City Council Preview
By Robert Haugh
The June 6 City Council meeting has a jam-packed agenda. It’ll be like having a 100-person battle royal. It sure makes for interesting theatre. The City may as well start charging admission.
According to the City staff’s agenda report, the 49ers will be at this meeting to address several items:
Stadium Authority Board Questions
City staff provided very brief answers to questions asked at the May 23 Council meeting. There’s surprisingly little detail or analysis.
For example, the Council asked why there was an increase in public safety costs. There’s a two sentence answer that’s confusing.. It says that salaries went up. But it also says that costs could be reduced by “the use of additional Security personnel.”
Wouldn’t adding security add to costs?
Another interesting answer: the 49ers finally paid their police overtime bill on May 26 for the January 1, 2017 game against the Seahawks. It was almost six months after the game, and happened after the Council asked at the May 23 council meeting if the bill had been paid. How many other bills are late? Does the team pay interest on late bills? If not, do other businesses in the City get their late fees waived, too?
U2 Concert
We didn’t expect this discussion to linger, but in addition to breaking the curfew law by scheduling U2 to go well past 10 p.m., the noise from the concert far exceeded noise ordinances. Neighbors were not happy. It’ll be interesting to see what the Council decides to do about this.
Other Items
Tasman East Specific Plan Area Study Session
The study session will address placemaking, mobility objectives and road network design. There’s a lot of interesting information being presented. But there’s one head-scratching design issue. There’s the potential for 4,500 new residential units in the area. But the design of the Plan Area requires residents to never cross a public street to access a park.
Legal Representation
The Council will increase by as much as $100,000 fees for the Thomas Law Group to represent the City in City of Santa Clara v. City of San Jose (San Mateo County Superior Court Case No. 17-CIV-00547). It looks like the legal battles with San Jose over Santana West won’t be ending soon.
Coming Soon – New City Manager?
The deadline to file an application for the City Manager position was May 31. This will be discussed in closed session. Interim City Manager Rajeev Batra retired at the end of March but has stayed on as a consultant. The City is overdue to bring in a full-time City Manager.
Look at the budget items:
$ 216k for travel, meals and entertainment?
$ 208k for phones?
$ 2+ million for outside services?
$ 378k for supplies
$ 4 million for compensation?
Where are the DETAILED breakdown for ALL categories?!?
The Public and the City Council, Mayor, City Manager and all Senior staff should have seen this ages ago.
How many years into this are we and we’re still getting the garbage from the Levi’s ManCo/StadCo branch of the SF 49ers?
This is INSANE!
Plus what is the breakdown between NFL and Non-NFL events and how is the mix different?
Is this 50/50 split fair to the Stadium Authority or is the costs being unfairly burdened onto the Stadium Authority?
Ohhhh Robert … You have missed a whole pile of other 49er issues that need answers too!
Like … And, this is just a few …
Revisit Stadium Curfew … Why is any City Staff, worth a plug nickel, asking for a meeting about noise curfew? Do they work for the 49ers too? Or what part of “NO” do *they* not get?
U2 Concert … Let’s see, someone owes VTA $61,000. Curfew was *blantantly* violated and done specifically after they were specifically told NO, curfew is 10pm!
Expenses … What is Santa Clara? Their cash machine? And the public doesn’t get to see what they spend our money on? The 49ers are involved with a “Public Stadium” … That means full-disclosure. If you don’t want to show the information, you don’t have to. But, the you pay for all of it too.
Handling the expenses can be so darn easy …
No receipts, No reimbursement.
.
Tasman East only has “Placemaking” listed and NO examples whatsoever.
Plus the absence of any real restaurants, retail on Calle De Sol and Calle De Luna.
Much less any specificity of parks, etc.
If a curfew is good enough for Mt View and Saratoga, why isn’t it good enough for Santa Clara?
The plug should have been pulled.
IF not, make the find at least $30k/minute!
That’s what it is in Tampa, Florida.