - Truck 34

By Roberta Millstein

Is now the time for the City of Davis to be spending millions of dollars on a ladder fire truck when it currently only needs this type of truck approximately once per month at most, when it can currently borrow UC Davis’s ladder truck for free?

What information do we need to answer this question?  What do we know and what do we need to know?

According to the Davis Enterprise, on March 16 the Davis City Council “expressed unanimous support for acquiring a ladder truck for the Davis Fire Department and directed staff to move forward both on securing a detailed cost estimate for a truck as well as developing plans to modify the downtown fire station to accommodate it.”

The estimated costs discussed thus far are as follows (with the City possibly being able to obtain some grants to offset some of these costs):

The following group-written letter was sent to the Yolo County Board of Supervisors, several of whom also shared the letter with the Davisite and suggested that other people concerned about this issue can contact the Board at: "Oscar Villegas, 1st" <oscar.villegas@yolocounty.org> "Don Saylor, Chair, 2nd" <don.saylor@yolocounty.org>, "Gary Sandy, 3rd" <gary.sandy@yolocounty.org>, "Jim Provenza, 4th" <jim.provenza@yolocounty.org>, "Angel Barajas, 5th" <angel.barajas@yolocounty.org>, "Patrick S. Blacklock, Co Admin’r" <patrick.blacklock@yolocounty.org>

[Updated to add signatories].

Dear Supervisors: 

We are residents of the rural communities along Highway 16 west of the 505 in Yolo County, with most of us living and some of us farming in and around Madison, Esparto, Capay, Brooks, Guinda and/or Rumsey. This area is a special one, renowned for the quality of its produce and sustainable farming, and variously called the “Capay Valley” or “greater Capay Valley.” We submit this letter to express our strong and united opposition to the cannabis industry in our communities.  

Since the County first began experimenting with the cannabis industry four years ago, and authorized cannabis cultivation without any prior analysis or environmental review, the greater Capay Valley quickly became overwhelmed with cannabis grows. As you stand ready to approve an Ordinance that will bring some permanence to this industry, we ask you to hear us.  While we recognize the County wants this industry because of the revenues it will generate, the Board needs to consider the real costs this industry poses to our way of life.  

Many of our families have lived in this region for generations. We have personally witnessed – and experienced – the harmful impacts of this industry. We want to make it clear to you, the elected Board of Supervisors, including our District 5 Supervisor Angel Barrajas, that we want the cannabis industry out of the greater Capay Valley, which needs to be protected from cannabis cultivation and related uses with an express exclusion or ban.

The following letter was sent to the Yolo County Board of Supervisors and shared with the Davisite

Hello Yolo County Supervisors,

Allow me to be frank. Although each county supervisor is elected by the voters of their district, you represent all the residents (whether they voted for you or not) of the entire county.

That means your unspoken eagerness for pot revenue needs to be balanced against how the carpet-bagging influx of most pot grows being located mostly in District Five could undermine what was already here and growing.

“The “California Travel Impacts” report, prepared for Visit California by Dean Runyan Associates, shows visitor spending reached $454.3 million and supported 5,219 jobs in Yolo County in 2019.”

While our county’s three large cities get the credit, recreation in Capay Valley is also a significant factor, with river rafting, Almond Festival tourism, lavender farms and wine tasting, the Yocha Dehe Golf Club, Cache Creek Casino Resort, Séka Hills Olive Mill, Mother’s Day garden tours, and 3 decades of Full Belly Farm’s Hoes Down events drawing considerable crowds. The county took in $15 million in local tax revenue in 2019 from visitors.  https://www.dailydemocrat.com/2020/05/16/new-economic-report-highlights-importance-of-tourism-to-yolo-county/

The following public comment by Matt Williams was delivered last night to the City Council regarding the Commission Appointments agenda item.

Madam Mayor, members of Council and City Staff, it has come to my attention from multiple disparate sources that the published Report for Item 7 on tonight's agenda was tampered with so that it does not reflect the actual results of the Subcommittee deliberations by Mayor Partida and Councilmember Carson. It is not clear from the information I have received whether the tampering was malicious or not, but it is crystal clear that Mayor Partida's views on the appointments were edited out of the document and Council member Carson's views were provided instead.

The Commission appointment process is supposed to be non-partisan, and free of personal political agenda. Unfortunately, all three of the Commission appointment processes since Dan Carson has been involved have been anything but non-partisan and have consistently advanced his own personal political agenda and higher office ambitions.

Some will say that Carson's actions in each of the last two appointment cycles was simply political infighting, but tampering with an Item Report, as has been done this evening, is much more sinister, and dare I say immoral. Council should insist on Councilmember Carson recusing himself from tonight's vote on Item 7, and the tampering should be openly and publicly investigated.

In case anyone might think that I am personally butt-hurt by Dan's conspiring to not have me reappointed to the Utilities Commission last cycle, he actually did me a huge favor by doing so, because today I began a 12-week course of hormone and radiation therapy treatment for cancer, Not having the responsibility of Utilities Commission duties has made my life simpler as I move forward with that course of treatment. Sometimes less is more. Thank you, Dan for making my life easier in that currently very important way.

In closing, the decision not to appoint Kelsey Fortune to the Utilities Commission needs to be addressed. Kelsey's credentials are a PhD in the Economics of Electric Energy. Those are skills and experience that perfectly matches what Davis needs on its Utilities Commission. Please take the wise step of appointing Kelsey to the Utilities Commission tonight.

Dear Planning Commissioners -

At the upcoming Planning Commission meeting this Wednesday you will be presented with the newly proposed "Davis-Connected Buyers Program" for the Bretton Woods Project. This new proposal has serious flaws and is essentially gutless in terms of ensuring that a large percentage of new homes are sold to existing Davis homeowners thus freeing up current local housing stock for new families as promised by the developer in the actual language on the ballot in the Measure J/R vote in 2018.

I have written a detailed article published in the Davisite about the new program and its shortcomings that are so severe that it renders the program practically non-existent. To see the article click on the following title, Bretton Woods Attempts Another Bait and Switch with Its Davis Based Buyers Program.

In summary, the new Davis-Connected Buyers Program states that it will have prospective buyers sign a disclosure form identifying their link to Davis but that it also allows ANYONE to refuse to sign the disclosure form because they are a member of a protected class based on any race, gender or gender identity, ethnicity, religion, etc. I myself could refuse to sign the disclosure form simply because I am a straight married white agnostic male and the developer's new proposal says that would allow me to buy a new home even if I otherwise had no links at all to Davis. The developer also claims that they will not investigate or demand proof of any "protected status" claims because he does not want to intrude on the prospective buyers privacy. In other words, the developer will take any and all buyers thus opening the floodgates to anyone who wants to buy there and has the wherewithal to engage in bidding wars.

Below is the text of a letter submitted to the Davis Planning Commission for its April 14th meeting expressing issues and concerns with the Bretton Woods Davis-Connected Buyers Program.

Commissioners:

I write to express concerns with the Davis-Connected Buyers Program (DCBP), which is scheduled to be presented at the Planning Commission’s April 14, 2021 meeting. I am disappointed that this agenda item is an informational update only rather than an action item. That suggests that the City Council is not interested in further commission input or recommendations on the DCBP and that its approval by the Council as submitted by the developer is a fait accompli.

I am now retired but have nearly four decades experience with state and federal fair housing laws. I was an attorney with Disability Rights California, California’s designated non-profit disability protection and advocacy organization, for 26 years and subsequently held positions as Chief Consultant for the Assembly Human Services Committee and as legislative director for the California Department of Developmental Services. I am also a former member of the Davis Social Services Commission.

Provisions of the DCBP do not make sense and the program will almost certainly not achieve its purported purpose. Most importantly, as has been alleged—including in a lawsuit challenging the DCBP that was subsequently dismissed without prejudice on procedural grounds—the DCBP is likely to perpetuate, and possibly exacerbate, existing racial disparities in Davis as compared to the region.

South-bound Pole Line just south of East Covell. Convenient to pick-up, not so convenient for people who want to use the lane

An hour earlier - most bikes are not equipped with headlights and the person on a bike might not see it.

UPDATE: The piles I've described in this post which were on or near the East Covell corridor have been removed. There are some others in the bike lane on Loyola between the entrance to Korematsu Elementary and Alhambra, and still nothing either here or in general to communicate to people driving motor vehicles that people on bikes may deviate from the bike lanes....

*****

Last week's storm was the worst in ten years by many accounts, with serious damage to trees and property, a significant loss of perishable food and other problems caused by lack of power.

Obviously city staff, private contractors and others had their work cut out for them and certainly we applaud their efforts, though many cheered PG&E field staff and they pooped on their bosses (and shareholders).

From what I saw, arterial streets in Davis were cleared for the most part by January 28th, the day after the storms mostly ended. When out then to photograph the weird non-standard lane design on Lake at Russell I passed the dangerousafety radar speed sign on East Covell Blvd. that I blogged about last week.

I noticed that street sweepers had made at least two passes on the traffic lanes of East Covell, because there was a consistent line of debris that started a  foot or two into the bike lane from the number two lane. I noticed the same, um, edging on other arteries.

City is blocking bike lanes?

The City of Davis' only response to recent crashes in the vicinity of Pole Line Road and East Covell Blvd has thus far been Enforcement¹. Actively, the Davis Police Department has been monitoring some locations in the area.  Passively, the City has placed a radar speed sign on WB East Covell between Manzanita and Baywood Streets, right about here.

Why is the radar speed sign in the bike lane? The City places similar signs - and they and private contractors place various construction signs - off to the side on streets when there's space to do so, so they clearly understand the advantage of doing so. But when there's no space, they place the signs on the side of the street, and on most collectors and arterial streets in Davis this means it's in a bike lane.

"Putting a radar feedback sign on Covell to invite drivers to slow down: good. Putting a sign in bike lane: not good," says Nicolas Fauchier-Magnan, the President of Bike Davis, who usually goes by Nico.

"Obstructing the bike lane, on a street where drivers routinely go 50 mph or more is simply irresponsible. 

"Come on, City of Davis," continues Nico. "You should know better, and you can do better. Please fix this terrible blunder before someone gets hurt. There is plenty of space on the grass, outside of the bike lane, to safely place this sign."

By Roberta Millstein, Pam Gunnell, Nancy Price, Alan Pryor, and Colin Walsh

Measure B – the measure that proposed a 200-acre business park and housing development outside of the Mace Curve – failed at the polls.  The defeat comes with official Yolo County returns showing that 16,458 people, or 52% of voters, said “no” to the project.  In Mace Ranch and Wildhorse, 60% of voters opposed the project.

This is a remarkable result considering that the No on B campaign was outspent by over 14 to 1.  As of October 28, Yes on B had spent $258,919 between when B was put on the ballot in July and the election in November, while No on B had spent $18,149.  The No on B campaign, composed solely of volunteer Davis citizens, created its own literature, designed its own sign and other graphics, was active on social media, and, to the extent possible during COVID, pounded the pavement distributing flyers to let Davisites know about the negative impacts that this project would bring.  It was a true grassroots effort.  There were no paid designers, no paid consultants, no multiple glossy mailers, and no push-polls to gather information on what messages would sell.  Opponents also could not table at the Farmers Market due to COVID restrictions, normally the bread and butter of a campaign lacking deep pocket donors to finance getting its message out.

By comparison, Yes on B hired a PR Firm and other consultants more than a year in advance of the vote to help contrive and package its message and run the campaign.

The fact that Measure B was nonetheless defeated in the face of long odds and unusual circumstances shows that DISC was a bad project for Davis from the outset.  It was too big, chewing up prime farmland and habitat.   The promise of on-site housing for DISC employees could not be guaranteed, making the development car-and commuter- oriented with extensive parking areas. Poor public transportation options exacerbated this problem. The DISC development would have massively increased Davis greenhouse gas emissions and made it impossible for Davis to meet its carbon neutrality goals. We are in a climate emergency, as Yolo County and other counties have recognized; Davis needs to shoulder its share of responsibility for climate impacts, including but not limited to wildfire impacts and extreme weather events locally and globally.

Opposing Measure B cost three sitting Commissioners a reappointment recommendation

By Alan Pryor

This Tuesday, December 1, the City Council will consider recommendations made by a subcommittee of Mayor Gloria Partida and Councilmember Dan Carson for seats on various City Citizen Advisory Commissions.  Their formal recommendations to the Council can be found here. This article discusses bias by that subcommittee in their recommendations made for reappointments to these Commissions.

Mayor Gloria Partida and Councilmember Dan Carson were also both on the Council subcommittee who negotiated the deal with the Davis Innovation and Sustainability Campus (DISC) to put it on the November ballot as Measure B. Both then also signed the Argument for the Measure on the ballot and both strongly promoted Measure B itself during the campaign.

The City’s website notes that its supposedly-independent citizen advisory commissions “have a critical role in the City of Davis” by providing an “important avenue for determining the community’s feelings about an issue.” 

But three sitting commissioners who applied for reappointment to 3 different commissions were all denied a reappointment recommendation:  Alan Pryor (Natural Resource Commission), Matt Williams (Utilities Commission), and Todd Edelman (Bicycling, Transportation, and Street Safety Commission). What do all of us have in common?  All three were active opponents of the recently-defeated Measure B on the November ballot in Davis.

But all other Commissioners, save one, who requested reappointment received favorable recommendations including some of whom had termed out. None of these recommended commissioners had publicly opposed Measure B and many were ardent supporters of Measure B as evidenced by Letters to the Editor in the Davis Enterprise or other means, including:

Yolo Democratic Socialists of America is hosting a zoom round-table to discuss how local leaders understand the 2020 election results, as well as how this new landscape will affect the political struggles we wage in our respective communities and workplaces.

Featuring Sally Mandujabn, a public education teacher hailing from a long line of organized labor, Dillan Horton, who ran for Davis City Council, and Neetha Iyer, a teaching assistant a head steward at UAW 2865.

There will also be a Q&A portion at the end - we want your input!

You can register for the event at tinyurl.com/YoloDSAElectionRoundtable

Sub-committee members Carson and Partida were DISC's most strident supporters on Council

(From press release) On Tuesday, November 24, City of Davis Staff released the Agenda for the December 1 City Council meeting. Item Four concerns recommendations for appointment and re-appointment for City Commissions, with terms starting from January.

The recommendations are made by a Council sub-committee, newly composed of Mayor Gloria Partida and City Councilmember Dan Carson. (For a few years the sub-committee was now Former Mayor Brett Lee and now Vice-Mayor Lucas Frerichs.)

The appointments and re-appointments apply to 12 of the City’s Commissions, composed of sworn-in volunteers who normally complete two full terms of four years each before being termed-out. Earlier in the fall, current Commissioners - whether they termed out or not - were asked if they wanted to continue to serve. 

Three current Commissioners - Todd Edelman from the Bicycling, Transportation and Street Safety Commission (BTSSC), Alan Pryor from the Natural Resources Commission (NRC), and Matt Williams from the Utilities Commission all expressed a desire to stay. None are recommended for re-appointment by the sub-committee.

With a chance to ask questions

By Matt Williams

On Friday, November 20^th, at noon, Davis Mayor Gloria Partida will discuss the issues of the day and then take questions from the public. The webinar is free and open to the public. Please register in advance. To join us please sign up here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_kswA1_FqRoG1VYL6S-FuQw

Davisite readers can post questions for the Mayor here in this thread that they feel will be good ones to have addressed during the webinar.  The questions posted here will be forwarded to the Mayor.  Presubmitting question(s) will give the Mayor time to consider her answer(s), as well as give webinar attendees an idea about the topics their neighbors are interested in.

For example, one question might be as follows:  “Gloria, the residents of District 4 voted “No” on Measure B by a 3,591 to 2,328 margin.  That is 60.7% against and only 39.3% for Measure B. What are your thoughts about that outcome?”

Another question might be “Gloria, 14,341 people voted in the three Council elections on November 3^rd, and in those same three districts 15,110 people voted on Measure B … a 5% higher turnout than the Council candidates got.  What are your take-aways from those results?”

Democracy works best when citizens actively participate.  So, here is a chance for everyone to participate.